Hedgecock baselessly compared Baghdad's violent death rate to D.C.'s
On the November 28 broadcast of The Rush Limbaugh Show, guest host Roger Hedgecock baselessly claimed that "the murder rate in Baghdad, the people being killed in Baghdad, is lower than the murder rate of Washington, D.C." Based on estimates from the Brookings Institution, Baghdad's violent death rate since January 2006 is about 238 per 100,000 people; by contrast, Washington, D.C., had a homicide rate of 35.4 per 100,000 in 2005.
While discussing NBC News' recent decision to describe the situation in Iraq as a civil war, Hedgecock wondered whether Washington should also be considered to be in a "civil war." According to preliminary statistics from the Metropolitan Police Department, 145 homicides had been reported in that city in 2006 by the end of October, for a homicide rate of 26.3 per 100,000 people. By contrast, estimates from the Brookings Institution's Iraq Indexes from January 30 and November 27 indicate that about 13,300 Iraqi civilians were killed in Baghdad by violence in 2006 through October 15, for a violent death rate of about 238 per 100,000 people, given Baghdad's population of about 5.6 million. (Brookings notes that these estimates of violence in Baghdad, using data from IraqBodyCount.org, are based entirely on media reports. The number of violent civilian deaths in Baghdad from January 1, 2006, through October 15, 2006, was obtained by subtracting the reported number of such deaths from the start of the war through January 1 -- provided in the January 30 Iraq Index -- from the same statistic through October 15 -- provided in the most recent Iraq Index, from November 27.)
The weblog Think Progress has previously noted that other conservatives have baselessly compared Iraq's death rate to that of Washington, D.C., and Philadelphia.
From the November 28 broadcast of Premiere Radio Networks' The Rush Limbaugh Show:
HEDGECOCK: They're calling it. In other words, it's like Florida for [Democratic presidential candidate Al] Gore. This is -- you know, this is -- they're calling the election. It's now a civil war. Boy, I'm glad we've clarified that. Let's see. Did they call Bosnia and Kosovo a civil war? Huh?
Did they -- did they call what's going on -- and by the way, the murder rate -- whatever you hear, whenever you hear a story about Baghdad about blowing up, about -- you know, today two car bombs went off in the entire country. The murder rate in Baghdad, the people being killed in Baghdad, is lower than the murder rate of Washington, D.C. Is Washington, D.C., in a civil war? NBC has not called it, so I dare not say.
they are both war zones. one is the war on terrer. the other is the war on poverty.
Perhaps you meant the war on the impoverished. Apparently, there isn't much interest in fighting poverty, at least not within the Christian Coalition. [link to www.cnn.com]
Besides the fact that Hedgecock is just wrong, he also falsely compared murder rates in a urban city to those of an entire country.
If the 2005 US murder rate of .oo56 of one percent was applied to the 26+ million people living in Iraq you would expect annual murders to total 1,508 or 125 per month for the whole country.
I believe more were killed in Baghdad on one day last week.
He was comparing it to another city. But it's true he was completely wrong. What a dumbass that guy is.
... you're right.
I realized that after I posted, but no way to change posts here.
: (
Brit Hume pulled this one a few years ago. The correct GOP talking point is to say that there is a higher homicide rate in [insert major U.S. city] than in Iraq, which is technically true for the reason you described. Hedgecock is such a moron that he couldn't even spout that misleading "statistic" correctly. He just wen with the D.C. to Bagdhad comparison, which is just flat out wrong by the numbers.
It's sad that we know their script so well that we start to complete their thoughts for them...
I think folks are catching on though. I hope.
He recently visited Baghdad so he could gauge the murder rate himself and compare it to DC.
I don't think so.
"A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on." -- Winston Churchill
We will see this incorrect stat again. It is making its way around the apparently incredibly gullible conservative blogosphere.
For those who may not know, Hedgecock was forced from office as mayor of San Diego for election irregularities. I've forgotten all the details, but he still insists he did nothing wrong and was persecuted. Sadly, here in Sandy Eggo people listen to his radio program in droves.
I can't remember who, but another radio weirdo said the same thing a while back, so HedgeCOCK isn't original. If you tell the same lie often enough, it becomes fact ... at least for the uneducated.
Roger Allan Hedgecock's website describes him as a former powerful political figure. The truth is he was kicked out of the office of Mayor of San Diego. How powerful is that?
