U.S...Eh?

I've done this with football and baseball already, I wonder if this would work with hockey. Let's find out. Also, there's a NASCAR race going on one channel over, so maybe we'll check in on that from time to time.

The highlight of the pre-game show was a quick interview with Canadian Prime Minister Don Cherry (I may be a little off on his job title, whatever). They had him in some sort of dimly lit room, I think so his outfit didn't blind anyone. The lowlight? A miracle on ice highlight package. Maybe it's because I'm not old enough to remember it, but I couldn't be more tired of hearing about that. Yes, I get it, we beat the Russians. Good for us. Another great triumph over a nation that could barely feed itself. Hooray.

The venue for most of the hockey has been Canada Hockey Place. Isn't that sort of like saying "the part of America where people are fat". Is anywhere in Canada not a hockey place? No matter how this game ends, I don't see a lot of people in Canada going to work tomorrow, I guess is what I'm saying.

The teams are just sort of feeling each other out for the first chunk of the first period. I think this is why hockey has trouble getting new fans. If you've never seen a hockey game before, it's hard not to get bored with these long periods of skating back a forth with nothing really notable happening. If I had to pick a key player for the U.S., I think it'd be Phil Kessel. I really like Kessel, he's fast, a playmaker. I think a U.S. win involves a goal or a least a big play from Kessel.

I feel like, if I ever date a Canadian girl, I'll never be able to break up with her. I would enjoy a Canadian accent in my life so much, I don't think there would be anything she could do to get rid of me.

I do not like the U.S. uniforms, at all. The blue is too dark, and the white helmets are ridiculous. And there's hardly any red at all. What's up with that? If they gave out medals for uniforms, the U.S. would definitely not win.

Ryan Callahan and Chris Drury are playing on the same line for the U.S. Rangers fans can tell you that line won't be scoring any goals. That reminds me, I don't know if I can go back to watching Rangers and Devils games after this. I may need a quick buffer period before I go back to the NHL.

1-0 Canada! There's absolutely no noticeable run up to most hockey goals. Things are just sort of gliding along and then BAM!, there's a goal. Scored by Jonathan Toews (pronounced Tays, um, OK). Shortly after, the U.S. took a penalty on a tripping call I didn't love. Power play! Power plays are the best. This particular Canadian power play was uneventful, good kill by the U.S.

So the first period ends 1-0 Canada. Not the most eventful period. The U.S. doesn't really look aggressive enough. Last Sunday they were all over the Canadians with the forecheck. Today? Not so much. Sounds like Milbury agrees with me, based on his long involvement with the Islanders, I'm not sure I should feel good about that. Also, they just mentioned that, during the pre-game, Roenick said this was maybe the most important hockey game ever. Calm down, big guy.

Quick NASCAR look-in. Hmmm, the cars seem to just be going around in a big circle. Must be warm-ups or something. I did learn that today's race is in Las Vegas. So, Vegas is full of rednecks this weekend. I feel like "NASCAR weekend in Vegas" is a good reality show we're missing out on. Still going around in circles. We'll check back later.

By the way, wouldn't zamboni races be an awesome winter Olympic event? They could have timed races, like speed skating, and some head-to-head events. People would love this, it would be at least as popular as curling. You know I'm right about this. Are you telling me you wouldn't watch that? I don't believe you.

Nice stop by Miller on Iginla after a turnover. The second period is looking a lot like the first period so far. By the way, if any of the other teams were in this game instead of the U.S. and Canada, the names would prevent me from even trying to do this. I don't think I could spell Ovechkin correctly if you gave me six chances.

Another Canadian power play. That one looked better than the last one, but no goal. The U.S. blocks a ton of shots. That must hurt so much. I'm honestly not sure I could do that. Anyway, good kill by the U.S. and they get their own power play immediately after.

The U.S. power play was a bit of a mess, and shortly after, BAM! 2-0 Canada. That happens so often in hockey, successful penalty kill followed by a goal. U.S. goalie Ryan Miller has the "hey, what happened to all those goals we were scoring" face going. This isn't looking great for the U.S. right now, they're starting to put the Molson on ice. But, the U.S. just got another power play. This one's pretty important, I feel like they need a goal here.

That power play was awful, at least until the last 30 seconds. It's also getting a little chippy out there. Too bad there's no fighting in the Olympics. In the NHL, this would be a perfect time for the Americans to pick a fight and try to get some energy going.

They're not doing any commercials during the game, good job by NBC. Two funny things. First, this turns the intermissions into commercial torture chambers. Second, the players still seem to be taking commercial breaks. Right now we just got a random 90 second stoppage in play for no particular reason.

And then....BAM! 2-1 Canada. Nice deflection by Kesler on a Kane wrist shot. Other than Miller, I think Patrick Kane has easily been the best American player in this tournament. The announcers just pointed out that the U.S. scoring play was offside. Can someone pour them a nice glass of shut the hell up?

The Americans just missed tying the game by maybe six inches, maybe less. Then Canada missed a 3-1 lead by no more than 3 inches. It's really hard to do hockey justice in words. The action just builds slowly, every minute is just a little more exciting than the last one. As we end the second period, it's 2-1 Canada. I use the word awesome a lot (I think it's because I grew up near the beach), but awesome doesn't begin describe what's about to happen.

Another quick NASCAR check. Circles...circles...circles. OK, enough. I kid because I care, I actually don't mind NASCAR. It's sad that NASCAR eventually has to be a casualty of us running out of oil. Those cars get like one mile per gallon. I wonder if they'll try it with electric cars or bicycles for a year before they give up.

The Americans forgot to bring the momentum they had with them at the end of the second period with them for the third. Canada was sort of in charge of the first five minutes, and then another commercialess commercial break. Sidney Crosby's making me a little nervous right now. He hasn't done anything great yet, he rarely gets through a game without doing something amazing.

Great stop by Miller on Heatley at about the ten minute mark. I really thought Canada had one there. Canada is still in charge and the Americans are running out of time. I think I'd start double shifting the Kane line, they've been great all tournament. The crowd is starting to buzz a little more. I'd honestly feel sorry for Canada if the U.S. pulls this one out.

Nice shift by the Kessel line, I'm still keeping an eye on him. Under six minutes, still no big pushes from the Americans. Under five minutes now, and another commercial free commercial break. Could this game end 2-1? I didn't think so ten minutes ago, now I'm starting to wonder.

OH MAN! Breakaway by Crosby, great pursuit by Kane and Crosby really didn't get a shot. How close was that? Hockey is just the shit. This is better than 10 superbowls and 30 NBA finals.

OK, about a minute and a half to go and Miller just went to the bench for one of the best phrases in all of sports, the extra attacker. Looks like the U.S. is finishing with the Kane line plus Parise and OHHHHHHHHH! 2-2! Parise banged one in off a rebound and, holy crap, we're getting gold medal game overtime. Every other channel on the TV should stop whatever it's doing and let people watch this. Roenick summed it up best; "someone is about to be a national hero". Roenick is super pumped right now, he may need a sedative.

So, umm, I'm gonna go watch some hockey now. I'll be back to tell you how it ends.

