More Broken Campaign Pledges: Obama Adminstration Continues Lies and Deceptions

No Laughing Matter -- Corrupt to the Core

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Question anything about how the Obama administration conducts itself, and be ready for the barrage of their pompous, overblown incredulous response. One has to wonder how they could spin what we report here.

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Just how much do President Obama and his sidekicks take us for suckers when we see something like a multimillion dollar consulting and training contract for the State Department being awarded to one of his wealthiest campaign contributors?

For a candidate who claimed his administration would be open and honest, ethical to the highest degree and not engage in no-bid contracting, how can anyone justify the $24.6 million contract awarded on the behalf of the US Agency for International Development to Checchi and Company Consulting, a company operated by Democratic Party financier, Vincent Checchi. The deal was to train judges and lawyers in Afghanistan to help the embattled country establish and strengthen the rule of law.

A top State Department Official, Assistant Secretary P.J. Crowley acknowledged difficulties with the transaction awarded on January 4 and has since been terminated because of the circumstances under which it was awarded.

Fox News reported this situation on January 25. Crowley insists that the abrupt termination had nothing to do with the Fox News exposure.

Once again, the Obama administration stands behaving in total contrast to the pledges to act differently on the campaign trail to end “no bid and cost-plus contracts” while taking shots at the Bush Administration for some of its transactions necessitated by battlefield necessities in warfare where specialized niche contractors had the resources to send human resources directly in harm’s way.

As always, to accurately assess Obama Administration activities, we must consider what they do and measure it against what they say. While spewing lofty goals of what they perceive as noble expectations, their true identity is that of a corrupt machine driven political machine that has been honed and perfected in Chicago politics for decades.

We must assume therefore, when the administration asserts high-minded purposes or that they are cleaning up the house shedding sunshine on the business at hand, their record so far shows they are almost certainly lying.

Fox News Coverage on this story: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010/01/31/state-department-admits-bid-contract-violates-obama-campaign-pledges/

Keith Richards Sober???

In almost stark contrast to “is nothing scared” the fellow who joked he snorted his father’s ashes mixed with “blow” and many have joked would be the only survivor besides cock roaches in the event of a nuclear holocaust, Keith Richards announced his has gone on the wagon. No he’s not being towed by “Wild Horses,” cruising in a “Black Limousine,” nor riding a “Silver Train,” ol’ Keef is off the sauce, tea totaling, desert-dry.

Always the personification of the worst excesses of the rock ‘n roll lifestyle, back in the late 70’s after a heroin bust in Toronto, his career and the tenure of the Rolling Stones as the world’s greatest rock ‘n roll band appeared to be over. He kicked the smack, but the other vices apparently remained in tact for decades. However, when Richards accounts for his home life, his exploits are much more down-to-earth than most of his fans would ever imagine including listening to Mozart in the morning and at times wondering what kind of crap his kids are listening to.

For a more complete accounting of Keith’s great spiritual leap, consult the following story from The London Guardian.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/musicblog/2010/jan/26/sober-keith-richards

We wish Keith Richards well and hope to be hearing the strums of Micawber, he trusty old worn Fender Telecaster in the near future.

Obama Ends American Manned Space Flight: WHERE'S THE OUTRAGE???

Ares Rocket, our next manned space effort shot down

by short-sighted and ignorant Obama administration.

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Do we need evidence that the term “progressive” is an oxymoron?

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Consider the Obama administration’s decision to put an end to US manned space flight by not funding Project Constellation and the Ares rocket.

The Space Shuttle program ends this year with its final missions to supply the International Space Station. For the foreseeable future, the station will be manned and supplied by the Russian and European Space Agencies effectively diminishing America’s lead in the space program despite its roll in the design and construction of the station.

With future missions being sacked, our country has surrendered to a disgraceful form of technological isolationism that will have serious consequences both short term and long term. How sad it is that we have lost our vision to “boldly go where no one has gone before.”

Back in the 1960’s as the United States landed on the moon sending six missions to the moon from July, 1969 to December, 1972. Further missions were planned with at least three being scrubbed due to supposed budget concerns. Social activists, environmentalists, ultra-conservatives, and other constituencies decried the county’s effort to excel in space exploration. It became a Liberal outcry, “How can we spend millions on putting men on the moon when we have so many problems on earth?” Of course there is a substantial percentage of mindless idiots who believe Project Apollo never happened. It was a government conspiracy to stage something that looked like a moon landing to scare the Soviet Union.

Well, boo (you-know-what) hoo!!!!!

Even at the peak of deployment, NASA consumed a relatively small percentage of the Federal budget while its comparative benefits were enormous. Whether its camcorders, personal computers, or MRI technology, all these use technology that was developed for manned space flight. While we are not manufacturing consumer products in space, dealing with the challenges of life outside the surly bonds of earth provide benefits large and small at every turn.

It’s hard to imagine it has been over 37 years since the last astronaut walked on the moon. Most of America’s population wasn’t even born. Even the most pragmatic space scientist must admit, there is little inspiring about the Space Shuttle program and given the horrible fates of the Challenger which exploded after launch and the Columbia which disintegrated on reentry, that tragic loss of human life makes the nobility of the space program seem that much more hard to grasp.

Yet thinking back to John F. Kennedy’s vision when committing to lunar landing by the end of the 1960’s decade, he noted:

“We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too.”

Kennedy’s vision is a valid today as it was almost half a century ago. When we gathered to watch the first steps on the moon on the July evening of 1969, looking ahead to the future surely we would have thought man would have ventured to Mars by the turn of the century and that space flight would be an every day occurrence by now. And it all could have been if we maintained the commitment, but now in 2010, we are leaps and bounds behind the eight ball even to master the requirements just to return to the moon.

The more we understand about the Universe, the more we understand about our earth and ourselves. At some point in the future, the sun will explode and the planet Earth will be gone. If our species or whatever we evolve into is to survive, we must find out destiny out in the stars. It is almost imprinted in our DNA that will be a challenge we will accept.

From the time the earliest humans ventured out of Africa to all the continents of the world, it has been part of the human spirit to reach out, explore, to learn how to survive in strange and harsh environments, to find new ways to do things, to invent new tools of survival, and to enrich our collective knowledge.

In one arbitrary and idiotic decision, Barack Obama has slammed the door on a vital part of humanity’s advancement. Shame on him and all those who share that kind of regressive thinking. It will cost us dearly sooner than we can imagine.

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Toyota: Trouble on Top of the Heap

What happened to Toyota? The world class brand name synonymous with quality is in the midst of an unprecedented recall which has forced the automaker to cease production and suspend sale of some of its most popular models including the bestselling Camry. Two problems contribute to the accelerator getting stuck leading to horrific accidents for drivers who aren’t skillful enough to know how to bring their vehicles under control.

Does this sound familiar? In the 1960’s, it was Chevrolet’s once popular, Corvair, that was assailed by Ralph Nader for its gas tank directly in front of the driver as documented by Nader’s book, Unsafe at any Speed, a work that essentially launched the consumerist movement.

The 1970’s were ridiculed with quality and safety issues from Detroit automakers. The move to subcompacts lead to substandard automobiles including the Chevy Vega which would screw up at any speed and the Ford Pinto that had a bad habit of exploding when rear-ended due to its faulty gas tank design. The 80’s had exploding Chevy pickups whose problems were exaggerated by NBC production teams who added explosives to exaggerate the problem for their primetime news magazine program. In the 1990’s, Firestone tires on the popular Ford Explorer failed causing horrible wrecks. Detroit’s quality was so poor in the 1980’s, one would think maybe someone had forgotten about him or her as a car owner if that person's car weren’t recalled.

All this and other issues set the stage for the rise of Toyota as an upstart in the market in the early 1970’s to total industry dominance in the 1990’s to where they are the world’s best selling brand worldwide and sell the many of the most popular passenger cars in America.

