tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3856837.post1314498948808582869..comments2023-10-24T09:06:30.200-04:00Comments on No More Mister Nice Blog: HOW JAMES COMEY PERSUADES HIMSELF THAT HE'S REALLY A STRAIGHT SHOOTERSteve M.http://www.blogger.com/profile/11963290427258439242noreply@blogger.comBlogger9125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3856837.post-51979996381115029632016-11-01T21:43:35.772-04:002016-11-01T21:43:35.772-04:00Very gentlemanly of you to give Comey such a fine ...Very gentlemanly of you to give Comey such a fine benefit of the doubt. I'm sure he's just trying to be fair. What gets me is the anodyne: "but rather to disrupt the integrity of the political system and undermine America’s standing in the world more broadly." Kind of like the Russians are just some juvenile delinquents out for the hell of it. Remember when they were the Masters of Deceit, any move, however small, was always a carefully thought out step in a master plan for world domination. They used to be the great chess players, ten steps ahead of us soft-minded liberals. Now it's as if they couldn't possibly strategize far enough ahead to know whether a Clinton or a Trump presidency would be better for their foreign policy. <br /><br /><br />Arjayhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18108983588844633646noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3856837.post-4973078697279887682016-11-01T13:36:16.521-04:002016-11-01T13:36:16.521-04:00Who cares what Comey tells himself? There is no o...Who cares what Comey tells himself? There is no one on earth easier to lie to than yourself, because there is no one who has a greater interest in believing your lies.<br /><br />Not to violate Godwin's law or anything, because I am certainly not comparing Comey to Hitler- maybe Vidkun Quisling, but not Hitler- but do you have any doubt that Hitler had convinced himself that he was acting in the world's long term best interests? It is no trick at all to convince yourself that you acted with the best of intentions.Green Eaglehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13477132834757467690noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3856837.post-30529797434192708532016-11-01T11:34:14.895-04:002016-11-01T11:34:14.895-04:00"it's been done several times"
The ..."it's been done several times"<br /><br />The rate going back thru the wild card era derives from only 5 times in the last 35 instances in either of the two best-of-seven series contexts (i.e. World Series or League Championship Series) where a team trailing either 1 game or 2 games to 3 went on to win that series. And only 2 of those 5 were of the former sort . That SEEMS to mean about a 15% chance, but then remember the Cubs were behind 1 game to 3 before Sunday's clash, so their task from before thhen was more like a 5-6% chance. One could choose to blend the 2 & get a ratio of ~1:11. And that's with a LOT of over-determined fanboy navel-gazing.<br /><br />IMO Silver is full of crap. Two routes to this view:<br /><br />A) I followed his blog from early in the 2008 cycle. Early on I noted his admission that his 'system' had some 'special sauce', which he partly cast in "fundamentals" and otherwise in some proprietary hidden goop. <br />He was MUCH better in 2012 when the NYT provided him its platform, I think because he depressed most of his special secret sauce nonsense in favor of adhere more closely to pure aggregation. Since he left NYT to set up his own site, he's gone back to hitting the special secret sauce, har. Sam Wang at PEC regularly spanks Silver for this.<br /><br />Wang has a HRC win in the upper 90s%. The NYT new flava fave, the Upshot, so has nothing like the need Silver has to be 'special' but also has to add something saucy to distinguish it from PEC, has HRC at a bit above 90s%. Historically Wang hasn't just spanked Silver, he & his PEC pure aggregation system mostly kicked 538's butt.<br /><br />B) The context of one or two scenarios lifted from first- to-4-wins sportsball series isn't usefully comparable to a 10 months of aggregated polling gathering up 50 different crab-lobster death struggles in 50 different patches of ocean floor. The reason the Best Team In MLB doesn't have much more than 1 chance in 8 of winning the WS, assuming it ever gets to the postseason without having to play in the Wild Card game, is that over the course of many millions of computer simulated seasons based on the statistics from 112 modern MLB seasons, one standard deviation in skill has been shown to amount to juuuust a bit outside low of a 1:25 edge, while one standard deviation in chance has been proven to amount to a juuuust a bit outside high of 1:25. The difference between the 2 amounts to about one in 167. And like with coin tosses (See the opening scene in Rosencranz & Guildenstern Are Dead), the odds reset to the same for EVERY SINGLE game in the overall competition.