White House Correspondents Insider

Behind the scenes of the most powerful city in the world — Washington, D.C. — and those who cover it.

Nate Silver vs. The Academy

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Google Talk with Nate Silver

The Academy Awards have been as mysterious as the electoral college, but perhaps no more? Nate Silver, flexing his mighty 2012 election data, announced today that he’d take a third try at figuring out why little gold men go to certain people and not others.

“My track record? Nine correct picks in 12 tries, for a 75 percent success rate. Not bad, but also not good enough to suggest that there is any magic formula for this,” he wrote. Even a 75 percent standing is impressive when many self-proclaimed “oscar gurus” are on par with their politico cousins in D.C. Sure, saying a democrat will take California is just as easy as saying that a Steven Spielberg film could get Best Picture or Daniel Day-Lewis is convincing as Abraham Lincoln.

Silver instead relied on the same formula from the election: taking a variety of data from insider (e.g. The Directors Guild of America, Screen Actors Guild) and outsider (e.g. Chicago Film Critics Association, Golden Globes) sources that’ve chosen their favorites. The data does appear to be skewing heavily for Argo to take Best Picture while Lincoln sweeps up the rest. But it’s the Best Supporting Actress category that will make or break Silver’s future chances at Oscar:

“There is considerably less reason for last-minute campaigning in this category: Anne Hathaway as about as safe a bet to win for “Les Misérables” as Mitt Romney was to win Utah. If Sally Field or Amy Adams wins instead, it will probably be time for me to retire from the Oscar-forecasting business.”

We’ll find out on Sunday whether Nate Silver can ever show his face in Hollywood ever again.

Petraeus Resigns After Probe Discovers Affair

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Barely a month ago, General David Petraeus and his wife Holly attended the premiere of Argo posing with Bryan Cranston and having the Breaking Bad actor leave his daughter a voice mail from the reception. That was the good news. The bad news: the general resigned his position as head of the CIA earlier this afternoon according to NBC News.

An FBI probe had uncovered that Petraeus had been compromised by his own biographer, Paula Broadwell, author of “All In: The Education of General David Petraeus,” who had tried to gain access to his email and other sensitive information. Slate named her as the other half of the affair that was uncovered by the FBI probe.

Broadwell made the media rounds earlier this year, including an odd interview with The Daily Show that becomes extremely cringeworthy toward the end. She recently published “David Petraeus’ Rules for Living” on The Daily Beast. Likewise, in hindsight, the fourth rule seems to come at an awkward time for the former director of the CIA:

There is an exception to every rule, standard operating procedure, and poli­cy; it is up to leaders to determine when exceptions should be made and to ex­plain why they made them.

Ben Affleck and General David Petraeus at ARGO Premiere

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The Embassy of Canada was ground zero for spooks, State Department officials and some of the best actors in Hollywood, Ben Affleck, John Goodman, Bryan Cranston and even Jennifer Garner. Time Warner’s Carol Melton along with the Canadian Ambassador welcomed the star-studded crowd that included Robert Anders, a consular officer at the U.S. embassy 33 years ago, who along with 5  American Embassy colleagues hid at the Canadian Ambassador’s Tehran residence until they could be slipped out of Tehran after the Embassy was overtaken.

Tony Mendez, the CIA agent who created an almost laughable but effective path to sneak the six Americans out of the country, received a big welcome from Ben Affleck.  Mr. Affleck spoke with pride about the joy of bringing this almost unknown great chapter in American Canadian cooperation to life.  He introduced CIA Director General David Petraeus and his wife Holly, saying he was “honored to be in the room with him.”

Actor Bryan Cranston was overheard taping a video greeting to the Petraeus’s daughter who could not attend the event.

Guests included the State Department’s Huma Abedin and husband, former Congressman Anthony Weiner who pointed out Huma got a screen credit in the film. CIA General Counsel Stephen Preston, NYT’s Maureen Dowd, PBS’s Gwen Ifill and Lisa Davis, Investigative reporter Mark Hosenball and AP’s Kimberly Dozier were part of the packed house.  Media favorites Men’s Health’s Marc Adelman, the Washington Post’s Amy Argetsinger, RNC flack Sean Spicer, Senator Boxer’s Laura Schiller, CNN’s Joe Johns and Sam Feist sipped water and ate up the popcorn and the story of a successful American CIA mission. Part of the film was shot at the State Department and the actors visited CIA headquarters.