Sean Hannity, Two-Year-Old

Sometimes you just have to see something to believe it.

Here is a transcript of his recent "interview" (and I put that in quotes intentionally--this is about as far from an interview as you can get) of Democratic Representative Joe Sestak of Pennsylvania. Hannity complains about the "9,000 earmarks" in the economic stimulus package, and then this happens:

HANNITY: Explain that to me. You're a Democrat. Help me out.
SESTAK: Absolutely. Sean, first off, you try to name me one -- one in the recovery bill of an earmark. Now, with a --
HANNITY: Got it.
SESTAK: -- 9,000 earmarks in this omnibus --
HANNITY: I got it.
SESTAK: -- bill -- just one moment.
HANNITY: Answer.
SESTAK: There were -- OK. If --
HANNITY: One.
SESTAK: -- you could, just answer this: Is -- there's 9,000 --
HANNITY: The salt harvest marsh mouse that gets $30 million. The railway from Los Angeles to Las Vegas: that is a pork project. That is reckless spending.
SESTAK: Sean, that -- those words are absolutely not in the bill, and you know it.
HANNITY: What --
SESTAK: You may be reading them off --
HANNITY: -- the stimulus --
SESTAK: -- the Internet, but those words are not in the bill.
HANNITY: Yeah, of course, because you hide it. But we know where the money's going. It's just like, for example, all-terrain --
SESTAK: Now, Sean, those words --
HANNITY: I'll give you another one.
SESTAK: Sean, if I could.
HANNITY: All-terrain vehicles --
SESTAK: Now, wait a minute, Sean, you're reading off an Internet type of thing.
HANNITY: I'm actually reading the bill.
SESTAK: You've got to read the actual bill, and I've read every word.
HANNITY: You know --
SESTAK: Now let's talk about the 9,000 earmarks.
HANNITY: Wait a minute. Wait a minute. You know and I know that Nancy Pelosi's district, that these marshlands to help save the mouse, that's where that money's going. This railway for Harry Reid, these all-terrain vehicle trails, they're in the bill, Congressman. We're spending $1.3 trillion of our kids' money. Why?
SESTAK: Sean, I just don't want to mislead the public. Those words are not in the bill. Number two: We're --
HANNITY: But the money is earmarked for it.
SESTAK: No, there are not, Sean. Number two --
HANNITY: You sound like Bill Clinton.
SESTAK: No, I'm just telling you what the facts are, 'cause I've read every word of the bill.
HANNITY: "I did not have sex with that woman." They -- that is where the money is going, Congressman. Be straight with the American people.

As comedian Demetri Martin says, it's almost as good to be loud as it is to be right.

Seriously, Sean, why do you even bother having guests? What is the point? You ask questions and then shout over the answers, repeating the same assertions over and over again (repeating things doesn't make them true, by the way, no matter how many times you do it).

Here are some simple tips for Sean:

1. When you ask a question, consider listening to the answer.

2. After listening to the answer, then you can respond. It's kind of a three-step process: you ask, he answers, you respond. This is called "interaction."

3. When you do respond, consider responding to what actually he said rather than just repeating stuff you already said.

4. Try to avoid calling the person you're talking to a liar unless you have some actual facts to back that up (which, you'll note, you didn't).

I learned this stuff when I was maybe three years old. Where does that leave Sean? (Hint: see the post title.)

A Tale of Two Editors

In the previous entry, we noted that the University of Illinois' Polar Research Group (misidentified as the Arctic Climate Research Center) said this in regard to its data being abused by George Will in his latest mondo-bizarro "global cooling" column:

It is disturbing that the Washington Post would publish such information without first checking the facts.

It sure is. And this has not passed without notice.

Post ombudsman Andy Alexander and Washington Post Writers Group editorial director Alan Shearer have reportedly responded, sort of, by saying that the Post has a "multi-layered" editing process and arguing, incredibly, that maybe Will wasn't all that wrong. Or that it's possible with a little digging and some creative thinking to come up with a scenario under which Will's statements aren't blatantly false. Or that somebody, somewhere, agrees with him. Or something.

Here's Shearer:

We have plenty of references that support what George wrote, and we have others that dispute that. So we didn't have enough to send in a correction.

Right.

