Fruitful Comparisons

Turns that I am not the only person who thinks one can compare apples and oranges:

In IR and poli sci in general, we are often compelled to compare events/dynamics/cases that are not identical.  We do not have too many genetically identical rats upon which to experiment.  The world gives us stuff that we can then compare.  And we can glean much from these comparisons--whether they are most similar or most different.  We just need to be careful about what we are doing, how we are doing and how much we can generalize. 

Anyhow, sometimes pop culture and I agree on poli sci methods.  Ok, rarely.  But here is one example.