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Edward Tufte Appointed To Help Track and Explain Stimulus Funds
President Obama recently announced several appointments to the Recovery Independent Advisory Panel, including data visualization expert Edward Tufte, author of The Visual Display of Quantitative Information. The purpose of the panel is to advise the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board, whose aim is "To promote accountability by coordinating and conducting oversight of Recovery funds to prevent fraud, waste, and abuse and to foster transparency on Recovery spending by providing the public with accurate, user-friendly information." Tufte said on his website, "I'm doing this because I like accountability and transparency, and I believe in public service. And it is the complete opposite of everything else I do. Maybe I'll learn something. The practical consequence is that I will probably go to Washington several days each month, in addition to whatever homework and phone meetings are necessary."
will that count as fraud, waste, or just business-as-usual?
(for more info see http://investigativereportingworkshop.org/investigations/wind-energy-funds-going-overseas/)
just take one of the most famous graphs from his book, and reproduce it:
relabel the ....
That's not scary. Try retitling it from "Napoleons invasion of Russia" to "Bushes invasion of Iraq". That sounds possible enough to be terrifying.
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
What's the big stink about ACORN anyhow? Are conservatives genuinely outraged that two people in an organization of over 400,000 members know what money laundering is?
As far as I see it, Democrats are peeved that Obama's been spending a lot of time and resources to appease conservatives and moderate democrats (he has), which has come directly at the expense of the democratic "base" (much tougher to prove). I honestly can't think of another president in recent history who has given so many concessions to the minority party and his political opponents.
Appointing a respected statistician like Tufte is a great strategy, and sends the message that "I have nothing to hide." I'd love to see Nate Silver directly involved with the administration as well...
-- If you try to fail and succeed, which have you done? - Uli's moose
Quite simply, he will be helpful because when he puts together a report, there will be one or two incredibly informative graphs that explain where the money went and how that money changed things.
What color is he going to use for "stuffed in underpants", which is the method Clinton's groupies used to spirit away a lot of stuff. I think brown would be a good color.
Who would win this election: Andrew Weiner vs Andrew Weiner's weiner.
Erm, Simon Heffer is a conservative mouthpiece not a beacon of public opinion.