Getting sloppy at the top

The Worldwide Leader™ is not having the best stretch this week.

Skip Bayless, for one, seems to enjoy taking a contrarian stand just for the hell of it. (Longtime readers know that I don't particularly care for his work.) His latest is that Reggie Bush should forfeit the Heisman Trophy because of perks offered to his family.

As Jason Whitlock points out in his own excellent column, the Heisman voters are required to choose someone who adheres to the NCAA guidelines. However, I'm trying to wrap my mind around Bayless' logic at the moment. On the one hand, he thought Barry Bonds' records should stand; yet it's certainly clear to me that Bonds' performance benefitted far more from the drugs than Bush's performance did from his mom's house. Would he have somehow run for fewer yards if the family had a third-floor walk-up in Sausalito? Even if he had known about the details (and why would he?), what possible on-the-field impact would this have?

Then, of course, there's the hockey. John Buccigross is still top-of-the-line, but otherwise I'm quite disappointed. Terry Frei, front and center - based on four games of the first round of the playoffs, you're speculating that goaltending isn't as vital to team success as it used to be.

Let's mention the very first flaw in your argument: "The point is, a week into the first postseason of the New NHL, definitive conclusions would be premature." That's from your own column. So naturally you caveat everything you say in the column to try to have it both ways - but your only evidence is the poor statistics from the Dallas-Colorado series.

Have you noticed that, without Dwayne Roloson (.929 save %, 2.49 goals-against), the Oilers would have probably been swept by Detroit, instead of level at two games each? Have you seen the difference that Cam Ward made instead of Martin Gerber in the Carolina nets?

Most of all, the point entirely left out of the column - goaltending is deeper now than ever before. You don't have the consolation of thinking, "It's only one game, we can come back and score five on that patsy tomorrow night." And even when a number-one guy goes down, through injury or poor play, the backup is still very sharp. All around the league it's the same thing - Ray Emery in Ottawa, Henrik Lundqvist for the Rangers (Kevin Weekes was their expected starter before the season began), Vesa Toskala in San Jose, Tim Thomas in Boston (who didn't make the playoffs)... With more scoring chances and the greater speed of the game, it becomes more important than ever to have a guy who can deflate the opponent with big saves, and there are more guys like that now than ever before.

Why, yes, I am a goaltender myself. Does that make me biased? Possibly. But even on my level I can see the difference between a guy who comes up big and keeps his team close vs. a guy who flubs his chance. No other major sport has quite the equivalent to a hot goalie, a guy who holds off incredible pressure for three, four, five minutes... A goalie can face a dozen tough shots, right after the other, and if he keeps the puck out, and his team comes right back and scores on the counterattack - you feel the whole rink just tilt in your favor. Even in a goal-line stand, you know the other guys are only getting four shots, max, and on the fourth they may just take the easy field goal.

I know I'm in the distinct minority here. Sports Guy refuses even to mention has foresworn the Lord's Own Hockey in his pages. But fair's fair - I'll leave basketball to him, and work my side of the rink.

UPDATE - he mentions the Joe Thornton trade today. But he also says:

But even though I loved hockey once upon a time... even though I have all these NHL memories from 1976-1994 that have been rendered pretty much useless, there came a point in my life where I had to make a decision: is it worth spending 400-500 hours every year caring about a franchise [Boston Bruins] that doesn't care about me, playing in a league that was becoming less interesting by the year? The answer was no.

I can dig it. The Mets nearly did that to me during the Dallas Green years - and I'd been a fan since their best player was Lee Mazzilli. With the Islanders, at least there was the false hope that we would start keeping some of the great young players we'd drafted, but those Mets teams were horrible: Bret Saberhagen, Bobby Bonilla, Vince Coleman, Eddie Murray... Even our good players, guys like Edgardo Alfonzo, Jeff Kent, and John Olerud, were joyless and mechanical.

Quick updates

* Regarding plagiarism - I've been going over the archives for a little while now, as part of a separate long-term project. Came across this post. The money quote: Now that’s marketing – infiltrate the dreams of potential customers and shake their hands.

Turns out, of course, that I'd "internalized" that concept from an early Futurama episode. I just thought that I'd blow the whistle now before I'm on 60 Minutes.

* My sports jinx powers are at their zenith. On Tuesday I had the all-nighter at the rink. I refereed three games and then played a fourth because the team was short many players. We lost. Better, about 45 seconds from the end I stepped on a stick blade and rolled my ankle. The doctor says that luckily I did nothing more than badly bruise my foot - nothing is broken and nothing appears to be torn. Needless to say, it's all Bush's fault.

* New stuff on the sidebar. I moved some stuff and added new, exciting links - Memeno Moron, the Cagey Mind, and Worship Naked. Click them and be happy.

That's all for now. Class dis-missssssed!

Plagiarism Redux

Much of blogdom has heard of the sorry tale of Ms. Kaavya Viswanathan, who has recently been busted for stealing many passages of her first novel, How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild and Got a Life, from other recent works by Megan McCafferty. She's been - well, not coming clean. More like sheepish and fawning, adhering to the growing standard society has been borrowing from its young (instead of sharply correcting). It was inadvertent. She "internalized" things she'd read.

(w/t to Sheila for link number one and Emily for link number two.)

She also had the services of a "book packager," so named because they stand behind-the-scenes and massage workable novels out of the rambles of authors. In other words, she couldn't even plagiarize somebody else's work on her own - she required help.