I can find "plenty of references" supporting the hoaxed Moon landing theory, too. Can Will write a "Moon Landings: Fake!" column for the Post and get it printed? What about a column that gets its support from the good folks at the Flat Earth Society?. Exactly how false does a "fact" have to be before the Post op-ed staff will refuse to print it? (Of course, the hollow Earth people hotly dispute the claims of the Flat Earth Society, but that's another story--maybe Will could use both of them in one column.)

No, the Post's responses are excuses, pure and simple. Any objective, halfway-competent fact checker would have seen massive problems with Will's column in a few minutes. And it wouldn't matter what the checker's take on global warming is, because everything in the column fell into one of three categories: irrelevant, misleading, or, in our most popular category, just plain wrong.

Now, I've been a Post subscriber for three decades. It has always been a good paper; at times it has been a great paper. But, multi-layered editing or no, this is a sorry excuse for journalism. If this kind of blatant dishonesty is permitted, how can we take anything in the Post op-ed pages seriously?

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A little comparison is instructive. Back in January, a newspaper printed a column in which the author wrote about a dilemma: the husband of a friend had been jailed for molesting a young girl. The man professed his innocence, and the columnist seemed sympathetic.

The problem is, the column was both misleading and factually inaccurate, with the result that the ambiguity of the man's guilt was greatly overstated. So the following subsequently appeared in the pages of the same paper:

The author [of the column] was writing about the dilemma she felt when a friend's husband was sent to jail for molesting a young girl, despite his protestations of innocence. In the end, she discovered that even though she wanted to believe her friend's husband, she couldn't quite do it.

The column had factual errors, and editors in the Magazine, including me, failed to catch them. The author wrote that the man had been talked into accepting a plea agreement, and implied that there had been only one accuser. In fact, the man had turned down the plea offer, and had been tried and convicted. Also, more than one girl made accusations. The inescapable conclusion is that the man's guilt was not as ambiguous as presented. .... Today, I want to apologize for our errors ....

Now that is a correction. That is an editor who takes responsibility for what he prints. And who is this? Why, it's Tom Shroder, editor of the Washington Posts's Sunday magazine. (Read the full correction here--it even includes a letter from the victim's grandmother, reprinted in full.)

Good for you, Tom. It's a shame that the op-ed editors don't have the same kind of guts.

Where There's a Will, There's No Way

George Will writes the most appalling drivel in his latest Washington Post column ("Dark Green Doomsayers", February 15, 2009). Here's a summary:

1. Scientists in the 1970s widely predicted severe global cooling.


2. The University of Illinois says that global sea ice levels now equal those of 1979.


3. The UN says that "there has been no recorded global warming for more than a decade".


4. Paul Ehrlich lost a 1980 bet that the prices of certain commodities would increase by 1990.


5. Ergo, there is no global warming.

The first three items are just plain wrong, and the fourth merits a resounding "Huh?". This seems to make his conclusion rather dubious. How's about we look at each of these.

1: Scientists in the 1970s were predicting global cooling

No, they weren't.

The quotes Will uses to buttress this assertion are generally from news and popular media. He doesn't bother to look at the scientific papers of the era because, if he had, it would have ruined his thesis. Among other things, he would have found this comprehensive study of peer-reviewed climate-related scientific articles from 1965 to 1979 (summarized nicely in USA Today). Of the 71 papers reviewed, fewer than 10% predicted global cooling, while over 60% predicted global warming (about 30% made no prediction).

Where he does quote scientific sources, he's less than candid about context or accuracy. Here's an example: he quotes a 1976 article in Science as predicting "extensive Northern Hemisphere glaciation". And Science did indeed predict that--but not in the way that George wants you to think. He quotes the prediction itself, but he doesn't bother with any of the fruity topping. Here's the bit he left out:

Having presented evidence that major changes in past climate were associated with variations in the geometry of the earth's orbit, we should be able to predict the trend of future climate. Such forecasts must be qualified in two ways. First, they apply only to the natural component of future climatic trends - and not to anthropogenic effects such as those due to the burning of fossil fuels. Second, they describe only the long-term trends, because they are linked to orbital variations with periods of 20,000 years and longer. Climatic oscillations at higher frequencies are not predicted. [Emphasis added]

George, this prediction doesn't take human activity into account. It's a very general forecast for the next 20,000 years in the absence of human activity.