From WIKIPEDIA, the free encyclopedia:
In 1985 he was forced from office after being convicted on one count of conspiracy and 12 counts of perjury involving improper campaign contributions. Hedgecock failed to report over $350,000 in illegal contributions from Nancy Hoover, David Dominelli, and the J. David Company. The perjury charges were later overturned due to prosecutor misconduct to include jury tampering, and, under a deal with prosecutors, Hedgecock pleaded guilty to misdemeanor money-laundering....... His political career over, Hedgecock started as a talk show host four days after resigning. His ratings were first fueled with his campaign contribution controversy, and has remained a popular commentator.
SAM: Well he's not popular with me. There is a conservative audience for him in San Diego. Listening to his talk radio show makes me ill, so I tuned him out.
The murder rate of our troops is close to 3000, with thousands more seriously injured. You and your President are responsible for their deaths. So why are you suddenly talking about murders in D.C. when you should be busy getting our troops out of that mess you caused in Iraq?
Your phony arguments don't cancel out or allow this huge blunder in Iraq to be somehow tolerated. The voters in our country made a historic and loud statement when they kicked your butts out of power.
After being kicked out of the Mayors office in San Diego, and now losing the Senate and House, you would think Roger would get the hint. But Noooooo!
100,000 Iraqis flee monthly, the UN said a couple of weeks ago. I don't see people fleeing D.C. violence. Hedgecock's comments were so erroneous and ridiculous from many angles.
If these 100,000 monthly citizens were available as bait, the Iraqi violence rate would be even more astronomical than it is now.
[link to abcnews.go.com]
This was a talking point early in the war...that the murder rate in Baghdad was no worse than that in major American cities. Even then it was bogus; show me one American city where heavily armed policemen are being killed at a rate of 2 or 3 per day, where dozens of headless bodies are found in piles on a weekly basis, where a hundred people are kidnapped in broad daylight from a public building, then you might have a valid comparison.
This is just more GOP pro-war pro-death propaganda...for some reason they still feel compelled, or are being paid, to defend this atrocious boondoggle. Why? I hope Washington is blanketed in subpeonas in January. We need to expose these war criminals for what they are.
makes limbaugh look like a genius. No wonder "roger hedgecock" is not, and never will be, a household name.
Have also heard this claim before, except last time I heard it, they were comparing the death rate in Baghdad to that of Detroit, and like others have said, it's still not even close. Not even remotely. I had read this on a conservative blog that I read, and quickly pulled up some statistics (from Iraqi Body Count) and compiled the data as to how many Iragis had been killed that particular month, and came up with a percentage of the population, and of course had the murder statistics from Detroit. The response from the blog's author, "Well, I KNOW that the murder rate in Iraq is lower than Detroit." Wow! Compelling argument they made there. I provided traceable data, even on the low end, as Iraqi Body Count only uses media accounting for the deaths seen or recorded, and still, they just "knew" that they were right. And called me something like a cut and run liberal, or something like that. They hate facts don't they these loud mouths on the radio? I think they do. The truth hurts.
If this jackass exemplifies the critical thinking of conservative/republicans in this country it's no wonder they got their asses handed to them in the last election. Although maybe he's deaf and can't actually hear the nonsense he's saying. Yea that's the ticket.
Prove it.
All of the wingnut broadcasters should travel to and broadcast from Sadr City, Kadhemiya, Adhemiya or the Suleikh neighborhoods in Baghdad. They can point out all of the good news coming from those neighborhoods.
If they did, we would certainly have some good news here, a few less blowhard hosts.
used in the past is to compare the number of US casualties to a death rate in the US, such as automobile deaths. So, for example, I've heard it claimed that while there have been close to 3000 US military casualties in Iraq, 150,000 people were killed during the same time period in America by auto accidents. Therefore, it's more dangerous to drive in the US than to be stationed in Iraq. But this is also a false statistic because the sample space for auto accidents is 300 million compared to the population of US military in Iraq of appx 140,000. Scaled to the US population the military death rate would compare more equally to 6 million casualties (or, 40 times the US auto rate. Hardly safer.
put several thousand troops on the streets of D.C. to get a more accurate comparison.
238 is somehow less than 35.4?
Sandman2 and Samscomputer, you hit it right on the nose . . ." . . .Hedgecock wondered whether Washington should also be considered to be in a 'civil war' " . . .
Hey Hedgehog, I haven't heard of insurgents setting off roadside bombs on Independence or Pennsylvania avenues, and Dumbya has not, as yet, sent an invasion force to look for WMD's or overthrow the mayor . . .
I live in National City, CA - burb of SD - only the extreme wingnuts listen to this clown and take him seriously . . . his conviction should have held; maybe he'd of gotten an education in prison . . .