With Detroit on the ropes with only Ford Motor Company not requiring taxpayer bailouts, General Motors and Chrysler fighting for survival, suddenly, the seemingly unphased Toyota, the king of the hill, is recalling its vehicles by the millions. A proper fix is in the works by supposedly week’s end.

How could this happen? Is this what happens when a company finds itself on top of the heap? Smugness and complacency sets in and standards become weaker. Design engineers and a car’s specifications become not as exact and less scrutiny is directed at outsourced suppliers. As General Motors and its Detroit brethren experienced in the 1980’s, so goes Toyota in the new millennium or so it would seem on this occasion.

Now that Toyota has come to terms with the problem, the real measure of the company will be how it responds. Do they fully accept responsibility, fix the problem, and not try to divert blame elsewhere or do they weasel around a total fix? Will they examine their systems, inspect their product designs, and make sure such a problem can never happen again?

Toyota will not come through this undamaged. Just the short disruption in sales will send some buyers elsewhere in the short term, and those who own vehicles, perhaps loyal Toyota owners, thinking about what they had at stake and the extent to which they were subjected to danger might look at other makes when it’s time for their next car purchase.

There’s no question Ford Motor Company has reengineered its company with quality cars ready for sale. To have won Motor Trend’s award for the best car and truck in the same year is noteworthy. The Ford Fusion is right there with the Toyota Prius as a major full production hybrid. General Motors, in absolute tatters a year ago, appears to have Chevrolet turning the corner with attractive new cars including a replacement for the plain-Jane Cobalt with a new Cruise coming to showrooms in the third quarter of the year. The jury’s still out with Chrysler as new vehicles are not replacing the ones the public found so unappealing to begin with. However, regardless of which of the old big three a driver prefers, once again, young men with horsepower on their minds can contemplate Mustang versus Camaro versus Challenger. Alas, Pontiac and its Firebirds are gone as are Plymouths and their Barracudas. However, the pony cars of today have much the same appeal for today’s youth that their fathers and grandfathers had back in the 60’s. And who’s missing in the pony car competition? Toyota!

Toyota faces tough challenges to right its ship and maintain its leadership in the world auto industry. Whether it is Detroit's attempt to recapture its former glory or new entriers into the auto industry with an ever stronger Korean presence and now even India becoming a player, they must deal with their current difficultly proactively and honestly. They need look no further than the Pontiac and Saturn dealers that are in the process of closing up shop to see what happens when #1 takes its lead for granted.

How Bad Are Things Going for Obama? ...Ask Obama Girl

Remember her? That's the Obama Girl. She's the gal who did that cutesy "I've Got a Crush on Obama" video that helped court the MTV generation's fancy to the Obama campaign.

Two years later and how things have changed. Amber Lee Ettinger has now appeared on both Sean Hannity's and Mike Huckabee's television programs announcing she's had some serious second thoughts about the President who was once the object of her affection.

As goes the Obama girl, so goes America, eh?

Our Take on Obama's State of the Union Address: Lies and Finger-Pointing

The equipment shown above along with the teleprompter

are essential support for any Barack Obama presentation.

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Barack Obama: State of the Union, an Exercise in Sanctimonious Indignation

Words cannot adequately express just how shocking Barack Obama’s first State of the Union address proved to be. In tone, attitude, and content, his speech was a horrible failure, a horrible reflection on the Presidency, and a presentation of intense dishonesty that goes far beyond any conventional notion of “spin.”

The message condensed from a rambling, bloviating pompous parade of verbosity to a more digestible morsel, is that the President clearly wants the world to know that he is dead on right about any issue he chooses to discuss, and that any initiative he has supported that is still pending or is not working are attributed to dastardly audacity on the part of which ever special interest he chooses to finger while often being disingenuously proclaiming his administration is above such interest peddling.

Look, we’re going to tell it to our readers straight in harsh terms the conventional media won’t, Barack Obama is a compulsive serial liar. His speech was full of lies. His own reason for being is based on big lies. Is Obama so tone-death that he only reads and hears what he wants to or does he think the public is too lethargic and disinterested that they won’t find out the extent to which he misrepresents the truth?

When a politician bases his approach on emotion which leads to a distorted idealistic view of the world that in his case is colored by an insanely egotistic point of view, reality is the first casualty and pragmatism is beyond his ability.


Start with his claim 2,000,000 people working who wouldn’t be thanks to the “Recovery Act” or “Stimulus.” There is absolutely NO data supporting that claim what-so-ever. He insisted the Stimulus was needed to keep unemploymenet under 8% and now it's over 10%. Call this lesson one in Obama-nomics.


The President would normally act respectful and deferential toward the Supreme Court in a formal setting like the State of the Union address, but shamefully, not only did President Obama take on the Supreme Court, his comments were quite simply bold faced lies when he said:

Last week, the Supreme Court reversed a century of law to open the floodgates for special interests — including foreign corporations — to spend without limit in our elections. Well, I don't think American elections should be bankrolled by America's most powerful interests, or worse, by foreign entities. They should be decided by the American people, and that's why I'm urging Democrats and Republicans to pass a bill that helps to right this wrong.

While making those remarks the camera caught Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alioto voicing to himself, “that is wrong.” For which the media savaged the Supreme Court Justice as if he had a “Joe Wilson” moment, like the South Carolina Congressman who yelled “liar” during a Presidential speech when the President did in fact lie. Justice Alioto was not addressing anyone and further was correct in his assertion since the majority opinion written by Justice John Paul Stevens, a moderate or swing justice, specifically asserted that their opinion would not in any way grant foreign companies any ability to contribute to elections. Among other things, Justice Stevens noted,

…we have never cast doubt on laws that place special restrictions on campaign spending by foreign nationals.

One has to wonder what would motivate the President to so obviously lie about a very important court decision. Was he ignorant about the details and did not review the contents of the decision in essence just hearing what he wanted to hear? Did the President clearly understand his comment was false and think he could convince a gullible public to believe his lie. Either way, the implications are extremely disturbing.

Once again, President Obama fingered lobbyists and special interests suggesting their influence is far too powerful and widespread but his administration alone has set such a fine example of keeping their influence away from the White House.

The President asserted:
To close that credibility gap we must take action on both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue to end the outsized influence of lobbyists; to do our work openly and to give our people the government they deserve.

That's what I came to Washington to do. That's why — for the first time in history — my administration posts our White House visitors online. And that's why we've excluded lobbyists from policymaking jobs or seats on federal boards and commissions.

If the Obama administration is so free of lobbyists, then why did SEIU President, Andy Stern visit the White House so frequently?

How then does Barack Obama justify his participation in closed meetings working on details of the Senate Health Care Bill with labor union officials that resulted in favorable provisions giving union members special consideration not given others with their health care benefits?

When examining both who works for his administration and who shows up for visits, his language runs shallow. Perhaps they are only considered lobbyists or special interests if their points of view run contrary to the Obama radical agenda.

Through out the speech Obama trumpeted his virtues, his attempts to govern openly, to fight special interests, to eliminate earmarks, and to freeze spending as of 2011. Somehow his words just don’t meet his behavior when the big money deals that have crossed his desk have so dramatically increased spending and what good is freeze after so many agencies have seen their budgets skyrocket. Why have there been over 300 lawsuits for public disclosure of records in just one year far more than any other President?

While basking in the glow of his own self-flattery the general tone of the speech was one of accusation and criticism of not just lobbyists and special interests, some of his harshest finger-pointing was directed at the Republican party accusing them as is the current Democrat drum beat of only seeking to negate not offer any ideas of their own. Of course, we’re well aware that Republicans have plenty of ideas worthy of consideration such as allowing health insurance to be purchased across state lines and promoting health savings accounts while finding private sector, less complicated means of improving access to quality care without government control.

