The 2020 census is being ‘sabotaged,’ says leading U.S. statistician • Hacker News Board

Re: The 2020 census is being ‘sabotaged,’ says leading U.S. statistician

#41

Post by rubyist5eva » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 1:28 PM UTC

cj wrote: post #26

rubyist5eva wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. I'm sick and tired of the Democratic Party using the judicial branch and SCOTUS to legislate from the bench because they can't get their agenda through in Congress like they are supposed to.

> Democratic Party using the judicial branch and SCOTUS to legislate from the bench because Hasn't the supreme court been majority conservative for quite some time? Not majority liberal? (unless your comment is sarcasm)

Anthony Kennedy was a swing vote and he retired in 2018, so no - it was not "majority conservative". Kennedy voted in the affirmative for both Planned Parenthood v. Casey and Obergefell v. Hodges, both of which both being particularly egregious examples of legislation from the bench. I am both pro gay marriage and pro-choice - but neither of these things exist in the Constitution. Not one word. Either amend the Constitution or allow states to create their own legislation. If both Roe/Casey and Obergefell disappeared overnight - do you think abortion and gay marriage would all of a sudden become illegal in New York and California?

If the Democrats don't see the judicial branch as an extension of the legislative, then why would they be threatening to pack the court with justices that will vote for their causes?

Re: The 2020 census is being ‘sabotaged,’ says leading U.S. statistician

#42

Post by VLM » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 1:28 PM UTC

I realize for political reasons we have to only support one side via extreme sophistry, essentially the whole topic is a giant dog whistle test to make sure our community is politically pure.

However its VERY hard to ignore the reality that essentially 100% of the US population has no difficulty, on average, kinda paying electric bills and property tax bills and phone bills.

Part of the sophistry is pretending that no non-white people are capable of responding to documents mailed to them and as such will be entirely disenfranchised. However, the actual percentage simply cannot be that high as 73 percent of households have satellite or cable TV and thus are at least occasionally responding to mailed documents. 73 percent of the population isn't even white anymore.

I mean, yeah, as a political purity test we can rally around Orange Man Bad and try to one up each other in our two minutes hate to eliminate diversity of opinion while encouraging groupthink, but reality is so far from the politics in this particular situation that its hard to play along. And if an individual can't stomach the extreme virtue signallers, may as well join the reality-based community and just vote Trump. So ironically I don't think this topic is a PRODUCTIVE purity test even from a purely leftist perspective.

Re: The 2020 census is being ‘sabotaged,’ says leading U.S. statistician

#43

Post by kevinmchugh » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 1:29 PM UTC

TheAdamAndChe wrote: post #31

bo1024 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are many reasons. They discuss poverty in the article. I would agree with cultural distrust of government officials. And very importantly, everything around the citizenship question/issue. > The notion of these counts ever being used for enforcement — basically targeting high population, low citizenship-count blocks for ICE raids or whatever — that would be really, really problematic. Stepping back, think in ge…

think in general about a government that wants to target, arrest, and deport certain groups of people Yes. They are deporting people who didn't come into the country legally. Its important to have an accurate count of citizens in the country since that's who votes. There is an upcoming Supreme Court case that will determine if non citizens should be counted for House representation. You may not agree with it, but it…

The constitution never said to count the people who vote. If you wanted to know that, just count how many people vote.

Re: The 2020 census is being ‘sabotaged,’ says leading U.S. statistician

#44

Post by Schiendelman » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 1:29 PM UTC

rubyist5eva wrote: post #15

Retric wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Poor people move around vastly more frequently and often end up temporarily sharing living spaces.

Not all non-white people are poor.

Please don’t strawman on HN.

Re: The 2020 census is being ‘sabotaged,’ says leading U.S. statistician

#45

Post by rubyist5eva » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 1:30 PM UTC

tolbish wrote: post #36

cj wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Democratic Party using the judicial branch and SCOTUS to legislate from the bench because Hasn't the supreme court been majority conservative for quite some time? Not majority liberal? (unless your comment is sarcasm)

thought it was sarcasm at first, but it appears rubyistSeva genuinely isn't aware that the Democratic nominee was blocked four years ago on the basis of it being an election year, only for the Republican party to turn around and do exactly that this year.