What did I say about Crosby? Gold medal winning goal, right in the middle of overtime. Man, tough break for the Americans, but a silver beats expectations for them and they don't have anything to feel bad about, Canada just had a little more talent. I can't wait to see the medal ceremony, this Canadian crowd is in full riot mode. Also, this was, absolutely, the best thing that's ever happened on my TV.

Olympic Carnival

The Winter Olympics got me again. This happens every four years, just like the World Cup. I spend four years complaining about the Olympics, about how all the events suck except the hockey and how it interrupts my favorite TV shows. Then, when it actually comes around, I watch at least one hour of it everyday, plus the hockey. Why? Because most of the events, odd as they may be, are still sports, which is better than most of the other crap on TV. Especially when House, NCIS, The Office and 30 Rock all take the two Olympic weeks off. So I've been watching. Here's what I've learned.

I learned the Olympic hockey competition is, quite literally, the perfect sporting event. There's absolutely nothing you could do to make it better. This is especially true when you have the event in Canada. Canadians feel the same way about hockey as Americans feel about bacon. Every game has a great crowd that knows exactly what's going on and when to cheer. Even better, the players totally give a crap. This is why Olympic hockey is soooo much better than Olympic basketball. Of course, I'd put money on the NHL figuring out a way to screw this up by not having NHL players at the 2014 games in Russia. Gary Bettman is like the Michael Scott of sports commissioners. Did he win his job in a contest?

While we're here, quick predictions for the hockey medal round. I like Canada over Slovakia. I think Slovakia is a pretty underrated team and I've liked them every time I've seen them play, but they can't hang with the Canadians. I like the U.S. over Finland. Finland plays solid hockey and Kiprusoff looked really good against the Czechs, but I really like this U.S. team and Ryan Miller's been solid. Close game, maybe overtime, but I like the U.S.

Slovakia vs. Finland makes an interesting bronze medal game. I'll take Finland. I think Slovakia might actually have more talent, but Finland has the goaltending advantage and I think that gets them at least a bronze. Finally, I like Canada for the gold. I know, the U.S. already beat them. First, this will be for a gold medal, the crowd will be nuts right from the opening face-off (I'm looking forward to this game already, please Finland and Slovakia, don't ruin this for me). Second, I think Luongo is just a better goaltender than Brodeur, at least at this point in Marty's career, so I think Canada's a better team than they were last Sunday if they stick with Luongo. Finally, the Canadians just have better talent. You saw this against the Russians. Russia's top players are just ridiculous, but when you get into a 60 minute game, depth is so important, every Canadian line is really good. I can't see the U.S. team beating them again.

I learned curling is awesome. I'm not sure if it's a sport, but I'm sure I can't stop watching it. There's something mesmerizing about it. You flip to CNBC or MSNBC to see if there's a hockey game going on, and you find curling. You think "hmm curling, let's see what else is on". But then, right before you're about to leave, you get a look at where all the stones are and you start wondering where they'll try to put the next one. An hour and a half later you just watched an entire curling match. If some American billionaire doesn't try to start a professional curling league in the U.S. in the next 12 months, we should take all of the money away from all of our billionaires, because they obviously don't know what to do with it.

Quick curling sidenote: The most interesting curling subplot was the constant complaining by the announcers and, apparently, some of the curlers, about the crowd being too rowdy. "Umm, excuse me, I can't slide this rock down this sheet of ice with you people shouting like that". It just seems so goofy, this is obviously some sort of Canadian or Scandinavian drinking game that somehow found its way to being a sport. I can't imagine the first curlers having polite crowds.

I learned I would very much like to be a speed skater. I definitely don't have the ability, but I'd still like to do it. Those people just look so relaxed, especially in the longer distance races. They just sort of glide down the straight parts of the track with their hands behind their backs, they look close to falling asleep. I wouldn't be even a little surprised if one of them stopped for a sandwich. But then if you actually look at how fast they're moving, it's like they're riding in an invisible snowmobile. Add this to the fun of short track skating (every short track race is constantly one wrong step away from a four-skater pile up), and winter Olympic skating destroys summer Olympic track and field. Destroys it.

I have a question though. The skaters wear those skin tight lycra suits for aerodynamics, right? Why don't track and field athletes wear those suits. Or, if it's more aerodynamic for the track and field people to wear spandex shirts and shorts, then why don't the skaters wear that? One of those outfits is more aerodynamic than the other, right? What am I missing? (Probably something obvious, seeing as I know almost nothing about skating, track and field or aerodynamics)

I learned even though I was wrong about the Olympics as a whole, I was right about some things. For example, I was right about skiing. All you have to do to win at skiing is get down the mountain the fastest. I could easily win a downhill skiing event. I'd die seconds later, because I would have no idea how to stop after I finished, but they'd have to bury me with my gold medal. The one skiing event I didn't mind was the new ski-cross. Ski-cross has potential, it's not quite there yet. I'm thinking maybe rockets on the backs of the skis, but it's on the right track.

Quick skiing sidenote: The cross country skiing is strangely riveting. Like a marathon on snow. It's sort of like curling in that I could watch it for an hour without noticing, but I can't quite put my finger on what's so entertaining about it.

I was also right about figure skating. In fact, it's even worse than I remember. One night, I tried to watch, because someone suggested to me that I should stick around for someone named Tanith Belbin. I didn't make it. Everything about it was awful. Every second was goofier than the last. Even worse than that, it's apparently the most popular sport, because NBC won't stop showing it. More than once, I saw figure skating on the big network while hockey was stuck on MSNBC or CNBC. I'm not OK with that, that's not how I roll.

I could go on for a while about this, but I think I'll just pick out my biggest problem. Figure skating has way too much crying. I don't mind some crying in sports. Basketball players cry when they win a championship. Baseball players cry when we find out they used steroids. Hockey players cry..never, they never cry, because they're real men. Figure skaters cry when they skate well, when they don't skate well, when they fall, when they get good scores, or bad scores, or any scores. Figure skaters cry at every possible outcome. It's unwatchable. Now, I fully realize that I am not physically capable of doing anything figure skaters do, including wearing the outfits. But that doesn't change how I feel about watching it.

I was also right about snowboarding, which is definitely not a sport. Also, is it just me, or are those snowboarding guys really unlikable? When you see an interview with Shaun White, don't you kind of want someone to run up and punch him in the face? You do, right? Or when you see them all just sort of hanging around the half pipe like high school stoners while they wait to go, wouldn't you love to see a bunch of ninjas run in and just go nuts on them? I feel like I'd enjoy seeing that.

Most importantly, I learned what it is that always makes the Olympics much better than I remember them being. There's always three or four things going on at once. It's like a sports carnival. So even when some of those things are figure skating and snowboarding, if only one of them is something I like, that's good enough, because I only need to be watching one thing at a time. Also, no joke, I would put up with months of non-stop figure skating if that's what I had to endure to get to this awesome hockey tournament.

Never Apologize, It's a Sign of Weakness

How awesome would it have been last week if Tiger Woods had simply walked to the podium, said "I am Tiger Woods", smirked at the cameras and reporters, high-fived a caddy and walked away? We would have needed to invent a new awesome scale.

