5 Comments

You're usually a very interesting and provocative writer. But--no disrespect-- I don't think the "Bayesian analysis" adds anything to the discussion at all, especially when the percentages used are necessarily so arbitrary.

About Sanders, we have no particular evidence that he's infatuated with the Scandinavian model sometimes wrongly called socialism. Did he spend his honeymoon in Denmark? We have plenty of evidence of his sympathy for collectivist totalitarians.

As Archie Bunker would say, "ipso fatso."

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What is the probability that Donald Trump is a rapist? Or a financial fraud? Frankly, this analysis is completely arbitrary and also pointless. Are you suggesting he is a closet Totalitarian intending to topple democracy? I think we have ample evidence that the only front runner to the next presidential election who clearly fits that bill is Donald.

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Appreciate the scientific effort but it is not needed to conclude that Sanders is not presentable and never was. A populist with Marxist ideas that obviously appeals to some desperados.

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While "if it's worth doing, it's worth doing with made-up numbers", 1.2% sounds like a ridiculously low number, so let's fiddle with that one (marking it as X). Constructing back, P(A|B)=P(B|A)*P(A)/[P(B|A)*P(A) + P(B|~A)*P(~A)] gives 0.05=0.75*0.003/(0.75*0.003+X*0.997). This produces that we only need to rise that number to ~0.042878636 (~4.3%) to get to 5%, and I'd say it is very likely that it is higher than 4.3%. (Also, a ruler with totalitarianist leanings in a country like America is not that likely to actually succeed in corrupting the country.)

Conversely, being a formal member of a communist party - or even its "central" committee in a non-communist country, which is about as much weight as "principal of a home school" - to get help from Soviets and actually being a crypto-communist in views are not the same, so I'm not sure Mandela's example applies.

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We have a plentitude of nose-in-the-trough professional politicians, who got into politics expressly to enrich themselves.

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