Suffering Idiots

Sad News

2011-06-29T13:55:00.001-07:00

Nothing really to criticize here, just upsetting to see a great player in any sport get removed from the game before it was time.

A call to arms from Kariya as he bows out, as well, flatly decrying the state of discipline for head shots in the NHL. And rightfully so - - this is coming from a man who had 20% brain function last year do to (mostly) unnecessary and flagrant hits. 20% brain function.

Get it together, Bettman, et al.

A Guy With Interests in Ethanol Shamelessly Defends Ethanol

2011-06-28T05:22:00.000-07:00

It's like people aren't even trying anymore. You used to have to do a quick google search to find out which pocket your columnist was in - - now it's right there at the end of the article:

Christjansen is president of the Indiana Ethanol Producers Association.

Ok. Let's hear what Mr. Christjansen has to say about his paycheck.

Imagine if today we had a viable alternative to gasoline; an affordable, proven and domestic fuel that cleaned our air while creating American jobs.

Someone invented a more affordable hydropowered engine? Are we using, like, liquid oxygen now? Or did someone invent that fictional engine from Atlas Shrugged that generates power from the static electricity in the air? Is air the fuel? Sweet! The future is now!

Imagine next that Congress, while doing the bidding of friends in Big Oil, conspired to kill that fuel in order to maintain the status quo and our failed energy policy that guarantees big profits for oil companies.

Bastards!

This is the reality that ethanol faces. With so many rumors and untruths, it is crucial to get the facts straight.

GASP! I DID NOT SEE THAT COMING!

Ethanol is the only viable domestic alternative to gasoline,

Let me stop you right there. I know you're about to go on and talk about how much corn we have and how we can produce ethanol cheaply and all that jazz. A few points first.

1) We have plenty of other fuel options. Many of them are "viable." I know you will make the case that ethanol is the most affordable, and you will be wrong. More on that in a second.

2) Why do we have so much extra corn in the first place? Perhaps it's because we're telling and paying people to needlessly grow it. As this NYT article points out, by subsidizing the cost of corn, the aforementioned in-the-pocket-of-Big-Oil Congress has artificially inflated the demand for corn, driving supply up to the point that the US is the #1 supplier of corn TO THE ENTIRE WORLD (40% of the total production comes from the US). Which is not a bad thing considering how many starving people there are in China/India/whichever country your Mom used to admonish you for not clearing your plate. Bottom line, we're producing more corn than the market demands, buying it at artificially inflated prices, and essentially giving it away to the rest of the world.

3) We're not even giving it away to the rest of the world anymore. From the same article above, 40% of American corn must go to ethanol production, per legislation in 2005 and 2007. So how exactly is Congress protecting the status quo by killing the corn subsidy? Seems like they're doing the opposite of that.

Christjansen goes on to talk about Indiana's corn production and its role in all of this. Skip ahead, skip ahead.

Ethanol accounts for nearly 10 percent of our fuel supply in a country that uses approximately 400 million gallons of gasoline per day. With the cost of oil over $100 a barrel, ethanol costs Big Oil more than $120 million per day in lost sales. Since it is more inexpensive than gasoline, ethanol helps to bring down the price of fuel at the pump for consumers. According to one Iowa State University study, ethanol reduced wholesale gasoline prices by $1.37 per gallon in 2010 in the Midwestern region.

This is mularky. Are you honestly trying to tell me that a mere 10% of the oil supply, was enough to bring down the whole sale cost of gas by over a dollar. If the average price of gas was $2.726 at that time, you're telling me that ethanol, which accounts for 10% of the overall market, brought down prices by almost 50%?! You, and the corn-choked state that put out that study, are lying.

Also, according to the Renewable Fuels Association, the US can presently produce 7 billion gallons of ethanol a year, or a little more than 1.9 million gallons per day. So, America's corn farmers would not be nearly as impacted by this change as Christjansen posits. Unless we were importing ethanol from other countries to which we had shipped corn for ethanol production, and we're not.

The sudden halt in ethanol production, accounting for additional imports, increased transportation costs, and lack of additional oil refining capacity, could cause gasoline prices to rise by as much as 92 percent, according to the same Iowa State study -- which at today's prices could mean gas eclipsing a staggering $7 per gallon.

Again, I call shenanigans. Sure, the price of gas could rise over $7 a gallon, and it could do that for any number of catastrophic and unforseen reasons (tornados in Missouri drove prices up across the Midwest for almost all of June, for instace). But, this is, again, ridiculous. The vast majority of Americans do not use gasoline with ethanol in it.

Two final points:

Hoosier families are tired of high gas prices and pinching pennies while their monthly budgets are being controlled by the whims of shahs and dictators in the Middle East and oil companies reap billions.

Gas prices are already high. How is ethanol going to help this in the future if any ethanol fuel source must be mixed with actual gasoline?

And it must be mixed with gasoline to combat the lie that people like Christjansen will tell you:

[Ethanol] cleaned our air.

Nope, it did the opposite. Ethanol produces almost twice as much smog-inducing carbon monoxide as gasoline. So...it distorts domestic markets, pollutes our air, (potentially) ruins our farmland by driving us towards the less-sustainable one-crop landscape we're currently seeing in the Midwest, and does absolutely nothing to help bring down the price of gasoline, which is as much controlled by Mideast supply decisions as it is by domestic oil commodities speculators.

But if you ask the dude who needs ethanol to sign his paychecks, this shit is like butta.

A BCS Conference Commissioner Weighs In

2011-06-21T05:25:00.000-07:00

Listen, you little pea-brained shit. You wanna pay college atheltes? Fine! Just make the numbers work and I'd be glad to. Do you know how much money it would take to give each athlete from a high-profile sport a salary each month for simple things like groceries and clothes and to relieve him/her of the feeling s/he had to steal or cheat the system simply to get by? Yeah, I don't know either. I pay people to shop for me, so I have very little idea of the market value of basic foodstuffs. A dozen eggs is like $20 right? $50? Either way, we're talking about a lot of money.

And where do you think that money will come from? Huh, chump? That's right - - my wallet. You're just gonna rob my kids of their allowances and their goose down duvet inserts so that some back-up running back future millionaire at Colorado State can buy pork rinds?

It can't happen. I wish it could. There's just not enough money. I'm sorry, there isn't. I don't know where it's all gone. But we just can't make the numbers work.

Fair and Balanced

2011-06-20T10:20:00.000-07:00

That's what we are here at SI. Fair. And balanced.

And always ready for someone to stick it to someone we've already roasted. We're that, too.

Mo Diplomas, No Problems.

2011-06-17T07:29:00.000-07:00

It is all too infrequent that an author's hypocrisy is a matter of public record, so this was an opportunity I had to seize.

"College athletes shouldn't be paid" by Douglas M. Gottlieb.

At first blush, this doesn't seem to be all that ridiculous. A man with an insider's perspective can give us some great insider knowledge about what's going on in the inner-workings of the NCAA, where record profits just seem to disappear. So this post on ESPN's Insider page might be worth reading. (If you can't tell, I despise the over-use of the term insider at ESPN).

While there is a sudden clamoring for universities to pay their players, I feel otherwise based on my time as a student athlete and even after I left campus.

Hold up there, sparky! Which campus are you talking about? I thought I remembered that you went to a few different schools.

Oklahoma State welcomed me after my issues at Notre Dame. I don't think OSU would have accepted me from junior college, if not for my athletic prowess.

OK, so that's Notre Dame, then JuCo, then OK State? Man Notre Dame is kind of a storied program, you were starting as a freshman, and your team showed some promise. Why did you leave?

Oh! Now I remember! You were accused of stealing your roommate's credit cards and charging $900 to them! And then you were expelled.

Why would you do such a thing? Was money hard to come by while you were a student athlete? Why would you play if you weren't getting any benefits?

While college players are not paid directly, they receive a tremendous amount of benefits that aid them during, and after, their time on campus.

Oh.

It starts with "comped" campus visits in high school and continues with tutoring, preferred class registration, choice housing arrangements and, of course, the ability to walk away with a degree and without an ounce of debt to your name.

Sure, that's a lot of benefits. I guess that paid for food and clothes, too? No? How about trips to the movies or drinks or Tamagachis or bandaids or a mattress pad or ANYTHING YOU NEED TO BUY WITH ANY FORM OF CURRENCY?!

Oh, you get none of that? Makes sense that somebody (anybody) might steal credit cards or sell jerseys and memorabilia to get a tradeable commodity for the purchase of other goods. In fact, that could probably be easily predicted by the entire compendium of human existence.

I am not claiming that athletes don't get a bunch of benefits, but when the March Madness alone brings in $613 million in revenue, you could give a kid some gas money (for the car that a booster bought him, of course).

While we're on the topic, what other sorts of benefits do college athletes get?

When you play big-time basketball or football, people want to hire you. You are a known commodity and, like the colleges, businesses too would like to profit from your presence -- and compensate you in kind.

Sure. If you can read and write. Say, you know where gobs of college athletes come from? Areas of destitution where roughly 50% of students graduate from high school and those who do graduate will, on average, perform at an 8th grade level.

But let's say you come from the inner city, you get into college on the back of astounding athletic ability and you stick it out for four years. Gottlieb is right that you'll have a degree that you more than likely wouldn't have attained otherwise (assuming of course that your ticket to college didn't itself pull you out of all those valuable classes and the degree you're now holding wasn't actually just a token of time served but an actual, meaningful symbol of your earned academic prowess over your time at the university).

But then he keeps going...

We so massively undervalue a college degree -- which can lead to increased earning potential in the professional world -- and overestimate the value of a couple of hundred dollars per month while in college, which may end up getting taxed anyway.

First, college degrees are dropping in value, because, compared to 50 years ago, a much much higher percentage of Americans are graduating from college. Many think that we may be at the peak of a higher education bubble.

And again, the same fatal flaw as before: Your degree, regardless of its value, is a deferred benefit. That doesn't get you shit in the here and now. And, though there are plenty of loans available, that means you're not leaving debt free as Gottlieb and others so often claim.

But it all comes to a head for me with this point:

The payoff is in the end, after school, much like the future doctors, scientists and businessmen and women with whom you attend school. College is about sacrificing, learning and growing as a person. The reward for all students is the memories and experiences gained in the short term and benefiting from them in the long run.

Yeah, college seems like a real sacrifice for most students. What with the partying and the indiscriminate sex and the long hours of sleeping and the nothing-that-resembles-the-working-world. I would HATE to do college for the rest of my life. Talk about a drag!

And in what fucking way is the (imagined) illiterate-but-monstrous back-up defensive tackle from rural Mississippi on a Big XII football team the same as an aspiring brain surgeon from Westchester, NY?! Are you out of your goddamned mind, Gottlieb?!

Sure, there will be a payoff if you're one of the elite athletes in college athletics. But if you're not - - or worse, if you were an elite athlete who rode that into college and you get injured - - you better unlace your cleats and grab hold of your ankles, because when the NCAA is done milking you for every penny, the rest of your Eat Shit And Choke Life is going to make you remember where you came from.

Unless of course you take the easy way out and steal credit cards.

A Nagging Issue

2011-06-16T13:01:00.000-07:00

This has bothered me for a long time and I finally did something about it at work today. Every year we seem to be floored by the newest "highest grossing movie ever." Simultaneously, the price of a movie ticket (and the price of everything else) keeps going up. This is not a coincidence.

I'm sure that others have assembled lists of the highest-grossing movies of all time that have been adjusted for inflation, but most of the ones I've seen have only adjusted for inflation based on movie ticket prices, which I don't think tells the whole story. Regardless, the rankings we always hear reported are undoubtedly in nominal dollars. To wit, from Wikipedia:

(Sorry the table is messed up, Blogger and I don't agree on formatting sometimes)

Top 50 Movies by Gross Nominal Box Office

1 Avatar $2,783,165,628 (2009)
2 Titanic $1,843,201,268 (1997)
3 The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King $1,119,110,941 (2003)
4 Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest $1,066,179,725 (2006)
5 Toy Story 3 $1,063,165,731 (2010)
6 Alice in Wonderland $1,024,299,801 (2010)
7 The Dark Knight $1,001,921,825 (2008)
8 Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone $974,733,550 (2001)
9 Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End $963,420,425 (2007)
10 Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 1 $954,501,070 (2010)
11 Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix $938,212,738 (2007)
12 Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince $933,959,197 (2009)
13 The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers $925,282,504 (2002)
14 Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace $924,317,558 (1999)
15 Shrek 2 $919,838,758 (2004)
16 Jurassic Park $914,691,118 (1993)
17 Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides $907,423,683 (2011)
18 Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire $895,921,036 (2005)
19 Spider-Man 3 $890,871,626 (2007)
20 Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs $886,686,817 (2009)
21 Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets $878,643,482 (2002)
22 The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring $870,761,744 (2001)
23 Finding Nemo $867,893,978 (2003)
24 Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith $848,754,768 (2005)
25 Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen $836,297,228 (2009)
26 Inception $823,576,195 (2010)
27 Spider-Man $821,708,551 (2002)
28 Independence Day $817,400,891 (1996)
29 Shrek the Third $798,958,162 (2007)
30 Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban $795,634,070 (2004)
31 E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial $792,910,554 (1982)
32 Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull $786,636,033 (2008)
33 The Lion King $783,841,776 (1994)
34 Spider-Man 2 $783,766,341 (2004)
35 Star Wars $775,398,007 (1977)
36 2012 $769,304,749 (2009)
37 The Da Vinci Code $758,239,851 (2006)
38 Shrek Forever After $752,600,867 (2010)
39 The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe $745,011,272 (2005)
40 The Matrix Reloaded $742,128,461 (2003)
41 Up $731,342,744 (2009)
42 The Twilight Saga: New Moon $709,711,008 (2009)
43 Transformers $709,709,780 (2007)
44 The Twilight Saga: Eclipse $698,491,347 (2010)
45 Forrest Gump $677,387,716 (1994)
46 The Sixth Sense $672,806,292 (1999)
47 Ice Age: The Meltdown $655,388,158 (2006)
48 Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl $654,264,015 (2003)
49 Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones $649,398,328 (2002)
50 Kung Fu Panda $631,744,560 (2008)

The average year of release from this list is 2004. The median year? 2006. So, in other words, if we look at box office lists in nominal terms, without accounting for rising costs due to the natural forces of inflation, the vast majority of the most (financially) successful movies have been made in the last decade.

But instinctively, you know this is wrong. You know that some of the most successful (read: financially and otherwise) movies were made decades ago; many of which will never be surpassed in importance. You also know that costs have gone up in the last decade since the release of the first installment in the LOTR series (#22 above) and even more so since E.T. came out in 1982 (#31). So isn't it much more impressive that these movies are able to make it as high up on the list when they're climbing uphill against the forces of economics?

Yes. It is.

So I compiled a new list, adjusted for inflation (based on the Consumer Price Index) so that everything is according to 2005 USD. However, some very successful but older movies were obviously trounced so hard by recent nominal dollars that they didn't make the Top 50 above and simply rearranging that list won't give us an objective ranking.

To account for this, I turned back to my head researcher (read: Wikipedia) and looked at the highest-grossing movie for each individual year, adjusted those to $2005 as well, and merged them into the list. I realize this isn't perfect as it doesn't account for years in which two movies were very financially successful, but there's only so much of the day to burn through at work. Apologies.

Top 50 Movies by Gross Real (2005 USD) Box Office

1 Gone with the Wind $4,599,729,414 (1939)
2 Bambi $2,760,032,508 (1942)
3 Avatar $2,520,298,495 (2009)
4 Titanic $2,169,748,403 (1997)
5 Star Wars $2,067,728,019 (1977)
6 The Exorcist $1,604,478,032 (1973)
7 Jaws $1,445,938,556 (1975)
8 The Sound of Music $1,436,818,705 (1965)
9 E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial $1,435,132,224 (1982)
10 The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King $1,185,247,766 (2003)
11 Jurassic Park $1,165,508,560 (1993)
12 The Empire Strikes Back $1,143,775,371 (1980)
13 One Hundred and One Dalmatians $1,142,826,967 (1961)
14 Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace $1,060,362,003 (1999)
15 Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone $1,049,017,551 (2001)
16 Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest $1,030,922,186 (2006)
17 The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers $1,000,413,563 (2002)
18 Grease $985,735,418 (1978)
19 The Jungle Book $980,674,664 (1967)
20 Independence Day $979,862,013 (1996)
21 The Lion King $978,090,562 (1994)
22 Pinocchio $968,438,701 (1940)
23 The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring $956,986,201 (2001)
24 Toy Story 3 $955,482,817 (2010)
25 Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets $949,987,547 (2002)
26 Shrek 2 $949,854,149 (2004)
27 Shrek the Third $940,504,016 (2007)
28 The Godfather $930,396,397 (1972)
29 Alice in Wonderland $920,553,429 (2010)
30 The Dark Knight $919,363,025 (2008)
31 Finding Nemo $919,184,472 (2003)
32 Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End $904,280,482 (2007)
33 Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire $895,921,036 (2005)
34 Spider-Man $888,429,615 (2002)
35 Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix $880,620,178 (2007)
36 Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 1 $857,824,274 (2010)
37 Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith $848,754,768 (2005)
38 Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince $845,747,711 (2009)
39 Forrest Gump $845,255,448 (1994)
40 Spider-Man 3 $836,185,119 (2007)
41 Return of the Jedi $823,693,095 (1983)
42 Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban $821,596,520 (2004)
43 Spider-Man 2 $809,341,533 (2004)
44 Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides $804,810,362 (2011)
45 Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs $802,940,158 (2009)
46 The Matrix Reloaded $785,986,508 (2003)
47 The Sixth Sense $771,832,387 (1999)
48 Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen $757,309,814 (2009)
49 The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe $745,011,272 (2005)
50 Raiders of the Lost Ark $742,874,597 (1981)

Average release year for this list backs up a decade to 1993. Median release is 2002. Though this is still far to the modern side of the movie-making timeline, that weighting is understandable due to the relatively recent invention of the Summer Blockbuster and the latest binge on high-budget (broad-base, large-profit) comic book films, let alone new ways of raising even more revenue, namely IMAX theaters and 3-D and digital projection premiums. Again, I suspect this average year would creep back into the past even further if I were to incorporate more than just the highest-earning film from any given year (though it is also possible that the new revenue streams I just mentioned would account for this and even things out).

Things that I like about this new list:
-It certainly gives you a better idea of cinematic quality in addition to financial success. Of the Top 10 films in the inflation-adjusted list, only Bambi wasn't nominated for Best Picture. Only 4 of the Nominal Top 10 were nominated (due in part to the utter domination of the Harry Potter series). The extent to which the Academy actually determines cinematic quality will be left un-debated at this time.

-It knocked Transformers down dozens of needed pegs.

-Raiders of the Lost Ark sneaks on.

-I, at least, get a better understanding of the societal impact of some of these movies. I have never thought Gone With the Wind was as good as everyone else thought, but you can begin to tell how important a movie it was for its time. The average income in the US in 1939 was less than $20,000, a gallon of gas cost 10 cents, and GWtW pulled in almost $4.6 billion?! I find this so astounding that I doubt the numbers on Wikipedia, but to the best of my knowledge, those are box office receipts and not all-time revenue.

-The Godfather also makes it on. How its usual absence hasn't provoked another baptism scene is beyond me.

-This is also a good reminder about monetary value, generally. Too often, political discourse fails to point out the impact of inflation as it pertains to everything from the debt and deficit to public sector salaries to the price of a gallon of gas. I think this is an intuitive way to realize the impact of changing conditions when making comparisons across time.

Things that I don't like about this list:
-Transformers is still on the list.

I'm sure there are many more interesting observations that can be pulled out of here, but I don't have the time to analyze now. I might check back on it later. In the meantime, perhaps creating two lists of some of the more successful movies of all time will result in some much-needed search traffic and welcome analysis from others.

American Exceptionalism

2011-06-07T11:26:00.000-07:00

There is no such thing as American Exceptionalism, at least not right now. I'll probably never win a Republican nomination for anything now, but it had to be said. For the last few years, demagogues and political agitators on the right have been repeating the chorus that America and Americans are great simply because of where they are from. It's this line of thinking that has fucked our country, and while there may be short term fixes, nothing has been done to stop the underlying decline of American society.

In the early nineteenth century many of the elements of the nascent American society were vastly different from the rest of the world. And America was better. The United States liberated itself from the colonial system before anyone else; as South America, Africa, and most of Asia were struggling under European domination, the United States was growing, fueled by innovations that the rest of the world was unable to pursue.

As steam power and the seeds of industrialization were taking root in the United States, the rest of the world was struggling to emerge from chaos. Europe was consistently embroiled in continent-wide warfare and revolution, South and Central America were struggling for independence, and Africa and Asia were still being stripped of their resources and ravaged by European colonizers. As progress was stagnate in the rest of the world, America alone drove forward, taming a continent, harvesting its resources, and reinvesting those resources to propel further development. By the start of the twentieth century, the United States had essentially established hegemony over the Western Hemisphere, and was poised to overtake and dominate Western Europe.

Of course things were not perfect, and travesties like slavery continue to be a blight on American history. But seemingly all of America's flaws were met by people pushing for progress and improvements, not only for themselves, but for others. Abolitionist and suffrage movements worked to undo two of the most heinous forms of discrimination the US has ever seen. Frederick Douglass, Abraham Lincoln, and Susan B. Anthony have all been immortalized for the work they did to give others a better life.

With such a fast and dramatic rise to power, it's difficult not to assume some degree of American Exceptionalism so, starting with de Toqueville, that's what people did. They saw that America was different, recognizing the absence of extremism and divisiveness in American politics, that America had limited the role of religions in society, and that feudalism and aristocracies had been replaced by a society that permitted, and even encouraged, upward mobility. In looking at the United States, nineteenth century observers saw a haven for immigrants, a country that offered opportunities to people from all over the globe, integrated them into society, and benefited enormously from their contributions. Knowledge and education were admired and sought; without them, the United States would not have been at the forefront of innovation for such a long time. Edison, Bell, Einstein and the Wright Brothers are all products of this. In the nineteenth century, America was exceptional; not inherently so, but because its people did exceptional things.

This continued into the twentieth century, as America became the most dominant nation on the planet. Fascism, Communism, and Japanese Imperialism all fell to American innovation, manufacturing, and technology. Enormous strides were made in the fields of genetics and computer science. Nuclear power was developed and harnessed. Shit, over forty years ago we put Americans on the moon; no one else has even tried since.

Unfortunately, in recent years America has ceased to be exceptional, because Americans have stopped trying to be exceptional. Instead of trying to be great, people are now trying to star in Teen Mom. The attributes that first made the United States great are largely absent now.

While American politics are not nearly as radicalized as in some other countries, we're rapidly trending in that direction. Compromise and conversation are being replaced by a terrifying polarization, and moderate voices are being drowned out by greedy, attention-starved politicians and their shouts of incitement to ever-more-extreme political bases.

The Establishment Clause is slowly becoming a relic of the eighteenth century, as Christians are trying to integrate their dogma with the American government. More and more schools across the country are teaching Intelligent Design in science classes, at the expense of actual science. Freedoms are being inhibited because of a sentence in the book of Leviticus and the nebulous, borderline hilarious (and very recent) concept of the sanctity of marriage.

For really the first time in American history, an aristocracy has emerged, headed by corporations (they're people now!) and their enablers, who don't see their rampaging greed as a flaw. This aristocracy, from both sides of the aisle, is shaping the nation's agenda for its own benefit and entrenchment; wealth is being concentrated in fewer and fewer hands, the middle class is disappearing, and the idea of upward mobility is being transformed from a dream to an impossibility.

Immigrants are no longer seen as a resource; as fences go up and nativism surges, new ideas are not given a chance to contribute anything of value. Hatred and fear of outsiders have sharply curbed the benefits we can derive from them; people all over the world still want to come to America, and we're turning them, and the progress they might bring, away.

While racism was never fully driven out of American culture, it seems to have experienced a revival in the last few years. For the first time in almost 250 years, the President of the United States is an African American; while this is unquestionably progress on the path to racial equality, the backsliding that has accompanied Obama's election is far from encouraging. No white President ever had to endure such a sizable minority of the country doubting that he was really American, or insinuating that he was secretly a Muslim (and who cares if he is?). All three branches of government have been complicit in the widespread discrimination against Muslims in the last ten years.

Those problems, this failing of American Exceptionalism, are almost entirely the result of decisions made by those who have already had their moment in the spotlight. The much greater problem, and the reason that America is, at best, decades away from recapturing any sort of exceptionalism, is the coming generations. Kids are fucking stupid, and at times is seems like that is encouraged. Vast portions of the country have embraced an anti-intellectual attitude; I cannot think of a worse way to decide who to vote for than "who would I rather have a beer with." Sarah Palin, who isn't even competent to be a student government president, and other politicians have ridden this wave of ignorance to political prominence and celebrity.

Fortunately in the case of Palin, but unfortunately in the case of millions of young people all over the country, most people are drawn much more towards the trappings of celebrity than having a prominent position in society based on achievement. People strive for fame as its own end, rather than the byproduct of an actual accomplishment. A century ago, the Wright Brothers became famous for inventing the airplane. Today, Paris Hilton is famous for having a rich grandfather and blowing some guy in night vision. We're doing things backwards; Neil deGrasse Tyson should be a household name, and Kim Kardashian shouldn't be. But NASA's budget is minuscule and shrinking, teachers everywhere are being laid off, and engineering jobs are being outsourced, not because foreign engineers are cheaper, but because they're smarter. America is falling behind so many countries, even some developing countries, in math and science. Coupled with drastic reductions in arts education, pretty soon we're not going to be good at anything.

As bleak as this looks, American Exceptionalism isn't dead, just dormant, and it can be revived. But that won't happen if people continue to see it as a birthright; America will only be exceptional again if people realize, like Americans 200 years ago did, that exceptionalism is something that needs to be earned. But who wants to do that while The Jersey Shore is on?

Who Told You What This Means?

2011-06-07T05:41:00.000-07:00

It seems enrollment in the University of Sarah Palin Online history department has really taken off.

A small northern Indiana college has decided to stop playing "The Star-Spangled Banner" at sporting events after starting to do so for the first time last year.

First off, very clearly written sentence. It appears the editors of theindychannel.com hold English degrees from the University of Sarah Palin Online.

Goshen College's board of directors said it will find an alternative that honors the country and the Mennonite Church-affiliated school's pacifist traditions.

The 1,000-student college has been playing an instrumental version of the national anthem, followed by a peace prayer, before games and other events.

OK, people protesting the National Anthem because we're at war. Been going on for years. All we need to do is call up Anna Benson and she'll straighten them out.

Some were upset with the school's decision last year because the song's lyrics contain references to using war and military might to defend the country.

Uh...ex-squeeze me?

If you wanna protest American jinogism, have at it. You are, by many accounts a) probably correct in your indignation towards American foreign policy and b) perfectly within your rights as an American in this freedom-loving land.

But get your facts straight. The lyrics to the Star Spangled Banner are pretty much just an account of the ass blasting the Baltimore Harbor was receiving from the British, and subsequent adjulation that, beyond any reasonable expectation, there was more than a few smoldering embers still there come dawn.

We've done a lot of terrible things in the years since Francis Scott Key wrote that long, rhetorical question we call our national anthem, and that stanza, in my mind, is pretty unobjectionable by comparison. If you're looking for an expression of American militarism to protest, this just isn't it.

But this might be.

So, Weiner is a dick after all

2011-06-06T19:07:00.000-07:00

I know, I know. Stupid and hackneyed subject. But I'm tired.

In really not-so-shocking news, Anthony Weiner actually did knowingly send his namesake to a woman on Twitter. Whatever, this really isn't that big of a deal, and I'm not convinced it spells the long-term end for Rep. Weiner. Quickly, though, does anyone actually believe the whistleblower's (heh heh) story?

Broussard said she wanted to come forward now out of concerns for her own image as an aspiring nurse, and that of her 3-year-old daughter, should her identity be leaked online.

The fact that her identity would be leaked seems unlikely. Who am I to say that a woman can't protect herself from scrutiny, but doesn't it seem odd that you're stepping into the limelight to avoid stepping into the limelight? Especially when, by my completely un-researched count, America actually has a pretty OK record at keeping the identity of sexual victims quiet? Save for the Tiger Woods affair, I suppose, but a number of those were self-reported, too. Sorry, I rambled. Hardly my point.

What is my point is that she (with an assist from ABC News) is being framed as a victim. Even though she:

participated in risque online chats -- as she has done with other men online -- with the man she presumed to be Weiner.

[exchanged] 'hundreds of messages,' many of a sexual nature.

and that Occasionally while chatting through Facebook, the two would simultaneously use email to exchange photos, she said.

Take note of the repeated usage of "it takes two to tango" words.

And while "she thought she could keep this private" she went to Drudge and Breitbart, 2nd and 3rd in voting to perennial all-star gossip Perez Hilton for the prized Last Person I Would Ever Tell a Secret To Award.

This is a long two-way street, and Broussard threw the brakes on when the opportunity was best. And that's fine. And Weiner made an exceedingly stupid fucking move and definitely acted like a schmuck both as a married man and a representative of the public, but let's not forget that the motivation for this girl to come forward rests in this line:

More than a dozen photos were obtained...and licensed from [Broussard] by ABC News.

And I'm willing to bet the cost of that licensing made all the embarrassment go away.

Ken Rosenthal, Welcome to Thunderdome

2011-06-03T05:54:00.001-07:00

This article about Brian Sabean is a bit much.

Evidently, Brian Sabean has forgotten the final play of the 2003 NL Division Series, when the Giants' J.T. Snow barreled into Marlins catcher Ivan “Pudge” Rodriguez, trying to dislodge the ball.

Nope. Bet you he hasn't forgotten. Bet you he still sometimes wakes up at night (maybe not since the world series win last year, but still) and has visions of one of the more excruciating ways to lose in the playoffs.

And, J.T. snow "barreled into" Pudge? Really? If anything, that is a phenomenal play by Pudge, diving back in front of Snow as he attempts to dive through a wide open window to home plate. It is in no way the same thing that Cousins did the other night, when he chose to dive back towards the field where Posey was crouched, as opposed to pursuing the path of least resistence towards the backstop. I'm not saying what Cousins did was dirty, but it's not the same thing that J.T. Snow did (or really, what Pudge did).

Evidently, Sabean is unaware of the argument that the Giants’ Buster Posey had his feet in the wrong position, leaving himself vulnerable to his season-ending hit by the Marlins' Scott Cousins.

No, I would bet that he's heard that ridiculous argument and the reason why he is speaking out now, a full 8 days after the injury (which you'll lambast him for in a second) is because that argument has gained so much traction in the last few days.

Were Posey's feet in the wrong position? Seems likely, even though the inestimable Tim McCarver was the first to posit this point. But you know under which circumstances the placement of Posey's feet wouldn't have been an issue? If Cousins didn't choose to go towards the front of the plate and kamikaze him.

I bet Posey would do it differently if he had the option, but in an article about whether or not Cousins should be blamed for running into a catcher, this is a decidedly irrelevant argument to make.

Evidently, Sabean is suffering from a baseball form of post-traumatic stress disorder.

I hate when people tell me not to take sports seriously, so I won't do that. But don't trivialize mental conditions with crappy comparisons to sports, especially conditions that gained traction through the suffering of war vets.

Everyone who loves the sport is upset by Posey’s injury. Lots of us believe Cousins' hit was misguided. But the Giants general manager went too far Thursday when, in an interview with San Francisco radio station KNBR, he wished for the end of Cousins' career.

