According to a poll performed by Frank Luntz, described in the Washington Times, Ivy League professors are even more left/liberal than previously suspected. Actually, I’ll bet that there are more than 3% Republicans. The rest are simply afraid to admit it–they don’t want to be hauled before the Committee For Un-Ivy-League Activities…

[Wednesday morning update]

As can be seen in the comments section, reader and fellow blogger Paul Orwin takes issue with the poll methodology:

I didn’t want to get into it in the comment section, but actually, 150 is not a very large sample size. Sampling error is not a function of relative sample size, but of absolute sample size. If the total population is 10, then 10% of the population is not an appropriate sample (i.e. 1). The margin of error in the poll is 8%, which makes any # of their analyses dubious at best.

Well, I hadn’t looked at the poll in any detail, so I’ll take your word for it. Certainly a 3% estimate of Republicans with an 8% error is meaningless.

Additionally, look at the distribution of responses, almost entirely from the liberal arts faculty, not from the sciences. No science is even mentioned as a response, all of them left to “other”. I am referring to hard science, biology, chemistry, physics, engineering and math, not social science.

While that may be true, I find it disturbing that even when one excludes the hard sciences, that the humanities professoriate is that far over. Not surprising, but disturbing. These are the people that indoctrinate many of our kids. I do agree that if this is the case, however, the reporting should have been describing humanities departments, rather than the universities as a whole.

In any event, the pollers tilt at least as far right as the pollees tilt left. By the way, I would guess that, depending on how you define “Ivy League Faculty”, this sample could be severely misrepresentative. Are med school, law school, business school faculty excluded?? It strikes me as a case of “We know that the Ivy League is a haven for wacko liberals, so lets eliminate from consideration anyone that might be moderate to conservative, and then trumpet our results as proof of the premise.” Typical hack job.

I’m not sure what you mean by the pollers “tilting right.” The poll was done by Frank Luntz, who is an admitted Republican, but he, like all pollsters, has a reputation to protect, and I’ve never gotten the impression from listening to him or seeing him on television (e.g., MSNBC during last years campaign) that he was particularly “right wing.” I don’t think that there’s a problem with the poll so much as with the reporting of it. Certainly, it’s no secret that the WaTimes is a conservative paper.

Mike Tyson bit Lennox Lewis on the foot at a press conference today. Funny, usually, he puts his own foot in his mouth.

Any chance they’ll pull his license again over this, or does that only happen when you masticate your opponent in the ring?

Mike Tyson bit Lennox Lewis on the foot at a press conference today. Funny, usually, he puts his own foot in his mouth.

Any chance they’ll pull his license again over this, or does that only happen when you masticate your opponent in the ring?

Mike Tyson bit Lennox Lewis on the foot at a press conference today. Funny, usually, he puts his own foot in his mouth.

Any chance they’ll pull his license again over this, or does that only happen when you masticate your opponent in the ring?

Stuart Carlson at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel has a stupid cartoon about the FDNY statue.

OK, so my question is, if you’re going to rewrite history, why an African-American and a Hispanic? Where’s the Asian-American? Where’s the South-Sea Islander American? Where’s the Inuit-American? Where are the Native American iron workers who helped build the thing? Where are the Female-Americans? Where does all this nonsense end?

Over at the site of Tim Blair (Oppressor), an idiot reporter, attempting to feel Al Qaeda’s pain, is justly mocked:

“My blindfolded eyes refused to adjust to the dark void that engulfed me. I was instantly disorientated…”

Allow me to pile on with a grammar flame. Does he think that adding the redundantly-superfluous “tate” to the perfectly-good word “disoriented” makes his outrageous hyperbole sound smarter and ooohhh so much more intellectual? It doesn’t.

As my first new post after my metapost about my software changeover, I want to belatedly recommend that everyone read Megan McArdle’s disquisition on abolishing the corporate income tax.

This is a worthy cause, of which I despair. Congratulations to “Jane Galt” for taking up the cudgel, anyway.

For those few who have been wondering why my posts have been sparse and sporadic for the last few days, I’ve been engaged in a switchover from Grey Matter to Moveable Type blogging software. It has involved much gnashing of hair and pulling of teeth, but I’ve finally gotten it up and running (at least, assuming that you see this post, and the new look of the site…).

The biggest challenge was in preserving the links to my old posts in the new system, so that archived links from other weblogs will still take people to the relevant posts in the new setup. I think that I’ve succeeded, by generating 400+ referral pages… (good thing I know a little Perl–it would have been murder to do that by hand…).

Anyway, feedback on the new site look is welcome. Also, notice my expanded and reordered link list to the right.

Enjoy.

[Update: Doh! That’s to the left. I was confused ‘cuz it’s on my right from inside this computer thingy…]

[Tuesday Morning Update]

I’m informed that the site is broken in some versions of IE on the Mac. Not owning a Mac, it’ll be hard for me to test, but I’ll play with it today and try to find the problem. I’ll appreciate any feedback from Mac users as I progress.

Both Alex Knapp and David Carr use the Congo volcanic eruption to take amusing jabs at overregulation. However, it’s distressing to see that while the media is now paying attention to this natural disaster in the Congo, that even now, there has been very little noting of the fact that this benighted country has been suffering from the largest and most unreported war on the planet for several years now. And it’s not clear which disaster will ultimately ever be amenable to human intervention–magma buildup, or the equally dangerous accumulation of tribalism, corruption, and failed socialism (thank you, decolonialists!) that continues to ravage much of the African continent.

[Update on Tuesday afternoon]

David Carr informs me via email that I misread his post (to be honest I just gave it enough of a glance to see that it was about the Congo eruption, and satirical):

I just wanted to point out that it wasn’t, in fact, a dig at overregulation but rather to send up the quixotic nature of the EU.

I know it’s just a quibble but I really, really don’t want the EU escaping even one pixel’s worth of my contempt.

Well, let it never be said that I am in any way derelict in my sacred duty to avoid shielding the EU from contempt. (Parse that! I dare you!)