For many people - more than you might think - public and political
dialogue seems dominated by extreme views that don't resonate.

A new study suggests a possible reason: People with extreme views seem more willing to share their opinions than others, but only if they believe, even falsely, that their views are popular.

However, the research looked at only a narrow topic range and
involved just college students, so more study would be needed to reveal
whether the findings apply broadly to other age groups and beliefs.

Still, the findings are intriguing.

The upshot of the research: Students who held extreme views on the
use of alcohol on campus were more likely than others to voice their
views. The key to their bold approach, scientists found, was that they
tended to believe their views actually represented a majority, when
that was not in fact the case.

That situation can set up a self-feeding cycle that promotes the
voicing of extreme views on one side of an issue and causes moderate
and even extremists on the other side to stay relatively quiet.

"When people with extreme views have this false sense that they are
in the majority, they are more willing to express themselves," said
Kimberly Rios Morrison, co-author of the study and assistant professor
of communication at Ohio State University. Those who take the extreme
version of their group's viewpoint may believe that they actually
represent the true views of their group, Morrison figures.

The studies

In a series of studies, Morrison and her co-author, Dale Miller of
Stanford University, found that college students who were extremely
pro-alcohol were more likely to express their opinions than others,
even though most students surveyed were moderate in their views about
alcohol use.

"Students who were stridently pro-alcohol tended to think that their
opinion was much more popular than it actually was," she said. "They
seemed to buy into the stereotype that college students are very
comfortable with alcohol use."

The results were detailed recently in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology.

The studies were done at Stanford, where alcohol use is prohibited
in common areas of all freshman dorms. In the first study, 37 students
were asked to rate their own views about this policy on a scale from 1
(very strongly opposed) to 9 (very strongly in favor).

The average students' own views were near the mid-point of the
scale, but most rated the typical Stanford student as more pro-alcohol
than themselves.

"There's this stereotype that college students are very pro-alcohol,
and even most college students believe it," Morrison said. "Most
students think of themselves as less pro-alcohol than average."

In the next two studies, students again rated themselves on similar
scales that revealed how pro-alcohol they were. They were then asked
how willing they would be to discuss their views on alcohol use with
other Stanford students.

In general, students who were the most pro-alcohol were the most
likely to say they wanted to express their views, compared to those
with moderate or anti-alcohol views.

A telling twist

Then researchers added a twist, giving participants fake data that
indicated that other Stanford students held relatively conservative,
anti-alcohol views. When extremely pro-alcohol students viewed this
data, they were less likely to say they were willing to discuss alcohol
usage with their fellow students.

"It is only when they have this sense that they are in the majority
that extremely pro-alcohol students are more willing to express their
views on the issue," Morrison said.

Interestingly, however, students who had more extreme anti-alcohol
views still did not desire to express them, even after seeing the data
that suggested a majority of their fellow students agreed with them.

"Their views that they are in the minority may be so deeply
entrenched that it is difficult to change just based on our one
experiment," Morrison said. "In addition, they don't have the
experience expressing their opinions on the subject like the
pro-alcohol extremists do, so they may not feel as comfortable."

The findings suggest possible parallels in politics, Morison figures.

She cites a hypothetical community that tends to be moderate
politically, but leans slightly liberal. People with more extreme
liberal views in the community may be more likely than others to attend
publicly visible protests and display bumper stickers espousing their
liberal views, because they think the community supports them.

A self-feeding cycle might ensue.

"Everyone else sees these extreme opinions being expressed on a
regular basis and they may eventually come to believe their community
is more liberal than it actually is," Morrison said. "The same process
could occur in moderately conservative communities.

