everybody knows how to type now. Everybody.

Unless there's a pertinent national security issue, I don't believe the FBI should be reporting the ongoing results of an investigation to the president.

FBI agents were pursuing what they thought was a potential cybercrime, or a breach of classified information.

...

Top officials signed off on the interviews, which occurred in late September and October, just before the U.S. presidential election. During Ms. Broadwell's first interview in September, she admitted to the affair and turned over her computer, the officials said.

On her computer, investigators found classified documents, the U.S. officials said, a discovery that raised new concerns.

At Mr. Petraeus's interview in the week before the election, he also admitted the affair and said he hadn't provided the classified documents to Ms. Broadwell. Agents conducted a second interview with Ms. Broadwell on Nov. 2. She also said Mr. Petraeus wasn't the source of the documents.

I read this three times and it makes no sense, and at best is non-responsive. They weren't investigating him for "marital infidelity" - do you have even the faintest notion of the facts thus far? - and you don't provide any reason for why they wouldn't inform the president of the investigation in any event.

I love it when liberals act shocked, shocked to learn that the cost of affirmative action is that peoples' accomplishments may be unfairly denigrated. As if opponents of AA didn't cite this as a specific problem with the policies, only to be handwaved away by liberals.

Why wouldn't you?

I love it when liberals act shocked, shocked to learn that the cost of affirmative action is that peoples' accomplishments may be unfairly denigrated. As if opponents of AA didn't cite this as a specific problem with the policies, only to be handwaved away by liberals.

"Gentlemen, shake hands with the man to the left of you. Now shake hands with the man to the right of you. You have just shaken hands with a valedictorian."

I love it when liberals act shocked, shocked to learn that the cost of affirmative action is that peoples' accomplishments may be unfairly denigrated by people like me

This indicates to me that Nate is a starry-eyed fool who will eventually be broken on the rocks of reality.

Nixon's dead?

I only half qualify, since I've rooted for Carolina since I was 12.

I love it when liberals act shocked, shocked to learn that the cost of affirmative action is that peoples' accomplishments may be unfairly denigrated by people like me


FTFY.

They weren't investigating him for "marital infidelity"

re: Petraeus, does anyone have the go-to article on what happened, and when, and who knew what, and when they knew it?

U.S. spy agencies are required to inform leaders of the intelligence committees of "significant intelligence activities," and the affair represented the potential for a security compromise, a congressional aide said.

However, U.S. officials briefed on the matter said the probe was closely held among officials at the FBI and Justice under a long-standing policy not to divulge information on continuing criminal investigations.

The disclosure policy was reinforced in a 2007 memorandum by Michael Mukasey, who was then attorney general under President George W. Bush. The memorandum, issued in the wake of the scandal over the firings of U.S. attorneys, sought to remind department employees that contacts with the White House and Congress about pending criminal matters were off limits.

The largest change I have seen in undergraduate writing over the past two decades involves how plagiarism affects their writing. The worst case I have seen was at an elite liberal-arts college where one student pasted in material from Wikipedia that included an image, URLs, and formatting. Most students are not as clumsy, but the internet has changed the way I structure research and writing assignments. As for syntax, spelling, and structural issues, it is as it was.

Math can be drilled.

I appreciate the nod to Deleuze there, and I promise you that I will keep an eye out for when Nate jumps the shark from modeling uncertain modulations of perceptibility to claiming to be presenting the thing-in-itself.

I'd like to think that if I randomly saved a baby who had fallen down a well and was called to sit on the talk show circuit for it, I'd also use that pulpit to criticize the pundits for the ways they make data say things it's incapable of saying. If I ever crash land an airplane in the Hudson River, I'm using my 15 minutes to go all Jon Stewart against Tucker Carlson on Crossfire, dammit. I don't hold against Nate the fact that he used the pulpit for a good purpose, even if it wasn't the point of his being in the pulpit, per se.

