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You are here: Home / Politics / Vive La Difference

Vive La Difference

by Tim F|  October 24, 20063:21 pm| 29 Comments

This post is in: Politics, War

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How often do you find an issue so cut and dried that the very worst from party A ranks better than the very best from party B? Unless you count the vote for majority leader, never. Yet when the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America tallied a grade based on more than three hundred Congressional votes over five years, that is exactly what happened. Guess which party came out ahead.

***Update***

Okay, that was just the Senate. As with all other things the House comes out a bit murkier, but the trend more than holds up overall.

As for the inevitable criticisms, bring them to my attention and I will air ’em.

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Reader Interactions

29Comments

  1. 1.

    capelza

    October 24, 2006 at 3:26 pm

    Wow…I wasn’t expecting it to be THAT cut and dried…

    But. but…the Liebrals don’t support the troops!

  2. 2.

    David

    October 24, 2006 at 3:27 pm

    When I see a ranking of legislators that places all members of one party above all members of another party, I don’t think “wow, that’s cut-and-dried.” I think “wow, they really massaged that data.” I’d love to be proven wrong if I can find their exact criteria, but this looks about as unbiased as a Focus on the Family “morality ranking.”

  3. 3.

    Tim F.

    October 24, 2006 at 3:31 pm

    I’m not sure that the IAVA considers itself a particularly partisan outfit, or a single-party mouthpiece like Dobson’s org. But if anybody can make credible charges of massaging the data then I’m all ears.

  4. 4.

    Perry Como

    October 24, 2006 at 3:31 pm

    Here’s the criteria:

    http://capwiz.com/iava/keyvotes.xc/?lvl=C

  5. 5.

    Andrew

    October 24, 2006 at 3:39 pm

    When I see a ranking of legislators that places all members of one party above all members of another party, I don’t think “wow, that’s cut-and-dried.” I think “wow, they really massaged that data.” I’d love to be proven wrong if I can find their exact criteria, but this looks about as unbiased as a Focus on the Family “morality ranking.”

    It took a total of THREE clicks, including the first link in the blog post, and about 15 seconds to find the complete criteria.

    So, the question is not the criteria; the question is: why are you are willing to write out a 50 word complaint casting aspersions on the ratings but are so lazy that you can’t be bothered to click a few times?

  6. 6.

    David

    October 24, 2006 at 3:49 pm

    Because I am, in fact, lazy. And because I didn’t think to look under “issues” for it instead of “Congressional Ratings.” Thanks. When I’ve got time, I’ll look at the text of at least some of the bills, amendments and procedural votes they used. I stand by the reaction that an independent study saying that any Democrat is better than all Republicans is suspicious.

  7. 7.

    The Other Steve

    October 24, 2006 at 3:56 pm

    Any independent study saying that any Republican is better than any Democrat should be accepted unquestionably.

    But I can’t say the same for any study that says Democrats are better than Republicans.

    Just trying to be fair and moderate here…

  8. 8.

    ThymeZone

    October 24, 2006 at 3:57 pm

    So, F is best and A is worst?

    I don’t get it.

  9. 9.

    Pelikan

    October 24, 2006 at 3:59 pm

    While you raise a good point about lopsided surveys, I’d say your suspicion is outweighed by the fact that any MAMMAL is better than all republicans these days.

  10. 10.

    David

    October 24, 2006 at 3:59 pm

    Sorry about that phrasing. I’d react the same way to a study claiming that any Republican is better than all Democrats (I did use FotF for the example of a rigged “ranking” system). I’m not trying to troll here. I just don’t like the idea of crowing over news that gives me a kneejerk reaction along the lines of “yeah, sure.”

  11. 11.

    Pooh

    October 24, 2006 at 4:01 pm

    I think David mnakes a valid point – I would check the criteria to be sure before citing this report, if only so that I have some factiness in my bag when someone predictably starts asking why these veterans hate America.

    In fact, I’ll do that just now…

  12. 12.

    ThymeZone

    October 24, 2006 at 4:07 pm

    These are reasonable questions when dealing with people who apparently will believe anything:

    “Is there going to be peace? Is there going to the end of any violence? Of course not. This violence is going to go on for a long time,” Hadley said. “But what you hope for is a situation where Iraqi governmental institutions and Iraqi security forces can manage and contain the violence so that it does not threaten the integrity of the Iraqi state and the ability of the Iraqi state to bring prosperity and economic life to its community.”

    Do you see? You just have to manage and contain the violence.

    Along the same lines as “Mister Clean will clean your whole house, and everything that’s in in it.”

    Why bother with silly details, if you can just get the jingles right?

  13. 13.

    neil

    October 24, 2006 at 4:11 pm

    They didn’t skew the rankings in the way I would have imagined they would, anyway (by including lots of amendment votes which failed on party line votes). They claim they rated _every vote_ on a bill relating to veterans’ issues.

    Really, I think that rankings like this are an inevitable consequence of one party with a unified Senate majority that has the power to force unpopular bills.

  14. 14.

    neil

    October 24, 2006 at 4:13 pm

    Also, every vote which included money for veterans in _any way_ made it onto their recommended list, from what I can see. This is probably the bulk of the votes, percentage-wise, that the rankings are based on. It doesn’t violate any preconceived notions, I think, that Democrats would do a lot better than Republicans on this score.

  15. 15.

    neil

    October 24, 2006 at 4:15 pm

    If they were really liberal scum, though, my Santa Cruz representative wouldn’t have lost points for voting against H. Res. 861, “to declare that the United States will prevail in the Global War on Terror, the struggle to protect freedom from the terrorist adversary.”

  16. 16.

