Morning in America: Butthurt Achieved

[Quality Start Machine]

So what they did, and it's brilliant even while cynical, is they hooked women to Obama through these Hollywood stars. These women were saying well 'George Clooney loves President Obama,' and a fair number of them I'm guessing said, 'so I love President Obama,' and the same thing with Sarah Jessica Parker. That to me, and this is obviously an overstatement, that to me is not what the Founding Fathers envisioned that when they were hoping for a well-informed electorate being advised of the issues and studying the issues, no, what we've devolved to is 'I love George Clooney, George Clooney loves President Obama, therefore I love President Obama.'

So...women were motivated to vote for Obama because of George Clooney and Sarah Jessica Parker?  More proof that I just don't understand women.

No. Women who already supported Obama were more motivated to donate to his campaign when offered a chance to win a dinner with them.

http://swampland.time.com/2012/11/07/inside-the-secret-world-of-quants-and-data-crunchers-who-helped-obama-win/

In late spring, the backroom number crunchers who powered Barack Obama's campaign to victory noticed that George Clooney had an almost gravitational tug on West Coast females ages 40 to 49. The women were far and away the single demographic group most likely to hand over cash, for a chance to dine in Hollywood with Clooney — and Obama.

So as they did with all the other data collected, stored and analyzed in the two-year drive for re-election, Obama's top campaign aides decided to put this insight to use. They sought out an East Coast celebrity who had similar appeal among the same demographic, aiming to replicate the millions of dollars produced by the Clooney contest. "We were blessed with an overflowing menu of options, but we chose Sarah Jessica Parker," explains a senior campaign adviser. And so the next Dinner with Barack contest was born: a chance to eat at Parker's West Village brownstone.

For the general public, there was no way to know that the idea for the Parker contest had come from a data-mining discovery about some supporters: affection for contests, small dinners and celebrity. But from the beginning, campaign manager Jim Messina had promised a totally different, metric-driven kind of campaign in which politics was the goal but political instincts might not be the means. "We are going to measure every single thing in this campaign," he said after taking the job. He hired an analytics department five times as large as that of the 2008 operation, with an official "chief scientist" for the Chicago headquarters named Rayid Ghani, who in a previous life crunched huge data sets to, among other things, maximize the efficiency of supermarket sales promotions.

So they pimped out the president? Nice.

Seems more like "pimping out" George Clooney and Sarah Jessica Parker.

They used Sarah Jessica Parker to sway the dressage horse vote away from Romney.

[Slaky]

It's good to remember there are still tons of people like this lady.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/gops-red-america-forced-to-rethink-its-image-of-country/2012/11/11/3bb15fb8-2ab0-11e2-bab2-eda299503684_story_2.html

[Quality Start Machine]

It's good to remember there are still tons of people like this lady.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/gops-red-america-forced-to-rethink-its-image-of-country/2012/11/11/3bb15fb8-2ab0-11e2-bab2-eda299503684_story_2.html

Worried about the direction of the country, but not enough to give up scrapbooking?

[J. Walter Weatherman]

This whole Petraeus business just keeps throwing us fresh twists...

WASHINGTON—A federal agent who launched the investigation that ultimately led to the resignation of Central Intelligence Agency chief David Petraeus was barred from taking part in the case over the summer due to superiors' concerns that he had become personally involved in the case, according to officials familiar with the probe.

...

The FBI agent who started the case was a friend of Jill Kelley, the Tampa woman who received harassing, anonymous emails that led to the probe, according to officials. Ms. Kelley, a volunteer who organizes social events for military personnel in the Tampa area, complained in May about the emails to a friend who is an FBI agent. That agent referred it to a cyber crimes unit, which opened an investigation.

However, supervisors soon became concerned that the initial agent might have grown obsessed with the matter, and prohibited him from any role in the investigation, according to the officials.

The FBI officials found that he had sent shirtless pictures of himself to Ms. Kelley, according to the people familiar with the probe.

[Armchair_QB]

This whole Petraeus business just keeps throwing us fresh twists...

WASHINGTON—A federal agent who launched the investigation that ultimately led to the resignation of Central Intelligence Agency chief David Petraeus was barred from taking part in the case over the summer due to superiors' concerns that he had become personally involved in the case, according to officials familiar with the probe.

...

The FBI agent who started the case was a friend of Jill Kelley, the Tampa woman who received harassing, anonymous emails that led to the probe, according to officials. Ms. Kelley, a volunteer who organizes social events for military personnel in the Tampa area, complained in May about the emails to a friend who is an FBI agent. That agent referred it to a cyber crimes unit, which opened an investigation.

However, supervisors soon became concerned that the initial agent might have grown obsessed with the matter, and prohibited him from any role in the investigation, according to the officials.

The FBI officials found that he had sent shirtless pictures of himself to Ms. Kelley, according to the people familiar with the probe.

They make movies about stuff like this.

[Bort]

The best part of the Petraeus scandal is that this is arguably the least ethically horrible thing a CIA director has ever done.

[CT III]

The best part of the Petraeus scandal is that this is arguably the least ethically horrible thing a CIA director has ever done.

Yeah, but do we really want a CIA director who can't even keep an affair secret?

[Bort]

The best part of the Petraeus scandal is that this is arguably the least ethically horrible thing a CIA director has ever done.

Yeah, but do we really want a CIA director who can't even keep an affair secret?

You'd think so, but given how historically bad they are at assassinating Castro and installing stable Central American dictators, simple competence isn't necessarily a requirement.

[Internet Apex]

Can't find the "Arizona" thread to bump, but this one obviously applies.

http://news.yahoo.com/arizona-woman-runs-down-husband-car-not-voting-045426220.html

[CT III]

Can't find the "Arizona" thread to bump, but this one obviously applies.

http://news.yahoo.com/arizona-woman-runs-down-husband-car-not-voting-045426220.html

Bah.  Like one vote ever made a difference.

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/race-city-council-tied-wife-candidate-doesn-t-161355890.html

[J. Walter Weatherman]

http://disappearingromney.com

Via...

http://www.reddit.com/r/mildlyinteresting/comments/132z6x/if_you_go_to_mitt_romneys_facebook_page_and_then/

If you go to Mitt Romney's facebook page and then click refresh, you can actually see his number of likes going down.

[Tonker]

By the way, do you think we could get the title of this thread changed to the correct spelling of "achieved"?

It just bugs me, that's all.

[PenPho]

By the way, do you think we could get the title of this thread changed to the correct spelling of "achieved"?

It just bugs me, that's all.

[BH]

I'm guessing this guy has some serious butthurt.

"My 15-year-old son, however, he was all about it."

[CT III]

I'm guessing this guy has some serious butthurt.

"My 15-year-old son, however, he was all about it."

Fortunately, he cites his day job as a professional wrestler, so fighting off such opponents is not likely to be difficult.

IRONICALLY this is a guy who should benefit hugely from Obamacare.