I can’t figure out how to link to comments properly on the Atlantic, but if you scroll through to the second batch of comments on this post, you will see that I have completely lost my mind. I am going out for a drink. I shouldn’t blog while I am grading, I know.
I have reposted the comments below. They were too big for a screen shot.
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DougJBalloonHow about putting a strike through the 0.1% at least?
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McMeganYou’re not factoring in growth. The correct equation is not 20 * $11tt, which is what my interlocutor–and I presume, you–are doing. That’s not even right by some weird arguable metric; it’s just wrong unless you presume that GDP is actually going to shrink farther and then stay there until 2023. I was using the CBO’s standard growth rate of 3%, which I freely predict was in error for the past few years, because I didn’t see this huge crash coming, but no way of knowing how big an error until 20203. However, not an order of magnitude as you claim. At the peak of spending, the cost of Iraq was maybe 1% of GDP, and spending has now fallen sharply; how could you think that it was going to be that high over a 20-year period, when we are supposed to have withdrawn for half of it?You wrote this in 2003. Let’s estimate the 2003 GDP as 11 trillion, let’s estimate 4 percent growth (that’s on the high side but I am a very generous person). Then over 20 years, the total DGP would be 327 trillion dollars. That estimate is probably on the high side, by the way.
You wrote “But it is not going to run us several trillion dollars (though even if it did, that would work out to less than 0.1% of GDP over the next 20 years.)”
Let’s take “several trillion”. I would say that several means at least 3 and probably 4. I’m not talking about how much the actual Iraq War costs — though that would be a pretty good estimate in fact — I am talking about your use of the phrase “several trillion”.
If I take 3 trillion and divide by 327 trillion, I get slightly less than 1%. If I take 4 trillion (really the kindest interpretation of “several trillion” I can think of) and divide by 327 trillion, I get over 1%.
You meant 1%, not 0.1%. Are you really so quantitatively inept that you cannot see this, even after I brought it up again? Are you really so nuts that you’re going to bs me about rates of GDP growth and not just divide 3 by 300?
God help us all.
Reader Interactions
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JCT
Whoa — that is awe-inspiring stupid there. I think some institution of higher learning needs to revoke McMegan’s degree.
As Barbie said “Math is Hard!”
soonergrunt
Does pink Himalayan salt have anything in it that causes structural trauma to the cognitive or ethical centers of the brain?
Cause that might explain her.
Stillwater
She has her facts, you got yours. Asymmetrical information!!
jwb
The “God help us all” is priceless.
sukabi
don’t really give a shit about someone who’s wrong about everything… but I’d think she’d at least proofread her comments rebutting other comments… this was particularly funny:
but no way of knowing how big an error until 20203. and by then no one will be around to prove how big a twit she really was.
Warren Terra
I just clicked through; two points on navigation:
(1) The place after the commenter’s name where it gives a rough time of commenting (“one hour ago”) is a permalink. This is the permalink for your comment thread.
(2) I initially thought your thread had been censored (I couldn’t find “Doug” on the page”) until I clicked the button at the bottom saying “load more comments”.
ETA: PS but for some reason when I use that permalink I highlighted none of the responses show up? Wha? They are still there if I start from the main post itself, but don’t show up if you link directly to the comment. And here I thought I was being so helpful and clever, but am nonetheless defeated by Bad Software.
Nutella
No wonder she’s off by a factor of 10. She’s even got the year as 20203!
The Grand Panjandrum
To link to a particular comment you click next to the person’s handle where it says “Six hours ago” (or whatever time it posted) and it will give you a permalink.
I have no comment on her lackluster arithmetical skills. Sigh.
Radon Chong
But McMegan is the Business and Economics editor for the eventtheliberal Atlantic Monthly! No way could she be wrong about something like this. DougJ, you need to apologize for the way you’ve basically ignored her work product and treated her so badly. For shame!
MikeJ
Can you edit out some of the miles of whitespace?
Cat Lady
You’ve got her in a defensive crouch DougJ, and she’s even trying to throw Cole under the bus on her reply to you just now.
joe from Lowell
Megan’s reply:
Dude, it’s dividing 3 by 300! You can’t look at this and see your problem?
Lady, wtf?
Warren Terra
She has now replied to the thread, which I will reproduce for anyone interested:
If anyone can see there how she can explain away an apparent simple arithmetic error (other than “a spreadsheet might have done it, but that’s unpossible!”), please let me know. But at least she’s preparing for a possible retraction, if she finds the time.
