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I know that when we make an argument, we need to provide data to back up our claims. I'm not exactly sure how far you will get with an argument, if you are using partisan think tanks to back up your claims. I'm very much a liberal, but even I know a republican would never believe anything I say, if I used the Brookings Institute, kaiser foundation, or Thinkprogress.com as my source of information.
I know that when we make an argument, we need to provide data to back up our claims. I'm not exactly sure how far you will get with an argument, if you are using partisan think tanks to back up your claims. I'm very much a liberal, but even I know a republican would never believe anything I say, if I used the Brookings Institute, kaiser foundation, or Thinkprogress.com as my source of information.
You need to be suspicions of any data those places spit out, and try to cross verify from independent sources.
You also need to separate opinion from fact, and be sure you are not using false info that has gone viral.
Just because you see the same quotes from numerous web sites and blogs, does not mean they are legit. Sometimes a telltale sign is when the same few, exact quotes are all that appear in site after site, and no originating source can be found.
I know that when we make an argument, we need to provide data to back up our claims. I'm not exactly sure how far you will get with an argument, if you are using partisan think tanks to back up your claims. I'm very much a liberal, but even I know a republican would never believe anything I say, if I used the Brookings Institute, kaiser foundation, or Thinkprogress.com as my source of information.
the above is codeword for "we reject the immagration paper by Herritage Foundation not on the merits but because we can just cal lthem partisian and they arent our partisan"
snort. How about this, lets not use partisan op/ed as some set of facts when it really is just opinion.
But if a think take puts forward a paper, and backs it with research, lets consider the paper on the merits. I am perfectly fine with poking holes in the research. That is a good thing.
But if it is research, with things like Math and policy etc, then lets look at the merits and not reject it based on source.
the above is codeword for "we reject the immagration paper by Herritage Foundation not on the merits but because we can just cal lthem partisian and they arent our partisan"
snort. How about this, lets not use partisan op/ed as some set of facts when it really is just opinion.
But if a think take puts forward a paper, and backs it with research, lets consider the paper on the merits. I am perfectly fine with poking holes in the research. That is a good thing.
But if it is research, with things like Math and policy etc, then lets look at the merits and not reject it based on source.
I highly doubt that you would believe anything coming out of a liberal think tank that supports liberal positions.
Brookings receives its funding from sources, mostly foundation and corporate, which I think defy the application of labels (which would be applied to Brookings). But back to the point: Few polls/studies are truly unbiased. Most have been commissioned by organizations which have a hand in formulating the questions asked and in how the final reports are written. Where someone's credibility or claims can be questioned validly is when they only and always quote reports or surveys from sources which exclusively represent a certain viewpoint.
I highly doubt that you would believe anything coming out of a liberal think tank that supports liberal positions.
I have in fact used information from Liberal think tanks to make my points.
I will absolutly reject out of hand opinion-used-as-facts when it comes form a liberal outlet.
however, I have many times in this forum debated the merits of studies I disagreed with, without rejecting the study because i dont like the source.
In fact, I did that yesterday discussing the subject of guns and suicide. It was an interesting discussion.
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