I didn't watch the Tiger Woods apology last week. I didn't listen to it on the radio. I didn't read a transcript or search the internet for clips. I tried my very best not to acknowledge it at all. I really couldn't have been less interested. Unfortunately, as the day went on, I found it to be unavoidable. Even with the surprisingly interesting Olympics going on, it seemed nobody in media was allowed to talk about anything else. I have a very easy system for gaging the relative size of a story. If both Fox News and MSNBC spend a considerable amount of time on the same story, it is a HUGE story. I mean, Fox could barely bring itself to pay attention to Haiti.

So even though I tried very hard not to see it, I wound up being subjected to soundbites and video clips and endless analysis. Some people were so riled up about this, I wonder if any of Tiger's other women were also married to TV reporters. So what if he sounded robotic? When's the last time a very famous person made an apology that wasn't either written for them or drunkenly shouted at a cop at 3AM? Yes, famous people, athletes, politicians, other big money types; they have writers. When they get in trouble, they have people who get paid a ton of money to write statements that sound good and don't get them into anymore trouble. Was this still news to anyone?

My only problem with Tiger is that he didn't take questions. Not because he owes us answers, he doesn't owe me anything. I was hoping, when I first heard he'd be making a statement, maybe if he took a lot of questions, and just kept answering until the press was out of questions, that maybe this would go away, and I wouldn't have to hear about it anymore. Now? It can't possibly go away yet, we don't know anything now that we didn't know last week, except that Tiger is the worst Buddhist in the history of Buddhism.

I have question, but it's not for Tiger. When did we become such babies? Tiger owes an apology to his wife for cheating on her like a dirt bag. He owes an apology to his kids for probably breaking up their family. That's it. He can apologize to his mom if he wants, and Buddha I guess, but even that's pushing it. Why do the rest of us need an apology?

His sponsors? Really? He owes an apology to his sponsors? When Nike signed him, did they sign him because they thought they were getting the world's greatest husband? Is that why people buy every piece of Nike golf crap they can find? Because they wanted to dress like a great husband. This is so stupid. Sponsors who use athletes know what they're getting into. These guys are rich, they're on the road all year, women know who they are and target them. Some of these guys are going to have some extra women. If that's a deal breaker for you, try using some mormons to sell your crappy golf stuff. They might have more than one woman too, but supposedly their god is down with that.

Speaking of other women, I saw this on Fox. Gloria Allred suggested Tiger owes an apology to all the other women he had sex with. Well, I agree that Tiger's description of the many women he had sex with as "temptations" introduced us to a new way of objectifying women. On the other hand, they all knew he was married. Of course they did, don't tell me they didn't know. It's not like he's some anonymous creeper they met in a dimly lit bar at 3AM. He's Tiger f*cking Woods...who they met in a dimly lit bar at 3AM. Most, if not all, of them had sex with him specifically because he's Tiger f*cking Woods. I'll be willing to consider the idea of Tiger owing the other women an apology if, and only if, all of those women first apologize to his wife.

And what about his fans? This is one that really annoyed me. I don't here a lot of marital fidelity based chants for Tiger when he's out on the course. I'm a huge fan of Tiger. I've tried watching golf a couple of times this year. It's awful. I don't know how anyone ever watched golf before Tiger. It's like going to the beach without water or sand. All that's left is the scorching heat and the jellyfish. If he does that to the Masters by not showing up because he's still in therapy or whatever, then he'll owe me an apology. Until then, we're cool.

Reconciliation

Some things are hard to reconcile...

I'm big on individual liberties. As a necessary caveat to that, I believe in limited government. When government expands with unnecessary laws and by doing unnecessary things, it leaves a little less liberty for the rest of us. My favorite example is the trans fat war waged by my former home city, and a number of other cities as well. I don't know exactly what trans fats are, but I know they're delicious. I don't have a problem with the government forcing foods to be honest about how bad they are for us, but once they've done that, if people still want to eat crap, get fat and die young, that's their right (it's honestly hard for me to believe anyone would disagree with me on this, but I know people do).

The difficult thing for me is, I've got a bit of dictator in me too. Specifically, if I were the President, I would feel strongly that my administration and I should be allowed to do whatever we want and everyone should shut up and let us. I wouldn't actually act that way if I was the President (well probably not, maybe not) but that's what I'd be thinking. Usually, these two somewhat conflicting impulses are easy to reconcile, because I'm not going to be the President, so limited government it is. But it gets harder when we have a President like Barack Obama, who I like and who I think is a smart guy and who I think probably knows what he's doing. Luckily, I don't actually agree with the President and his party on a lot of things, so even though I like him, I'm still pretty firmly in favor of limiting his power.

I'm thinking about reconciliation now because there's suddenly a lot of talk about Senate Democrats using the reconciliation process to pass health care reform. The President is meeting with Republicans again Thursday, this time Senate Republicans and this time specifically to talk about health care. I expect it to be mildly entertaining, but not as great as the smackdown the President laid on House Republicans last month. I also expect it to get us nowhere in terms of getting closer to passing a bill.

Sidenote: I wish the President would do this kind of thing on the really stupid Republican talking points, like how lots of Republicans say they don't believe in evolution (I'm sure lots of Democrats say this too, but I'm picking on Republicans for now). Recently, Olbermann threw out a statistic that said 38% of people in Texas think that humans were created in our present form about 10,000 years ago. 51% of people in Texas (and yes, I'm accepting Texas as a reasonable proxy for "Republicans") don't believe in evolution (what do the 13% of people who don't believe in evolution but also don't think people were created 10,000 years ago believe?). 30% of people in Texas believe humans and dinosaurs lived at the same time. That last one always gets me. 3 out of 10 people think the Flintstones was a documentary (I may have stolen that joke from Bill Maher, I don't care, it's funny) Do you think if I stop believing in Texas I can just make it go away?

Anyway, health care is something I'm a little conflicted about too. I'm so tired of hearing about it, but it's just as important as it was six months ago and we're not really any closer to a solution than we were six months ago, or six decades ago for that matter.

On one hand, I know we need a change. It's ridiculous that so many people in this country don't have health insurance. And I'm not so quick to call health care reform an unnecessary expansion of government because, as I've argued before, the private sector sucks at providing health insurance. I think that's an argument the Democrats are missing out on. We don't really need health care reform. Health care in this country is awesome. Hospitals are great, we have the best doctors, we have great technology. We need health insurance reform. It's not the care that needs fixing, it's the access. I think people (some people anyway) who already have good access would be more reasonable about this issue if they understood that this isn't really about them. No wait, that's a terrible strategy, it's damn near impossible to get most people to care about anything that isn't about them. I retract that suggestion.

On the other hand, everything I know about the current Senate health care bill tells me we're getting a crappy bill at the end of this process. I don't want to get into a whole thing here about everything that might appear in a hypothetical health care bill, so just one example. I hate the individual mandate, I really do. The idea that the government can force people to by a product is insane. And don't come back at me with auto insurance, the government can only force you to by auto insurance if you make the free choice to own a car. I know it's hard to make insurance affordable if healthy people don't have to buy it, and I don't necessarily have an answer for that, but I still don't like it. If I were a Senator, I'd probably vote against the next health care bill that comes up if it's as compromised as I think it will be. Why? Because individual mandate+no public option=big fat multi-billion dollar gift to insurance companies and I don't care what else is in the bill, I wouldn't put my name on that.

