Matthew Yglesias » 37 Percent

Jan 5th, 2009 at 4:22 pm

37 Percent

Mitch McConnell says Republican senators “represent half the American population.” James Surowiecki does the math and concludes that they actually only represent 37 percent of the voters. All the more reason not to worry too much about getting 80 votes for anything.

Comments
60

60 Responses to “37 Percent”

fostert Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 4:28 pm
Yeah, but Surowieki is using regular math, not Karl Rove’s math. And we all know that Karl Rove has The Math.
right Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 4:46 pm
So I did a quick-and-dirty calculation of how many Americans the senators in each party represent, assuming that each senator represents all of the people in his or her state and that the currently open Senate seats (like Delaware, Illinois, and New York) will be filled by someone from the same party. And what you find, if you do the math, is that Republican senators actually represent about thirty-seven per cent of Americans.

This is pretty funny, but I can’t quite replicate his numbers. If you do it exactly how he describes it — “each senator represents all of the people in his or her state” — then Republicans represent about half the population (Texas, Florida, Pennsylvania, Ohio, etc. are all said to be “represented” by Republicans as they have at least 1 GOP Senator).

If you say each senator represents half the population of his or her state (i.e. Bayh represents half of Indiana, Lugar represents the other half), then I get 38% representation for Republicans–close to Surowiecki–which makes sense, given that the Republicans have 41 Senate seats.

The precise McConnell claim of “Republicans represent half the American population” is a bit closer to the first set of calculations though, intuitively, as Bayh and Lugar both represent all Indianans.
right Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 4:47 pm
Quick addendum to the above: under the first methodology, Democrats represent 75% of the American population; under the second, 62% (naturally).
JimboSlice Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 4:55 pm
Actually if you do the REAL math you come out with 50.3%.

My method (which is the same that New Yorker guy says he used)
I took all the states with atleast 1 R Senator and added up the populations.

AL 4.662
AK 0.686
AZ 6.5
FL 18.328
GA 9.685
ID 1.523
IN 6.376
IA 3.002
KS 2.802
KY 4.269
LA 4.41
ME 1.316
MS 2.938
MO 5.911
NE 1.783
NV 2.6
NH 1.315
NC 9.222
OH 11.485
OK 3.642
PA 12.448
SC 4.479
SD 0.804
TN 6.214
TX 24.326
UT 2.736
WY 0.532

TOTAL 153.994
US POP 305.986

% 0.503271392
Stephen Myles Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 4:58 pm
Since senators are elected by the state at-large, it logically follows that each and every senators is the plenipotentiary representation of his or her state.

The logic which yields the 37% follows from erroneous and inapplicable logic.
mkd Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 4:59 pm
I did my own crude math after the 2004 election and found that the Republican “majority” in the Senate only represented something like 44% of the population. I also recall a study that showed the majority of total votes cast that year were for a Democrat (combined House/Senate/President races).

Basically, throughout the years of the Permanent Republican Majority (2001-2007) the majority of Americans never did support them. Yaaaay Democracy!
Peter K. Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 5:05 pm
Actually if you do the REAL math you come out with 50.3%.

My method (which is the same that New Yorker guy says he used)
I took all the states with atleast 1 R Senator and added up the populations.

… (lots of numbers)

BUT OBAMA IS THE DECIDER AND HE HAS A LOT OF POLITICAL CAPITAL TO SPEND SO THERE.

Oi, Surowiecki used the term “neo-Hooverites”! The House GOP nutjobs who rebelled against Bush on the bank bailout are Know-Nothings, they don’t even know who Hoover was.
JimboSlice Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 5:10 pm
BUT OBAMA IS THE DECIDER AND HE HAS A LOT OF POLITICAL CAPITAL TO SPEND SO THERE.

That may be the case, but that does not excuse someone from messing up the facts. As I said I used the New Yorker guys methodology:

So I did a quick-and-dirty calculation of how many Americans the senators in each party represent, assuming that each senator represents all of the people in his or her state and that the currently open Senate seats (like Delaware, Illinois, and New York) will be filled by someone from the same party.

And doing that came up with EXACTLY the # that Mitch stated. Now one could argue that is not the proper way to determine political capital and whose voice should be heard. But, the fact remains that James Surowiecki either lied about his methodology, lied about his results, or is incompetent.
mkd Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 5:13 pm
Jimbo,

Please apply the same counting standard to the Democratic Caucus and see what percentage you get. Share your results with the class.