“If I never hear from Cousins again and he never plays another game in the big leagues, I think we'll all be happy,” Sabean said.

“(Cousins) chose to be a hero in my mind, and if that's his flash of fame, that's as good as it's going to get, pal,” Sabean said. “We'll have a long memory."

Sabean is angry. And understandably so. If "everyone who loves the sport" is upset by this hit, why wouldn't the guy in charge of the team be exponentially more upset?

And I honestly don't think Sabean was wishing for the end of the guy's career. If he was, then my defense of him holds considerably less water. But taking for granted for a second that he wasn't wishing ill will to this guy, it's very possible that the longest tenured GM in baseball thinks Scott Cousins (.222/.276/.346 in 66 ML games and, granted, only 44 ABs) is not very good at baseball and won't be around for all that long. Even in AAA Cousins only OPSed .792 in 118 games, so it's not absurd to think that these might be some of the few days we see of Scott Cousins in the majors and that this might seriously be the only noteworthy thing he does.

“Believe me, we're talking to (former catcher) Mike Matheny about how this game works. You can't be that out-and-out overly aggressive. I'll put it as politically as I can state it: There's no love lost and there shouldn't be.”

This was probably a bit much. Hit him next time, but don't talk about it.

I could maybe understand Sabean's reaction if it occurred in the heat of the moment — the night of Posey's injury or even the day after. But eight days later? Sabean had plenty of time to sort through his emotions.

"Yep, thought about it. Still pissed."

MLB, WWE, it's all starting to sound the same.

Not quite, but Ken Rosenthal might me on to something here! I think Brian Sabean should challenge Scott Cousins to a ladder match on homeplate at AT&T Park. We'll put the MLB rule book up top, and whoever gets up there first gets to decide whether the collisions rules will be amended! Oh this is awesome! Somebody get Vince McMahon on the phone, we've got tickets to sell!

I've got no problem with the Giants being upset.

Really? Seems like you've got a tiny issue with Brian Sabean being upset...

I've got no problem with manager Bruce Bochy lobbying for a change in rules. Baseball should better protect its catchers, not because it was Posey, the reigning NL Rookie of the Year, who got hurt, but because it's the right thing to do.

Is this the first catcher injury of the year? I'm not sure and I don't feel like looking it up, but I feel like this has A LOT to do with the fact that it was the reigning NL ROY. Nobody is going to shed tears over Ronnie Paulino getting trucked (if and when that happens).

MLB on FOX's Tim McCarver had a good suggestion — a base runner who hits a catcher near the head should automatically be ejected and fined, his run taken off the board.

Well it's a suggestion. It's not a good suggestion. You want umpires to be able to judge hits to the head? Have you seen how much trouble the NHL has had with that this year? They still sometimes get it wrong (allegedly) days later after hundreds of rewatchings. And you have to be aware of how contentious the instant replay issue has been in baseball. Are you going to be willing to let umpires slow down the game to see if there was intent in the contact? If you're not planning on it, you should be, especially if we're gonna start negating runs all willy nilly.

FOXSports.com's Jon Paul Morosi also had a sound proposal — a base runner should be called out if he initiates contact with a catcher who is not blocking the plate.

Cousins might have been called out under the McCarver Rule. He certainly would have been called out under the Morosi Rule.

I think you've got that backwards, chief. Watch the video again. Cousins puts his shoulder into Posey's chest protector. No contact with his head whatsoever. The first thing that Posey's head hits is the dirt when he places his forehead on the ground and claws at the ground like he's crawling out of a foxhole with no legs (which might be exactly what that felt like based on the subsequent medical reports).

And he most certainly COULD have been called out under the Morosi rule. You know who thinks so? Morosi. That's why he wrote the article. From this article (on FoxSports.com - - the same goddamn site posted Rosenthal's article, too.)

"If that rule were in effect Wednesday, Florida's Scott Cousins would have been called out after initiating contact with Posey -- rather than sliding -- on a play at the plate in the Marlins' 7-6, 12-inning win."

Research, people. Simple research.

But let's assume Morosi didn't write that. What sort of collision do you think that would apply to, Rosenthal? Josh Hamilton belts a homerun, trots around the bases, then throws a Superman punch to Kurt Suszuki's face before he puts him in a suplex on home plate? I don't think some of the contact in Baseketball would get people ejected in the MLB if Ken Rosenthal was in charge. (PS - I'm really digging this MLB/WWE idea. I think we've really got something).

Here's what Morosi had in mind as justification:

"Posey was not in possession of the ball as Cousins arrived with what proved to be the winning run. Nor was Posey completely blocking the plate. Cousins had an alley to slide in safely, around the tag. He didn't take it."

Not, "Posey was standing approximately 4 feet from homeplate when Cousins pointed to the stands and asked, 'Is that your, Mom?' before he donkey punched Posey in the back of the dome."

But it is wrong to demonize Cousins for a play that was not outside the present rules, a play that even some Giants said was clean, a play that required an instinctive, split-second base-running decision in the 12th inning of a tie game.

Posey set up in front of home plate, leaving Cousins a lane in which to slide. In retrospect, Cousins should have used that lane. But that's easy for others to say.

Let's take the second point first: you admit that Cousins shouldn't have done that? What have we been talking about all this time? And who are the others? Are they the same others who are finding it really easy to criticize the avenue through which Brian Sabean expressed his outrage. The others are assholes.

And as for the first point (not demonizing players for things that weren't against the rules at the time), uh, what do you call all of these?

Steroid use should affect baseball and somehow SABR nerds are also to blame
Players who get DUIs should be punished via non-existent DUI rule
Actual article title: Was it really worth it, Barry?
Mark McGwire's apology not good enough for Rosenthal
Video: Punish A-Rod and Tejada
Indignation over Sammy Sosa being on that stupid list

This is just a sampling of Rosenthal's righteous commentary that does EXACTLY the same thing he just spoke out against. I got tired of looking at these, but there are plenty more if you're interested.

Consistency, people. Simple consistency.

EDITOR'S NOTE:

Having re-read this, I now see that Rosenthal said he WOULD be called out under the Morosi rule. Certainly steals some ire away from my argument, and it should be noted that Rosenthal wasn't nearly as wrong in writing this as I first claimed.

A Modest Proposal for the Looming Medicare Crisis

2011-06-02T18:21:00.000-07:00

It seems all this hand-wringing over the aging American population and its potentially catastrophic impact can finally end.

On a Sunday morning at the Costco in Raleigh, N.C., Ron Moerbe filled his shopping cart with all the things a self-described aging, hearing-challenged diabetic might need: some amplifying earphones, organic cucumbers and a case of 5-Hour Energy shots.

That's "all the things a self-described aging diabetic might need?!" Here's a list of ten things I can think of that said person might need from Costco beyond the aforementioned spartan list:

Toilet paper
Insulin
Vegetable peeler for that organic cucumber
Something to eat other than a cucumber
James Patterson novels
Potable liquids of any kind
One of those unreasonably large tubs of Cheeze Balls
Batteries
The box sets of "Murder, She Wrote" and "Matlock" (why choose between them?)
Condoms

How is 5 Hour Energy #3 on the list? I understand you're going for a kitsch opening to an article about 5 Hour Energy, but your premise is fatally flawed.

The 65-year-old salesman says he drinks up to three a day to stay alert when he's on the road. He scoffs at the idea that he might be too old for the stuff. "I'm reverse discriminate," he says. "I don't see why kids need 'em."

My grandpa used to say this - - "How are you tired? You're just a boy!" - - like tired is something you grow. Like a beard.

Also, I'm no scientist, but three 5HEs (roughly 6000% of the RDV of B6 and 24999% of the RDV of B12, total) seems like far too much. In fact, 5HE thinks that's too much also. Here is the label of 5HE:

RECOMMENDED USE: Drink one half (1/2) bottle for moderate energy. Drink one whole bottle for maximum energy. Do not exceed two bottles of 5-hour ENERGY^® shots daily, consumed several hours apart. Use or discard any remainder within 72 hours (three days) after opening. Refrigeration not required.

When the company volunteers a warning, you know it's a keeper.

Their makers pitch them as a youthful tonic when coffee just isn't enough. "You know what 2:30 in the afternoon feels like, right?" a young fan asks on a late-night TV ad for 5-hour Energy.

I hate those ads. And since when are paid actors "fans?"

Also, virtually every old person I know switched to decaf 20 years ago. We're really asking these old coots to go from 0 to 60 in the energy department.

Now, the shots are appealing to a growing number of people over 60 who aren't ready to slow down with age. At the Raleigh Costco, cases of energy shots are stacked beside Ensure nutrition shakes and across from tubes of wrinkle cream.

Circumstantial at best. There may be an ad campaign aimed at seniors, but placing cases of 5HE next to products that people from many age groups and both sexes use is not evidence of that.

Last October, the company handed out thousands of samples at the annual AARP convention in Orlando. "It was amazing to see the number of people who took it right there and then," says Mr. Bhargava, who staffed the booth.

You were at an AARP convention! They probably thought it was cough syrup! We need to be careful with how much spare change we leave lying around so that my grandma doesn't end up eating it. If we handed her some, she would surely ingest it.

In January, 5-Hour began running full-page ads in the AARP Bulletin, which is delivered to 22 million households. The ad shows John Ratzenberger, best known as postman Cliff Clavin on "Cheers," holding a bicycle. "Getting older is fine," says the 64-year-old Mr. Ratzenberger. "But not having the energy to do the things I enjoy isn't."

In the history of our great nation, how much influence has been gained by scaring the shit out of old people?

Turns out, 5HE brought in $1 billion last year, due in large part to the new-found zeal for the product among the elderly. Shit, old people really love this shit! Is there any downside?

Sold as dietary supplements, energy shots don't require Food and Drug Administration approval.

Hmmm...

A study in the journal Pediatrics in February warned that consumption of too many energy drinks can give children heart palpitations, seizures and other problems.

Welp, there you have it. If 5HE seizures are sort of like the virus in "The Andromeda Strain," we're about to have a lot fewer old people on hand. If your elderly loved ones have any hobbies that require wakefulness, make sure their affairs are in order.

Groundhog Day?

2011-06-02T16:17:00.000-07:00

In the week or so since Dick decided to get back into writing here, I've been looking for something to write about. Unfortunately, I haven't really found anything that interests me, so I've tried to figure out why. And the conclusion I came to while scouring Newser.com for something to write about was this: pretty much everything is the same as it was two years ago.

Maybe that's pessimistic, and admittedly it's pretty hard to discern progress without some amount of hindsight, but seriously, look at what's happening now:

Sarah Palin has unleashed her inner media whore, and the media (and no one else) is following breathlessly.
Lance Armstrong is being accused of using steroids in a bike race that happened almost a decade ago (I'd appreciate it if someone would let 60 Minutes know that no one, probably not even Lance Armstrong at this point, cares about professional cycling).
Some global panel has declared that the War on Drugs has been a bust (seriously, I need to find a way to get paid for telling people things that everyone has known for at least fifteen years). No one wants to get rid of drugs, people who make drugs (alcohol and tobacco companies) just want to get rid of the drugs that other people (minorities) make. What drug you're using isn't of any interest to the government, they only care about whose drug it is.
Shaq retired (I thought he died in 2007).
Democrats and Republicans are accusing each other of distorting facts and engaging in demagoguery (how else is anyone supposed to get elected when people like my brother, who told me the other day that the number of members of the House changes, are allowed to vote?).
Seriously, this Octomom lady, the one with the cavernous vagina, still has her name in the news.
The Supreme Court is still protecting Bush Administration officials from any sort of retribution for how they raped America (and I still can't figure out where there are still people out there who value the opinions of Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, John Ashcroft, and Karl Rove, as if all of their theories of governance hadn't been empirically proven to be abject failures over eight years).
Some dumb cooze is denying that the naked pictures she took of herself are her (but really, she should just embrace them, she looked good).
Shit, people are still talking about the vapid whore with the ass, the one that Ray J pissed on.
The Phillies are better than the Mets.

So what's actually happening that isn't a boring retread of things that have been covered ad nauseum over the last two or three years? Well, there's the shocking revelation that Frank Sinatra took twelve showers a day. I guess that's interesting. Meh. Someone in government has finally started trying to do something about the disgustingly racist sentencing disparity between convictions for possession of cocaine and crack. I guess it's refreshing that Obama is being criticized for his "European ways"; I mean, the underlying complaint is still that he's not American enough (because he's black), but it's a nice break from the Kenyan agitation and Islamophobia.

So really, what is there to write about that hasn't already been beaten into the ground? Oh well, I guess I'm not one to talk, I wrote this while listening to Blink 182 and SR-71.

Traffic Patterns

2011-06-01T05:25:00.000-07:00

At the penultimate intersection of my morning commute, there are two right-hand turn lanes. This is necessary because only half a block after that right hand turn, most cars will make a left into one of the busier parking garages in the downtown area; it's a refreshingly logic traffic pattern, relaly. Since that is the garage that I use every morning, I make my right turn from the left right-turn lane, so that I am in position to turn into the garage. It appears many people don't understand this.

If I felt that people were simply trying to take advantage of the much shorter right right-turn lane line and thought they could easily cut into the approaching left turn lane, that would be one thing. But I honestly think people just don't understand how it's supposed to work. The looks on the offending drivers' faces is not that of either determination or selfish indifference, but confusion and abject terror.

What's worse - - in the past few days, I've been cut off like usual, but then I've done reasonable well to take a breath and put that person out of my mind once they pulled out of sight, only to end up on the stairwell or in the elevator with them. I am a little worried about my impending sarcastic comments if this pattern keeps up.

LoMo Hemingway

2011-05-31T13:38:00.000-07:00

The fact that people care about this enough to prompt an AP article is astounding and depressing.

Logan Morrison a hit on Twitter

Good Lord.

MIAMI -- Logan Morrison tweets to the amusement of thousands and the dismay of his team's top executive.

The 23-year-old left fielder known as "LoMo" may lead the league in Twitter wisecracks.

He does, it's true. Logan Morrison has an astounding TWA of .455, good enough for a 30-point lead over second place Twitterer Hunter Pence. But once you adjust for the low attendance and thereby quick cell reception at Marlins games, LoMo's xTWA is a dismal +89.

Morrison engages in exchanges with his Twitter followers, unlike celebrity athletes who limit their tweeting to status reports on dinner plans and such.

This was written by ESPN.com news services. To ESPN, this is news.

What's more, we first hear about whether or not LoMo uses asterisks in the middle of naughty, grown-up words (sometimes he DOESN'T!) before we hear about the fact that he also uses Twitter to raise money for the American Lung Association in memory of his late father who died of lung cancer. Priorities.

Mike Wilbon. Meh.

2011-05-31T05:28:00.000-07:00

The point in this article from Michael Wilbon isn't all that objectionable - - that people are no longer tepid towards LeBron James - - provided you can find that point, and you've found it at one of the small moments right before Wilbon rebounds like a bungy cord and changes his stance.

Taken in order, here are some of the there's-no-way-you-can-think-both-of-these-things-at-the-same-time claims:

The Eastern Conference finals just enjoyed ratings and viewership records for cable TV on TNT, according to Nielsen.com…And it's entirely because of LeBron James.

Again, perhaps you’re right, and that’s a strong statement to make. Let’s see how Wilbon backs it up in the next sentence.

OK, the Knicks getting Carmelo Anthony and making it back into the playoffs caused a little bump, as did the run of the Chicago Bulls, whose local viewership reached historic levels. Having so many big-market teams in the postseason mix (New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Philly, Dallas, Boston, Miami) is always good for a league tilted toward urban fans. But this, or 90 percent of it, is about LeBron.

So, your argument for LeBron being responsible for increased ratings is that a number of enormous markets that had not been in the playoffs for quite some time are now in the playoffs? Was LeBron so hated that the Sixers and Knicks, oddly good enough to make the playoffs each season for the last decade, but too complacent to finish out the season, had their ennui obliterated by their hatred of Bron Bron and decided to reach the playoffs again after a succession of team meetings and dramatic roll call votes? That’s the only way that LeBron could account for “90 percent” of this increased attention, rather than say the successes of any of these teams front offices in finally securing players that could win more than 30 regular season games.

With LeBron and the Heat in the championship series, the NBA Finals has a chance to be the highest-rated and most-viewed Finals since the Orlando-Houston series in 1995 or even the Bulls-Portland series, Jordan's second Finals, in 1992.

The highest-rated championship series in recent memory is one that featured two profoundly team-oriented contenders. And all these comparisons to Jordan (like the one about to follow) are decidedly misplaced, then.

Whatever; the league hasn't enjoyed this kind of wire-to-wire attention since the 1995-96 season, when Jordan, back for his first full season since 1992-93, commanded unprecedented interest. Jordan, of course, also enjoyed unprecedented popularity without villainy.

This is where I really started to have trouble. Wilbon seems to be saying the entire time that LeBron-cum-super villain is what has made the NBA season popular, but he keeps comparing him to Michael Jordan (who, also, could be much more aptly compared to Tiger Woods than can LeBron), who captivated sports fans simply by doing things with a basketball that continued to shock and amaze. Isn’t LeBron drawing this much attention off the court closer to Dennis Rodman wearing a wedding dress than it is to Jordan’s flu game? And he also keeps comparing LeBron to Jordan and then these finals to the 95-96 Finals which did not feature Jordan nor did they feature a stand-alone character that stole all of the attention (with the possible exception of Hakeem, but I don't think the amount of individual attention is really that close at all).

Frankly, LeBron doesn't have any of the stuff villains are made of, yet he has accepted being cast in that role.

“Accepted” is a funny word to use here, because I often think of “accepted” as meaning “totally cool with that,” whereas LeBron continues to whine about his image like he didn’t get invited to the cool kid’s birthday party in 4th grade.

LeBron doesn't play with any noticeable physicality, hardly ever fouls anybody hard, doesn't talk much -- if any -- trash by today's standards, and other than a couple of notable occasions of walking off the court without shaking hands after playoff series defeats (a trend that, annoyingly, seems to be on the increase across the league), has been guilty of nothing objectionable. He simply hasn't fit the villain's bill.

Sure, he doesn’t fit the villain’s bill ON THE COURT. But he remains the only example in all of sports of a player that turned down more money from the only team for which he ever played - - a team based in his hometown - - to go play somewhere else. And he rubbed everyone’s face in it, stopping only to apologize after he beat the Celtics and was able to declare that, at least from a basketball standpoint, the move to Miami wasn’t a totally fuck job.

But the thing that really made me comment on this article is what seems to be a prevailing sentiment throughout sports coverage that Wilbon saves for the end of his piece:

And with that, LeBron James smiled and walked into the NBA Finals, his image having changed dramatically since he appeared in the 2007 Finals: a much richer, more controversial, more hated, more internationally celebrated, more complex and more fascinating figure now than then.

Yes, his image has most definitely changed, but I don’t think his (Suffering Idiots buzzword alert) solipsism is fascinating at all. It’s utterly predictable. LeBron would have been a fascinating figure if he had made the bold choice and risked never winning a championship in Cleveland (unless he could pretty much do it on his own, which he almost did) out of some profound sense of loyalty or the historic importance that a championship in Cleveland might have.

But looking out for #1 isn’t dramatic or interesting or complex or fascinating. It’s timeless and it’s unchanging, and it got sports fans upset, not because they all feel bad for Cleveland, but because they all feel the urge to hate the prototypical selfish athlete made manifest in King James.

The Relatively Short Hello

2011-05-27T10:35:00.000-07:00

It's been over a year since anyone posted here, and far longer than that for me, but what do you say we get back to this? I'm feeling a rush of inspiration having started to read FJM over again from the beginning.

I don't have anything to say at the moment, but let this post be the harbinger of ill-advised commentary to come.

-Gerber

Tiger Apology

2010-02-19T07:53:00.000-08:00

I'm watching First Take right now, and they have on some lady who wrote some book called "The Art of the Apology," or something like that.

And honestly, she's just spewing nonsensical drivel, talking about all the things that Tiger should do or say in his apology. Fuck that. People shouldn't be dictating what Woods should be saying. Well, that's only half true. People to whom Tiger owes no apology shouldn't dictate what he should say. And that's every fucking person in the entire world who isn't married to him.

She said that some golf writers won't be covering the event because they're not allowed to ask questions. That's ridiculous too. Without Tiger most of these people wouldn't have jobs. We can't go back to a pre-Tiger PGA, and as unfortunate as it is for people like Ernie Els (but honestly, fuck him), without Tiger no one cares about golf. These writers shouldn't be trying to ask Tiger questions, they should be groveling and begging for him to come back, and probably apologizing for publicizing his personal life.

Finally, I love that Tiger is stealing all of the attention away from the Accenture Match Play tournament (I refuse to call it a championship, because Tiger isn't in it). Accenture, of course, is the first company that dropped Tiger as it's representive. They're also, of course, the guys who helped Enron cover things up. (http://tinyurl.com/ylzkqm9) Fuck them, too.

He's apologizing now. Disappointing.

Things That Are True

2010-01-25T14:51:00.000-08:00

Here's the complete list of things that Andrew Jackson would do if he were President now, instead of this Obama clown:

Whatever the fuck he wanted

Some days I really wish Lincoln had just let the South leave

2009-10-16T10:16:00.000-07:00

I saw this article about ten minutes ago. I would have started writing about it right away, but it took some time to get over the sadness I was feeling for America. Quick summary: a justice of the peace in Louisiana refused to grant a marriage license to an interracial couple. Yeah, the guy is almost certainly a racist douchebag. But he doesn't think so. Here's what the guy, Keith Bardwell, had to say about his decision:

"I'm not a racist. I just don't believe in mixing the races that way."

"I have piles and piles of black friends."

Bardwell said he asks everyone who calls about marriage if they are a mixed race couple. If they are, he does not marry them

And finally, my favorite:

"I try to treat everyone equally"

Fuck this guy.

Are you ready for some Favre?

2009-10-05T19:50:00.000-07:00

If you hadn’t heard, Brett Favre and the Vikings play the Packers tonight, and people seem to think that it’s a big deal. There’s speculation that this will be the highest rated game in the history of Monday Night Football. Meh.

Since ESPN has essentially told me that as a sports fan I have to watch this game, I’m going to share the experience with everyone. And by everyone I mean Gerber. You still reading this garbage, Dick?

It’s now 8:11. The game hasn’t started yet, and I won’t watch the pregame show. Both ESPN and ESPN2 have essentially been airing nothing but Brett Favre all day today, so I’ve more than had my fill. So until kickoff I’ll watch hockey. Devils against the Rangers on Versus. Fuck both of these teams, but it’s hockey. And they probably won’t say Favre’s name.

One of the biggest casualties of the Brett Favre hysteria has been Ken Griffey Jr. Junior is one of the three best baseball players I’ve ever seen play (the other two being Chase Utley and Jimmy Rollins. Ok, or maybe Barry Bonds and Albert Pujols. But give Utley a few more years.), and may have played his last game ever yesterday. Seriously, this could be his last season. And I haven’t seen shit about it on ESPN. Yeah, Brett Favre was great and all, and I suppose he’s still serviceable, but Griffey, before he went to the Reds, was just the coolest. I don’t know of anyone who didn’t love Ken Griffey Jr. He was the second coming of Willie Mays, a pure five tool player who did everything so well. He was so much fun to watch. Seriously, he was just the best, and if this really is the end of The Kid’s career, somebody needs to be talking about it.

The Rangers and the Devils are still tied at two. I’m pretty sure that the Devils are going to be the most boring team in the history of hockey this season. The Devils, as a rule, are usually pretty boring, and they have been since I’ve been watching hockey. Now, they’re being coached by Jacques Lemaire again, the man who almost killed hockey with the trap. I don’t expect to ever see a Devil in the other team’s zone.

Just to be clear, I want the Packers to win today. I want them to destroy the Vikings. I want them to beat the Vikings so badly that the entire state of Minnesota is utterly demoralized for the rest of the season. I want Favre to blow the game by chucking up interception after interception. I would like to see Adrian Peterson take a swing at him on the sidelines. And I really, really want to see Brett Favre cry.

The Flyers have looked pretty decent so far this year. Pronger has been as advertised, an absolute beast, especially shorthanded. Seeing him and Kimmo kill off a two minute 5-on-3 at New Jersey Saturday was incredible. The Flyers take so many stupid penalties, it’d be nice for that not to kick us in the ass. JVR has looked pretty good too, with assists in both games so far. It’s early in the season, but he seems to have some nice chemistry with Giroux and Powe. Carter and Richards have both gotten off to good starts, with each center scoring a goal in each game. But two games into the season the best Flyer has been Ray Emery. It didn’t have much to do in Carolina, but he didn’t fuck up, so that’s nice. And he played really well against the Devils, making some incredible saves, and keeping the Flyers in the game when they went down two men early in the first period. Things won’t get any easier for the Flyers, as their next three games are against Washington, Pittsburgh, and Anaheim, but I think we’ll probably win all three of those games. I really don’t see this team ever losing. Especially once Giroux starts scoring.

Ok, it’s 8:35 and I’m being bitched at to turn off fun sports so my roommates can watch Favre. Jaws is telling us that Adrian Peterson is kind of a big deal. If the Vikings win this game, it won’t be because of Favre, it will be because he’s handing the football to the best football player in the world. No one will mention that tomorrow though. Brett Favre Brett Favre Brett Favre.

So you know what sucks? Drexel’s student newspaper. I didn’t read the whole thing, because it wasn’t very captivating. But here’s the impression I’ve formed from today’s issue and one issue from the very beginning of the school year. First of all, we need to look at the staple of any good college newspaper: the police blotter. The Drexel one sucks. It’s boring. Clinical, even. A car was broken into. No one needs to read about that. Where are the stories about RA’s busting pudding wrestling parties, or douchey kids getting pistol whipped? Maybe no one at Drexel is having fun. Who knows?

Kickoff just happened. My roommates refuse to watch with the sound off. So the Packers have a player named Jermichael. I’m kind of happy the sound was on so I could hear that.

The Steelers won yesterday, holding off a furious charge led by Philip Rivers. Ben Roethlisberger really is the opposite of Donovan McNabb. All he does in win football games. Donovan pukes. Roethlisberger is so much cooler. You know who else Roethlisberger is cooler than? Aaron Rodgers. The Packers were marching down the field, tight ends were literally hurdling defenders, and then that asshole fumbled. Shit.

Ok, honestly, you might as well stop reading this now. From here on out there’s going to be very little that’s not hate directed at Brett Favre and anyone or anything making him look better.

Ok, I spoke too soon. Turns out there’s something that bothers me even more than Brett Favre: this Mayan apocalypse nonsense. It’s not going to happen. Please, everyone, don’t worry about this. Also, don’t go see that movie. Honestly, if the Mayans were so smart, they wouldn’t have mostly died off more than a thousand years ago. They didn’t know so much.

I would very much like to meet someone who was a contestant on Legends of the Hidden Temple. I want to know what the Temple Guards were like when the cameras weren’t rolling. Still scary? Probably.

Favre to Shiancoe for a touchdown. At least that’s fantasy points.

Um, things do no look good for the Packers right now. I think Aaron Rodgers may have wet his pants. It’s a good thing they’re already yellow. Brett Favre.

JUMP PASSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS. RODGERSSSSSSSSS. TEBOWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW.

Um, that was a touchdown from Rodgers to that Jermichael character. It was pretty cool. Also, not technically a touchdown, but The Favres didn’t challenge the play.

The Favres just went three and out. Fuckers.

Big baseball game tomorrow. I’m rooting for the Twins. Why? Because I want to see Carl Pavano face the Yankees in the playoffs. Excuse me. I want to see Carl Pavano shut the Yankees out. And he will. It’s destiny.

Brad Childress managed to now throw a challenge flag in time. He and his assistants couldn’t get it out of his pocket. Let’s throw this on top of the growing collection of anecdotal evidence suggesting that Childress really isn’t a good football coach.

Brett Favre hits a wide open guy. “What a throw by Brett Favre!” He’s gunslinging. Now a touchdown to some guy that isn’t Shiancoe. My fantasy team isn’t impressed. The Favres are up 14-7.

So the Penn Bookstore doesn’t have a single book about Peter the Great. That’s pretty bad. I mean, shit, he’s one of the three most important people in Russian history. But I guess they need the space for books with Palin on the cover (not even her fucking book!).

So Sampdoria is tied at the top of the Serie A table with Inter? That’s pretty crazy. But come on, there’s no way they last. Kinda have to figure that Inter and Juve will finish one and two, with Fiorentina third, and any number of teams, hopefully including Roma, competing for fourth, and the last spot in European play. Totti had two goals Sunday. He’s so fucking good. Brett Favre.

It’s almost halftime. The Vikings have the ball, and they’re driving down the field. The game is tied. That’s how you liveblog.

Brett Favre was just intercepted in the endzone, but the refs bailed him out with a bullshit pass interference call. AP runs it in the next play. I think that maybe the refs may be slightly favoring the Vikes slightly. They’ve already ignored a couple holds, now a very dubious pass interference.

“It’s been great what Brett Favre has done for the city (Minneapolis) and the organization (I can only assume he’s talking about the SS).” They’re actually showing highlights of Brett Favre practicing from like sixteen years ago. I swear to God.

I’d like to take this paragraph to remind everyone that Glenn Beck still has not denied that he, Glenn Beck, raped and murdered a young girl in 1990. No one has refuted the assertion that Glenn Beck raped and murdered a young girl in 1990. Just saying.

First half ends on a failed Hail Mary. Come on Packers, God is clearly on Brett Favre’s side.

And Kid Rock welcomes us back to the game. I swear they’re doing everything they can to get me to switch to RAW.

Another Favre touchdown pass. Al Harris looks bad. I’ve never been able to understand how he’s been a starting CB since leaving the Eagles.

I’ve pretty much lost interest in this game, so I’m going to post this and start reading Brett Favre. I mean evidence.

Thumbs Anyone?

2009-09-23T12:35:00.000-07:00

Thumbs up: Sarah Palin. She gave her big speech in Hong Kong this week. I don't know what she was blathering on about. I'm sure she sounded very smart. But she managed to give the entire speech without saying "death panel" once. I feel like this is her first step, albeit a very, very small one, towards respectability. But it probably isn't.

Thumbs down: The Ukraine. They won't let Elton John and his partner adopt an HIV-positive baby. That's fucked up. If we, as a global community, will let Nadya Suleman have eight kids, we can't not let Elton John have at least one.

Thumbs Up: Motherfuckin' football season is here! As a Mets fan, this football season feels like the first time they served beer after Prohibition ended. And it seems like it's going to be a pretty good season, too, what with all the last second finishes and shittiness of the Cowboys.
Thumbs down: The Yankees being back in the playoffs. How awesome was it last year when the Yankees weren't in the playoffs? Weren't we all happier, even for just a few days? Well now that's over. And worse yet - - the Yankees are really fuckin' good this year.

Thumbs Up: New Thursday night TV. The Office has always been outstanding. New comers Parks and Recreation (recently featuring Amy Poehler rapping 'Parents Just Don't Understand') and Community (simultaneously funny and insulting to each and every student pursuing their Associate's) are solid. Add 30 Rock's triumphant return this week and cap it all off with a little It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia and there's really no reason to leave the couch or associate with actual people on Thursday.