It's a small advance for society, I suppose, that Ms. Viswanathan didn't merely throw it all on the anonymous packager. And she did contribute some original material. She and her publisher have announced that future editions of her novel will offer more of it in place of the stolen bits. In software terms, that means that "Opal Mehta" was a beta version pawned off as a finished product, requiring patches and additional work that the consumer should have gotten in the first place. I was rather hoping that the practice wouldn't catch on elsewhere. (And I should know, since I ran a blog carnival that blew up in my face some months back. Yes, it was my fault.)

But if that wasn't enough fun, today I open to the funnies in the Star Ledger and find this from Vic Lee. And that sounded eerily familiar. I jogged upstairs and consulted the wall of a coworker and, sure enough, there it was.

That was a panel by Mike Twohy, originally running in the New Yorker on July 8, 2002. Ironically, his daily single-panel, That's Life, was replaced in the Ledger by Lee's "Pardon Our Planet" - in the same spot on the page, no less. I guess Lee promised them that some days, nobody would be able to tell the difference.

Hockey today, interesting stuff tomorrow

Some reflections on the NHL playoffs -

* The Islanders have been out for some time, but the next best thing is watching the Rangers and Flyers look like stooges. Four games, four losses: combined score of 21-6.

* Naturally, the Isles are not out of the news. Naturally, it's bad news. For those counting at home, this makes TWO Islander owners in the past ten years accused of fraud. (The first, John Spano, commited the fraud to try to buy the Isles.) My banner at work is flying half-mast.

* And in other news, Carolina, with former Isles coach Peter Laviolette, lost their first two playoff games, at home, to the seventh-seeded Canadiens. My all-sports jinx streak is intact. At this point, I could watch a replay of the 1980 Finals and Nystrom would hit the post.

* By the way, Laviolette has grown a goatee for the playoffs, and looks like an exceptionally grumpy Kevin Nealon.

* Closer to home, my deck hockey team is playing roller hockey for the very first time. None of us can really skate all that well. But in our second-ever game, we won - which conveniently coincided with my vacation last week. We used to have the "Fan Ban" because we'd lose big games when anyone came to watch - I may find myself in that situation...

To Oldly Go

One might hope that this was a gag, but Vulcans don't observe April Fool's. So, sci-fi fans get to lumber through another Star Trek movie, come 2008.

They have noticed that James Doohan and DeForest Kelly are dead, right? Or do we get an answer to the burning question - can you do Warp Two in a Hoveround?

Daily Variety said the action would center on the early days of "Star Trek" characters James T. Kirk and Mr. Spock, including their first meeting at Starfleet Academy and first outer-space mission.

Somehow, that doesn't make me feel any better. Nobody else can be Mr. Spock.

The as-yet-untitled "Star Trek" feature, the 11th since 1979, is aiming for a fall 2008 release through Paramount Pictures, the Viacom Inc. unit looking to restore its box-office luster under new management, the trade paper said.

By forcing out another installment of a dead franchise, like so much tapioca on Bingo Night? Listen, this isn't like Batman, where fans will accept a different talent under the mask. And how many Bond fans still think of Connery as THE James Bond? Anyone who tries to "do" Kirk will inevitably look like Zapp Branigan. Set phasers to kibosh, Mr. Chekov.

If you really want to do this right, you may want to see how people feel about a Deep Space Nine feature - you can get the genuine cast, you can try a different kind of story, roll the Cardassians out on the big screen for once. Admittedly, the series finale burned a lot of bridges, but that's never stopped anyone before. Or, by Roddenberry, you may try a NEW crew entirely. 179th Rule of Acquisition - Supply without demand is a waste of latinum.

Drove safe, having a great time

North Carolina is an interesting place.

* Back in New Jersey, nearly any two-lane country road you find is bound to run past a lot of new housing development. Down here, you can ride one of these for miles without passing another car, much less a house.

* The Target is HUGE. Ginormous, even. They have 32 checkouts and a beer and wine aisle.

* Dillard's! Sheetz! Food Lion! What brave new world, that has such regional brands in it!

* It's almost worth the extra 15 cents a gallon to pump my own gasoline.

The best part, hands down, is the hospitality. I'm not talking about the fabled "Welcome, Yankee, glad you could visit!" sort of general friendliness, though I'm glad to say that it's alive and well. In specific, we're being put up for the week by two of the Ladybug's best friends from college. They have four children and a dog are still finding room for us.

Blog goes on without me

For the next week, there will be less noise than usual in this space. I've gone on vacation with the Ladybug. Anyone in Norf Cackalackie should wave as we scroll down mighty Route One. I'll be checking in from time to time while I'm away, though, so stop in and say hi. Limericks welcome!

When you say "Blog" then boy you've said it all

And if not, others will say it for you.

Part of me just wants to say, "Blogging is dead," and retire. Then the rest of me laughs at my pretensions. That's the point I get from it, anyway - the reminder not to be cynical and just to enjoy talking about hockey, culture, faith, more hockey, obscure video games, and what-not.

If I beat a few more pop-cult references into the ground while I'm at it, well, eh. Nobody will remember it next week, anyway, so I may as well accept the total deflation of ego and the loss of the dumb-assed expectation that I will be universally admired as the Paragon of All Things Blog. Post some quizzes, take it seriously until the thread dies, and then laugh and buy each other beers.

(w/t to Sheila)

Coming soon to the Android's Dungeon

WunderKraut is out of hiatus for a little while, and picking up where he left off with the good stuff. He reminds me of my own geekedness growing up. (Warning - I have not yet grown up.)