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PHILADELPHIA – Some Dodgers lingered in the dugout, staring at another wild Phillies celebration on the infield.
Most of them headed back to the clubhouse.
After all, the Dodgers saw this show before. The sequel was just as bad as the original.
Bounced again in the NL championship series by Philadelphia for the second straight year, the Dodgers squandered home-field advantage and their league-best 95 wins seemed about as empty as Philadelphia's discarded champagne bottles.
It might be time to call rewrite in Los Angeles.
The NL West champions made all the right moves in the regular season, but they flopped two straight years in the NLCS.
Ryan Howard, Jimmy Rollins, Chase Utley and Cole Hamels aren't leaving Philadelphia any time soon. The Dodgers are going to have to make some bold moves this offseason if they want to get past Philly and return to the World Series.
"It'd be nice to be celebrating like that," third baseman Casey Blake said.
They weren't even close to a wild and wet locker room party. If not for Utley's costly error in Game 2, the Dodgers would have been swept.
"There's a lot going on in that clubhouse. There's a lot going on in their stomachs, which is good," manager Joe Torre said. "They care a great deal. I don't think the Phillies wanted it more than us, it was just that they were able to do it."
Every possible weakness was exposed in the five-game series.
Closer Jonathan Broxton, who went 7-2 with 36 saves in 42 opportunities and a 2.61 ERA, was done in for the second straight year in Game 4 by aging pinch-hitter Matt Stairs. Stairs fashioned himself a Philly folk hero last year with his winning two-run homer off Broxton, and he coaxed a four-pitch walk Monday that led to the tying run in a ninth-inning rally.
The rest of a supposedly deep and strong bullpen flopped, and there was no true stopper anchoring the rotation.
Los Angeles hoped 21-year-old Clayton Kershaw would be the postseason ace, but he posted a 9.45 ERA in the NLCS. The Phillies picked up former Cy Young Award winner Cliff Lee and Pedro Martinez to bolster their staff down the stretch. The Dodgers countered with Phillies castoff Vicente Padilla — and he promptly got rocked on a familiar mound in a Game 5 loss.
"We kept passing around that No. 1 pitcher thing all year long, and I think we have a couple of guys in that clubhouse that certainly eventually will emerge as being capable of doing that stuff," Torre said.
Torre hasn't duplicated his World Series trips in Los Angeles, although he extended his streak of consecutive managerial playoff appearances to 14, tying the record set by Atlanta's Bobby Cox from 1991-05.
Torre won four World Series titles with the Yankees, the last in 2000.
The 69-year-old manager has one year left on a three-year deal he signed after 12 seasons guiding the New York Yankees. He plans to return for at least one more year and try and win his first World Series title in the National League.

"It's still something that keeps me around and keeps me wanting to do it some more," Torre said.

And then there's Manny Ramirez. Who knows what the dreadlocked slugger is thinking about heading into the offseason. Ramirez, whose season was interrupted by a 50-game suspension for violating baseball's drug policy, will likely exercise his $20 million option for next season and return to his familiar cleanup spot.

Ramirez was 5 for 19 with one home run and two RBIs in the series against the Phillies. The homer was his only extra-base hit.

The Dodgers have the most potential players (16) eligible for free agency and most of them don't figure to return. They took care of one contract this week when Ned Colletti agreed to a long-term extension to stay on as general manager.

The Dodgers have reached the postseason in three of his four seasons.

Not bad, but not a World Series.

"We have the capability, we have the talent, but that's all well and good," Torre said. "It's like having that good team on paper. You still have to go out there and play between the lines."

INDIANAPOLIS – Indiana said it was going to get outsourcing right when it turned welfare eligibility services over to a private contractor in 2007. Now critics say the failed move is the latest warning that states should not allow for-profit companies to run social services.
The ambitious, $1.34 billion effort to automate applications for food stamps, Medicaid and other welfare benefits was being closely watched after states such as Texas had problems when they tried similar plans.
Indiana fired IBM Corp. as the lead contractor on the project Thursday over problems including lost documents, delays in benefit approvals and poor service.
"Other states should beware," said Jim Wallihan, an advocate for senior citizens in Indiana. "Indiana's been a good demonstration, along with Texas, that there's some variables involved that just don't take well to privatization."
From the beginning, officials said Indiana had learned from the experiences of other states and was confident it had a better approach. But its contract with IBM quickly led to a long list of complaints.
Gov. Mitch Daniels, a privatization supporter who leased the Indiana Toll Road and proposed outsourcing the Hoosier Lottery, said IBM didn't make enough progress to fix poor service. Indiana will retain other private contractors as it works to create a new hybrid welfare eligibility system.
IBM has said it believed it was making progress and that high unemployment led to more demands on the welfare system, making the changes more difficult.
Daniels said the decision to cut ties with IBM is a reflection on the company's specific plan, not of the merits of privatization.
"It has nothing to do with private or public," Daniels said Thursday. "It had to do with a concept. If you've had tried to use the same concept IBM brought, and every worker was a state worker, you'd have had exactly the same results, or worse."
Both Indiana and Texas — where thousands of children lost health insurance because of problems from an outsourcing experiment that ended in 2007 — learned a costly lesson, said Celia Hagert, a senior policy analyst at the Center for Public Policy Priorities in Texas.
Yet more states could still consider privatization — touted as a way to save money — as they search for budget cuts during the economic downturn, she said.
"These two huge and costly errors in Texas and Indiana should give any state pause when it thinks that privatization is going to save them money, because it's not," Hagert said. "It causes a lot of damage."
That won't stop states from turning to privatization as a way to cut costs in the future, predicted Dru Stevenson, a professor at the South Texas College of Law who opposes the practice.
"States will continue to fall for this and it will continue to backfire," he said.
But Michael Kerr, senior director of state and local issues for the industry group TechAmerica, said private companies can give states better data, more predictable spending, additional skills and more manageable infrastructure while eliminating waste and fraud.
"It's just a question of finding the right mix of technology and delivery and cultural change and such that would enable some of these larger projects to work well," he said.
While Indiana has cut out IBM, it's keeping other companies, which will now work directly for the state's Family and Social Services Administration.
"The state may be taking a more direct managerial role, but I don't see very much being different despite the fanfare," said Stacy Dean, director of food stamp policy for the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a Washington-based think tank and advocate for low-income people.