There was no scientific consensus for global cooling in the 1970s; in fact, scientists were already tending, although not with today's near-unanimity, in the opposite direction.

Item 1 is wrong.

2: The University of Illinois says that global sea ice levels now equal those of 1979

No, it doesn't.

In fact, University of Illinois Arctic Climate Research Center immediately repudiated Will's statement:

In an opinion piece by George Will published on February 15, 2009 in the Washington Post, George Will states "According to the University of Illinois' Arctic Climate Research Center, global sea ice levels now equal those of 1979."

We do not know where George Will is getting his information, but our data shows that on February 15, 1979, global sea ice area was 16.79 million sq. km and on February 15, 2009, global sea ice area was 15.45 million sq. km. Therefore, global sea ice levels are 1.34 million sq. km less in February 2009 than in February 1979. This decrease in sea ice area is roughly equal to the area of Texas, California, and Oklahoma combined.

It is disturbing that the Washington Post would publish such information without first checking the facts.

Plain enough? The very source that Will cites says, "We do not know where George Will is getting his information....".

Item 2 is wrong.

3: The UN says that "there has been no recorded global warming for more than a decade"

No, it doesn't.

Will references the UN World Meteorological Organization (WMO) but appears to be quoting a badly written BBC News article.

Here's the deal: In early 2008, the WMO noted that 2008 was likely to be cooler than 1998. Why? Because 2008 was going to be a La Niña year, while 1998 was an extreme El Niño year. La Niña has a cooling effect, while El Niño has a warming effect. Now, anyone who was old enough in 1997-1998 will remember the extraordinary weather of that period. Along with everything else, it was damned hot--hot enough that almost everyone who tracks these things ranks it as the warmest or second warmest year ever.

So, it's not surprising that 2008 would be cooler than 1998, and the WMO said so. But here's how the BBC News article phrases that:

This would mean that temperatures have not risen globally since 1998 when El Nino warmed the world.

Uh, no, it wouldn't mean that at all. It only means that the specific year 2008 would probably be cooler than the specific year 1998 due to La Niña/El Niño effects. This has nothing to do with global warming, and it is unequivocally wrong for Will to quote the WMO as having said anything even remotely like "there has been no recorded global warming for more than a decade." [Update: See Hume-an Error for more detail on why you can't do this.]

In fact, the WMO says this in the next paragraph of the same article that Will is quoting:

"When you look at climate change you should not look at any particular year," [WMO secretary-general Michel Jarraud] said. "You should look at trends over a pretty long period and the trend of temperature globally is still very much indicative of warming.

"La Nina is part of what we call 'variability'. There has always been and there will always be cooler and warmer years, but what is important for climate change is that the trend is up; the climate on average is warming even if there is a temporary cooling because of La Nina."

So when Will says that

[A]ccording to the U.N. World Meteorological Organization, there has been no recorded global warming for more than a decade....

what the WMO actually says is that

[T]he trend of temperature globally is still very much indicative of warming....

Item 3 is wrong.

4: Paul Ehrlich lost a 1980 bet that the prices of certain commodities would increase by 1990.

Wow, this one is true. But I'm still trying to figure out how it's relevant. The fact that an individual scientist made a foolish bet thirty years ago and lost is supposed to somehow prove that the understanding of climate change that is now accepted by 97% of climatologists is wrong? Seriously?

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Now, Will's column is an op-ed piece. He's entitled to his opinion (however wrong-headed it may be). But here's the thing: it doesn't matter what your view of climate change is--these "facts" are simply wrong. Opinion is opinion. Facts is facts. If your facts are wrong, your opinion is of no value.

It gets worse: not only is the column wrong on facts, it is fundamentally dishonest. Will had to know that everything he wrote was wrong (well, except for the part that's irrelevant). If he read enough of the BBC News article to find the WMO "statement" he used, then he had to have also read the WMO's refutation of that point--it's the next paragraph. Furthermore, Will was taken to task on the 1970s global cooling myth (and much more) when he wrote the same thing at least three times before.

George Will is a professional writer with a professional research staff. He is paid top dollar to write these pieces. It is inconceivable to me that he was unaware of the factual inaccuracy of this column. If he was, then he is grossly incompetent and shouldn't be writing for a top newspaper like the Post. If he wasn't, then he is lying.

