Sarah Palin seems to get a lot of mileage out of items she posts on Facebook. So recently she published a “factoid” there on excerpts of a speech she gave : “Did you know that U.S. actually only ranks 25th among major world players on defense spending as a percentage of GDP?" PolitiFact (PF) picked it up, and wanted to verify this ranking, and then determine if it was a valid measure. For the record, re-evaluating quoted statistics found technically true for comparison to “peers” isn’t something that’s only been done with Sarah Palin: When it comes to global stats—be it health, climate change, and in this case, defense, we can almost always count on Republicans to suspect the source as biased or in error. Bryan in his Blog reviews is no exception.
Bryan begins with a quote about how the media has a “deep anti-military bias.” Bryan claims that Palin wanted to show her audience that … ‘there is no "gusher" of defense spending.” Clearly, both Palin and Bryan want to justify US defense spending, and Bryan’s preconception with that justification was demonstrated throughout his critique.
But getting back to Palin’s statement, how DOES the US compare to the rest of the world?
She (or in this case, PF) could have shown this graph:
Or how 'bout these interesting "factoids":
- US military spending is close to Cold War levels?
- The US spends more per capita than any other country?
- That US military spending is more than the next 14 nations’ expenditures….combined?
- US Defense spending is 3.3 times that of our adversaries
Palin’s use of “percent of GDP” as a statistic connects with previous GOP proposals to actually tie defense spending to the GDP. From the Heritage Foundation, “…Spending 4 percent of GDP on defense will not cause the U.S. to go bankrupt.” Heritage has published other related articles as well, even one called “Four Percent for Freedom.”
Another one of Bryan’s reasons PF’s comparisons were not *coherent* enough was that most of the “peer” industrialized countries fall under the “NATO umbrella” and are “substantially subsidized” by the U.S. But just how is that quantified—just how much does the US subsidize through NATO?
“How much does NATO cost and who pays for it? NATO is an intergovernmental organization to which member nations allocate the resources needed to enable it to function on a day-to-day basis. There are three budgets: one civil and two military. Each NATO member country pays an amount into the budgets based on an agreed cost-sharing formula. Taken together, these budgets represent less than half of one percent of the total defence budget expenditures of NATO countries.”
In other words, according to NATO, the members share the cost. It also says “All member countries that participate in the military aspect of the Alliance contribute forces and equipment.”
However, there may be another reason that Bryan is making this point about NATO. The substance of the NATO-US military contribution is implicit; we station roughly 75,000 American troops in the “European Command” mostly located in Germany, which, by the way, spends the most for defense next to the U.K. The Cato article, in fact, is sprinkled with references to what NATO countries spend on military spending as a percent of GDP and how far it is below that of the U.S., because “Money is flowing from defense programs to shore up beleaguered European welfare states.” Cato even suggests pulling out half the troops. This is the core of the “substantial subsidies” to NATO countries Bryan claims. However, it makes significant logistical military sense for us to have troops forward deployed in case a conflict erupts nearby, particularly in the Middle East. In that case, it makes us responsible for *our* cost. In other words, some of the cost is shared (variable), but some of it is cost is fixed in that it is related to our own security interests, not just Europe’s.
Bryan’s contention about NATO reflects his own bias about defense spending and enabling of the “European welfare state.” If Chile, New Zealand, Sweden and Finland were in location(s) of strategic military advantage for the United States, we’d probably be “substantially subsidizing” their defense budgets as well. NATO countries should be included, and whether we’re enabling their social welfare state by “substantially subsidizing” their defense is a matter of opinion, and is beyond the scope of what PF should be checking.
While Bryan’s argument was weak, the brevity (549 word count compared to normal 700-800) of this PF fact-check relative to others made it good fodder for Bryan to bloviate on. It reminds me of what I used to call a quick, unchecked data report: “down and dirty.” Jacobson needed to clean it up a bit and provide more detail, and certainly for Bryan’s benefit, another interview to re-confirm Todd Harrison’s statement that Sarah’s little factoid was misleading.