For the sports geeks it was Stratomatic Basbeall. And for poor sports geeks in high school with few friends and no hobbies, it was homemade strat-ball using two 6d and two 8d.

I actually did pretty well - it was realistic and decently balanced. I never quite got the hang of pitcher fatigue, but it had injuries and errors. It would take about a half-hour per game. In about 400 games, there was a pretty good spread of outcomes, too. I keenly remember one of my pitchers taking a perfect game into the ninth, just putting on a clinic - ground ball, pop-out, strikeout - and then giving up the fatal single with two outs.

It's as close as anyone ever got in the "It's Just Dice" League. And I can't tell you, after all the games I'd played, how tempting it was to simply call that first single a walk and give him a shot for the no-hitter - I sat there for ten minutes (rain delay!) thinking about it and finally decided that, even in pen and paper, you have to earn it. And after that the ball started flying around the yard and I actually had to go get him and have the closer end the game. Final line:

	IP	R	ER	H	BB	K
Walker (w)	8.2	1	1	3	0	8
Soeczak (s)	0.1	0	0	0	0	1

Yes, I do remember it that well. I may even have the scorecard somewhere in the basement.

Then Video Killed the Role-Playing Star. I eagerly scored a copy of Tony LaRussa's Ultimate Baseball, on two (!) 3.5" floppies, for your IBM-compatible PC running DOS. I translated my team over there (because who needed the Montreal Expos?), and even took the time to get enough stats to recreate many of the actual big-leaguers of the mid-90s. (They didn't have a players license, but they did have all-time teams.) Some of the folks who eventually worked on the High Heat series for 3do helped program this game, and it was very good - down to small details, such as having to pull a pitcher at the second mound visit.

Pity that 3do is gone now, but they brought it on themselves by failing to follow HH2001 with anything approaching its quality. The last edition didn't even offer mouse support and did away with the historic ballparks. Still, some things come full circle.

Heheheheh

Via Lileks, we now know what Summers has been doing in his spare time.

Yessa!!!

My first spam! Sunday, 4:27 pm, a credit rehab dealio. They thoughtfully included the long list of credit-like terms designed to let search engines find the page and tell their spambot buddies. Alas, it is now deleted, but "Yahitsi," thanks for playing. Nobody goes away empty-handed. For being the first spammer to breach the Hive defenses, you win a ban and a special parting gift.


updated, April 11, 10 am - thanks for the support, guys.

Random mutterings

* Still working on the background thing, folks. Whatever I did to make it better before isn't happening now. My Firefoxers can't read half the posts I write, and Prussian Tiger and Sluggo are wondering why I've entered a blue period. I may need that drunken road trip to Norf Cackalackie. Maybe Easter week... 'Sader, do you live anywhere near Raleigh?

* Speaking of NC - a citizen thereof became the Coalition's 50,000 visitor earlier this afternoon. Congrats to the Swillers. And of course, I was 50,001. I missed by less than three minutes. Blast! (Why did I take late lunch today?)

* Many personal projects are finally moving again; in particular, one large boondoggle has finally crossed the finish line. All that's left is the mailing.

* I saw most of this game. The second period was as bad as I've seen since the Fishstick days. The Rangers pretty much moved the puck at will and created excellent chances nearly every shift. The Isles' only solid stretch came on the power play - and they hit the post twice. And in other league news, a new businessman has joined the bidding for the Pittsburgh Penguins. He says he may move them to Hartford. It was a shame when the Whalers moved to Carolina (and we lost a top-five logo, too); I wonder if the league (and owner Peter Karmanos) would let the Penguins take over the Whaler name, the way the NFL created the new Cleveland Browns?

* And that's that. Back to the grind.

Speaking of white backgrounds

At 11:03 am, I was on our loading dock. It was SNOWING.

Yeah, I know it won't stick and won't last, but did New Jersey need that last kick in the nads from Old Man Winter? Is this Buffalo or something?

Oh well. Time to fight winter with winter - I'm playing the Christmas mix. No, bag that. Do not go gently into that snowy night. 20cc's of the Beach Boys, stat!

This may cause trouble

One thing about dating is having your eyes opened to new things. I'd been to one theater show in my whole life as of my last birthday, but have now gotten to see four shows since, with the motive power being my more-sophisticated city-loving Jersey Girl.

I'll have to go back and let you know how the other three went, but the most recent visit to the theatuh was a local company production of "Urinetown" held at the Jersey Shore Arts Center. It used to be the Neptune High School, circa 1896, but had been abandoned for some time until JSAC took possession and began renovation. It's good news, too - this building is gorgeous. I've been in plenty of schools, and most were 60's or 70's cookie-cutter boxes with bad lighting, and cramped rooms, and questionable choices in architecture and layout.

Now picture a high school with 14-foot ceilings... and a main entrance that opens on a grand staircase which sweeps up toward the second floor, and classes with doors with honest-to-goodness knobs and not levers or handles... and above the doors, single-pane hinged windows for ventilation... a building so old that it was probably built without electric wiring...

Sheila is an arts nut; I am a nostalgist. The hallways filled with chattering people visiting the gift shop and waiting for admission, and I painted them in high collars and jackets, with long dresses for the lasses, books strapped together with belts, inkwells and nib pens waiting quietly on each desk for the next lesson.

Oh, yeah, and there was a show too! I got a last little twinge of remember when as we all entered the auditorium: the JSAC restored the original row seating, wooden folding chairs on a long, curved, wrought-iron framework. Many veterans in the audience had brought cushions from home.