<br /><br />But this presidential election is a contest in which there are self-contained points tests where Trump has NO chance, and others where Clinton has ZERO chance. The difference between them is that Clinton has SO MANY MORE points already safely stowed away in her handbag before the overall competition versus how many Trump already has his money-grubbing tiny mitts all over, so clinch the overall, she just doesn't have to do much at all.<br /><br />So tonight, when the somewhat-better-at-baseball Chicagoans face the up-1-game with home field & last at bats Clevelanders, neither team enjoys any comparable head start.<br /><br />I don't read much on 538 - maybe Harry Enten if I notice he's got something interesting up. But I'm a totally addicted NoMore because Steve M. is an honest vendor of political analysis who is trying to b.s. anyone with secret special sauce and so often produced good solid pieces like this one or quirky offbeat ones that mostly can't be found elsewhere. Also, because you like Pierce & he likes you, and those alone mean you start every piece with 265 blogger votes already in the bag, AFAIC.Feud Turgidsonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05379322096770703017noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3856837.post-87986985403540990402016-11-01T10:38:18.806-04:002016-11-01T10:38:18.806-04:00Folks listen up. All the Trump-Russia leaks from t...Folks listen up. All the Trump-Russia leaks from the FBI are coming from Comey himself. It is his way of making amends for the Hillary email mess. Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14006984334289913006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3856837.post-69071324290433783882016-11-01T10:33:34.116-04:002016-11-01T10:33:34.116-04:00Oh, and please make it snappy!
I have a funeral t...Oh, and please make it snappy!<br /><br />I have a funeral to go to.<br />My own...Victorhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06609452382111686086noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3856837.post-90347913448796533432016-11-01T10:30:49.889-04:002016-11-01T10:30:49.889-04:00Bar-keep!
Please, another airplane modeling glue m...Bar-keep!<br />Please, another airplane modeling glue martini - wet, dirty, and with extra rat-fucker feces-stuffed lives!<br /><br />Oh, and a side of horse-doovers:<br />Let me have a few sniff's of coke, some meth, a crack-pipe, a full bong, and heroin as well as as syringe, some rubber cords to tie-off with, a spoon, and a lighter.<br />Thank you...Victorhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06609452382111686086noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3856837.post-14876591660400179472016-11-01T08:54:29.534-04:002016-11-01T08:54:29.534-04:00Two points: 1) absolutely nothing connected in any...Two points: 1) absolutely nothing connected in any way to Putin is ever just "innocent" and 2) Republicans always play much more ruthless hardball than Democrats and have absolutely no compunction about breaking the law, cheating, ratfcking and any other damnable behavior because their voters are always IOKIYAR.Jimbohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13891331049535299222noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3856837.post-33297589530051473132016-11-01T08:29:37.954-04:002016-11-01T08:29:37.954-04:00That said, yes, I'm sure that's the kind o...That said, yes, I'm sure that's the kind of thing Comey tells himself.Yastreblyanskyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08335868257729063363noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3856837.post-78543167352145050102016-11-01T08:28:14.734-04:002016-11-01T08:28:14.734-04:00It's not a benign analysis! "It's OK ...It's not a benign analysis! "It's OK , the Russian government isn't trying to interfere in who gets elected, they're merely trying to make our government permanently dysfunctional and unable to carry out effective foreign policy." If it were merely about politics Comey would be right to leave it unpublicized at the time of the election (though he'd still be wrong in refusing to do the same with the Weiner case). But it's not.Yastreblyanskyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08335868257729063363noreply@blogger.com