General Stuck
Buck up Dougj, no mortal man can withstand the cold hard reasoning of McCardle, nor escape the infallible logic of her steel trap mind. My head exploded, when she explained how veterinary bills increased in linear juxtaposition with rising healthcare costs over decades, that proved in no way related were these costs to the 30 million humans with no health care other than emergency rooms. It blew my mind, and the fact that veterinary bills likely went up because there were more humans, over time, with more pets, could not save me. It did not compute to dispel this collective truth. Macmeghan wins, always. No matter.
John S.
Oh man, she’s going full metal McMegan on DougJ.
Hell hath no fury like a libertarian scorned.
Zuzu's Petals
Kee-rist on a broomstick, I’m tempter to register just to comment on this stupidity:
Does she not even realize that we will be paying for health care, disability, and other long-term costs LONG, LONG after we have withdrawn from Iraq? Does she not consider the loss to the economy of the contributions of those disabled workers, or the infrastructure, education, or other investments that could have been made over the years?
The $3 Trillion War
Good God, what an idiot.
taylormattd
@Warren Terra: Holy Christ. It really is that she is dumb as a sack of hammers.
I thought it was largely a bunch of disingenuous propaganda. But no. Just fucking stupid.
I’m opening some wine.
Warren Terra
Note also that the main point of her post (before Doug threadjacks it) is both unremarkable and somewhat obtuse. She highlights a practice of normalization that is indeed misused to make small changes appear bigger visually – but being the delightfully entitled person she is, she chooses to make this point in the form of kicking advocates for poor people. I know I’ve seen the practice in any number of settings, and the practice could be criticized in a way that doesn’t involve knocking away Tiny Tim’s crutches.
And while the practice is misused, it isn’t always wrong. “Full emplyment” is variably defined as 3-5% unemployment, because there are always going to be people in transition, misfortune, and the lazy and the unemployable. So it wouldn’t be irredeemably crazy to show unemployment over time with the Y axis starting at 3%, or at 5%. There can be good reasons to normalize, as well as bad ones. But I guess there are always good reasons for Ms. Galt to sneer at the unfortunate.
Bella Q
I can be almost that stupid if I drink enough. Where could I get a gig like hers? Off to start getting stupid.
Zuzu's Petals
@Zuzu’s Petals:
By the way, the first sentence of my prior comment does describe “direct cost to the taxpayers,” Megan.
But ya gotta love this reply to one of Doug’s comments:
To repeat…what an idiot.
Lesley
I take it she didn’t respond to your last comment?
forked tongue
I tried scanning thru the comments to try figuring out what the hell you were talking about, but had to bail when my eyes lit upon the bright spark who was claiming birthers have nothing on the paranoid conspiracy nuts on the left who go around arguing that “we” (I’m pretty sure he meant the Bush administration) used 9/11 as a pretext for invading Iraq.
“You lose, liberals!” was his triumphant cry.
jwb
@John S.: And this is why it takes a lunatic to refute a moronic argument.
robin502
“[A] practice of normalization that is indeed misused to make small changes appear bigger visually” I don’t get it here, and I didn’t get it there… This was not a small change! A +1.3% year-on-year change when the mean absolute change was 0.433! Even in a short time-series that is striking, given the small standard deviation: 2002 through 2008: Mean=28.1857, St.Dev.=0.4562, St.Err.=0.1724, 99%C.I. = [27.669,28.703].
Mike B
Check her out on bankruptcy rates. She shows a chart showing that the rates by which bankruptcies are increasing going down, and titles her post on it “Bankruptcies Falling Again”.
Astounding. She should buy a pet that can tap its paws to do math for her.
dmsilev
@joe from Lowell: Oh my. “The computer said that was the answer, so it has to be right.”. That excuse will earn you at least a one grade penalty on a freshman physics lab assignment, never mind an actual argument in the actual real world.
dms
Southern Beale
I guess this post involves math.
I was told there would not be math. Apparently McMurgle was told the same thing.
matoko_chan
First culture intellectuals cannot do math or science.
alwhite
I used to argue with my cat. She used to shit on the floor in front of the litter box. I patiently explained how this was wrong and why she should not do that. She would look at me dumbly and meow. I would provide examples of proper cat pooping and hygiene. She would look at me stupidly and meow.
It occurs to me that I was much more likely to make that cat a smarter shiter than you have of correcting the dumb ass at Atlantic.
Jules
All I know is pointing me to McMegan made me read the post about the $6800 stereo cables on Amazon which led to much LOLing over the review section for said cables on Amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/AudioQuest-K2-terminated-speaker-cable/dp/B000J36XR2/ref=cm_cr_pr_product_top
Almost as funny as the reviews for the Three Wolf Tshirt….
hypusine
That’s the tell, right there. She’s wrong and she knows it.
