Heritage Blowing Smoke

More today on the relationship between movement conservatism and facts. The Washington Times today reported on the Heritage's study on congressional district voting patterns and wealth (the Times validating Heritage? you don't say). Greg Sargent did a takedown:

So 84 of 167 of the wealthier House districts are controlled by Dems. That's a hair over 50% -- supposedly proving that Dems are the new party of the "rich."

But here's what's funny about this. Right now, roughly 54% of all House districts are controlled by Dems. So in reality, the percentage of the wealthier House districts controlled by Dems is actually lower than the percentage of districts Dems control overall. What's more, the households where the median income exceeds the national average are hardly all "rich." So this chief data point just doesn't support the claim.

See also Paul Krugman and Andrew Gelman. It seems Heritage sliced and diced its numbers pretty carefully, so if you just so much as sneeze, its case blows away.

Why is this so predictable?