The BCS (and Bill Gates) says: “You Will Be Assimilated”

Okay, this’ll be the last anti-BCS rant of the 2010 season.  Before that, however, a couple of pieces of housecleaning:

• Regarding my tweet last week which read “(Eric Cartman voice) ‘I hate you, Kyle Brotzman. I hate you so very, very much.”: Given today’s uptight, “everything you say has the potential to incite a new Columbine/Oklahoma City” culture, not to mention the fact that the Kyle actually received threats this past week, I feel obligated to state that I WAS KIDDING.  Although I’m still a little pissed that the Broncettes couldn’t bring home the BCS bacon; we Fresno State fans were REALLY counting on that check, fellas.

• Bruce Feldman last Saturday posted that part of the reason Boise lost was because they hadn’t been tested to that point, and therefore didn’t have the mental makeup to pull it out in a close game.  I’ll go one step further: All of those easy wins may have given them an inflated sense of self-worth, especially by boat-racing my beloved ‘Dogs the week before.  So Nevada, once again, You’re Welcome.

• An addendum to my last post about how much difference being in a strong conference makes: Witness the 5 teams left behind when the old SWC disbanded with the 4 teams that got left behind.  Arkansas lucked out and landed on its feet in the SEC, and TCU recently finally stepped back into the AQ promised land with its recent move the Big East (more on that in a moment),  but the other three- SMU, Rice, and Houston- never achieved half the accolades they did when part of that conference.  And what attracts recruits, teams, etc. to a conference?  The chance to play in a meaningful bowl game. No kid grows up dreaming of his team playing in the New Mexico Bowl.  Well, with the possible exception of kids in the ‘No, where they could be forgiven for thinking it was the only bowl available, since it’s where Fresno State seems to end up every year.  (The ‘Dogs perpetual relegation to the NM bowl reminds me of Spurrier’s old quip that you could spell “Citrus” [Bowl; now the Capital One Bowl, where the SEC's 2nd or 3rd best team historically goes] without “UT.” [University of Tennessee]  There’s a joke in there somewhere, but it’s not hitting me at the moment.)

So on to the rant.  Watching TCU’s defection to the Big East, it finally hit me what the tactics of the BCS remind me of: The browser wars of the late 90s-early Oughts.  Like Microsoft, it has simply changed the terms of the game by packaging substandard programs (we’re looking at you, Big East) within their market-hogging monolithic operating system.  And similar to Bill Gates business m.o., the BCS’ tactics have the binary simplicity of the Borg: Either you will be assimilated (Utah, TCU) or annihilated (pretty much every one else).  I remember casually following the Netscape-Internet Explorer dual as it inevitably moved from the marketplace to the courts, where Microsoft dragged out the proceedings until Netscape effectively had been marginalized to where, even as they won the battle, they lost the war.

So it is now with the non-AQ conferences.  Realistically, the BCS is playing a zero-sum game, with even some of its own conferences being squeezed (we’re looking at you again, John Marinatto).  Looking at a number of factors, not the least of which are viability of media markets, schools which exist in rich recruiting areas (a HUGE factor in the Big East’s acquisition of TCU), and historical relevance vis a vis appearing semi-regularly in the Top 25, there are to my thinking only two conferences that stand a chance of getting promoted up to The Bigs: The Mountain West and Conference USA.  The other conferences- the MAC, the Sun Belt, and the now depleted WAC- simply have not been relevant at the FBS level in this decade, and are not likely to be any time soon.

However, it’s not time for the MWC and Conference USA to break out the party hats.  The Borg-like assimilation of both conferences’ best teams are likely to continue, which means that, it’s far more likely that they will be raided and thereby marginalized than eventually meeting the criteria to become AQ conferences.  To be more specific, I think it’s only a matter of time that the Pac 12 is successful in courting Texas and Oklahoma.  Once they go, the Big 12 will have no choice but to steal teams from the MWC and C-USA conferences to stay viable.  If, say, the Dallas and Houston schools, as well as Boise State, end up in the Big 12, that would effectively neuter the Mountain West and Conference USA to the point that they would most likely be relegated to the MAC/Sun Belt level of college football: FBS conferences in name only.

To be clear, I am hoping, I am praying, I am sacrificing a Chik-Fil-A sandwich on my Lee Corso Commemorative Alter that I’m wrong and that both conferences eventually are accepted as automatic qualifiers (in truth, I hope that before 2020, college football will adopt a playoff system, but I relegate such pipe dreams to the same dreamland where money grows on trees and the streams and rivers flow with Sierra Nevada Pale Ale).  But it’s like my father says: Hope in one hand, s*** in the other.  See which one fills up first.  And nobody s***s on the little guy like the Bulls*** Creation Series.

A Boatload of Thanksgiving Turkeys

I know it’s a day late, but I am just filled with thanks, mainly centered around college football, strangely enough.

On behalf of the rest of the WAC, I am thankful for Boise State being completely useless.  My loathing of the fact that I have to root for the Broncos so that Fresno State might get a taste of the BCS dollars they bring in is well-chronicled.  To watch them gak the game the way they did, well, I just threw up in my mouth.  A lot.

Oh, and by the way, I am thankful for Nevada for doing what the ‘Dogs couldn’t, and in so doing, screwing both themselves and Fresno State.  Before the win, most projections had the ‘Pack going to the KFH Bowl in S.F.; now, the Broncs will most likely get that slot, which means that the ‘Pack wins a glorious trip to… the Humanitarian Bowl.  Congrats, gents.  All of which means that Pat Hill‘s boys end up in… New Mexico.  Again.  And now that vomit in my mouth is starting to become a kind of mouthwash.