Surely, the Obama “State of the Union” address should come as no surprise to anyone who has followed his political career. That it was a work of intense self-glorification and fault-finding in anyone who has shown the slightest resistance to his every suggestion is classic Obama. That he has made bold claims not supported by his actions is exactly what we’ve come to expect from the President who campaigned again and again that health care legislation would be negotiated openly and broadcast on CSPAN and proposed all bills would be posted on the Internet for public reaction before signing, but participated in closed door, Democrats only, health care deliberations and demanded immediate passage of extremely expensive legislation with short deadlines where we were shocked to find even the most prudent representatives on Capitol Hill would not have time to read the bills before voting them on to the President for his signature.

The State of the Union is a presentation given on a world stage. Foreign Policy concerns were all but absent and more critically so were considerations about waging an all-out fight to defeat terrorism and prevail in our conflicts worldwide. In his shameful short remarks on national security, his first impulse was to scold those who have attempted to escalate the need for more attention on the War on Terror calling them “schoolyard taunts.” Then while selling his approach to fighting terrorism, how quickly he mentions “WE have prohibited torture…”

We have prohibited torture! Enough already. This is some of the most disturbing of the rhetoric implicitly directed at the past administration suggesting that the Bush administration sanctioned and administered torture. The debate on waterboarding is a legitimate discussion, but one need read the accounts, the chain of command, how much attention was given, and the extent to which such actions were closely monitored and supervised when any form of “enhanced interrogation” was utilized against brutal terrorists some of whom were directly involved in genocidal attacks on our country.

For Obama to assert anything on how his administration has handled national security is laughable especially in light of the Christmas Day bombing episode in the skies over Detroit where were it not for the terrorist’s failure to successfully ignite his bomb, hundreds would have died.

Obama’s address was given in the shadow of testimony from Lee H. Hamilton, the Democratic co-chairman of the 9/11 Commission who was harshly critical of the administration’s effort noting the administration’s inability to understand and process intelligence data effectively.

In summing up the Obama “State of the Union,” the message Obama seemed to be suggesting is, if there’s anything that’s not working right, don’t blame him. Look at all the horrible people who don’t listen to him or dance to his tune in every way. Given the long list of villains he chastised, we’re shocked that he didn’t have some words to say about Balloon Boy’s mother and father for their insane hoax to attempt to land roles on reality television. Of course, “reality television” is about as oxymoronic as concepts like fiscal restraint, transparency, and openness in government are in the context of the Obama administration.

It’s all about me, with well over 100 first person pronoun references through the course of such a long, tedious speech.

It's All About ME!!!

Barack Obama referred directly to himself (I, me, my) 114 times in tonight's State of the Union address.

Chris Mathews Overdoses on Obama Kool-Aid: "Forgot He Was Black"

Here it is, as clear and open as it can get, MSNBC's front row commentator gushing all over Obama and sticking it to anyone who'd disagree with him. This is a work of art.

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http://www.breitbart.tv/msnbcs-matthews-i-forgot-he-was-black-tonight/

Champs Ready for the Super Bowl

Surely, there were few surprises for AFC fans as the Colts prevailed beating the New York Jets 30-17, but give the Jets credit. They played a strong first half, but despite leading at halftime, a late score before time ran out was a tip off for things to come as Peyton Manning showed he was tuned up and ready to pick the Jets superb defense to pieces.

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It took a field goal in overtime for the New Orleans Saints to finish the Minnesota Vikings 31-28, but getting there was quite a journey. Outside of the Big Easy, many fans will argue the Brett Favre's offense lost the game more than the Saints truly winning the game. Through out the game, we saw some of the most awkward and amateurish fumbles this side of a local beer league's play, but perhaps the whole Vikings season and Brett Favre's comeback season will come down to a late 4th quarter interception.

We'll have more to say about the Super Bowl as the big event approaches, but for right now, it's hard not to imagine a Colts victory. Peyton Manning is on the march.

Time to Start Talking O's? The Hot Stove Report

In less than a month, the Orioles pitchers and catchers will report to the Orioles’ new, much needed new Spring Training home in Sarasota, Florida before playing their first preseason game against the Tampa Rays on March 3. Finally, the Orioles have a facility where they are close to other teams and can build a training camp worthy of a 2010 major league effort. So what kind of team will be showing up for work?

Are you having trouble figuring out what to make of the Orioles’ off-season moves?

This writer surely is.

Here’s a summary of what’s happened around the hot stove.

Their first move that was expected practically all season long was not to resign third baseman Melvin Mora perhaps one of the least recognized stars in Orioles’ history, but age was taking its toll and the team hoped to find more offensive clout at the hot corner.

November was largely a month of housekeeping adjusting the roster moving players around to form the basis of the 40 man roster that would report to spring training. In the process, they added two catchers to their system with limited major league experience claiming Craig Tatum off of waivers from Cincinnati and signing free-agent, Michel Hernandez from Tampa Bay. They also grabbed a left-handed reliever, Mike Hinckly who worked with the Washington Nationals.

Action picked up in December first addressing the need for an experienced starter acquiring Kevin Millwood from the Texas Rangers for reliever Chris Ray and cash. Millwood is a twelve year veteran who posted a 13-7 3.67 ERA record with Texas last year having been more or less a .500 pitcher for most of his career but enjoying some highly successful years with Atlanta through 2002 when he was sent to Philadelphia for the 2003 season. Backing up the rotation, the Orioles hope to have found their closer in lefty, Mike Gonzalez, signed as a free-agent from Atlanta.

Needing help on the corners, the Orioles signed free agent first or third baseman, Garrett Atkins, a solid RBI threat capable of over 20 homers based on his experience from 2005-2008 with Colorado though having a tough 2009 season with some injuries,

To provide solid backup for Matt Wieters, the Orioles offered Chad Moeller a minor league contract to play his way onto the roster in Spring Training. Moeller did a satisfactory job as a backup and worked well with the young pitchers after the team traded Greg Zaun.

This week marks perhaps the biggest move of the off-season signing Miguel Tejada expecting him to play third base. Tejada still swings a hot bat with 46 doubles hitting for a .313 batting average.

What the moves the Orioles have made so far in the 2009-2010 off-season indicate is that the team is not truly seeing itself as a contender for 2010, but in addressing weaknesses that were painfully obvious in 2009, they gain upgrades in crucial areas without throwing up barriers as the young players close to reaching the majors continue to develop.

The Orioles still could use a proven starter, preferably a left-handed starter and a possible designated hitter capable of around 30 homers. Doing such could give the O’s a shot at their first winning season since 1997.

Speculation continues that the team might have some interest in bringing back Erik Bedard, 31 years old, who was practically missing in action for Seattle the last two years after the Orioles pulled off one of their most dramatic trades ever trading him to the Mariners for a bevy of players not the least of which is a possible future superstar in Adam Jones. Bedard surely would represent a significant risk since he was limited to thirty starts over two years, 11-7 over all having serious injury problems. If recovered and playing like the pitcher he was in 2006 and 2007 with miserable Orioles team, such an addition especially as a lefty, could provide significant benefits to the Orioles.

While additional moves might take place in the next three weeks before pitchers and catchers report, this off-season does not appear to be one for blockbuster moves for the Orioles. Still, while the 2009 Orioles were obviously a team rebuilding, that they lost 98 games and tumbled terribly once again in September, such a dreadful performance was a major blow to the confidence of all expecting to see a team moving toward better things in the future. 2010 will be the year Baltimore baseball fans can truly judge if Andy McPhail’s master plan is building a winning team in the near future. The goal for 2010 should be to at least hit the .500 mark or slightly better.

