Trends in Mass Shootings

Right-wing ideologue S.E. Cupp recently challenged left-wing ideologue Michael Moore,

Mass shootings are also down... yes they are! It is true! Mass shootings are... It is fact! They are down, as is gun crime. That's a fact.... Look it up, I'm not the first person who said it.

Well, facts are important, but they're not something I find to strongly correlate with Cupp's arguments. So let's take a look. If you apply a narrow definition that excludes "things like armed robbery or gang violence", as did Mother Jones, you find an increase in casualties and that "24 of the last 62 worst mass shootings have taken place in the past seven years alone". If you apply a broad definition, Fox News found that mass shootings are holding steady.

Why the difference? Fox is looking at all mass shootings involving four or more victims — that’s the standard FBI definition. Mother Jones, by contrast, had a much more restrictive definition, excluding things like armed robbery or gang violence. They were trying to focus on spree killings that were similar in style to Virginia Tech or Aurora or Newtown. The definitions make a big difference: On Fox’s criteria, there’s no uptick. On Mother Jones’, there’s a clear increase.

Meanwhile, by either criteria, there does seem to be a surge in mass shootings in 2012. But it’s unclear whether that’s a one-year blip or not.

I would wonder what Cupp was looking at, but she seems like the type who believes that anything she says magically becomes true if she argues forcefully or claims "It's a fact!"

When Moore challenged her, specifically in relation to school shootings, Cupp added to (or is it amended) her claim,

There have been fewer mass shootings over the past thirty years. That's just a fact.

It's certainly not a fact in relation to school shootings. I have not yet found data predating 1976, but it's also not true in relation to homicides with multiple victims going back to 1976. Perhaps she's alluding to lynchings and prohibition-era violence associated with organized crime? One can only guess - but when you're addressing a relatively rare type of crime (homicide with multiple victims) such factors can easily skew the trend.

At this point, I'm comfortable concluding that Cupp was either making stuff up or was cherry-picking a source in order to present what she knows to be a distorted, fundamentally untrue statement of "fact". I'm prepared to be proved wrong. Anybody?

Babble, Indeed

In a pretty typical demonstration of how to waste space, Maureen Dowd offers her latest attempts at witty put-downs, directed principally at the President and the political left. This one caught my eye:

W.’s reign of error so enraged Democrats that they that were bound by one desire: to get rid of him. Bush, Cheney and Rove inspired the Democrats to spawn a powerful lefty tower of babble led by Rachel Maddow, Michael Moore and the blogosphere.

Wow. Tower of babble. How... original. Okay, and the "tower" is built upon three mighty legs...

1. Michael Moore, who isn't even a Democrat and doesn't appear to have a significant political following.

2. The "blogosphere" which has proved to be pretty darn powerless, as you would expect, although I suspect Dowd is kvetching because the left-wing blogosphere holds a very low opinion of her columns. (Can that be said to distinguish them from any other faction of the blogosphere?); and

3. Rachel Maddow? Why do I feel the presence of a green-eyed monster.

I don't watch Maddow's show, save for an occasional clip I find online, but it's patent from those clips that Maddow is bright, informed and engaged. If Dowd thinks it's clever to include Maddow in her "tower of babble" conceit, I would like to see her challenge Maddow to an interview on the substantive issues of the day. At the end of the interview they can poll the audience as to who spent more time babbling. I very much expect that Maddow would be game. Maybe Dowd can try to convince Maddow that she's incredibly powerful in her position, shaping the agenda of the Democratic Party's left wing - that should be good for a few chuckles. And perhaps she can explain how a faction can be "powerful" when everybody with power is intent upon ignoring it, marginalizing it, or both.

So, how about it?

He's Going After Hillary?

Walter Olson is apparently so preoccupied with Hillary Clinton that the suit against Michael Moore somehow escaped his notice.