RK ARCHIVE - Cuccinelli TV Ad - Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics

The ad said that while Janet Oleszek has been on the Fairfax County School Board, standardized test results "have remained flat" while expenses increased.

What the ad did not say is that the test results have been among the top 5% in the nation. Remaining consistently in the top 5% is an amazing achievement. But Ken Cuccinelli portrays it as a failure.

What the ad did not say is that, as a result of the misbegotten No Child Left Behind rules, Fairfax County, with its large ESL population, is forced to include results from students who are not ready to take test in English.

What the ad did not say is that Ken Cuccinelli is part of the Republican majority in Richmond that has refused to fully fund the Fairfax County schools, so that the county has had to raise the property tax to fund the difference.

What the ad did not say is that Fairfax County Schools are doing a remarkable job, thanks to Janet Oleszek and the rest of Fairfax County School Board and the Fairfax teachers -- and in spite of the efforts of Ken Cuccinelli and some of his colleagues in Richmond and Washington DC to make that job impossible.

Comments

Mean attacks on every level (Teddy - 10/7/2007 10:20:55 PM)

including the time-honored technique of republican thugs who smash opponents signs--- go to the corner of Shirley Gate Rd and Braddock Rd south of Gairgax City. There is a little hill there covered with political signs of every stripe, including one really b-i-g Cuccinelli sign, and a big Oleszak sign which was at the top of the hill. Someone wended their way up the hill through all the signs in order to smash the Oleszak sign, and only that sign. Every other sign is intact, including, of course, the Cuccinelli sign, which now reigns supreme as the only really b-i-g sign on the hill. I wonder who would do that.

Then there's the Petersen v Devolites-Davis campaign. I live in that District, and have been receiving one (sometimes two) four color slick mailouts a day from Devolites-Davis, most of them full of either outright lies or shaded statistics and distorted "facts" intended to turn me off Chap. Since I am no longer a republican, and have by now been removed from most republican mailing lists, I can only conclude these are all-voter mailouts. What an enormous expense, day after day, to print and mail slick-paper color mailouts. This barrage is extraordinarily expensive, and one must ask: where is this money coming from, and what strings does it have attached?

Once again, republicans are substituting money and brute force for people.

Cooch doesn't get statistics... (KathyinBlacksburg - 10/9/2007 4:37:11 PM)

Really high scores one year, particularly among the top-scoring districts, will likely be followed by slightly lower scores the next.

It's called regression to the mean. And it's an aspect of probability that Cooch doesn't get. And if he can't understand statistics (and how not to mislead with them), he doesn't deserve to be returned to the Senate. Of course, he doesn't deserve the Senate for a lot of other reasons as well.