I also disagree that he gave them "more data in order to do just that." It's like blaming Oppenheimer for Nagasaki.

You claimed to be describing the world as it is--

Nitpick of limited usefulness: I claim to describe the world as it presents, not as it is.

that news media are giving audiences crap because that's what the audiences want. From that perspective, it doesn't matter what anyone within that structure does, because they'll always be dragged down by the stupid wants of those stupid audiences. What this has to do with Nate: I get the sense that Nate sees himself engaged in a bigger and more important project than he was with the baseball stuff. The stakes are certainly higher. So he seems to want to push the level of discourse up a notch, not just invent better tools. But that might be too much projecting on my part-- I don't read his work as regularly as a lot of people here do. I'll repeat that Silver's popularity isn't just as a result of his ability to produce good data-- being a good writer/communicator, and knowing how to build a brand around his data have helped a good deal. I know Nate used to do forensics stuff, so he's obviously trained in argumentation, and that comes out in his writing.

I think you are correct in that 1) the audiences get crap because they want crap and 2) the producers provide crap because that's what sells, and 3) Nate wants to be above it and 4) thinks he can help fix it with smarter data.

This indicates to me that Nate is a starry-eyed fool who will eventually be broken on the rocks of reality.

And Missouri was not part of the Confederacy.

Kentucky was not part of the Confederacy but is clearly very Southern in its identity.

Indian Territory had tribes that held slaves and many tribes allied themselves with the rebs.

Yskjfhsk lksdhfsyur ksldfl. LAKJFHK?

To whom it may concern regarding the United States federal elections of 2014, 2016 and beyond:

Allow me to introduce myself to you, the existing (or aspiring!) strategist for the Republican Party. My name is Eric Arnold Garland and I am a White Man. Boy, am I ever – you need sunglasses just to look at my photo!

If I read the news correctly, I fit a profile that is of extreme importance to the GOP, as I embody the archetype that fits your narrative of Real Americans. Just how much should my profile interest you? Are you sitting down?

My family lineage goes back to the MAYFLOWER, BOAT ONE!!! (Garland family of New England-> John Adams -> Howard Alden -> Plymouth colony ->KINGS OF MUTHAF***IN’ ENGLAND)
I am a heterosexual, married to the super Caucasian mother of my two beautiful children who are, inexplicably, EVEN WHITER THAN I AM.
I am college educated (Master’s degree!) and affluent.
I am a job creator and small businessman.
We pay a lot of taxes! Every year!
I grew up in a rural area and despise laziness!
Having started my own business, I have complained at length about the insanity of federal, state and local bureaucracy – and its deleterious impact on the innovative small businessman.
I currently live in the suburbs in a historically Red state.

HOLY WHITE PEOPLE, BATMAN!!! Wow, you’re thinking – this is not some Mexirican in the Sun Belt we need to attract via harsh anti-Castro policies or appeals to “valores de familia” - this is the BREAD AND BUTTER OF THE GRAND OLD PARTY, a Mayflower-descended small business owner, burdened by taxation, looking out for his beautiful White family in the suburbs of a city (St Louis) surrounded by racial tension and urban blight!

How can I put this gently? My wife and I are not sensitive to your messaging, nor did we vote for the candidates you proposed for us this past Tuesday.

Yskjfhsk lksdhfsyur ksldfl. LAKJFHK?

SdeB, Missouri and Kentucky had partisan representatives in the CSA legistlature but officially belonged to the Union.

As of Saturday November 10, 2012, 15 States have petitioned the Obama Administration for withdrawal from the United States of America in order to create its own government.

States following this action include: Louisiana, Texas, Montana, North Dakota, Indiana, Mississippi, Kentucky, North Carolina, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, New Jersey, Colorado, Oregon and New York. These States have requested that the Obama Administration grant a peaceful withdrawal from the United States.

These citizen generated petitions were filed just days after the 2012 presidential election.