Facing the future, the Orioles organization has a tremendous stable of young pitchers. Brad Bergesen, Brian Matusz, and Chris Tillman showed potential to be at least acceptable major league starters. Matt Wieters showed tremendous growth since being called up to the majors finishing with a .288 batting average supported with 15 doubles, 9 homers, and 43 RBI’s in about a half a season’s worth of at bats. Brian Roberts remains one of the best second basemen and lead off hitters in the business and Cesar Izturis provides a fine double play partner while surely the weakest bat in the lineup. Finally, the Orioles could well have the best outfield in baseball. Nick Markatis is as good as ay right fielder in the game. Adam Jones was well on his way to a breakthrough season as he started to add a fine power stroke to the rest of his tools in center field. Jones could well be a legitimate five tool player. Left field should belong to Nolan Reimold who was playing a stellar rookie season before being cut short by injury hitting 15 homeruns and 18 doubles in just 358 at bats.

While fans watch what’s going on at Orioles Park at Camden Yards they’ll still keep an eye cast at what’s happening in Norfolk and Bowie. Eyes will be on third baseman, Josh Bell and more prospective starters led by Jake Arrieta and Troy Patton.

The Orioles must see huge improvement on the mound. Starters must be able to not give up early leads and last six innings. The bullpen must not pour fuel on the fire as was too often the case in 2009.

Can the Orioles win twenty more games in 2010? Doing so would put them at 84-78, not good enough to get in the playoffs in the American League East but possibly good enough for third place. Meanwhile, fans will remain grumpy and impatient many not giving any credit for Andy McPhail’s efforts but viewing thirteen years of continued frustration seeing a team that was once the pride of baseball for consistent winning fall so miserably.

There’s nothing wrong with Baltimore baseball winning won’t cure. The time has come.

NFL 2009: Conference Championship Playoffs

New York at Indianapolis (-7 1/2)
Minnesota at New Orleans (-3 1/2)

These are intriguing matchups, and for the fun of it all, we're picking the underdogs for both. For the AFC game, Indianapolis supposedly has a weak attack against the run though they sure shut down Baltimore's last week. Likewise, the Jets have nothing to lose with their powerful defense. If they can control the ball and take the lead early on, they could pull the unthinkable.

Minnesota fighting New Orleans is a closer proposition. If Brett Favre can overcome the crowd noise at the Superdome and play his kind of offense, they could beat the Saints.

One Sick Story

Here's a link to a news story from Georgia. This is about the sickest news reported in a long, long time. Somehow, it just seems to be a metaphor to the state of society on a much grander scale. Why does it seem like the kind of antics Glenn Beck stages on his show so frequently?


http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,583632,00.html?loomia_ow=t0:s0:a16:g4:r2:c0.000000:b29974752:z0

Glenn Beck -- When, Please Tell Us When His 15 Minutes Are Up!!!

Well, Glenn Beck got off his frothing and foaming about the communists, socialists, and progressives goosestepping into Washington with the headless horsemen and black helicopters flying overhead to trash Scott Brown's dramatic victory in Massachusetts. Not willing to talk about the specifics of real timely issues or the significance of blocking the real threats before us not the bogey man fantasies he loves raving about, he went into one of his goof ball rants with Brown as his target. Apparently, Brown's humor irked the emotionally unstable talk show host.

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While many of us are not surprised that many people surrounding the Obama administration are steeped in socialism and have had close associations with dangerous radicals, what's more important is how these figures are getting their hands on the tools of government to really screw things up. One major check against them is the Republican Party who scored a huge victory.

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The end result is the Obama government takeover of health care has been dealt a very lethal blow. It's time for Beck to grow up and face the issues. His rants and raves, smirkish routines, and name calling only gives Obama, Reid, Pelosi and all their followers a good easily identified whipping post who they attempt to equate as the spokesman for those who disagree with them.

2010 NASCAR Season -- Noteworthy News as Season Nears

Race fans, are you starting to feel the itch just a little? We have but two more silent weekends before engines roar in Daytona. One month from now, we’ll be in the thick of it!

NASCAR is unveiling a substantial change to the Sprint Cup race car. Going into the future visiting yesterday, it looks like the wing is going bye-bye while a conventional spoiler will be put back in service. We await NASCAR’s rationale for doing this. Fans have not taken to the look of the so called “Car of Tomorrow” citing the wing as not looking “NASCAR.” This writer is more disturbed by the front air dam with its little strings to hold it in place giving the race car the look of a mutated snowplow. NASCAR will test the new spoiler design on March 23 and 24 at Charlotte Motor Speedway after which time implementation plans will be announced.

In more moves aimed at “back to basics” racing, the bump draft rule at Daytona and Talladega will be eliminated. Daytona cars will be using larger restrictor plates cranking up the horsepower.

There are still some drivers and teams that don’t have arrangements for next year; here’s a few. The Front Row racing operation intends to race two cars and switch to Ford. No word yet what will become of Hall-of-Fame racing that had an arrangement with Yates last year. Meanwhile, Roush-Fenway found a buyer for the #26 car, Bill Jenkins, Latitude 43 Motorsports with Frank Stoddard as crew chief. Horsepower will remain Roush/Yates keeping the ride a Blue Oval effort. Boris Said is a likely frontrunner for the driver’s position.

Front Row racing intends to run two full-time Ford rides also with Roush/Yates power. Travis Kvapil will return to drive the #34 car. Long John Silver sponsors this ride. Their second effort will feature rookie driver, Kevin Conway, supported by Extenze Male Health in car #37. They will attempt to buy out a defunct ride for owner’s points.

The departure of Martin Truex Jr. to Michael Waltrip racing opened a spot for Jaime McMurray who will race the #1 Chevy for Earnhardt/Ganassi.

Bill Elliot, in addition to running his part time schedule with the “legendary” Wood Brothers may enter the #6 car into the Shootout since David Ragan does not qualify, and important move for Roush sponsorship exposure.

ABC/ESPN announced it is switching most of its races that had aired on ABC to ESPN. The only races remaining on ABC will be Saturday night affairs: Bristol, August 21, Richmond, September 11, and Charlotte, October 16. This move surely hurts those few who don’t have access to cable during the part of the long Sprint Cup season where race results really matter. However, NASCAR has not thrived on local ABC affiliates. Some local stations have interrupted late running races for the sake of their local news and some local stations in markets that station management sees NASCAR as not a first tier sport do not sufficiently publicize the broadcasts. ESPN will provide constant hype and support. Pressures like long running races due to rain delays won’t be as much of a factor. Many fans agree that since the ESPN gang resumed covering NASCAR in 2007, the coverage is cold and stiff compared to their coverage from the network’s infancy in 1981 through 2000. While we’d hardly single out any of their on-air personalities as unappealing, they don’t as a team, convey the kind of fun and enthusiasm nor the connection with race fans they did when play-by-play announcer, Bob Jenkins worked with Benny Parsons and Ned Jarrett in the booth with Dr. Jerry Punch as the #1 pit reporter. Today’s coverage has so many players for each telecast, loads of gizmos and technology tricks, the coverage seems to overwhelm the race.

After Jimmie Johnson winning his unprecedented fourth consecutive championship, the 2009-2010 off season has been relatively quiet. There isn’t the sense of overreaching doom that troubled automakers and a weak economy had last year. The big consolidation was announced long before the end of the season as Yates and the Gillette/Petty operation branded as Richard Petty racing merged forming a four car Ford team. This move leaves Roger Penske’s operation with the #2, 12, and 77 cars as the only Dodge entries left in the field. The Milwaukee Mile no longer had financially viable promoters to continue the Nationwide and Camping World Truck races at that long standing venue.

