… In politics and beyond, we often use numbers to validate our intuitions and to measure the vagaries of life, yet we know that these numbers are often imprecise. And perhaps more than any prior election, this year’s race has shown how easily numbers can be abused, exploited or misconstrued.
The campaigns of Obama and Mitt Romney have used numbers as weapons dressed as incontrovertible facts, often pulling them out of context and ignoring contrary evidence. But the misuse of numbers goes beyond political machinations. [cont.]
Zachary A. Goldfarb, Washington Post