DeLong

brad delong originally quoted my post re the diddling of the army recruitment numbers, then he offers the following, and crosses out his reference to my post:

"UPDATE: A correspondent writes:
The June goal (5,600 or so, I believe) was previously published, so at least in this particular case, there's no book-cooking involved.... Army Times [is], of course, intimately interested in recruiting numbers, and publish[es] a monthly recruiting tracker that follows the Army's recruiting woes, and includes goals for upcoming months through the end of the fiscal year; the 5,600 goal for June has not, I don't believe, changed since they began running that graphic several months ago.

The June goal is lower largely because of how recruiting 18-year-olds works, and in part because of how the Army accesses and trains incoming soldiers. Graduated high school seniors are more likely to pop into the system in July, and especially August and September. We'll know a lot more when the Army bumps up against its massive August and September goals, which are both above 8,000.

All of which is not to say that the Army has anything but a huge, huge problem on its hands."

i sent him the following email:
----- Original Message -----
From: luke
To: delong@...
Subject: recruiting numbers
Date: Sat, 02 Jul 2005 20:52:36 +1000

>
> hi brad - lukery here from wotisitgood4 (you quoted me re the june
> recruiting figures)
>
> i see in your post that you mention that the Army Times
> pre-announced the June numbers, but you didnt give a link - would
> you please be able to send that through to me? thanks.
>
> i dont know anything about army recruiting, but im a bit skeptical
> about the information your correspondent provides, for 2 reasons.
>
> firstly, s/he says "The June goal is lower largely because of how
> recruiting 18-year-olds works" - the problem with this is that the
> June04 quota was 1000 (approx 20%) higher than the purported June05
> figure. unless this calendar year is substantially different for
> some structural reason, its difficult to imagine how this might be
> true. your correspondent suggests that june recruiting is
> *generically* different (ie not specific to this particular
> recruiting year), but this doesnt seem to reconcile with the fact
> that the 05 numbers are significantly different to the FY04 numbers
> (from what i understand, recruiting is famously tight for hitting
> quota within a couple of percentage points - at least it was until
> feb05 - therefore i assume that a 20% swing in projection seems
> most unusual).
>
> second, Eric Schmitt's june8 NYT article contained this delicately
> phrased nugget: "Two recruiters in the New York area... said their
> mission for June had not been changed, nor had the goals for July,
> August and September." (this article was after the May 'quota' was
> retrospectively downgraded.) given what has transpired since, any
> reading of that quote indicates that while the jul/aug/sep quotas
> may not have been altered, the june number certainly was (even
> though the june number may not have been set in stone at that
> point).
>
> it may be true, as your correspondent suggests, that the army
> pre-announced the 5650 number, but my guess is that it
> happened *after* the May 'revision', and it has *nothing* to do with
> "how recruiting 18-year-olds works".
>
> further, id argue that Schmitt wasnt snookered at all, but that he
> intentionally, knowingly, specifically, intended to deceive. if he
> was being serious, he would have explained/justified why the June
> target was 30% lower than the May quota, or why the june05 quota
> was 20% lower than the june04 target, if that line of logic was
> legitimate. given the apparent shenanigans with the May numbers,
> any reasonable journalist would ask whether the same thing was
> happening again, and the prima facie case is that these latest
> numbers are more of the same. if that isnt the case, then a
> minimally-curious journalist would at least put forward the postion
> that your correspondent does and explain/justify it further.
>
> i dont have a particular gripe about schmitt - the entire press
> corp essentially pushed the exact same position - but facts can be
> stubborn. i hope that you can provide a link, as per your
> correspondent, to the Army Times which disproves my argument.
>
> cheers
>
> lukery
> ________________________________________________________________________________
> four moron years.
> wotisitgood4.blogspot.com