I do not see a third alternative.

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Update: We now know for a fact that Will was previously apprised of his misuse of a Science News article--but the current column misuses the same quote in the same way. Journalist and science writer John Fleck reveals in the Albuquerque Journal that he sent a copy of the complete article to Will in 2008:

When George Will last wrote about this subject, in May 2008, I sent him a copy of the 1975 Science News article, hoping he might get a fuller picture of what was going on at the time. I got a nice note back from him thanking me for sharing it. It doesn't seem as if he read it, which would have been nicer.

Troubling Mentions of SEAN HANNITY in Fake Criminal Complaint

Here's Sean Hannity discussing the criminal complaint against Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich:

The word president-elect is mentioned 44 times in the document. Pretty troubling.

Oh, really? Did you read it, Sean? Or did you just ask someone who can read to count them for you? Did he note that not one of those "mentions" alleges or even hints at any wrongdoing on Obama's part?

In fact, every one of the "mentions" is similar to this one:

Intercepted phone calls demonstrate that ROD BLAGOJEVICH ... [has] engaged in efforts to obtain personal gain ... through the corrupt use of [his] authority to fill the vacant United States Senate Seat previously held by the President-elect.

So, the "mention" is a reference to the "Senate Seat previously held by the President-elect." Pretty damning stuff, Sean.

Just for fun, let's make up a fake (and totally unprofessional) criminal complaint. Here goes.

1. Defendant ADAMS suggested, during a telephone conversation with defendant BAKER, that Fox News personality SEAN HANNITY might be interested in their murder-for-hire scheme.

2. Defendant BAKER responded that SEAN HANNITY was a "stand-up guy" who would never become involved in "anything like this".

3. Defendant ADAMS agreed that SEAN HANNITY was "a real American" and a "fine human being" but nevetheless convinced defendant BAKER to establish contact with SEAN HANNITY.

4. Defendant BAKER subsequently called SEAN HANNITY, who expressed shock and disbelief and immediately hung up.

5. SEAN HANNITY subsequently called the Federal Bureau of Investigation and agreed to cooperate in all respects with an investigation.

6. SEAN HANNITY, in utter disregard of his personal safety, agreed to a meeting with defendants ADAMS and BAKER, to which meeting SEAN HANNITY wore a recording device.

7. SEAN HANNITY subsequently delivered the recorded tapes to the FBI by special courier at SEAN HANNITY'S own expense.

8. The FBI arrested defendants ADAMS and BAKER and credited SEAN HANNITY with the apprehension, stating that "SEAN HANNITY is the kind of American we need more of."

Uh-oh. SEAN HANNITY is mentioned eleven times in the complaint. And it's way shorter than the Blagojevich complaint.

Pretty troubling.

The Lost Moment

As an American liberal—and I'm proud to use the word even though the conservatives have managed to turn it into a slur—the Republicans I could vote for have been few and far between. John McCain was one of them.

While I certainly did not agree with all of his positions, McCain appeared to be committed to doing what he felt was right and honorable, the political fallout within his own party be damned. As the Republican party moved further and further rightward, and determined to oppose the Democrats on any issue, regardless of logic or consequences, McCain stood out. He worked with Democrats and opposed most of his party on campaign finance reform, normalization of relations with Vietnam, environmental and energy issues, patients' rights, and immigration. He voted against some of the Bush tax cuts. He excoriated Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell as "agents of intolerance" and denounced "the politics of slander and division."

Oh Johnny, I hardly know ye.

Because he knew it was the only way to gain the 2008 nomination, McCain has moved relentlessly to the right since the 2004 election. He cozied up to those agents of intolerance, delivering the 2006 commencement address at Falwell's Liberty University. He came out against his own immigration reform bill. In a stunning reversal of his repeatedly stated position on torture, he voted against a ban on "enhanced interrogation techniques," some of which he himself endured in Vietnam. He gave up his opposition to Bush-style tax cuts and now proposes even larger cuts in the face of unprecedented budget deficits and economic upheaval.