And then the show started, and I got in trouble. (If you want to see the play sometime, you may want to skip ahead a little. I'm careful about spoilers, but it happens.)

It's simple enough - for me, a little peek through the fourth wall goes a long way. This play had no fourth wall whatsoever. Later the Ladybug explained that it was the whole point, and it was unlike typical Broadway because of it. I got in worse trouble by saying that sort of proved my point.

Hey, if you want to have ironic fun at the conventions of a musical, have at 'em - but to announce as much to the audience? Indeed, to start with a number called "Too Much Exposition"? I enjoyed the second act much more because there was much less of that sort of thing. It may be that I'm a curmudgeon about it and others absolutely love it; I think that it shows weakness on the part of the authors not to be able to wink at the audience without a sledgehammer. Isn't it enough to have the running gag where the cast reacts in surprise to a plot twist, all in unison? (Well-done and very funny, I might add.)

The cast was fine, though - in a few cases much better than fine. Little Sally and Officer Lockstep were quite well done. A couple of the numbers were sung in counterpoint and I couldn't make out what either group was saying, and there was a ragged moment for one actress early in the second act, but since she'd spent the last fifteen minutes gagged it was most understandable. She came through beautifully otherwise. Great band, good stage design (especially considering the extreme small size).

My dear, I'm sorry if you were irked at me at intermission. I wasn't pooh-poohing. To give you a compare and contrast, this is pooh-poohing. Don't tell your dad, and I won't either.

New look, new problems

This is a bummer. I did a little fine-tuning and I got rid of a dark hunk of blue across the bottom of the sidebar. Apparently that didn't help, and non-IE users are still having difficulties reading in here. As near as I can guess the faint light blue background turns into a darker blue in Firefox.

I'll post in a larger text size, which should also help; and hopefully I can figure out how to turn the text color from navy blue to black, to improve the contrast. Failing that, I can try to change the background to straight white.

Wish me luck...

updated, 9:50 pm - Well, I hope this looks better. There's more contrast (at least as far as IE can tell me) though I still can't figure out how to make the post background white. Due credit to ColorMatch for the proper hexidecimal codes. They provide five complimentary colors for homemade palette work, too - a great little utility.

update again, 12:29 am - son of a gun. Now the background IS white. Folks, you'll have to let me know how it looks to you...

Stylin' the new look

Officially, this is post #300 - a new look for the Hive, since the old format was about a year old. Hopefully old comments haven't been lost. For the next few days I'll be tinkering, since any template change requires one to redo the whole sidebar. If your link is somehow 404, please let me know!

In the meantime this isn't mere housekeeping. Via It Comes In Pints? (who were clued in by caltechgirl), behold the First Church of Xenu. The "Xenu for Kids" button is absolutely a killer - and be sure to check out the Graphical Representations. Number Three is not to be seen with any sort of beverage in one's mouth.

Enjoy Xenu's wrath!

Three times a-fisking

[Welcome back! I decided that this was too much fun to let sit, so this is going up a day early. Those of you who are welcome (but not back) may have missed part one and part two of this exercise. Well, go ahead, we’ll still be here when you return. The rest of us, on to the rest of “what Republicans believe.”]

15. “A president lying about an extramarital affair is an impeachable offense. A president lying about WMD existence to enlist support for an unprovoked, undeclared war and occupation, in which thousands of soldiers and civilians die, is, somehow, solid defense policy in a War against Terrorism.”

Again, let’s quibble about the grammar for a second – “A president” cannot be “solid defense policy,” regardless of the president or the policy. For that matter, he can’t be an impeachable offense, he can only commit one. As things stand, it takes a few tries to finally figure out that lying is the subject modified by the subordinate clauses, not the president. Sorry, but if it’s confusing, it’s not correct.

More substantively, President Clinton DID commit four impeachable offenses. The “about” makes no odds; he perjured himself and tampered with witnesses. This is less-than-becoming behavior for the chief executive of the United States. On to the next – lying about WMD. Well, I’ve seen the sixteen words, and they were not nearly the only thing in that speech, so – no. Unless, of course, one is also willing to state that the Democrats also lied about WMD throughout the 90’s. It seems much more likely that the current sense of outrage has to do with Bush actually acting on this intelligence, instead of merely sounding good in speeches. (As we’ve all heard, he often doesn’t.)

This was flawed intelligence that Hussein himself contributed to – his own generals were astonished that there were no chemical and biological weapons to use against the Coalition forces; how were those forces supposed to know better? AH – increased intelligence. Glad to see the Left is on board with the need for a stronger intelligence program.

Leaving all of that aside for the moment, were WMD the only reason to invade? By no means. The “unprovoking” included refusal to comply with any of the terms of the original cease-fire, which according to convention means that a state of war still exists. The current action wasn’t ‘declared’ because one does not need to declare the same war over and over again.

The “deaths of soldiers and civilians” thing is too silly and banal to reason with. War kills things? You don’t say! You never saw that “War is bad for people and other living things” bumper sticker? But I will grant this much: a lot of the current unrest could have been spared if the US had actually done one of the things it’s being accused of here – occupation. Had we simply conquered the country outright and then worked from there, there would be less civil unrest. But there'd also be less freedom, and that's the point of what's going on out there.

16. “Government should limit itself to the powers named in the Constitution, which should include banning gay marriages and censoring the Internet.”

Point of fact – gay marriage is not now currently lawful. In many cases, the states have never ruled, and in every case, lack of ruling indicated lack of need, since nobody ever imagined a challenge to the definition of marriage that has existed since history dawned.