I’m thankful AGAIN to the Broncos for giving ammunition to E.G.G.- head (that’s E. Gordon Gee, the prez of Ohio State for the uninitiated) in his assertion that major non-AQ teams don’t really play anybody.  Don’t care that Nevada could probably beat every Big 10 but the three top teams; the national perception is that Boise should have boat-raced the ‘Pack.

That said, I’m thankful that the OSU president’s dumb*** remarks give me a chance to take YET ANOTHER shot at Ohio State, who ritually get ridiculed in national media outlets for their lack of production in games that count (read: BCS games).  Gee dismissed the whole notion of non-conference scheduling mattering, which is understandable, when one views the OOC scheduling pattern for THE Ohio Blahblahblah: One challenging AQ game, followed by FCS and MAC teams. One might wonder why OSU would play the MAC schools and risk the possibility of getting upset, thereby strengthening the recruiting power of a, say, Bowling Green.  That is, until you look at the MAC schools rankings over the past decade and realize that they’ve rarely posed a threat to the Ohio States of the world.  In case you didn’t sense the sarcasm in the previous 2 sentences, let me share my e-mail to my man Ivan Maisel (pre-Gee announcement) to drive it home:

Gotta love the PHENOMENAL hypocrisy that AQ supporters display when they talk about Boise St. and TCU’s non-conference schedule.  Let’s see if I have this right: Ohio St. supporters [I originally included more schools; I’m truncating this deliberately to stick it to the Buckeyes even more] want Boise to come to their place, play for significantly less than what another FBS patsies would command (a salute to San Jose State here.  They got paid, but, boy, did they pay for it), and get no return date?  Oh, and on those rare occasions when they actually do man up and commit to a home-and-home, they back out of the back end once a more lucrative game comes their way.

It must be wonderful to live in AQ world.  They’re like Floyd Mayweather: They can continue to look good by ducking the fight AND claim they would’ve beaten the other guy because he hasn’t fought anyone- and is probably on steroids anyway.  [And… WHAH-CHAH!]

And to twist the knife even further, let’s burst E.G.G.-head’s bubble regarding the AQs alleged superiority to non-AQs because of their strong conference schedules.  Uh, E.G.G., don’t know how to break this to you, but in the same way that the Pac 10 for most of the Oughts was considered to be SC and the 9 Dwarves, the Big 10 was for that same period mostly considered OSU and the 10 Dwarves.   BTW, this is all you need to know about how most of the academic world views E.G.G. as a university president.

At the end of the day, what gets ignored in the “AQ schools play a tougher conference schedule that non-AQs” argument is that it is precisely those BCS bucks/prestige that make the AQ conference schools tougher.  Where the Big 10, say, on any given year has it over the Mountain West is that teams 6-11 are tough.  Why?  They’re attracting blue-chip athletes.  Why? Not being competitive, that’s for sure (Indiana and Vanderbilt, we’re looking at you).  No, it’s the top flight facilities and the ability to play in the Big House once every other year.  Do you think if, say, UNLV, could lobby recruits with improved facilities financed with BCS dollars, AND the lure of possibly ending up in a BCS bowl, AND getting to play in San Diego and Hawaii once every other year, that might make them more competitive?

I’ll give the final word to Maisel again.

Listen, you can’t apply logic to any argument anybody makes in this whole BCS free-for-all, because every argument, if you listen to it too closely falls apart like an old T-shirt. The people in the [AQs] have a point about the strength of schedule with the non-AQs. But they don’t care enough that they would actually play those teams and solve the problem. The [AQs] wants some sort of historical waiver because of what they’ve done, but we can’t consider Boise State’s body of work over the last few years[Admittedly, this comment was written on Wednesday, so just take it in the spirit in which...blah, blah, blah]. So, just always keep a grain of salt handy.

Gaahhdd, I hope that Michigan wins tomorrow.

Terminated 4: Decline of the Machine

Another post-lette for today.  The cooling fan on my MacBook is acting up, so I literally had to stick the computer in the freezer for about 10 minutes right now just to get it to the place where it would be usable.  All so I could bring these pearls of wisdom to you.  Maybe more like cubic zirconium.  Either way, they will shimmer, they will shine, you will ooh, and you will ahh.

Still recovering from Fresno State’s absolute pasting last night at the hands of BSU.  While not making excuses for my boys, I give you the following pre-game quote from Winston Venable, Boise State strong safety:

“I don’t think we’re too into style points. If you want style points, you get Kellen Moore and Titus Young throwing fade balls in the fourth quarter.”

Which is pretty much what happened.  Not just once, but TWICE (the first time failed).   So when Venable, Petersen, et al, said that style points don’t matter, they would be… what’s that word… LYING.  Understand, I’m not mad at BSU; okay, that’s not true.  Still, everybody knows that, sadly, style points are necessary in the current system if you want to play in a BCS game, and even more so if you want to play in the Big Game.  It’s when you try to convince us otherwise that we start to laugh.  Although the ‘Dogs lost, my consolation prize will be watching St. Christopher of Petersen dodge, “Did you run it up to score BCS points?” all week.  B.S. U, indeed.

Saw where Hollinger had columns on back-to-back days regarding high-profile NBA centers and their injury problems.  First up was Yao Ming on Wednesday; not much else to say there, other than the Rockets need to trade him.  His ceiling at this point is Ilgauskas 2.0, not great for someone who as little as two years ago was an NBA All-Star.  But where can he go?  All the places that would seem to fit for him- and I believe Daryl Morey would go to great pains to find out where Yao wants to go; no way he ends up in Milwaukee, say- don’t need a center.  The Knicks and Golden State, two teams located in areas with a large Chinese population, don’t need a slow, aging center to clog up the middle with their 7-seconds-or-less offenses.  Other teams, like the Lakers, Bulls, and Nets don’t need a center, period.  So what’s left.  Maybe the Clips; I hear Donald Sterling is very fond of Asians.  Especially when he’s looking for prospective tenants.

