Radio red and blue

How polarized is the American electorate? According to Fiorina et al’s “ Culture War? The Myth of a Polarized America ” not very. Fiorina et al. do a wonderful job of laying out the claim that it is the elites that are polarized, not the electorate. So how ideologically different is a Republican rur’l Texan from an urban Democratic New Yawker? Here I plot the mean ideology (measured on a -1 to 1 scale with -1 being extremely liberal and 1 extremely conservative) ... more

In the New York Times last week, Michael Powell looked at the value of endorsements in presidential nominations and came up with little: “A majority of endorsements are political popcorn, signifying nothing.� This misses the big picture. Marty Cohen , David Karol , Hans Noel , and John Zaller have just finished a new work on the role of political parties in the nominations process, which is forthcoming from Chicago University Press. Hans presented an overview of the book at GW l... more

I love dogs, and my “frivolity”-category posts will probably reflect that fact. Here, for starters, is an irresistible (at least to me) up-close-and-personal photo of my late brother and sister-in-law’s beautiful boxer, Frida, who is now the housemate of my niece Kathi. Frida (named for Frida Kahlo because of the dark circles around her eyes) was bred for show but became a house pet after she was diagnosed as having a heart murmur that turned out to be a false ... more

Recent days have brought a shower of media attention to the long-term economic cost of the war in Iraq. This sent me back to my stereotypically yellowed course notes and materials, to an article by James L. Clayton, titled “Vietnam: The 200 Year Mortgage,” which appeared in The Nation on May 26, 1969 — an old article, to be sure, but one from which much can still be learned. According to Clayton, the pattern of long-term costs associated with American wars indicates that &... more