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Nate Silver blasted for comparing Covid school closures to Iraq war: 'Worst take of 2022'

Silver tweeted about Covid-related school closures calling it 'a disastrous,invasion-of-Iraq magnitude (or perhaps greater) policy decision'

Statistician Nate Silver is being slammed for comparing school closures due to Covid-19 with the decision to go to war in Iraq. His comment came after some school districts took the decision to have students return to remote learning because of soaring Omicron infections and staffing shortages.

Clara Jeffery, the editor-in-chief of Mother Jones, said there was a “lot of liberal pundit handwringing to the effect of ‘we can close schools now that we know of the great harms to kid’s mental health.'” She said: “Is anyone pushing closures that aren’t solely prompted by staff shortages due to their own infections?” In a follow-up message, Jeffery wrote that “pundits seem to be fighting the last war. Excepting SFUSD,” referring to the San Francisco Unified School District, whose officials want schools to stay open. She said that “even SFUSD isn’t headed toward indefinite closures.”

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'Disastrous, invasion-of-Iraq magnitude policy decision'

Silver responded to Jeffery’s tweet, writing: “Suppose you think that school closures were a disastrous, invasion-of-Iraq magnitude (or perhaps greater) policy decision. Shouldn’t that merit some further reflection?” Jeffery then addressed Silver directly, tweeting: “You think this was a policy decision… equivalent to the deaths of 460,000 people and the destabilizing of an entire region And…do you think parents and educators have not been reflecting?” Silver replied: “Yeah, I think depriving tens of millions of school children of an in-person education for a year or longer is absolutely on that magnitude. No question.”

Journalist James Fallows tweeted that while “school closures were a mistake,” the decision was made in “conditions of genuine fluid uncertainty. Nothing about Iraq decision is comparable.” Silver replied by tweeting “sometimes, large mistakes are made under conditions of uncertainty, even by good, well-meaning people." He later said, "The evidence points toward this being a really bad decision. And it’s a high-stakes, tantamount-to-going-to-war decision."

'The worst take of 2022 already'

MSNBC host Mehdi Hasan has called Silver “insane” for Silver to compare “school closures to protect kids and teachers from a deadly virus, to a war of choice that killed 100s of 1000s of innocent men, women, & children. Ladies and gents, we may have the worst take of 2022 already.”

Others have also chimed in: "I keep hearing Nate Silver is smart, but then I keep seeing what he says," one of them said, while another commented, "Lukewarm take: Part of the reason Nate Silver and Matt Y are hostile towards academics is b/c they're used to being the smartest guy in the room. Academia sort of forces you to wrestle with the fact that you're seldom the smartest in the room, no matter how smart you are." A third noted, "Karl Rove is making sense and Nate Silver is making nonsense. Welcome to 2022." The next remarked, "Apparently Nate Silver like school waaaayyyyy more than the rest of us." One of them added, "Missing some school in America is deemed as painful as literally dying in Iraq. Muslim life means so little to pundits like Nate Silver. Wow." Another wrote, "Nate Silver is so far gone. Equating two years of interrupted in-person classes with 20 years of war that killed over 46,000 civilians is beyond repugnant while only looking at the US is just disturbing."

A commenter tweeted, "I respected Nate Silver, the number cruncher; I loathe Nate Silver, the pundit. He pivoted hard into punditry." One more pointed out, "Nate Silver, sub-Trump scum of the Earth." Another quipped, "Do you think Nate silver was his birth name or just a pseudonym given because his opinions are rarely given a ~second~ thought." A person reacted with, "Nate Silver with a take so insane I stared at it for like 5 minutes." One more said, "Nate’s gotta do something with his life since phone polls no longer actually work." Another stated, "Nate Silver lost the plot in 2016. He just speaks now to hear his own voice." The next commented, "I remember when 538 was a private website that simply showed us Obama was likely gonna win in 2008. When did Nate Silver go full Q???"