Thanks

(Was it a much bigger number than 50.3%? Yeah, I thought so.)
JimboSlice Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 5:24 pm
mkd: I get 75.285%.
Rob Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 5:26 pm
Jimbo-since each person is represented by three individuals you can’t just use overall population to get a % that makes sense.
mkd Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 5:32 pm
Wow, by McConnell’s logic the Democrats should be granted a filibuster proof majority!
jack lecou Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 5:33 pm
This is pretty funny, but I can’t quite replicate his numbers. If you do it exactly how he describes it — “each senator represents all of the people in his or her state” — then Republicans represent about half the population (Texas, Florida, Pennsylvania, Ohio, etc. are all said to be “represented” by Republicans as they have at least 1 GOP Senator).

Right. But then if you do that, each state’s population goes in twice, so “total population”, the denominator to figure the percentage, is really US Pop*2. And if you do it that way, it’s mathematically equivalent to your second calculation – counting a senator as representing half his state.

My method (which is the same that New Yorker guy says he used)
I took all the states with atleast 1 R Senator and added up the populations.

I think you’re doing it wrong. See above.
mkd Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 5:33 pm
also, what Rob said.
JimboSlice Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 5:39 pm
Guys I know that is probably not the best way. But the way that Mitch defined it, and the methodology that the New Yorker guy explained, yields 50.3%. I am pointing out that New Yorker guy got his #’s wrong.

As they say their are lies, damn lies, and statistics.
anonymiss Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 5:41 pm
Actually if you do the REAL math you come out with 50.3%.

Uh, this so-called REAL math also gives us Democrats representing 75.4% of Americans while at the same time Republicans represent 50.3%. Do you see the problem here?

I think you failed math.

But it’s OK, so did Mitch McConnell.
JimboSlice Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 5:42 pm
Jack: Your post is wrong. If you want to assume that each senator represents 1/2 of their state you need to completely re-do the calculations since some states like Texas have 2 Republican Senators but other states like OH are split.

Again, what I did is exactly what the New Yorker guy said he did. He did not say that he magically doubled the US population.
James Gary Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 5:44 pm
But the way that Mitch defined it, and the methodology that the New Yorker guy explained, yields 50.3%. I am pointing out that New Yorker guy got his #’s wrong.

I don’t have time to do the math right now, but I bet if you used that same methodology to figure out the Democrats’ numbers you might get a result showing the Democrats have more than 50% representation. So there. It is good to know that 110% of America is represented in the Senate.
James Gary Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 5:46 pm
And the reason I love this blog is that in the time it took me to type out my comment above, two other people had already nailed it.
JimboSlice Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 5:46 pm
Actually as an Engineer I have probably taken (and passed) more math than you ever dreamed existed. My math is correct if you use the assumption that the New Yorker guy did – that each senator completely represents his population. Under that assumption you will ofcourse get %R +%D >= 100% because there are some states that have 1 D and 1 R (and the states with the Socialist and the Lieberman have only 1 I).
jack lecou Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 5:46 pm
Well, I shouldn’t say wrong. I’m not sure there’s a “right” way to do this. After all, Surowiecki’s method seems to imply that the US senate represents 610M people.

Your method actually seems fine. It’s just NOT what Surowiecki’s doing. (Although note that 50.3/(50.3+75.3) ~= 40%)

What makes the problem tricky is having two senators to a state, with no districts. It’s also a somewhat malformed question. What does it mean to “represent” a person? Obviously a Republican senator technically “represents” all the Democrats in his state, in the sense that he serves them, but it’s hard to say that he really represents their views. A better way to do this might use voting totals – although that’s got problems too.
jack lecou Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 5:47 pm
My math is correct if you use the assumption that the New Yorker guy did – that each senator completely represents his population.

That’s NOT equivalent to this:

I took all the states with atleast 1 R Senator and added up the populations.
James Gary Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 5:49 pm
A better way to do this might use voting totals – although that’s got problems too.

Well, one could give 100% of a state’s representation to a state with two Senators of the same party, and split it 50% where the Senators are of different parties. I’m not suggesting that the result would have any significance whatsoever—but then, neither do McConnell’s numbers or Surowiecki’s.
JimboSlice Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 5:51 pm
Here it is:
50.3% of Americans are represented by a Republican Senator
75.3% of Americans are represented by a Democratic Senator
25.6% of Americans are represented by both a Democratic and Republican Senator.

