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Miscellaneous See other Miscellaneous Articles Title: Speech by members of Congress drops a grade level due to conservatives and new members, according to study Are members of Congress dumbing down their discourse? The Sunlight Foundation determined that Congress is talking at nearly a full grade level below the level at which members spoke seven years ago, according to its study of the Congressional Record—the official record of members' proceedings and speech. The foundation applied the Flesch-Kincaid grade level test to congressional conversations and found that today's Congress speaks "at about a 10.6 grade level, down from 11.5 in 2005," senior fellow Lee Drutman wrote in his analysis. Sunlight also found that the newest as well as the most conservative members of Congress on average speak at the lowest grade level. The following is a Sunlight Foundation graphic charting the grade levels of members' speeches: (Sunlight Foundation) Republican Rep. Mick Mulvaney of South Carolina scored lowest with a 7.9 grade level average for his speech. But he told Yahoo News Monday that although he doesn't believe anyone equates "sentence length" and the "polysyllabic nature of words" with intelligence, his ranking is something to be proud of. "I see it as an affirmation that we're doing something right," Mulvaney said of his fellow bottom-tier representatives. "You've got to speak clearly and concisely," Mulvaney said, if you want people to know what you believe. He noted that he and some of his fellow bottom-rankers, including Republican Reps. Rob Woodall of Georgia and Sean Duffy of Wisconsin, speak extemporaneously and don't use prepared notes. "This is a group of people who are trying to sound like ordinary people and not like politicians," Mulvaney said. Ranking one step above Mulvaney was Woodall, then Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky, Duffy and in fifth place, Rep. Todd Akin of Missouri—all Republicans. Leading the list as the most advanced speaker is Republican Rep. Dan Lungren of California, who speaks like a college senior. He is followed by Democratic Rep. Lucille Roybal-Allard of California, Democratic Sen. Daniel Akaka of Hawaii, Republican Rep. Jim Gerlach of Pennsylvania and Republican Rep. Tom Petri of Wisconsin. (A complete ranking of members can be found here.) So how to explain both the overall drop in grade level average and the conservative-heavy bottom tier? Drutman emphasized in an interview with Yahoo News that the exact cause is difficult to determine, but the foundation's report concludes that an influx of new members is dragging down the grade level average for Congress overall. But Drutman said the results are neither good nor bad, in his opinion. "On one hand, you might be concerned that members are speaking at a lower level," Drutman said. But he added on the other, "You might see it as just members speaking more directly to their constituents and being more accessible and plain-spoken." Drutman noted that many public speakers, writers and others are educated on how to speak and write in simple terms to reach the widest audience. Drutman said the shift "reflects some of the ways the institution has changed" and said the study was conducted in the "spirit of fun" and was not intended to "pass judgement." It should be noted that the Congressional Record can be amended by members, meaning they can insert speeches they never actually issued and modify those they did issue. Drutman said he has no data to base a guess on how that may shape the grade level results overall. Poster Comment: John Burkardt · Monroe County Community College Let me clue both sides in on somethng here. IF you set aside your preconceived biases (and we can't do that can we? sarcasm) You'll see that the graph is manipulated to suggest huge gains and less drops by democrats. (At least we know where Yahoo leans) Is anyone going to tell me that the difference between say 11.2 and 10.7 is as big as is presented here Cmon on! or that 10.6 for democrats and 10.2 for republicans in 2011 is a statistically viable finding? The bottom line is that it was a slow newsday so they manipulated a graph to set off people's baises- happens all the time. The real news is that both parties have essentially the same level of "dumbness" no matter what year you pick. Libedrals aren't as "educated" as they say they are and republicans aren't backwoods rednecks. Everything has to be "dumbed down" because of the American Educational System, politians know this and the media knows that we'll bite into any big lie they trot out with "statistics." Congratulations- now back away from this reasoned post into more idiotic mudslinging. Robert Maxwell · Top Commenter · Cornell University The tendency of the mind is to simplify issues and this is reflected in vocabulary. If we can reduce an issue to a bumper sticker we don't have to think about it -- which is "good" because thinking is an irritant. The simplest view of the real world (in all its complexity) is to reduce it to "good" and "evil." That way we don't need to know anything at all about it. Some groups see the world as simpler than some other groups. Robert Pruitt · Top Commenter · Cal Poly Pomona Well, at least now we know why none of them read the health care bill. They couldn't.. Post Comment Private Reply Ignore Thread Top • Page Up • Full Thread • Page Down • Bottom/Latest
#1. To: Tatarewicz (#0)
I would suggest that, previously (altho I don't know if it was as recently as 7 years ago), Members would revise their remarks before the text was published in the Congressional Record. It seems that nowadays they do not; they simply let their comments go in as uttered. Perhaps the rise of C-SPAN and a comparison of the videos of their actual speeches with the texts published in the Congressional Record chilled the practice of revision. But my point is that, on their feet, the Members were just as dumb and low-grade as now, except, previously, they'd improve their words before the rest of the world could see them via the Congressional Record.
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