Major Sprint Cup Teams for 2010:

Chevrolet

Richard Childress Racing
#29 – Kevin Harvick, Shell/Pennzoil
#31 – Jeff Burton, Caterpillar
#33 – Clint Bowyer, General Mills/Cheerios, BB&T

Earnhardt-Ganassi Racing
#1 – Jamie McMurray, Bass Pro Shops
#42 – Juan Pablo Montoya, Target

Hendrick Motor Sports
#5 – Mark Martin, Go Daddy.com
#24 – Jeff Gordon, DuPont
#48 – Jimmie Johnson, Lowes/Kobalt Tools
#88 – Dale Earnhardt Jr., Mountain Dew, Amp Energy Drinks, Army National Guard

Stewart/Haas Racing (Hendrick Motor Sports affiliate)
#14 – Tony Stewart, Office Depot/Old Spice
#39 – Ryan Newman, U.S. Army


Dodge

Penske Racing
#2 – Kurt Busch, Miller Lite
#12 – Brad Kesolowski, Verizon (no postings)
#77 – Sam Hornish Jr., Mobil 1

Ford

Richard Petty Motorsports
#9 – Kasey Kahne, Budweiser
#19 – Elliot Sadler, Stanley Tools
#43 – A.J. Allmendinger, Best Buys
#98 – Paul Menard, Menards

Roush/Fenway Racing
#6 – David Ragan, UPS
#16 – Greg Biffle, 3M/Red Cross
#17 – Matt Kenseth, Crown Royal
#99 – Carl Edwards, Aflac/Subway

Front Row Racing
#34 – Travis Kvapil, Long John Silver
#37 – Kevin Conway (ROTY), Extenze Men’s Health Supplement

Latitude 43 Motor Sports (Roush/Fenway affiliate)
#26 – Boris Said?, Erik Darnell? -- TBD


Toyota

Joe Gibbs Racing
#11 – Denny Hamlin, FedEx
#19 – Kyle Busch, M&M’s
#20 – Joey Logano, Home Depot

Red Bull Racing
#82 – Scott Speed, Red Bull
#84 – Brian Vickers, Red Bull

TRG Racing (Michael Waltrip Racing Associate)
#47 – Marcos Ambrose, Little Debbie

Michael Waltrip Racing
#00 – David Reutimann, Aaron Rents
#56 – Martin Truex, Jr., NAPA Auto Parts

Historic Victory in Massachusetts

This is a day for right minded Americans to savor for a long time. Scott Brown convincingly defeated Martha Coakley to win the Massachusetts Senator position held by Ted Kennedy from 1962 until his death last year.

That the state of Massachusetts, one of the most predictably loyal Democratic states would serve Brown such a significant victory speaks volumes of the nation’s dissatisfaction of the Democratic Party’s attempt to transform our constitutional democracy into the statist nightmare of Obama nation.

Any one with the slightest bit of common sense and decency cannot help but be outraged with how the Democrats’ attempt to seize control of the nation’s medical system by some of the most blatantly cynical and corrupt methods imaginable. When Nebraska gets special consideration on Medicaid and excluding its insurance giant Mutual of Omaha from fees that would be imposed on other health insurers for Ben Nelson’s vote and similar treatment is passed on to Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Michigan to reward the auto workers, an entity largely controlled by Michigan’s labor unions, and the State of Louisiana likewise gets Medicare concessions not available to other states to court Mary Landreau’s vote, how can any one consider that proper conduct. To add insult to injury adding concessions to labor unions exempting union members from taxes others with private insurance would be forced to pay puts the Democrats of the United State Senate at extreme odds with rational American thinking. Martha Coakley pledged her unconditional support for the Senate’s plan.

While Coakley certainly made her share of idiotic mistakes from not knowing who a major Red Sox star was and called him a Yankees fan to campaigning for special interest lobbyist money in Washington DC days before the election, her arrogance and detachment from the electorate in the Bay State was astounding.

Make no mistake, however, that this election was more about Barack Obama and the behavior of Harry Reid’s majority of sixty Democrats than anything else. The Obama administration has dropped the ball on one issue after another from not taking responsibility for the near miss of a terrorist catastrophe over the skies of Detroit and its inexplicable ignorance on the Fort Hood massacre to radical environmental policies like “cap and trade.” The mantra of hope and change with a spirit of openness in government that voters thought they were embracing in voting for Obama proved an illusion. Right from the get-go from the earliest appointments, how they were handled, and how the President first began his taking the reigns of power, the Obama administration proved itself dependent on filthy Chicago style machine politics trading favor and selling out to special interests the total opposite of the promise to, as one for instance, have negotiations for “health care reform” broadcast on CSPAN.

An important threshold was crossed. With but 41 votes, the Republicans can now sustain filibusters and block the most onerous Democratic legislation.

Momentum has shift since November when voters in Virginia and New Jersey turned their statehouses to Republican leading to a huge triumph on this date. Hard work remains as there must be more turnover in both the house and senate to restore the nation’s Capitol to the people’s house.

Let us savor this victory as we prepare for greater battles ahead.

Martin Luther King Day: REALITY CHECK

America celebrates Martin Luther King’s birthday today as the third Monday of January, making it a government holiday conducive for a three day weekend but perhaps less honorific of the man whose birthday was January 15, 1929. It’s the man and his accomplishments that matter, and who else in American history helped change America for the better the way Dr. King did?

Like many martyrs, it has become almost impossible to talk about Martin Luther King objectively, as a real person who had real strengths and weaknesses. Since his death on that horrible 4th day of April, 1968, politicians, civil rights leaders, journalists, and Americans from all walks of life have cloaked their objectives behind the King legacy, some times in noble ways consistent of the dream King envisioned; others in dreadfully opportunistic ways that either misrepresent his principles or use his vision to stir emotions for unjust causes.

It’s hard to believe what racial divides existed in the summer of 1963 when King gave his famous “I Have a Dream” speech from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. This writer can remember as a youth travelling through Virginia where a dining facility had separate bathrooms where the ones for “colored people” was only accessible from outside and then seeing robed Ku Klux Klan members standing on a street corner in a small Tidewater town.

Within a decade much had changed. The break down of racial barriers through the 1970's were substantial. Now, a generation later, the United States has a Black president although Barack Obama has no familial connection whatsoever to the citizens of African descent whose ancestors were brought to these shores as slaves. From corporate board rooms to virtually every walk of life, people of all races are leaders and top professionals. That the gender barrier has also fallen also owes much to the pathway the Civil Rights Movement provided.

While much has been accomplished, there is still much work to be done. Sadly, the so-called “Black Leaders” are hardly on the right path and often use racial division as a means to promote themselves and their special interests but not help those in need at all. For if there were not racial division, they’d have no reason to exist. How many times have there been situations that required clear, rational discussion where figures like Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton injected race creating a racially inflammatory situation where a more reasoned approach would be to the greatest benefit of all? Sufficient examples document Jackson’s corporate shakedowns where he attempts to establish improper racial practices by major companies leading to settlements most beneficial to Jackson’s special interests not the black community at large.

Racial quotas more politely named “affirmative action” and perhaps the rise of political correctness itself are negative consequences of how the real thrust of the pursuit of social justice has been perverted. Truly, if what really matters is as King expressed, the content of one’s character not one’s skin color, the hypocrisy becomes quite evident.

Such distinctions as mentioned so far don’t address the real issue, that racism is still alive and well, and a huge segment of African-America does not have the same opportunities as the rest of the population.

Consider the following subjects: academic performance and test performance, unemployment, and the prison population – whose numbers are showing a horrible disconnect with the rest of America, young black men, we MUST do better.

In the best of circumstances, white teachers who’d go berserk at the slightest suggestion they might see the world in racial terms are quick to write off the potential of young black male students who might be well-behaved and polite but only squeaking by with “C” work. “Oh he’s doing pretty good for a black kid.” Well, maybe this kid has the potential to do “A” work but isn’t being challenged to do so. How about that? There is no question that the pervasive culture of mainstream public education is one of lower expectations of African-American students. Teachers are reluctant to challenge black students where they might be much more assertive with other students.

Far worse is the climate that exists in predominantly majority black schools generally in urban areas where the white population has evacuated and at times left the local district with less funding that their surrounding communities. For the last few decades state and Federal funding has poured into urban schools but like sending foreign aid to a corrupt third world dictatorship, the money seems to go more toward perks and privilege for the bureaucracy never reaching those in need for whom the funds were intended.

