What WATT can't do

Every measurement has blind spots. Here are ours, in the open.

Jul 4, 2026 · 7 min read · Honest limits

Draft outline — to expand. The section headings below follow the copy deck (§12, M2). Replace this note and the placeholder lines with the full text.

Ghostwriters and staff: whose voice are we scoring?

Placeholder — a lot of "a leader's words" aren't theirs. What that does to the signal.

Thin and uneven records across eras and candidates

Placeholder — some figures have oceans of coverage, others a puddle.

The reductionism risk: a person is not a number

Placeholder — the danger of flattening a human being into a score, and how we resist it.

Coverage bias we can dampen but never delete

Placeholder — source weighting reduces bias; it does not erase it.

A high score ≠ a good outcome

Placeholder — perception is not performance; the map is not the territory.

How we keep WATT a "directional indicator," not a verdict

Placeholder — the guardrails that keep the number humble.

XLinkedIn
Keep reading