Thumbs Down: Commuting during the school year. It now takes me 15 minutes to drive through a neighborhood that should logically take less than one. The weird thing is, I don't even see that many buses on the road. It's the cops who have nothing better to do than guard our crosswalks and stay at home parents who won't wait an extra hour before running errands that kill me. Nothing rips the soul out through your eye sockets quite like sitting through the same traffic light three times.

And we’re back. Again. At least I am. Get excited.

2009-09-23T12:19:00.000-07:00

So it’s been a while. Here are some things that have caught my attention recently.

The guy who owns the Utah Jazz’ D-League team wants to stage a one on one game between Michael Jordan and Bryon Russell. He’ll make a donation to the winner’s charity of choice. Tremendously noble. But he thinks that this game should happen during halftime of his team’s season opener. Come on, how delusional is this guy? If Michael Jordan is going to play any sort of basketball game, I feel pretty comfortable saying that it won’t be during halftime of a Utah Flash game.

I drink almost exclusively from two cups. The first is a 7-11 GI Joe souvenir cup with Duke on it. I do have the entire set of four, but the Duke cup is my favorite. The second cup is a Phillies 2008 World Series Champions pint glass. To clear up any potential misconceptions about this glass, I didn’t steal it from a bar. At some point in the night I ended up with it, it became more of an effort to bring it back to the bar than to keep it, so I just brought it home with me. Again, not stealing. Brett Myers would understand. Also, GI Joe and the Phillies? Convince me I’m not an eight year old.

Moammar Gadhafi is saying things. I didn’t read this whole article, because it was boring, but one part of it jumped out at me. Gadhafi wants to get rid of the veto power that the five permanent members of the Security Council have. I hope this proposal goes all the way through, and then at the very last minute we veto it. Fuck him. Also, the capitalization of teleprompter in this article amused me. TelePrompTer. Weird.

I have a new favorite website: http://glennbeckrapedandmurderedayounggirlin1990.com/. The URL is a little bit misleading. No one is saying that Glenn Beck raped and murdered a young girl in 1990. I don’t know if Glenn Beck raped and murdered a young girl in 1990. But Glenn Beck has refused to deny that he raped and murdered a young girl in 1990. So did Glenn Beck rape and murder a young girl in 1990? Probably. Fuck him.

Last week I met someone who claims to have “no emotions.” That just isn’t true. To quote someone who is almost certainly a genius, “it means that she’s so emotional that she can’t feel any one emotion over all the others at catastrophically high levels.” You shouldn’t be walking away from people like this, you should be running.

This story was pretty funny. This coach is setting a precedent that may come back to kick his ass, but it’s still a pretty stand up move. Nevertheless, I still think that Chip Kelly is an asshole, and will continue to think so until he revokes LaGarrette Blount’s suspension. Yeah, Blount hit a guy in the face, but the guy probably deserved it, and Blount apologized like right away. The guy he hit has accepted the apology, so Oregon should drop their self-righteous, draconian punishment and let Blount have at least some of a senior season.

Sunday is International Michael Vick Appreciation Day. (That may not be actually true.) He’s going to destroy the Chiefs. He was holding back during the preseason. He’s going to score like six touchdowns. Adjust your fantasy rosters accordingly.

2009-09-23T07:20:00.000-07:00

We'll write something soon, I swear.

Yeah?

2009-09-09T18:41:00.000-07:00

Really, you want to get into this? Ok.

Hello, My Friend, Hello

2009-09-08T15:18:00.000-07:00

It's been too long since I posted, so here's a quick thought to remind the Phils they still love it in the can.

Curses are dumb

2009-08-13T14:04:00.000-07:00

People, for the most part, are stupid. They watch Fox News, take quizzes on Facebook, and are responsible for Larry the Cable Guy. Most appallingly, though, many of them believe in sports curses. Even the writers of this site aren’t above this; at least part of Gerber believes that the Mets are sucking so badly this year because they started an affiliation with the AAA Buffalo Bison (pronounced bi-zon). But that’s asinine. The Mets are struggling because they have a terrible GM, who was brought in to replace a terrible GM, who in turn replaced another terrible GM. They don’t pay overslot for draft picks, opting instead to do things like giving $25 million contracts to Luis Castillo. And, well, everyone on that team, with the exception of Johan Santana, is a little bitch. There is no curse. Here are the real reasons behind some other famous sports curses.

Let’s get the biggest one out of the way, the Curse of the Bambino. The Red Sox went from 1918 to 2004 without winning the World Series. Some people thought that it was because the franchise was cursed, doomed to mediocrity because they had sold promising pitcher George Ruth to the Yankees. Other people realize that this 86 year stretch happened mostly because Tom Yawkey, longtime Red Sox owner, was a terrible, terrible racist. He had the first chance to sign Jackie Robinson, but he passed. Robinson and Ted Williams in the same lineup? Damn. The team also had the chance to sign Willie Mays, Hank Aaron, and Ernie Banks. Declined on all three. Seriously, the Red Sox didn’t integrate until after Jackie Robinson had retired. The Yawkey family sold the team before the 2003 season. Since then? Two World Series.

Whining about curses isn’t exclusive to the American League. Cubs fans do it too. They call it the Curse of the Billy Goat. It’s not worth repeating here. The real reason the Cubs haven’t won a World Series since 1908? Their winningest pitcher is Charlie Root. How much success could they legitimately expect?

Curses aren’t exclusive to baseball either. Just ask a Detroit Lions fan. In 1958 the team traded quarterback Bobby Layne to the Steelers. Layne allegedly said that the Lions wouldn’t win for fifty years. They haven’t. What can explain this curse? Well, Barry Sanders is the only memorable Lion I can think of. He realized the futility of playing for the Lions and retired early. Here’s a list that some guy made of the top 75 Lions of all time. Look at the top 10. Seven of them played all, or a significant portion, of their career before 1958. You have to go down to #59 on the list to find a quarterback who played after Layne.

Some curses affect more than one team, afflicting whole cities. Until this past October, Philadelphia was plagued by the Curse of William Penn. Prior to the Phillies becoming World Fucking Champions, no Philadelphia team had won a title since One Liberty Place was built, becoming the first building to rise higher than the statue of William Penn on the top of City Hall. There was no curse. People like Rich Kotite, Ray Rhodes, and Donovan McNabb’s gaping vagina kept the Eagles from winning the Superbowl. The Flyers never won the Stanley Cup because they’ve had goalies like Roman Cechmanek, Robert Esche, Garth Snow, a very old John Vanbiesbrouck, and Martin Biron. The Sixers didn’t win anything because they were never able to find anyone good who could play with AI. And the Phillies, the losingest team in all of sports, were held down by decisions like putting in Mitch Williams, giving Ed Wade a job, letting Ed Wade keep his job, and still not firing Ed Wade. Plus, they never should have traded Larry Bowa and that second baseman throw in.

And the Phillies just won, sweeping the Cubs. Time to go do something else.

Oh, hey, look, we still have a blog

2009-08-05T11:48:00.000-07:00

Ok, so we haven’t said much recently. Whatever, it’s summer. Here are a bunch of words that won’t really say much of anything.

Right now I’m watching the Mets beat the Cardinals. Thrilling. I’m sorry, but the Mets just are not a good baseball team right now. I don’t see how they’ll make the playoffs this year. Nelson Figueroa is pitching well though, bailing out an injured Jon Niese. Honestly, this game hasn’t been all that exciting. My favorite part so far has been learning that Jeff Francoeur has yet to draw a non-intentional walk since being traded. Also, Pujols has a six at bat hit streak going, with at least two doubles and two home runs in that stretch. In his most recent plate appearance, though, he was hit in the forearm. David Wright better watch out next time he comes up.

Last night Prince Fielder went nuts after being hit with two outs in the ninth, rampaging through the bowels of Dodger Stadium looking for Guillermo Mota. Um, ‘roid rage? Let’s be honest, he’s probably been doing that stuff since he was twelve. Dodgers-Brewers game tonight could be a shit show. Or, more likely, the umpires will warn both dugouts before the first pitch, and the game will be boring.

HBO is offering August Rush on demand through the end of August. It’s such a good movie, I can’t think of anything better to watch when hung over. I think they blew it by not marketing the movie that way.

Cardinals just threw at David Wright’s head! Bottom six, Mets are up 7-0. Wright got out of the way. Warnings issued. Wright grounds into a double play. Last Thursday, some Giants pitcher had the audacity to throw at Chase Utley’s head. Four pitches later Utley put the ball out of the park. I know it’s just anecdotal, but maybe this is why the Phillies are the reigning World Fucking Champions and the Mets are, well, the Mets. And seriously, I can’t overstate how cool Chase Utley is.

The GI Joe movie comes out Friday. I’ve been alternating between excited and terrified. They’ve been advertizing it so much I feel like they’re trying to trick people into going to see it. Whatever, there’s no way I won’t see it. And it’s GI Joe, so it’s going to be good. I just found out today that it was written by the people who wrote Four Brothers. That was a movie that I expected to be awful, but it actually wasn’t bad at all. So I guess there’s hope. The fight between Snake Eyes and Storm Shadow needs to be really bad ass. Really though, I think everything is going to come down to these accelerator suits. If they’re as idiotic as they sound, the movie is probably fucked. But if they’re ok, there’s hope.

Francoeur just drew a walk! Swear to God. That’s probably a good note to end on.

Top 10 things that have happened in my life since the NL won their last All Star Game

2009-07-15T06:54:00.000-07:00

10. I graduated from elementary school, middle school, high school, and college.
9. I turned 11.
8. I traveled to 12 different countries.
7. Found out for sure that Santa isn't real.
6. Started picking out my own clothes. Every morning.
5. No one tells me when to go to bed anymore.
4. All but one of my favorite teams from the four major sports (Mets, Giants, Rangers, Knicks) have at least made the championship of their respective sport.
3. Drank my first beer.
2. Girls stopped being gross/I found out how awesome boobs are.
1. I grew pubes.

Sarah Palin isn't above the FJM treatment

2009-07-05T10:18:00.000-07:00

Let's dive right in:

Palin Announces no Second Term
No Lame Duck Session Either

Yeah, so this happened. Damn. I wonder why. Let’s see what the Governor has to say.

Hi Alaska, I appreciate speaking directly to you, the people I serve, as your Governor.

Shit. Should I not be reading this? Actually, probably not. Chances are I end up with a headache. And no answers.

People who know me know that besides faith and family, nothing's more important to me than our beloved Alaska. Serving her people is the greatest honor I could imagine.

What she’s not saying here is that Alaska is a distant third. And when she says family, she means herself, because technically she’s in her family. I guess what I’m saying here is that while she’s going to try to portray this as some sort of altruistic move, she’s doing it because she thinks it’s best for her. Tremendously solipsistic.

I want Alaskans to grasp what can be in store for our state. We were purchased as a territory because a member of President Abe Lincoln's cabinet, William Seward, providentially saw in this great land, vast riches, beauty, strategic placement on the globe, and opportunity.

So he knew that we needed some territory close enough to Russia to keep the Tsrarist bastards in check?

He boldly looked "North to the Future". But he endured such ridicule and mocking for his vision for Alaska, remember the adversaries scoffed, calling this "Seward's Folly". Seward withstood such disdain as he chose the uncomfortable, unconventional, but right path to secure Alaska, so Alaska could help secure the United States.

Man, Sarah Palin’s existence is pretty damning evidence that maybe Seward was wrong after all.

Alaska’s mission – to contribute to America. We’re strategic in the world as the air crossroads of the world, as a gatekeeper of the continent. Bold visionaries knew this - Alaska would be part of America's great destiny.

Strategic? I guess, in the sense that all our nukes are going to fly over Alaska when we bomb North Korea. Gatekeeper to the continent? I don’t think anyone has entered North America through Alaska since the Bering Strait was walkable.

Our destiny to be reached by responsibly developing our natural resources. This land, blessed with clean air, water, wildlife, minerals, and oil and gas. It's energy! God gave us energy.

There are two things that I love about Sarah Palin’s writing that are exhibited in this paragraph. First, look at that first sentence. She clearly thinks that verbs are a tool of the liberal media elite. Second, exclamation points. This is just the first of many. Get excited. I am, however, disappointed that she doesn’t leave the “g” off her gerunds when she writes. Oh well, can’t win ‘em all.

So to serve the state is a humbling responsibility, because I know in my soul that Alaska is of such import, for America’s security, in our very volatile world. And you know me by now, I promised even four years ago to show my independence… no more conventional “politics as usual”.

“Politics as usual” in this case means actually doing your job, what the people elected you to do.

And we are doing well! My administration's accomplishments speak for themselves. We work tirelessly for Alaskans.

What, exactly, has she accomplished? Also, !!!.

We aggressively and responsibly develop our resources because they were created to be used to better our world... to help people... and we protect the environment and Alaskans (the resource owners) foremost with our policies.

Maybe it’s just me, but I don’t see how “responsibly develop our resources” is compatible with “drill baby drill.” Also, just saying you protect the environment doesn’t make it true. The animals she shot from helicopters are part of the environment, maybe we should ask them. But we can’t, because she shot all of them and now they’re dead.

Here’s some of the things we’ve done:

Oh?

We created a petroleum integrity office to oversee safe development. We held the line for Alaskans on Point Thomson – and finally for the first time in decades – they’re drilling for oil and gas.

There’s probably been a reason we weren’t drilling there for decades. Like calamitous environmental effects. That last paragraph seems so far away.

We have AGIA, the gasline project – a massive bi-partisan victory (the vote was 58 to 1!) – also succeeding as intended - protecting Alaskans as our clean natural gas will flow to energize us, and America, through a competitive, pro-private sector project. This is the largest private sector energy project, ever. This is energy independence.

The only thing better than a real governor using exclamation points is when one uses them to brag parenthetically. I think she uses so many dashes because she doesn’t know how semi-colons work.

And ACES – another bipartisan effort – is working as intended and industry is publicly acknowledging its success. Our new oil and gas “clear and equitable formula” is so Alaskans will no longer be taken advantage of. ACES incentivizes new exploration and development and jobs that were previously not going to happen with a monopolized North Slope oil basin.

I love in this paragraph how she’s treating “industry” as some sort of entity, one capable of making public acknowledgments. Also, I read that second paragraph like four times, and I’m pretty sure that Piper wrote it. It’s, um, well, she’s no F. Scott Fitzgerald.

We cleaned up previously accepted unethical actions; we ushered in bi-partisan Ethics Reform.

How many ethics complaints have been filed against her since the beginning of her term? Um, the internet says it’s a lot.

We also slowed the rate of government growth, we worked with the Legislature to save billions of dollars for the future, and I made no lobbyist friends with my hundreds of millions of dollars in budget vetoes... but living beyond our means today is irresponsible for tomorrow.

Is this a good spot to talk about that bridge? Eh, no one wants to hear about that, back to her bullshit.

We took government out of the dairy business and put it back into private-sector hands – where it should be.

Wait, what? What does this even mean? Clearly I don’t know nearly enough about Alaska’s thriving dairy industry, and its conspiratorial tendencies. Seriously, what does this even mean? As of last April there were six dairy farms in Alaska.

We provided unprecedented support for education initiatives, and with the right leadership, finally filled long-vacant public safety positions. We built a sub-Cabinet on Climate Change and took heat from Outside special interests for our biologically-sound wildlife management for abundance.

I love that she capitalizes “Outside” here. What’s going on with that? Xenophobia? I’m going to say yes.

We broke ground on the new prison.

Cool.

And we made common sense conservative choices to eliminate personal luxuries like the jet, the chef, the junkets... the entourage.

Um, she sold the jet for a loss. Say what you will about conservatives, but most of them are damn good at making money. See, she’s not even good at being a conservative.

And the Lt. Governor and I said "no" to our pay raises.

I don’t see why this is seen as a good thing. Honestly, I don’t think I would vote for someone who’s just going to turn down money. There’s something untrustworthy about it.

So much success in this first term – and with this success I am proud to take credit... for hiring the right people! Our goal was to achieve a gasline project, more fair oil and gas valuation, and ethics reform in four years. We did it in two. It’s because of the people… good public servants surrounding the Governor's office, with servants' hearts and astounding work ethic... they are Alaska's success!

Oh man, I love the ellipses-exclamation point combination. This is my favorite paragraph, because she uses it twice. Though something is missing. I dunno, I just feel that type of punctuation only really works when you have Kelso from That ‘70’s Show yelling “Burn!” right after. Also, is she saying that she accomplished everything she needed to already, and that’s why she’s resigning? Because if so, she’s lying. Especially about ethics reform.

We are doing well! I wish you'd hear more from the media of your state's progress and how we tackle Outside interests - daily - special interests that would stymie our state. Even those debt-ridden stimulus dollars that would force the heavy hand of federal government into our communities with an “all-knowing attitude” – I have taken the slings and arrows with that unpopular move to veto because I know being right is better than being popular. Some of those dollars would harm Alaska and harm America – I resisted those dollars because of the obscene national debt we’re forcing our children to pay, because of today’s Big Government spending; it’s immoral and doesn’t even make economic sense!

Oh man, great paragraph. It’s got her attacking the media, Obama, and the mysteriously-capitalized “Outsiders.” She also portrays herself as a martyr, because, well, I don’t know. She just really likes herself.

Another accomplishment – our Law Department protected states’ rights – two huge U.S. Supreme Court reversals came down against that liberal Ninth Circuit, deciding in our state’s favor over the last two weeks. We’re protectors of our Constitution – federalists protect states’ rights as mandated in 10th amendment.

Ok, this might be the most poorly-constructed paragraph so far. But, um, how is a Supreme Court ruling an accomplishment that she can take credit for? Also, bonus douche-points for bashing the liberal Ninth Circuit. All those damned gays and abortionists in California. Finally, the 10th Amendment doesn’t mandate that anyone should do anything, it says what can’t be done by the Federal government. Come on, this is something you learn in the most basic civics or politics class.

But you don’t hear much of the good stuff in the press anymore, do you?

Yeah, fuck those guys.

Some say things changed for me on August 29th last year – the day John McCain tapped me to be his running-mate – I say others changed.

Not just others. Absolutely everyone else. Or her.

Let me speak to that for a minute.

Take as long as you need.

Political operatives descended on Alaska last August, digging for dirt. The ethics law I championed became their weapon of choice. Over the past nine months I've been accused of all sorts of frivolous ethics violations – such as holding a fish in a photograph, wearing a jacket with a logo on it, and answering reporters’ questions.

Also misusing funds, improperly disclosing information, and breaking election law. They seem pretty serious.

Every one – all 15 of the ethics complaints have been dismissed. We’ve won! But it hasn't been cheap - the State has wasted thousands of hours of your time and shelled out some two million of your dollars to respond to “opposition research” – that’s money not going to fund teachers or troopers – or safer roads. And this political absurdity, the “politics of personal destruction” … Todd and I are looking at more than half a million dollars in legal bills in order to set the record straight. And what about the people who offer up these silly accusations? It doesn’t cost them a dime so they’re not going to stop draining public resources – spending other peoples’ money in their game.

I counted 18. Whatever. And it’s not like Sarah Palin was wasting Alaskan time and money going all over the country both before and after the election. How did Alaska benefit from having its Governor miss the last couple days of the legislative session speaking at some anti-abortion festival?

It’s pretty insane – my staff and I spend most of our day dealing with this instead of progressing our state now. I know I promised no more “politics as usual,” but this isn’t what anyone had in mind for Alaska.

Yeah, you’re right, you are full of shit when you say you’re a maverick and are dismissive of “politics as usual.” I’m glad we were able to clear this up. On behalf of America, I accept your apology.

If I have learned one thing: life is about choices!

Like choosing to not let people choose to have abortions.

And one chooses how to react to circumstances. You can choose to engage in things that tear down, or build up. I choose to work very hard on a path for fruitfulness and productivity. I choose not to tear down and waste precious time; but to build up this state and our country, and her industrious, generous, patriotic, free people!

USA! Sorry, I got swept up in all the nice things she was saying about me. But it might be worth asking just what she’s accomplished since August.

Life is too short to compromise time and resources... it may be tempting and more comfortable to just keep your head down, plod along, and appease those who demand: "Sit down and shut up", but that's the worthless, easy path; that's a quitter's way out. And a problem in our country today is apathy. It would be apathetic to just hunker down and “go with the flow”.

This paragraph just seems contradictory. She’s saying you shouldn’t take the quitter’s way out in her resignation statement. Am I taking crazy pills?

Nah, only dead fish "go with the flow".

Yep, she wrote “Nah.” She’s just so damned folksy.

No. Productive, fulfilled people determine where to put their efforts, choosing to wisely utilize precious time... to build up.

Again, is the ellipsis necessary?

And there is such a need to build up and fight for our state and our country. I choose to fight for it! And I'll work hard for others who still believe in free enterprise and smaller government; strong national security for our country and support for our troops; energy independence; and for those who will protect freedom and equality and life... I'll work for and campaign for those proud to be American, and those who are inspired by our ideals and won't deride them.

Ugh, I’m really sick of the whole anti-abortion thing. “Protect life.” Fuck that. It really bothers me that people like priests and the Pope and shit have so much influence over shaping peoples’ lives, when they have such insular existences, with really nothing in common with the people they’re supposed to be leading to salvation.

I will support others who seek to serve, in or out of office, for the right reasons, and I don't care what party they're in or no party at all. Inside Alaska – or Outside Alaska.

This is a lie. They will all be Republicans. Every single one.

But I won’t do it from the Governor’s desk.

Allahu Akbar.

I've never believed that I, nor anyone else, needs a title to do this - to make a difference... to help people. So I choose, for my State and my family, more "freedom" to progress, all the way around... so that Alaska may progress... I will not seek re-election as Governor.

I hope she said “I needs” during the press conference. And she’s not doing anything for her state or her family; it’s for herself.

And so as I thought about this announcement that I wouldn’t run for re-election and what it means for Alaska, I thought about how much fun some governors have as lame ducks… travel around the state, to the Lower 48 (maybe), overseas on international trade – as so many politicians do. And then I thought – that’s what’s wrong – many just accept that lame duck status, hit the road, draw the paycheck, and “milk it”. I’m not putting Alaska through that – I promised efficiencies and effectiveness! That’s not how I am wired. I am not wired to operate under the same old “politics as usual.” I promised that four years ago – and I meant it.

What the hell? Just because she’d be a lame duck doesn’t mean she would have to do any of these things. She could just, well, not.

It’s not what is best for Alaska.

Well, she and I probably agree that her not being governor is best for Alaska.

I am determined to take the right path for Alaska even though it is unconventional and not so comfortable.

Again, yeah, her not being in charge is probably a good thing.

With this announcement that I am not seeking re-election… I’ve determined it’s best to transfer the authority of governor to Lieutenant Governor Parnell; and I am willing to do so, so that this administration – with its positive agenda, its accomplishments, and its successful road to an incredible future – can continue without interruption and with great administrative and legislative success.

She’s just so cocky and delusional, I love it.

My choice is to take a stand and effect change – not hit our heads against the wall and watch valuable state time and money, millions of your dollars, go down the drain in this new environment. Rather, we know we can effect positive change outside government at this moment in time, on another scale, and actually make a difference for our priorities – and so we will, for Alaskans and for Americans.

I can’t be the only person who would pay a decent amount of money to watch Sarah Palin actually hit her head against a wall, can I?

Let me go back to a comfortable analogy for me – sports… basketball. I use it because you’re naïve if you don’t see the national full-court press picking away right now: A good point guard drives through a full court press, protecting the ball, keeping her eye on the basket… and she knows exactly when to pass the ball so that the team can win. And I’m doing that – keeping our eye on the ball that represents sound priorities – smaller government, energy independence, national security, freedom! And I know when it’s time to pass the ball – for victory.

So she basically has her one go-to metaphor, basketball, and she fucked it up. Keeping you eye on the ball is baseball. I would never vote for someone who so egregiously mixes metaphors. You know what, fuck it. November 6, 2012, let’s not even bother with an election. Palin vs Obama, one on one, game to eleven, winner gets the Oval Office.

I have given my reasons candidly and truthfully… and my last day won’t be for another few weeks so the transition will be very smooth. In fact, we will look to swear Sean in – in Fairbanks at the conclusion of our Governor’s picnics.

Actually, her reasons were given in the least candid and truthful way possible. I still don't think I know what they really are. She’s full of shit.

I do not want to disappoint anyone with my decision; all I can ask is that you trust me with this decision – but it’s no more “politics as usual”.

I’m not disappointed with her decision. I really wish she would completely go away though, fuck these half-measures.

Some Alaskans don’t mind wasting public dollars and state time. I do. I cannot stand here as your Governor and allow millions upon millions of our dollars go to waste just so I can hold the title of Governor. And my children won’t allow it either.

Ah, the children. One of them is knocked up now. I’d bet anything.

Some will question the timing. Let’s just say, this decision has been in the works for awhile…

I don’t know if I buy this. Obviously she planned to do it right before the Fourth of July, because it’s such a weird thing she didn’t want everyone to talk about it. But if she were smart, and we have months of evidence showing she’s not, she would have announced it on the day that Michael Jackson died. You know, if this has been in the works for a while.

In fact, this decision comes after much consideration, and finally polling the most important people in my life - my children (where the count was unanimous... well, in response to asking: "Want me to make a positive difference and fight for ALL our children's future from outside the Governor's office?" It was four "yes's" and one "hell yeah!" The "hell yeah" sealed it - and someday I'll talk about the details of that... I think much of it had to do with the kids seeing their baby brother Trig mocked by some pretty mean-spirited adults recently.) Um, by the way, sure wish folks could ever, ever understand that we all could learn so much from someone like Trig - I know he needs me, but I need him even more... what a child can offer to set priorities right – that time is precious... the world needs more "Trigs", not fewer.

Ok, who was mocking Trig? I don’t think anyone was. But if she says it, it must be true. More importantly though, of her five kids, which one answered “hell yeah?” Was that Trig’s response? Clearly she didn’t ask all five kids. She just lies so casually, it’s appalling.

My decision was also fortified during this most recent trip to Kosovo and Landstuhl, to visit our wounded soldiers overseas, those who sacrifice themselves in war for our freedom and security… we can ALL learn from our selfless Troops… they’re bold, they don’t give up, they take a stand and know that life is short so they choose to not waste time. They choose to be productive and to serve something greater than self... and to build up their families, their states, our country. These Troops and their important missions – those are truly the worthy causes in this world and should be the public priority with time and resources and not this local / superficial wasteful political bloodsport.

Palin capitalizes “Troops” because she just supports them so much. She even got her passport just so she could go visit them.

May we all learn from them!

Ugh, almost through it.

*((Gotta put First Things First))*

I swear to God that I did not change the punctuation here at all. That’s exactly how it appears on Alaska’s website. I’m sure we’re all thinking “what the fuck?”

First things first: as Governor, I love my job and I love Alaska. It hurts to make this choice but I am doing what’s best for Alaska. I’ve explained why… though I think of the saying on my parents’ refrigerator that says “Don’t explain: your friends don’t need it and your enemies won’t believe you anyway.”

I think this makes her the first prominent politician to quote a refrigerator magnet. This just is not politics as usual.

But I have given my reasons… no more “politics as usual” and I am taking my fight for what’s right – for Alaska – in a new direction.

I’m afraid that if I keep rolling my eyes at this they’ll get stuck like that.

Now, despite this, I don’t want any Alaskan dissuaded from entering politics after seeing this real “climate change” that began in August… no, we need hardworking, average Americans fighting for what’s right! And I will support you because we need you and you can effect change, and I can too on the outside.

God I hope she can’t. That’s not the good kind of change.

We need those who will respect our Constitution where government’s supposed to serve from the bottom up, not move toward this top down big government take-over… but rather, will be protectors of individual rights - who also have enough common sense to acknowledge when conditions have drastically changed and are willing to call an audible and pass the ball when it’s time so the team can win! And that is what I’m doing!

If I were supposed to rewrite this paragraph so that it makes sense, I don’t know where I would even begin. It’s convoluted, poorly punctuated, frighteningly enthusiastic, and I don’t really know that the point she’s trying to make is.

Remember Alaska… America is now, more than ever, looking North to the Future. It'll be good. So God bless you, and from me and my family - to all Alaska - you have my heart.

No one is looking towards Alaska. At all. I bet a pretty substantial portion of Americans don’t even think it’s a state.

And we will be in the capable hands of our Lieutenant Governor, Sean Parnell. And Lieutenant General Craig Campbell will assume the role of Lieutenant Governor. And it is my promise to you that I will always be standing by, ready to assist. We have a good, positive agenda for Alaska.

Is that a promise or a threat?

In the words of General MacArthur said, “We are not retreating. We are advancing in another direction.”

God I hope she ends up somewhere in the Pacific Ocean.

Not to be a dick, but...

2009-06-25T17:11:00.000-07:00

Um, he was still a pedophile.

More Steroids

2009-06-25T06:25:00.001-07:00

It’s been a while since we’ve done something terribly irresponsible and potentially libelous here. This strikes me as a good time to change that. Obviously, there have been a lot of people saying dumb things about baseball players and steroids. First, there was that guy talking about Raaauuuuul, and the ridiculousness of people flipping out over that. Then, it was released that Sosa tested positive in ’03. No one was surprised, but some people were laughably indignant. Whatever, it doesn’t bother me.

So anyway, of the 104 players who tested positive in 2003, two names have now been confirmed, Alex Rodriguez and Sammy Sosa. For the mathematically challenged, that leaves 102 players still quaking with fear at the thought of exposure. Well, probably not quaking, but it may be on their mind. Maybe. Anyway, here is the list of 102 players who I think comprise that list. Just a couple notes on how this list was built. First, it’s all pretty much bullshit. I didn’t do anything like look for trends in career statistics. I didn’t look at statistics at all. And I wouldn’t say I’m necessarily accusing any of these players of doing steroids, just that it wouldn’t surprise me if they had. Also, there are a couple names that only made this list because their inclusion will piss off Gerber (be sure to wish him a happy birthday today). Ok, here’s my list:

Players named in the Mitchell Report who also probable tested positive in ’03:

Chad Allen, Larry Bigbie, Barry Bonds, Kevin Brown, Alex Cabrera, Roger Clemens, Bobby Estelella, Ryan Franklin, Eric Gagne, Jason Giambi, Jeremy Giambi, Jay Gibbons, Jason Grimsley, Todd Hundley, Paul Lo Duca, Jason Manzanillo, Denny Neagle, Armando Rios, John Rocker, Benito Santiago, Scott Schoenweiss, Gary Sheffield, Miguel Tejada, Fernando Vina, and Matt Williams.

And now the rest:

Jose Acevedo, Wilson Alvarez, Jeff Bagwell, Rod Beck, Jay Bell, Ronnie Belliard, Adrian Beltre, Joe Borowski, AJ Burnett, Eric Byrnes, Miguel Cairo, Vinny Castilla, Juan Castro, Shawn Chacon, Bruce Chen, Jeff Conine, Jose Cruz Jr., Ray Durham, Juan Encarnacion, Keith Foulke, John Franco, Aaron Fultz, Andres Galarraga, Troy Glaus, Juan Gonzalez, Tom Gordon, Kevin Gregg, Vladimir Guerrero, Travis Hafner, Todd Hollandsworth, Jorge Julio, Jeff Kent, Bobby Kielty, Ryan Klesko, Barry Larkin, Matt Lawton, Ricky Ledee, Travis Lee, Kenny Lofton, Braden Looper, Javy Lopez, Mike Lowell, Orlando Merced, Jose Mercedes, Kevin Millar, Kevin Millwood, Sergio Mitre, Raul Mondesi, Magglio Ordonez, David Ortiz, Lance Painter, Brad Penny, Mike Piazza, AJ Pierzynski, Sidney Ponson, Edgar Renteria, Dennys Reyes, Ivan Rodriguez, Tim Salmon, Jason Schmidt, Richie Sexson, Ben Sheets, Randall Simon, Alfonso Soriano, Mike Sweeney, TJ Tucker, Jose Valverde, Todd Van Poppel, Ugueth Urbina, Jason Varitek, Jose Vidro, Billy Wagner, Vernon Wells, Preston Wilson, Kerry Wood, Dmitri Young, and Victor Zambrano.