Having said that, as someone who probably won't like the final bill, do I think Senate Democrats should use reconciliation to pass a bill? Of course they should. Why? Because I want the people in charge to either believe in what they're doing or go away. This is where the dictator in me comes out again. Democrats, if you think you've got an idea that's best for the country, than just do it and live with the consequences. All this nonsense of looking for compromise and political cover, that just tells me Democrats really have no confidence in their own ideas and they'd very much like to not be held accountable if something doesn't work out. If that's how you approach decisions, get a job which doesn't require you to make any.

People ask me why I don't change my party affiliation considering how often I disagree with and mock Republicans. This is why. Everything Democrats do strikes me as cowardly. When Republicans get power, they tend to do things (and sure, starting with Reagan, a lot of those things have been pretty stupid, but they still did them, and most of those guys would do those same things again if we let them). When Democrats get power, they spend a year searching for political cover and nothing gets done. You could have the best idea in the world, it doesn't help anyone if you're not willing to act. Democrats don't act, they cower and beg us not to vote against them.

Is Barack Obama a political coward? We're about to find out. I hope not. He's a smart guy, but that doesn't help us if he spends the next three years not doing anything because he's terrified of not getting re-elected. One of the best things about George W. Bush was his constant sense of certainty. He wasn't always right (OK, he was hardly ever right, that's not my point right now), but HE was always sure HE was right. If we could only get that sense of certainty into a guy like Barack Obama, who might actually be right sometimes, we might just get somewhere.

And yes, I understand that Barack Obama and the Democrats just doing whatever the hell they wanted to do would also stick me with a government doing a lot of things I wouldn't really like. Yes, that happens sometimes. I don't know where people got the idea that we're entitled to a government that only does things we like. The government doesn't work for us, they work on our behalf, there's a big difference. They don't always have to do what we say and we don't always have to like what they're doing.

But here's the problem, Barack Obama's willingness to listen to other ideas and compromise is, at least tangentially, related to his high level of intelligence and, simultaneously, one of the main reasons people are so frustrated with him. In contrast, George W. Bush's ability to block out dissenting opinions and inconvenient facts and do whatever he wanted allowed him to get a lot done, but was also a key part of his, um...unremarkability(I just made up a word, I do that quite often, I could be the next Republican President). I feel like I want a President who can do both. Because then, even if I wouldn't like what was happening, at least something would be happening, and that's often better than nothing. See? Some things really are hard to reconcile.

Deadline

It wasn't too long ago that the NBA trading deadline was almost as boring as the NFL's annually uneventful deadline. In the last few years though, the NBA deadline has blasted right past the NHL and is quickly approaching baseball's level of deadline interest. On top of that, they've successfully paired their all-star weekend with the deadline, allowing a double dose of NBA excitement. Or, in the case of this season, allowing them to clean up the disaster that was the all-star weekend with some hot new trade stories. I'd like to personally thank the NBA for giving me something to sort of care about this last week without having to talk myself into snowboarding as a sport. Let's take a closer look at all-star weekend and some of the deals we saw leading up to 3PM today, and let's see if I'm getting a little nervous about my pre-season NBA picks.

There's nothing original in saying the slam dunk contest sucked, but I'll say it anyway. Boy did that slam dunk contest suck. Do you think they talked about ending it after the second round of dunks? They had to at least consider it, right? If I were NBA supercommish David Stern, here's what I would have done. Right after the first round of dunks, I would have pulled Dwight Howard off the sideline and offered him $500,000 to save my crappy dunk contest. Then, after the crappy finals, right as they were getting ready to announce the champ, all the lights go out. Cue the superman music and out runs Dwight. He spends five or ten minutes doing all the insanely athletic things no human should be able to do, but that he can do while also smiling and looking like he's not really trying. The crowd leaves totally satisfied, and Dwight gets his money and a nice trophy.

I, David Stern, can either tell the truth and be a genius for saving an event that was dying right in front of us, or, I say we had it planned all along and I'm the diabolical genius who tricked everybody into thinking we were putting on such an awful event and then surprised everyone with a great finish. Either way, the NBA looks great and all anyone talks about the next day is the awesome ending.

As for the rest of all-star Saturday; the shooting stars thing with the WNBA players and the TNT staff is a joke. The 3-point contest is usually something I enjoy, but this year's felt strangely unfulfilling and even a little awkward. The point guard thing is just ridiculous. The HORSE competition continues to be a solid idea, but they're going to need to start Durant-proofing the course, and it also appeared to be happening in a high school gymnasium, which I thought was weird.

The all-star game itself was perfectly adequate. For everyone whining about the lack of defense; boohoo, it's an all-star game, it's supposed to be fun, and defense is tiring. The one thing I always find interesting about games like that is the alpha dog factor. Who jumps out at you as a star among stars? You know who jumped out at me? Carmelo Anthony. And I remember thinking the same thing about the 2008 olympic team. I've never been too high on Carmelo, I've always seen him as a notch below your real NBA stars. I've changed my mind. Carmelo can carry a team through the playoffs. This completely changes my view of the Denver Nuggets. I never considered them a real contender, because you need an alpha dog to get past Kobe and LeBron, and I didn't think Denver had one. Now? I'm convinced Denver has one.

By the way, I also noticed that Chris Kaman was an all-star. It's a tragedy how that plane full of all the other western conference big men went down over the rocky mountains. I hope we find those guys soon.

On to the trades, starting with the Knicks, since I'm from New York and I still get to see all their games. They traded Nate Robinson to the Celtics for Eddie House. I can't complain about this from the Knicks' side. Just by showing up, Eddie doubles the number of Knicks who can shoot. For the Celtics, who I root for, the value is a little less clear. You can be crazy and still be valuable in the NBA, like Gilbert Arenas was. But Nate isn't as good as Gilbert, or Artest, or even Rasheed Wallace from five years ago. To be valuable, I think you need to be at least as good as you are crazy, and I'm not sure Nate's there.

The Knicks also traded Darko Milicic for a guy they're immediately releasing, they literally gave him away for nothing. I have some ice cream in my freezer, and if I was an NBA owner, I could have traded it to the Knicks for Darko. Is Darko the worst draft pick in sports history? Who can give us an official ruling on this?

The main trade for the Knicks was the T-Mac thing. Sports radio in New York has been buzzing about this for weeks, which tells you how awful basketball in New York is right now. The idea of adding a guy who was great six years ago and might get you to 35 wins gets everyone all worked up. The Knicks gave up Jordan Hill (8th pick in last year's draft, which is handy, because he'll never be anything better than the 8th man on a winning team) and some draft picks, in exchange for which they got McGrady and they got someone to take on the ridiculous Jared Jeffries contract. Seems like a pretty good deal.

Along with the usual salary cap related flotsam and jetsam, the Rockets got Kevin Martin and the Kings got Carl Landry. Boring names aside, I like both of those guys for their new respective teams. The ball belongs to Tyreke Evans in Sacramento now, so Martin kind of had to go, but a legit power forward fits in well. The Rockets desperately need a scorer, and Martin fills that role. The rare good trade all around. Also, the Kings got Larry Hughes, which is good because last time I saw the Kings play I was thinking they needed someone to miss ridiculous jump shots.