Then on Thursday, Johnny H. tackled The Dong Texter himself, Greg Oden.  At this point all the Durant v. Oden stuff has been hashed and rehashed, but one additional question for Paul Allen and Co.: If your franchise has a history of acquiring centers with dodgy health histories, and one of the two guys you want to draft is a center with a dodgy health history, don’t you HAVE to go with the other guy, just so you don’t have to hear it from all quarters when the guy inevitably ends up on the Disabled List?  It’s like if I’d dated a couple of girls named Jenn with daddy issues.  If I started to see another Jenn, and I find out that Dad was never around, and she’s a former stripper, don’t I have think twice about continuing to date her, if for no other reason than I don’t want my buddies to bust my balls about it when it all falls to s***?   I know hindsight is 20/20 and it may seem cheap and easy to say this now.  That said, if you’re the Blazers, you knew she was a former stripper, and as Colin Cowherd says, “Date the stripper, don’t marry the stripper.”  The Blazers are married to the stripper now.  This analogy now seems wildly inappropriate in light of Oden’s aforementioned texting incident.  Stop talking, Cannon.

I have more, but not sure how much more my computer has to give.  “I just want to post my blog.”  “Sorry, Loose [yes, that is my ACTUAL first name], I’m afraid I just can’t do that.”

2001.  Anyone?  Anyone?  Bueller?   Bueller?

The Future Mountain (Wild) West

We’re a mere hour away from Fresno State-Boise State, and I’m trying to mentally steel myself for the inevitable asswhuppin’ that will ensue. (Reverse jinx cast: check.)  As I’ve mentioned in this space before, even if we lose, we win if the Broncos make it to a BCS bowl.  Cold comfort to be sure.  A bit like consoling yourself with the money you got from your sugar mama wife in the divorce, only you now a 40-something divorcee and only get to see your kids on alternate weekends.  But at least you can afford a bitchin’ home theater system to watch football games on.

Read last night where Hawaii is now the latest rat to possibly jump the sinking WAC ship.  I like this move; it almost completes the evisceration of of the conference by the Mountain West.  Furthermore, Fresno State has to be thrilled with the proposed terms of the move, which would add the Rainbow Warriors as a football-only member, which means that the Bulldogs don’t have to worry about getting worked by the Rainbow Wahine every year in volleyball and softball.  I have to think that Utah State will be the next to go, if for no other reason than to reclaim the Salt Lake City TV market that will be lost once BYU becomes an independent.  At this point, Karl Benson has to be feeling a bit like Monica during that “Friends” episode where they throw dueling birthday parties for Rachel: “Ya know, my conference is fun. I mean, maybe it’s a little quieter, less obvious sorta fun but, you know, if people would just give it a chance…”  Which in this analogy would make Craig Thompson… Phoebe?

If Utah State or another bandied-about possibility, Houston, join the conference, the MWC will be up to magic number of 12, perhaps as soon as 2012.  (BTW, if Houston’s amenable, it’s the far more likely possibility; historically higher-ranked team plus a MUCH bigger TV market.)  At that point, I can’t see how the BCS leaves them out of the equation in 2014, when the BCS board considers possible new member conferences.  As a Fresno State fan, I’m loving Craig Thompson‘s work a bit more every day.  Keep it up, C.T., or, in athlete-speak, stay aggressive.

Grapeshot II: Grapeshotter (-ier?)

A bit of a slow week for current events/pop culture happenings that might inspire me to write more than 500 words.  So of course that means, More Grapeshot!

******

Read Rick Reilly‘s Mailbag column this week.  There was an a**-  whoops, wait, my mother always taught me, if you can’t say anything nice…. Anywho, this individual wrote in to respond to Rick’s column regarding the flaws in the BCS computers and how they need to be rejiggered so that teams like Boise St. don’t continually get leapfrogged by inferior teams from AQ conferences.  According to Mike from Cleveland:

If Boise State wants to be seen as legitimate, they can play Ohio State, Alabama, Oklahoma, Oregon, etc., on the road. I’m sure OSU would take a home game vs visiting Boise. They would also win by 14.

With apologies to Daniel Tosh, “Let’s put 20 seconds on the clock and see how many holes I can poke in Buckeye Mike’s argument.”

1. Um, actually Mike the problem is your d-bag team WON’T schedule challenging teams from non-AQ conferences instead of Cupcake U.  Boise can’t get those games because YOUR team is being… how to put this diplomatically… pansy-asses.  Don’t get it twisted.

2. On those occasions a team like the Buckeyes does schedule a program like Boise (or my boys, Fresno State) it’s invariably a one-off or 2-for-1 arrangement which totally benefits the AQ school.  Let’s see: OSU gets a home date, all the gate receipts, concessions, etc., while paying out a pittance to the non-AQ challenger.  As opposed to scheduling a doormat like a San Jose State, who gets paid upward of $750,000 to be the designated sacrificial lamb, the Fresno States of the world have to beg for the game, then get a payout nowhere near the level of Cupcake U., because OSU knows the Dogs, Broncos, et al., need the game more than they need the money.

3. Oh, and to make things fun, on those rare occasions where the AQ school agrees to a home-and-home, once their home date is played, they… wait for it… back out of the game like the a**holes they are.

(I realize that was way over 20 seconds; sue me.)

Mike, it’s clear that your boys are supremely confident that they will beat the Dogs or the Broncos by 2 touchdowns, minimum.  That’s why they’ve scheduled non-AQ powerhouses Toledo, UAB, Akron, and Miami(Ohio).  Because all of those teams regularly are in the Top 25.  Ooops, sorry, I have backwards: None of those schools is regularly in the Top 25.  3 of those schools are from the MAC, which would be the shittiest FBS conference were it not for the Sun Belt Conference existing, however marginally.