Schools must create a safe, comfortable environment if the neediest students are ever to have a chance to succeed. Children need teachers who take an interest in them as individuals and work with them on their academics and character.

Evil influences confront young black males at every turn where the “gangsta” influence and contempt for authority it embraces pervades the culture and leads to dangerous behavior of gang involvement, violence, and drugs.

Corporate America, whether it is the music industry pushing the worst of rap music that glorifies violence and sexual aggression or companies and retailers of “athletic apparel” selling their overpriced wares to often the most economically disadvantaged households, inappropriate and unrealistic images are suffocating reality – the underlying value: crass conspicuous materialism.

Washington, DC had a most beneficial program granting tuition vouchers to needy students to attend private and parochial schools. How quickly the Democratic Party’s majority on Capitol Hill revoked this program to satisfy the political desires of the teachers unions rather than benefit the children. To see the kids who had benefitted from this program, how intelligent, articulate, and purposeful their enriched education had helped them become – that these kids had bold dreams of college and beyond and to think that kids in this program would be thrown back into the cesspool of DC schools is beyond heartbreaking, it’s purely a moral outrage.

That these kids from such limited backgrounds could do so well shows convincingly that given the right kind of attention and a solid academic program, ALL CHILDREN CAN SUCCEED.

We need only look to where many of the kids in urban public cities graduate to see the results of a failing institution. Again and again, we’ve heard that there are more black men of college age in prison, on probation, parole, or facing charges than attending college. To say that this is in part a direct result of the dreadful school environment many of which served as the breeding and indoctrination grounds into lives of crime is ludicrous. It would be interesting to note how many of these young black men are in jail for drug possession charges that white kids in the suburbs would never get locked up for.

We must unite as a nation and declare that every school must be a compassionate and effective place of learning for all students, that every child matters, that every child must be challenged to succeed, that all behavior good and bad has consequences, and that hard work, positive values, and respect for others will always be the ultimate desired result with a meaningful curriculum that provides the necessary knowledge, skills, and values supporting these aims on every level.

We must assure that American justice and law is color blind. The insane war on drugs and how the law persecutes minorities must be torn inside out where law enforcement deals with the real dangers to society and isn’t locking up kids for blowing a little reefer. The greatest defense against drug abuse is creating the values where such counterproductive behavior is not an option. This points directly back to proper schooling that instills proper self-respect and discipline that help young people chose more appropriate alternatives.

Dr. Martin Luther King’s dream is alive so is his struggle. The battle lines are different but the goal remains the same.

Somehow, Martin Luther King sales at the big retailers and NBA matinees disregard the very philosophy behind which honoring Doctor King with a holiday was established in the first place. Sadly, in 2010, MLK day is becoming just another government holiday whose essential meaning is not getting the reflection it deserves.

NFL Football: Modern Pro Football Celebrates Fifty Years of Hard Hitting Play On and Off the Field

Fifty years ago, pro-football was celebrating the Baltimore Colts’ second championship, the second one achieved in Baltimore once again against the New York Giants after the legendary championship game in Yankee Stadium, the Colts’ first championship often dubbed, “the greatest game ever played.”

Television brass discovered professional football was a very television friendly game while Sunday football was gaining stature versus the college game and starting to eat away at Major League Baseball as a dominant national professional team.

While perhaps not seeming so significant at the time, an upstart league would begin play in 1960 as the NFL added two expansion teams, the Dallas Cowboys and Minnesota Vikings.

The original AFL consisted of:

Eastern Division
Boston Patriots
Buffalo Bills
Houston Oilers (now Tennessee Titans)
New York Titans (now New York Jets)

Western Division
Dallas Texans (now Kansas City Chiefs)
Denver Broncos
Oakland Raiders
Los Angeles Chargers (now San Diego Chargers)

The NFL teams were:

Eastern Division
Cleveland Browns (now Baltimore Ravens AFC)
Dallas Cowboys
New York Giants
Philadelphia Eagles
Pittsburgh Steelers (AFC)
St. Louis Cardinals (now Arizona Cardinals)
Washington Redskins

Western Division
Baltimore Colts (now Indianapolis Colts AFC)
Chicago Bears
Detroit Lions
Green Bay Packers
Los Angeles Rams (now St. Louis Rams)
Minnesota Vikings
San Francisco 49ers

During the 1960’s, the NFL first tried to drive the AFL out of business and also began its first big national TV contract with CBS while the AFL linked up with NBC. Soon, the NFL decided rather than to beat them, have them join the NFL and the two leagues merged leading to the first Super Bowl after the 1966 with the Green Bay Packers beating the Kansas City Chiefs. Vince Lombardi’s team made the upstart AFL look like a second class operation with a convincing 35-10 pounding. They’d win again the following year over the Oakland Raiders 33-14.

Meanwhile, the NFL opened up new territory moving south adding teams in Atlanta and New Orleans in 1966. The AFL was growing too – adding a team the Miami Dolphins in 1967 and the Cincinnati Bengals in 1968.

The initial impressions of the merger being a shotgun wedding with an inferior AFL diluting the superior NFL were turned inside out with Super Bowl III pitting the highly favored Baltimore Colts led by Johnny Unitas versus the upstart New York Jets with their brash quarterback, Joe Namath who promised a Jets win. The Jets promised as delivered dominating the Colts with a 16-7 victory.

As the 1960’s came to an end, professional football now extended to 26 cities with almost all regions of the country represented. It was time for the finishing touches to create one unified National Football League. The Baltimore Colts, Pittsburgh Steelers, and Cleveland Browns moved to what would be called, “The American Conference (AFC)” while the remaining NFL teams would be “The National Conference (NFC).”

With NFC games on CBS, AFC games on NBC, and Monday Night Football on ABC, fans could enjoy a wide choice of games with 1:00 pm and 4:00 pm games on Sunday and then a national telecast on Mondays.

The 1970’s saw the undefeated Miami Dolphins in 1972 and the dominance of the Pittsburgh Steelers who’d win three Super Bowls in the decade as heated rivalries formed and powerhouse franchises emerged. The NFL opened up the only region of the country without an NFL team adding the Seattle Seahawks and solidifying the Florida market with a team in Tampa.

While the 1980’s saw the game leap to even greater heights, it was a decade of upheaval.
Teams moved initiated by the Oakland Raiders moving to Los Angeles, the Baltimore Colts to Indianapolis, and St. Louis Cardinals to Phoenix, Arizona. Players went on strike in 1982 playing only nine games. It got uglier in 1987. While the record shows fifteen games were played, three games were played by a rag-tag assembly of replacement players, but by the time the Washington Redskins won the Super Bowl at season’s end, the Strike and replacement saga was rapidly becoming a distant memory.

The 1990’s continued franchise movement and expansion with an attempt to solidify Dixie adding an NFC team in Charlotte, North Carolina, but the second move seemed a little more far fetched with a team awarded to Jacksonville, Florida seeming to leave Baltimore and St. Louis out in the cold with their dreams to rejoin the NFL, but those dashed hopes would be short-lived as the moving vans pulled up to the Los Angeles area teams. The Raiders returned to Oakland and the Rams moved to St. Louis to open the 1995. The following season would see Baltimore’s dream of football justice secured but at quite a dreadful price to the heart of football. The Cleveland Browns moved to Baltimore in a move that was as heartbreaking and reminiscent of the Colts departure for Indy a dozen years earlier. For Cleveland, the pain would be brief as the NFL presented the Ohio fans a new Cleveland Browns, with all their history in tact to play in a new state of the art open air stadium. The Houston Oilers bolted Texas for Tennessee to become the Tennessee Titans playing in Nashville once a new stadium was completed.

The paranoia caused by musical franchises saw one city after another building lavish new stadiums. Only a small minority of towns have facilities that existed at the time of the merger. Balancing out the league to 32 teams, Houston regained an AFC team for the 2002 season with both conferences being organized into four four team divisions.