I’m tempted to give a pass on “censoring the Internet,” since this blogger’s column came three weeks before the FEC’s ruling that blogging is protected political speech. But I find that I can’t. Really, who shows the most disdain for bloggers? (A helpful rundown from the inestimable Ms. Malkin begins to answer the question.) Remember the howling by the Minneapolis Star-Tribune’s Jim Boyd in 2004? (Hopefully you do, because the Tribune’s site no longer offers access to the editorial.) Remember this hoo-hah from last year? More recently, we had some holiday fun: according to some, the unwashed, untutored masses cannot possibly be trusted with a public voice. These people are in favor of democracy?

17. “The public has a right to know about Hillary's cattle trades, but George Bush's Harken Oil stock trade should be sealed in his Daddy's library, and is none of our business.”

Hm. According to this report (nearly four years old, btw), the Harken Oil trade came to light via the Freedom of Information Act. It doesn’t sound like anyone was locking anything away. The SEC investigated it at the time and found no illegalities. Contrast with this. This came to light precisely because of illegal practices by those who were also advising Ms. Clinton:

“The records the White House released yesterday were part of an investigative file from 1979, when the exchange charged Bone and Refco with violations of its record keeping and margin requirement rules. Bone was suspended for three years; Refco paid a $250,000 fine, then the largest in the exchange's history. Internal memos from that investigation cover transactions from the same period in June in which Clinton was trading, but not the same trades. In one instance, the Merc found Bone and a fellow broker were ordering 1,000 cattle contracts at a time – far over the limit allowed at the time – and then allocating them to other customers.”

Conclusion – the public has a right to know about both. They can then make up their own minds based on what they know. Horrors!

18. “What Bill Clinton or John Kerry did in the 1960s was of vital national interest but what Bush did in the 80's is irrelevant.”

There’s a good reason to treat Clinton and Kerry’s past differently from W’s – they are, in fact, different things. Clinton dodged the draft, and Kerry repudiated his own service. Bush partied hard, but unlike Clinton and Kerry, there is no evidence that he advocated the defeat of his own country’s armed forces in war, much less actively worked to make it happen. It’s also important that Clinton and Kerry are proud of their dishonorable pasts, while Bush has turned from his – he’s been clean and sober for quite some time.

19. “Trade with Cuba is wrong because the country is communist, but trade with China and Vietnam is vital to a spirit of international harmony.”

This is hardly universal. I think that some of our policy toward Cuba, in fact, is shameful – we ought to welcome anyone who tries to cross, even if they aren’t yet ashore. In fact, I’d have the Coast Guard patrolling international waters to rescue and welcome to America anyone they can reach. And that truck with the homemade 55-gallon pontoons would be on permanent display in the Smithsonian as an example of what lengths people will go to in pursuit of freedom – except for the Fourth of July, when it would be paraded down Broadway and showered with ticker tape.

There are, however, one or two things to consider that suggest that it isn’t hypocrisy to treat Cuba and China differently. First, Cuba is about 1/10,000th the size, and second, China is a nuclear power that could incinerate several of our allies in the Pacific Rim. It deserves a little consideration – dare I say, a little nuance?

20. “Affirmative Action is wrong, but it is OK for Bush's Daddy and his friends (here and in Saudi Arabia) to get him to graduate from Yale without studying much, to dodge the draft in the Texas Air National Guard, to bail out his companies (Harken Oil and the Texas Rangers), to get the Governorship of Texas and then to have the Supreme Court appoint him President of the USA.”

Here, at we careen into the homestretch, we are beginning to see frothing and fatigue. This whole screed wobbles precariously on one quite unlikely point, like an upside-down pyramid - somehow the Bush family secretly runs everything. (I mean, hasn't anyone heard of the Illuminati or Xenu? Get your secret cabals straight!)

First, I have no idea how anyone from the House of Saud has anything to do with running the undergraduate program at Yale. Bush didn’t do any worse than Kerry in the Ivy League; maybe the French helped Kerry skate by?

Second, entering the National Guard is enlistment. How does one dodge the draft by volunteering for the armed forces? One may as well say that I dodged my last temp assignment by finding a full-time job, or dodged traffic court by paying the fine three weeks in advance.

Third – Harken Oil was not Bush’s company. It took over Bush’s company. It’s not uncommon for companies to purchase competitors, even ones that are insolvent. It could be for the tax write-offs, for access to new markets, or to reorganize and then resell the acquisition… Whether or not this involved people Bush knew doesn’t seem like a big deal. Most people just call that “networking.” Likewise, the Texas Rangers purchase – Bush was one of many investors. The team got a sweetheart stadium deal from the City of Arlington that people like to suggest as evidence of the eeeevil of W. Such a deal was par for the course, however, in the 90’s, which saw a huge boom in stadium construction: Baltimore’s Camden Yards, Chicago’s New Comiskey Park (since renamed), Cleveland’s Jacobs Field… The trend has accelerated, with new ball parks also going up in Seattle, Houston, Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Milwaukee, Detroit, Philadelphia, and San Francisco – and that’s just baseball. AND that doesn’t include new stadia built specifically for expansion teams, such as Denver’s Coors Field, Bank One Ballpark in Arizona, or the Trop in Tampa.

Bush (along with his fellow owners) pulled in a good profit on the sale of the team, ten years later. This ought to be expected in the midst of a boom in the value of sports franchises. (Tom Hicks, who bought the Rangers for $250 mil, could sell the team today for a tidy profit of $76 million.) What's more, the Texas Rangers were a terrible mess before Bush's team bought them - a bad team in a crappy facility with woeful attendance. By the time Hicks took over, they had the new facility, in which millions of fans watched their most successful seasons, led by major stars stars such as Juan Gonzalez and Ivan Rodriguez. (An excellent book called "Seasons in Hell," talks about these days in gory detail.)

