Paper training a not-so-great Dane

Yeah. That guy.

I apologize if that last post confused you. I was in the midst of slapping down a Danish ham who had accused me of plagiarism and lying. As you can imagine, blog-post decorum was the last thing on my mind.

The whole thing started when Peter Ravn Rasmussen--a pompous ass who publicly declared, "I know almost everything. Truly."--took issue with a post I wrote about the "74 school shootings" myth that was winding its way through the Internet.

Unable to refute my point, he instead took issue with my use of the word "randomly," suggesting that rather than "randomly" selecting the examples I used to make my case, I had actually copied them from a Glen Beck article on the same topic. The only problem was no such Glen Beck article existed. It seems Peter R. Rasmussen, "Super Genius," simply made the whole thing up.

Now, as most of you know, I like a good argument. And I am (generally) willing to admit when I'm wrong. But I don't cotton to being called a plagiarist and a liar so--after giving him fair warning--I unleashed a bit of American diplomacy on his highly educated...self.

In retrospect, it was probably not a good use of my time to lock horns with a guy who has a webpage dedicated to his college report card. (Apparently, his mother's refrigerator door wasn't recognition enough.) But when you get called a liar by the type of guy who posts this on the web, well, you just gotta take a stand.

"[O]ver the past few years, I have been studying history at Copenhagen University, in Denmark. During that time, my grades have been unfailingly high, and I have managed to achieve a BA with one of the highest grade averages in university history. Obviously, this presents me with a unique chance to brag - and to be perfectly frank, I am incapable of resisting the temptation."

The following is the exchange between me and the current Dane of my existence. I apologize in advance for the earthy language.

June 11 at 6:55pm 

Peter Ravn Rasmussen: Want to do the math on the probability that you would "randomly" select precisely the same incidents that Glenn Beck seized on?

June 11 at 7:26pm 

John Doyle: I'd love to let you all carry on without interruption, but I do need to straighten out one commenter. Peter, I haven't even seen Beck's piece, so you'll have to save your polemics for some other angle of attack on my post. To the extent that I started my investigation with Fresno because I lived there once, I plead guilty. The rest were selected as randomly as I could manage (what with my ACME List Randomizer still in the shop and all) -- so while truly not random, they certainly weren't selected to suit an agenda. That is all. Carry on.

June 11 at 7:35pm 

Peter Ravn Rasmussen 0.0000000000013919687 That's quite an achievement. Sure you're not psychic?

June 11 at 7:39pm 

Peter Ravn Rasmussen: Seriously, dude, can you give me next week's lotto numbers?

June 11 at 7:42pm 

John Doyle: As of this moment I haven't seen his post. Send me a link. And generally speaking, I can only be polite about being called a liar for just ... so ... long, as anyone who knows me well will attest. Tread lightly, chum.

June 11 at 7:50pm 

John Doyle: Hey Pete, I can't even find a Beck post about the shooting. You've called me a liar twice, now I (and the class) want to see the "evidence." Cough it up.

June 11 at 11:39pm

John Doyle: Hey, Peter Ravn Rasmussen. Still waiting on the Glenn Beck link. Step to it, man! Lives are at stake.

June 12 at 1:13am 

Peter Ravn Rasmussen: I do have to sleep and work some time, you know, John -- and being in a different time zone means I do that at my convenience, not yours. Sitting here over my morning coffee, I can't presently find the Glenn Beck list I referenced (I don't go making bookmarks of his ravings, as you well know). So, if it comes down to that, I have no link to reference (mostly because my google-fu can't find it right now -- but if I do, I will link it later).

But let's just for the sake of argument take the Blaze article referenced above, and consider it. Your list, which you call random, coincides in 5 of its 10 "not a 'school shooting' because reasons" instances with the Blaze list of 31 incidents. So what's the probability of that, assuming you did what you claim, and just drew ten random numbers? 0.01054773662 About 100 to 1.

If that's random, John, it's a highly improbable outcome. Now, if you'd just started out by saying, "I've looked at the list, and there are some cases that strike me as problematic", you would have been on perfectly sound ground -- you might even have gotten me to agree that some of them should have been avoided. Even though the 74 listed incidents were selected by a quite transparent methodology, that doesn't mean the method could not have been refined to be more convincing, by leaving out some of the cases. I'd have been the first to admit that. But you had to go and poke my math-brain by claiming that your list was "random". Not the smartest move.