The delusional AQ fans like Mike need to do the world a favor and lock themselves in their team-themed man-caves for both their own safety and the safety of society.  ‘Cause if you’re that out of touch with reality, you’re a menace to society.  Full stop.

*****

Overreaction Monday (©2010 Colin Cowherd) came a bit late this week with the Heat’s loss to the Green Machine on Thursday night.  Setting aside the various diagnoses from NBA experts far and wide, a thought occurred to me today: What if the Heat turn out to be the NBA version of a hot baseball team?  The rules are pretty simple for MLB postseason success: You just need at least 2 hot starting pitchers you can ride to 4 wins per series.  There’s other stuff needed of course, but you can go a long way in October with great starting pitching.  Maybe that’s what’s going to happen with the Heat.  Like baseball, when the playoffs start, rotations tighten and innings (or minutes) increase for your frontline guys.  Miami still scares the hell out of me because they have another gear or two left, particularly if the Superfriends are all playing 45 minutes/game.  Don’t fool yourselves, folks, the Heat are going to be a force come late April.  Bank on it.

(That said, I still don’t think they’ll beat the Celts to get out of the East.)

*****

Finally, in the category of “Thank God we got that settled,” researchers have evidently figured out how cats drink.  The best part?  “The project required no financing. The robot that mimicked the cat’s tongue was built for an experiment on the International Space Station, and the engineers simply borrowed it from a neighboring lab.”  Setting aside my obvious sense of relief at discovering that no tax dollars were used for this scientific endeavor, I have to ask: Tang, Velcro, now a robot cat tongue.  What will NASA think up next?

*****

BTW, not many people realize that Die Hard 2‘s full title was Die Hard 2: Die Harder. I mainly attribute that fact to the fact that it was lopped off most ads for the movie, probably because 20th Century Fox realized how doofy that sounded.

Until next time….

It’s the Sport of Kings/Better than diamond rings/it’s…

Well, the weekend’s pigskin slate is complete and I find myself of two minds on a couple of subjects.  I would like to chalk it up to the time change, but unfortunately my ambivalence on both of these issues has been ongoing for a number of weeks, and in many cases, even months or years.

Item 1: The BCS and non-AQ conference schools.  Boise St. and TCU both put on clinics this week, and barring a huge egg-laying by Boise against Nevada later this month, both figure to finish in the top 5 of the final BCS poll.  (I would like to believe that my beloved Fresno St. Bulldogs will beat the Broncos, but the ‘Dogs just struggled to put away La. Tech.  Let’s just say I’m not optimistic)  However, with respect to a non-AQ team appearing in the final game, it’s looking more Highlander-esque every day: ”There can be only one.”  At the beginning of this year, I thought a non-AQ team making the Championship game would be the one thing that might finally bring the AQ conferences to heel, and finally force them to adopt a playoff.  (Tangent: I hoped that team would be Boise, which highlights one of more galling aspects of the BCS: In order that Fresno St. can get a piece of the BCS dollars that Boise brings in and thereby grow the program, I have to root for our bitterest rival.  Of the myriad reasons that the BCS sucks, this has to be in the top 10.)  The Death Star is destroyed, the Emperor is thrown down the reactor shaft, Ewoks rejoice, etc., etc.

‘Cept I know that’s not what’ll happen.  The AQ (Always Querulous) conferences will grumble a bit how a one-loss SEC or Big 10 team didn’t get in, but they’ll also use it as Exhibit A in arguing that the system works.  “See?” they’ll say, “The little guy got in all by himself under the current system,” knowing that in all likelihood this will be at best a once-in-a-decade occurrence.  So I’m forced to root either for the almost improbable, or the possible but odious: Root for both non-AQs to get in, or root for neither of them.  The former I’m stating now is just not happening; no way Oregon loses again in the regular season.  The latter galls me for two reasons.  One, I hate rooting AGAINST the little guy; pulling for the underdog to come out on top is one of the reasons I like watching sports.  Two, the prospect of having 2 undefeated non-AQs once again would undoubtedly lead to a serious push to change the system… from Congress.  Setting aside my limited government leanings, I would like Congress to be focussed on things that, what’s that word… MATTER.  In the best of all worlds, a movement to strip the BCS of its antitrust exemption would be a bipartisan effort that, in bringing both  sides together to slay the BCS beast, will lead to lawmakers to come together, sing “Kumbaya,” and dissolve the gridlock that looks to be headed our way.  But who am I kidding?  Even if they bust the BCS, they’ll just go back to their respective trenches the next day.  Now the BCS has bummed me out even more.  “I need to stop thinking while I’m ahead.”

Item 2: The coaching turmoil in Minnie and Big D.  The latter got resolved today with the firing of the Marshmallow With a  Headset, as Colin calls Wade Phillips, but Brad Childress still miraculously has a job, which ironically is due to the play of…  Brett Favre.  (Side note: Why Jerry Jones waited this long to fire Wade and bump Garrett up to the Big Chair is beyond me.  Ostensibly Phillips was always a caretaker coach until such time as Garrish was able to take the reigns, so why it took this long is a bit of a mystery.  At least Garrish has a chance to possibly salvage his reputation, upgrade his standing from, well, garish to semi-respectable.  That sigh that you heard was every Dallas fan collectively sighing now that their hopes for the rest of the season are pinned on the performance of an O-coordinator who called a game last night where the ‘Boys had 87 yards through 3 quarters.  But I digress.)  I find that my response to both stories is similar to how I would respond to watching Sandra Bernhardt and Madonna make out: I’m repulsed, and yet I can’t look away.

