Sep
4
Tags:
Partisanship

Stumbled across this interesting website tonight while searching for archives of Paul Krugman's articles: lying in ponds.

Lying in Ponds is an attempt to quantify and analyze partisanship in the American punditocracy. Lying in Ponds believes that a lack of excessive partisanship is a necessary but not a sufficient condition for constructive punditry. The views of pundits who are excessively partisan cannot be taken seriously, because their ulterior motives or uncontrolled biases are certain to frequently contaminate their judgements.

I'm all for promoting open, vigorous debate, but I'm not convinced that our modern two-party system is simply historical coincidence. I think one can make an argument that there are valid game-theoretic reasons a two-party system would endogenously arise given our system of government in the United States. There may also be sound ideological reasons for a two-party system, though not being a poli sci major I can't say what those are off the top of my head. :) More research necessary....

(By the way, Paul Krugman is currently listed as the #1 most partisan pundit, based on the site's "objective" measures. Surprising, I'll have to look at their methodology.)