Louisiana was the first State to file a petition a day after the election by a Michael E. from Slidell, Louisiana. Texas was the next State to follow by a Micah H. from Arlington, Texas.

The government allows one month from the day the petition is submitted to obtain 25,000 signatures in order for the Obama administration to consider the request.

Regarding the FBI investigation it seems OK to not tell the President during the early stages of the investigation. There are thousands of things (inclduing many investigations) the President could get told and since there is only so much time not everything gets through.

Perhaps Obama could have

I love it when liberals act shocked, shocked to learn that the cost of affirmative action is that peoples' accomplishments may be unfairly denigrated. As if opponents of AA didn't cite this as a specific problem with the policies, only to be handwaved away by liberals.

been the first president in foreever to not do political/PR events?

Also, it's racist to ever suggest that Affirmative Action helped anybody.

Perhaps Obama could have canceled his appearance on Bill Simmons's podcast to receive the news about an investigation involving the CIA director instead of talking college hoops

There was plenty of time.

Also, it's racist to ever suggest that Affirmative Action helped anybody.

Why is it important for the President to know who ###### who? Because that's what we're arguing here in regards to Petrasus.

No, but it is questionable to suggest anyone ever possibly helped by AA is automatically unqualified and job X should have gone to someone who could never have been helped (like a white male, just for example).

Yes. The Missou case is interesting because you had a runaway government, but the basic fact remained that no government could keep hold of Missouri and secede. The secessionist governor "ruled" from Arkansas and Texas. Kentucky is even weaker; Kentucky's legislature rejected secession. Calling them parts of the Confederacy is like calling Texas an independent nation because some guy on the Internet said so. It was a realistic hope that never came to be, and the claim of admission was a fantasy. More Kentuckians and Missourians fought for the United States than for the Confederacy.

My point is: If it didn't cross Obama's desk - and let's stipulate to that since at the moment that is apparently the story - why didn't it? "There wasn't enough time" is not a valid reason. This was an investigation involving the head of the CIA and the fact that his mistress had classified documents. That was not worthy of Obama's attention?

It seems that either his operatives shielded him from it deliberately or he wasn't running this ship in a sensible fashion.

I am not prepared to stipulate that it was, no. I know you have already decided it had to be a POTUS level briefing, but apparently the FBI didn't agree with you.

This is just you being an Obama hating partisan. Nothing more, nothing less. You're damning the man, sans even the most trivial of evidence, of either incompetence or malfaescence, based on nothing more than the vague gut feeling you have that the FBI should have done something they didn't do. This is just silly.

Well, Feinstein said yesterday that she and her committee should have been informed. Do you disagree?

So apparently now "Mr. President, Sir, we are investigating a breach of security involving the CIA director's mistress" are words that shouldn't be expected to be uttered to the president.

The one I remember is: Look to the person at your left. Look to the person at your right. In 4 yours, 1 of you won't be here." And that was not inaccurate.

But it's kind of a giveaway when "AA" is pointed out continually about minority (or female) AA hires, without simultaneously acknowledging the historic fact that AA has benefited far more white males than all of the minorities and women put together. It's also telling that virtually none of the people kvetching about "AA" today (or their ideological ancestors) ever lifted a finger to dismantle the original (and far deadlier) version of AA when it ruled virtually every institution in the country.

then tell the losers that they're racist when they point out the game is rigged against them.

Depending on what sort of standards you want to use, "unqualified" people have been getting admitted to schools and getting hired for jobs in this country ever since it began.

To whomever finds David Petraeus' affair an affront to decency or a dereliction of duty, I'd suggest you google "Kay Summersby."

All we've done is mandate winners and losers via policy in a zero sum game and then tell the losers that they're racist when they point out the game is rigged against them.

To be fair, in this thread they are more being called stupid for considering themselves a.) rigged against and b.) the losers.

