Statistics: 'Lying for Justice' and for More Government
Sowell, Thomas, Human Events
Hysteria Sells
"Every year since 1950, the number of American children gunned down has doubled." Did you know that? It is just as well if you did not, because it is not true.
It takes no research to prove that it is not true. If there had been just two children in America gunned down in 1950, then doubling that number every year would have meant that, by 1980, there would have been one billion American children gunned down--more than four times the total population of the United States at that time.
Yet the claim that was quoted did not come from some supermarket tabloid. It appeared in a reputable academic journal. It is one of innumerable erroneous statistical …
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Publication information:
Article title: Statistics: 'Lying for Justice' and for More Government.
Contributors: Sowell, Thomas - Author.
Magazine title: Human Events.
Volume: 57.
Issue: 26
Publication date: July 16, 2001.
Page number: 18.
© Human Events Publishing, Inc. Feb 16, 2009.
Provided by ProQuest LLC. All Rights Reserved.
This material is protected by copyright and, with the exception of fair use, may not be further copied, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means.
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