The Hype King and his Cavs picked up Antawn Jamison. This really doesn't change my opinion about them at all. My favorite part of this trade was Zydrunas Ilgauskas. The Cavs traded big Z to Washington, where he'll take 30 days off and then come back to the Cavs. NBA trades aren't always the most interesting, but the NBA definitely has the goofiest trades. It may be time to re-think the salary cap structure a little.

Sidenote, here's my thing about Lebron. Two things really. First, I never like players who get the hype before they get the wins, at least not until they actually get the wins. More importantly though, it's this: MJ, Kobe, guys like that, they need to win. I'm honestly not sure if MJ would have survived an NBA career without titles. I'm not sure yet if Lebron needs to win, or if he just wants to win.

I think I'm more interested in all the things that didn't happen. The Suns, after weeks of trying to trade him, didn't trade Amare Stoudemire. Um...awkward. Especially since this is the second year in a row that happened. So now Amare has to play the rest of the season on a team that can't possibly win a title and couldn't possibly be less interested in still having him around. Sounds like fun.

Lots of teams just did nothing. I don't mind the Magic doing nothing, I'm not sure they needed to add anyone. I don't mind the Heat doing nothing, they weren't going anywhere this year either way, so why bother. But if I'm a fan of a non-Lakers western conference team, I'm a little punchy right now. Kobe won't still be limping around come playoff time. In fact, he'll be even more well rested for destroying you. The Jazz even gave away one of their better players, Ronnie Brewer, for nothing. Is there something in the NBA rulebook that would allow western conference teams to just surrender to L.A. instead of playing them? Probably not. Too bad, because I think the Jazz are ready and that would be pretty fun to watch.

I picked the Magic to win the east, and the title. I'm still fine with that, at least the east part. I don't like the Cavs, the Heat didn't get any better, the Hawks are still the Hawks and I just don't see the Celtics making it through the playoffs. The team I picked to lose to the Magic, the Spurs, has me pretty nervous. Even if the Lakers stumble, my new found belief in Carmelo Anthony makes the Nuggets very scary. Plus, to be honest, I hate rooting for the Spurs. Something about them has always really annoyed me. I feel the same way about Tim Duncan as I used to feel about John Stockton. I respect his game and he seems like a really nice guy, but sometimes I just wish one of the NBA's crazy people would tackle him on the court for no reason.

That's pretty much it. Truth is, I was 10 times more interested in pitchers and catchers reporting to Yankee camp than I was in anything that happened in the NBA. I'm trying to get back into basketball this year, but once April comes and baseball really starts, I can't promise anything.

We Need Better Holidays

This week's convergence of Valentine's Day and President's Day has led me to the following conclusion: These holidays all suck. Go look through a calendar, look at all the nonsense holidays. It's not all nonsense, but there's a lot of nonsense in there. Somebody has to do something about this, and I nominate me. I'm not saying we cancel the holidays, we all need days off work. I'm saying we're America and we can do better! Some holidays can stay, but many need replacing, or at least updating. Let's do this month by month.

January
January's main holidays are New Years and Martin Luther King Jr. Day. They can both stay. We need to celebrate the new year sometime and it's important that we all recognize the fulfilment of Dr. King's dream that, one day, people of all races would come together to not have work, or school. Can we move black history month to January though? Why isn't Martin Luther King Jr. Day during black history month? How hard is that? Who plans these things? This idea would also get black history month out of February and into a real month, thus rectifying the greatest injustice of our time.

February
This is where it starts to get ugly. President's Day? Look, if Lincoln and Washington can't even have their own days anymore, then why even bother? Valentine's Day? Sorry, we're getting rid of all made up, greeting card holidays. And don't even get me started on Groundhog Day. So first, obviously, we're giving the former Presidents back their own holidays. Washington gets the second Monday and Lincoln gets the third, and we get off for both. Lincoln freed the slaves, how is that not good enough for his own day?

I'm also adding a day. I think we should all celebrate Purim. You heard me. Look, I don't know much about Purim, but I know when I worked at Hofstra the Rabbi used to always bring me a pastry and a little note about Purim, and it was pretty awesome. One problem though, sometimes Purim is in March. Jewish holidays are a mess, they're all over the place. I think we need to help them. Let's pin Purim down on February 23rd every year. This also makes life a little more fair, because I'll be taking away most of the Christian holidays, but not all of them. So I think Judaism deserves one, and I'm picking Purim.

March
St. Patrick's Day? Come on. Listen, speaking as someone who is 100% Irish, I can tell you that we don't need you to make up an excuse for us to get drunk, we can take care of drinking excuses all on our own. As for the rest of you, I'm tired of you all pretending to be Irish every year. I'm putting an end to this. Luckily, I have a perfect replacement. I say, every year, we make sure baseball season starts on March 30th. Everyone gets a day off to watch baseball, and you can still drink if you want to. Works for me.

April
Easter's a mess too, I never know when Easter is. Every year I'm just sitting here and all of a sudden it's good Friday. Also, I try not to mock religion too much here, but even when I used to go to church, the whole premise of Easter seemed a little thin to me. I'm inclined to get rid of it completely, but I do like the hard boiled eggs and other people like the chocolate. So first, we clean up the mess. Easter is April 3rd every year. Done. Second, we change the name. Chocolate Day is a little too on the nose and a little too specific. Candy Day sounds like a strip club holiday for some reason. Bunny Day? That kinda sounds like a strip club holiday too. Naming holidays is hard.

I've got it! Spring Break is a national holiday every year. OK, so forget about April 3rd, Spring Break week is the second week in April. You start the week, on the Sunday before, with chocolate and alcohol, and you end the week, on the last Sunday, with hard boiled eggs as part of breakfast. They'll help with the hangovers. This also works because a lot of people get at least a week off for Easter or Passover (yeah, Spring Break is replacing Passover too), so keeping it a week long holiday solves that problem. I love this idea.

May
Memorial Day stays, no questions asked. I'd sign off on a Memorial Day every month if people wanted one. Mother's Day? Sorry, another greeting card holiday, and we don't even get a day off for it. Also, shouldn't we be able to summon the humanity to be nice to our mothers once a year without someone telling us to? Since we don't get a day off for Mother's Day, it doesn't really need replacing. I'd also like the Tuesday after Memorial Day off, no reason, just because.

June
Everything I said about Mother's Day goes for Father's Day too. June needs a holiday though. We could celebrate the summer solstice. Of course, we could also sacrifice animals and virgins to our gods, but we're not pagans and this isn't the 4th century BC, so no thanks. I have a much better, and frankly, long overdue idea. June 13th is now Carrier Day. Every year, on June 13th, we will celebrate Willis Haviland Carrier, inventor of air conditioning. The beginning of summer is a perfect time for this, and if you still want to get your dad something, you can buy him an air conditioner.