24.7% of Americans are represented exclusively by Republican Senators
49.7% of Americans are represented exclusively by Democratic Senators
jack lecou Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 5:52 pm
Or, in case it’s still not clear, “each senator completely represents his population” implies that Jon Kyl, (R – AZ) represents 6.5M people. But by the same token, John McCain, (R – AZ) ALSO represents 6.5M people.
JimboSlice Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 5:52 pm
My math is correct if you use the assumption that the New Yorker guy did – that each senator completely represents his population.

That’s NOT equivalent to this:

I took all the states with atleast 1 R Senator and added up the populations.

Yes, yes it is equivalent.
right Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 5:55 pm
I’m glad this continues to be hashed out, but the real point here is that McConnell said Republican Senators represent half the American population. Since a Republican Senator represents all the inhabitants of his/her state — even if the state’s other Senator is a Democrat — the math that Jimbo, I, and others have calculated above shows this to be a true statement.

It would also be true to say Democratic senators represent three quarters of the American population.
mkd Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 5:55 pm
I will grant that with tortured logic and a random number completely lacking context you can arrive at McConnell’s silly “we represent half the population” talking point.

The “New Yorker guy” however, seems to have added the populations each senator represents (Boxer= 35M, Feinstein= 35M, Cornyn= 25M, McCain= 600k, Kyl= 600k etc). Takes THAT TOTAL NUMBER and divides it by the total party numbers. He didn’t phrase it well, but that is clearly where his number (a more accurate number IMO) comes from.
ben Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 6:00 pm
Does Mcconnell’s method have anything to do with the 3/5th’s compromise?
jack lecou Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 6:02 pm
Yes, yes it is equivalent.

No, it’s not. I don’t know if you’re the right kind of engineer or not, but in pseudocode (hope pre works…):

Surowiecki’s way:

for each GOP Senator, SEN {
(People Represented By GOP senators) += (Population of SEN’s state)
}

Your way:

for each State with a GOP Senator, STATE {
{People Represented By GOP senators) += (Population of STATE)
}
ad Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 6:18 pm
Israel’s Policy Is Perfectly ‘Proportionate’
Hamas are the real war criminals in this conflict.

By ALAN M. DERSHOWITZ

Israel’s actions in Gaza are justified under international law, and Israel should be commended for its self-defense against terrorism. Article 51 of the United Nations Charter reserves to every nation the right to engage in self-defense against armed attacks. The only limitation international law places on a democracy is that its actions must satisfy the principle of proportionality.

Since Israel ended its occupation of Gaza, Hamas has fired thousands of rockets designed to kill civilians into southern Israel. The residents of Sderot — which have borne the brunt of the attacks — have approximately 15 seconds from launch time to run into a shelter. Although deliberately targeting civilians is a war crime, terrorists firing at Sderot are so proud of their actions that they sign their weapons.

When Barack Obama visited Sderot this summer and saw the remnants of these rockets, he reacted by saying that if his two daughters were exposed to rocket attacks in their home, he would do everything in his power to stop such attacks. He understands how the terrorists exploit the morality of democracies.

In a recent incident related to me by the former head of the Israeli air force, Israeli intelligence learned that a family’s house in Gaza was being used to manufacture rockets. The Israeli military gave the residents 30 minutes to leave. Instead, the owner called Hamas, which sent mothers carrying babies to the house.

Hamas knew that Israel would never fire at a home with civilians in it. They also knew that if Israeli authorities did not learn there were civilians in the house and fired on it, Hamas would win a public relations victory by displaying the dead. Israel held its fire. The Hamas rockets that were protected by the human shields were then used against Israeli civilians.

These despicable tactics — targeting Israeli civilians while hiding behind Palestinian civilians — can only work against moral democracies that care deeply about minimizing civilian casualties. They never work against amoral nations such as Russia, whose military has few inhibitions against killing civilians among whom enemy combatants are hiding.

The claim that Israel has violated the principle of proportionality — by killing more Hamas terrorists than the number of Israeli civilians killed by Hamas rockets — is absurd. First, there is no legal equivalence between the deliberate killing of innocent civilians and the deliberate killings of Hamas combatants. Under the laws of war, any number of combatants can be killed to prevent the killing of even one innocent civilian.

Second, proportionality is not measured by the number of civilians actually killed, but rather by the risk posed. This is illustrated by what happened on Tuesday, when a Hamas rocket hit a kindergarten in Beer Sheva, though no students were there at the time. Under international law, Israel is not required to allow Hamas to play Russian roulette with its children’s lives.