The conservative view of AA:
So long as AA exists, all AA folks that fail at all, only failed because of AA (Because they did not belong there in the first place). If they succeed, they succeeded only because of AA. All non-AA folks succeed only because of their superiority and fail only because of AA.

If AA were to go away then we could go back to the past when the success and failure of white men was due to pure merit! Non-white men, sure they get merit too, we promise and this time we really mean it. Trust us.

So we're back to AA being absolutely necessarily while simultaneously it's apparently incredibly racist to believe that AA works. You guys can't have it both ways here.

So I guess we should be asking why Cantor didn't "do anything".

Despite efforts at FBI and the Justice Department to keep the investigation closely held, word of it leaked to a small number of lawmakers. Rep. David Reichert (R., Wash.) received a tip from an FBI employee that there was a national-security issue related to Mr. Petraeus, according to an aide. He forwarded the information to House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R., Va.), who alerted the FBI in October."

Brian Stelter of The New York Times reports that MSNBC is finally starting to catch up to Fox News in the rating game, mainly by becoming the left-wing answer to Fox's conservative cheerleaders. Stelter says MSNBC, which normally trails Fox News in overall ratings, managed to best their cable rival in the key 25-54 year-old demographic on three straight nights after last week's election. MSNBC still trails behind Fox and CNN in the number of overall viewers, but has closed the gap considerably in the recent years, by accepting their role as "the Anti-Fox News." The re-election of Barack Obama will only help MSNBC keep the ball rolling, as hosts like Rachel Maddow and Chris Matthews have become unapologetic supporters of "Obama's America" and stand to benefit from four more years of his liberal politics.

Lassus, some working class white guy who can't get a job as a firefighter even though his test scores are much, much better than those of minority applicants who do wind up getting the jobs is participating in a rigged game and is a loser of that game.

Actually, the guy whose test scores are worse because he had the misfortune of going to terrible schools in a district with no money,

It's not a money issue despite what Robinred says, as has been told to liberals repeatedly.

NEW YORK (AP) — The puppeteer who performs as Elmo on "Sesame Street" is taking a leave of absence from the popular kids' show in the wake of allegations that he had a relationship with a 16-year-old boy.

Then why are private schools so expensive?

The re-election of Barack Obama will only help MSNBC keep the ball rolling, as hosts like Rachel Maddow and Chris Matthews have become unapologetic supporters of "Obama's America" and stand to benefit from four more years of his liberal politics.

Summersby is not believed by most scholars

Lumping Maddow in with Matthews or any of the big names at Fox is just stupid. Maddow is a liberal; she is also a fantastically thorough journalist. She's as far above Matthews in MSNBC as Shep Smith is above Hannity on Fox.

In other media fun, Slate points out that you can go to Mitt Romney's Facebook page, note the number of "likes" under his name, wait a few seconds and then refresh the page. The number will have gone down. Romney's Facebook friends are dumping him in real time.

MSNBC, which normally trails Fox News in overall ratings, managed to best their cable rival in the key 25-54 year-old demographic on three straight nights after last week's election.

Fox News viewership was probably unusually depressed on November 7-9, as was their audience.

So we're back to AA being absolutely necessarily while simultaneously it's apparently incredibly racist to believe that AA works. You guys can't have it both ways here.

Why hasn't the South hasn't become a straight contest between the Tea Party and the GOP, or why isn't Oregon a contest of Dems vs Greens (though I know Greens are prominent out there)? The national two parties are stronger than I would have guessed just looking at the contours of the U.S. demographically.

It's not a money issue despite what Robinred says, as has been told to liberals repeatedly.

In other media fun, Slate points out that you can go to Mitt Romney's Facebook page, note the number of "likes" under his name, wait a few seconds and then refresh the page. The number will have gone down. Romney's Facebook friends are dumping him in real time.

This is totally plausible, but it wouldn't last very long. Our election system (single member district plurality voting and first past the poll) all but ensure we have a two party system until we get ourselves some instant runoff at minimum.