Finally, like Colin Cowherd, I’m going to talk about something from outside sports, but connect it to sports in a seamless link.  Or at least I hope so.  I read this grimly trenchant article in the New Yorker about the attempt to shepherd a climate change bill through the legislative process by Senators Kerry, Leiberman, and Graham.  It was illuminating on several fronts, but the one “inside baseball” item that got me thinking was the recounting of the Gang of Three’s frustration at watching the Obama administration give away all the stuff they wanted to use as carrots to encourage cooperation (or at least lack of obstruction) from various special interests groups .  While I’m sure the White House had good reasons to put those items in other bills, it put me in mind of this exchange from “The West Wing:”

BRUNO

You were the one who sent them the press releases, right?

JOSH

What press releases?

BRUNO

Subcommittee. About tobacco.

JOSH

Yes, I was.

BRUNO

Well, that was stupid.

JOSH

Kalmbach’s a fat-ass Rotarian gasbag. I knew once I sent the thing he’d raise the profile and give us the press we needed.

BRUNO

Kalmbach is vulnerable in his home state. He’s got an influx of tech and other clean industries along his Route Nine corridor, along with the suburban voters that go with it – affluent parents that who don’t want their kids smoking.

JOSH

We got the money, Bruno.

BRUNO

You don’t want the money. You want the issue. You should have waited until the fall when the bell rings and then we hammer them with it. Then Kalmbach, Leder, Ross, Roark, Steve – whoever gets the nomination – has it hanging around their necks they’re nicotine pushers. Plus, you get the money. The sooner you get I know what I’m talking about, and I’m on your side, the sooner your world gets better. Of course, you got the money. I’m amazed they didn’t send it to you with candy and a stripper. Pennsylvania, Michigan, Ohio – three swing states you could have brought over with that. That’s an election.

All of which brought me back to… football.  I couldn’t help thinking that at least the way that Ryan Lizza portrayed it, the Obama administration got fleeced worse than Chris Wallace did on the Gasol trade.  Why? There are established guidelines in all sports for what certain commodities are worth, but none in politics.  (I know categorizing players as “commodities” probably offends most sports fans’ sense of the “thrill of victory”-tinted humanity with which they seem to view athletic endeavors, but at the end of the day, that’s what athletes are.  Ask the NFL, who are only now adopting a more “humane” policy toward head injuries after a huge dose of negative PR.)  Nowhere is this more regimented than in the National Football League, where values for players are almost as fixed as an actuarial table: An All-Pro with “x” years of service is worth a 1st round pick, unless he’s had injury troubles, then he’s worth 3rd, and so one.  So while I realize there may never be a consensus within the respective lawmaking bodies on what a given amendment in a piece of legislation is worth (especially when beating the other side is at stake, as the article and “The West Wing” scene make clear), at least legislators within a given party should be able to agree on the value of, say, a tax break for beet farmers.  Like a drunken buddy who decides to trade Chris Johnson for Terrell Owens in your fantasy league, there has to be someone in a position of power within the party to e-mail and say, “Vetoing this.  Bad trade.”

I don’t know enough about the legislative process to actually draw up the Congressional equivalent to the kind of charts that I’m sure GMs around the NFL have to make their trade decisions.  What we need is a “John Clayton of Pennsylvania Avenue” to come up with this.  Politico, et al., the gauntlet has been thrown down.

Ode to Giants Past, or This Ewe’s for Bud

So I was glad to hear that the baseball team that I root for (when I actually watch baseball) won the World Series.  I actually had not followed the S.F. Giants much this year, and didn’t really start seriously viewing them (read: watching more than one inning of a game) until they were on the verge of beating the Phillies.  In terms of bandwagon jumping, it’s a bit like trying to take a cab from the Presidio to the Golden Gate Bridge.  “Um, sir, you realize you’re kinda, uh, what’s the word I’m looking for?  HERE.”  Not sure it’s possible to be a bandwagon jumper for a team you’re ostensibly a fan of,  but if it is, I think I would’ve qualified last month.  Although due to my lukewarm affection for the game, I wasn’t so much on the bandwagon as riding on the running board, like a Chicago gangster on a Studebaker.

While the team sounds like it would’ve been a hoot to follow throughout this miraculous season, I’m more than a little pissed off, both at myself and Bud Selig.  My irritation with myself stems from the fact that I could have seen Timmy Lincecum and Bumgarner and Cain while they were playing AAA ball in Fresno, but didn’t, or couldn’t, due to various geographical and time restrictions, as well as my aforementioned aversion to baseball.  However, now that I’ve returned, Kotter-like, to the ‘No, I can’t help feeling that despite my apathy for the Grand Old Game that I should have gone to a game or two, to root, root, root, for the home team, and also for the kooky promotions that minor league baseball cooks up.

When I truly reflect on the game and its ills, though, I pause, mid-flagellation, and think of the myriad ways that Der Kommisar had made the game of baseball unpalatable to anyone but the most diehard of diehards.  Schlepping the MLB into the 21st century by not offering MLB highlights on YouTube or not allowing people who pay to see every game on MLB Extra Innings to, you know, see EVERY game?  Check.  Starting playoff games at a late enough hour that my friends in Hong Kong have a better chance of staying awake for than I do?   Check.  Allowing a steroids epidemic to render meaningless all baseball records?  Check.  In every day, in every way, Bud has shown why he has the title of “The One Commissioner that makes Gary Bettman Look Competant.”  Although, with respect to the last indictment, one of the bitterly ironic twists of the steroids era is that now, unlike Red Sox fans, or Yankees fans, I can be “thankful” I don’t have a 2002 World Series victory to try and rationalize to myself, thanks to the Giants epic meltdown that year.