Five skunks for PolitiFact;
Four for Bryan
Postscript: According to Bryan White’s criticism:
“Street mistakes NATO's budget for the cost of NATO. NATO has its own organization and infrastructure. Those things require funding and of course it is expected that member nations assist in paying the cost. Beyond its organization and infrastructure, however, NATO is a mutual defense pact. That means that even if Luxembourg only contributes a tiny contingent to NATO operations in, for example, Afghanistan, Luxembourg could potentially count on the U.S., France and Great Britain coming to its aid if she was attacked. Priceless. Quantification is a red herring. The benefits of collective defense are obvious even if they can't be rigorously reduced to dollar amounts.
NATO is an intergovernmental organisation to which member countries allocate the resources needed to enable it to function on a day-to-day basis and to provide the facilities required for consultation, decision making and the subsequent implementation of agreed policies and activities. It is supported by a military structure which provides for the common defence of the member countries, cooperation with NATO’s Partner countries and implementation of Alliance policies in peacekeeping and other fields. Since NATO has only a limited number of permanent headquarters and small standing forces, the greater part of each member country’s contribution to NATO, in terms of resources, comes indirectly through its expenditure on its own national armed forces and on its efforts to make them interoperable with those of other members so that they can participate in multinational operations.”
Bryan holds this aloft as proof of my "many errors." But "errors" such as this cannot block the overlying truth. The fact of this “quantification” (in bold above) which Bryan calls a “red herring” is the very thing he emphasizes in his “NATO umbrella” logic of why certain countries should be “excluded” from consideration in defense spending as compared to the U.S. In other words, Bryan’s own logic has gone around full circle. Of course, this is what he typically does in his Facebook comment threads, and has been noted by other commenters there as well.
| Title and Link | July 9, 2010: ' The U.S. "only ranks 25th worldwide on defense spending as a percentage of GDP." ' |
| Who? Affiliation | Sarah Palin, Republican |
| Ruling | Barely True |
| Checkers | Louis Jacobson: ( Writer, researcher); Morris Kennedy (Editor) |
| Number of Words | 549 |
| #Sources Cited | 5 |
| Argument Summary | The US is 25th in the world in terms of defense expenditures as a percent of GDP. While technically correct, US spends more than anyone else in absolute terms. PF looked at how US compared to peer countries (as % of GDP) using SIPRI data. They concluded her statistic was misleading due the highly skewed comparison data and so rated her Barely True. |
| Bryan’s Argument | Unfair comparison: (1) Most of “peer” countries to compare to are in NATO and subsidized by US; (2) PF used SIPRI data which is suspect because “non-transparent” countries like China would not provide correct data (3) Consider the rest of Palin’s entire comments in the context of this “factoid.” Bryan: “PolitiFact left important data hidden and inserted opinion, if not error, by preferring a different measure based on incoherent grounds.” |
| Quick Interpretation | Standard GOP talking point (4%) with a very misleading justification, with Bryan weakly rationalizing that justification. |
| My criticism: | I’ve maintained in my guidelines (#1) that PF should keep to the truth of the original statement. But they could have done a better job explaining and supporting how misleading it was. Also, “dubious sources” are from “dubious sources” (Bryan). NATO factor has further caveats Bryan ignored. Context of Palin statement is basic Republican pro-Defense boilerplate. |
| Guidelines | Maybe (1) as too much information. Perhaps time constraints prevented PF’s writers from speaking with other sources or researching further. |
| Rhetorical Devices/Logic fallacies | None, only Bryan’s trashing PF’s source. Compilers of global data (WHO,OECD or SIPRI) are often considered suspect. |
DOES IT CHANGE THE RULING? | Yes, to True. |
My view | Bryan wants “a recommendation from a consensus of neutral experts” so that PF just doesn’t go by its own “opinion.” Agreed, but there were other ways to show Palin’s statement was deceptive. |
Comments | “… only four nations on the CIA list could be described as either industrialized democracies… Israel (6th), Turkey (16th), China (23rd) and Greece (24th). Probably Jacobson meant that only four of the [major player] nations rated above the U.S. on the list…”No sh*t, Sherlock! I think that one was pretty obvious. |
Consequences of Bryan’s interpretation (What I have to believe if he is correct) | Bryan wants to adhere to the literal truth of Palin’s statement and support it with the underlying context of the rest of Palin’s comments. In the case of PolitiFact, their research was insufficient and the comparison unfair, it only rested on their opinion, i.e., was subjective. |
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