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Fact-checking Bachmann

Posted at 5:15 PM on July 10, 2009 by Bob Collins (12 Comments)
Filed under: Politics

Rep. Michele Bachmann overreached today when she delivered her latest salvo against the U.S. census. Bachmann proposed allowing people the option not to answer questions on the census.

ASSERTION: "Beginning last weekend, the Pentagon was broken into, its computers, as well as Homeland Security's computers, and North Korea may be the culprit," she said. "What we know is that the government's computer systems are not hacker proof."

FACT: According to the Associated Press, "Treasury Department and Federal Trade Commission Web sites were knocked out by the blizzard of digital requests, while others such as the Pentagon and the White House were able to fend it off with little disruption." No one has been "hacked" in this cyberattack from -- reportedly -- North Korea. Instead, access to a computer service is blocked through "denial of service" attacks. No information actually is pried from a targeted computer. And no computer was "broken into."

As the AP report characterized it:

Denial of service attacks against Web sites are not uncommon, and are usually caused when sites are deluged with Internet traffic so as to effectively take them off-line. Mounting such an attack can be relatively easy using widely available hacking programs, and they can be made far more serious if hackers infect and use thousands of computers tied together into "botnets."

ASSERTION: "And so American's private information, including their home telephone numbers..."

FACT: But you can get people's home telephone numbers from a telephone book.

ASSERTION: ".. and very private information about their personal lives could be subject to a hacker."

FACT: True, a computer could be hacked into. But that doesn't stop Bachmann from accepting donations on her Web site that require you to reveal your credit card number, your occupation, your address and your email address. One has to calculate the risks and evaluate the return.

A couple of weeks ago, Bachmann said the census data might be used to round Americans up, making a connection to Japanese internment in World War II.

If Bachmann is worried about what the government might do, it's not as if it hasn't given some reason to be. In 2004, the Electronic Privacy Information Center said it obtained documents to show that data "on people who identified themselves on the 2000 census as being of Arab ancestry" had been given to the Department of Homeland Security. But the DHS said that was to figure out what language to use on signs at airports.

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I have a confession to make. I can't remember ever filling out a census form. I can't remember anyone coming to the door and asking me questions. A young man stopped by a month or so ago to confirm that my address is correct, apparently to be sure I didn't put four large numbers on the post by the garage to fool the Census people.

"I know for my family the only question we will be answering is how many people are in our home," Rep. Bachmann told the Washington Times last month. "We won't be answering any information beyond that, because the Constitution doesn't require any information beyond that."

That, of course, is wrong, according to Census officials. It also ignores the reality that the Constitution provides a framework for laws. There's nothing in the Constitution, for example, about a 55 mph speed limit, but my argument fell on deaf ears in White Bear Lake not long ago.

What's the point of the census? Let's look at a couple of the questions.

Question: How old are you?
Reason for asking: The voting age population census could help Minnesota lawmakers decide, for example, which House district could be eliminated if, as reported, the state loses a congressional seat.

Question: Last week did this person work for either pay or profit?
Reason for asking: Helps to identify the impact of immigration and job markets, according to the Census Bureau. It's an issue that's been important to some representatives like Bachmann and could provide facts to back up assertions, should that ever comes back into style in Washington.

None of this is new. The census people have been making this point for decades:

Many of the questions claimed as "personal" are actually on the American Community Survey, rather than the Census short form that most people will get.

Bachmann is making the claim that government intrusion by way of the Census is an expanding universe. But there's evidence that the opposite is true. Past census records, for example, reveal that Clark Haley of Anoka County got $18 a month in a government pension for having a "diseased lung" in 1869. George Fairbanks, also of Anoka County, got $4 a month for chronic diarrhea.

Let the record show, there are no questions planned in the '10 Census about diarrhea.

Comments (12)

she's a loon who thrives on instilling fear in ignorant people. she makes up more inflammatory remarks than Rush Limbaugh.

Posted by Heidi | July 10, 2009 8:07 PM

As an "address canvasser" for the Census Bureau. I did feel a little stupid every time I stood at a front door and said to the homeowner that I was "confirming" their clearly-posted address. But I said that to have something to say, not because the Census Bureau thought someone was trying to confuse it. The reason the young man spoke to you at all was just to be courteous. He could have done his job even if you hadn't been at home. He visited your home for two reasons: To confirm that your posted address matched the one already listed in the Census Bureau's database and to use the GPS device in his hand-held computer to match your address to a specific spot on the globe. I suppose Ms, Bachmann would not approve of the latter, but the intention is to be able to visit in 2010 those addresses whose occupants do not respond to the mailed census form.