While we’re on the subject, I realize I’m about 3 years late in writing about this, but one of the saving graces of the steroids era coming to an end is not having to listen to “steroid apologist guy.”   Back in 2006 when I was working in NYC doing data processing and listening to a lot of sports radio, I could count on one of these dim bulbs calling in at least once every other week to try and argue that “steroids don’t help you hit ’cause you can’t teach hand-eye coordination.”  Disregarding for a moment that this genius was most likely making the assertion because he secretly knew that the players on the team he rooted for were all juicing, there were a number of talk show hosts that were more than happy to give guys like this a forum (ahh-ahh-Erik Kus-idiot!  Sorry. Winter, mold.).  SAG would grudgingly acknowledge that maybe some muscle mass might allow a hitter to power one or two balls over the fence that wouldn’t normally go out, but that it was ridiculous to think for a second that it could replace good ‘ol eye-ball-bat.

And I would scream: SO NOT THE POINT!  It’s a real simple equation, folks: Steroids= all kinds of muscles.  Not just the slow-twitch type muscles needed by Russian weightlifters, but the fast-twitch kind used by, say, a track athlete.  In fact, the first time I remember hearing about steroids was when Ben Johnson got busted for taking them not long after the ’88 Olympics.  So help me out here: If I have really good hand-eye coordination, and I take a chemical that will give me the fast-twitch muscles necessary to hesitate that extra hundredth of second, see which way the pitch breaks BEFORE I swing, will that help at all?  You wanna see ridiculous, watch tape on Barry Bonds some time.  In ’93 he was breaking on a pitch when it was 2/3 of the way to the plate; by 2002 it was down to 1/2 way.  For a man that victimized pitchers without the juice, it was like giving a cheetah a Jaguar to make it easier for it to hunt antelope.

And now that the Giants are the toast of the town, Barry has graciously offered his services to be a…. wait for it…. hitting coach.   Setting aside the cheap jokes for a moment… okay, maybe just one: Let’s hope when he says he’ll give pointers that they aren’t the point of a needle!  Hah!  Okay, that was bad.  In all seriousness, while the Giants could certainly use some hitting help- I wouldn’t want to play either the Phils or the Rangers series again and count on these guys being able to duplicate the way they hit in those series- I think I’d rather have these amateur Emanskis coach ‘em up before I’d let Captain Balco back on the Giants ship.

So now we have a clean champion, in my Citay by the Bahh-eeyay.  Too bad I stopped caring about baseball 10 years ago and couldn’t enjoy it.

Maybe it’s just ME. Maybe it’s because I just straightened up….

I awoke this morning to discover that the Midterms were over, and in the immortal words of Whoopi Goldberg‘s alter-ego Fontaine, “I, for one, was glad, ’cause normal programming was back on the air.”  With Jon & Stephen’s rally and Election Day practically back-to-back this year, there was almost enough material to feed the 24-7 media monster.  If you are a political media junky like I am (not), it was probably a welcome break from the normal pattern of “Story du jour-ruminate(in the bovine sense)-repeat,” only using a different talking head each time for variety’s sake.  Probably like an early Christmas for the Politico crowd, but with a much greater quantity of Aquanetted hair.

Like Brett Favre’s broken ankle, I elected (punny, que no?) to skip all the media overkill and only pay attention when the game was actually played.  Actually, that’s a lie.  In both cases, I just waited for the wrap-up: The Pats-Vikings game because NBC stubbornly continues to insist on broadcasting Raiders games despite the fact that the team hasn’t been relevant for nearly a decade; and the election because, well, there were episodes of “The Good Guys” (highly underrated TV show, btw) and “Hawaii Five-O” to catch up on.

Speaking of catching up, looks like we Golden Staters are getting the Jerry Brown Experience Part 2: No Pot Brownies, Just Good Government.  Having lived through Governor Moonbeam the first time, I’m hoping that the Sactown Bee is right when they say that he is the “best-equipped candidate” to clean up California.  And that the “equipment” isn’t a bong.  We kid because we care, Jer.  Seriously, we care.  Please, for the love of God, clean up this mess.

The one storyline of this election that was interesting was the heightened nature of the electorate’s eternal dual personality disorder, largesse vs. libertarianism.  On the one side were those that felt that the American economy will recover nicely on its own, thank you very much, if government will just get out of the darn way.  On the other side of the chasm were those voters who didn’t think the government went far enough with providing aid to drag us out of the economic meltdown.  Nowhere was this more starkly seen than in Nevada, as this article from  L.A. Times last month detailed.  Ultimately, when given the choice between the “we pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps ’round here” ethos espoused by many in the state and the “Please, sir, may I have another” realpolitik, more Nevadans chose the latter, sending Harry Reid back to Washington.  Given the odiousness of both choices, I’m sure many had to be wondering if they could elect Wayne Newton through a write-in campaign.

In a fluke of the news cycle, the issue of bringing home the legislative bacon seems to have coalesced around the Silver State.  Reid’s reputation as a senator that makes sure that Nevada gets a good-sized cut of the government pie aroused the ire of one of Vegas’ biggest movers and shakers, Steve Wynn.  While I’m not nearly as pissed off as he, Wynn’s invocation of Alexis de Tocqueville‘s prescient observation that “the American Republic will endure until the day Congress discovers that it can bribe the public with the public’s money” does highlight this less-discussed other side of the political bribery coin.  We focus a great deal on the legalized payola to elected officials in the form of campaign donations by special interest groups, but comparatively little ink is spilled talking about how our elected officials essentially buy our votes through government works.  Even when these projects are necessary (and the vast majority are necessary, despite the ragings of the Tea Party), they are often tailored in such a way as to benefit a certain elected official, most often by housing the bureaucratic infrastructure within said official’s state.  Neither part of this electoral moneychanging machine is palatable, but with the corruption found in campaign finance I can at least see the strings.  The amendment that Senator Buckshot decides to slip into an appropriations bill to grease the skids in his or her reelection bid is a much tougher bit of corruption to root out, because frequently the offending party is from another state.  So, many of us reason, as long as our representative is ensuring that we get our cut of the pork in our state, well, that’s just the way that the game is played.