While Israel installs warning systems and builds shelters, Hamas refuses to do so, precisely because it wants to maximize the number of Palestinian civilians inadvertently killed by Israel’s military actions. Hamas knows from experience that even a small number of innocent Palestinian civilians killed inadvertently will result in bitter condemnation of Israel by many in the international community.

Israel understands this as well. It goes to enormous lengths to reduce the number of civilian casualties — even to the point of foregoing legitimate targets that are too close to civilians.

Until the world recognizes that Hamas is committing three war crimes — targeting Israeli civilians, using Palestinian civilians as human shields, and seeking the destruction of a member state of the United Nations — and that Israel is acting in self-defense and out of military necessity, the conflict will continue.
jeebus Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 6:19 pm
Most retarded conversation ever.
Chet Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 6:31 pm
Since senators are elected by the state at-large, it logically follows that each and every senators is the plenipotentiary representation of his or her state.

And that therefore the US Senate represents 200% of Americans.

Oh, wait. Yeah, I’m not seeing why this assumption is better than the other one.
Adam Villani Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 7:22 pm
Just look at Jimbo’s post #24. That ought to be clear to everybody.

OK, thought experiment time. Let’s say that each state was represented by one Republican Senator and one Democrat. In that case, it would both be true that, excluding the District of Columbia, Republicans would represent 100% of the population in the Senate, and ALSO TRUE that Democrats would represent 100% of the population in the Senate. The two statements are not exclusive, and the two figures need not add up to 100%. Senators do not represent 50% of their states’ populations.

As long as we’re comparing resumes, I have a B.S. from Caltech in Geology, so I took a ton of math classes, too. Also, I got an 800 on the Analytical Reasoning section of the pre-2002 GRE.
Adam Villani Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 7:27 pm
I just want to note that if you have not just one but two shots to represent every American in the Senate, and with those two shots per American you still just barely scrape past representing 50% of them, that is actually a pretty piss-poor showing.

This is also true. “Republicans represent half of the population” is a true statement, but it is also a misleading statement, since people (as seen in this thread) are wont to assume this means that Democrats only represent the other half. In fact, they represent the other half, PLUS about half of the population that is also represented by Republicans.
Stephen Myles Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 8:24 pm
And that therefore the US Senate represents 200% of Americans.

Yes, based upon that calculation, this would be the mathematical conclusion. However, as two person are simultaneously representing the same, indivisible group of people, the amount and degree of support is therefore indivisible beyond this point. The assumption is that one senators is as good a partisan representation as two senators, because the amount of representation is vested in the delegation, not the individual.

This would be a familiar concept in at-large election systems, like those commonly in use throughout the wealthier parts of the Commonwealth.
roger Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 9:01 pm
McConnel has 41 senators. He can dream about representing half of America all he wants. He still has 41 senators.
So: Fuck him. Run over the creep. Let’s get this Bill Ayres inspired administration off with a bang. And no sugar for Kentucky.
Skeptic Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 9:59 pm
Wow. I think this thread is proof that Americans are the dumbest people on earth.

I can’t imagine any other nation where this conversation would be taken seriously.
Nate Peele Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 10:53 pm
Wow. I think this thread is proof that Americans are the dumbest people on earth.

I can’t imagine any other nation where this conversation would be taken seriously.

USA! USA!
jeebus Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 11:34 pm
I can’t imagine any other nation where this conversation would be taken seriously.

I assure you that dumb people are very well represented the world over.
Chet Says:
January 6th, 2009 at 1:29 am
However, as two person are simultaneously representing the same, indivisible group of people, the amount and degree of support is therefore indivisible beyond this point.

Well, but that gets absurd pretty quickly. If the esteemed Senators A and B of State X find themselves voting opposite on some issue, which of them represents the people? They can’t both be representing the same people, unless they represent a constituency composed entirely of schizophrenics. Either one of them represents everybody, and the other no one at all, or they both represent different portions of the same body politic.

And at that point, it might be salient to, say, compare their positions on various subjects with the stated positions of their nominal constituencies, and see which matches up better.

I guess what I’m saying is – why make the assumption of indivisibility? Especially when it leads to such counterintuitive definitions of what it means “to represent”?
Adam Villani Says:
January 6th, 2009 at 1:59 am
If the esteemed Senators A and B of State X find themselves voting opposite on some issue, which of them represents the people?

