The Weirdest Conspiracy Theory of All Time
We ran binary logistic regressions across the variables. The results are interesting but the most dramatic was saved dealers v. donations by candidate and/or party.
This puzzled us. Why would there be an significant noticeable (we have rightly been called out for using significant here) and highly positive correlation between dealer survival and Clinton donors? Granted, that P-Value (0.125) isn’t enough to reject the null hypothesis at 95% confidence intervals (our null hypothesis being that the effect is due to random chance), but a 12.5% chance of a Type I error in rejecting a null hypothesis (false rejection of a true hypothesis) is at least eyebrow raising. Most statistians would not call this a “find” as 95% confidence intervals are the gold standard for this sort of work. Nevertheless, it seems clear that something is going on here. Specifically, the somewhat low probability that the Clinton data showing higher survivability of Clinton donors could result just from pure chance. But why not better significance with any of the other variables? Why this stand out?
via Zero Hedge: I Am Marla’s Observations On Artificial Selection In Chrysler Dealerships.
I thought this was a joke when I first heard of it, but apparently it’s circulating as a serious theory, and gaining momentum.
It seems that there has been a lot of grumbling surrounding the closure of certain car dealerships in the the Chrysler wind-down. The company didn’t want to shut down some 25% of its dealerships, but the President’s Automotive Task Force insisted. And once the shutdowns commenced, rumors began to circulate that there were more forced closures of dealerships who contributed heavily to Republican candidates last year than dealerships who gave to Obama or Hillary Clinton.
Picking up on this, Zero Hedge — the very interesting site that gave us lots of very intriguing data on Goldman Sachs in recent months, even prompting a response from the company — put out an analysis of the closures and found a very strong correlation between dealerships that were saved, and dealerships that donated heavily to Hillary Clinton last year. Why should that matter? Because Obama’s guy in the Auto Task Force is Steven Rattner, hedge fund star, big pal to Times owner Pinch Sulzberger, former bigwig at Lazard Freres, and former journalist himself. And Rattner is married to Maureen White, who was once Hillary’s National Finance Chairman. So the theory here is that White and Rattner got together and made a Santa-Claus style list of “good” dealers and “bad” dealers.
I don’t know. It sounds sort of like bullshit to me. The notion that someone would bother to kneecap a bunch of Chysler dealers seems pretty absurd. Hell, if you want to punish a Chrysler dealer, it seems to me that the best thing to do is force him to keep trying to sell Chryslers. But you can expect to hear some more about this in the future… I’ve seen this three times already, now all that needs to happen is a Tweet on the subject from Kim Kardashian or something. Stay tuned.
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[...] via Matt Taibbi – Taibblog – The Weirdest Conspiracy Theory of All Time – True/Slant. [...]
correlation = causation. duh.
Let’s see.
The most heavily Democratic districts are in cities. The weakest car dealerships are in urban areas. That’s enough to null this hypothesis for me.
Nate Silver has a pretty thorough takedown of this ridiculous theory at fivethirtyeight.com. The gist: according to FEC records, an overwhelming majority of car dealers are Republican donors. Therefore, it’s not surprising that a lot of the dealers being closed were, too.
Nate also specifically addresses this “analysis” in a later post for what it is: Inside any large data set you can usually find a subset of that data that will confirm your hypothesis. Without being overly technical he does a good of explaining why Zero Hedge is full of shit. (I’m using “full of shit” as a technical term instead of the less artful but much more colorful term Stupid Motherfucker.)
I forgot to add that is nice to see that four months into a new Democratic administration we have the return of the Clenis. Ah, good times, eh?
In response to another comment. See in context »You know, sometimes politics is so sneaky and dirty in its simplicity. They know something like this would be uber-scrutinized and that the normally logical people would say absurd this is.
And yet … elephant dealerships closed by the donkeys in charge. Sometimes the simplicity of a conspiracy really IS the truth of the conspiracy. No hooha here, folks. It’s sad, but funny, and it’s politics.
Also, remember Twain: ” … lies, damn lies, and statistics.”
And sometimes statistics are the truth, the damned truth, and haha to the suckers who think the statstics are damned lies.
Any chance of you coming to speak at Emerson College? I tried contacting you through Rolling Stone & the old Smirking Chimp, but no dice.
We could really use a respectable journalist who isn’t wishy washy or stuck doing stories on five hot tips to cool down in summer!
[Tip #3; make sure to bring SUN BLOCK!]
My theory is that if a conspiracy theory requires a bunch of people acting intelligently and quietly, it’s false. If it involves people following their worse natures by using their political connections, it’s likelier.
Kim Kardashian tweets? Who knew? ;p
Isn’t this the conspiracy theory that Michelle Malkkkin thought up?
O/T but Friedman’s got a new column, and I’ve already identified the fun part. Speaking of Obama’s Middle East approach, Friedman writes:
“Rather, he sees it as part of his broader diplomatic approach that says: If you go right into peoples’ living rooms, don’t be afraid to hold up a mirror to everything they are doing, but also engage them in a way that says ‘I know and respect who you are.’
God knows that’s what I do when I go into people’s living rooms. I usually just pull the mirror off the wall from over the mantlepiece and then while following them around holding it, I make sure and say “I know and respect who you are”.
Or at least I did, I’m not invited into people’s houses much anymore, oddly.
They had a piece about this on Olbermann’s show. Now, this is Olbermann, so we do need to think about it for ourselves a bit, but he says that something, and i’m doing this from a poor memory, 90% of car dealers are republican, or, have given to Republican candidates. I think that if you look at it this way, the percentage of closing Republican dealers matches the percentage of Republican dealers in general.
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