This sort of justification gymnastics reminds me of a great Outland comic strip where the various characters try to exercise fiscal restraint while carving out exceptions for whatever pet project happens to serve them.  In the last panel, Opus turns to the audience and says, “We have met the special interests.  And they is us!”  And that was at least a decade ago.  More than ever (as Thomas Friedman has repeatedly pointed out) there seems to been little appetite for the sort of tough love that the American public needs to hear regarding government spending.  Specifically, there seems to be no voice in Washington espousing the spending of our tax dollars on things that will both grow the economy and improve America’s longterm position as an economic powerhouse, like green tech, repairing the nation’s infrastructure, speeding up Internet services nationwide, etc.  The “What’s in it for me” dynamic in American politics has left me to wonder, like Jon Stewart, “Are we the people we were waiting for?  Or does it turn out those people are still out there and we don’t have their number?’’  If we’re not, I hope we find those persons’ contact info soon.  Like Fontaine said, “The country we save might just be our own.”

Lastly, no tour of political idiocy would be complete without a contribution from the mayor of  L.A., Anthony Villaraigosa, or as Carolla refers to him, Mayor Villaretardo.  Tony was at a small Democratic rally the other day when he dropped this bon mot praising the S.F. Giants and their World Series victory.

Tony’s lucky it’s not 2013; otherwise, like Megamaid, he might have gone from sucking up to the voters to blowing his chance to win whatever elected office he chooses to run for next.  My partner in crime, the Right Reverend Billy Law (© 2002, Darth Valles), didn’t decide  to leave The City of Angels because of Tony.  Nonetheless, I’m sure he’s happy to have migrated to the comparative sanity that is Sactown, away from the mayor’s drunken sway.  I am in no way asserting that the mayor is a heavy drinker; just that if I was him, it’d be a better cover story than, “I’m really this big a goofball.”

This story, along with all the others that popped up during the silly season goes to prove that when it comes to pandering in politics, there is no red or blue  (or orange and black for that matter), just green, in the form of the negotiable bearer bonds that are your vote and mine.  ‘Cause no matter who you voted for, the results always seems to hit your pocketbook one way or another.  Now on to the sanity of the holidays!

Good times….

The Grapeshot

The Mission Statement of Plausible Deniability: Will have to wait until another day.  However, one feature of this blog that will be recurring is The Grapeshot, my semi-regular posting of all things too short for a full-blown article (I figured I’ve seen enough writers milk this hackneyed premise that I would just go ahead and wade in hip-deep).  Why grapeshot?  Well , there’s the whole artillery angle (time to brush up on your military history), as well as the fact that I’m sipping a bit of the grape as I write this, much like Proust… or Adam Carolla.  Without further ado:

 

“Wrong Verb.”  I was watching Kevin Pollak‘s latest stand-up special “The Littlest Suspect” the other night.  Kevin does a killer Nicholson impression, and so, doing his best “Jack,” told the oft-repeated tale of Jack Nicholson, who when asked by an aspiring starlet at a Hollywood party whether he wanted to dance, replied….

I’ve been a Lakers fan for years, but if I wasn’t, Jack’s presence alone might’ve been enough to shift my loyalties to the Lake Show.  And if you can’t understand why, re-read the story.

*****

On the same night, watched “A Night of Too Many Stars,” with Sarah Chalke and Lauren Graham.  I hear there were other celebrities there; Tom Hanks in particular seemed to be on my TV screen WAY too much, but again, the Dynamic Duo were the only two celebs I was interested in.  For those who would ask, in Chandlerian fashion, “Chalke (waving one hand) or Graham (waving the other hand)?” I would respond, ala Joey, “Put your hands together.”

*****

Heard on the “Adam Carolla Show” a story about a Chinese city that has installed coin-operated park benches.  After the allotted time, the bench deploys metal spikes that, erm, encourage the sitter to get up.  Although the whole thing may be a hoax based on a famous 2008 German art project, Rudy Guliani was nonetheless alleged to have said earlier this week, “Spiked benches!  Why hadn’t I thought of that?  Wait, lemme call Bloomberg.”

*****

Something that popped into my head the other day that I’m sure others have thought of, but explain again why porn is legal but prostitution is not?  The woman is getting paid for having sex in both cases.

I’m sure someone somewhere could explain the distinction to me.  I just think this is another one of those “Did you think you could keep this up?” laws (©2009 Adam Carolla), like segregated water fountains.  I think we can all agree that at some point, people will come to the self-evident realization that prostitution is a victimless crime, and just stop giving a shit whether people pay for having sex.  And when that happens, be it 5, 15, 50, how many ever years from now, we will be wondering what the hell took so long when men in this country will have been legally paying for women to have sex, albeit indirectly, since the advent of movies.

*****

A final note: A decidedly pro-Obama crowd turned out for the Prez when he appeared on “The Daily Show” the other night.  Critics have been killing Stewart for being too deferential.  While I take their point that Jon’s stock in trade is being irreverent to news personalities that other commentators genuflect to, maybe I’m old-fashioned.  Sure, I might’ve wished that he had been a bit more insistent in his questioning.  Nonetheless, I found the level of respect that he showed to the President (and the presidency) refreshing.

The guy I REALLY felt sorry for was the poor shmoe who, at the beginning of the interview, as Obama was trying to explain the difficult circumstances he inherited, tried to start a one-man standing O on the line “We’ve gone through the two toughest years of any time since the Great Depression.”  “ALRIGHT, guys, let’s give the man a hand!  Who’s with me?  Nobody?  Ohhkay.” [sitting back down]  I don’t know that this is actually what happened, just what I imagined from such vigorous, and ultimately onanistic, applause.