The FSSA will develop a detailed plan by Dec. 14 for a new hybrid welfare system that Daniels said will incorporate successful elements of Indiana's old, face-to-face process along with the call centers, document imaging and other automation IBM and its partners introduced.

That was little consolation to Rene Fuller, a case manager at a women's shelter in Anderson who has helped residents there contend with lost documents and other problems in the new system.

"I have a fear that it's going to get worse before they can make any improvements," Fuller said. "We're kind of holding our breath, to be quite honest with you."

___

Associated Press Writer Mike Smith contributed to this report.

BILLINGS, Mont. – A convicted con artist from California who roiled a southeastern Montana community with his unlikely bid to take over its empty jail said he intends to return to the state and pursue a military training center.
Michael Hilton, 55, is the lead figure of Santa Ana, Calif.-based American Police Force. The company struck a deal last month with unwitting officials in rural Hardin, Mont. to take over its never-used, 464-bed jail.
In his first interviews since the jail deal's collapse, an unapologetic Hilton told The Associated Press that his intentions were honest but his "tainted" name and a business partner who turned against him helped sink the deal.
"What happened in my past, I admit it. I'm not proud nor ashamed," he said, adding that "there was nothing malicious" in his jail proposal.
Hilton's run-ins with authorities stretch back more than two decades, to a 1988 arrest for credit card fraud. He spent three years in prison in California in the 1990s and has outstanding civil judgments against him totaling more than $1.1 million.
But he said his intentions in Hardin had been sincere and that he "stood my ground" when his background caught up to him.
The Montana jail plans unraveled after media revelations about Hilton's criminal past sparked an investigation by Montana Attorney General Steve Bullock. Hardin had been desperate to fill its jail after it sat empty for two years. Officials with the city's economic development agency signed a deal with Hilton without a thorough background check.
The deal was never ratified by US Bank, the trustee on $27 million in bonds used to build the jail.
Hilton now claims to have an agreement to lease 1,200 acres in Big Horn County for a tactical military training ground. He says he will be a "consultant" on the project because his investors no longer want him at the forefront. "We're going to build that. It's not an empty promise," he said.
The lease agreement for the supposed training center was said to be with a prominent Hardin businessman and rancher.
Details offered by Hilton could not be immediately confirmed, but there were strongly expressed doubts.
"(Hilton) just goes onto the next plan, then the next plan, then the next," said Maziar Mafi, a Santa Ana, Calif. trial attorney. "He never stops because the minute he stops, nobody's going to believe."
Mafi invested $35,000 in the jail plan and helped craft the contract between Hardin and American Police Force before cutting his ties to the project.
Hilton says Mafi undermined the jail deal by failing to file the necessary paperwork to incorporate American Police Force in Montana. Mafi said he didn't do so because Hilton had asked that his name be left off the documents, raising suspicion for the attorney.
No criminal charges have been filed over the scuttled jail deal, although state and federal authorities are investigating.
The executive director of the city agency that owns the jail, Greg Smith with the Two Rivers Authority, resigned last week for undisclosed reasons.
"I never asked for any bribes, nor did I bribe anybody," Hilton said.
A native of Montenegro with at least 17 aliases, Hilton adopted the title "captain" when he formed American Police Force. He has pegged the cost of the proposed training ground and a related dormitory for more than 200 trainees at $17 million.

Yet he's struggled to keep up with far smaller financial obligations, such as $1,000 debt to a Hardin bed and breakfast where he and several associates stayed for several days in September. Hilton said he was "transferring money from one account to another account" to pay off the debt.

Such promises appear to be stacking up too quickly for Hilton's Montana spokeswoman, Becky Shay, who is now seeking Smith's former post at the Two Rivers Authority after failing to receive a paycheck from Hilton after three weeks on the job.

Shay quit her job as a reporter covering Hardin for the Billings Gazette Sept. 25, when Hilton offered her $60,000 a year and a company car. After the Mercedes SUV she was using courtesy of Hilton was reclaimed this week by Mafi, Hilton's former business partner, Shay was back in her old car — a 1999 Dodge Intrepid with balding tires.