Important Crime Statistic Is Just A Frequently Retold Lie

Hey did you know that if you are a failure at third grade, the government just assumes that you'll be a criminal forever? No? Well good, because that isn't true anyhow. For many moons, Democratic candidates have repeated this old saw about states using third-grade reading scores as a predictor for how many prison beds they'll need in 15 years. This sounds like exactly the sort of sad, spooky metric that governments would use to determine how doomed its citizens are, but apparently nobody actually uses it. 

Barry R. Green, director of Virginia's Juvenile Justice Department, said that when officials draw up six-year plans for how much prison space the state will need, they rely on factors that include arrest and conviction trends, but not test scores or any other education data. A policy group convened at the end of the process discusses general social issues, Green added.

Well that is not very chilling AT ALL.

We heard that the National Furry Convention uses the most recent general election returns to determine where they should hold their next quadrennial meeting. Reddest county in America wins. Tell your friends!

 In Politics, Fact, Fancy Can Blur in Keystroke [Washington Post]