They both do. I have two Senators. They both represent me, even though I only voted for one of them, although a lot of people voted for both. There is no single voice of the people. Senator A casts a Yes vote, representing the people. Senator B casts a No vote, also representing the people. The people do not cast votes in Congress. They elect (or select through other means) people to represent them in the House of Representatives and in the Senate. That is what representive democracy is, as opposed to direct democracy.

I live in California and have a zillion crappy propositions to vote on each election. That is direct democracy, and it sucks.
Stephen Myles Says:
January 6th, 2009 at 2:51 am
chet:

The concept is at-large representation; the State, in its abstract, collective form, is represented by its senatorial delegation of two Senators. This is a remnant from when Senate was appointed by legislature, instead of directly elected. The view of Senate as a national, rather than regional instrument is a rather modern concept; for a long time Senators were viewed as purely State representatives and were expected to reflect not a particular partisan viewpoint but rather the interests of the entire and particular State.

I suspect you are doing this from pure democracy instinct from the gut rather than a detailed understanding of constitutional and legislative history; the fact is, senators represent states in their entirety and not just some particular group of people within that state; this is how the organ was designed, and this is how it functions.
Stephen Myles Says:
January 6th, 2009 at 2:58 am
By the way, if you really wanted to know, the system of two senators for every state is a carry-over from the practice in the British Parliament of the time, of having most of the parliamentary districts send two Members to Westminster; some only sent one. It was thus impossible to have distinguished the MP’s of two-member constituencies from those from single-member constituencies in terms of representation; both were seen as equally valid representatives of their districts, in entirety.
mark f Says:
January 6th, 2009 at 9:07 am
The people who are confused by this should think of it more as a Ven diagram than as a pie chart.
cialis Says:
March 2nd, 2009 at 12:11 am
cialis
Excellent site. It was pleasant to me.
brand viagra Says:
April 2nd, 2009 at 11:03 am
Excellent site. It was pleasant to me.
buy cheap viagra
cheap viagra Says:
April 8th, 2009 at 5:18 am
Thanks for the review!
viagra
Niss Says:
April 17th, 2009 at 4:14 am
its the fags ! http://fagstore.com
Tunks Says:
April 17th, 2009 at 9:23 am
this is a test of the global broadcast system by syndk8
Youst Says:
April 18th, 2009 at 10:19 am
Again, power dropped across all engines as more emissions requirements came into effect. The 1973 Firebird Trans Am saw the first introduction of the famous or infamous depending on which automotive historian you talk to large Firebird graphic. This factory applied decal, a John Schinella restylized interpretation of the Native American fire bird, took up most of the available space on the hood. Also in 1973, the new Super Duty 455 engine Super Duty harkening back to Pontiac s Racing Engines was introduced. Although it was originally supposed to be available in GTOs and Firebirds, only a few SD 455 engines made it into Firebird Trans Ams that year. One so equipped was tested by Car and Driver magazine, who proclaimed it the last of the fast cars. But the pendulum had swung, and the SD 455 only hung on one more year in the Trans Am. frfljaj
Behme Says:
April 18th, 2009 at 3:11 pm
nice blog, download games here http://rslib.com http://rslib.com/tag/game
Ulland Says:
April 19th, 2009 at 4:46 pm
Outstanding post and blog…..I’m very impressed with all the usefull information here! fat loss 4 idiots
Alberico Says:
April 19th, 2009 at 5:01 pm
Outstanding post and blog…..I’m very impressed with all the usefull information here! fat loss 4 idiots
Weinreb Says:
April 19th, 2009 at 5:55 pm
Thats awesome; i like it
–
Feyzahil
Pareja Says:
April 19th, 2009 at 6:53 pm
Outstanding post and blog…..I’m very impressed with all the usefull information here! fat loss 4 idiots
Grieves Says:
April 19th, 2009 at 9:32 pm
That was great, thanks!
Ostrye Says:
April 19th, 2009 at 10:22 pm
Idk whether to laugh or cry…
Dobrunz Says:
April 20th, 2009 at 5:57 am
I found you on Google blog search, I was originally looking for information on pharmacy related products, but I think your blog has been spammed with related keywords, hence the reason you showed up.
Fanara Says:
April 20th, 2009 at 10:24 am
Nice post! Now understand about this topic better and I learn a large from your other post in your blog. I’ll be waiting for another post. Thank You. Best FHA Loans Site

Matt Yglesias

37 Percent

60 Responses to “37 Percent”

Blogroll