Institute for Analytic Journalism

Cynthia Taeuber will present her online course "Using the Census's
American Community Survey (ACS)" at statistics.com Nov.17 - Dec. 15.
She will be available for questions and comments on a private
discussion board throughout this period.

Prior to 2006, analysts had to make do with increasingly out-of-date
detailed information about households and individuals while they waited
for the next decennial census. Starting in 2006, this information will
be made available on an annual basis in the ACS.

This course shows what sort of information is included, how to obtain
it, and what methodological and sample size issues present ... more »

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Sunday, October 1

Tracking the bucks all the way to court

by JTJ on Sun 01 Oct 2006 07:10 PM MDT

Another unique investigation by The New York Times gets A1 play in this Sunday's edition (1 Oct. 2006) under the hed "Campaign Cash Mirrors a High Court's Rulings." Adam Liptak and Janet Roberts (who probably did the heavy lifting on the data analysis) took a long-term look at who contributed to the campaigns of Ohio's Supreme Court justices. It ain't a pretty picture if one believes the justices should be above lining their own pockets, whether it's a campaign fund or otherwise.

In any event, there seems to be a clear correlation between contributions -- and the sources -- and the outcome to too many cases. A sidebar, "Case Studies: West Virginia and Illinois," would suggest there is much to be harvested by reporters in other states.

There is, thankfully, a fine description of how the data for the study was collected and analyzed. See "How Information Was Collected"

There are two accompanying infographics, one ("Ruling on Contributors' Cases" )

is much more informative than the other ("While the Case Is Being Heard, Money Rolls In" ), which is a good, but confusing, attempt to illustrate difficult concepts and relationships.

At the end of the day, though, we are grateful for the investigation, data crunching and stories.

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