July

Independence Day can stay. Honestly, it's not my favorite holiday, but fireworks are pretty and July doesn't really have that much else to offer. We can probably spruce it up a little though. Let's combine it with Halloween, which I'll be banishing from October anyway. From now on, for the 4th of July, kids can dress up as their favorite founding father. This would be a real boon for the powered wig industry, which somehow missed the boat on a government bailout. You don't get candy though, just fireworks and freedom.

August

August is the worst month. It's hot, there's nothing going on, kids have nothing to look forward to but going back to school. Why we haven't put a good holiday somewhere in the middle of this month is really beyond me. I'm moving Labor Day to the third week of August, and making it Labor Week. Each day could have a theme, like Monday could be railroad day. For the kids, Friday's theme would be Jimmy Hoffa. It would be just like an Easter egg hunt, only instead of eggs, you'd hide little Jimmy Hoffa dolls all over your house and let the kids find them. Fun for everyone, and it would give birth to a new industry of Jimmy Hoffa doll making.

September
I moved Labor Day because I already had a great idea for September. The second Sunday of September is when we'll observe the beginning of football season. We get Friday off to draft fantasy teams and Monday off to talk about the success or failure of our fantasy teams, and possibly also to try and recover from gambling losses. The most important part of this would be completely getting rid of the NFL's Thursday night season opener. Football happens on Sunday, and then one extra game happens Monday. And that's it. No Thursday. NO THURSDAY!

October
Columbus Day might be my least favorite holiday. First of all, I'm not sure "discovered" is the proper word to describe what happens when you accidentally stumble across land that other people already live on. That's like going to visit your neighbors and then claiming to have discovered the pool you didn't know they had in their backyard. It had already been discovered, you just didn't know about it yet, and finding out about it doesn't make it your pool. Columbus Day is definitely out.

Halloween's out too. Candy on Halloween is the same as greeting cards on Mother's Day or Valentine's Day. It's just a made up holiday to sell stuff. Also, aren't we sort of heading this way anyway? How many more years of Halloween do you think we get before paranoid parents all decide they can't let their kids go around the neighborhood wearing masks and asking strangers for candy? 20 years? 30 years? Why wait?

So October needs an influx of new holidays. I've got two ideas, and I think we only need to pick one, or we could do both, either way works for me. My first idea would involve promoting some holidays from the minor leagues. In Alaska, October 18th is Alaska Day. Why can't everyone celebrate Alaska? October 24th is United Nations Day, which we should probably enjoy while it lasts. That's only my second favorite October idea though. You may have noticed I didn't mention April Fools Day in April. Well, if everybody knows it's April Fools Day, you can't really fool anyone. I say we make it April Fools Month, and move it to October (still calling it April Fools Month). People would be totally fooled.

November
Just like Memorial Day, Veterans Day stays, period. Thanksgiving's a real toss-up for me. First of all, who am I supposed to be thanking? Secondly, turkey is like 13th on my list of favorite meats. Also, Thanksgiving promotes more football on Thursdays, and I'm still not a fan. On the plus side, it's two days off from work and kids like the parade. Also, we just started having Thanksgiving at my aunt and uncle's house a couple of years ago, and my aunt's a really good cook, so there's that. The verdict? I'm putting Thanksgiving on probation. It can stay for now, but we're re-evaluating it in ten years, and we're changing the turkey to bacon.

December
Christmas stays. Christians hate hearing this, but Christmas has become so disassociated from religion, that really everyone can celebrate it. I'm making one tweak, everyone gets the week between Christmas and New Years off. Everyone. No exceptions. Regardless of all the awesome new holidays I just created, Christmas is still the king of the holidays, and it always will be. Why? Because everyone loves presents. Sometimes it's just that simple.

Hot Stove Episode Three: Return Of The Hot Stove

Welcome to my last bit of commentary on baseball's incredibly fun off-season. In about a month, I'll do pretty big season previews and picks for both leagues. But that's next month. For the moment, let's wrap up the hot stove league and get ready for pitchers and catchers.

Now, I'm a pretty rational guy. Sure, I sound pretty confident in my opinions, and I do like calling people stupid (especially the stupid people, they're so stupid), but if you come back at me with a rational argument, I'm usually at least willing to debate respectfully. When it comes to baseball, however, you can either agree with me or you can sit there and be wrong, it's up to you (OK, if I'm going to keep doing this for a while, I'm gonna need a sarcasm font).

Let me first say that I now understand why sequels are usually not as good as the first movie, and why the third movie in a trilogy is usually even less...as good. Neo can't discover the matrix again, Michael J. Fox can only go back to the future so many times before we stop caring, nerd revenge gets boring after a while and John Lackey and Jason Bay can only sign with one team (by the way, if you want to laugh your ass off for a good 20 minutes, go to wikipedia and look up a list of movie trilogies. The fact that people decided to make two more of some of those movies is life changing information. And if you want to laugh your ass off for hours and hours, go to a site called conservapedia and look up, well, anything). The trades and signings are less interesting by this point in the off-season, but luckily, like most trilogies, sometimes they're also more ridiculous (I'm looking at you Omar Minaya), and that's right up my alley.

I continue to love what the Seattle Mariners are doing with this off-season. They signed Felix Hernandez to a long term deal and picked up Casey Kotchman and Ryan Garko. The King Felix deal means they get three or four more years of his work before they have to start thinking about trading him to Boston or New York again. Kotchman is a better player than we've seen him be since he got shipped out of LA, and I think we'll see that this year if he gets to stay somewhere and be wanted for a full season. Garko makes a solid DH for whenever everyone figures out that Griffey is done (which should happen sometime around April 7th). In my first hot stove post, I said I thought Seattle needed one more bat. Since then, they've picked up three or four. Mission accomplished. I don't want to give away too much before next month's season previews, but I bet you can guess who I have winning the AL west this year.

Speaking of the AL west, the Rangers signed Vladimir Guerrero. I'm not sure what Texas is up to here. Every summer, a Rangers team that was promising early on falls off in August because they play in Texas and it's 110 degrees at night. Now they're stocking up on guys who can't stay healthy in normal human weather (Hamilton, Harden, Vlad). I like all those guys individually, but on the same team, in Texas? I don't see this ending well.

Speaking of not ending well, what the hell is going on with the Mets? Gary Matthews Jr.? Gary Matthews Jr.!?! I know it was sort of a panic move after Beltran had what appeared to be surprise surgery, but GARY MATTHEWS JR!?! The 35 year old who had one good season, and two more halfway decent seasons? And the one good season, 2006, was followed by his name being tied to an HGH scandal? I know they only had to pick up about $2 million of his salary. I wouldn't pay two dollars to have Gary Matthews Jr. play for my team. But don't worry Mets fans, because you also picked up Josh Fogg, Fernando Tatis and Frank Catalanotto. How long after signing his contract do you think it took Jason Bay to immediately regret that decision? Ten minutes? Five seconds? I feel sorry for Mets fans. If I was a billionaire, I'd buy them all ice cream, or strippers, their choice, whatever would make them feel better. What a disaster. If the Mets win 85 games this season, Jerry Manuel should get a lifetime contract extension and immediate admission to Cooperstown.