Fourth – and most importantly – Bush was twice elected Governor, and since then, twice elected President. I’m reasonably sure that he doesn’t have 60 million relatives (with about 2.3 million in Texas alone), so his support was broader than merely family.

21. “You are a conservative, but it is OK to spend like there is no tomorrow and run up deficits that your grandchildren will have to pay, while at the same refunding as much tax money as possible to rich people who do not need it.”

Anyone who thinks that “(R)” stands for “conservative” hasn’t been listening to McCain, Chafee, Snowe, or Specter for the past ten years. This could easily and more truthfully be turned around – you are a liberal, so it is OK to complain about Republicans whether they seek to cut or increase government spending, while completely not noticing the Democrats' role in the growth of federal government's budget and scope. But as it stands, the above statement betrays a flawed argument common on the modern Left – rich people don’t need the money, therefore it is allowed (indeed, laudable) to take it by force of law. Philosophically, it’s part of the larger trend toward class warfare, fueled by the firm belief that wealth is de facto proof of dishonesty and greed, matched only by the belief that the Left Knows Best where our own money is concerned.

I’ll gladly grant that the current Congress is spending like a pack of drunken sailors, which even in peacetime would be irresponsible. But I’m not going to bitch if they pass some tax cuts, even if they do give back more money to other people. Soros earned his, and I earned mine, and I don’t begrudge him his extra million. Where does he get off begrudging me my extra hundred? If rich Democrats really think the government doesn’t do enough for the poor, they have the same freedom as every other citizen to give to their favorite charity, or the local panhandlers, or whatever they please. The key there is, whatever they please; not whatever the government so orders.

That brings us to our stirring conclusion:

“Contemplating these illogical paradoxes can take a toll on a healthy mind.”

They sure can, but this three-part guide should get you through the worst of it safely. For example - a paradox is not the same as straight illogic. The word they’re looking for is “contradiction,” since paradox, by definition, is something that only seems contradictory on the surface. My service to you, the reader!

“So if a friend of yours has been acting a bit dazed and confused lately, be nice: he or she may be a Republican.”

And can you blame this hypothetical friend? Half the people he knows think him daft and wish him ill, and he has to spend all day refuting the dullest, silliest misconceptions about his positions on life and society. No wonder I've gone a bit peculiar.

Seven and the Ragged Fisking

[Welcome to part II of the mass fisk of alleged Republican stupidity! Part one is here, holding #1-7 of “things Republicans must believe.” Part three will arrive tomorrow.]

8. “If condoms are kept out of schools, adolescents won't have sex.”

Grossly simplified. The position is a bit subtler: schools are meant to teach children math, science, history, and language, leaving the teenagers’ proposed love affairs to the guidance of parents, clergy, and doctors. This, you’ll note, does not question whether condom usage is good or bad, only their elevation to “school necessity” on par with textbooks and teachers’ pay.

One could argue further that condoms mask consequences for sex and thus undermine learning how to handle adult privileges with responsibility; but again, that would be an argument between the kids and their parents, not kids and their teachers.

9. “A good way to fight terrorism is to belittle our long-time allies, but then demand their cooperation and money.”

Belittle? Such as: “Romania and Bulgaria were particularly irresponsible. If they wanted to diminish their chances of joining Europe they could not have found a better way.”

Or: “France is doing everything it can, but the problem is that it is impossible to stop Bush from pursuing his logic of war to the end.”

Of course, those are quotes ABOUT the Coalition and George Bush from Jacques Chirac. But credit for the consistency – they aren’t on board with the war even when it flares up within their own borders.

10. “HMOs and insurance companies make huge profits and have the interest of the public at heart.”

Whether or not any company makes a profit is a matter of public disclosure and not political voting record. But of course they don’t have the interest of the public at heart. Like any other business, they have the interests of their sharholders at heart. That’s why there are proposed alternatives, such as letting individuals set aside pre-tax income for medical expenses, under their direct control and outside the reach of HMOs.

The Democratic alternative can best be described as “mass government takeover.” A cynic may look at that and think that politicians were simply envious of insurers’ profits and hoping to get their hands in the pie themselves. I’m not that bitter, but I don’t like the thought of an already-overlarge state apparatus, creating yet another department (with all of its bureaucratic overhead) to take control of people’s ability to pay for medical services. It doesn’t sit right with the notion of a well-informed and active citizenry; and more practically speaking, it doesn’t work. “Good money after bad” is never a sound plan. (And as you’ll see in #21, rampant government spending is a Bad Thing, a realization that comes late to the Left.)

11. “Providing health care to all Iraqis is sound policy. Providing health care to all Americans is socialism.”

I missed where we were ‘providing health care’ to Iraqis. We’re building hospitals and training doctors, and the most reliable sources of medical care are currently military doctors or civilian outfits attached to the military. But the main difference between part one and two of the above is that nobody expects us to provide health care to Iraq for the rest of our lives. And the second difference, not really much smaller, is that health care is readily available to all Americans, as well as to anyone else who happens to be sick. Every emergency room in the nation has notices in multiple languages: nobody can be turned away, even if they have no insurance provider and no means to pay.