Obviously, this list won’t be 100% accurate. First of all, I only picked players I had heard of; when the list eventually comes out, and it will, there will undoubtedly be players on there that I am not familiar with. Second, some of the names on this list are ridiculous. Like, Victor Zambrano is only on there so I can mention him here, and then so I can write Scott Kazmir’s name. Mets fans’ heads are now exploding. Whatever, I don’t expect to get everyone right, I would be happy with a success rate of .367.

Howard Bryant is Prolifically Stupid

2009-06-19T09:01:00.000-07:00

Dude, give it a rest already.

If you happen to be Sammy Sosa or Alex Rodriguez, or even Roger Clemens, Barry Bonds or Rafael Palmeiro, at this point, invincibility has been your best friend. You won. You got away with it. The large majority of your peers, your bosses and the people who pay to watch you play the game agree that using anabolic substances is cheating. On March 17, 2005, Sosa and Palmeiro testified to the House Government Reform Committee that using steroids was cheating.

Yet, you've all been caught and faced no sanction.

Wrong. Wrong wrong wrong. More wrong than a dog fucking a donkey sucking on your mother's toes (and that shit is real wrong).

The jury is still out on Sosa and Rodriguez. At the very least, their images have been permanently altered; for Sosa, his 2005 Congressional testimony is already being reexamined, seemingly with the likelihood that perjury charges could be brought. Those two have been outed too recently though to really analyze the situation.

Unless of course you're Howard Bryant and you only need 4 days to write 2 articles analyzing what everyone and their mother already new about Sosa. Then you can draw as many conclusions as you like.

As for the others, we're past the point where we can say they got away scott-free. Roger Clemens is still under investigation by the FBI and a Grand Jury was convened to consider indicting him with perjury charges. That sounds exactly like the retirement I always envisioned for myself.

Barry Bonds, the all-time home run leader in MLB history, could not find a team to play for while he was still willing. Oh, and he's also under federal indictment for perjury. Man, I wish I got to relax like millionaire ex-baseball players do...

So far Rafael Palmeiro has the best case for being "untouchable." Except for the fact that he'll almost assuredly be the first player with 3,000+ hits and 500+ home runs not to be inducted on his first ballot. Oh, and he used Viagra.

Perhaps the Hall of Fame voters will punish you when it is time for induction, but from the institutions that matter -- Major League Baseball and the National Baseball Hall of Fame -- silence has governed.

Comprehending the second-greatest organizational failure in the history of the game has been left as an individual choice.

The second greatest organizational failure, eh? Then what was the first?

There is nothing clean about the steroids disaster. The commissioner is...

Nope, that's still the steroid scandal. Skip ahead, skip ahead...

The two greatest organizational failures in baseball history have closely mirrored the larger society.

Right. You mentioned that already. What's the other one?

The first -- the 60-plus years of segregated baseball -- reflected the unfortunate attitudes of the times.

Phew! That one took a while!

And are you sure about that, Sparky? First, isn't that more of an organizational failure for America than it is for baseball? It's not like everyone was walking around holding hands and we weren't telling people where they could stand, sit, eat, or shit and we weren't burning crosses on people's lawns and we weren't chastising mixed marriages and baseball was the only one saying you can't play with us. All of those things were happening all of the time, in and out of baseball.

And! Branch Rickey signed Jackie Robinson to a minor league deal in 1945 and brought him up to the majors in 1947 a full 7 years before Brown v. BOE of Topeka. So how exactly is that a failure on baseball's part? Wasn't baseball more trailblazing than they were failing?

The second -- the cynical, industrywide [sic] choice of money over integrity -- not only has poisoned baseball in the form of a runaway PED scandal but also has damaged institutions such as Wall Street and the banking industry.

You heard it here first (well, really, second because Howard Bryant keeps bringing up the same, tired, woefully inaccurate point, but I think you get my meaning) - - Major League Baseball is the reason why you had to foreclose on your house!

Did baseball choose money over integrity? Youbetcha. Was it the first time in history? Sub-question: are you out of your fucking mind?! I can count on one hand the number of times someone chose integrity over money.

And Jose Canseco offering steroids to every man, woman, and child in the 90s did not cause Wall Street to become greedier or GM to keep shitty books.

Now some tired stuff about how baseball says they want to move on, the cheaters are still getting away with it - - essentially everything he said in his article from two days prior - - so we'll just skip all of that.

Does management really want to rid the game of performance enhancers? If it does, here is what baseball should do:

Oh this should be good. This article is only 5 years removed from when every sports rag had to peddle a similar article out there. OK, Howie - - lay your innovation on me.

1. Selig must place any player found to have used anabolic substances on baseball's ineligible list for at least a portion of his Hall of Fame eligibility. Keeping players out of the Hall of Fame is the only language players understand. Because of the money, they are untouchable.

So is it money that players respond to or is it the HoF? This whole time the greed of the MLB has caused all of America's problems, but now the revolving doors of the Hall of Fame (which are remarkably non-revolving) are the roost cause of inflation.

The commissioner needs to create a sliding punitive scale: 10 years on the ineligible list after the last active game for the 104 players whose names were on the 2003 survey testing list or in the Mitchell report or who violated the league policy from 2004 to 2009; lifetime ban for anyone caught using steroids starting in the 2010 season.

I really want to see who was on that 2003 survey list. But, it would be a really shitty thing to keep those players from the Hall of Fame. Why? Because they said they wouldn't get in trouble! Interesting strategy here, Cotton: let's have the MLB lie to improve it's moral standing.

Bryant adds something about character and integrity and writing on HoF plaques, which aren't altogether terrible insights, but I'm really sick of reading his article.

Let's part with this:

Such steps are not perfect, but they represent a start beyond the talk, a stronger deterrent for players. And in some way, they address the areas important to the public: the Hall of Fame and the idea that players not only escaped punishment but were rewarded for doing so.

Howard Bryant is really pimping this retribution thing hard! Are you starting to hear the jealousy in his voice like I am? One thing's for sure: if steroids could make you a better writer, Howard Bryant would be all hopped up on that shit. And I would have to say they certainly couldn't hurt at this point.

Just Say the Word..

2009-06-18T15:45:00.000-07:00

Ok. This one really pisses me off.

You can fire missiles into the Sea of Japan for a while before I really get pissed, though I certainly don't like it as is. But why the fuck is anybody still tolerating this?

Firing a missile on path for Hawai'i on July 4th? Fuck you very much. Why hasn't someone put that Munchkin understudy in his place?

Wake Up and Smell the Anabolic Steroids

2009-06-18T08:08:00.000-07:00

Sammy Sosa apparently tested positive for steroids. Everyone saw that coming. Except this guy.

A saying exists in baseball that the smartest person in any clubhouse is the guy with either the highest batting average or the most consecutive zeroes on his paycheck.

I have never heard that saying.

In other words, the superstars -- smart or dumb; black, white, Latino or Asian; old or young -- run the show.

Ok, let's say that adage does exist: why would that surprise you? And what does it matter how old, young, dark, or light someone is, your original point was that that person is a superstar and that's what matters. I already feel a migraine coming on.

Keep that in mind as you consider the New York Times report that Sammy Sosa is one of the 104 players who tested positive for performance-enhancing drugs in baseball's 2003 survey testing because the news should not be met with an indifferent yawn, as if Sosa is just another in a long line of Hall of Fame-caliber talent biting the dust: Alex Rodriguez, Manny Ramirez and now Sosa, all in the first half of the 2009 season alone. Instead, this news should be greeted with the kind of outrage reserved for the worst breaches of trust because you, Mr. and Mrs. Fan, have been taken for a very special kind of ride.

First: nay, sir. I was not taken for a ride. At this point (and I don't think I'm anywhere near the minority with this one) I'm more surprised when I wake up each morning and don't hear that one of my favorite players has an ear growing out of his forehead. Instead it was you, Mr. Sportswriter, who was taken for a very special kind of ride; very special because you were the only person on that ride.

It must have been soul-crushing when Howard Bryant found out that Santa wasn't real - - during his junior year of college.

Second: why are we supposed to be outraged about this one? How is this different from any of the other recently outed stars? Because he is in fact "just another in a long line of Hall of Fame-caliber talent biting the dust."

By now, that con game has been exposed completely and a new argument -- let's call it the "Alex Rodriguez Defense," used by players, fans and, unfortunately, some Hall of Fame voters -- has surfaced. This one suggests that these steroid-using superstar players were merely "caught up in a culture."

Yup. That's what happened. Look, in free agency, it's every man for himself. Especially in an arbitration system where a player is endlessly compared to his peers on paper alone, every edge counts. Beyond that, once you see that 3 out of 5 of your competitors are getting an edge at a pretty reasonable price (neglecting of course the harmful biological effects) you'd be likely to try it yourself.

It is one thing to lie, which is bad enough, but what these players have done is infinitely worse. They have lied, convinced that their good will and celebrity -- and batting averages -- would allow them just enough dispensation to get away with it, to drown out anyone not taken in by their false charms.

Chicks dig the long ball. And, not coincidentally, so does everyone in America. Mark McGwire saved baseball while he was hopped up on more bovine hormone than an actual Big Mac. Same goes for Sosa and Bonds. To condemn them for that now while we were all loving it is just as much deception and backstabbing as lying about steroids in the first place.

Even as the card house collapsed, the players knew the fans were just red-blooded capitalists who would forgive lying and cheating because there was big money at stake.

I don't think the players thought it through that much. I don't think they gave a shit about forgiveness; that never even crossed their minds.

How many times have we all heard the old saw? "Well, what would you have done for $10 million? You would've done the same thing."

Yes, you would have. I know I would have. I know a handful of people who I believe possess enough integrity to have said no in that situation. I don't count myself among them.

Now I'd like to think I would have done the Pettite thing and just owned up. "Yep, you got me. Real sorry about that. Honestly." Is it worse to continue to lie about it? Absolutely. But that's not the issue right now; the issue is why you're surprised that players who lied about this for the majority of their careers are going to change their tune now.

Ironically, it is the Phillies' Raul Ibanez, burned by a blogosphere that does not have to adhere to traditional journalistic standards, who now turns back to the mainstream media -- with all of their supposed "agendas" -- to defend his name.

I'm not going to discuss this point, it's already been beaten into the ground. But one thing: "a blogosphere?" If you're going to needlessly disparage someone's passion or hobby, at least know how to refer to it let alone what actually was said.

But fans aren't the only suckers walking around today.

The writers did the same, and continue to do so. Some have decided to use their Hall of Fame votes in the affirmative for the game's great but disgraced players -- Sosa, Bonds, Clemens, Ramirez -- because the players were part of a larger culture.

Interesting that those guys have received HoF votes, seeing as how not a single one of them is eligible and two of them aren't retired (and one will definitely be playing in 2 weeks time). Jerk off.

Is this baseball or Wall Street? The cultural intention to defraud is the same.

Bazing! Good one. So let's haphazardly use your same faulty logic and lazy approach to research in another venue you're hopelessly unqualified to critique: finance! First, guy, what the fuck do you know about Wall Street? And b) I haven't been on the floor in a while, but I can't imagine the institutional goal of Wall Street is to defraud. Nor is it in baseball.

Today, it is not enough for a player merely to say he never used. Albert Pujols already did so on the cover of Sports Illustrated this year. Derek Jeter constantly has protected his legacy by saying "Not everyone is on this stuff." Both might never have used, but the words of Jeter or Pujols have no more value than Sosa's empty challenge to anyone questioning his accomplishments.

So you admit that you don't believe these guys! Then why the fuck are you so surprised?!

In the words of that old dude with leprosy from Braveheart: You let yourself be deceived.

Oh, Joe

2009-06-17T11:37:00.000-07:00

Joe Morgan is still chatting on ESPN.com. He had a great answer to a question about the Braves today:

Well, the Braves do not have a consistent offense, first of all. Any time Chipper has some inconsistent days, its' even weaker. One of the biggest problems has been Jeff Francoeur, he has not been consistent the last couple of years. They need him if they're going to make any sort of run. As the team is constructed now, I don't think they could beat the Phillies or the Mets.

So many consistencies.

The Fuck?!?!

2009-06-16T14:59:00.000-07:00

Donte Stallworth was sentenced today for killing a man. He got 30 days. That's one month. Vick was sentenced to 23 months just for killing some dogs. Seriously? Are dogs 23 times more important than people? I blame PETA. Fuck.

Mama Don't Let Your Baby Grow Up to Be a Country Music Fan: A Country-Work Orange

2009-06-09T16:35:00.000-07:00

I've put this off for too long. Tonight is the night.

As a self-obsessed person, it bothers me on some level when I'm guided solely by instinct; I have too high of a regard for my intellect to believe that it can be over-ridden all nimbly bimbly all the time. And as far as I can tell, my instinct is to hate country music.

I'm sure that there are many adequate reasons to hate country music, but I can never put my finger on them. There are obviously very distinct attributes to the genre, but what troubles me is that for every trait of a country song that I complain about I can think of a song that I love that embodies the same trait. For every song with stupid lyrics, I'll show you a Weird Al song that I still like. For every predictable convention, I'll show you the 90s playlists on my iTunes. And above all, I love the Allman Brothers. I must figure out what really bothers me.

Tonight, I will do what few who hail from the Northeastern United States have ever done - - I will listen to country music for an indefinite amount of time without a break.

There are several possible outcomes here:

1) My ears may bleed. I'm prepared. My girlfriend is an audiologist and she's on speed dial.

2) I will discover nothing. Very likely. I might just quit. Time will tell.

3) I will win a Nobel Prize. Also likely. My article will revolutionize not only how we view country music, but how we conceive of consciousness.

4) I will grow to like country music. This unfortunate side-effect may occur. But just like the anal leakage that occurs from some prescription drugs, I'm willing to undergo this fate. In the name of science, of course.

I have chosen to listen to KAFF Country. This station has been chosen for it's current popularity (it broadcasts on both FM and AM frequencies out of Flagstaff, AZ) and since it tells me the name of the artist and the title of the song.

I will begin my study as soon as I get back with a stiff drink.

Song: Sideways
Artist: Dierks Bentley
Brief Description: Upbeat, power chords, electric guitar, standard song composition with verses, chorus, and bridge. Nothing disagreeable upfront.
Chorus:
And it’s hey now here we go.
DJ don’t you play nothing slow
Keep those girls out on the floor
Gotta make them want to come back for more.
Been here since the sun went down,
Be here when it comes back around
Worked all week it’s time to play
Gonna get a little bit sideways…
Sideways.
Comparable song(s) that I sort of like: Maybe a little bit of DMB's worst stuff in there, I could definitely feel a Kid Rock or Uncle Kracker vibe. And those are not good things.
Why I hate it: This one's lyrics based: the idea that we should celebrate Southern "culture". Of course, there's a reference to blue jeans. Of course there's red necks fighting in the parking lot. And talking to the DJ in a song went out with Kool and the Gang.

Song: Something's Gotta Give
Artist: Leann Rimes
Brief Description: Obviously female vocals. Pronounced fiddle and major chords with acoustic guitar.
Comparable Song(s) that I like: Nothing. Nothing at all. I guess maybe Devil Went Down to Georgia because of the fiddle, but that dude was way better on the fiddle than this ass hat.
Why I hate it: Something's gotta give?! When the title is a cliche, it already smells like hackneyed crap. In the first verse (and repeated thereafter) our female protagonist thought she would have a minivan by the time she had "31 candles on her birthday cake." Those are rockstar ambitions alright.

Song: Smalltown USA
Artist: Justin Moore
Brief Description: This song is the enemy.
Comparable Song(s) that I like: It sounds like a shittier version of God Bless the USA. Sort of like Black Sheep was for Tommy Boy.
Chorus:
Give me a Saturday night my baby by my side
A little Hank Jr. and a six pack of lights
Old dirt road and ill be just fine
Give me a Sunday morning that full of grace
A simple life and I'll be okay
Here in small town USA
Why I hate it: This is the quintessential country song. Over-the-top lyrics and message. The twang is unbearable. I imagine this is what plays on the beat-up boombox while Rednecks are putting up their make-shift border fences.

Song: One in Every Crowd
Artist: Montgomery Gentry
Brief Description: Somewhat funny song about the asshole friend in every group out at a bar. Nothing remarkable from a musical standpoint. Acoustic guitar and splashy cymbals.
Comparable Song(s) that I like: Nothing really sounds like it, but they do make references to Lynard Skynard for whom I do have a taste. Hmm.
Why I hate it: "There's one in every crowd, and it's usually me." That's the last line of the chorus. It's an uninspired version of "I've got Friends in Low Places." It's predictable and fails at being funny for an audience of moderate intelligence.

Song: Runaway
Artist: Love and Theft
Brief Description: The band name sounds like an album title. In fact it would be a pretty good album title. It's a typical formula, complete with the staccato snare drum fill before the chorus kicks in. Meh.
Chorus:

And pack my bags and never look back

Run a parallel line with the railroad tracks, make my getaway

Ill put the pedal to the metal as the sun goes down

Leave everybody sleepin in this sleepy town tonight

And at the break of day, Ill be a runaway

Comparable Song(s) that I like: It's a poor man's 3 Doors Down, in a way. But the lyrics and vocals were much more powerful from 3 Doors Down's first album, and they're only mediocre.
Why I hate it: I'm starting to pick up on a theme: the music itself sucks. When the vocals comprise the top part of the chord for more than the end of the song, I'm out. I want no part of this. The obvious troublesome comparison for this theory is Journey: I've got a super-gay love for "Don't Stop Believing." But I know that song to be just as distasteful for some as country is for me. Otherwise, if you're playing the fiddle and not melting someone's face or I can tell what's going to happen in your song while I'm hearing it for the first time, just stop.

Oh good, the KAFF country quiz (does it say something that they play Jazz during the dead air time on their internet station?). Good time to break and analyze that last chorus, which was a doozy.

Gonna pack my bags and never look back
"Pack my bags" has to be the most over-used, thinly-veiled metaphor for leaving in all of country music. I've heard it no less than 3 times in this short listening.

Run a parallel line with the railroad tracks, make my getaway
Well this seems ill-advised. Why run next to the tracks when you can just jump on? Use your head, kid.

Ill put the pedal to the metal as the sun goes down
So now we're driving? I thought we were just running parallel to the tracks? Why were you running in the first place if you had a car? Again, this is a poor getaway. And why are you leaving as the sun goes down? What happened to cover of darkness.?Everyone's gonna know you left dude!

Song: A Real Fine Place to Start
Artist: Sarah Evans
Brief Description: If country music is like a bad night at the theater, female vocals in a country song is like being trapped in a burning theater while seeing Cats for the 5th time.
Comparable Song(s) that I like: I think I covered this one above.
Why I hate it: I feel like I heard this song the last time some ugly harpy came through my headphones. We're at the cock-rock power guitar solo. Just look at these lyrics:

Holdin' you close, chasin' that moon.
spinnin' all night,
lovin' just who you are:
sparks flyin' in the dark.
shootin' out lights, huntin' down dreams,
figurin' out what love really means:
baby givin' you my heart,
is a real fine place to start.

The first lines are bad, but not unreasonably bad. I'll let them go.

Shootin out lights, huntin' down dreams
The letter g must feel so unappreciated in the South.

And shooting out lights must be running up your electric bill. We're in a recession. Act like it.

It's a real fine place to start
Not surprisingly, I have a semantic disagreement here. Ostensibly finding true love is a real fine place to start? Ok, then where is this start taking you? If most heart-sick girls dream of "true love" as you just described it, Ms. Evans, where do you hope we go from here?

You're being unreasonable and greedy and I won't stand for it.

Billy Joel is always my go-to counter-example to demonstrate useless lyrics. This is no different. More on that below.

Song: Since I Quit Drinkin'
Artist: Toby Keith
Brief Description: I actually laughed at this one. Maybe it's because I'm an alcoholic, who knows? The guy quits drinking and soon finds his wife to be intolerable. Not necessarily inventive, but not unfunny either.
Comparable Song(s) that I like: Maybe a funny Irish Pub Song like the Chandeler's Shop.
Why I hate it: This still isn't a song I can ever see myself listening to regularly. It sounds like a song I would laugh at on vacation, maybe listen to a time or two when I got back home, but would soon forget about and would never pay to own.

Theme of hatred #2: The emphasis on the mundane. We've seen people who long to drive minivans. We've heard the description of a typical Saturday night out, and heard the love of "a little grace on Sunday mornings." And now, all the humor in this song derives from household chores. I don't need to hear about your boring-ass life, even if you're making fun of how boring it is. It's boring; don't tell me about it.

Let's take a look at Billy Joel. "Piano Man" is also a song about a Saturday night at a bar. It also features some of the most genius lyrics of all time. Instead of "there's a guy playing piano and drinking a beer," "the piano sounds like a carnival, and the microphone smells like a beer." The old man doesn't get nostalgic about when there were "31 candles on his cake," but rather "when [he] wore a younger man's clothes." And it doesn't get more poetic than "they're sharing a drink they call loneliness, but it's better than drinking alone."

You're a country singer- the ugly, abandoned step-child of the bard. At least pretend like you know what the word "poetry" means.

Song: Love Story
Artist: Taylor Swift
Brief Description: Starts with a plucking acoustic solo. This sounds like every female vocalist who's had any modicum of fame while my sisters have grown up and listened to the radio (Vanessa Carlton, JoJo, Michelle Branch, et al).
Comparable Song(s) that I like: [Blank stare]
Why I hate it: Theme of hatred #3: Predictability. Ok, the formula has proven to sell. I get it. Many find it enjoyable, if not palatable. Fine. But in this short session of shit, I have gotten to the point where I have predicted drum fills, guitar riffs, key changes, and even lyrics. I am not a musician. This is a problem.

Song: I Can Sleep When I'm Dead
Artist: John Michael Carroll
Why I hate it: YES!!!! This is it! This is the end! It's got everything that I hate and I can finally liberate myself from this hell. It starts with a kitschy low voice and the chorus is obnoxiously high. And then it alternates! And here again we see the rogue, wandering, rough neck man trope that is all too common. Look at these fuckin' lyrics:

If there's somethin' goin' on within a hundred miles from home,
Ya gonna hear my V-8 sing
Long as I can beat the train and they got a passing lane,
Baby, I ain't gonna miss a thing
Life's too fun and I'm too young and the night ain't over yet
Like I said I can sleep when I'm dead

First off - - bullshit. There's no way anything all that interesting is going on within 100 miles of home every night; there's just not that much within 100 miles of your home in most of this country (coastal regions notwithstanding). I often drive more than 4 hours at a time throughout the Midwest and I don't pass anything that even resembles the sort of urban area where something would be going on. Your just lying to me, and I don't take kindly to that.

And why are we still so obsessed with trains in country music? Is it because they're easy to rhyme with? I understand the role of the train in 19th century America for the artist, but aren't we a little past that? And if you're a songwriter, don't you think we could get a little better at rhyming? I've got a sister in 1st grade who could tell you a thing or two about rhyming with "train."

I must walk away from what I fear has drawn me in too deeply. I'll boil this down to my three points:

Country music is...
1) Musically unappealing. High vocals; twang; predictable, major chords; no virtuosity. Why bother? Not that this is any different with mainstream pop music, but then again, I don't listen to mainstream pop music either.

2) Where mundane shit abounds. I don't need to hear about you Tuesday afternoon.

3) Predictable. Everything sounds exactly the same. As far as I can gather, there are three types of country songs: the sappy girl-singing love song; the sappy boy-singing love song, and the up-beat, always-sung-by-a-man song about traveling or drinking.

And there you have it. Everything you need to know about country music. Any questions?

Three One Two Four Five

2009-06-05T11:00:00.000-07:00

8:30 – This summer, with the job I have, I get to work overnight if I want to. I’m actually doing that right now. It’s not so busy here; there was maybe a half hour’s worth of work to do when I go in, but that’s mostly done, leaving me free to write this nonsense and watch the discovery channel, at least until the Lakers Magic game comes on. Consider this a live blog of a 7pm-7am shift.

I don’t especially care about the NBA; the finals aren’t all that compelling, and I don’t have a rooting interest. I guess it would be cool for Jameer Nelson to win an NBA title, he’s a good guy, it seems. Though it would have been a lot cooler had he won an NCAA Championship. Fucking Oklahoma State. But beyond him, I don’t care about anyone playing anymore, I’m even pretty ambivalent towards Kobe.

All this talk about Kobe’s legacy is boring as hell. Honestly, I couldn’t care less about it, or NBA history in general. There’s very little of interest there; I have no idea how Bill Simmons managed to put together a 700 page book on the subject. It’s not like baseball history, which is incredible. Basketball history is essentially Naismith, Wilt getting laid, the Celtics winning titles, that all-star game where the players refused to play, Kareem, Bird, Magic, MJ, and then present day. I feel like you could pick any decade since like 1890 (maybe excluding the 80s) and there would be more interesting baseball stuff in that ten year period than in the entire history of the NBA.

I moved last weekend and I’m happy that’s done. Moving three people’s stuff in one day just in not a good idea. But the new place is cool. You should come by.

8:54 – National Anthem in LA. The guy is doing a good job, but honestly I prefer just an instrumental version. Regardless, America is amazing. The other day I actually made a list of the greatest Americans in history, and I was going to write about them all and crap, but since the only internet I have is intermittent wireless that reaches from the school I just kinda lost interest. Anyway, here’s the top five: Andrew Jackson, Jim Morrison, Neil Armstrong, Ted Williams, and Mark Twain. This is indisputable; if you disagree I can only presume that you support the terrorists. You’re either with us or against us.

9:03 – Quick flurry of work. Not really much, it took like four minutes and now it’s over, just in time for tip off. I think that Andrew Bynum is going to break out this series, and just annihilate Howard. I don’t like Howard. He’s an absolute beast, and he’s probably known he was bound for the NBA since like middle school. He should have been practicing his foul shots.

9:14 – We have an incredible soda machine here. Like half the time it gives you two cans. Incredible. Maybe this is why the city’s budget is so fucked up. Also, I’m clearly not an economist.

9:24 – Just printed out some guy’s criminal record. It was so many pages I had to use one of those black clip things instead of a paper clip. The guy was committing crimes all over the country, a really serious criminal. Maybe we need like some sort of 18 strike law or something to lock this guy up forever. Unrelated, except for the word strike, but Sandy Koufax twice struck out the side on nine pitches. Only two other players have done it twice. The first time Koufax did it was actually the first inning of his no hitter. Pure dominance.

9:30 – I brought a book to read in case things get really boring and slow: High Fidelity, by Nick Hornby. Being able to read is one of the coolest things about not being in school. After this I’m going to read Choke, by Chuck Palahniuk, Stonehenge, by Bernard Cornwell, and some book on the history of chess that my roommate has the looks interesting. The last book I finished was The King’s Commission, by Dewey Lambdin. It was ok, good enough for me to want to read the next one in the series.

9:45 – Still no work coming in. Come on people, commit some crimes. I just noticed that Nelson is in the game, and is killing it. Awesome. The Phils play in about 20 minutes, getting into the hard part of this road trip. They’ve won like six in a row, are 3.5 up in the Mets, and I feel like there isn’t a team in baseball that they can’t sweep. It’s an incredible team, and I like everyone on it. And now we actually have depth in our system. Happ and Bastardo have done well in the few starts they’ve had, we have a ton of corner outfielders, at all levels, Drabek just got promoted to AA and is flowing there, Carrasco still has great stuff despite struggling this year, and I still have hope for Lou Marson and Joe Savery. Maybe we’ll even move some of these guys to acquire a co-ace. I know it won’t happen, but I’d love to see Ruben bring Roy Halladay to CBP.

10:11 – Oh man, I’m so pumped. I just got back inside from running laps around the CJC, (aside: that bing.com commercial was intense and impressive) trying to burn off some of the enthusiasm-driven energy. Why am I so pumped up? Because I just saw a commercial for the new GI Joe movie. It even had some stuff that wasn’t in the trailers I’ve seen. And holy shit, it looks incredible. Obviously there’s going to be a ton of ass-kicking. I mean, come on, it’s GI Joe. But the great thing about GI Joe, and I really hope the movie handles it well, is how cool the characters are, both the good guys and the bad.

My favorite GI Joe of all time is actually a member of Cobra: Firefly. I doubt he’ll be in this movie, but I would like to see him in a sequel. Dude’s incredible. He’s a demolition expert, great at blowing shit up. He’s a sneaky motherfucker too. But when the GI Joe’s spot him, that’s bad news too, cause he’ll kick their asses. He can fight Snake Eyes to a draw. Also, his action figure is the coolest.

10:31 – Gerber and I are going to write a movie. It’s only in the embryonic stages now, but I can tell it’s going to be great. Look for us to be winning Oscars in 2013.

10:49 – The undergrad intern just left, peacing ten minutes early. There really isn’t anything to do. Also, Kobe is going to sweep the Magic. Penguins won tonight. Fuck them.

11:03 – Doing some busy work. People need to stop being criminals. It’s not cool. But I dunno, I can’t help but feel it’s not all their fault. Not to make excuses, cause come on, stop it, but it’s remarkable how many of the defendants that come through here don’t have jobs. Also, it’s pretty absurd how much time and money is wasted prosecuting people for pretty minor drug offenses. We need to make some jobs and then just leave people alone if they’re not bothering anyone.

Some people, though, are just really fucked up, probably beyond any kind of help. Earlier this week some asshole took an eleven year old girl down some alley and raped her for like an hour. He should be gelded. Police named this guy as a person of interest, and offered a reward. This worked out pretty well: the guy was noticed in his neighborhood, and a bunch of people kicked the shit out of him. While this is pretty gratifying, vigilantism just isn’t a good thing. That group wasn’t the only posse stomping some guy in the name of justice; another group thought they were kicking and bludgeoning this same rapist, but it turned out to be the completely wrong guy. Oops.

11:34 – I really wish the Lakers weren’t killing the Magic so badly now, it would make my night less boring. 2008 World Series MVP Cole Hamels is locked in a pitchers’ duel against Clayton Kershaw, but as I write this Raaaaauuuuuuuuuuul Ibanez just belted an RBI double. Runners on 2nd and 3rd, one out, Pedro Feliz coming to bat. And the Dodgers are pulling Kershaw: 5.1 IP, 7H, 2ER, 5K.

11:40 – I think that maybe an alternate theory of the JFK assassination should be given some consideration. I’ve heard that Lee Harvey Oswald did not shoot Kennedy, and neither did anyone on a grassy knoll anywhere. There was certainly no magic bullet. No, some people are saying that the Secret Service shot JFK and that other guy. Why? Because they had just become zombies, having been very recently bitten. I’ve never seen anything or anyone saying that isn’t the case, so it must be true. Similarly, I’ve also never heard from anyone that Hillary Duff isn’t in to me, so I can only assume that that is equally true.

11:44 – The janitors are here now. I can’t stand the noise vacuum cleaners make. It’s worse than nails on a chalk board.

