Two Krugman Corrections
Appended to Paul Krugman’s column this morning were two corrections, one to his original column on the Florida 2000 controversy, and one to his follow-up column:
Corrections: In my column last Friday, I cited an inaccurate number (given by the Conyers report) for turnout in Ohio’s Miami County last year: 98.5 percent. I should have checked the official state site, which reports a reasonable 72.2 percent. Also, the public editor says, rightly, that I should acknowledge initially misstating the results of the 2000 Florida election study by a media consortium led by The Miami Herald. Unlike a more definitive study by a larger consortium that included The New York Times, an analysis that showed Al Gore winning all statewide manual recounts, the earlier study showed him winning two out of three.
The first one is very clear — he used a number from the Conyers report which supported his thesis but turned out to be very wrong and could have easily been checked. I’ll call that a 2-point error on our 3-point scale. The correction is complete and straightforward, so I’ll give that 2 points.
But I really don’t understand the second correction, and that reaction is widespread (Donald Luskin, Patterico). Michelle Malkin seems to have the most complete discussion. I’ll follow the issue and try to untangle it.
UPDATE: Tom Maguire has some ideas.