Restoring Sanity Takes Another Hit

I want to preface this article by saying that I did the proper preparation for this article in my “office,” in the Arthur Fonzerelli sense of the term.  The Juan Williams affair stinks on a number of levels, and brings to mind a couple of eerie similarities to past events, some known to the nation, some just to those in the ‘No.

Let’s start with calling bullshit on NPR‘s assertion of the need to maintain journalistic integrity.  Folks, for those of you who haven’t been told, there are VERY few instances of journalistic impartiality anymore, if there ever were any.  Also, Virginia, there is no Santa Claus.  Fox News is the most obvious example of journalistic bias, but there are also numerous instances where journalists act as cheerleaders for a particular party.  The days of a journalist sticking to the Joe Friday maxim of “Just the Facts, Ma’am ,” are gone.  To paraphrase a Rick Patino-ism, “Folks, Edward R. Murrow isn’t walking through that door.  Walter Cronkite isn’t walking through that door.”

However, there is some precedent for this type of hatchet job.  As James Rainey of the L.A. Times pointed out, William’s ouster strongly resembles that of Shirley Sherrod, the erstwhile Department of Agriculture official, in its seemingly breakneck rush to judgement.  While others have contended that they are not at all similar because NPR had access to the full transcript of William’s remarks, unlike in the Sherrod case, I would argue NPR saw what they wanted to see (more on that in a moment).   However, the other parallel that Rainey didn’t mention is in how the two incidents served as a proxy fight for one side of the political aisle to strike at the other.  In the Sherrod case, it was for Andrew Breitbart (who was himself a stand-in for various right-wing organizations) to strike at the Obama administration.  In the case of Juan Williams, it was for NPR to strike back at Fox News.  It’s not William’s commentary that has ruffled the feathers of the NPR hierarchy, it is where he’s making that commentary.

Which brings us to the other event that this brouhaha evoked for me.  For most Fresnans (and perhaps a few really diehard college sports fans), the Stacy Johnson-Klein lawsuit against Fresno State that ended with the Aquanet-affin’d coach winning a $19 million judgement in her sexual harassment suit against the university is indelibly etched in their memory.  For those of you not from the 559, I won’t bore you with the details, but the bottom line is the university had a number of good reasons to fire the coach, and finally pulled the trigger when it was discovered that she bummed a Vicodin off of one of her players.  That Johnson-Klein displayed questionable professionalism during her time at CSUF was not in dispute, and had the university been run…um, what’s that word… COMPETENTLY, they would’ve meticulously detailed the coach’s numerous transgressions, so that when the time came to can her, they could simply say, “See, it’s not just this mistake, it’s ALL the mistakes.”  But her lack of “go along to get along” ruffled the administration’s feathers and made it a personal, rather than personnel, matter.  Luckily for Johnson-Klein, Scott “Stop Short” Johnson, the athletic director at that time, made numerous passes at her, and the whole narrative of the trial became “Fresno State fired me because I’m an advocate for equality for women, and I was gonna blow the whistle.”  See, there’s a right way to terminate an employee, and a wrong way.  NPR might have been right to assert that William’s appearances on Fox strained journalistic ethics. However, rather than articulating a policy and documenting infractions, they made it clear to all that they wanted Juan out.  Again, personal rather than personnel.  Through their ham-handed management of the situation, the most memorable instance of which was Vivian Schiller’s unfortunately glib remarks regarding William’s mental state, they made the story, “NPR has it out for Juan.”  Bottom line: Like CSUF, NPR f***ed up.

[Editorial note: I'm going to try and keep this blog PG13, both in the name of civil discourse and also to guard against that hopeful day when a child of mine asks, "What does "effed" mean, Daddy?"  "Well, son, you know how in school when you get an F it means Failing? Well that's what it means.  It's like saying you fouled up, but different."]

At the end of the day, I’m left with three thoughts on Juan’s dismissal.  One is that the whole dustup once again demonstrates the knee-jerk reaction that takes place in this country whenever something that seems on the surface to be impolitic is uttered.  Whether it’s “I had a problem with white people,” or “When I see a Muslim at an airport, I get nervous,” there is a Black Friday at Toys R Us-esque rush to judgment whenever this happens(And no, those weren’t direct quotes from Sherrod and Williams.  Get over it.).  It is the #1 malady afflicting our political discourse (such as it is), and is a huge irritant to the thinking Middle of this country, voiced most eloquently by Jon Stewart.

The second thought I have is the one voiced by Ross Douthat of the New York Times: In this time of increasing partisan rancor, do we really need to be discouraging those that at least try to have an intelligent discourse with the other side, albeit on their turf?  I’ve watched Williams since his days on “The McLaughlin Group,” and have never came away with the impression that he is anyone’s flunky, especially not for Fox.  NPR cans Juan for being a “sellout,” Juan feels burned, and the civility of political discussion in this nation is diminished.  Again.

On a final personal note, I lived in NYC in 2001 when the Twin Towers were attacked.  I don’t know of anyone that lived in that area at that time that doesn’t feel some lingering aftereffect from it.  For me, it is hearing a low-flying airplane and wondering if it’s going to crash.  It’s not that I necessarily think that the plane might’ve been hijacked, but simply because I’ve been made more aware that s*** happens.  I can perhaps fault Juan for not more artfully expressing himself, for making clear the true intent of his words, but I know that fear.  I also saw the interview, and understand what Juan Williams was trying to convey: That while there may be fear, we can’t let that fear overrule our own logical processes, cannot let that fear overrule our own basic sense of human decency.

My thanks to Tobin Harshaw at the NY Times for his aggregation of many of the articles I cited in this post.