Dammit Politifact… For The Love Of God, Consistency?!

obenshain1129There is nothing more frustrating to an educated person to observe a group of barely-literate people pass judgment.

Politifact… that’s you.

To wit:

“We’ve been studying this for the past 20 years and we’ve got great experience and shown that this whole truth-in-sentencing movement actually works, and what the governor is doing is messing with success. Our crime rate has dropped to, what, third lowest in the country; our recidivism rate is down by 20 percent, and that’s the second lowest in the country. The governor just doesn’t need to do this.”

So speaketh State Sen. Mark Obenshain regarding Virginia’s excellent recidivism rates.

Politifact’s quibble?

In other words, Virginia’s decline in violent crime rates is consistent with national trends. The Powerpoint slide that Obenshain cites does not connect Virginia’s decrease to no-parole. To the contrary, it contains this caveat: “There are many factors involved in the national drop in crime rates over the last two decades, many of which are not unique to Virginia.”

Here’s a thought.  What was Virginia’s recidivism ranking by state 20 years ago?  What is it today?

If it’s less than 2nd place?  Well… you know, narrowing down variables and stuff.

Now of course, the good folks at Politifact will argue that they ranked Obenshain mostly true.  Why all the hot heat for a mostly true statement?  After all, it’s mostly true and mostly right, so mostly folks should have no problem with a mostly accurate ranking (mostly).

Nonsense.

It’s a true statement, not disproven by Politifact’s quibbling and narrow attempts to find any gap in the armor.  This isn’t disproving a negative; it’s proving a negative.  Do it — otherwise, raising the question is a case disproving the negative (not mostly) and a logical fallacy of the most pernicious sort.

…that is, if such things were taught in America’s public colleges and universities nowadays.

We rate Politifact as mostly irrelevant, mostly partisan, and mostly absurd.  Again.   Obenshain’s claims frankly deserve better if honest policy debate is of any value.

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