Warren Terra
@Jules:
Please note that (1) you do save 20% ($1600!) on the lsit price for those cables; and (2) you can get a “refurbished” set for $4999.99. I want to hear about that refurbishing process.
P.S. To be fair to McBargle, she was not endorsing the cables, she was laughing at the reviews. I feared she might be endorsing them; anyone who raves over Organic Locally Sourced Pink Himalayan Sea Salt might be expected to go nuts over any pompous middlebrow product.
ETA Apparently there’s only one in stock (and one “Refurbished” set, as well). Act fast!
Fwiffo
My AP calculus teacher called this CCDS – chronic calculator dependency syndrome. If you can’t tell that 3ish out of 300-something isn’t going to be anything like 0.1%, then you probably aren’t qualified to even operate a calculator.
Jules
@Warren Terra:
Think of all the things you could buy with the $1600 you will save…it is like FREE money in your pocket.
J.W. Hamner
@Warren Terra:
Is it really too much to ask for people to read the Y-axis? And the numbers posted above the bars. All the information is there, so I don’t see what’s misleading about it. If she wants to say that the increase in working poor isn’t significant… which is what I presume she wants to do… she should actually do that. Range limiting the y-axis so that people can see the change relative to the mean is not a liberal plot to give young black bucks access to pink Himalayan salt… and it’s not a controversial practice and should not trip anybody up who is even marginally mathematically or statistically literate. Which is probably where our problems come in.
Delia
@Warren Terra:
It should be noted that the refurbished cables available for $4999.99 carry a $6.49 shipping fee. The seller also notes that the dust cover is missing and there are scratches on the front. So you get what you pay for.
El Cid
@Jules:
How about these? A pair of speaker wires, starting at the bargain price of $33,000.
Any other peasant speaker wire would fail to give the pure audio experience you are seeking.
Don’t forget a high quality power cord for your ultimate home entertainment electronics, which you can have for a starting price of only $1,475.
Who would allow lower class power cords to deliver their dirty electricity to your cherished components?
This Balloon-Juice comment section is not worthy of Transparent Cable’s description of why these cost-effective elite products deliver an exclusive sound experience.
As far as more accessible brands, the justifiably beloved Denon used to make available a “Denon Link” Cat5e / ethernet cable which used to be their standard way to hook one of their receivers to a CD or DVD player with a much higher audio resolution than possible by optical or digital coax connections.
Called the AKLDL1, it was highly respected on the Amazon website where Denon sold it through in addition to their own website a few years ago.
Here are some of the reviews from satisfied customers.
DougJ
@The Grand Panjandrum:
No, that doesn’t work either, it doesn’t let you see the comments below yours.
Delia
On the other hand, those of you in the class of the newly poor who are unable to afford the $1600 in savings you get from buying these cables might want to spring for some inflatable toast, only $2.99 plus shipping. It also receives rave reviews.
FormerSwingVoter
@El Cid:
This isn’t as good as the various cables, but I like this fine product.
The reviews are great, but the customer-added pictures are what really bring it home.
Zuzu's Petals
Y’know, her original 2003 article was just a goldmine of stupid:
Not to mention laughable in retrospect:
Is there a chance in heck she’ll apologize for ANY of this?
twiffer
@Jules: thank you for that.
Sasha
@soonergrunt:
Hey! Don’t go hating on pink Himalayan salt. It’s good stuff.
Sko Hayes
Who knew that Amazon product reviews could be so funny?
I’m sitting here in my drab little cubicle, LMAO, and my coworkers are probably thinking maybe I need a few days off.
Sebastian Dangerfield
The factor-of-ten error is, of course, something of a leitmotif in McArdleland. See, e.g., The Pizza Party Fiasco (blamed on the “the calculator on my computer,” which “won’t go into the billions”).
xjmueller
@Sko Hayes:
Amazon has some wonderful reviews. my faves:
http://www.amazon.com/Tuscan-Whole-Milk-Gallon-128/dp/B00032G1S0/ref=sr_1_2?s=grocery&ie=UTF8&qid=1293036862&sr=1-2
if the link doesn’t work, check out tuscan whole milk in the grocery section at amazon.com.
JR in WV
Numerically challenged people who didn’t get basic concepts from 9th grade, and then didn’t take any more math after graduating from high school just can’t be helped to understand math over the web. Or by email.
There is no way someone so confused about simple math should be commenting professionally about economic issues! Using Excel to do what she was doing, just sad!