Randy Johnson won his 300th game tonight, topping the baseball juggernaut that is the Washington Nationals. Randy Johnson is pretty interesting. Obviously he’s a first ballot Hall of Famer, with huge K totals, and he was utterly dominant for a while, but for some reason I don’t think of him right away with Pedro, Maddux, and Clemens. I think part of it might be that he’s been pitching for so far past his peak, and completely reinvented himself. But he’s probably one of the five greatest lefthanders in history, with Koufax, Carlton, Waddell, and I don’t know, maybe Warren Spahn, Carl Hubbell, and Eddie Plank, who I’m almost positive is a lefty. Pretty elite. Slightly related, but did you know that of all the LHP starting pitchers in Cooperstown, the second lowest career ERA belongs to George Herman Ruth?

12:05 – The people at work are watching some show about stupid criminals. The FIghtin’s are up 3-0. Hamels is pitching really well, but has only struck out three through six. But he’s pitching a lot better than in his last start, so hopefully he’s good to go.

Albert Pujols is amazing. Is he top five first basemen of all time already? He’s definitely still behind Gehrig and Foxx, and probably Greenberg too. But I dunno, he could already be on a level with like Willie McCovey and Eddie Murray. And he’s still decently you, probably could play for another ten years. Damn.

12:16 – I’m bored. That’s all.

12:21 – Israel is probably funding the Somali pirates. If they’re not, they should. It’d be such a good move for them. It fucks with Egypt and all the Persian Gulf countries that don’t like Jews, and it brings an even greater American naval presence into the area. It’s a brilliant scheme.

Dave Holmes is on at least two TV shows. That amazes me, it’s two shows too many. Can we really not find anyone better? I think we can. Come on, America.

Most people write the letter “S” from top to bottom. I don’t, I go bottom to top. So does Winston, actually. It’s just more efficient that way, and writing flows better, left to right. What other letters do you end up going right to left? Pretty much only g, p, and y, and they’re fucked up because they go below the line. S’s should be written from bottom to top. Try it, it’s liberating.

12:42 – Phillies just won. Cole rocked the CG SO. 5K, 5H, fewer than 100 pitches. Ace. I doubt more than ten thousand people in LA know or care though, I guess LA had a bigger game tonight. Sometimes I think baseball would be more interesting had teams never moved to the West Coast, and things were a lot more regional, with just the east coast and the Midwest. The Royals could be like the westernmost team. That might be fun, so many rivalries all over the place. Hockey should have done the same thing, and not gone south of DC. Phoenix, really? Ugh, Gary Bettman.

12:55 – Approaching the halfway point. A nap would be huge. Going to go get food.

1:23 – Back to work. Well, not work. Can’t say that I’ve had an hour’s worth of work yet. Combined, the four of us here have done maybe two hours. We’ve also watched two full episodes of The Smoking Gun: World’s Dumbest Criminals. I can’t take this nonsense. What a terrible show.

2:39 – Long hour. Decent amount of work, actually. But that’s done, and now I guess it’s movie time. They put on The Strangers, something I really don’t have any desire to see. So far it’s not good. I don’t need to see people get stabbed. Rest assured, the movie I write with Dick will be better.

2:50 – I wish I had a five hour energy drink. This is clearly the perfect time for one. I know I’ve said it before, but it’s totally worthwhile to repeat: five hour energy is the best energy drink ever made. It’s what God drinks when He gets tired. Just amazing. There’s no crash. Seriously, Guarana has been holding us back for so long. This has rendered Rock Star, Monster, and Red Bull all obsolete.

3:01 – Four hours left. Less, even.

3:07 – People need to stop committing crimes. Everyone would benefit from it. Just be cool.

Since I’m doing this co-op nonsense, I have to go to class once a week for two hours at a time. It’s ridiculous. Including myself, there are four people in the class, plus the teacher. We don’t learn anything, just mostly sit and talk. We talked about what we thought about the first year of law school, other jobs we’ve had, bosses, and some other stuff. I don’t see how we’re supposed to be graded, and more importantly, I don’t see why I need to waste two hours a week. Whatever.

3:26 – Seriously, I can’t stress this enough: stop doing illegal things. It’s incredible, seeing some of these rap sheets that are like 80 pages long. Seriously, people in their fifties who’ve been committing crimes for decades, with no end in sight. I think part of the problem has to be how little jail time these fucks do. And we can’t put anyone in jail, because there’s no room. It’s absurd how fucked up this is. And also, a ton of paper gets wasted here. Pretty much not the most environmentally friendly working environment.

3:48 – Reading CNN.com. It’s an elite news source. So far, the high point has been a Sarah Palin quote from the political ticker, saying that Obama’s fiscal policies “defy economics 101.” If anyone would know, it’s Palin; community college Econ 101 is probably the extent of her economic education. God, she sucks. Second favorite is an article talking about how awesome all the shows on TNT are. TNT and CNN are, of course, owned by the same company. The news is awesome.

4:02 – I guess it’s time for the second half of tonight’s double feature; the guys who get paid to be here just put on Goodfellas. It’s a decent movie, much better than The Strangers. I just wish that Ray Liotta weren’t in it. Nothing against him, but I don’t see Henry Hill, I see Shoeless Joe Jackson. Third highest batting average of all time. He came up with the A’s and I wish he would have stayed in Philly playing his whole career for Connie Mack. He wouldn’t have been caught up in all that 1919 nonsense, and then who knows what he could have done. Challenge Ruth as biggest star of the 20s? Possible.

There are so many cool hypotheticals with baseball. What if Ted Williams had never missed time for two wars? What if Ty Cobb had tried to hit for power? How far would Matt Stairs hit a Walter Johnson fastball? What if Micky Mantle had been sober his whole career? How ridiculous would Satchel Paige’s numbers be if he hadn’t been stuck in the Negro Leagues? What about Josh Gibson? Sadaharu Of?

4:38 – No one writes kick ass songs about America anymore, and that sucks. We need like a God Bless America for this decade. And please don’t let it be a Toby Keith song.

Ok, more about books. Gatsby is pretty much held up as the book representative of the twenties. Same with Grapes of Wrath for the Thirties, Keroac for that era, you know. So what book is going to come to be considered to represent the 80s and 90s? Bright Lights, Big City is cool, written in the second person, but really isn’t that great a book. American Psycho nails that time period, but a whole lot of hookers get killed. Maybe Fight Club? Though the fighting and shit kinda overshadows a lot of that, especially in the movie. Also, Phillip Ross sucks, I’ve never been impressed with him. I’d say that Richard Russo is the best American novelist right now.

5:12 – So a couple weeks ago I wrote an all-star team of baseball movie characters. I was going to do the same for hockey, but there really isn’t enough for a full post. So I’ll put it here. The first line is Adam Banks centering Connor Banks and Ned Braden. Second line is Dean Youngblood, Stevie Weekes, and Gunner Stahl. Third line, my checking line, is the Hanson Brothers. First defensive pairing would be Reggie Dunlop and Tree, and the second would be Fulton Reed and John Beebee. Starting goalie is Julie the Cat Gaffney, backed up by the French Canadian guy that Keanu Reaves plays in Youngblood. It’s not a full roster because hockey movies just don’t have them.

5:40 – About an hour left. Goodfellas is still going strong, the Lufthansa heist just went down. I’m trying to decide if I want to walk home or pay the two dollars for the subway. If it’s not raining I’ll probably walk. Getting to wear jeans to work is great, way better than a suit.

6:10 – Wandered around for a little bit just now. Things are coming alive upstairs. Even down here people are starting to trickle in. More lights are on, printers are making noise, feet have come down off desks. Shit is getting serious. At least Goodfellas is still on. That Henry Hill is one traitorous bastard.

6:25 – I just saw a commercial for some sort of museum exhibit about Galileo and the Medici family. Also, work is pretty much wrapped up.

6:50 – The seven o’clock people are in now. Leaving.

Today on CNN: Morons!

2009-06-03T07:27:00.000-07:00

Like every day, really. But this is a new low, even for this reputable news source.

Sierra Journey Factor is 8 and has spinal muscular atrophy, which essentially means that her musculature is decaying. Depending on severity (and the accuracy of the doctors at Wikipedia on whom I rely for all my medical advice) patients can either die in infancy or live to old age, which I suppose is also true of every person who has ever lived.

In order to combat this disease, Sierra's family has decided to fly to China so that Sierra can be injected with stem cells at the bargain basement rate of $26,500 (not to mention the $25,000 they expect to spend on travel and lodging).

According to Sierra's mom: "We are really walking into this blindfolded. It's scary, but everybody says it's so nice over there."

They got all of their information from a website called chinastemcellnews.com, which containts testimonials about the practice. It is also the leading home for grifting Snake Oil Salesman in the 21st century.

I mean come on, people! Would I pay $50,000 to improve the quality of life for my kid? Absolutely! Would I pay $50,000 for a Chinese quack to inject my daughter with medicine not currently used in America, solely because people said they were "nice"? Hell fuckin' no.

And nice?! What's "nice" about this?!

Thumbs 9: One Thumb Short of the Most Awkward Double-Fisted Handshake Ever

2009-05-29T15:22:00.000-07:00

Thumbs Up to the Orlando Magic. Though they stumbled in Game 5, they are causing enough, hysterical strife for all the loud-mouth Cavs band wagoners to make me happy. And my bet is that they're exponentially increasing the chances that Lebron is a Knick in 2010.

Thumbs down to these Ass-Hats http://www.cnn.com/2009/SHOWBIZ/Movies/05/28/ent.movie.smoking/index.html
Cocksuckers want any movie with smoking in it to be rated R, as they might incite youth smoking. At the same time, why don't we rate any movies that show children being lazy as NC-17 and burn any movies that blaspheme.

Thumbs Up: Terminator Salvation. Infinitely better than the third installment despite the lack of nearly naked robot-women. It's so satisfying to finally stop pussy-footing around the actual war with machines and see Christian Bale put a bullet in a metal skull.

Thumbs Down: Work After a Long Weekend. I don't care that it was only four days in “actual time,” it sure felt like a regular week of getting poked in the eye by beaurocracy. The miserable weather didn't help anything, but sources report that that, at least, will change in the next couple days.

America lives to fight another day...

2009-05-18T19:23:00.000-07:00

During the first episode of this season of 24, I confidently predicted that Jack Bauer would die. I quickly began to doubt myself, but resisting the urge to backpedal, I told one of my roommates of my prediction and let it simmer.

Weeks passed and I said nothing. I couldn't fully believe that a network show would betray every guideline of cookie-cutter writing and kill off the series protagonist (in a still-viable series), but I didn't rescind my prediction.

And then, months into the season, things began to fall into place.

There was a biological pathogen. There was confirmed exposure. There were seizures. There was the refusal to attempt experimental treatments. There were the tearful goodbyes.

And then, there was the curtain. And the assertion from that dumb bitch Kim that she would defy her father's wishes. And there was also the research of my shrewd roommate who pointed out that Keifer Sutherland had been signed to a three-year contract last year worth $40M.

So that brings the tally to:

Rupert Murdoch- 1
My failed attempts at clairvoyance- 0

I'm better at Christianity than you

2009-05-17T18:40:00.000-07:00

Leviticus doesn’t care if you gay marry. Well, that guy might, but he doesn’t matter. The important thing to know is that Jesus doesn’t care. Seriously, it wouldn’t bother Him at all. He even said it. I swear, it’s in the Bible. Fine, I’ll prove it.

Jesus was, by all accounts, a pretty good guy. It’s really a shame that the 2000ish years after He died have been filled with dumbasses and shitheads perverting everything He said. Like, the Crusades. Does anyone think that Jesus would have approved of that? Going by what He taught, I’m going to guess not. But that’s not the point. I’m going to tell you the religious dogmatic justification for gay marriage.

First, I guess we should know what biblical passage douchebags base their opposition. The most quoted source is Leviticus 18:22. It says, “Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind; it is abomination.” I’m using the King James Version of the Bible, here and throughout this post, because it seems pretty well respected. Anyway, for those of you not familiar with Leviticus, it’s basically of book of God giving a bunch of rules to Moses that I guess weren’t important enough to be included in the Ten Commandments. That’s essentially the whole book, just God telling Moses what the Jews could and couldn’t do. One rule says that a priest must marry a virgin (I’m pretty sure a priest wrote the book), another says that you can’t eat animals like hare, coney (never heard of it, but it’s probably delicious), or pigs.

Clearly people have been pretty selective in deciding what rules of Leviticus to follow. That’s because, and I absolutely believe this, most really religious people are awful hypocrites; it starts with the Pope and extends downwards through Catholicism, and just rampages through protestant and evangelical denominations. These people seem to have forgotten the disdain Jesus had for hypocrites. But just because people that don’t want to allow gay marriage love eating bacon doesn’t mean that Leviticus doesn’t matter. Leviticus doesn’t matter because Jesus said it doesn’t.

I don’t understand why people are so willing to go back to Leviticus when there are other sources, specifically the Gospels. Well, I do, it’s because the Gospels don’t give them the answers they want. Matthew 22 deals with all the laws in Leviticus. Jesus is being questioned by a bunch of Pharisees and Sadducees, and these guys are pretty big assholes. After Jesus annihilates the Sadducees, an uppity Pharisee tries to trick Him. He asks Jesus what the most important law is. Jesus answers, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. “ (22:37-39). Nothing about not marrying another man, nothing about not eating pork, nothing about priests marrying virgins. Why? Because all of these rules are ridiculous. Seriously. If you want to get married, or have gotten married, who are you to stop someone else? I’m not saying that this invalidates the 10 Commandments or any of that nonsense. They’re consistent with this. Don’t kill anyone, because you wouldn’t want anyone to kill you. The same goes for stealing from them, or lying to them.

Jesus just wanted people to stop being dicks. No one remembers that. John 11 says that Jesus wept when He heard that Lazarus was dead. He must be bawling over the current state of the Church.

All Star Team

2009-05-17T15:11:00.000-07:00

The Phillies have been playing the Nationals this weekend, and it’s been going well. The Nationals are not a good team. I thought about how they could be better. First, they should accept that they’re not going to win this year, and actually let the younger players play. They never should have sent Milledge down, that was just idiotic. And now he has a broken hand. But then I started thinking about how cool it would be if someone could have Roy Hobbs play for them. That naturally led to me making an entire team of fictional movie baseball players. Way too much time and thought went into this:

Leading off and playing center field is Willie Mays Hayes, who’s just a pure leadoff hitter. He has great speed, both on the bases and in the outfield.

Batting second and playing third base is Benny the Jet Rodriguez. He’s pretty much the perfect choice to hit second, for his ability to move runners. If he was able to put a ball right into Smalls’ glove, he’ll be able to hit behind a runner or second, or take advantage of the hole that would open up with a first baseman holding Hayes. He also has a lot of speed, just look at that nickname, and will spend a lot of time on base.

Batting third is my shortstop, and possibly the best hitter on the team, Joe Hardy. If a guy sells his soul to the Devil for his ability, he better be great, and Hardy was, hitting over .500 in a stacked American League. Seriously, Satan-given talent, he’s good.

The cleanup hitter in this lineup was probably the easiest choice to make, right fielder Roy Hobbs. When he walks down the street people look up and say, “There goes Roy Hobbs, the best there ever was in this game.” You know you’re hearing the music in your head right now.

Protecting Hobbs in the lineup is another power hitter, first baseman Clue Haywood. Although he couldn’t lead the Yankees past the Indians for the pennant, he did hit for the Triple Crown. He’s an intimidating veteran presence in the lineup.

Batting sixth is the catcher, Crash Davis. I have issues with Bull Durham. Davis was a switch-hitting catcher with power from both sides of the plate. There’s no way he wouldn’t have had a major league career. It just doesn’t make sense.

For the seventh spot in the lineup, I’m shifting a natural centerfielder to left: Kelly Leak. Yeah, he’s young, but there’s a lot of upside here. I mean, he hit over .800 for the Bears. Plus, he has a Harley.

The eighth spot in this lineup, second baseman, was the hardest to fill. I ended up choosing Tanner Boyle, converting him from shortstop. He’s young, but really not all that good. Really, I see him as the David Eckstein of this team. He’s gritty, plays hard, and is hilariously offensive. I don’t know if that last part is true for Eckstein, but I like to think it is.

The ninth spot in the order is filled by the pitcher. If I’m making up a team, it’s a given there won’t be a DH. It’s un-American.

The ace of my pitching staff is Billy Chapel. If someone can throw a perfect game in his last career start, there’s something special there. Hall of Famer.

The second starter, the Sain to Chapel’s Spahn, is another Hall of Famer, Henry Wiggen. Also, it doesn’t hurt that he’s a pretty good guy.

The third spot in the rotation goes to another young player with a lot of upside, Nuke LaLoosh. Having Davis on this team will really help him reach his potential.

The fourth starter may be somewhat controversial, but is really just a winner, and deserves a spot on this team. Kit Keller may not have the ability of Nuke or some of the other starters, but she’s a competitor.

Rounding out the rotation is another veteran presence, Chet Steadman. He may not be The Rocket anymore, but he can still put batters away.

Closing for the team, which as I type this really needs a name, will be Rick Vaughn. His nickname is the Wild Thing, he needs to close. He even has a theme song!

Also in the bullpen are Henry Rowengardner, John Rhoades, Duke Temple, Jim Bowers, who in addition to being a good reliever is a great clubhouse presence, and Mel Clark, who hopefully will be just as good without Angels backing him up.

On the bench are Moonlight Graham (I broke my one rule about real people because I really wanted him on this team. He’s gotta play at some point.), Pedro Serrano, Marla Hooch, The Whammer, Jake Taylor, and Lou Collins.

Managing this team is another easy decision: Jimmy Dugan. I’m pretty sure this team is unbeatable.

Thumbs VIII: Roman Numerals Are Cool

2009-05-15T13:53:00.000-07:00

Thumbs Up: Summer. It’s the greatest. It just has absolutely everything anyone could ever want. Seriously guys. Summer.

Thumbs Down: The McCain family. Like, three generations of them. I don’t care what any of them think. John McCain hasn’t been interesting since 2002, his daughter has never been interesting, and I would have bet several vitals organs that his mother was dead. But they’re all consistently in the news. I don’t care if Meghan McCain thinks Karl Rove following her on twitter is creepy. I don’t care what any of them think about Rush Limbaugh. Please, just go away.

Thumbs up: Transformers 2. Never has there ever in the history of celluloid been a better crafted franchise than the current Transformers genius that has seen fit to grace us with its divinity. Cars? Becoming robots?! You just get the fuck right out of here! There is absolutely no way that I don't not enjoy this movie! (Editor's note: We at SI hear that Michael Bay and Dreamworks are using any means necessary to promote their new movie. This is in no way related to the Thumb you just read.)

Thumbs down: The Preakness. Nobody likes a half-assed effort. Pimlico is a hellhole, but for years it was an unabashed hellhole. It was striving to be the greatest hellhole among the hellholes; the lowest circle of the hell; the leg of the Triple Crown with the longest and wettest run of the Port-o-Johns. But now they've pussied out, and are not letting anyone bring their own booze in, thus negating the entire reason why anyone would pay $55 dollars, wait in line at 8am, and stand in piss, beer, and (probably) semen for a horse race. 'Tis a shame.

Thumbs Up: Sleeper Sitcoms. As the new TV season winds to a close I thought it might be time to honor those shows that refuse to die. Sure, we’re all excited about The Office, Lost, and Scrubs, but did anyone know that According to Jim was still on the air? Seriously. New episodes. I wouldn’t watch it myself, but bravo for outliving the ‘God took the wrong Belushi’ jokes. And Two and a Half Men? How did that become everyone’s favorite show (in syndication on at least one additional network plus new episodes) when no one I know watches it regularly? Today I salute you, cockroaches of the sitcom world.

Thumbs Down: Megan Fox. Not for any particular reason. Maybe I just want to be the first man to publicly turn her down. Actually, now that you mention it, I am kind of sick of her being lauded as the-next-female-action-star and the-next-Angelina-Jolie. Personally, I think she’s got a weird face (I never thought Angelina was anything special either, so maybe they got that right) and from what I understand, from browsing her Myspace page not too long ago, she’s dumb as a brick and not too shy about it.

Commencement Address for Graduating Education Majors

2009-05-14T16:44:00.000-07:00

The following was inspired by the commencement address on Deadspin today.

Good evening to you all, and first, a heart-felt congratulations to all of you here today. You are about to set out on a remarkable journey beset by challenges and filled with triumphs. I am envious of the experiences that lay ahead of you. In a way.

You have asked me here tonight to perhaps bestow some of my wisdom upon. I will gladly oblige. After all, you are all education majors (what are the odds?!) and have therefore publicly demonstrated your penchant for making terrible life decisions.

I mean come on, people! The only major more worthless than Education is Communication; you are in rarefied air of stupidity.

The best teachers in the world have not taken the most education classes; they've taught the most classes. Be honest: how many times in the past four years have you pretended you couldn't read in order to better learn how to read? A dozen? More? Do you think you learned anything from that other than how to act like you can't read? That will help you guide the futures of tomorrow's leaders.

I don't care how many times you've read Harry Wong, there is no procedure for when a kid shits on the floor. And if you want to be taken seriously, stop taking your best advice from a guy named Wong.

So, without further ado, allow me to give you some life lessons about teaching I have learned in only a year.

Your students will not appreciate what you do. During the Magic/Celtics game tonight, they showed a clip of a player speaking at a local middle school about the dangers of smoking. You'd think the little shitheads would at least be excited about being out of class. Then, a mascot did a trampoline dunk in their gym, and no one fucking clapped. Not one of those future homeless bastards clapped.

There is no better metaphor for your upcoming career.

If you teach 8th grade, don't. 8th graders are evil incarnate. They don't give a shit about anybody, but themselves. This wouldn't be a problem unto itself, except for the clusterfuck of hormones accompanying their solipsism. I hated my own blood when they were this age, I in no way would voluntarily subject myself to someone else's failed abortion in this miserable period.

There's only one solution to this. If you're a male teacher, get a vasectomy so you don't perpetuate the problem. If you're a female, sell your eggs; you'll need the cash anyway.

Do not bring your work home. See if you can follow this logic: your kids don't do their homework, why should you have to?

Mind the German factory system. The American public education schedule was established using the German factory work day as a model. In the winter, I was always in school before the sun rose and my own apathy to my job and affection for my couch was all that got me out of that decaying building before sundown.

Summer is a sacred observance. Remember how ecstatic you were at the first day of summer? The sun always shined on the last day. Someone always had a pool party and ordered pizza, no matter how old you were. You realized you could sleep in the next day, play baseball in the afternoon, and not treat a relative stranger as a parent for the better part of the day.

Now take that feeling, multiply it by a hundred, pop a Vicodin, and get a blow job from a mail-order bride and that's almost as great as the first day of summer feels when you're a teacher.

Parents are the enemy. Know it now: you are always wrong. If a student calls you a fuckin' faggot on his way out of your room while he kicks the glass pane out of your door punches a whole in the wall, you better not have the audacity to call his mother. For if you do, she will storm into your classroom and reach deep down into your soul to tell you exactly why you don't get it and where your parents went wrong in raising you. And it will probably happen while the class in front of you has gotten quiet for the first time all week. Just know it now, it will make it easier to swallow.

Conflicting standards. I told my students they needed pencils in my class. They grumbled that they couldn't afford them. Then they all pulled out their Sidekicks and Blackberries and texted their parents that they needed pencils. The brain fragments from my exploding head did not please the front row of students.

Teachers are at school more than you ever thought. I am on contract to be in our school building 20 days longer than the students. That's almost 3 weeks. That's a lot. That's a fuckload of time "teaching" without having anyone to teach. And the usually happen on Fridays. God forbid anybody get a 3 day weekend.

Worse yet, these days are populated by the same meeting in repetition. These Groundhog Days, these Sisyphean nightmares are all the same. You have a faculty meeting in the morning where all of the fatasses on your faculty have assembled a cardiac arrest spread with every sugary breakfast nugget and diabetes-inducing liquid they could find. Your principal starts off the meeting by praising you for your effort, then tells you what they're going to try to do to make sure the 20 person brawl that happened yesterday won't happen again. You'll recognize immediately that their suggested plan will do nothing, and you'll zone out.

Your body carries itself off of the cafeteria bench you've been occupying for the last two hours by the influence of the others moving around you, and only your physical motion pulls you out of your trance. You retreat to your classroom, counting down the hours until it's acceptable to disappear for a short while for lunch. You saunter about the school searching for coffee, quietly so as not to draw attention to yourself, but quickly because it's harder for an administrator to hit a moving target with bureaucratic bullshit.

You return from lunch and doctor the sign out sheet so it looks like you were only gone for a half hour. You turn off the lights in your room when you get back. When you're found there you'll claim it's because you prefer daylight. Really you don't want to be found.

When you finally can, years later, leave the school that day, you'll find the happy hour nearest your house and get loaded, pausing briefly to eat and stopping fully at 10pm, when your used-to-rising-at-6am-body decides it doesn't want to play anymore and shuts down for the night.

For you are a teacher, and that is what you have chosen. And you'll start the whole thing over again on Monday. Why? Because you hate yourself.

Enjoy your upcoming careers. You've made a fulfilling choice.

Happy Mothers' Day

2009-05-10T13:13:00.000-07:00

I just saw this on CNN, and had to say something about it. They’re about to talk about President Obama’s speech/performance at the Correspondent’s Dinner last night. They showed the clip of him saying something like, “My next 100 days will be so successful that they will only last for 72 days. And on the 73rd day, I will rest.” Then the anchor came back on, saying that Obama was making fun of himself, others in his administration, and Republicans. Yeah, he did do all three of those things. But he was also making fun of the media. In fact, that’s who he was mocking in that quote. In the leadup to his 100th day, he was pretty forthright in acknowledging that it wasn’t a real milestone or anything, just a pure media creation. But the media kept pushing the hysteria. Between watching last night, and watching today, they’re just not acknowledging that the joke is on them too. It’s about as bad as watching Sarah Palin on SNL as Amy Poehlar (yeah, there’s no way I’m looking up how to spell that correctly) rapped about how much of a joke she was.

Speaking of Sarah Palin, I’m so good at segues. Also, at least last night Wanda Sykes was getting a lot of shit from the morally superior, humorless talking heads on MSNBC. Yeah, some of her jokes were mediocre, that was to be expected, she’s a mediocre comedian. But they weren’t offensive. The joke about Sarah Palin and pulling out seemed to bother some people. If you’re one of those people, fuck you. Yeah, it really sucks for her daughter that she got pregnant, and then couldn’t have an abortion because of her mother’s political ambitions. Or her religious convictions, whosever bullshit you want to believe. But if Bristol is going to be a national spokesperson for abstinence, she’s fair game for jokes.

As for Sykes’ jokes about Limbaugh, meh, fuck him. She wasn’t saying anything more offensive than he says on a daily basis. Back to studying. Happy Mothers’ Day.

Thumbs 7: A Day Late and a Thumb Short

2009-05-09T15:25:00.000-07:00

Thumbs Up: Great Britain. This week the English released a list of about 20 people who they just wouldn’t let into their country. I think that’s awesome. Seriously, some people, like Fred Phelps, are just worthless, and there’s nothing to be gained by letting them in. Britain is on to something. Of course, this has stirred up controversy, as conservative talk show host Michael Wiener (not a dick joke, that’s Michael Savage’s real name! Ok, it’s also kind of a dick joke.) is on the list, and vows to fight it. I hope he wins, I don’t want him in my country.

Thumbs Down: Myspace. I mean facebook. It’s tough to tell the difference. Two of my friends are fans of weekends? Seriously? Who the fuck doesn’t like the weekend? Over 600,000 people are fans of laughing. Because I guess the other 7 billion people on earth hate laughing? People also need to stop taking those stupid fucking quizzes. I don’t care what STD you’re best represented by, or whatever. There seem to be fewer and fewer reasons each week to stay on facebook.

Thumbs up: Canadian hockey. HA! Hockey is the desert sucks after all! The Coyotes (formerly the Winnipeg Jets) are bankrupt and might get sold back to Canada. HA! A friend of mine once pointed out the lunacy of having hockey teams located below the latitude where ice naturally freezes. Hopefully this begins the recession of hockey back up North and the simultaneous recession of Gary Bettman.

Thumbs down: Blow Jobs. OK, I don't really mean that. But I'm trying to convince myself that I might. Someone recently put one of the more trying would-you-rathers to me: would you rather go the rest of your life without eating cheese (all types of cheese, from breakfast danish to pizza to fondue) or without getting head (sex is fine and so are HJs, but no dome shots)? I've now gone so far as to try to approximately quantify my marginal gratification from each occurrence. This could get serious.

Like I needed another reason not to like the Red Sox

2009-05-07T19:54:00.000-07:00

So Manny Ramirez was suspended 50 games for testing positive for steroids. Let’s be honest, he was probably cheating in ’04 and ’07. Whatever. David Ortiz and Jason Varitek were almost definitely on steroids too. I don’t care. The Phillies still won in 2008. See:

Haven’t posted that in a really long time. Still great. Anyway, it was pretty fun to read Bill Simmons today. I’m pretty sure he spent most of today fighting back tears. But really, this isn’t a big deal, and Manny will still almost certainly get into the Hall of Fame eventually. But if they let in all these steroid users, and they’re going to have to, I really want to see Shoeless Joe and Pete Rose in there. Also, what the fuck, how is Jose Canseco never wrong about anything?

Lots of other things have been happening, but since I’m stuck in the middle of exams I feel like I’m missing everything. Some stuff is just too omnipresent to avoid.

Bristol Palin seems to be just as narcissistically attention-seeking as her mother, and is pretty much dominating the internet with her abstinence campaign. Yeah, good luck with that. I’m sure if they get Shawn Kemp on board they’ll really change some lives. Is she really being held up as a role model?

Somebody on TV said that Joe the Plumber was leaving the Republican Party. I don’t know if I’m more surprised that the GOP is still around or that Joe is. I won’t miss either.

Jon Edwards is in the news a lot now too, I guess because his wife’s book is being released. And his lady friend wants a DNA test for the kid. Yeah, this is something else that I just don’t care about.

Um, Kiefer Sutherland headbutted someone? That’s actually pretty cool. Sometimes people just need to be headbutted.

People still seem to care about Miss California. I still think the woman that won was hotter.

Mormon’s baptized President Obama’s mother after she died. That’s weird, but not a big deal. I can’t imagine that’s something that God is really gonna be bothered by.

Some people are pissed off that Michelle Obama wore shoes that cost more than five hundred dollars. Fuck that, she’s a millionaire, she can afford them, good for her.

Brett Favre isn’t going to play for the Vikings. At least that’s what he’s saying this week. Next week, who knows?

The Marlins keep losing, making instant-history ESPN hosts look even more like assholes. It’s a shame they couldn’t play all 162 games against the Nationals. I know it would never be ok, but I kinda wish MLB had relegation. The Nats are not a major league team.

Gary Bettman is fixing the NHL playoffs. You can’t convince me otherwise.

Seriously, Shoeless Joe Jackson needs to be in Cooperstown. Honestly, I kinda think that Roy Hobbs should be too.

Probably the best baseball movie that no one has heard of is Bleacher Bums, starring the brother from Everybody Loves Raymond. It’s basically just a group of people sitting in the bleachers at Wrigley making bets about the game. It’s incredible.

Solipsism is a pretty fun-sounding word.

Every time I ride the subway I think that might be the day I start my successful gypsy career.

