Time is Not A Theoretical Variable

Carter and Signorino (2010) (hereinafter “CS”) add another arrow, a simple cubic polynomial in time, to the quiver of the binary time series—cross-section data analyst; it is always good to have more arrows in one's quiver. Since comments are meant to be brief, I will discuss here only two important issues where I disagree: are cubic duration polynomials the best way to model duration dependence and whether we can substantively interpret duration dependence.