I've become slightly intrigued by what the Oakland A's are doing (when did this become the AL west blog?). I really like the Ben Sheets signing for them (sorry Mets fans, I thought I was done hurting you for today). Healthy Ben Sheets wins 17-20 games and makes the A's a contender, not healthy Ben Sheets means the A's do what we already expected them to do this year, not a whole lot. I like Coco Crisp for them too. I get fooled by Coco Crisp every year. I always think he's ready for a good year, I haven't been right yet, but I'll go to the well one more time. Their line-up still looks, um, awful, but the A's always look that way in February. Some years it turns out that way, some years we get surprised. We'll see, I'm interested though.

On to the usual Yankees/Red Sox border war. The Yankees added Randy Wynn, Marcus Thames and some other guys, including Royce Ring, who was a decently regarded prospect at one time and may be worth keeping an eye on. As a Yankees fan, I really couldn't be happier with how this off-season turned out. Right down to putting Joba in the bullpen and making Hughes the fifth starter.

Did you know the Red Sox picked up Jeremy Hermida? Me neither. It could be nothing, the Marlins apparently gave up on him, and they're pretty good with young talent. But Hermida was a big time prospect and he just turned 26. I'd keep an eye on that, Boston could have a real corner outfielder there. If I were a Red Sox fan, this Hermida thing would make or break the off-season for me. If he turns into a good everyday outfielder, you have to like the Sox. If he doesn't help them, they're one bat short.

Quick hits on some other transactions
Ryan Church to the Pirates: He had to be on someone's DL this year.
Big name Cuban pitcher Aroldis Chapman to the Reds: Um..what? That really came out of nowhere. Did the Yankees and Red Sox fall asleep? Is he the Cuban Hideki Irabu? I have to see how this plays out.
Aubrey Huff to the Giants: What's the difference between signing with the Giants and retiring? I'm not setting up a joke, I'm honestly asking.
Orlando Hudson and Jim Thome to the Twins: Unless those guys were signed because they have a secret plan to finish Joe Mauer's new deal, I don't care.
Brian Giles to the Dodgers: Hey, isn't that the guy who hit for the cycle the day Richard Nixon resigned?

Biggest free agents still available
Johnny Damon - Somebody's getting a pretty decent hitter once he lowers his ridiculous asking price, just don't expect him to steal 25 bases or play defense. He spent most of last season running like he was carrying Kevin Millar on his back.
Jarrod Washburn - Come on Mets, just throw your fans a bone. Washburn's a decent pitcher, and no one else seems to want him. You're going to need someone, at least to fill in while Oliver Perez is in AA working on his mechanics.
Russ Branyan - I'm a little surprised he's still out there. I wouldn't mind him as my team's DH. Just look at that cool name.
Pedro and Smoltz - I wouldn't touch either of these guys, but someone will.
Rocco Baldelli - I know, not exactly the biggest of names, but I'm keeping an eye on him. I haven't given up on Rocco. I remember Sports Illustrated once suggesting that Rocco could be the next Joe Dimaggio. That sounds like a guy someone could use.
Chan Ho Park - OK, that's it. When I'm considering writing a sentence about Chan Ho Park, you know it's time to stop commenting on the off-season and just wait patiently for spring training.

What Are They Up To?

I'm starting to feel like I finally achieved my dream of moving to Edmonton or Alaska, only nobody told me. If you live in the northeast or mid-atlantic, you know what I'm talking about. There's snow everywhere, it's like some kind of Dickensian frozen hellscape out there. The sun doesn't help, it just makes the blinding white snow even brighter. Yesterday I felt like Forrest Gump. There was big snow, little snow, sideways snow, upside down snow. I'm thinking of investing in some cross-country skis, or a plow for the front of my car. I'm not complaining, I like winter, I like snow, I love the cold.

The best part about all of this is the reaction of climate change deniers. Hannity, Goldmember Beck, Big Fat Rush, other conservative pundits and commentators on Fox, lots of Republican Congressmen and Senators. They believe, because it's cold right now, that this completely destroys all theories of global warming and climate change. That's pretty dumb. These people are suggesting, with straight faces, that snow, in winter, means climate change is just a big liberal myth. How dumb is that?

Sometime in our infancy, after birth but well before we learn not to fear the toilet, we develop our understanding of object permanence. That is, the understanding that things we've seen before continue to exist even when we cannot see them. So basically, when you say that climate change is all a myth because you're cold right now, even though you know, say, that last decade was the hottest decade we've ever seen, you're making an argument that even a 1 year old would find implausible.

I saw Olbermann and Jon Stewart, among others, hammering the deniers pretty hard for this. That kind of insane stupidity is right in their wheelhouses. But see, I'm not buying it. I refuse to believe that all of the people I've seen mocking Al Gore this week because it's snowing are actually that stupid. Rush maybe, Jim Inhofe definitely, but not all of them. No way. Take Beck, he's not a dumb guy. He plays dumb for his audience sometimes, but he's a master manipulator, pretty funny (sometimes intentionally) and he knows a lot of big words, like communist and eugenics and oligarchy (although that one took him two tries) and woodrowwilson (that might be two words, I'll have to check that). Anyway, my point is, I'm positive Glenn is at least as smart as, say, a four year old, or a chimp.

Hannity too. He doesn't play dumb on TV so much as he plays willfully ignorant. But Hannity also knows big words, like propaganda and hyperbole, and I've seen him use his opposable thumbs to throw a football and hold a piece of paper. He too, is definitely at least as mentally capable as a toddler or a lower primate.

That brings us to my question. What are these people up to? Are they just trying to bait Democrats into a climate change fight so it looks like they're not paying attention to the economy and terrorism? Are they just trying to kill that idiot-ass cap and trade bill? I still say my argument against cap and trade (that it's stupid and won't even do much for the environment, you can read all about it in one of my earlier posts) is better than any other argument I've heard. Are they just trying to make Democrats look generally silly?

I don't know, this seems like kind of a stupid way to do any of those things, and Democrats can look silly all on their own. Is it just because ignoring science is generally good policy in the Republican party right now? This time, I'm really just asking questions. I honestly don't know. But I want to know. Conservatives everywhere spent the last two days saying incredibly stupid things on TV, and I honestly believe many of them know better. What are they up to?

Just Tell Us How

I was watching some footage from Sarah Palin's tea time speech over the weekend, and it struck me that she was doing something that's one of my major beefs with the Republican party right now. She kept talking about things she wanted, and things we should do, and things that should happen, and a lot of them sounded just fine with me. But Sarah, like a lot of politicians, seemed to keep leaving out one key point in all of her proposed ideas. How? How does she propose we get to where she wants to be?

My favorite example was her take on fighting terrorism; "we win, they lose". I'm not making that up, I actually saw it on tape. Awesome! Why didn't the rest of us think of that? Unfortunately, I can only remember her mentioning two actual strategies she might employ. I don't expect her to lay out her whole secret plan for defeating the terrorists, but I'm going to need more than this.

First, divine intervention (once again, I'm not making that up). Let's try something. You start praying and I'll start shooting at you (and let me be clear, I'm not shooting at you because you're praying, you're praying because I'm about to start shooting at you, which I already decided to do for some unrelated reason). Let's see who comes out on top. I don't mind a President who prays a little about how to deal with enemies, really, I don't. Even with my not believing and all, I can accept prayer as a way many people clear their minds and focus. I'm just not willing to accept it as a key part of the strategy.

