Pat Schroeder wrong to claim conservatives don’t read

Los Angeles, CA (August 22, 2007) -- Former congresswoman and uber-liberal Pat Schroeder -- president of the American Association of Publishers -- claims that liberals read more books than conservatives because the latter “just want a couple of slogans: ’No, don’t raise my taxes, no new taxes’...on every page.” Schroeder was commenting on an AP-Ipsos poll that, according to her, “found [that] people who consider themselves liberals are more prodigious book readers than conservatives.”

Replies Eric M. Jackson, author of “The PayPal Wars” and CEO of World Ahead Media, “It’s an ill-advised statement by Schroeder, given that she’s the head of a theoretically non-partisan trade organization that should not be alienating a large percentage of the country’s population.”

And it’s particularly ironic in view of World Ahead’s most recent release through its WND Books imprint. “The Late Great U.S.A: The Coming Merger with Mexico and Canada” (WND Books, ISBNs 0-9790451-4-2, $25.95, July 2007) by Dr. Jerome Corsi has not only gone into a third printing, but has made the New York Times bestseller list.

“Conservatives certainly do read,” Jackson continues. “Of course, since liberals face the ever-present imperative of establishing their own intellectual superiority despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, it’s easy to understand why Schroeder shot off her mouth over this poll. But when one takes a moment to study it, problems with her flippant interpretation become apparent.”

Here are just some of those problems:

1. Self-identified Republicans are just as likely to be book readers as self-identified Democrats.

2. The average self-identified conservative book reader consumes about the same number of books per year (eight) as the self-identified liberal (nine). Given the poll’s small sample size, there is likely not much statistical difference in these averages.

3. The breakdown Schroeder cites doesn’t control for children. Parents are more likely to be conservative than adults who don’t have children, and raising kids cuts into reading time.
4. Similarly, the poll’s breakdown doesn’t control for religion.
5. The poll can’t surmise cause and effect. Liberals likely consume more media that conveys a left-wing editorial perspective. And, if the big New York publishers crank out a disproportionate number of liberal books, doesn’t it follow that liberals will disproportionately buy them?

“Simply put,” Eric M. Jackson concludes, “the poll results Schroeder cites simply don’t support the clumsy conclusion she is advancing. But she sure is liberal in interpreting the data to fit her own worldview!”

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