And ignore the flamers… waste of space

“as a criticism of statistics, it is worthless”

If you are referring to my lack of statistical criticism then you are correct. It wasn’t intended to be an analysis of statistics, but rather a curiosity. I thought it interesting both that the report came out, and that it was being quickly criticized. I think that both the report and the criticism are likely politically motivated.

The mortality rate does seem ridiculously high to me though. It would mean somewhere in excess of 16,000 “excess” deaths per month over the course of the study. With the level of reporting and propaganda surrounding this war, I find it hard to believe that this level of death has gone unmentioned by members of either side of the conflict.

If the carpet bombing of Germany for two years killed approximately 300,000 German citizens, then a mortality rate of similar proportion due to small arms fire seems very unlikely. Also of questionable value was the studies reported pre-invasion mortality rates. Saddam Hussein was a dictator whose reign was marked by it’s brutality. A 2% mortality rate due to violence is absurd.

“Maybe it reinforces someone’s political/ideological/ego trip?”

While I’ll admit to a fairly large ego, I would disagree with your comment. My ego isn’t something that is inflated or deflated by something like this. I am confident in my abilities and knowledge, and fairly open towards criticism or comment. I’m not above changing my mind if a situation or evidence suggests I may be in err.

You failed to include the URL of the blog you normally post from. I’d be happy to add it to your comment if it was left off by mistake.