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Software Spots Spin In Political Speeches
T.S. Ackerman writes "According to an article in NewScientist Tech, there is now software that can identify the amount of spin in a politician or candidate's speech. From the article, 'Blink and you would have missed it. The expression of disgust on former US president Bill Clinton's face during his speech to the Democratic National Convention as he says "Obama" lasts for just a fraction of a second. But to Paul Ekman it was glaringly obvious. "Given that he probably feels jilted that his wife Hillary didn't get the nomination, I would have to say that the entire speech was actually given very gracefully," says Ekman, who has studied people's facial expressions and how they relate to what they are thinking for over 40 years.' The article goes on to analyze the amount of spin in each of the candidates running for president, and the results are that Obama spins the most."
Gladwell is the Barack Obama of the writing world.
That IS a bad analogy.
Have you heard him give a one-on-one interview? He uses more verbal pauses (uh, um, etc.) than anyone I have ever heard. Granted, he is excellent when working a crowd, and the tone of his voice is catchy.
Help fight poverty: Punch a poor person.
Spin isn't lying so much as it is making something look good for you whether or not they really are. Good spin doesn't lie.
Example: Katrina was a disaster. Someone wanting to blame FEMA spins the story so FEMA is the bad guy. Someone else can tell the same story (same facts) and make the mayor of N.O. the bad guy. No one is lying so much as they are carefully ignoring certain facts and emphasizing others.
Help fight poverty: Punch a poor person.
http://skillicorn.wordpress.com/
check out this entry:
http://skillicorn.wordpress.com/2008/09/05/comparing-the-democratic-and-republican-convention-spin/
As usual, high spin is indicated by the red end of the line. Here are the spin scores for all of the speeches analyzed (positive numbers are high spin):
1. Bush 0.40
2. Thompson 1.71
3. Lieberman -0.73
4. Romney 4.36
5. Huckabee -1.8
6. Giuliani 2.97
7. Palin -0.62
8. McCain -7.38
9. M. Obama -1.24
10. Hillary Clinton 2.43
11. Bill Clinton 0.99
12. Biden -1.35
13. Obama 0.31
seems like a bit of discrepancy with what's reported in the article.
Yeah, because McCain's still doing that 'straight shooter' nonsense.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/politico/20080913/pl_politico/13412
Oh... wait... he found it wasn't working so now he's a cut-throat asshole just like the rest of them who will lie at the drop of a hat?
Of course you'll read this and say "Well he's keeping things even" and frankly I don't give a damn anymore, I'm tired of it all and no one changes anyone elses opinion, vote for whoever you want... just don't get your facts backwards
Beware of he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart, he dreams himself your master.
The algorithm counts usage of first person nouns - "I" tends to indicate less spin than "we", for example. It also searches out phrases that offer qualifications or clarifications of more general statements, since speeches that contain few such amendments tend to be high on spin. Finally, increased rates of action verbs such as "go" and "going", and negatively charged words, such as "hate" and "enemy", also indicate greater levels of spin. Skillicorn had his software tackle a database of 150 speeches from politicians involved in the 2008 US election race (see diagram).
Anyone here who believes that there is more to spin than using certain words? I understand that analyzing semantics is more difficult than just using "cut", "grep" and "wc" on a candidates speech text, but that's just pathetic. Seems a typical case of measuring something that's easy to measure, than claiming that was what you were looking for from the start.
How about:
I'd add Martin Luther King, but I guess from your post that you probably think he was a one sided evil despot too. Believe me, if you think Barack Obama is one-sided, your knowledge of politics and history is zero. By European standards, he is a moderate right-winger.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
If you're concerned about the relationship between the experience of a president and how history sees him, plug what Obama's numbers will be at the time he's sworn in into this convenient chart: http://www.electoral-vote.com/evp2008/Info/experience.html
Those numbers would be about 3 years in the US Senate and 6 years in the state Senate. In particular, pay attention to Abraham Lincoln's numbers on that chart.
By the way, look at the details of your straight shooter's plan to fix the market crash. Oh, wait, there isn't one, unless you count his longstanding position of not regulating the market.
Well, then, let's look at the details of his plan to provide tax relief. Oh, wait, it provides about half as much relief to the middle class worker as Obama's plan. And, by the way, trickle-down economics clearly don't work.
OK, let's look at his plan to solve America's energy problems. Every expert I've heard on the topic says offshore drilling will have insignificant effects on the price of oil. Of course, I'm sure it will be great for American oil companies...
Facial Micro expression analysis is a science that long predate this years political campaign, and indeed predate the Bush administration. If you don't believe me, ask your friendly neighborhood spy hunter about it. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microexpression) I work with the intelligence community, and believe you me, it's a BIG deal, and it's not poppycock.
Speak for yourself.
Federalist 23 (Hamilton):
Defective as the present Confederation has been proved to be, this principle appears to have been fully recognized by the framers of it; though they have not made proper or adequate provision for its exercise. Congress have an unlimited discretion to make requisitions of men and money; to govern the army and navy; to direct their operations. As their requisitions are made constitutionally binding upon the States, who are in fact under the most solemn obligations to furnish the supplies required of them, the intention evidently was that the United States should command whatever resources were by them judged requisite to the ``common defense and general welfare.'' It was presumed that a sense of their true interests, and a regard to the dictates of good faith, would be found sufficient pledges for the punctual performance of the duty of the members to the federal head.
Federalist 41 (Madison):
A system of government, meant for duration, ought to contemplate these revolutions, and be able to accommodate itself to them. Some, who have not denied the necessity of the power of taxation, have grounded a very fierce attack against the Constitution, on the language in which it is defined. It has been urged and echoed, that the power ``to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises, to pay the debts, and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States,'' amounts to an unlimited commission to exercise every power which may be alleged to be necessary for the common defense or general welfare. No stronger proof could be given of the distress under which these writers labor for objections, than their stooping to such a misconstruction. Had no other enumeration or definition of the powers of the Congress been found in the Constitution, than the general expressions just cited, the authors of the objection might have had some color for it; though it would have been difficult to find a reason for so awkward a form of describing an authority to legislate in all possible cases. A power to destroy the freedom of the press, the trial by jury, or even to regulate the course of descents, or the forms of conveyances, must be very singularly expressed by the terms ``to raise money for the general welfare. ''But what color can the objection have, when a specification of the objects alluded to by these general terms immediately follows, and is not even separated by a longer pause than a semicolon? If the different parts of the same instrument ought to be so expounded, as to give meaning to every part which will bear it, shall one part of the same sentence be excluded altogether from a share in the meaning; and shall the more doubtful and indefinite terms be retained in their full extent, and the clear and precise expressions be denied any signification whatsoever? For what purpose could the enumeration of particular powers be inserted, if these and all others were meant to be included in the preceding general power? Nothing is more natural nor common than first to use a general phrase, and then to explain and qualify it by a recital of particulars. But the idea of an enumeration of particulars which neither explain nor qualify the general meaning, and can have no other effect than to confound and mislead, is an absurdity, which, as we are reduced to the dilemma of charging either on the authors of the objection or on the authors of the Constitution, we must take the liberty of supposing, had not its origin with the latter. The objection here is the more extraordinary, as it appears that the language used by the convention is a copy from the articles of Confederation. The objects of the Union among the States, as described in article third, are ``their common defense, security of their liberties, and mutual and general welfare. '' The terms of article eighth are still more identical: ``All charges of war
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