So I'm catching up on stuff.
And I come across a short in Science (314, 1231 24 Nov 2006) on the resignation of the head of the US census bureay and his deputy.
Ok, interesting. It comes after a new Commerce Secretary is appointed. BFD.
Well, the Census Bureau does the census - coming up in 2010 - which detemines congressional seat allocation, could that be it? In particular, is the fight over the "undercount" correction at issue?
(There is a robust argument that the Census should do a "completeness correction" to correct for underreporting on census forms, and it is known that poor people systematically underreport at a higher rate, and they are statistically more likely to be democrats, natch).
But, no, the article claims both the head and his deputy were on board with the administration in opposing undercount adjustments.
So, why did they leave? The article also claims they were fired, which they can be as presidential appointees.
Then, right at the end, an unsubstantiated "source" makes an interesting claim: that the deputy was the target of the firing, not the head - who presumably was collateral casualty or resigned from principle rather than fire his deputy on behalf of the administration.
Why would they do that" he was "resisting pressure to appoint partisans to career posts"!!!
What?
How can you even be a partisan statistician? And why does anyone care.
In view of the DoJ shenanigans, this now looks serious, not curious. Just how deep is selective hiring of partisans into non-partisan civil service career positions going? And to what end?
Presumably it is something a little bit deeper than crude return of the old spoils system of patronage.