The NFL has never stood stronger than it does in January 2010, but missing a team in the nation’s second largest market, Los Angeles creates a black hole tugging on the need for a team. The collective bargaining agreement expires after this season and the cozy protection of the salary cap could be in jeopardy while there are dark whispers of a lockout for 2012.

Some cities must surely be a little weary of the future. Buffalo, San Diego and Minnesota play in old venues lacking the modern perks demanded by today’s owners. Jacksonville is having difficulty filling its stands seldom having a game qualify as a sellout to lift the television blackout. St. Louis could face a shaky future as the ownership situation is resolved. St. Louis has a tricky out-clause based on its stadium rating that could allow it to move. Buffalo’s owner, Ralph Wilson, couldn’t be more loyal to Buffalo, but he is 92 years old. The team is already playing one game a year in Toronto.

Looking ahead through the next decade, expansion does not seem like a good idea, but almost certainly a team will land in Los Angeles. Could the Bills be Toronto bound?

Part of the NFL’s success is never standing still as the history of the last fifty years clearly demonstrates. Upstarts will be assimilated as was the AFL or eliminated as was the USFL and other lesser leagues.

While baseball continues to relish the title of the Great National Pastime, is there any question which sport garners the most support and attention?

Ravens 2009: It's Over

The Baltimore Ravens lost to the Indianapolis Colts 3-20. Making last week's pounding of New England look like a distant memory, the old demons of penalties and turnovers vexed the Ravens as Peyton Manning's mastery intensified as the game progressed. Look at Ed Reed's highlights to see the team's fate. He had one interception called back for a penalty. He fumbled the other. Both had the potential to be game breakers. Add to the fumbles and penalties, a few too many dropped passes, the Ravens never put up a successful attack.

The Ravens Defense did okay, good enough to lose. Reality says a team should plan on scoring more than 20 points to beat the Colts.

For a season that got the Ravens to the second round of the playoffs, their effort provided more than its share of frustration after winning their first three games, which they promptly negated losing their next three, only once in the remaining of the season would they win two straight during the regular season facing the Detroit Lions and the Chicago Bears. They appeared to blow a lock on the playoffs in their horrible game in Pittsburgh in week 16 but slid into the playoffs with a sharp win in Oakland.

Looking at this year's experience and the 2008 season, the Ravens are a good team, good enough to make the playoffs. They still have work to do to become a championship team. They'll need help with their receiving corp and defensive secondary to do so.

The frustration of this season won't heal easily, but as fans turn their attention to next year, the Ravens can stand proud that they were among an elite few who made it to the playoffs for two years in a row, and if they make some important adjustments to their roster, they should make it three in a row next year.

Intellectual Scum: The Conspiracy Mindset

We're probably not as evolved as we think
we are, and evolution doesn't explain
everything -- that's why it's called a THEORY!!!
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Hot on the heels of Danny Glover's and Pat Robertson's ridiculous assertions about the cause of the Haiti earthquakes is an ad on Fox television for its show, Bones. The subject, there had to be a second gunman in the Kennedy assassination.
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Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, dogs and cats, and intellectually curious banana slugs, let's make something perfectly clear.
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The Warren Commission told the truth. To look at the amount of research and the integrity of the members on the panel made it abundantly clear what happened on November 22, 1963 in Dallas, Texas. That there might be a few things that aren't 100% crystal clear doesn't open the door to all the wacky theories on the subject. "The Government lied." so the ad says. We'd better worry about the real lies the government is pumping out right now on subjects like health care, terrorism, and the economy and get our minds of the idiot bullshit about JFK's death.
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Don't expect to know much if your source of the news is Jon Stewart and the late night talkers. Talk show hosts are first and foremost entertainers and some aren't very good at it. That there is some monolithic clearly articulated progressive movement as Glenn Beck explains it is cheap baloney.
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Yes, ten agents from Al Qaeda really did hijack four airliners, two of which crashed into the World Trade Center, one into the Pentagon, and the fourth into a field in Pennsylvania. What kind of stupid asshole would believe our government turned lose the hounds of hell on itself. If you believe that, you have no right to be taken seriously about anything.
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There is no Easter Bunny. Deal with it. Elvis died back on August 16, 1977.
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Neil Armstrong was the first man to set foot on the moon on that memorable Saturday night, July, 1969.
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Pat Robertson is dead wrong, so is Danny Glover. The planet isn't perfect. Tectonic plates shift around in ways science hasn't fully mastered explaining. Science doesn't know everything. Rationalizing, that's the way God planned it doesn't explain everything. People who believe in mindless conspiracy theories have trouble dealing with the truth on just about everything.

There are the conspiracy theories that involve the "I know something the big important guys don't know" and those almost always involve the U.S. Government is the root of all evil. There's also the faith in something bigger ridiculous mindset...whether it's faith in a malicious murdering God or junk science. We're sure to hear that the "Swine" flu was created by the government for biological warfare. It's God's punishment or somehow the virus developed as a result of climate change allowing the little beasties to grow and develop in new and more threatening ways.
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While we're at it, there's no tooth fairy either. DEAL WITH IT.
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Danny Glover: Global Warming Caused Earthquake

Last night, it was the radical right. Tonight it's the loony left. Leave it to Danny Glover to size up the Haitian tragedy -- the cause: Global Warming!

What happened in Haiti could happen to anywhere in the Caribbean because all these island nations are in peril because of global warming. When we see what we did at the climate summit in Copenhagen, this is the response, this is what happens, you know what I'm sayin'?"

Of course, the implication is that earthquake is our fault. We know what he's sayin' is totally nuts. Tectonic plates are probably a little too scientific for idiots like Glover and Pat Robertson to understand.

Baltimore Ravens: Coach Cameron Knows How to Pick a Winner

Cam Cameron's wonderful story reveals the tremendous heart and character of a real winner

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We are proud to report a wonderful story from behind the scenes at Ravens Camp. Offensive Coordinator, Cam Cameron became aware of the plight of a classmate of his son who attends Loyola-Blakefield High School in Towson, Maryland. Matthew Costello is a young man stricken with inoperable brain cancer and is the son of Jaime Costello an anchor for WMAR-TV. Knowing that the young Costello is a diehard sports fan, Cameron felt moved to see what he could do.

ESPN’s columnist Rick Reilly relates this wonderful story. It’s so refreshing amidst all the recent scandals in professional sports to see something as thoroughly wonderful as this!

Please see attached link:
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/columns/story?columnist=reilly_rick&id=4825585&sportCat=nfl

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NFL 2009: Playoffs - Divisional Round

Lots of football fans consider the Divisional Championship round of the playoffs the best weekend of all. Why not? It’s two days of football, four games total between some darned good teams. This year, three of the eight teams return from last year, Baltimore, San Diego, and Arizona. Of course, last year’s champ, the Pittsburgh Steelers have been watching all the playoffs from home.

Arizona at New Orleans (-7)
A team that gave up 45 points to Green Bay cannot withstand New Orleans attack with Drew Brees under center. The Superdome will be rocking at the Saints attempt to move deeper than they ever have as a team before.

Baltimore at Indianapolis (-6 ½)
As a Ravens fan, my worst nightmare is the thought of a Matt Stover field goal as the clock runs out winning for the Colts. The Ravens must be sure it can’t come to that. The defense must hit Peyton Manning early and often while maintaining their strong running game eating up the clock and keeping the bowl out of Manning’s hands. If they do that, they’ll win.

Dallas at Minnesota (-3)
This is perhaps the tightest matchup of the weekend. Dallas is on a roll, but one should; never underestimate what Brett Favre can accomplish in the heat of battle looking for one last hurrah. With a noisy dome screaming at Dallas, the Vikings should squeak this one out.