Posted by Henrik in Maine | July 11, 2009 10:17 AM

Assertion: But you can get people's home telephone numbers from a telephone book. : FACT: The real fact is that you cannot get everyone's phone number from a telephone book. Many people do not have a land line and because of that are not listed. Many others are unlisted.

Assertion:: ".. and very private information about their personal lives could be subject to a hacker." FACT: It is one thing to "volunteer" information to a company or government agency, it is another to be told you may be subject to imprisonment or a fine if you do not answer all these questions.

Assertion: "No information actually is pried from a targeted computer. And no computer was "broken into." FACT: Maybe it didn't happen this time but we were given notice three times in the past year that our SS# and other private information may have been compromised because of hacking from an insurance company, from our bank and from another company. Those were just companies that we 'voluntarily' gave our information to. If it didn't happen this time, it is only a matter of time that unnecessary personal information that the census is asking would be misused in some form.

Posted by Donna | July 11, 2009 12:38 PM

Assertion: "If it didn't happen this time, it is only a matter of time that unnecessary personal information that the census is asking would be misused in some form." FACT: Do you know what an appeal to probability is? Because that's it. Congratulations. You just won the internet.

Except for Bachmann's sensationalist squawking about the American Gestapo beating down your door to carry you and your family off to the concentration camps, can anyone honestly come up with of any way that census data can be "misused"? Because I honestly can't. The information they collect is just too mundane. Maybe they're putting all the atheists in a big database of people who aren't eligible for government jobs, or dumping radioactive waste in high-price, young-age neighborhoods, to make sure hipsters and yuppies can't reproduce. Maybe. Or maybe Bachmann just can't get enough of the sound of her own voice, no matter how ridiculous she sounds.

Posted by Donavon Cawley | July 11, 2009 2:25 PM

I keep wondering how she got through high school. Was she even listening in class? Or did she have a conspiracy theorist for a teacher.

Posted by Eiolg | July 11, 2009 2:42 PM

Comment 1:
has any politician ever cared that their claims were wrong, when the error is due to willful stupidity? Or due to efforts to obfuscate their electorate?

Comment 2:
There is very, very little which is not available to the government through indirect methods. Am I white? Well, it depends on who's asking. It depends upon who's answering.

My last job required some security checks through the FBI for employees involved in a specific project. One of the questions on the background form was to self-identify race. One woman checked two boxes: black and white. I stopped by and asked if she intended to check both of them. Her parents are white and black, and she considers her self both.

The self-identification of our citizens is something of importance in determining how to interpret demographics. How many black live in Ms. Bachmann's district? Well, if she wants to know ... she's going to have to call the U.S. Census bureau.

Posted by Elizabeth T | July 11, 2009 3:00 PM

Is this the same Congresswoman who wanted all of Congress to allow for thorough background checks in case some are not "pro-American" about 9 months ago?

Her complaint about the long form further confuses me: "If the long form is necessary they should at least include the question 'Are you a legal resident of the U.S.' as that information would be useful." Why would that be useful Ms. Bachmann? So you can round them up like the Japanese-Americans were in the 40's? And say you were living here without appropriate documentation would you answer truthfully on a form connected to an address?

Me feels a rant comin' on, must go now!

Posted by Minn Whaler | July 11, 2009 5:00 PM

Maybe I'm wrong here (not having filled out Census papers), but I thought all of the data we submit stays anonymous. In other words, while Census finds out that someone who's 5'11", 200 lbs, has a full-time job and has running water lives at an address, they don't know what that person's name is or SSN is.

Sure, a little sleuthing could figure that out, but in this case, the Census knows a lot of specific facts about a person, but they don't know WHICH person...

...right?

Posted by Tyler | July 11, 2009 6:04 PM

And people say Al Franken is a comedian!

Seriously, thanks for the fact checking because she is spreading misinformation and confusing citizens, trying to make them believe that the U.S. census is spying on them. Will she have anything to say about the recent revelations of domestic spying authorized by our former president or the super-secret CIA program Cheney kept from Congressional oversight?
I'll be waiting for her vigorous denunciation of this abuse of power.

Posted by Joanna | July 12, 2009 8:59 AM

The shame...we here in Minnesota are cringing whenever this woman opens her mouth. It's like trying to get an eel pout out of the boat but the damn thing is too slippery and it's thrashing about.

Stay tuned to Comedy Central for an update.

Posted by MNguy | July 12, 2009 9:41 AM

Michelle Bachmann is an embarrassment to the state of Minnesota.

Posted by J Smith | July 12, 2009 2:17 PM

I was census taker in 2000. It was a lot of fun and great 2nd income. It got my love for politics flowing.

Posted by Brian Hanf | July 13, 2009 9:14 AM

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