    Punchy

    October 24, 2006 at 4:20 pm

    Those damn vets, obviously trying to sell a few books.

  17. 17.

    neil

    October 24, 2006 at 4:21 pm

    Really, contra David, the level of polarization in Congress is such that you’d probably have to massage the data to get _any_ scale where one party didn’t tend to gather at each end of the scale.

  18. 18.

    Perry Como

    October 24, 2006 at 4:24 pm

    I wonder if George Soros funds the IAVA?

  19. 19.

    neil

    October 24, 2006 at 4:24 pm

    Also, being a cut-and-running pacifist doesn’t save you, as poor Ron Paul demonstrates.

  20. 20.

    neil

    October 24, 2006 at 4:41 pm

    I found some Democrats who did worse than some Republicans!

    Don Young (R-AK) loves the pork, he got a C+
    Jerry Lewis (R-CA> also loves the pork and got a C
    Dennis Kucinich hates our veterans and only got a C-
    Katherine Harris (R-FL) must have been copying Kooch’s answers, she got a C- too
    Cynthia McKinney (D-GA) can’t please anybody, she got a D+

  21. 21.

    Pooh

    October 24, 2006 at 5:53 pm

    Really, contra David, the level of polarization in Congress is such that you’d probably have to massage the data to get any scale where one party didn’t tend to gather at each end of the scale.

    Gather yes, the extreme polarity where all dems are better than all reps is fishy though. I’m not saying it’s wrong, I’m saying it’s startling enough to demand further inquiry…

  22. 22.

    neil

    October 24, 2006 at 10:29 pm

    You don’t need to ‘demand further inquiry,’ their web site contains every bit of methodology used to calculate the ratings, just like every other advocacy group’s Congressional ratings.

    On the other hand, if you don’t actually want to find out anything more and you just want to cast aspersions on the group, then please try to be a little more honest in the future.

  23. 23.

    p.lukasiak

    October 24, 2006 at 10:36 pm

    I think David mnakes a valid point – I would check the criteria to be sure before citing this report, if only so that I have some factiness in my bag when someone predictably starts asking why these veterans hate America.

    The actual “point” is that David decided to cast aspersions on a veterans group, rather than accomplish the EXTREMELY simple task of finding out what the criteria was.

    I was as skeptical of the results as anyone, which is why I went looking for the criteria — and, despite David’s protests, it was quite easy to find.

    That being said, there should be one caveat added… the group supported all efforts to spend money on veterans, regardless of the wisdom of those expenditures. The GOP was trying to keep the Bush budget deficits from exploding, and doing it (in part) on the backs of veterans. Democrats felt free to vote for these measures regardless of he budgetary consequences knowing that they wouldn’t pass. The Democrats could act “irresponsibly” by voting for bills that were overly generous to veterans and get a “good guy” grade with no budgetary consequences attached … while acting “responsibly”, GOPers got a “bad guy” grade.

    That being said, the overwhelming differences between the parties is significant….

  24. 24.

    Andrew

    October 24, 2006 at 11:18 pm

    I only take issue with your caveat:

    the group supported all efforts to spend money on veterans, regardless of the wisdom of those expenditures.

    In the case of underpaid troops at war, dealing with contractors who earn many times their salary, losing limbs, suffering traumatic brain injury, and pressed into serving past any reasonable expectation, they deserve over-the-top, wasteful, prolifigate, and absurd levels of spending more than any other group in America.

    If I had to go cutting the budget, they are the last place I’d look. Gold plated toilet seats for returning vets? How many do you want?

    I know you’re not necessarily saying that we need to be tight with veterans budgets, but we’re still spending more on the Ag Dept than Veterans Affairs.

  25. 25.

    Pooh

    October 24, 2006 at 11:29 pm

    At risk of playing Althouse here, I think you all need to check your reading comprehension – David is not ‘casting aspersions’ – he’s saying the results are suspicious (and as to the ease in ‘checking methodology, most of the bills listed mean nothing to me, so who am I to say that each one is ‘graded’ appropriately? Not try to make an appeal from ignorance here…) I don’t think he or I is saying that the conclusions are wrong, just that the uniformity of results is odd…

    As to the larger point of the report, DUH, like we all haven’t been saying the same thing for 2+ years…

  26. 26.

    Jess

    October 25, 2006 at 12:49 am

    Wow–that is really interesting. Gee, I wonder if it will appear on the front page of any major newspapers? (made you giggle, didn’t I?)

  27. 27.

    jcricket

    October 25, 2006 at 10:02 am

    This really isn’t that much a surprise.

    The GOP talks about supporting the troops, but it’s just talk. The troops don’t matter, except as a “tool” to use against the Democrats or to get the Democrats to also vote in favor of some other tax cut or oversight elimination bill.

    Writ large you can see this when the GOP claims to represent the majority viewpoint, yet every single poll shows the American public on the side of Democrats and solidly in favor of the way Democrats vote on issues (war, torture, wiretapping, oversight, spending, the economy, abortion).

    What’s shocking to me is that people keep believing the GOP rhetoric, not looking at the actual voting records. To be fair to Dave, if I were not already a Democrat, I’d say “this can’t be true” (like he did). But that’s the problem the GOP faces, the deeper you look into what they have done or “who they are”, the worse it looks for them.

  28. 28.

    jcricket

    October 25, 2006 at 10:04 am

    Sorry, I should add that the troops are also little “game pieces on the Risk board” for the neocons. That’s about how much they’ve thought they’ve put into the troops when committing them to their various ill-conceived military adventures.

  29. 29.

    Bender

    October 25, 2006 at 3:31 pm

    IAVA? The group who spoke at Yearly Kos?

    Yeah.

    They’re totally impartial.

    (/naivety)

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