I’m sick of hearing about Arlen Specter. He was fun for like twelve minutes. That ended.

I’m almost done with my first year of law school, I think that gives me a pretty good shot at being named to the Supreme Court.

President George W. Bush has been raising a ton of money for his Presidential Library. This only confirms that he probably is a really cool guy, just a terrible President.

I’m pretty sick of PETA. People need to leave Mike Vick alone. There are Superbowls to be won with him and Tim Tebow on the same team, on the field at the same time, co-running a double wildcat offense. It just sucks that Bill Belichik is going to be the only coach daring enough to give it a shot.

I recently finished Joe Morgan’s autobiography. It was awesome. He’s a terrible broadcaster, but a pretty cool guy. Some great stories in there, my favorite being that on the 83 Phils Gary Matthews would usually be taken out of the game around the seventh inning for a defensive replacement, because by that point in that game he was usually too hammered to play. Gotta love Sarge.

So yeah, there’s been a lot of news that I’ve barely been paying attention to, but I don’t feel like I’m missing much. Thumbs tomorrow, I promise.

This is great - - give me more!

2009-04-30T09:39:00.000-07:00

Hey, how's it goin? Long time no see. Hope you've been doing well since the last time I posted. Oh what's that? There's still only 4 people who read this site? I'll hold off on the pleasantries then.

More news about A-Rod today, and much of it is awesome. Turns out he's covering up his lies with more lies, and every day finds himself buried under a bigger mountain of deceit.

After the report of his alleged steroid use came out, he "confessed" (and I'm forced to use that term lightly now) that he stopped using in 2003, that he was unaware of what he was using, and that he was essentially trying to fit in with all of the cool kids in Texas.

False. (Allegedly).

However, none of the news that came out today was particularly alarming, save perhaps that it's highly likely A-Rod used steroids in high school. If he really did gain 25 lbs of muscle between his sophomore and junior years, I would vote that it's impossible that he didn't use steroids, but we'll say it's possible for now. The only reason we find this surprising is because for most of us, Rodriguez is (still on some level) the wunderkind of recent memory. He was the youngest member of a young and exciting (and very likable) Mariners team that took on the Yankee beast in the 90s. We were prepared from Day 1 to watch his meteoric rise to the top of the all-time record sheet, and our naivete in assuming he could do it without enhancement was spurred on by his young age and youthful visage. I think we're still reeling from that.

Further, when dealing with such an image-obsessed, egomaniacal pro-athlete, we can't really be surprised that he had a harem of women across the country or even that he was tipping off pitches to other players to receive tips in return and pad his stats. Baseball is a numbers business, and a reasonably intelligent man such as A-Rod can draw the straight, logical line between stats and dollars quite easily. I don't find any of this shocking.

Really the surprising news today is more that we're still only hearing about A-Rod. Remember when he was first outed as a steroid user, it was because his name was part of a list of 104 positive tests from other major league players. That was on February 7th. It's two months later and we've gotten precisely 0 other names on that list.

What the hell?! A-Rod becomes less likable with every news story that comes out, but why is he getting railroaded for a generation of steroid users? Why is he being punished for being better than everyone else?

You want this to happen as much as I do. I want to hear about more people getting embarrassing nicknames. I'll see you Bitch Tits for A-Rod, and raise you Silver Dollars, Saucy Nips, Tiny Balls, Backne, Crater Face, Hulk, Ass Cyst, Mega Dome and whatever other off-color nicknames can arise from the physical maladies associated with steroid use.

There are enough players that I love to hate; I really want to have better nicknames for them.

Public Service Announcement

2009-04-29T17:25:00.000-07:00

There is no such thing as swine flu. Everyone is just covering up a Zombie outbreak. Prepare accordingly.

More Specter Stuff

2009-04-28T14:28:00.000-07:00

So for the most part, I’m pretty unabashedly liberal, except for when it comes to lobbing crusie missiles are third world countries. So I figured it would be only fair to see what the other side thinks about Specter’s change of party affiliation. I figured the best place to really find out what people thinks was the comment thread that FOX News thoughtfully provided for their mongoloid viewers.

Mike Q. says: Leaving a party because your ideology no longer matches that of your current party, fine. I see no problem with that. Leaving your party because you’re afraid you will lose an election is hypocritical and disingenuous. Despite Specter’s political rhetoric to the contrary, that’s what this smacks of.

Maybe. But why should Specter remain loyal to the Republican Party when the party has stopped being loyal to him?

PEslashPM says: The Republican party: R.I.P. 1854 ~ November 2008

God willing.

MERVYN says: REPUBLICANS OF PENNSYLVANIA NOW IS YOUR CHANCE TO KICK THIS BUM OUT HE HAS ALWAYS OPPOSED THE TRUE ELEMENTS OF CONSERVATISM HE NEEDS TO GO NOW TOGETHER WITH HIS NEW FOUND ALLIES THE DEMOCRATS.

You know who else opposed the true elements of conservatism? The Republican Party. Also, why do people insist on writing in all caps? Is there some sort of computer virus that only affects the shift key? Don’t these people realize that it makes it impossible to take anything they write seriously?

Johanna says: Specter was a decent man who always won his elections with many Dem votes. If the Republicans want to become a “pure” party, and invite the Club for Growth to “weed out” those who are not “pure,” he was right to leave. Republicans have to decide whether to be a national political party or a small club of like-minded ideologues.

I doubt she is a frequent foxnews.com visitor. I liked her statement.

Warrenjh says: There will be more exodus in the GOP if they do not turn down rhetoric and be a party that is inclusive and not exclusive, People like Sean and Rush with a very narrow minded agenda is killing our party.

Yup, couldn’t agree more with Warren. There’s definitely value in a real conservative or libertarian approach to governing. The GOP has chosen to ignore that, focusing instead on hate, polarization, arrogance, and exclusion.

Ramon says: Arlen Specter should stay with his party and continue working on the Republican agenda until he is due for re-election. Voters from the Republican party were the ones that elected him in that office to work on the Republica agenda. He should only change parties when he is due up for re-election so the voters are aware of his political agenda.

I chose this one, even though there were a lot of people saying essentially the same thing, because Ramon managed to be somewhat coherent. Two things: parties are not up for election, people are. Republicans didn’t vote for the Republican Party, they voted for Arlen Specter. People who don’t consider the candidates, and only vote along party lines, or even worse along one issue (abortion) are terrible for democracy. Put some thought into your vote. Also, a lot of Democrats voted for Specter as well, and have voted for him for years. Finally, as Specter said, 200,000 Pennsylvania Republicans have changed their voter registration over the last year; by switching he is representing his constituency.

Eric says: Specter has always baffled me and angered me with his voting record. I say on one hand good bye, farewell. But he has chosen one of the worse times to leave that could hurt a party he had chosen to be a part of, just for his own gain. Not a man of integrity who can change and allign himself with those that desire to have it only their way, and stamp out the speech and vote of a party which tries to still represent the majority of our Country which desire morality, honor, In God we Trust, Marraige being of a man and woman. His decision could help sway many decisions that would change the things this Country was founded on, and for self preservation.

I really struggled to understand what Eric was saying here; I guess that’s one of the drawbacks of homeschooling. If I’m interpreting this correctly, though, he’s saying that our country was founded on “morality, honor, in God we trust, [and] marriage being of a man and woman,” and that by changing parties he’s jeopardizing these things. Um, no. First of all, morality and honor are pretty subjective things, so you can’t really say that one party is more honorable or moral than the other. As for in God we trust, that was added to money in the fifties; it’s not a principle our country was founded on, it’s Cold War propaganda. Finally, the country wasn’t founded on the principle that marriage was between a man and a woman. There’s nothing anywhere that suggests that. And for the love of God, don’t point to the Bible.

Diane says: He’s a Red Coat, a worm, don’t let the door hit you on your way out Spector !

What the hell? Is it 1773 again? She really called him a redcoat.

Kent says: I agree with J S Cros. Sphincter should have to resign his seat, obviously he doesn’t care for his constituents who voted for him. Especially those that voted for him based on him being affiliated with the GOP.

I think I already addressed what this guy thinks. I’m pointing this out because he called Specter “Sphincter.” See, FOX got upset by all the teabagging jokes, but really I think they were upset that they didn’t think of them first. Really, immaturity crosses party lines.

Mark says: hey – do you hear a sucking sound? Must be the GOP.
John P says: Your wrong about the origins of that sucking sound. It’s coming from Barney Frank’s office.

See! Told ya.

DAN says: We`re not going anywhere ant. We will take this country back from you leftist trash by force if we have to. Keep up your leftist propaganda and watch what happens.

The south will rise again? People like DAN make that warning of right-wing extremists seem prescient.

Milt from CA says: And another thing…Arlen, YOU are as responsible for the monstrous increase in the deficit as is barack hussein osuma. You’ve been showing your liberal colors for years but voting in favor of Porkulus was your ultimate coming-out-of-the-closet-in-your-mind moment. Good riddance.

I agree, Specter is just as responsible as Obama for the deficit. Neither of them is nearly as responsible as Bush, though.

Jules says: Sylvie; you have got to be black.

What the hell? This was just there in the middle of the page, not as a reply to anything. I’m a little bit curious.

Bob Runninger says: Since he is a Progressive Republican at heart he is in good company with the other Progressives. We don’t need his whining in the Republican Party.

Yeah, fuck progress!

Ken Miller says: Good by and good ridence

Ken used four words, and managed to spell two of them incorrectly. I would bet a decent amount of money that he spelled his name wrong.

Independent Thinker says: I think it is great that Specter is switching, it shows that he is a man of conviction and does not want to remain in a right-wing extremist party.
Before the Republican Party became so radical and extremist, Specter probably felt quite at home in the the GOP, but now many moderate Republicans like him are becoming very uncomfortable and do not want to support the Taliban-like agenda of the GOP.

YOU GET WHAT YOU VOTED FOR says: You were dropped on your head as a baby, Right?

So the first guy gives a thoughtful response. The reply? Not so much.

Chris Gallimore says: Specter has been a useless piece of sh#t for years. Good riddance. With rinos like him, Snowe and Collins Bush couldn’t get his agenda through even when the republicans had a majority. Republicans will not be the majority again if they continue presenting themselves as democrat lite.

Well, then thank God for Snowe, Collins, and Specter. There’s been an awful lot of hatred on these forums directed at Snowe and Collins, and I don’t really get it. Why are Republicans trying to marginalize people? It just doesn’t make any sense to me.

Last one:

FLOYD says: When 2010 comes around we going to have clean house , and we well. I just hope spector when he stands before his maker has a good excusue for turning his back on moral princples and backing a groupd of cheats and murders.

I hope when FLOYD stands before his maker God throws a dictionary at his face. FLOYD is way too representative of the people posting here. I should have known what I was getting myself into when I went to foxnews.com. I can feel brain cells dying. I need to stop.

Arlen Specter is cooler than you

2009-04-28T11:45:00.000-07:00

As you may have heard by now, Arlen Specter has decided to switch parties, leaving the GOP to run for reelection in 2010 as a Democrat. In the short term, this gives the Democrats 59 seats in the Senate, which will become 60 once Norm Coleman recognizes the inevitable and Al Franken is seated. In the long term, it sets up a potential Toomey-Specter rematch, this time in the general election.

Sen. Specter’s decision to switch parties will have a broad range of consequences. First, it eventually give the Democrats a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate, allowing them to pass pretty much any bill they want. Or, more accurately, any bill that Specter wants passed. In the statement he released today, Specter emphasized that his loyalty was to the people in Pennsylvania he represents and to the country, not to any one party. He has shown a willingness to cross party lines in the past, most notably when he broke from the Republican caucus earlier this hear to support President Obama’s stimulus package. While Democrats are hopeful that this will enable them to steamroll any filibuster, this outlook may be too optimistic; despite changing his party affiliations, I don’t expect Specter to blindly follow Harry Reid’s lead.

Nevertheless, this is still pretty bad news for the Republican Party. After having gotten their asses kicked in elections across the board in 2008, the Republicans are in desperate need of reaching out to moderates, as Reagan was able to do in 1980. Bush was a historically bad President, and the Democrats were able to largely run against him and his record; Republicans can’t bank on Obama being as trailblazingly terrible, and will need to get support for their own policies and initiatives, not just an anti-Obama movement. To do this, they’re going to need to reach out and attract voters who leaned to the left in ’08, if not Democrats then at least independents. Specter’s defection is a blow to this; if one of the more moderate Republicans is leaving the party as it swings dangerously towards the right, how can they hope to attract other moderates? As Specter stated in his press release, over the past year 200,000 Pennsylvanians have switched registration from the GOP to the Democratic Party; Specter’s defection will not likely stem this tide, but rather could possibly even enhance it.

Republicans have, predictably, come out attacking Specter, choosing to cast his decision as a move based on self-preservation rather than a reaction to the failings of their party. Michael Steele, Lindsey Graham, and others seem to have taken it for granted that Specter would lose in the 2010 primary election to Pat Toomey, whom he is currently trailing in polls of likely GOP primary voters. Specter was able to hold off a challenge from Toomey in 2004, but as the Republican Party has swung to the right he has been isolated in the center, vulnerable to a primary challenge. By joining the Democrat caucus, he has a much easier road to reelection; while I don’t know for certain, it would not surprise me if his defection were conditional on having the full support of the Democratic Party not only in the 2010 general election, but against any primary challengers. And in a general election against Pat Toomey, Specter should have very little difficulty; in 2006 the conservative Democrat Bob Casey massacred the nauseatingly-conservative Rick Santorum, and I see no reason a Specter-Toomey showdown would be any less one sided. I’m going to vote for him.

Things I've been thinking about while not writing

2009-04-28T08:55:00.000-07:00

Is there any better way to start a post than by talking about dinosaurs? Nope, didn’t think so. TIME has an article online about how they died, adding another voice to the chorus of people claiming that an asteroid was not responsible for the mass extinction of the dinosaurs. This article doesn’t really offer an alternative theory, but does present a lot of geological evidence in support of its thesis. I guess this adds weight to the volcano theory, which the geologists mention towards the end of the article as a possibility.

In her most recent online column, Ann Coulter continues to show how, um, special she is. She attacks Manhattan for being “traitorous,” attacks Janet Napolitano for warning against right wing extremists, and, in my favorite statement of this week, describes liberals as having “absolutely no morals and yet are ferociously judgmental.” Now, I could go on probably forever about how this last sentence is a pretty clear case of the pot calling the kettle black, but that wouldn’t show just how terrible a person Coulter is. Instead, I’m just going to tell you what this article was about. You’re probably thinking it’s got something to do with homeland security, probably that warning that was sent out across the country warning about conservative radicals. Well, you’re wrong. It’s her obituary to her mother. She fills it with so much hate and anger directed towards Democrats it’s just scary. I think something might be wrong with her.

After last night, I kinda feel bad for any baseball fan that isn’t also a Phillies fan. Seriously, this team is amazing; last night’s game just gives further evidence of that. The Phils got terrible pitching from their starter, Joe Blanton, and fell behind early. But then Ryan Howard launched a grand slam, tying the game at six. The Phils fell behind again, and again came back to tie it at seven. Then Scott Eyre came in to pitch the eighth inning, and all hell broke loose, leaving the Fightins down four after seven and a half. But the most fun team in baseball wouldn’t put up with that nonsense. Pedro Feliz, who didn’t start the game, got the rally going, and hits by Rollins and Utley followed, along with a sac fly by Victorino. Howard and Werth both walked, bring Raul Ibanez to the plate with the Phils down two. He got a first pitch fastball and unloaded on it, sending a line drive over the wall in right field for another grand slam. Madson came in and shut down the Nats, getting the save. All but one of the Phillies’ wins this year have been come from behind; in their sweep of that Marlins this weekend they won two games which they trailed heading into the ninth. It’s incredible; they’re getting terrible pitching and still finding ways to win. It’s just such a fun team to watch.

In other sports stuff, the Ducks knocked the Sharks out of the playoffs. What’s Joe Thornton’s deal? Even going back to his time in Boston, his teams tore it up in the regular season, but once the postseason started they just got steamrolled. It’s almost starting to make the trade that sent him to San Jose defensible from the Bruin’s perspective. Chicago beat the Flames, knocking them out of the playoffs; they’ll go on to play the Canucks, and the winner of that matchup will go on to lose to the Red Wings, who look absolutely unstoppable. Two game sevens tonight, with the New York Sean Averys looking to avoid choking away their series against the Caps, and Martin Brodeur looking to hold off the Hurricanes, who have looked surprisingly good. Both games should be interesting, if the Rangers don’t fold in the first ten minutes. Also, I’m sure some basketball stuff happened last night.

Alright, swine flu. What’s the deal with this? People are flipping out all over the place, Matt Drudge predictably fanned the flames over the weekend, and the number of reported cases in America is in double digits now. But are people actually dying from this? I mean, I understand that this is killing people in Mexico, but that’s a third world country without really any hospitals. We’re better than that. CNN has a story about a teenager from New York who had swine flu, popped two Tamiflu pills, and is fine now. So let’s stop flipping out about this; just wash your hands, stay away from Mexico, and stop whining. Also, if you’re Rush Limbaugh, stop blaming this on Obama. Seriously.

My favorite story in a really long time is this one from the Huffington Post. Yep, conservatives actually believe that Stephen Colbert is also a conservative. This is so incredibly dumb I just don’t know how to react to it. Seriously, I had to read that article like three times. I’m pretty sure that the people who believe Colbert is a conservative had ancestors who were eating babies in Ireland in the beginning of the eighteenth century.

Some Polish pianist is making waves today after he went on an anti-American rant at a concert in LA Sunday night, leading people to walk out of the concert. The guy is pissed that the US is installing a missile defense shield in Poland, because evidently he is in favor of a nuclear holocaust. The guy said he would never perform in the United States again. Good, I hope he never comes back. Fuck him.

The British are kicking a druid out of Stonehenge, though the guy has been living there since last June. Whatever, go for it. The only cool part about this is the guy’s name. It used to be John Rothwell, but in 1976 he had it legally changed to King Arthur Pendragon. The guy is clearly crazy, but that’s just an awesome name.

Ugh, secession

2009-04-21T09:12:00.001-07:00

Sorry for writing so much today, this is what happens when I only have half of my morning class and then half of my afternoon class. Lots of time. Anyway, secession.

I had thought that this nonsense was pretty much over, and it was no longer an issue. But CNN.com has an interview up with Ron Paul where he says secession is American and a whole lot of other nauseating garbage.

Look, I don’t care if the 13 colonies seceded from Great Britain, that doesn’t make secession American. Remember that whole Civil War thing? I think that established, pretty much unequivocally that secession wasn’t cool. Same with nullification, not allowed. That’s not how federalism works.

I don’t understand how people can justify this by saying that the government is doing all sorts of terrible things and, as Gov. Perry said, “thumbing its nose at the American people.” Someone needs to explain that to me. President Obama has been in office for like three months, not even 100 days yet, after winning the Presidency by a pretty wide margin. And he’s got pretty strong approval ratings. Seems to me he’s doing what the majority of the American people want. The only people at whom the government is “thumbing its nose” is a group of right wing conservatives still bitter from November.

And, Daniel Webster:

I have not allowed myself, Sir, to look beyond the Union, to see what might lie hidden in the dark recess behind. I have not coolly weighed the chances of preserving liberty when the bonds that unite us together shall be broken asunder. I have not accustomed myself to hang over the precipice of disunion, to see whether, with my short sight, I can fathom the depth of the abyss below; nor could I regard him as a safe counselor in the affairs of this government, whose thoughts should be mainly bent on considering, not how the Union may be best preserved, but how tolerable might be the condition of the people when it should be broken up and destroyed. While the Union lasts, we have high, exciting, gratifying prospects spread out before us and our children. Beyond that I seek not to penetrate the veil. God grant that in my day, at least, that curtain may not rise! God grant that on my vision never may be opened what lies behind! When my eyes shall be turned to behold for the last time the sun in heaven, may I not see him shining on the broken and dishonored fragments of a once glorious Union; on States dissevered, discordant, belligerent; on a land rent with civil feuds, or drenched, it may be, in fraternal blood! Let their last feeble and lingering glance rather behold the gorgeous ensign of the republic, now known and honored throughout the earth, still full high advanced, its arms and trophies streaming in their original luster, not a stripe erased or polluted, not a single star obscured, bearing for its motto, no such miserable interrogatory as "What is all this worth?" nor those other words of delusion and folly, "Liberty first and Union afterwards"; but everywhere, spread all over in characters of living light, blazing on all it sample folds, as they float over the sea and over the land, and in every wind under the whole heavens, that other sentiment, dear to every true American heart, - Liberty and Union, now and for ever, one and inseparable!

On this Miss USA nonsense

2009-04-21T08:45:00.000-07:00

So this probably happened a couple days ago, but I just read about it this morning. Apparently at the Miss USA competition one of the favorites, Miss California, was asked a question by “celebrity” judge Perez Hilton about same-sex marriage.

Her answer was, “Well, I think it’s great that Americans are able to choose one or the other. We live in a land where you can choose same-sex marriage or opposite marriage. And you know what, I think in my country, in my family, I think that I believe that a marriage should be between a man and a woman. No offense to anybody out there, but that's how I was raised.”

Naturally, Hilton got really pissed off by this (his stunned face in the youtube video is actually pretty funny), later called her a dumb bitch, and Miss CA ended up coming in second place. There’s speculation that her answer is what cost her the title, but I’m not buying into that, because I think that Miss North Carolina was better looking anyway. But I think the reaction to this is pretty overblown.

I wish people would stop trying to force their views on other people. Miss CA thinks that marriage should be between a man and a woman, she was raised that way, fine. Agree or disagree with that as you will. But why get angry at her, she’s entitled to believe what she wants. Hell, she even says it’s great that people have the opportunity to choose between the two. She believes what she believes for her own reasons, and it’s not like she’s campaigning for a constitutional amendment. I’m actually impressed she stuck by what she believed, when the judges were clearly wanting for the other answer. By flipping out Hilton is doing more to hurt his cause than to help it; he’s galvanizing the other side and giving them a figure to rally around. I dunno, his reaction just really bothered me, I'm just really not a fan of fanatics, regardless of their side. Unless it's sports.

First in War, First in Peace, Last in the NL East

2009-04-21T08:19:00.000-07:00

So, uh, what’s going on down in D.C.? Is it possible that the Nationals are the worst run franchise in sports? With Matt Millen no longer involved in Detroit, and basketball not mattering enough to me for it to be considered, I think that this may be the case.

I guess a good place to start is with Jim Bowden, who served as their GM until he resigned this spring. Why did he resign? Well, it didn’t really have anything to do with him being just terrible at his job, even though he was, as shown by his failure to trade Soriano, and extensions of Dmitri Young and Ronnie Belliard. No, he resigned because he was being investigated by the fucking FBI. I swear that’s true. Allegedly he’s been skimming money off the top of signing bonuses paid to Latin American prospects.

But now that Bowden is gone there’s hope for the future, right? I mean, they’ve got some good young talent, maybe they can rebuild. Or, maybe not. They have the first pick in this summer’s draft, and would be crazy not to take Stephen Strasburg. But he’s a Boras client, and it will take a huge signing bonus to get him, possibly double what’s ever been paid before. Will the Nationals be willing to do that? They managed to not sign their first round pick from last year’s draft, so nothing is guaranteed.

And then there’s this business with Lastings Milledge. The Nationals don’t really have all that many players with any sort of a high ceiling. There’s Ryan Zimmerman at third, the face of the franchise who was just locked up with a five year contract extension. There’s Adam Dunn, who’s clearly not an up and coming player, but as their marquee free agent signing from this winter, and someone who actually doesn’t suck, who should be in the lineup every day. And there’s Lastings Milledge. He’s basically the only centerfielder on their roster, with a really quick bat and still a lot of potential. He started to put things together in the second half of last season, where he played pretty well. Then he started this season struggling a little, so the Nationals did what any poorly run, irrational franchise would do: they sent him down to the minors. Seriously. The Nationals aren’t going to contend this year, they don’t even have a realistic shot at fourth place in the division. So why not give Milledge at bats against major league pitchers to work his problems out? Demoting him makes no sense at all; it’s not good for him, and it’s not good for the team.

So with Milledge toiling away in the International League, that Nationals found themselves in need of a centerfielder. They decided to use the always entertaining, slightly unhinged Elijah Dukes in that role, even though he’s more of a corner outfielder. Well, at least that was their plan. But then Nationals’ manager Manny Acta benched Dukes for showing up like five minutes late to a pregame stretching session. Now, Dukes has had some issues with authority; you figure that if he was late because he was busy texting pictures of a gun to people whose lives he’s threatened, as he’s done before, then the benching might be merited. But he wasn’t. He was late because he was away at some community outreach event, signing autographs and speaking to little league players. Seriously. But in the National’s zero-tolerance, zero-common sense locker room, he was benched and fined $500. The baseball gods were clearly angered by this, as they smited his replacement, who broke his ankle while making a catch in that game. As for the fine, the little league, uh, league, is taking up a collection to pay it, not because Dukes needs the money, but more as a show of solidarity and to thank him and all sorts of things. And the worst part is that I have no doubt the Nationals will be willing to take their money.

Right now the Nats are 2-10, and seemingly incapable of even spelling their team name correctly on their uniforms. Don’t expect any sort of improvement soon.

Spring Cleaning

2009-04-19T10:19:00.000-07:00

This is nothing like the spring cleaning that Winston was whining about Friday, it’s a lot more speculative. Right now the Washington post has ten things that they would get rid of in a world-wide spring cleaning. The ten things that the Post writers would do away with are the Nobel Prize in Literature, the NAACP, the White House Press Corps, Tenure, the Prom, the term “Muslim World,” Larry Summers, the Vice-Presidency, Television, and West Point. They have essays up about each one of those things if you’re especially interested; I wasn’t, and only read the one about the Nobel Prize, so I won’t be talking about their decisions. Instead, I’ve come up with a list of ten things that I would like to see be swept off the planet.

Twitter: Ok, so now Oprah has a Twitter, Ashton Kutcher has a million people following him, but this is plagued by controversy, and all of this is considered to be news. What the fuck? You cannot convince me that Twitter won’t be responsible for the downfall of America. It’s our lead-lined plumbing and barbarian hordes combined.

Sarah Palin: One of John McCain’s staff members, one who was involved in vetting Palin, recently described her selection as high risk, high reward. Fuck, that’s how I drafted my fantasy baseball team, it’s not how we should govern. I would be a lot saner if she just faded into obscurity.

All the people who got pissed off when Obama said that America wasn’t a Christian nation: It isn’t. Never was, hopefully never will be. Thomas Jefferson certainly wasn’t a Christian. Yeah, the money says “in God we trust,” but come on, that’s not necessarily a Christian god. If you want to, say America is a monotheistic nation; I’ll still dislike you, but I’ll be pleasantly surprised that you know a polysyllabic word. Or maybe go read the Bill of Rights.

Portugal: Xenophobic? Eh, maybe. But what has Portugal done for the world recently? They’ve made no meaningful contributions since pretty much the fifteenth century. If Christiano Ronaldo is at all indicative of the rest of Portugal, and I’m assuming he is, we can do without them.

CNN.com’s iReporter program: I can’t think of one meaningful contribution iReporter has made to my understanding of the world. Seriously, we don’t need to give a voice on cnn.com to every vapid asshole with a camera. That’s what blogspot is for.

Axis of Evil: Not the term, I’m ok with that. I’m mostly talking about Iran and North Korea. They’re both getting pretty uppity again, and I wouldn’t mind seeing them gone. While Iran is putting Americans in jail on specious accusations of espionage, the Israelis are getting ready to bomb them back to the stone age if they even hint about developing a nuclear weapon. I’m ok with that. As for North Korea, they’re doing all sorts of saber-rattling, saying that any sanctions would be regarded as an act of war. You know what else could be considered an act of war? Launching missiles and then lying about it. Crazy people don’t make good world leaders.

Stephanie Meyer: Is this the future of literate? Wikipedia actually lists her occupation as “novelist.” That’s like calling the homeless guy with a rhyming cardboard sign a poet. Somebody needs to do something; between Twilight and Napoleon Dynamite, Mormon propaganda is threatening to destroy American popular culture.

NASCAR: Stop it. I’m watching a baseball game, and FOX is trying to make me like NASCAR. It’s not going to work. And I don’t care how many backflips Carl Edwards does, he’s no Ozzie Smith. My respect for Tim McCarver increased exponentially when he just flat out said that Ozzie was better. And Joe Buck, what the hell, how can you possibly pick Edwards?!?! Jack Buck wouldn’t have put up with that garbage. Disgraceful. But back to NASCAR, it’s not entertaining, it’s just a waste of gasoline. Every time NASCAR stages a race, a Saudi oil prince smiles, and then writes a check to Hamas.

Newspapers: The internet has made them pretty much superfluous at this point. It seems like the only thing that newspapers really write about any more is the death of newspapers. I see why this would be a big deal to reporters, but it bores me. Let’s stop wasting paper.

The NBA: The NBA season started with like six teams being capable of winning the title. Attrition has whittled that number down to two, the Lakers and Cavs. Of course, the NBA is still going to go through with this whole playoffs thing, and it will dominate ESPN programming for two months, and I won’t care. Because the NBA is a joke. The officiating is farcical at best, there’s way too much whining, no one is especially interesting, and it just can’t match the intensity or entertainment of college basketball. I would not miss the NBA at all.

Brief Thoughts

2009-04-17T11:05:00.000-07:00

I’m done my brief, 4600 words. I’m pretty sure that my guy is gonna win. Whatever. On to more important things.

The Governor of Texas is in way over his head. Secession? Really? That worked out so well the first time, didn’t it. Honestly, I’m excited about it too, and really hope they go through with it. First of all, I think America would be a better place without the Lone Star State. Too many evangelicals there. Second, and most importantly, if Texas secedes, I’m pretty sure there would be a zombie outbreak. In fact, I’m certain of it. If Texas leaves the Union again, Andrew Jackson will rise from the dead an lead an army of zombies on a rampage all the way to the Rio Grande, not stopping until he hangs or eats the brains of every secessionist down there, starting with Rick Perry.

A couple days ago a statement was made public warning about right wing extremists. This, naturally, made the right wing extremists flip out. But, uh, the more they flip out, the closer they get to doing the things that the government was warning about. Facist-leaning Republicans seem to struggle with irony. And common sense.

Oh, and they don’t really have a sense of humor either. Fox News has a really bitchy article up about how CNN and MSNBC weren’t respectful enough of their contrived tax day protest. Evidently when Sean Hannity and whoever else came up with their idiotic tea party idea, they didn’t consult any high school sophomores, who would have exposed the obvious flaw. So CNN and MSNBC did their duty as proud American institutions and made the obligatory teabagging jokes. I think that some guy named David Shuster wins the prize for most awesome mockery of Fox News and this whole endeavor, saying, "Teabagging day for the right wing and they are going nuts for it, " followed by "They want to give President Obama a strong tongue-lashing and lick government spending." You think that Fox News would catch on to the mockery, and maybe adapt, but they haven’t. In the middle of the article there is an invitation to join the forums and comment about this whole debacle. The link reads, “Click here to join the discussion on teabagging.” I swear I didn’t make any of this up.

