<p><strong><em>Added in Edit</em></strong>: Now that two of us are accused of abusing our position as moderators, I'm not sure I can contribute anything further.</p>

<p>You have said of each of us that you think we're abusing our positions; you have the right to email the people that oversee us (yes, even us completely unpaid volunteers). See <a href="https://meta.stackexchange.com/questions/28867/what-recourse-do-i-have-if-i-believe-a-moderator-has-abused-his-her-privileges">this meta post</a> which explains how to do that.</p>

<hr>

<ol>
<li><p>In respect of the first post you link to, the stackexchange network is deliberately designed (not by any of us talking here) to work a particular way. This includes that - </p>

<p>a. Answers must be answers, questions must ask questions. You are not allowed to post comments as answers and if you do they will be deleted.</p>

<p>b. novice users don't have the ability to make comments; this is deliberate -- to make sure new users at least understand how the system works before they start commenting. The system worked correctly in this case because it seems you're not yet in a position to understand the appropriate site behavior (including that you don't comment in answers), and so it looks to me like you shouldn't in fact be free to comment until you've learned more about how it works. The site works this way for a reason.</p>

<p>c. moderators are not only given the ability to delete comments posted as answers, <em>that's one of the things they're tasked with doing</em>. That's what moderators are elected <em>for</em>. whuber not only acted as he should, he was chosen by the rest of us to do exactly that, and the site would be far poorer without his efforts. </p>

<p>d. If he had not deleted your non-answer, <em>I</em> would have as soon as I became aware of it. I expect any of the other moderators would do the same. It's our job. In a typical day, I will delete several posts like that. </p>

<p>So in the first case, you've accused him of wrongdoing when he did what he's supposed to do. </p>

<p>[The correct action for a user without the reputation to comment if you feel his answer is wrong (it isn't actually wrong but that's not the present issue), is to post a better answer. Many of the active users - the people who bother to vote - are very experienced and knowledgeable statisticians with the ability to tell a good contribution from a poorer one. If the people who vote on the site agree that your answer is actually better, you'll get some upvotes, and it only takes a small handful of upvotes to earn the reputation required to be able to comment. If your answer is less spectacular or does not improve on existing answers, you might require several more answers to get the needed reputation.]</p></li>
<li><p>With respect to the second post -- I see <em>no evidence whatever</em> that whuber "copied" your answer. There are some similarities, as you would see if two people answer the same question; this is not only common on the site, it's exactly as you'd expect. [Several times on other questions I've given answers with closer similarities to answers of his than his was to yours .... without anybody accusing me of any misbehavior.] However, in several respects, his answer is clearly better than yours. The person who asked the question -- who as far as I can see saw your answer before whuber posted - nevertheless chose his to give the tick to; that is, Repmat also thought it was a better answer. Presumably that first upvote is his as well. [Anyone with even passing familiarity with this site would already know that it would be ludicrous to expect whuber should need to do anything of the kind, since he knows vastly more than most people on the site (only a tiny handful are in his league, myself not included), has no need of reputation and has many times shown that he doesn't care about getting more (if he did, he could easily have far more than double his current reputation).]</p>

<p>Now you've drawn my attention to the question, I shall certainly be upvoting whuber's answer, since it's the best answer I see on the page; it's better than yours in several important respects, and I think Repmat chose wisely in awarding the tick. In his position, I'd have done the same thing.</p>

<p>I see nothing whatever that supports your second accusation against whuber. Unless you have something substantially better to base it on than the similarities we'd expect to see in answers to the same question, I don't see there's anything to respond to.</p></li>
</ol>