June 12 at 9:23 am

John Doyle: Peter Ravn Rasmussen, I'm going to "unfriend" you now. But before I do I want to you to know that if you had pulled this stunt within 200 miles of me--calling me a liar and then blaming ME when you couldn't back up your slander--I would have taken the time to track you down to discuss this face to face. Adios, mother fucker. 

Pardon the interruption, dear readers. I need this space to correct the record.

o   

Peter Ravn Rasmussen Want to do the math on the probability that you would "randomly" select precisely the same incidents that Glenn Beck seized on?

June 11 at 6:55pm · Like · 2

o   

John Doyle I'd love to let you all carry on without interruption, but I do need to straighten out one commenter. Peter, I haven't even seen Beck's piece, so you'll have to save your polemics for some other angle of attack on my post. To the extent that I started my investigation with Fresno because I lived there once, I plead guilty. The rest were selected as randomly as I could manage (what with my ACME List Randomizer still in the shop and all) -- so while truly not random, they certainly weren't selected to suit an agenda. That is all. Carry on.

June 11 at 7:26pm · Like

o   

Peter Ravn Rasmussen 0.0000000000013919687

That's quite an achievement. Sure you're not psychic?

June 11 at 7:35pm · Like

o   

Peter Ravn Rasmussen Seriously, dude, can you give me next week's lotto numbers?

June 11 at 7:39pm · Like

o   

John Doyle As of this moment I haven't seen his post. Send me a link. And generally speaking, I can only be polite about being called a liar for just ... so ... long, as anynoe who knows me well will attest. Tread lightly, chum.

June 11 at 7:42pm · Like

o   

John Doyle Hey Pete, I can't even find a Beck post about the shooting. You've called me a liar twice, now I (and the class) want to see the "evidence." Cough it up.

June 11 at 7:50pm · Like

o     

o   

John Doyle Hey, Peter Ravn Rasmussen. Still waiting on the Glenn Beck link. Step to it, man! Lives are at stake.

June 11 at 11:39pm · Unlike · 4

o   

Peter Ravn Rasmussen I do have to sleep and work some time, you know,John -- and being in a different time zone means I do that at my convenience, not yours. Sitting here over my morning coffee, I can't presently find the Glenn Beck list I referenced (I don't go making bo...See More

Sitting here over my morning coffee, I can't presently find the Glenn Beck list I referenced (I don't go making bookmarks of his ravings, as you well know). So, if it comes down to that, I have no link to reference (mostly because my google-fu can't find it right now -- but if I do, I will link it later).

But let's just for the sake of argument take the Blaze article referenced above, and consider it.

Your list, which you call random, coincides in 5 of its 10 "not a 'school shooting' because reasons" instances with the Blaze list of 31 incidents. So what's the probability of that, assuming you did what you claim, and just drew ten random numbers?

0.01054773662

About 100 to 1.

If that's random, John, it's a highly improbable outcome.

Now, if you'd just started out by saying, "I've looked at the list, and there are some cases that strike me as problematic", you would have been on perfectly sound ground -- you might even have gotten me to agree that some of them should have been avoided. Even though the 74 listed incidents were selected by a quite transparent methodology, that doesn't mean the method could not have been refined to be more convincing, by leaving out some of the cases. I'd have been the first to admit that.

But you had to go and poke my math-brain by claiming that your list was "random". Not the smartest move.

June 12 at 1:13am · Like

June 12 at 1:13am · Like

o   

John Doyle Peter Ravn Rasmussen, I'm going to "unfriend" you now. But before I do I want to you to know that if you had pulled this stunt within 200 miles of me--calling me a liar and then blaming ME when you couldn't back up your slander--I would have taken the time to track you down to discuss this face to face. Adios, mother fucker. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AjlicBcvw-o

June 12 at 9:23am · Edited · Like · Remove Preview

The Surreal with the Fringe on Top -- Why you need to doubt almost everything you see, hear, or read on the Internet

"The curtains are made out of fish bladders.
That dashboard--dried skin from a dead cow.
And that fringe atop us? Caterpillar spit?
Ain't she a beauty?"

In one of the opening numbers of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s musical, Oklahoma!, Curly tries to persuade Laurey to go to the box social with him by promising to take her there “in the slickest gig ya ever seen” – the surrey with the fringe on top.

It’s a sweet ride. The wheels are yella, the upholstery’s brown, the dashboard’s genuine leather, with isinglass curtains you can roll right down, in case there’s a change in the weather.

When I first heard about isinglass curtains during rehearsal for our high school’s rendition of Oklahoma!, I pictured an exotic, delicate roll-able crystal sheet. Turns out isinglass curtains are actually made from the dried swim bladders of fish like sturgeon or cod. Not as romantic, of course, but certainly nothing to fear.

