The actual assertion that the Census Bureau could behave in such a way as to tilt things one way or the other way in the partisan sense, is, on the face of it, a silly charge. It's the same Census Bureau that's considered to be incompetent by some people, and then some of the same people are saying that this incompetent agency is so clever and so Machiavellian that it can design a census for partisan reasons.

It's seriously unfortunate when an elected official of the federal government says she's [Michelle Bachmann] going to deliberately break the law. I don't know what kind of signal she thinks that sends, but if she believes that's a good signal, I'm sad for the country. I think that it's deeply, deeply, unfortunate that a member of Congress would, in effect, invite other people who feel that way to say, "Well, I don't have to do it either."

The first presidential veto, by George Washington, was a veto of Alexander Hamilton's formula for apportioning the House, and the one that Washington preferred was one that Thomas Jefferson produced, and that was one partisan issue. The apportionment formula that Jefferson produced gave an extra seat to Virginia. Everybody knew what that game was. Look, partisan interest in the census is simply nothing new.

The census is a scientific effort. We know that a census number is an estimate. It's not the truth,

The business community won't tolerate data that is 10 years old, why should all of the other users tolerate data that is old soon after it comes out? ... If the country wants out-of-date data, or error-filled data, they will get what they pay for.

are groups not likely to use the Internet.

And then we have attitudinal issues. We have people who are skeptical, indifferent, apathetic, don't want to cooperate. And we have people who are outright hostile and will refuse to be counted, ... So there is no way we will get to 100 percent. Our best estimate right now is that we are going to run harder to stay in place.

There's more information on your driver's license than on the census short form.

It is ... a complicated, challenging task. But the alternative is to just ignore them -- is to say, 'Well, even though we didn't count them and we know they are part of the United States, since we don't know where to put them, we'll just sort of leave them off the census rolls. That strikes us as a social injustice.

Never have we been so diverse, never have we been so many and never have we been so carefully measured.