...on Michelle Obama wanting you to walk more.
No, really.
The Governors Highway Safety Association says pedestrian deaths increased in the first half of 2010 and the First Lady's program to get Americans to be more active could be partly responsible.
Governors Highway Safety Administration spokesman Jonathan Adkins told 630 WMAL that Michelle Obama is "trying to get us to walk to work and exercise a little bit more. While that's good, it also increases our exposure to risk."
Apparently Michelle Obama wanting Americans to eat healthier is responsible for a rash of choking on baby carrots, her asking Americans to cut down on smoking has in turn caused a unchecked growth in tobacco plant monsters rampaging around the Carolina hills murdering people, and wanting kids to eat better school lunches has caused a dangerous overflow in our country's storage capacity for little rectangular pizzas, causing spontaneous grease fire combustion across the country.
This isn't "one plus one equals two" it's "one plus one equals Dostoevsky and sulfuric acid pie with extra purple." This is literally the definition of the phrase "correlation does not equal causation".
Of course, Jim Hoft totally believes this anyway.
You know, my first thought is: of course more people out walking instead of driving means that statistically there will be more people hit by cars.
ReplyDeleteThe solution is to get people to drive safely and with regard to other people, particularly those who don't have two tons of metal encasing them while they go down the road. Not "ZOMG MICHELLE OBAMA IS TRYING TO MAKE US KILL OURSELVES!"
All said, the article isn't *that* bad, as it does (gloss over) other factors such as driver/pedestrian distraction and aggressive maneuvers.
But in the end, the between the guy in the two ton metal vehicle capable of going 70+ mph, and the guy who isn't in one that's capable of going maybe 5 mph, the guy in the metal vehicle has to give way and be more careful. The pedestrian? Hurts themselves at most. The driver? Can hurt a hell of a lot more.
We really need to move away, as a nation, from the car culture as much as we possibly can.
Well, I was pointing out the idiocy of going from "There were more pedestrian accidents in the US" to "It's Michelle Obama's fault."
ReplyDeleteAnd in further reading, apparently the number of pedestrian deaths jumped from 1,884 to 1,891. Isn't even less than your standard margin of error?
ReplyDeleteAlso, when I reflect, I think my first thoguht might be completely wrong in a "statistics don't work that way" sense. Especially if (as is exremely likely) that far more people would have started hoofing it:
From this article:
If more people are walking, the rate number of crashes may rise simply because of numbers, but the actual crash rate, any person's chance of being hit or killed, is lower. More pedestrians get hit every year in New York than in Miami, but it's far more dangerous to be a pedestrian in Miami; it's just that so many more people are walking in New York. More get hit in downtown DC than elsewhere in the city, but walking is riskier in many of those other areas.
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Fair enough, I'd agree with you in that, it is stupid to blame Michelle Obama's health initiatives. ESPECIALLY with such a small increase.
(Edited to add further comment and fix the link. Kitty must preview first!)
In case anyone didn't know, and I'm sure Zandar doesn't, "winger" Ed Morrissey flagged down this story as well. Unlike Zandar, Morrissey actually finds data showing that it's silly to tie Michelle Obama wanting us to walk more with the extremely low increases in pedestrian deaths. In other words, Morrissey disagrees with Hoft.
ReplyDeleteWell good for Cap'n Ed. He's smarter than Jim Hoft!
ReplyDeleteThat's not hard.
StarStorm-
ReplyDeleteI think you're right about the margin of error. The "jump" is more like a microscopic movement at best.
"Well good for Cap'n Ed. He's smarter than Jim Hoft!
ReplyDeleteThat's not hard."
Irony detectors.
This blog lacks them.