Until now. Fish bladders are all over the news this week, striking fear into the hearts of beer drinkers everywhere. Why? Well, according to food blogger, Vani Hari, some beer brands “are trying to slowly poison us with cheap and harmful ingredients,” like fish bladders.

It’s great hype, resulting in breathless headlines and countless morning TV show appearances for Food Babe Vani Hari (who will show you how to avoid being poisoned by your food for a mere $17.99 a month).

The trouble is her claim about fish bladders in beer is alarmingly overblown … a fish story, if you will … and patently absurd.

Humans have been clarifying beer and wine with isinglass for centuries. They are among a group of substances known as “finings”—which includes egg whites, blood, milk and Irish moss for you vegetarians—that are used to remove organic compounds like yeast, sulfides, and proteins from beer to improve the clarity or to affect the taste and aroma of the final product. During the process, all these scary finings settle to the bottom of the cask and disposed of.

But you wouldn’t know it from the headlines that demand to know: “What’s in your beer? Fish bladder and anti-freeze ingredient?,” “What’s in that beer you’re drinking? Are brewers hiding something?,” and Vani’s own eyebrow-raiser: The Shocking Ingredients In Beer.

Vani certainly has a right to make bank by hyping imaginary dangers to a gullible public, and the media has a right to attract eyeballs with sensational headlines. But if you’re at all interested in learning the facts on any given issue, you owe it to yourself to dig just a little deeper before taking your place among the chorus of the easily misinformed.

Turns out I was right after all ... if you can trust that Tea Party propaganda organ CNN

Is it a "Happy" dance or "Gloating" dance?
Not sure. But I sure like dancing. 

Yesterday, when I argued that Everytown for Gun Safety did serious damage to their cause by overstating the number of school shootings with their "74 school shootings since Newtown" campaign, I enraged a lot of people for having the audacity to present evidence that rocked their tidy little belief construct. 

Although the aim of my post was to highlight the dangers of overstating the facts in any PR campaign, I was vilified as a liar on the issue of gun violence. It got so personal, that I actually "unfriended" a Facebook acquaintance, something I have done only once before--and that was to distance myself from a nut job who posted racists rants about President Obama. 

Well, it turns out that I was right after all. CNN just ran a story in which they claimed the actual number of shootings represented on the “74 shootings” list is closer to 15. 

“CNN determined that 15 of the incidents Everytown included were situations similar to the violence in Oregon -- a minor or adult actively shooting inside or near a school. … Some of the other incidents on Everytown's list included personal arguments, accidents and alleged gang activities and drug deals.”

Now, some of you may think that I am highlighting the CNN story so I can gloat about being right. And you'd be ... absolutely correct.

But I am also posting the story because the lesson here is an important one: If you've got a compelling story with incredible, stunning facts--15 school shootings since Newtown--don't screw it up by exaggerating. You're standing there with a 1,500 pound marlin. Don't wreck the moment by telling us about the one that got away.  

Gunsmoke and Mirrors: Have there really been 74 school shooting since Newtown?

"Sure, Jimmy, technically it's not a
gun. But we'd still better get the
Hell outta here before they
add us to the list."

I randomly selected and investigated 10 of the alleged "74 school shootings since Newtown"--a claim that has been lighting up the Internet like tracer rounds. I came up with one shooting that actually fits the description of what we think of when we hear "school shooting"--a middle school student shot two other students in school on a school day. Here are the other nine incidents:
20. Two custodians shot by third custodian late at night.
23. Five-year-old brings loaded gun to school in his backpack and it discharges.
27.  A 19-year-old man kills himself in a high school parking lot on a Saturday.
28. Two teenagers get shot outside of their school after a fight broke out. Police say it was part of an ongoing dispute.
33. A football player is shot on a high school campus on a Sunday, presumably by someone from a rival team that they had had an altercation with.
37. Four gangbangers try to rob a teacher in a classroom at 7:00 p.m.
49. A high school girl is shot in the butt by a gang member she is acquainted with while standing in a school parking lot after a basketball game. She is refusing to cooperate.
54. A guy kills another man in his car parked in a school parking lot.
55. After a group of students is accosted by a gang outside an off-campus restaurant at 2:45 a.m., someone fired at the dorm building they lived in.
I don't fault people trying to draw attention to the issue of guns in schools. But generally speaking, you're not doing your cause any favors when you so obviously overstate the problem.