This raises difference number three – the issue isn’t who gets care, but who pays for that care. Some people propose that the government ought to, and that is socialism – “A philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy; its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery.” (Winston Churchill)

12. “Global warming and tobacco's link to cancer are junk science, but creationism should be taught in schools.”

The global warming debate centers not so much on whether it’s happening, but on whether man is at fault or merely the witness of long geological cycles. Nobody seriously proposes or thinks that smoking isn’t linked to cancer. Some people merely state that the right to smoke, risks be damned, belongs to the citizen. You’d be hard-pressed to find a lot of consensus on creationism, either. Certain hard-core conservatives are way, way down on intelligent design or the thought of having it in the schools. (I've got an eye cocked askance, myself - see point #8 above.)

13. “It is okay that the Bush family's Carlisle Group has done millions of business with the bin Laden family.”

It’s Carlyle, actually – formed in 1987 by nobody named Bush, and never owned by anyone from the family. W was on the board for about two years, ending in 1992. His father served for five years, ending in 2003. Some others associated with the group: Clinton administration honchos Mack McLarty (White House Chief of Staff), William Kennard (then-FCC Chairman, now Managing Director of Media for Carlyle ), and Arthur Levitt (then-SEC Chairman, now a Carlyle Senior Advisor). Oh, yes, and George Soros.

The bin Laden family divested from Carlyle in late 2001, thus denying everyone, Republican or Democrat, the pleasure of their business.

14. “Saddam was a good guy when Reagan armed him and Rumsfeld reassured him he was our buddy, a bad guy when Bush's daddy made war on him, a good guy when Cheney did business with him, but then a bad guy again when Bush junior needed a prop for his re-election campaign as the war President.”

Once again, spectacularly incorrect. Saddam Hussein was NEVER a good guy. The US supported him against the Ayatollah, in a war which Henry Kissinger once famously hoped that both sides would lose. Under George H Bush the US cooperated in a joint operation against him, officially under the banner of the United Nations. Failure to remove him permanently was hailed by way too many people as an excellent sign of restraint, which was then used by Hussein against the interests and safety of the American people. (Again – bad guy, not good.)

The alternative to correcting this initial mistake, as openly stated by many on the Left, is that he should have been left there. That’s an excellent way to look good in the eyes of appeasers, but rather less helpful in actually doing anything about terrorism.

[This is too much fun, really. And just think, part III is just ‘round the corner… For those who came in halfway, here’s part I.]

Easy to be hard

The following is stolen from a blogger who stole an email from his sister...

“It resonated with my very soul,” he gushed. Given that kind of press I had to read it for myself. Alas – I’d seen it before. It’s been winging around the Interweb with “FW:” stuck to the front like gum under a school desk.

It’s a little long to share with you all at one hunk, like he did, but I thought I’d have a go at providing some rebuttals… Look for the second and third thirds in a little while. For now:

“It is very tough to be a Republican in 2006, because somehow, you have to believe concurrently that:”

Hey! My manifesto is finally here! Thank the Maker – the Rove Rays have been faint lately.

1. “Jesus loves you, but shares your deep hatred of homosexuals and Hillary Clinton.”

Hm. All Republicans are Christians, and all Republicans “hate” homosexuals and Hilary Clinton. News to Tainted Bill, I’m sure. Let’s just confine ourselves to the Christian Republicans, then. How many hate homosexuals? Was there a poll I missed? Hilary, I could see where you get that idea, although my own point of view (being a Christian and all) is that I don’t care much for her proposals for our government. As a voter, I’m allowed that much. But hate her? I’ve never met her.

Back to gays and lesbians. I’m still trying to figure out the hate thing. Presumably it’s the assumption based on two things: Romans chapter 1 and opposition to same-sex marriage. My own observation is that the first is interpreted variously, and the second is hardly universal.

2. “The United States should get out of the United Nations, but our highest national priority is enforcing UN resolutions against other nations.”

Incorrect. The highest national priority is defending the nation. Whether UN resolutions support or oppose this goal is immaterial.

3. “Standing Tall for America means firing your workers and moving their jobs to India.”

Hell, I think we should have a stronger manufacturing base. Should I turn in my W bumper sticker?

4. “A woman cannot be trusted with decisions about her own body, but multinational corporations can make decisions affecting all humankind without regulation.”

Oy. Humankind is a crappy word. Use “mankind” or “humanity,” not both at once. OH – ok, back to the fisk. How are abortion legislation and interstate commerce related? If the author is actually trying to make a point about how much profit Planned Parenthood makes from this practice, we may be going somewhere…

Anyway, I think someone’s mistaking “less regulation” with “no regulation.” There are already plenty of laws in place controlling how people conduct their business affairs. But there’s one glaring difference being glossed here – one is always free NOT to buy whatever is being offered for sale, a freedom that a child in utero does not have.

5. “Being a drug addict is a moral failing and a crime, unless you're a conservative radio host. Then it's an illness and you need our prayers for your recovery.”

Rush bashing is fun! Apparently, the reverse is true – drug addiction is a disease deserving treatment, unless you’re Rush, in which case he ought to be driven from the airwaves. But leaving that aside - who said this? Who ever said that ONLY a few people deserve prayer? And whoever said that you can’t also pray for someone who’s gone to jail for his crimes? I mean, people prayed for Tookie Williams, right?

6. “The best way to improve military morale is to praise the troops in speeches, while slashing veterans' benefits and combat pay.”

Silly GOP. The best way to improve military morale is to undermine support for their missions with one’s every utterance, and to spit on veterans in parades and call them baby killers!