New York Jets at San Diego (-7 ½)
Over the last eleven weeks of the season, San Diego has been the NFL’s most consistent performer and overall has more talent than the New York Jets. If the Jets are really fired up, they could pull the upset, but their Cinderella run will probably run out on the west coast Sunday evening.

Pat Robertson: Haitian Earthquake - God's Punishment?

Pat Robertson is a world-class idiot. Who needs a tele-evangelist who preaches God gets his jollies killing poor people whose ancestors ticked God off. Naturally, the left wing in this country will try to make Robertson's remarks represent those of all conservatives. This writer thinks Robertson's comments are about as stupid as they come.

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Robertson's remarks:

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And you know Kristi, something happened a long time ago in Haiti and people might not want to talk about it. They were under the heel of the French, uh you know Napoleon the third and whatever. And they got together and swore a pact to the Devil. They said we will serve you if you'll get us free from the French. True Story. And so the Devil said "OK, it's a deal." And they kicked the French out. You know, the Haitians revolted and got themselves free. But ever since they have been cursed by one thing after the other, desperately poor. That island is Hispaniola is one island. It's cut down the middle. On one side is Haiti, on the other side is the Dominican republic. Dominican Republic is prosperous, healthy, full of resorts, etc.. Haiti is in desperate poverty. Same island. Uh, they need to have, and we need to pray for them, a great turning to God and out of this tragedy. I'm optimistic something good may come.

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ARRGHH!!!!!

Haiti

Surely by now anyone who doesn't live under a rock is aware a horrible earthquake over 7.0 on the Richter Scale devastated the country of Haiti, by far the poorest and least stable country in the Western Hemisphere.

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Massive public and private efforts are under way to help the Haitian people whose situation is made far worse by having virtually no infrastructure and a totally ineffective and corrupt government. In a nation of approximately nine million people, the low estimate is that at least 50,000 people have been killed while the work goes on to rescue more.

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This is no time for cynicism. As humans, we are compelled by our humanity to help those in need. In the long term, we must work with the people of Haiti to rebuild their country and develop a productive healthy society.

USC Appoints Lane Kiffin????

Lane Kiffin departs the Tennessee Vols for the USC Trojans making us wonder, what is USC thinking?

Kiffin led the Vols to a 4-4 record in the SEC (7-6 overall) better than 3-5 (5-7) the previous year.

His tenure as Oakland Raiders head coach was miserable, but could Vince Lombardi succeed in Al Davis's world.

He came to Tennessee making a lot of noise including accusing Urban Meyers of Florida on his recruiting methods and generally coming across as brash and petulant. Was there a clear silver lining in his two win upgrade and one conference win improvement earning them their first bowl appearance, the Chick-Fil-A Bowl? For Tennessee fans, it was perhaps the first big hoorah since the days of Peyton Manning.

Still, he takes over perhaps the highest visibility program in the nation with the highest expectations. USC has been the established dynasty in the new millennium. Does Kiffin's experience along with his service as wide receivers coach and offensive coordinator at USC from 2001-2006 at USC create enough good vibes to deserve the job?

We'll see.

More on McGwire

While it appeared to be a refreshing break on Monday to hear Mark McGwire had confessed to his steroid usage, the more we hear from him, the clearer it is his just doesn't get it. Excuses won't work.

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He still won't acknowledge that he took drugs to enhance his performance. The excuse that he took them to help comeback from injuries just doesn't fly. Look at how his physique changed, and that wasn't just filling out from maturity was it?

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The pissing contest he has entered into with Jose Canseco is comical. Jose Canseco might be a serial liar on some accounts, but he did give us a look behind the curtain that nobody wanted to believe at all when he did. We just realize Canseco is a scum bag. There were no noble motives in his ratting out his profession. It was calculating and self-serving.

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The truth, the whole truth, and a clear statement of what an athlete did was wrong is the only acceptable outcome to involvement in this dark chapter of professional sports. McGwire continues to equivocate and rationalize. That is unacceptable.

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As the week passes, he has done little to look any more authentic than his silly remarks about not wanting to talk about the past when he testified on Capitol Hill. Mark McGwire and dozens more have a long way to go. There will never be a better time than now to set the record straight. The integrity of baseball deserves it.

Dem Baw-Lee-Mur Sportz Fans Will Drive Yew Crazy, Hon

Why are so many Baltimore fans so blue and crabby?

We don't call our hometown Crab Town for nothing, hon. This writer will be the first to defend his hometown for the many fine things we enjoy or if we're unjustly criticized from afar, but darn, while we do have some great sports fans, just witness the roar at any home Ravens' games, listening to local sports talk over the years reveals a subclass of sports fans that are uniquely Baltimore and uniquely terrible.

Every home town has its dumbass sports fans. There are the ones who are self-appointed geniuses who think they know everything. There are the ones who live in fantasy land who think all the star players are readily available at some great big Sam's Club where its just a matter of team owners and GM's picking someone who the fan thinks belongs on the home team, and boom, just like that done deal. Somebody in the Orioles' organization screwed up with Mark Texeira for example. Some fans are just plain dullards. No explanation needed.

In Baltimore, we have a unique form of paranoia that pervades a significant percentage of sports fans. Tune in to any of the local sports-talk stations any given day, you'll hear them. Some of the talk show hosts could be part of this cult. Hello Nestor Aparacio whose radio station has all the power of an average light bulb.

There's a canned speech that preludes most discussions of the Orioles. Peter Angelos, the team owner, is the villain. The speech begins with "He fired Davey Johnson and Jon Miller..".and then lists whatever crimes Angelos might have committed against Baltimore baseball. Hmm, does anyone think Jon Miller's ability to return to his home town and broadcast for the Giants had an appeal for him? Okay, Angelos screwed things up big time for many years. He also inherited a depleted organization. Still, these Baltimore blockheads must have missed the headlines about Andy McPhail's arrival as team President and not witnessed what he's attempting to accomplish. The Orioles are a frustrating mess, but there's an intelligent, informed point of view and there's the weird conspiracies. Don't hold your breath for the day Cal Ripken owns the club.

The paranoia around the Ravens is more surreal. Okay, no city has ever dealt with the heartbreak and insult the Baltimore football fan suffered on that snowy night in March, 1984 when the Mayflower vans packed up the Colts and moved them to Indianapolis. Ask fans in Cleveland how they feel about what happened to the Browns. Sure Cleveland got a better deal than Baltimore, but who won a Super Bowl first? The Ravens or the Indianapolis Colts? The Ravens did. The Ravens are one of the ten best teams of the last decade. Ooops, the Colts are #1. Baltimore fans must accept that Peyton Manning will deservedly be mentioned in the same breath as Johnny Unitas. Deal with it.

Baltimore, we have a football team. They've been here since 1996. They're not going anywhere, and they're pretty darned good.

Oh, but the league officials are out to get the Ravens. The national media doesn't respect us. Wake up, if we heard the sports talk or listened to the radio broadcasts of other cities, they'd surely cite calls that went against them too. There are some pretty sloppy crews, but the crew who handled Sunday's game in New England was superb.

As for the national media, does anyone really care what Colin Cowherd has to say? He's a west coast pretty boy who could just as well be a tabloid or entertainment reporter. Consider the source. Chris Berman tends to dis the Ravens, but he's a front runner. When the going gets good, all of a sudden, he'll be making all his sound effects and weird noises ring true for the Ravens. Are we going to let something Keeshawn Johnson had to say matter? Truth be told, Baltimore gets treated pretty decently. We're developing the kind of reputation fans in Oakland and Pittsburgh enjoy. The only way to enhance it is to have more home playoff victories. The Ravens post season play has largely been a road show.

The Ravens have the opportunity that only seven other teams currently enjoy, a chance to advance to the Super Bowl. Right now, what else matters? We can relish our win last week or look ahead to Sunday's game. The Ravens weren't "supposed" to beat New England. They did. They're not supposed to beat Indianapolis. They can.

That's good enough for this fan.