Even Ann Coulter weighed in on this teabagging discussion, acting every bit as sanctimonious as Fox News, but with more jokes about Barney Frank. As an aside, can someone explain to me why I read Ann Coulter’s web site? I thought I was better than that. But even though I read her regularly, I can’t remember I got all the way through one of her postings; it seems every week there’s a paragraph that makes my head hurt so much I need to jump over to youtube and watch Bobby Orr highlights until the pain goes away. This week the line was, “Obama's biggest shortcoming is that he believes the things believed by all Democrats, which have had devastating consequences every time they are put into effect.” What the hell? Was Clinton’s Presidency so devastating? Certainly it wasn’t as bad as Bush’s time in office (pick whichever Bush you prefer, neither was any good). Seriously, how does she get away with making such absurd claims.

Getting back to this whole secession thing, just because it baffles me, and it’s still a big deal, people are now polling Texans about a couple of the issues here. I’m like to interpret these numbers for you. 31% of Texas voters say their state has the right to secede. From this, it stands to reason that 31% of Texas voters are mildly retarded. This figure may be low, however, because I sincerely doubt that most Texans know what the word “secede” means. 18% of Texas voters say that they would vote to leave the Union; these are more likely than not the same people that were trumpeting the phrase “’Merica! Love it or leave it!” over the last eight years. Clearly these Texans don’t love America, which must make them terrorists. You’re either with us or against us.

If Dmitry Medvedev were an American, he would vote Republican, live in Texas, watch Fox News, and probably have a lifesize cutout of Bill O’Reilly in his bedroom. But he’s not, he’s a Russian. And he’s warning NATO not to run any war games in Georgia. So, if I follow his logic, it’s ok to invade Georgia and kill a shit ton of people there, but having a military exercise in the country is way out of line. Weird.

One more Republican I don’t like (can you tell that there aren’t any stories about outer space or dinosaurs) is Norm Coleman, the guy who lost the Minnesota Senate race to Al Franken, but won’t go away. Seriously, this guy, when it seemed like he was winning, said that Franken should concede so Minnesota could be properly represented. (He really did say something like this, I just don’t feel like looking up where; if you don’t believe me look it up for yourself.) Naturally, he’s now losing, has been for months, but won’t concede. He’s pretty much burned up all his state court options, and now he’s gonna introduce a suit in federal court. I don’t think he’ll win, because, quite simply, fewer people voted for him than voted for Franken, but if it gets to the Supreme Court all bets are off; Franken could win by thousands of votes in Minnesota, but when he loses by one in Washington (and he will), he’ll be screwed.

Finally, I’m going to just briefly throw out my two cents on the debate about LeBron James that is raging over at our sister-blog, www.dauerism.wordpress.com. The Yankee hat thing doesn’t bother me, and I don’t care about all this talk about him eventually going to the Knicks. LeBron actually seems like a pretty good guy. But when his career and Dwayne Wade’s career are both over, I really want to be able to look back and say that, yeah, James was a much more talented player, but he’s no Dwayne Wade, and then point to the five NBA championships that Wade has won and the zero that James has. That would just be amusing.

Thumbs 6: The Fellowship of the Thumb

2009-04-17T10:42:00.000-07:00

Thumbs up: John Madden. Say what you want about Madden, I love the guy and I'll miss him in the booth (especially since Chris Collinsworth will be filling in for him - - but I digress). So he mumbled and said the occasional incoherent thing. Honestly, tell me a sportscaster who doesn't say something nonsensical at least once a game. Madden's brief resume when I look back at him: the turducken; a bitchin' cameo in Little Giants and a solid caricature of himself in the Replacements; the most interesting travel habits of any human being I know; and of course 30 years in the booth and a Superbowl win.

Thumbs down: Broken penises. According to the Sun, there has been an alarming (nay, very alarming!) increase in cases of broken penises in Jamaica. And I don't mean broken like "get a hit of Viagara" broken. I mean broken like shattered. Evidently: “During very rigorous intercourse the man can hit the woman’s pubic bone and sustain a fracture. There is a loud popping sound, excruciating pain and swelling.” I would but that on the scale of terrible outcomes resulting from a sexual encounter between Herpes and having a kid. I wish that upon very few men.

Thumbs up: Deadliest Warrior. So Spike TV essentially decided to make a TV show out of possibly the greatest debate ever: who would win in a fight, a ___ or a ___? I caught the show for the first time this week, as a Viking squared off against a Samurai. I only managed to watch the second half of the show, but in that time I saw mannequin heads getting lopped off with a long sword, some weird samurai stick obliterate a shield, a guy nail two targets with two spears that he threw AT THE SAME TIME, and, finally, a reenactment of a hypothetical fight. It was awesome.

Thumbs down: Sarah Palin. Again. She’s the worst. When she first was picked as McCain’s running mate, she wanted people to talk about her family, specifically her son who was going into the army, and the baby with Downs. Then, like a week later, no one was supposed to talk about her family, cause her daughter was knocked up. And then when people tried to find out what the deal was with the father, Levi, Palin flipped out again, saying the media was destroying a young man’s life. Now, of course, Palin has reversed course again, and she’s attacking him hardcore, while Bristol preaches the merits of abstinence. But don’t worry, I figured out what’s going on here. When the North Vietnamese captured John McCain, the brainwashed him, and him bringing Sarah Palin to prominence is really just the continuation of a Cold War plot to destroy America. If she actually becomes President, it will have worked.

Thumbs Up: Must See TV. Seriously, I don't even know why any channel but NBC broadcasts anything besides a test pattern on Thursday between 8 and 10 pm. My Name is Earl is always solid and Amy Poehler could get me to watch paint dry as long as she stood in front of the camera and ran a commentary on it. For my money, you can't beat the one two punch that is The Office and 30 Rock. Tina Fey is so appealing to watch I'm going to have to make up a word for it... um... how about hysdorable? In fact, I have to give 30 Rock the edge at this point and proclaim it the funniest show on television at this moment.

Thumbs Down: Spring cleaning. It's amazing how much crap accumulates everywhere over the course of the year. At least it's your own crap when you clean your home though. When your office decides it's time to sweep out all the nooks and crannies the task is daunting. Suddenly, you're clearing out pamphlets that were made before you were born and probably printed on some combination of asbestos and mercury.

RIP Harry

2009-04-13T15:24:00.000-07:00

I watched the Phillies game today, wasn’t going to not watch it, and it was weird. And sad. This sucks.

CSN Tribute to Harry Kalas from Mike Meech on Vimeo.

Post-Easter Post

2009-04-13T08:46:00.000-07:00

So lots of cool things have happened over the last couple of days, the most important of which is clearly the home run Matt Stairs hit to bring the Phillies to .500. It was majestic. But on to the other things.

The biggest story, in my eyes, at least, really just makes you think “America, fuck yeah!” When the Somali pirates captured an American ship, and took the captain hostage, you kinda figured they were getting in over their heads. I mean, it’s one thing to fuck with Danish or Panamanian ships; honestly, you can probably get away with that. But the US has a pretty badass navy, and a President who has to make known that he won’t put up with shit from anyone. So we sent in the Seals, and they kicked all sorts of ass. They rescued the captain, who’s pretty much fine, killed three of the pirates, and now we even have one under arrest who can stand trial. Additionally, it must be noted that the French also tried to rescue some hostages from pirates, but didn’t do nearly as well.

The pirates, understandably, aren’t taking this so well, and have issued some threats to both the French and Americans. This really isn’t the best course of action for them. If they were smart they would just take the beating they got and go back to preying on ships for Comoros or some other country that won’t fight back. The US and France will seriously fuck them up if they get too uppity. If they actually start killing Americans, they’re gonna have to deal with the wrath of the US navy, and their AK 47s really aren’t going to be able to compete with Tomahawk cruise missiles.

Speaking of the French, it’s important to note that they’re assholes. This has manifested itself most recently, and really fairly consistently over the last like twelve years, in their treatment of Lance Armstrong. They’ve dicked him around with bullshit allegations incessantly, and they’ve never been right; he has passed every drug test he’s taken. But now it’s possible that he won’t be able to compete in the Tour de France this summer, even though he’s racing to raise global awareness about cancer. Two things have been made clear by the actions these French assholes are taking. First, the French love cancer, probably as much as they love not showering. Also, they’re afraid of Armstrong. They know he won’t lose, and they don’t want to be one-upped by an American anymore. Let’s be honest, America has been doing things better than France since America first existed. We had a Revolution for democracy, and things went pretty well; the French tried to follow in our footsteps, and mostly just a lot of heads got lopped off, and the only decent French military mind since William the Conqueror ended up exiled in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. Oh, and they went back to a monarchy. Later, America decided it wanted to fuck with Mexico, and we got a ton of land out of it. When the French tried to do the same, they actually lost, getting their asses handed to them at the Battle of Puebla. In the twentieth century, France is best known for getting steamrolled by Germany, twice (seriously, the Maginot line? Great plan, dickheads; Vauban would be terribly disappointed in all of you). America bailed them out each time. Now, America is a world power, and France is mostly just fading into irrelevancy; they’ve been passed as a power by a bunch of other European and Asian countries, their soccer team isn’t that good anymore, and the Eifel Tower isn’t really anything special. Pretty much all they have left is this bike race, and they’ve been trying to take it back after Lance Armstrong had made it his bitch for seven years; clearly they’re screwing around with Lance because their national pride is dependent on it. Well, fuck them, I hope he gets to race, cause you know if they let him in there’s no way he won’t win number eight.

So since the economy is shit, local governments are doing all sorts of crazy things to raise money. And it’s bullshit. Seriously, a streetlight user fee? That’s asinine. Streetlights are there to make streets safer. The purpose of a government is to protect its people. Really, the responsibility for this falls on the government. Stop sucking.

The Pope said Mass in the Coliseum on Good Friday, and spewed some nonsense about the world being a desert of godlessness. I ignored most of that. But this part was interesting. He said that there are “many societies in the world where women fail to receive a fair deal.” Um, would one of these societies maybe be the Church? You know, the one that won’t let women be priests. Maybe the Church should work on its own discrimination before criticizing anyone else. Benedict has been pretty clear in stating that he won’t permit women to be priests. It’s pretty much bullshit that there’s a sacrament that only men can receive (nuns don’t receive Holy Orders). How is that a fair deal? Maybe it’s not as overt as marrying your eight year old daughter off to some guy in his forties to settle some debts, but it isn’t not discrimination.

Finally, Woody Harrelson is the coolest.

Thoughts on Friday's baseball games

2009-04-11T09:52:00.001-07:00

I’m home for Easter, so I got to pay a lot more attention to baseball games that the Phillies weren’t playing in. MLB Extra Innings is awesome.

The first game yesterday was the Rangers visiting the Tigers, with Kris Benson getting the start for Texas. Last year the Phillies brought Anna Benson’s husband to training camp, and then gave him a minor league contract, hoping he would be able to rehabilitate himself enough to be an effective starter for them, cause Adam Eaton sucked. Judging by this game, it’s a pretty good thing that didn’t work out. Detroit put up 15 runs, eight off of Benson. I’m thinking that with Kris Benson as their third starter, behind Kevin Millwood and Vicente Padilla (all three former Phillies), the Rangers aren’t going to have the pitching to contend in a really terrible division. They’re gonna end up losing a lot of 9-8 games.

The Cubs played Milwaukee in kinda a weird game. Rich Harden pitched really well, as he pretty much always does when he’s healthy, but only went six innings, turning things over to the bullpen. The Cubs’ best reliever is without a doubt Carlos Marmol, and their closer is Kevin Gregg. This setup seemed to work pretty well for the Cubs in the seventh inning; down by one (maybe two, I don’t remember), the Brewers sent Ryan Braun to the plate with the bases loaded. Marmol was able to get him to fly out to right. But then the Brewers got a shot at Gregg in the ninth inning, down by one, and with some poor work in the outfield by Soriano they tied the game, in undoubtedly the first of many blown saves by Gregg. Milwaukee went on to win on a walkoff either infield single or fielder’s choice; runners on the corners, one out, groundball to Theriot, he goes home instead of trying to turn two, but the runner is able to slide in safely.

The Blue Jays and the Orioles both won, beating the winless Indians and the Rays, respectively, to stay in first and second in the AL East. They, uh, won’t finish the year there, but I’m at least excited to see Toronto once they get Marcum and McGowan back next year.

The Twins beat the White Sox, with Joe Crede, weirdly accompanied by Air Supply, homering against his old team. Carlos Quentin homered in the loss, and managed not to break anything. Dumbass. The Diamondbacks beat the Dodgers, which I suppose may turn out to be important in September, but I can’t really get worked up about it now. The Padres beat the Giants, but the only interesting thing about that game was incredible catch Scort Hairston made, robbing one of the Molinas of a home run. The Mariners beat the A’s, but since neither King Felix or Brandon Morrow pitched, I don’t care.

The Mets lost, which is nice, but the Marlins won, which sucks. Hanley Ramirez and Dan Uggla both launched animalistic home runs into empty seats. Seriously, Marlins fans suck. They have a really good team, and it’s really just an amazingly well run franchise, with so much young talent, and there are just entire sections completely empty. Against a division rival. In the first week of the season! I think it’s about time this Miami experiment ended and the Marlins go somewhere else. A team in Las Vegas could be pretty cool.

The Cardinals beat the Astros, presumably moving Ed Wade a step closer to unemployment. Albert Pujols did some stuff, showing how good he is at baseball. Kelly Johnson had a walk off single as the fucking Braves beat the Nats in ten, but he still has a girl’s name.

The Yankees beat the Royals, with Teixeira getting on base three out of four times, making the assholes who wrote the “Money for Nothing” headline after the first game of the season look even more like, well, assholes. I’m convinced that the New York media is actually more unlikeable than the Yankees. So when can we start to consider Alex Gordon a bust?

Finally, the Angels beat the Red Sox in one of the saddest games since 2001. Really though, watching the game you knew there was no way the Angels were going to lose. Sarge Jr. made a nice catch, and walked twice, but doesn’t have nearly as many hats as his father, so there’s still work to be done. Also, Boston’s alternate caps, the dangling socks, are retarded.

Cole will be fine; he missed spring training.

Thumbs 5: Look Who's Thumbing Now

2009-04-10T13:23:00.000-07:00

Thumbs Up: Baseball. It's back, and it's awesome. My Mets won, the Phils lost (and had a fantastic comeback against the Braves), the high school team I coached looked pretty respectable in their first-ever game, and I already scored free tickets to a luxury box and will be on the field for batting practice at a major league game later this month. Long live 'Merica's pastime!

Thumbs down:The Mets. This one is painful for me, but it's necessary. If we didn't all punch our loved ones in the jaw when they messed up, we wouldn't be grown-ups. Deadspin reported earlier this week that the Mets are ending their long-standing tradition of Little League Days. They used to allow little leaguersby the thousands into particular games at discounted rates and have a pre-game parade on the field. But with fewer seats at Citi Field, it just doesn't turn enough of a profit to be brought across the parking lot from the old stadium. For shame!

Thumbs Up: Levi Johnston. Over the summer I felt bad for this kid as he was essentially dragged around as a pawn by the McCain/Gimmick campaign. But over the last week or so, I’ve really come to respect him. He’s shown no fear or hesitation in going after the most powerful person in
his state, calling her out for being a heartless, blinded by ambition, disingenuous liar.

Thumbs Down: Texans. Well, not all Texans, but definitely these four. I don’t even know if I can express how terrible what they did was, and I don’t even especially like dogs. I can’t help but wish Mr. Luttrell had gotten a clean shot.

Thumbs Up: Having Good Friday Off. I've got a lot of things to gripe about at work (see below), but non-profits do days off right. The three day weekend's all the sweeter knowing that Cadbury Cream Eggs lie at the end of it.

Thumbs Down: Shared Cubicles. Working in a cubicle is miserable enough. When you share a cubicle with two other people, though, you spend your workday constantly looking over your shoulder to see if anyone has noticed that you're dicking around on the internet. I can't even get in a decent game of freecell, damnit! I'm also the furthest one from the window, which means that another person controls when and for how long I have access to the sun. That starts to mess with your head after a while.

Exchanging Lineups: The Deleted Scenes

2009-04-08T12:34:00.000-07:00

Here are some potential verses from Exchanging Lineups that didn't make it into the final poem. It's not that they weren't good enough. Maybe they were too good? Again, some were written by Dick, some by me, and I have to think it's pretty obvious who wrote which.

B is for Bowa
An angry shortstop.
Gold with the glove
But his bat had no pop.

C is for Carlos
Panamanian backstop.
Upped his game in the Series
Now the Phils are on top.

C is for Coste
He can hit and can write.
Despite years in the minors
Never gave up the fight.

D is for Drew
A worthless little shit
If only his face
A thrown battery’d hit

D is for Dutch
Though he is crazy now.
Travel through time
And help Mitch out somehow.

E is for Edgardo
Alfonzo and fewest errors.
His play at second
Made the 99 Mets all the better.

E is for Eckstein
His hustle and grit.
Who cares if he won’t
come through with a hit.

E is for Eyre
A midseason pickup,
Retiring lefties
With hardly a hiccup.

H is for Howard
And of course home run too.
The strike outs don’t worry me,
Nor should they you.

J is for Jimmy,
Cocky but great.
“Team to beat” are the words
That Mets fans now hate

J is for Jayson
And the balls he hits far
I hope my mom lets him out
Of the trunk of her car.

K is for Kruk
And his wondrous mullet
Like Superman’s cape
You don’t want to pull it

L is for Lidge
On the mound, top nine.
Strike three to Hinske,
Even Buck's call was fine.

M is for Moyer,
The ageless wonder.
Looking for a fastball
Is quite a blunder.

N is for Nunez,
Wes Helms and Dave Bell.
A trio of third basemen
Straight from baseball Hell.

P is for Pat,
He led the parade.
Not even with time
Will that memory fade.

P is for Pedro
In the field always scrappy.
His single in the seventh
Made the whole city happy.

Q is for Queens
Not where the Mets play
But rather their fans
All of whom are gay.

V is the Vet,
Years ago knocked down.
Count on a riot
When the Mets were in town.

W is for Wright;
His name and his swing.
His game, all-in-all,
Is a beautiful thing.

W is for World Series
The Mets and Phils both have two.
Whose team gets the next one?
Me or You?

W is for Williams,
The Wild Thing, Mitch
If only he’d never
Been brought in to pitch.

Steve Phillips is not a smart guy

2009-04-08T07:43:00.000-07:00

Steve Phillips used to be the General Manager of the New York Mets. During his tenure, the Mets actually played in a World Series. Still, he wasn’t a very good GM. He signed players like Mo Vaughn (after he stopped being good at baseball), Bobby Bonilla (after he stopped being good at baseball), Kenny Rogers (we all know how that went), and Rickey Henderson (when he was more crazy than good). He also didn’t do so well trading players. If you want to see a Mets fan’s head explode, just bring up Scott Kazmir for Victor Zambrano. He was eventually fired, years later than he should have been. With apologies to Bill Simmons, Steve Phillips probably belongs on the terrible GM Mount Rushmore. Well, now he’s got a job as an analyst on ESPN. He’s all over the place, showing up on Baseball Tonight, the occasional SportsCenter, random games throughout the week, and, starting this season, Sunday Night Baseball, making a broadcast that prominently features Joe Morgan even less enjoyable. He does not go a good job.

Yahoo’s Roto Arcarde brings to light this gem, which in turn was brought to my attention by Jon, that Phillips dropped during one of the games he was working this week. Phillips apparently doesn’t buy into any of the statistical analyses of defense. It doesn’t seem to matter to him that they’re gaining traction with front offices throughout the majors. No, they’re all wrong because they don’t value Jeter highly enough. In fact, most measures of defense seem to suggest that Jeter sucks defensively. And really, most non-Yankee fans, and even the rare reasonable Yankee fan, acknowledge that Jeter is not a good defensive shortstop. Seriously, just go to Baseball-Reference if you don’t believe me; he’s not good defensively. Sure, he puts up good numbers with respect to fielding percentage. He handles balls hit right at him without any real problems. But he can’t move to his left. He lets so many hits go up the middle that a competent shortstop would field. The Yankees know that at some point they’re going to have to move him to a different position, possibly center field, as soon as he lets them. So probably never.

But anyway, this isn’t about how bad Jeter is defensively. No, it’s about Steve Phillips, and how he’s dumb. So Phillips doesn’t buy into any of these measurements of defensive proficiency. Why? Because they’re critical of Jeter. Steve doesn’t see any limitations to Jeter’s range. Look, I know he has a handful of Gold Gloves. He doesn’t deserve them. He pretty much made a reputation for himself as a good defensive player by diving face first into a chair and that flip to home against the A’s. But he’s not good defensively. Seriously, just watch like two Yankee games. Or even watch some of the WBC games where he was killing America. Whatever. You’ll see he’s not good. Unless you’re Steve Phillips.

No, Phillips has made up his mind that Jeter is still great, and everything else is just nonsense. I don’t know how he’s come to this conclusion, but that’s his stance. Here’s what he had to say about these statistics: "Because the statistics don't match what my eyes say, it makes me mistrust the veracity of the system." Maybe the problem is actually with his judgment. I mean, there’s got to be a reason no one else has hired him, while even Dusty Baker still gets job offers.

Thumbs 4: The Secret of the Thumbs

2009-04-03T10:25:00.000-07:00

Thumbs Up: Parent/Teacher Conferences. Other than the fact that I was at school from 7am to 7pm last night, PTCs are like a holiday. It's the one day a year where I get to look a parent in the eye and either say, "Your kid is great - - don't go changin'" or "If I never saw your kid in my class again, it would be too late" (in so many words, of course). I get equal enjoyment out of both encounters.

Thumbs Down: Officer Dickhead who pulled over Ryan Moats. This is oldhat at this point, but I can't tell enough people how much I despise this guy. If you haven't seen the video of the encounter, head over to Deadspin and watch true douchebaggery in action as Houston's Finest give pride to the shield. Earlier this week, the officer in question resigned, but I hope he goes the way of Mike Nifong and gets a stay at Federal Pound Me in the Ass Prison.

Thumbs Up: Wiffleball. Baseball season starts Sunday, but wiffleball season has already begun. To some people spring starts when they see a robin, to others the season is ushered in by shirtless white trash. But you know spring is really here when you pull your first line drive with a bright yellow bat.

Thumbs Down: Whoever gives out the Peabody Awards. CNN got a Peabody award for their political coverage. I guess someone has to get this award, but CNN blows. As I write this, some of CNN.com’s headlines include: “Mom urges kids to chug vodka, cops say,” “First Lady, Queen embrace; tongues wag,” “Valerie Bertinelli hanging on to fat clothes,” and “Proposal diamond slips through bridge.” And these aren’t obscure headlines pulled from the depths of the site, they’re right from the front page; you don’t even need to scroll down. That’s award-winning journalism.

Thums Up: National Poetry Month. Clearly, I’m not worried about ‘Thumbs’ being a popularity contest. Poetry is quite possibly the most underappreciated art form, so get yourself some culture this month. Dust off that copy of Leaves of Grass that’s been propping up the couch’s uneven leg or the copy of The Waste Land that you haven’t touched since (or, let’s be serious, during) school and give it a once over. You might just like. And that’s coming straight from Sam-I-Am.

Thumbs Down: Conficker. Seriously, I’m not even mad at these Eastern European hackers, I’m just disappointed. April Fool’s Day came and went and all the virus did was what it’s been doing… nothing. Whatever happened to showmanship? After all the hype I was expecting a Skynet scenario. I’ll give them until the end of the month to make their slave computers self-aware and start killing household pets, otherwise I’m going to go on record and call them punk-asses.

Exchanging Lineups

2009-03-31T16:36:00.000-07:00

A is for Ashburn
Whom I never saw play,
But loved on the radio
Joining Harry’s play by play.

B is for Brogna
My childhood hero.
Probably explains
Why I'm still such a zero.

C is for Cole,
Carlton reborn.
Two lefties leaving
The batter forlorn.

D is for Dallas Green
Played for both; K'ed nary a hitter.
Didn't stop there - -
For both, became a Skipper.

E is for Eisenreich
A rightfielder with pluck.
Had a powerful arm
And shit, bitch, ass, fuck!

F is for Franco
The first New York captain.
Fuck Derek Jeter
And the Yanks while we're at it.

G is for Gary,
Sarge and his hat.
Equally good
With a mic or a bat.

H is for HoJo
And the '86 Series.
Waiting to get back there
Is making me weary.

I is for Inky
And his mighty swing.
Joe Carter sure robbed him
Of that World Series Ring.

J is for John Olerud
Hit for the cycle - - how you like that?
They say that his swing
Was as hard as his hat.

K is for Kalas
The voice of the Phils.
His call of Game 5
Provides nothing but chills.

L is for Losingest
The very first season set the mark.
Even still, rooting for the Mets
Takes a lot of heart.

M is for Moyer,
The ageless wonder.
Looking for a fastball
Is quite a blunder.

N is for no No-Nos.
Bleeders, bloops, and frozen ropes,
Teams always hit at least one,
And I'm starting to lose hope.

O is for Owens
And Pat Gillick too.
To each man fans owe
A heartfelt “Thank you.”

P is for Piazza;
Most dingers ever for a 2.
Still wish Mike speared Clemens
With the broken bat he threw.

Q is for quaint,
Which the Vet never was.
But the roar from the top
Would give visitors pause.

R is for Rich,
As Lenny’s become;
Steroids or cash,
He has quite the sum.

S is for Stocker
His career peaked in ’93.
But I still have his rookie card,
It’s mint condition. Fuck me.

T is for Tug
A Phil and a Met.
Ya gotta believe
He’d be a safe bet.

U is for Utley,
World Fucking Champ.
Is an MVP next
For this loveable scamp?

V is for Valentine
And his Eye Black mustache.
Said Sayonara for Japan
And now is swimming in cash.

W is for Williams,
The Wild Thing, Mitch.
If only he’d never
Been brought in to pitch.

X is for Xavier
A short-lived, but great Met.
Brought a tear to my eye
When they sent him to Pitt.

Y is for Youth
Much of mine I passed
Watching the Phils
Struggle in last.

Z is for Zambrano,
Not the good one, but Victor.
Fuck you, Steve Phillips.

Dick and I wrote this, inspired by this Ogden Nash Poem. I wrote the first letter, and from there we alternated. We're both better at poetry than Winston. Baseball starts soon. Get excited.

Thumbs 3: Because 2/3 of a thumb is better than no thumb at all (or what I learned from playing with fireworks)*

2009-03-27T07:49:00.001-07:00

Thumbs Up: Facebook. Last week they changed their design, and people have been bitching about it. Well, people bitch every time that Facebook makes even the slightest change. Those people need to calm down a little bit. I appreciate that Facebook continually tries to make itself better, even knowing that, at minimum, a vocal minority of its users are going to whine about it before even giving it a chance.

Thumbs Down: Matt Drudge. I realized recently that I would pay close to four hundred dollars for the opportunity to punch Matt Drudge in the face. He’s an asshole, and if anyone deserves to be hit, it’s him. Seriously, he lost his show on Fox News because that network was uncomfortable with how he was manipulating facts to support his anti-abortion agenda. Yeah, he was too disingenuous for Fox News. He’s an ass.

Thumbs Up – Suffering Idiots writers who write their Thumbs contribution on time. Thumbs, for those of you who may not know, is a collaborative effort among myself, Gimpy, and Dick. We collectively dropped the ball last week, but we’re limping along at two thirds strength this time around. Hey, last time I checked a tricycle that was missing a wheel was called a bicycle and that was good enough for our ancestors back in the Old Country, damnit!*

Thumbs Down – Ringback tones. Yeah, I didn’t think people still had them either, but they do. At my job, I probably make between 25 and 50 calls a week and a frighteningly high ratio of those calls involve Beyonce or Lil Wayne blaring in my ear. This is by no means a Thumbs Down to those artists; however, the ringback tones that feature them are often of poor quality and inappropriate volume. I would much rather hear a simple ring to let me know my phone is working than T.I. telling me that the person I’m calling is having so much fun chilling with him that s/he might not be as quick to answer as they would normally.

Thumbs Up: Sunshine. Apologies for this obvious thumbs up, but let'snot underestimate how terrific it is to be out of the winter woods.It's finally getting dark after 7pm. As a teacher who's in school by7am every day and out no earlier than 3, I was down to a measly 2 hoursof sunshine per day for a solid 2.5 months there.

Thumbs down: Chalk. I love March Madness, but I hate when the top seedswin. For the first time in the history of the tournament, all of the 1,2, and 3 seeds from every region made the Sweet 16. Beyond that, therehaven't even been that many exciting games overall. Some of the gameshave been close, but by and large the team that should have won has won. Where's the fun in that?

*At the time of this posts initial publication, Dick Gerber had not yet submitted his Thumbs. Although he did sneak them in this afternoon, let's make sure to shame him anyway.

Sunday Night Baseball

2009-03-22T20:25:00.000-07:00

I was all set to write about this Barack Obama, Special Olympics thing that’s been going on. I was several paragraphs in, and it was really good. But I had to stop writing it. Something even more retarded was happening. United States vs. Japan, WBC semifinals. It was on ESPN. Jon Miller was calling the game. Joining him in the box? Joe Morgan and Steve Phillips, baseball's answer to Matt Millen and Mike Millbury. Get excited, everyone.

Derek Jeter is playing short. I understand why the Yankees do it: they don’t have anyone better. But Jeter is the third best defensive shortstop on this team, at least. Mark DeRosa is better defensively than Jeter, and he’s playing first. I’m pretty sure Evan Longoria played short in college, and he’s on the bench. But worst of all, Jimmy Rollins, gold glove shortstop, is DHing! If they really feel the need to play the Captain, why not have him DH, and let Jimmy play defense. He can go left.

Here are some things that Joe Morgan and Steve Phillips have said:
* Team USA is going to win because they’re mentally tough. Also, Roy Oswalt, the starting pitcher, added as an afterthought.
* Bottom 1st, 2-0 count, did they just cut Joe Morgan’s mic? I really think they did.
* Joe Morgan is talking about middle infielders being able to play other positions. I love it. Stick to what you know.
* Joe is comparing Adam Dunn to Ted Williams. VORPies everywhere are rejoicing.
* I’ve blocked them out at this point. It’s good to be back in midseason form.

I should respond to Gerber’s post the other day about David Wright. I’ll give him credit for playing hurt, he’s American hero, and seeing him knock in Jimmy was harmonious. In two weeks he’ll go back to being a fascist pederast.

McDonalds is advertising on Japan’s batting helmets. Seriously.

Top 3, Jeter grounds up the middle, Japanese shortstop goes to his left, throws Jeter out, making the captain jealous.

Fukodome really isn’t a good defensive center fielder: misplaying the Wright double off the wall and the Jimmy single in the first. Him being an all-star last year was a joke.

Bottom three: really nice play by Wright fielding a bunt, Scott Rolen esque. No joke, it was just really nice. Cue text from Dick: “somebody suck David Wright’s dick right now!” Oh, and then he throws the next ball into right field. He must have been distracted.

“Slidepiece” – Steve Philips, bottom 4. That means it’s baseball season.

America is losing, though they could have had a much better team. Real Team USA lineup, cause I’m bored:
Rollins – SS
Wright – 3B
Utley – 2B
Teixeira – 1B
Braun – LF
McCann - C
Sizemore – CF
Markakis – RF
Rotation of Hamels, Halladay, Sabathia, and Lincecum, with Lidge, Nathan, and Papelbon in the bullpen. Iannetta, BJ Upton, Mark DeRosa, Evan Longoria, and Josh Hamilton on the bench. Charlie Manuel managing.