No, no – that’s not an answer. If this accusation is true, it is shameful, especially in wartime. My search so far, however, turns up evidence (according to this site) that monthly pay has gone up from 2004 to 2005 to 2006. This is just base pay, not accounting for housing and food allowances, health benefits, and so on. Neither could I find the combat scales. We’ll have to score this one a draw until I can get more information – in fact, I may as well go begging. Cullen? Ms. Sister?

7. “Group sex and drug use are degenerate sins, unless you someday run for governor of California as a Republican.”

Well, I won’t cut and paste from number 5, that’s lazy. But if you checked, I think you’d find some skeletons in a lot of Democrats’ closets, as well – or in some cases, in Democrats’ cars, at the bottom of a canal.

[More? Sure, why not! Part II is now up, and part III will follow in due time…
update - ok, it's due time.]

I have no post, so I must meme

Right now I'm stumped... Ebb tide, no juice, no ideas, no enthusiasm; it's too nice a day to be of so grey a mind, so I'm going out to rollerblade fall down lots while the weather is nice. But I will leave you with this: the Three Things Meme.

Things you do when you’re -
Sad -
1. mope; 2. sleep; 3. think about how much worse things could be instead.
Bored -
1. mope; 2. sleep; 3. take epic walks (we're talking on the order of five miles or more).
Happy -
1. write; 2. seek out friends for good long talks (usually over a meal); 3. sing (poorly).
Angry -
1. kvetch; 2. write (but much less productively); 3. cuss. (As Twain wrote, "When angry, count four. When very angry, swear.")

Places you’ve been -
1. South of the Border. The kitschiest place on earth.
2. NYC. A collective salute to the City that Sleepeth Not - I've actually gotten a chance to do a fair amount of neat stuff in the city: Broadway, Central Park, the Intrepid, a couple of nice restaurants, a concert, and even Windows on the World, before the end.
3. Down the Shore. I've never stayed in a bed and breakfast or anything like that, but I've been able to hit a lot of the landmarks: Ocean City, Ocean Grove, Red Bank, "Sleazeside," Jenkinson's, Wildwood, and the Sodom by the Sea itself, Atlantic City. If you're in shouting distance of the Jersey Shore, you ought to take advantage and check out the sights.

Places you’d like to be -
1. Nassau Coliseum. I've seen the Islanders play in the Garden, the Meadowlands, and in Philly - but not in their own arena.
2. My own home. I've yet to earn my way out of shared living arrangements. Some have been much nicer than others, but it would still be pleasant to have my own front door before much longer.
3. In print. I think that this is closely linked to #2.

What’s the last thing you -
Watched on the tube - I saw the Sopranos last night. This brings my total number of episodes to six. It's not bad stuff.
Heard on CD/radio - currently listening to one of the many PC mixes, a 60/70 pop blend, as it turns out. The last three songs were Al Stewart's "Year of the Cat," Van Morrison's "And it Stoned Me," and the Bee Gees' "Nights on Broadway."
Read in the news - the FEC affirms that blogging on political issues is protected speech. (w/t to the Coalition, as usual)

Three memories -
1. I was very small, maybe five or six. I was in the car with my parents driving home from someplace or another, and bawling my eyes out, unconsolably, for reasons long forgotten. But I remember the song on the radio - Barry Manilow, "Looks Like We Made It." That's why I held silent while Sheila and company had their little Manilowpalooza - they brook no guff on this topic, and I am stuffed with guff. It's not Barry's fault, but he happened to be the soundtrack to the first abject misery of my conscious life. Them's the breaks.
2. I was there when my brother took his first steps - from me to our mother, and then back again. He was the happiest kid in the world.
3. Our arch-rivals, the Mad Surfers, had the better of us one day. We were down 9-2, just getting mugwhumped. With ten seconds left, one of their players gets the bright idea of calling time-out, in order to pull their goalie for an extra attacker. "We never get to practice that sort of thing," the little snot told me in the handshake line. "The next time we play, you'll need that time-out," I shot back. We met in the league championship the next month. Final score - Rockets 3, Mad Surfers 1, with 26 saves for your humble narrator. Hells yeah.

Three favorite things -
1. Reading. There's a reason I didn't list this in the first section, "things you do when ____." I'm always reading, regardless; the real surprise is that for all my consumption of printed words, I'm not that well-read compared with my peers.
2. Sports. Grew up watching, and going out to run around with whatever ball was in season at the time. Another real surprise - for all my running, jumping, dribbling, and passing, I'm not all that coordinated. I get by more on reflexes and practice than I do on raw skill.
3. Music. The radio was on all the time. Mom tells me that, as a wee tot, I would stand in my playpen and bob up and down in time to whatever was on. My favorite is reported to have been Paul Simon's "Kodachrome."

Three pastimes -
1. You're reading it right now. Some of you have also read more conventional examples of my favorite pastime.
2. Games - board games (including a few I've invented), computer games, games of chance and skill, more conventional athletic contests... I'm a competitve creature.
3. I'm dating right now - six months and counting. Pastime seems like a poor choice of word for it, actually. Blessing is obvious, and adventure is accurate but a little deceptive if you don't know me well. I have an imaginative and romantic turn of mind that turns errands into quests and day trips into fantastic journeys. Come to think of it, that's probably why I'm always writing and singing... But whatever you call it, I'm happy.

Three reasons I’m not tagging anyone –
1. It never works, anyway.
2. I'm going to assume that people either already have their subject matter for the day and won't need the nudge, or will like the idea and do it on their own.
3. Time's a-wasting. As I said before, I have falling down to do.