Official Washington is one of the last redoubts of the thumb-tapping BlackBerry user. The new Digital Government Strategy, released on Wednesday, contains hints that the BlackBerry is on the way out as federal government’s leading mobile device. For R.I.M., the Canadian company that makes the BlackBerry, the key phrase in the document is “device-agnostic security and privacy controls.” For IT specialists, a big part of the appeal of Blackberry has been in its secure connection to data servers. The government now is looking to secure its data at the source, rather than secure individual devices. As part of the plan, the General Services Administration has been tasked with creating “government-wide mobile-device management platform” that is designed to work across operating systems. The Federal Chief Information ... Continue reading →

If these forays seem random, it’s because at least some of them almost certainly are. To those familiar with the campaign’s operations, such irregular efforts at paid communication are indicators of an experimental revolution underway at Obama’s Chicago headquarters. They reflect a commitment to using randomized trials, the result of a flowering partnership between Obama’s team and the Analyst Institute, a secret society of Democratic researchers committed to the practice, according to several people with knowledge of the arrangement. (Through a spokeswoman, Analyst Institute officials declined to comment on the group’s work with Obama and referred all questions to the campaign’s press office, which did not respond to an inquiry on the subject.) Continue reading →

George LeMieux is an old hand running political campaigns, but he wound up in the U.S. Senate by ferociously campaigning for just one vote: Gov. Charlie Crist's.How LeMieux pulled it off — tapped to serve a vacant Senate seat in 2009 by a governor who had reservations about his former chief of staff — speaks volumes about LeMieux's ambition, savvy and knack for bare-knuckle politics that's again playing out as he campaigns to unseat incumbent Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson."He really wanted to do it. So he was going to do everything he could," former Lt. Gov. Jeff Kottkamp said. "He really, really wanted to do it."Kottkamp had been told he would be picked. Other top contenders included former Secretary of State Jim Smith, U.S. Rep. ... Continue reading →

By Jason Kirk - College Football Editor While we wait for the late-summer conference realignment scramble, let's go ahead and prepare ourselves for the best and the worst. Follow @SBNationCFB Follow @sbnation on Twitter, and Like SBNation.com on Facebook. May 23, 2012 - With college football playoff details coming later this summer, likely by early July, we know conference realignment moves are on hold for the time being. Once the 2014 playoff system comes out, the free-for-all is back on, with the renewed possibility of Notre Dame easing into the Big 12 as its NBC deal runs out, upping the stakes even more. We have a good sense of the general moves still on the board, but if we really are entering the long-prophesied, 64-team ... Continue reading →