JRoll works a walk top five, after being down 0-2. He’s an American hero, 2-2 with a walk. Right after that, David Wright strikes out looking, proving once again that he hates America. When asked for comment after the game he was unable to speak, seeing as how he was choking.

Wrigley Field was built for a Federal League team. Just saying. Also, I’m looking into reports that dinosaurs were actually made up by the CIA to discourage time travel. Carl Everett hasn’t disagreed with this.

I pay much better attention when the team I’m cheering for is winning. America winning: riveted. America down, but threatening: watching, but with music playing. America down, Japan batting: game on in the background, reading about Tamerlane.

No Met has ever thrown a no-hitter. I’m terrified that will change this year. Ed Wade is still in charge down in Houston, the Astros will probably be no hit a couple times this year. But he’ll probably also trade Roy Oswalt to the Phils for Travis D’Arnaud and a veteran middle reliever.

How many HRs would Sadaharu Oh have hit over here? 500? Fewer than that?
Matsui averaged a homer every 16.58 at bats in Japan, and one every 25.82 over here, for whatever that’s worth. I mean, you still have to factor in things like his natural decline with age. Bill James should tackle this, not me.

Actually, after looking, someone did. This guy says 527. I think that may be high, especially considering he would have started his career in the 60s, when pitchers were just steamrolling. But since this guy did math, I’ll defer to him.

Jimmy, top seven, stand up triple. 3-3, BB. ‘Merica. Stranded as Wright goes down swinging on a 55 foot pitch. If Al Qaeda had a flag (assuming they don’t) it would be blue and orange.

Joe thinks the US should bring in some minor league pitchers. I’m not here to disagree with him. I say we should have gotten Stephen Strasburg into this tournament, and just unleashed him. He’s clearly heads and shoulders above the competition he’s facing at SDSU, and I really want to see him. Triple digit velocity, he’s gonna tear shit up in the pros. Barring Mark Prior Dusty Baker stuff.

Bottom 8, runner on third, two out, ground ball in the hole to short, Jeter fields it, throws high and wide, runner safe, run scores, three run deficit. Now things are really falling apart, it’s 9-4, but most importantly, all Jeter’s fault. He’ll be leading of the top of the ninth.

And we’re back. Yu Darvish on the mound, Jeter at the plate. Yikes. 6-3. One out. Darvish has a weird delivery. Not Nomo weird, but there’s an interesting little hesitation there, or something. He’s young, too. I wonder how much the Yankees and Red Sox are gonna offer up as posting fees. Jimmy got another hit. 4 for 4. As Jon Miller said, “Jimmy Rollins has played like a World Fucking Champion tonight.” I may not have gotten that quote exactly right. Wright struck out though. That’s his third strikeout. KKK? I don’t think that David Wright has ever denied being a member. Something to consider. And Adam Dunn makes the last out, crushing American hopes. Where is baseball’s Mike Eruzione?

Finally, because I wrote it already, and I would hate for it to go to waste, here’s something I had to say about this whole Special Olympics thing: And now they want Obama to hire a Special Olympics athlete to work in the White House. Wasn’t eight years of Bush enough for them? Suck it, Jay Leno.

The 'Merican 'Mazins

2009-03-20T09:16:00.000-07:00

Since it seems as though this blog unabashedly favors the Phillies (and I've lost many hours of sleep attempting to find Mets stories to right this ship - - without success) I am jumping at the opportunity to post this tidbit about David Wright.

Basically, Wright played through what he thought was a broken toe (X-Rays ended up being negative) during the WBC game against Venezuela even though the game meant squat dick to team USAs overall success in the tourney.

Now, as a Met fan, am I pleased about this? Not fully. I'd rather him be healthy for a full season that matters. However, he says he would have played through this in the middle of the season, too. And he knew that the only healthy replacement on the bench was catcher Brian McCann.

So even if Wright loses a game or two from this display of manliness (and it doesn't look like he will) could I really be upset that he chose to represent help out our national team? Well considering I made apologies for Rey Ordonez and Luis Lopez after they both missed games from injuries that resulted from a fist fight on the team bus that broke out over a glove - - no, I can't fault David for loving 'Merica.

PS - How did we not have a 'Merica tag yet? For shame!

Sharpening the Saw

2009-03-17T13:03:00.000-07:00

I can’t imagine what it would be like to have lived before the Internet. Yeah, I was alive before it was really widespread, but it’s been around for most of my life. I just feel like people would know so much less without it. It makes so much knowledge so widely available, it’s really just an awesome thing. The Internet was throwing all sorts of things at me today, almost overwhelming the two hours I have between classes.

Weird things have been happening all over the place. First, Rome. Or en route to Africa. Whatever. The Pope said stuff here. He was right, then he was wrong. First he said, correctly, that simply distributing condoms in Africa wouldn’t fix the AIDS crisis over there. It would be a good place to start, but he’s right, it’s not some panacea, there will still be AIDS. But then the Pope said something that, had I not been accustomed to the crazy that spews from his mouth, would have made my head explode. He said that distributing condoms would make things worse. He didn’t say how this would happen, probably because the only rationale for such a crazy stance would be that Jesus would come down from heaven wearing a flaming suit of armor to duel a fourteen foot tall AIDS monster on the moon, but all the condoms in Africa would weaken him (they’re his kryptonite), and the AIDS monster would win. I think that’s the only way that distributing condoms would make AIDS a bigger problem.

Buried within that same article was another asinine statement from the Pope. Speaking about the global economic crisis, Benedict has called for international solidarity with Africa, but has no specific solutions. Maybe he could give some of the trillions of dollars that the Church has squirreled away in art and crap throughout Europe to poor people. Jesus told the tax collector to give all his possessions to the poor, remember it’s easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to get to Heaven, so maybe the Church, and I recognize that this is crazy, should do what Jesus was saying.

Shifting gears, the BBC has done some pretty sketchy research, and they’re saying that Cleopatra may have been at least part African. They came to this conclusion by looking at the remains of someone who may have been her sister Arsinoe. Of course, these bones could just as likely, if not more likely, belong to someone else entirely. But the skull that they’ve been looking at has a lot in common with Egyptians and Africans, instead of the Greeks from whom Cleopatra was originally thought to have been descended. There isn’t enough here to make me believe that Cleopatra was anything other than Greek. But it wouldn’t surprise me if this did turn out to be true. Cleopatra was the first Ptolemaic ruler of Egypt to actually know Egyptian, and a bunch of other languages as well, so it would be kinda cool if she were part African as well.

Ok, dinosaurs. I’m going to start with the less cool one to build things up. Researchers in Alberta have found a small dinosaur, the smallest carnivore in the United States, which is basically a miniature raptor. It’s less than two feet tall, with claws and teeth, and strikes me as being just a little ball of hatred. This is another dinosaur that I wish were still around, as there are all sorts of possibilities for amusement. First, of course, Michael Vick would probably own like 80 of these things. And it would be crazy to watch them fight. Maybe others could be domesticated, and people could have these little dinosaurs as pets. I just think that would be pretty cool.

But the much crazier find is some sort of giant sea monster that people have found in the arctic. Referred to as Predator X, a type of pliosaur, this thing must have been the apex predator of its time, pretty much just invincible under water, as long as it wasn’t fighting a Megalodon (and it wouldn’t because they lived in different areas). Predator X, as I’m going to keep referring to it, was fifty feet long, more than ten feet of which were devoted to its skull. And mouth. Hell, its teeth were each about a foot long. But the best part about it is its jaw strength. Predator X could snap its jaw shut with 33,000 psi of force. For the sake of comparison, the average PSI of an alligator, pretty much the modern gold standard, is 3,200 psi. Humans can muster about 150 psi, and lions and tigers can top 1,000 psi. Hell, scientists estimate that the average T Rex could only bite with around 8,000 psi. Predator X was just animalistic. It would still probably get wrecked by a Megalodon, but it still must have been a pretty cool animal

Thumbs 2: Thumb Harder

2009-03-13T06:00:00.000-07:00

Thumbs Up – The Netherlands. The Sidney Ponson-led baseball juggernaut knocked the Dominican Republic out of the World Baseball Classic, and managed to make Jose Reyes look like a bitch in the process. At least the choking was condensed to one game here, rather than the entire month of September.

Thumbs Down – Davey Johnson, manager of Team USA in the WBC. For some reason, Johnson keeps giving Derek Jeter playing time over Jimmy Rollins. This bothers me not only as a Phillies fan, but also as an American. Rollins is great defensively, Jeter can't go to his left. Jimmy can run, and hit for both power and average; Jeter is declining asa batter. Team USA is better with Rollins on the field.

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Thumbs Up- Spring Break. I teach for a living, and after any given week I'm ready for a week off. When I finally get that week off (as I will starting after school on Friday) it's heavenly. And this particular one is especially so as it features St. Paddy's day and the start of the NCAA Tourney. It doesn't get much better than that.

Thumbs Down- The week before Spring Break. Holy hell. If my kids are usually shit heads, then they are like shit heads on crack this week. This happens every time (the week before Christmas break was the longest week of my life)! I stood in disbelief while a 16 year-old stormed out of my classroom screaming "You got me fucked up!" because I told her to wait 5 minutes before I let her go to the bathroom. Aren't kids adorable?

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Thumbs Up – www.sporcle.com. Far and away one of the best ways to kill an afternoon on the internet. Sporcle caters to the quizmaster within us all, challenging its viewers to name all of the elements on the periodic table or World Series Champions in sequential order. The categories vary from Movies to Geography to History; there really is something for everyone. So sit down by yourself or with a group of your friends (like most things in life, Sporcle makes for an excellent drinking game) and try to name all of Batman’s nemeses. Just don’t let your teacher or your boss catch you.

Thumbs Down – Dunking. I know that dunking is one of the cornerstones of this great country of ours and that all Americans are entitled to life, liberty, and the pursuit of mad air, but there’s a time and a place for it. Stories of premature dunking and the heartbreak they cause are rampant this week. St. Mary's was down 2-0 before the tip off against Gonzaga after a technical foul for dunking in warm ups. Even worse is this story where Harlem’s boys basketball team travelled 168 miles just to forfeit a game after one of their players broke the backboard with a pregame dunk. The coach basically told his kids, “I know it’s against the rules, but everyone else is doing it so go crazy. What’s the worst that could happen?” Turns out the forfeit of a division game and a quick trip to the loser’s bracket is the worst that could happen. I hope you feel real smart.

Heads Up

2009-03-12T11:10:00.000-07:00

I just want to make sure everyone saw how the US - Venezuela game ended last night, specifically who got thrown out trying to steal second base in the ninth inning. Remember that until Friday, so I look like a fucking prophet.

The Church, and idiocy

2009-03-12T09:25:00.000-07:00

Kang: Abortions for all!
Crowd boos.
Kang: Very well… no abortions for anyone!
Crowd boos.
Kang: Hmm… abortions for some, miniature American flags for others!
Crowd cheers
- Treehouse of Horror VII

Yeah, going there again. I really don’t understand the thought process that goes into a lot of the decisions the Catholic Church makes. It’s like they decide what the logical course of action would be, and then go in the opposite direction. Seriously, how do things like this keep happening?

First, there’s a pretty sad case coming from Brazil. A nine year old girl was raped by her stepfather, became pregnant with twins, and had an abortion. Abortion is illegal in Brazil except in cases like rape or when the mother’s life is in danger. Both of these exceptions are present in this case. Any guesses who the Church excommunicated?

Most people, I imagine, would guess that the rapist step-father was the one kicked out of the Church. However, as Rome has reiterated many times over the last couple decades, raping children really isn’t that big a deal. The stepfather gets to stay in the Church, and, if he takes Holy Orders, may end up presiding over an Arch Diocese somewhere.

No, rather than side with logic and compassion, the Church instead decided to excommunicate the doctors who performed the operation, and the girl’s mother. What the fuck? Does anyone think that this is a good idea? Brazil is one of the most fiercely anti-abortion countries in the world, but even most Brazilians are appalled by the Church’s actions here. Nothing about the Church’s decision makes sense.

Seriously, can’t we just calm down about abortion. It’s a legitimate medical procedure, and if you think it’s wrong you don’t have to get one. Over two hundred thousand woman are treated in Brazilian hospitals for problems spawned by illegal abortions every year. I doubt that anyone has any idea how many illegal abortions go unreported. This is obscenely dangerous; when one out of every three pregnancies is unwanted, people are going to be having abortions. It’s the government’s responsibility to offer a safer alternative to a wire hanger in a Sao Paolo alley.

Barack Obama is also catching shit from the Catholic Church, this time over his decision to fund stem cell research. The Church says he’s just doing this to help drug companies, because I guess there’s no way that being able to regenerate cells would help anyone ever. The Church says that Obama is choosing politics over ethics, which I guess is one way to look at this, albeit a retarded way. I feel like this is something that the Church is going to apologize for opposing in like six hundred years, after some hellbound scientists have cured Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, and most spinal cord injuries.

I’m going to give Jon the last word on this Church stuff:

"I'm tired of all this from-down-on-high bull, I don't really understand the people who get to make these rules up. It doesn't make any sense that they should be able to decide the fate of someone's soul, based on an interpretation of a translation of a translation of a collection of passages from a series of possibly unrelated documents passed down through generations that were supposedly written via the influence of an invisible spirit. Honestly, I think Church doctrine has been interpreted more often and far more loosely than our own Constitution, and the conservatives all applaud their 'hard lines' on dogma when it's pretty plain that it’s being manipulated for the hierarchy's benefit."

You know who's a dick?

2009-03-10T11:45:00.000-07:00

Robert Mugabe, President of Zimbabwe. Yeah, bold statement, isn’t it? But seriously, he’s a douchebag. Look at some of the things he’s done: he’s redistributed land, leaving his country starving, he’s completely killed the value of the Zimbabwe dollar, he’s stayed in power for over twenty years through all sorts of questionable methods, and he’s just not a good ruler. And then last week he may have been involved in arraigning an assassination attempt on his Prime Minister, who is also the leader of the opposition party (and who actually beat Mugabe in a Presidential election last year). The Prime Minister, whose wife died in the attack, has said that it was just an accident, and there was nothing sinister about it. Meh, he probably has to say that just to stay alive.

Anyway, the funeral for the wife, Susan Tsvangirai, was today. And Mugabe went! Not only did he go, but he spoke there! What the hell? Come on, if there’s a cloud of suspicion hanging over you, stay the fuck away. Of course, Mugabe used this platform to say it wasn’t his fault, calling the accident “the hand of God.” That’s bullshit. Seriously, I don’t understand how Mugabe has been able to get away with being an asshole for so long. Look at Guinea-Bissau, leaders are getting killed in Africa all the time. How has no one put a bullet in his head yet?

Unrelated, but here’s something else that bothers me. When you look at something that lists all the US Presidents in the same place, and has a picture of them, the same picture is used for Grover Cleveland for his no-consecutive terms. I think that he should get different pictures. He had to have looked different, Obama is aging pretty dramatically already, so let’s represent his Presidencies with different pictures. He deserves it.

Oh man, it's almost time for baseball

2009-03-09T11:09:00.000-07:00

Seriously everyone, baseball starts soon. Real baseball, not the WBC, not grapefruit and cactus leagues, not A-Rod or Clemens or McNamee, the good kind of baseball. Baseball is really cool, and has been for more than a century. During that time people have been saying cool things about baseball. I’ve put together a list of my 26 favorite non-Yogi Berra quotes. Why 26? If you’re reading this you already know the answer to that.

26. The whole history of baseball has the quality of mythology – Bernard Malamud

25. Bob Gibson is the luckiest pitcher in baseball. He is always pitching when the other team doesn’t score any runs. – Tim McCarver, back before he became unbearable

24. The screwball's an unnatural pitch. Nature never intended a man to turn his hand like that throwing rocks at a bear. – Carl Hubbell. This quote is doubly important, because it underscores the threat that bears represent.

23. He (Darryl Strawberry) is not a dog; a dog is loyal and runs after balls. – Tommy Lasorda. Fuck the Mets. All of them, ever, except for Tug and the Dude. But yeah, fuck the rest of them.

22. No matter what I talk about, I always get back to baseball. – Connie Mack. Yeah, me too.

21. Some of these guys wear beards to make them look intimidating, but they don't look so tough when they have to deliver the ball. Their abilities and their attitudes don't back up their beards. – Don Drysdale. The last sentence there just seemed absurd.

20. Every day is a new opportunity. You can build on yesterday's success or put its failures behind and start over again. That's the way life is, with a new game every day, and that's the way baseball is. – Bob Feller. Kinda uplifting.

19. When I began playing the game, baseball was about as gentlemanly as a kick in the crotch. – Ty Cobb. How angry would Ty Cobb have been if he had played in the 80s and was just snorting mountains of coke all the time?

18. It's such a beautiful sport, with no politics involved, no color, no class. Only as a youngster can you play and as a pro can you win. The game has kept me young, involved and excited and for me to be up here with gems of baseball – Jack Buck. So much better than Joe Buck.

17. Washington – first in war, first in peace, last in the American League. – Charles Dryden. Classic.

16. If they worked as hard at their jobs as I do at mine, this country wouldn’t have the inflation problem it has now. - Mike Marshall, on booing fans.

15. I like radio better than television because if you make a mistake on radio, they don't know. You can make up anything on the radio. – Phil Rizzuto. He was a cool guy.

14. The kid doesn't chew tobacco, smoke, drink, curse or chase broads. I don't see how he can possible make it. – Richie Ashburn. Also a cool guy.

13. People ask me what I do in winter when there's no baseball. I'll tell you what I do. I stare out the window and wait for spring. ~Rogers Hornsby. Also, he tries to make Tom Hanks cry.

12. I think I was the best baseball player I ever saw. – Willie Mays. I love the ego here. I also love that it’s probably true.

11. Anybody who's ever had the privilege of seeing me play knows that I am the greatest pitcher in the world. – Dizzy Dean. Again, pure ego. Less true though, unless he said this in 1934, cause that year he probably was the best pitcher in the world. Except for Satchell Paige.

10. Since 1946, the Cubs have had two problems: They put too few runs on the scoreboard and the other guys put too many. So what is new management improving? The scoreboard. – George Will. I don’t care if it makes me a bad person, I love that the Cubs have sucked for so long.

9. Baseball becomes dull only to those with dull minds. Today’s game is always different from yesterday’s game. – Red Smith. Seriously, baseball is so cool.

8. Ninety percent I’ll probably spend on good times, women, and Irish whiskey. The other ten percent I’ll probably waste. – Tug McGraw. Yeah.

7. I remember one time going out to the mound to talk with Bob Gibson. He told me to get back behind the batter, that the only thing I knew about pitching was it was hard to hit. – Tim McCarver. I love Tim McCarver being put in his place.

6. Sure, I screwed up that sacrifice bunt, but look at it this way: I’m a better bunter than a billion Chinese. Those poor suckers can’t bunt at all. – John Lowenstein. But seriously, if you’re in the majors you need to be able to bunt. Come on.

5. In the end it all comes down to talent. You can talk all you want about intangibles, I just don't know what that means. Talent makes winners, not intangibles. Can nice guys win? Sure, nice guys can win - if they're nice guys with a lot of talent. Nice guys with a little talent finish fourth and nice guys with no talent finish last. – Sandy Koufax. But what about David Eckstein?

4. It is the sport that a foreigner is least likely to take to. You have to grow up playing it, you have to accept the lore of the bubble-gum card, and believe that if the answer to the Mays-Snider-Mantle question is found, then the universe will be a simpler and more ordered place. – David Halberstam. ‘Merica.

3. He was thrown out trying to steal second; his head was full of larceny but his feet were honest. - Arthur “Bugs” Baer. I just love this one. It makes me laugh every time I see or hear it.

2. You always get a special kick on opening day, no matter how many you go through. You look forward to it like a birthday party when you're a kid. You think something wonderful is going to happen. – Joe DiMaggio. I can’t wait.

1. Yeah:

Sounds like someone has a case of the Mondays

2009-03-09T08:25:00.000-07:00

I really don’t like Twitter. I find nothing worthwhile in the idea, and believe that it is killing America. It also gives me headaches, especially when things like this become an issue. Because of Twitter users whining, pronouns are becoming an issue again. This shouldn’t be happening.

CNN gives the sentence “Everyone loves his mother,” and then goes into all sorts of things that people are trying to say instead of “his.” “His” is correct. “Her” would also be correct, and it doesn’t bother me at all if you use it. If you say “their” I’m going to lose respect for you. If you say “his or her” I won’t be able to take you seriously. And if you say “ip,” I won’t show you the courtesy of finishing the conversation; I’m going to have to be as far away as possible, because the profanity is going to be coming. Just choose one, his or her, and stick with it. No one whose opinion matters is going to think you’re a misogynist for saying “his;” instead, they’ll understand that you speak English well. We’ve managed to get through centuries without a pandering gender-neutral pronoun, and Twitter is no reason to change.

It’s a good thing that the world is in such good shape right now; our economic success is permitting the Illinois State Senate to tackle important issues, like Pluto’s classification within our solar system. A couple years ago people who have spent their entire lives in Astronomy decided that Pluto was not a planet, but rather had more in common with other dwarf planets in the Kuiper Belt, and should thusly be considered. And as much as elementary school mobiles would disagree, they were right. Pluto doesn’t revolve around the sun on the same plane as the other planets, and crosses Neptune’s orbit. It’s not very big, and is actually smaller than Eris, another dwarf planet. There’s really no good reason to consider Pluto a planet other than nostalgia. But the Illinois Senate isn’t going to put up with scientists’ nonsense, Pluto is going to be a planet because they want it to be, to hell with everyone else. Whatever, fuck them, I can’t really get as mad as I would like when politicians do dumb things anymore.

Since I’ve been writing about things that are dumb and things that make me mad, I feel like I need to close this by tying everything together, and write about something that’s both of these things. Or someone. Ok, Joe the Plumber. This is a little bit old, but it still bothers me. Joe is suing people. Putting aside my certainty that at some point in the last five years Joe has bitched about frivolous lawsuits and other right wing talking points, Joe is suing officials in the Ohio government for searching through databases for information about him after his dumb ass was made famous during John McCain’s desperate attempt not to seem out of touch with ‘Merica. Joe says he can’t plumb (that can’t be the right verb) because Democrats might say he did a shitty job just because he’s a Neanderthal. Er, a Republican. Now, it’s probably more likely that they would say he did a shitty job because he doesn’t so much have a plumbing license, but that seems to be irrelevant to Mr. Wurzelbacher. And as much as he sucks, his last name is fun to say. Not that that’s relevant. But yeah, so Joe is suing, claiming harassment and emotional damages and all sorts of other nonsense, and he may win, but really everyone is going to lose, because he’s found a way to stay in the public spotlight for just a little bit longer.

Where have you gone, Ken Tremendous?

2009-03-08T16:08:00.000-07:00

Baseball is back. It’s happening right now, and I couldn’t be happier about it. Hell, it’s not even real baseball, it’s this World Baseball Classic nonsense, but I don’t care. Seriously, it’s baseball. Of course, baseball brings its own baggage with it. Yeah, there are steroid stories and crap, but I don’t care about any of that. It doesn’t bother me. What really annoys me is that now that baseball is back, the idiots who get paid to talk about it are back too.

I was watching the Dominican Republic thwomp Panama Sunday, despite Carlos Ruiz’ best efforts, when I was ambushed by Steve Phillips. Yep, the Steve Phillips that ESPN thinks is going to save Sunday Night Baseball from Joe Morgan (he won’t. If Jon Miller can’t make up for Joe Morgan, I doubt anyone can. Maybe not even Harry Kalas. And poor Jon Miller, what did he do to deserve both Morgan and Phillips in the booth with him?). He came out of nowhere, and really bothered me for like an inning and a half. But I quickly got back into regular season shape, and before I knew it I wasn’t hearing him anymore. It was glorious. And then Gary Thorne struck! I normally don’t have a problem with Gary Thorne, and I’m not positive that it was him; it may have been just one of those ubiquitous voices that they seem to grow in Bristol. Whatever. On to what he said.

Panama was up in the top of the sixth, down 5 to 0, one out. At the plate was Julio Zuleta, whom I’ve never heard of, but the announcers were hyping him as a pretty powerful hitter. After Zuleta hit a pretty deep foul ball, Thorne said, “Right now Panama needs some base runners. A long ball with nobody on isn’t really going to do anything for them.” Or something like that. What the hell? You know what a home run does for them? It gives them a fucking run. What does a walk or a single do? Yeah, it puts a guy on base, which would have been nullified when the next batter grounded out to Tejada, which could have been an easy 5-4-3 double play. It’s not bad to put a run on the board; a home run is pretty much always preferable to a single. Yeah, this has been done pretty much to death. But seriously, people, even Tim McCarver is coming around to understanding this. Scoring runs is better than not scoring runs.

Thumbs: The Beginning

2009-03-06T07:02:00.000-08:00

Thumbs Up – Thumbs. It’s such a good concept when done right. Basically all that’s required is a short paragraph explaining why something is awesome or something sucks. Most of the time I struggle to write more than a paragraph about something, so this is pretty much the perfect format for me.

Thumbs Down – Loyola Greyhound’s execution of Thumbs. Freshman year of college, Thumbs was one of the biggest drawing points of the Greyhound, usually read right after the police blotter. In the years since, it has gone drastically downhill. Anonymity of the writers, vapid subjects, and moral crusading have all contributed to Thumbs’ position as just another article to be ignored. I think we can do it better here.

Thumbs Up – Michael Cera. Talks have again picked up about an Arrested Development movie after Michael Cera has finally signed on, presumably having been reminded of what made him famous and where his bread was buttered in the first place. There's no way that this movie could possibly be a bad idea.

Thumbs Down – John Hodgman. Dude lambasted the word "meh" on Twitter (bonus thumbs down to twitter which need not be elaborated upon) saying it was "the essence of blinkered Internet malcontentism. And a rejection of joy." And what do I have to say about John Hodgman waxing etymologic? Meh.

Thumbs Up – Snow in March. Our West Coast readers (Hah!) might not appreciate this one, but I can’t think of a better way to start a month than with a snow day, a rare occasion after graduation. I’ll take a morning of shoveling over eight hours in a cubicle any day.

Thumbs Down – Comedy Central’s Roast of Larry the Cable Guy. Remember when you had to be a respected and successful comedian over the course of a lifetime to deserve the honor of a roasting by your peers? You do? Would you please write a letter to Comedy Central then? Roasts have consistently gone downhill since the transformation from “The Friars Club Roast…” to “The Comedy Central Roast…” Jerry Stiller deserves a roast. One could even make an argument for Jeff Foxworthy, but Larry the Cable Guy’s only claim to fame is an appeal to a niche audience of rednecks and stupid people and a couple of wretched movies.

Italians start making moves; not related, but Earth almost gets fucked

2009-03-04T14:20:00.000-08:00

Oh, science. Apparently, the Italians have realized that I’ve been right all along, and that scientists weren’t doing enough cool things. Most of them seem to have shrugged off my scorn and went back to conjuring up tiramisu recipes, or whatever they do over there, but one guy stepped up. Ok, maybe I had nothing to do with this, cause he started being awesome years ago, but the story is out now. Anyway.

Severino Antinori, a crazy motherfucker, is now claiming that he helped bring three cloned children into the world. According to him, and no one else, Antinori took cells from three sterile men and, using the process of nuclear transfer, impregnated some women. He says that there are now three children, two boys and a girl, who are each nine years old, healthy, and living in Eastern Europe.

This is pretty awesome, but also cause for concern. No, I’m not talking about the ethical implications of cloning; those really don’t bother me. Instead, I want to know why this guy was able to clone people almost ten years ago, but the last time other scientists tried to clone something, that Ibex, it didn’t even last an hour. This guy needs to help other scientists out so that everyone can be on the same level. He can bring so much more awesomeness into the world.

Alright, so try not to freak out, but a fucking asteroid passed within 38,000 miles of earth. That’s like a fifth of the distance between earth and the moon. It’s barely twice as far from earth as our communication satellites are. It could have been a disaster. Why the hell didn’t we hear about it until after the asteroid had passed?

Ok, so the asteroid was only about forty yards wide; rather than killing everyone off, it would have just messed a lot of stuff up. But seriously, why wasn’t there any sort of warning? People had to have known that this was coming. What the hell?

Bill Donohue Should Have Been Aborted

2009-03-02T14:38:00.000-08:00

President Obama has nominated Kathleen Sebelius, the Governor of Kansas, to fill the role of Secretary of Health and Human Services. She seems to be a brilliant woman and an excellent governor, and, provided that she’s done nothing to draw the IRS’s ire, you would think she would sail through the confirmation process. But anti-abortion people are getting pissy about it.

I’m going to get my biases right out in the open out front: I don’t like the pro-life movement. I think that, for the most part, they’re insufferable, hypocritical assholes. The headmaster where I went to middle school and high school, Father Shea, was one of the worst of this type of person. He was staunchly pro-life, and did his absolute best to indoctrinate each of the students. Every January he would organize a trip to the Pro-Life March in DC, and he would basically bribe students to go. He chartered coach busses and gave plenty of free time in DC after the march; it was basically a day off school. He would even cancel school that day if more than half the student body would go, adding an element of peer pressure. He would do all of this just to swell the numbers at this rally. But seriously, what the hell does a sixth grader know about abortion? At no point in the 7 years I went to his school was the other side of the issue presented at all. It was all just shameless brainwashing. And how can people, like President Bush, claim to be pro-life, yet have no problem sending people to be executed? It just doesn’t make sense to me. And the rationales behind it, all that nonsense about souls and things, it’s just terribly inconsistent with the First Amendment. In fact, the more I think about it, the more certain I am that these people hate America. If you personally think abortion is wrong, that’s fine, and I have no problem with it. But shut the fuck up, and stop trying to legislate it away. I’ve never heard a good reason for outlawing abortion that was independent of religious beliefs, and I probably never will.

Anyway, these anti-abortion people are giving a lot of shit to Sebelius in this confirmation process. Bill Donohue, president of the Catholic League, called her an “enemy of the unborn.” Putting aside how cool a title that is, incendiary rhetoric doesn’t really serve a purpose. Does Donohue have any statistics to back up his argument? If he did, I doubt I would have this bad a headache. Rather than point to any sort of empirical study, Donohue says that Sebelius has been criticized by the last three archbishops of Kansas City. So what? Honestly, if a Catholic politician hasn’t gotten shit from the Church he probably hasn’t been doing a very good job in office. And the archbishop of Kansas City? How many little boys do you need to molest before being put in charge of such an off the beaten track dioceses? Probably between four and nine; double digits and they just give you a posting to the Vatican.

More rational Catholics, notably Catholics United, were quick to shed light on one of the pro-life movement’s biggest foes, the truth. First, they pointed out that Sebelius is on record saying that she personally opposes abortion. Then they point out that Sebelius has lowered abortion rates in her state, offering incentives for adoption and offering more care for pregnant women. Anti-abortion crusaders point out that Sebelius vetoed a bill that would tighten restrictions on abortions. I guess they weren’t really concerned by its unconstitutionality and the dangers it posed to women’s lives. I guess they think the world would be a better place if abortion were a crime performed by hobos charging half a sandwich and a bottle of malt liquor in alleys with rusty wire hangers.

Whatever. People are going to get all up in arms about this, it’s not going to do any good, Sebelius will be confirmed, and we can all forget about it until Obama makes his first Supreme Court appointment. Maybe during the interim we can go back to actually respecting the Constitution.