The New Republic

Whoever wrote it should read "Strunk and White." He starts a large number of sentences weakly with "there is,"" it is," "there are," and "it should." Their decision to not reveal the source of information resulted in sweeping conclusions without verification or support for those conclusions. I don't have enough experience to grade papers, but I think it fails of its essential purpose.

- Nusholtz

February 28, 2012 at 8:34am

Man, I'm going to have to resist the temptation to do this rather than the stacks of grading that are part of my actual job.

- frippo

February 28, 2012 at 12:01pm

Wow, was that an exercise in letting my obsessive-compulsiveness have free reign. The paper has some interesting insights, but is also sloppy throughout, both in presentation and content. -I realize this was written before spell-checking software, but embarrassing basic spelling & grammar errors appear on almost every page. Worse, this was a joint paper by students who should have been checking each others' work. -Good insights around Page 7-8, but undone by major internal contradictions on page 9. A few unsupported assertions weaken the paper, but it goes completely off the rails at the conclusion, which starts off mealy-mouthed, then goes...where? I can't tell. Final Grade: 72 (Where I went to college, this would be a low C, but in High School and previous, it would be a D or below.) -2: Page 1-17: Grammar: errors with use of commas throughout. -1: Page 1: Mispelling ("usinf") -1: Page 2: Diminutive use of "Democrat" instead of "Democratic" -1: Page 2: Mispelling (multiple items relating to "related topic") -1: Page 2: Mispelling ("has bee") -2: Page 2: Goals have not been formulated from your interviews; you may have discerned them that way, but they weren't created by your research. -1: Page 2: ("would be nive") -2: Page 4: "A PAC desires to support winners to make its executive director and its board look good. No PAC director either affirmed or denied this statement." If so, on what basis are you asserting that the statement is true? -1: Page 5: Mispelling ("increaseing") -1: Page 6: Mispelling ("are disjoint") -1: Page 7: Mispelling ("preceeding") +4: Page 7: Valuable insight: "A candidate, no matter how strongly he supports a PAC's position, is worthless to that PAC if he is not elected." +2: Page 8: Bold (but well-supported!) statement: "A PAC must neither be a political whore, selling itself to winning candidates, nor, a political martyr, dying on the cross of ideological purity." -1: Page 9: Mispelling: "organization oa a PAC" -3: Page 9: Citation that PACs almost never support incumbents contradicts previous assertion on Page 3 that some PACs are supporting challenger candidates against incumbents. -3: Page 9: Statement that legislators are "answerable" to PAC directors contradicts previous assertions on page 4 that "This study has found that a solid majority of legislators are not tools of any particular special interest that PACs represent" and that PACs "seek primarily the right of easy access to the legislator...not to buy control, but to increase the odds of success for the lobbying efforts." -1: Page 10: Stating that it is "deducible" that an issue will not be addressed in this paper is a needlessly distant (and kind of silly) way of just saying that you haven't covered it. -1: Page 11: Grammar: "PACs endorsment letters to its members" should be either "a PAC's" or "their members" +2: Page 11: Interesting insight about the ability of union PACs to deliver manpower and votes, rather than just funding. -1: Page 11: Mispelling ("arguement"-twice) -1: Page 13: Mispelling ("subtlely") -1: Page 14: Referencing the "bi-annual budget fiasco" without providing at least a sentence or two of explanation weakens your argument. -1: Page 15: Mispelling ("arguements") -1: Page 15: Asserting that PACs "began well after the decline of the parties" implies that there is more supporting information available about the history involved, but it is not provided, leaving this as an unsupported statement. -1: Page 15: "degratory"-this is not a word. +3: Page 16-17: Interesting presentation of campaign finance alternatives, and valuable that the legislative history and current situation are presented as well. -1: Page 17: Mispelling ("symtoms") -4: Page 17: Given the serious research involved, a conclusion that simply explains what will happen "if present trends continue" is rather weak, all the moreso by the bait-and-switch of the abrupt, unsupported, and baffling final line: "The day of interest group pluralism is dawning in Pennsylvania." What does this mean, and on what basis are you saying it? -1: Appendix A: Page 1-3: Three full pages of complex (and often leading) interview questions is rather excessive. How many of these questions did you even get a chance to ask? -1: Appendix A: Page 2: The questions put to the interviewees demonstrate that you had a picture of what the decision-making factors PACs used in mind before conducting interviews, as all the factors mentioned in the interviews (except Visibility) appear in the paper. It would have been valuable to describe how your assumptions were challenged or confirmed in your research. +1: Appendix B: Page 4-5: Including the top contributing PACs, sorted by dollars contributed, is interesting data. -1: Bibliography: Page 1-9: Summaries of interview responses and cited sources include many misspellings and haphazard editing throughout. -1: Bibliography: Page 7: The uneven confidentiality agreements made with interviewees raises concerns about the ethics of the research done. While Jerry Rothenberger's responses on Page 7 are explicitly edited for confidentiality, James Biery's responses cited on Page 1 include admissions that he has knowledge of criminal activities. -1: Bibliography: Page 8: Diminutive use of "Democrat party" -1: Bibliography: Page 10: Diminutive use of "Democrat party"

- janus

February 28, 2012 at 2:49pm

I'm a little distressed to discover that O'Connor gives grades based on how hard you worked, even if your conclusions are crap. Literally an A for effort, huh? ...and a little more distressed to hear that he circulated parts of the paper to local lawmakers. I hope he didn't include the parts of the paper summarizing the interviews, which include names with the responses-and a few admissions of knowledge of criminal activities.

- janus

February 28, 2012 at 2:57pm

Wow. Um...yeah. I was so busy responding to the info provided about how the paper was graded that it didn't hit me until seconds after I clicked submit that I was being a jerk and making it impossible for people after me to respond fairly, for which I do sincerely apologize. Any TNR staffer with editing rights, feel free to remove my post above from 2:57...

- janus

February 28, 2012 at 3:00pm

I wish you would have provided the paper without a name. I would have liked to have read the comments here. I think their impressions is colored by who wrote the study and not by the paper itself.

- arnon1

February 28, 2012 at 7:08pm

I posted this on the other Santorum thread but it also belongs here: On the basis of the college paper which I just read I agree with Molly Redden's view that Santorum was not interested in social issues. It would be hard to guess to what party the writer belonged if one didn't know the name of the writer. The paper's organization could have been tightened and there a few solecisms which indicate it's the work of an undergraduate but otherwise this is a solid piece of work. I was wondering if Santorum had some help in composing the study. One doesn’t often see such well written papers handed in by undergraduates. As for grades, I don’t know if I would have given the paper a B+ or an A- minus. That would depend on the quality of the other papers handed in that semester. I am surprised that this candidate who has degenerate almost into madness seemed to be so rational at one time. It’s as if he became a parody of the candidates who tailored their views to those who back them with cash. In other words he became what he covertly criticized in his study.

- arnon1

February 28, 2012 at 9:08pm

When will we know who won the contest? btw: a question that I had after read the paper was whether Rick had any help writing it? I don't know if any one else had the same feeling but it reads in places as if more than one person had written it.

- arnon1

February 29, 2012 at 8:00pm

I am checking back way late, but I have a sad suspicion that I broke the contest. Arnon: It was a joint paper; Philip H. Johnson appears as an author on the cover page right below Santorum.

- janus

March 5, 2012 at 8:05pm