Many had hoped that all this simply reflected what he had to do in order to gain enough support within the Republican base to gain the nomination, and that, once the nomination was secured, he would move back to the center. He would drop the mask and turn back into John McCain. But this has not happened. He has given up none of his new positions, and his campaign has been marked by the very sort of duplicitous and underhanded tactics that the Bush organization used to defeat him in 2000, the same "politics of slander and division" that he once denounced.

In recent days it has turned downright scary. Inflamed by Sarah Palin's thinly-veiled "He's not like us" theme, enraged audiences at McCain events have gotten out of control. The crowds, increasingly composed of the most vicious, least tolerant, least informed among us, are hurling insults and even threats at Barack Obama. We hear shouts of "traitor," "treason," "terrorist," even "off with his head" and "kill him"; but the candidates, McCain and Palin, say nothing.

We haven't heard "nigger" yet, but how far off can that be?

At a Wisconsin rally last Friday, a woman said something to which McCain finally reacted.

Woman: I don't trust Obama. I've read about him. He's an Arab.

McCain: No ma'am. He's a decent family man, a citizen that I just happen to have disagreements with on fundamental issues and that's what this campaign is all about.

Now, I don't claim to know his thoughts. Maybe he'd just had enough, and his innate sense of honor and integrity required him to say something. Or maybe he felt that he had no choice but to respond because this time it wasn't just an anonymous shout from the crowd but instead was addressed directly to him, on camera. I don't know.

But, whatever his motivation was, here was a moment. It was an instant in time when at least partial redemption was possible. It was a moment when he could have shaken everything off, like a dog shaking water off its back, and become the man that we know he can be. He could have said something like this:

No ma'am. No. That is not right. Barack Obama is not an Arab. And by the way, Arabs are not our enemies. The overwhelming majority of Arabs—and Muslims everywhere—are friendly and peaceful men and women who pray to the same God you do. Our enemies are a tiny minority, religious extremists.

Barack Obama is not an Arab. He is not a Muslim. He is not a terrorist. He does not hate America. He is not your enemy; he is as patriotic as I am. He is a good and decent man who has the best interests of all Americans at heart. Barack Obama and I disagree on some issues—but we agree on many more. Your choice should be based on those issues where we disagree and on nothing else.

My friends, I have let this campaign get away from me. I truly believe that I would make the better President, but in my great desire to win this election and lead this country forward I have foolishly accepted some very bad advice. I should have known better. You have seen in my own campaign the very tactics that have been used against me in the past, and I know from my own experience how wrong they are. And in allowing my campaign to run this way I have pandered to extremists and lost the very people I most needed to win the election—the huge majority of reasonable, moderate Americans.

It stops here, my friends. It stops right now. From this moment on, my campaign will focus on the issues, and only on the issues. We will not distort the positions of my opponent, but we will highlight our differences and let you be the judge. We will be truthful about my own positions—and I will be telling you what I really think and plan, not what my campaign advisors tell me to say. It may not be what you some of you want to hear. So be it. But my campaign will be fair, honorable, and truthful, and that is something I can live with, whatever the results might be. I cannot do otherwise any longer.

Maybe if life were scripted by the writers of The West Wing, he would have said that. He certainly could have said more than he did. But he didn't.

It probably would have been too late to save his campaign, but at least he would have been able to sleep at night.

How To Win a Debate Without Really Trying

I'm seeing a lot of stuff like this from CNN:

[S]ince Biden was supposed to destroy Palin, and didn't even come close, this was a good night for the Republican.

As P.G. Wodehouse once wrote, "what frightful horse-radish."

Most of the talking heads now annoint debate winners not in terms of who actually performed better, but who performed above or below expectations. In this case, Sarah Palin didn't accidentally set the podium on fire as expected, so she won.

OK, here's my plan: I'm going to challenge Michael Phelps to a 100-meter butterfly. But first, I must tell you that I'm a terrible swimmer. I'm not sure I could finish a 100-meter race. There, now your expectations for my winning are pretty low, right? So, when I do eventually crawl out of the pool, you'll be surprised that I failed to drown.

Which will make me the winner. All I need to do is perform better than expected.

PS to Sarah: in a debate, you're really not supposed to say "I may not answer the questions...." It's a debate, the point of which is, well, that you answer the questions.

Where Do You Want to Go Today?

Southwest Airlines's cruise search. Going nowhere is certainly a money saver.