The Republican party had no reason to hold confirmation hearings for Merrick Garland - the votes did not exist to confirm him. The role of the Senate is to provide advice and consent - there was no consent so there was no reason to do it.

This year is different - Republicans hold the majority of the Senate and the White House. This nominee has the votes.

Re: The 2020 census is being ‘sabotaged,’ says leading U.S. statistician

#46

Post by mcintyre1994 » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 1:30 PM UTC

mkl wrote: post #37

learc83 wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The census bureau was original granted an extension that has been rolled back. It's not being cut "unusually" short, but the pandemic drastically impacted the census bureau's ability to do their work, and we are giving them less extra time than they say they need.

I'm surprised they're not just cancelling or postponing it. In 2011, earthquakes in Christchurch, New Zealand, displaced thousands of people. The national census scheduled for the following month was cancelled, and a replacement was later organised for 2013. I think the theory was that delayed statistics were better than unreliable and incomplete statistics. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Zealand_census#History

The US constitution requires them to do it every 10 years, and it was last done in 2010.

More cynically it’s been really politicised and not doing it this year would risk the Democrats being in power to do it next year.

Re: The 2020 census is being ‘sabotaged,’ says leading U.S. statistician

#47

Post by Schiendelman » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 1:31 PM UTC

mkl wrote: post #37

learc83 wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The census bureau was original granted an extension that has been rolled back. It's not being cut "unusually" short, but the pandemic drastically impacted the census bureau's ability to do their work, and we are giving them less extra time than they say they need.

I'm surprised they're not just cancelling or postponing it. In 2011, earthquakes in Christchurch, New Zealand, displaced thousands of people. The national census scheduled for the following month was cancelled, and a replacement was later organised for 2013. I think the theory was that delayed statistics were better than unreliable and incomplete statistics. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Zealand_census#History

I think our government is unable to budget without it. And isn’t it constitutionally mandated?

Re: The 2020 census is being ‘sabotaged,’ says leading U.S. statistician

#48

Post by kevinmchugh » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 1:31 PM UTC

jimktrains2 wrote: post #40

TheAdamAndChe wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

think in general about a government that wants to target, arrest, and deport certain groups of people Yes. They are deporting people who didn't come into the country legally. Its important to have an accurate count of citizens in the country since that's who votes. There is an upcoming Supreme Court case that will determine if non citizens should be counted for House representation. You may not agree with it, but it…

The constitution specifically says the census is a count of all "free Persons", not only citizens. Obviously SCOTUS will weigh in now, but I think it's important to realize the actual wording of what the census is.

14th amendment drops the "free"

Re: The 2020 census is being ‘sabotaged,’ says leading U.S. statistician

#49

Post by Retric » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 1:31 PM UTC

BoiledCabbage wrote: post #8

Retric wrote: post #5

Trying to sidestep democracy is how you end up with armed revolt. I wish both sides would realizing their destroying people’s faith in the system and how quickly that can destabilize everything.

> I wish both sides would realizing their destroying people’s faith in the system And I wish people would stop saying 'both sides' when it's 95% only one side. That's the issue. One side is now against census so people aren't represented, restricting voting so people don't get a say, and people keep saying 'both sides'.

It might not be close to 50:50 but it’s not 95:5. Less tainted is still tainted.

When I say both sides, I mean both sides. Gerrymandering to give minorities districts for example does the same thing to undermine people’s faith in the system. The goal should be to outlaw gerrymandering not find some way to allow it to be useful politically.

Should people in DC maintain the right to vote? IMO they should, but it’s become a political issue not a democracy issue.

Re: The 2020 census is being ‘sabotaged,’ says leading U.S. statistician

#50

Post by Schiendelman » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 1:32 PM UTC

TallGuyShort wrote: post #35

Retric wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Counting everyone is literally what’s in the constitution. Remember, when the country was formed immigration wasn’t some complex thing you just showed up. Picture an immigration official trying to turn back a ship full of slaves because they where undocumented or missing paperwork. Meanwhile they still counted as 3/5th person in the official count.

I'd be fine with that, but let's be clear that that's not the system the Democrats move towards. Instead we have this weird system where a bunch of people jump through hoops to be here legally and a bunch of people don't, and Democrats pick and choose when they care about either one. There's no predictability, rule of law, consistency or sense on this issue from either party. I began immigration to the US under a Dem…

It really looks like you’re conflating policy with bureaucracy.