Second, not giving Miranda rights to terrorists. I honestly don't care what we do with terror suspects. I feel the same way about this as I do about the death penalty. I have an opinion, but if the government is doing something different, I'm not going to get all worked up about it. But I have a question. Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck, people like them, they always tell us how our rights are inalienable, given to us not by the government, but by the man in the sky. If that's the case, don't those rights apply to everyone? Isn't Sarah and Glenn's god in charge of everything? Inalienable, god-given rights don't really sound like the kind of thing you have to be American to get.

Also, isn't this whole terror thing about us defending our way of life? And doesn't our way of life involve, ya know, rights and stuff? Look, I'm not in charge of what we do with terror suspects, and I don't know enough about it to say I think we should do one thing or another, and I'm perfectly happy with us not giving people rights if the experts think that's best. But things you say have to be congruent with other things you say. Rights can't be endowed to us be an omnipotent creator but also only apply to certain people. We can defend ourselves against terror by stepping outside of our usual rule of law, but don't tell me we're defending our values and our way of life by not adhering to them.

I'm wandering a bit. Seriously, I DON'T CARE what we do with terror suspects, send them home, kill them, shoot them into space, whatever. I just want to know what the plan is. How does Sarah think we can get from here to "we win, they lose"? Can we even win? Do you see terrorists ever surrendering and signing a peace treaty? Me neither. Can we convert or kill every terrorist? I don't think so. I don't think this is winnable. This is the new world order, it's how things are from now on. We'll be in this fight for decades or centuries until there's no more America. And then the new America will have to deal with it. That's what I think. Sarah thinks there's a way to win. That's much better than what I think, but I need to hear how.

Federal spending is another one of these things. Both parties do basically the same thing on this, but I have more of a beef with Republicans. Democrats are supposed to be stupid with money, they're Democrats. Republicans are supposed to know better. Everyone wants to cut federal spending, balance the federal budget, make the government live the same way American families live. On the other hand, both parties can't wait to tell me how they're not going to cut defense, social security, medicare, medicaid or national security spending. Why? Because cutting any of those things would be terrible politics.

Hmmmm. Social security, national security and defense, medicare and medicaid and interest on the federal debt made up somewhere around 65% of last year's federal budget (I refuse to do research for anything I'm not getting paid for, but I'm pretty sure I'm within a few percent one way or the other). If we spent on just those things, and completely cut everything else, we might break even. So, how do we balance the federal budget without cutting any of the areas where we spend real money?

Am I suggesting we cut these areas? Well, I'm 30. I've already spent 13 years paying into social security. Good luck getting me to vote for you if you're telling me I can't get a check when I retire (by the way, I don't see me living to 65, or whatever the retirement age will be when I get older, 91 maybe? I'm just saying, ya know, when I hypothetically retire). And good luck getting anyone to vote for you if you're suggesting cutting defense. Everyone wants to cut taxes too, don't even get me started on that. Balancing the federal budget is a great idea. I just don't see it being possible anytime soon. Some politicians talk like it's possible. That's much better than what I think, but please tell the rest of us how.

I see a lot of issues like this. Republicans keep saying they want health care reform too. They want tort reform. I'm OK with that as long as it restricts frivolous malpractice suits and not people's ability to sue insurance companies for screwing them. They want interstate portability. Speaking of asking how, someone tell me how letting insurance companies sell insurance across state lines without any federal regulations on them doesn't result in every insurance company being headquartered out of a P.O. Box in Delaware or whichever other state is willing to regulate and tax them least, or not at all. More importantly, Republicans say they have a plan to reform health care too. Fine, great, I can't wait to hear it.

Here's my point. People will say I'm wrong about everything. Maybe. I don't know a whole lot about terrorism or balancing the federal budget or health care. I'm not saying I know the right way to handle any of this. Here's what I'm saying. For either political party to campaign and speak as if they will win the war on terror, or balance the budget, or solve one of our other seemingly unsolvable problems, but not actually have a plan to do so. That's criminal. Have a plan. Be ready to do something when you get elected. Otherwise, go away, because you're not helping.

PS...there's been a lot of talk about ending the don't ask, don't tell policy since the President mentioned it in the State of the Union Address. I'd like to write about this, but there's not really a whole blog here. It's a bigoted and incredibly stupid policy that makes some people more equal than others AND prevents us from having the best possible military at a time when we're fighting two wars. Anyone with a working brain should be all for ending it, and that's really all I have to say about that.

That Bowl Was Super, Thanks For Asking

Biggest sporting event of the year: Check
Dopey, over-hyped commercials: Double check
Me watching and making fun of it: Another no-brainer

Pre-game highlights? Um...I refuse to watch pre-game shows as a rule. Also, if anything doesn't need nine hours of hype leading up to it, it's the superbowl. So my pre-game viewing consisted of watching other channels until kick-off. The highlight was on Fox News. They were breathlessly covering a U-Haul truck which had been pulled over in Arizona. Supposedly the truck was full of illegal immigrants from Mexico. When the police breached the back of the truck, it was empty. In the immortal words of Kent Brockman, "so, once again, we've been duped". My favorite part was when the anchor said "there could have been dangerous people inside; snipers, drug cartel members, Mexicans". Wait, what was that last one?

My other pre-game comment comes from NBC. After an awesome hockey game (isn't every hockey game an awesome hockey game?), they showed a PGA tour event. My level of interest in golf without Tiger Woods is roughly equal to what my interest level would be in a hockey game without ice or a NASCAR race without gasoline. Note to the PGA: Your sport sucks without Tiger Woods, I don't care if he's a sex maniac, get him back, now.

Hey, am I the only one getting a little tired of hearing the national anthem before everything? (Probably). I don't necessarily need us to stop doing it, or even to change the song around too much, but maybe just an updated version. I nominate Them Crooked Vultures to create it. I could sit through a Zac Brown Band concert if Dave Grohl was on drums. OK, enough stalling, football time.

CBS stole NBC's idea of having the players introduce themselves, but they forgot to steal the best part, so we didn't get to hear Jeremy Shockey or Reggie Wayne tell us they're from "The U". Over/Under on mentions of Dwight Freeney's ankle tonight, 52.5. Saints go three and out on the first possession, not a good omen. Also, the crowd sounds roughly 104% pro-Saints. Good for them, if you weren't already a Colts fan before the season started, there's simply no excuse for not rooting for the Saints.

Jim Caldwell has the blank stare working right from the start. Field goal on the Colts' first possession. Commercials so far; house made of Bud Light; old people playing football, I think they were trying to sell me a Snickers; and Tim Tebow tackling his mom, which apparently had something to do with focus on the family. The kickoff back to the Saints was followed by an awful commercial featuring the '85 Bears, I think they were trying to sell me a cell phone or something.

Finally the Saints get a first down. The Colts are bringing a ton of pressure. I've never gotten the impression that the Saints are a team that can be rattled by pressure, Brees doesn't strike me as that kind of guy. Marques Colston dropped a big play, he's still mourning the loss of the Hofstra football program. The next pass was incomplete after obvious pass interference. Hey Saints! Don't expect too many calls today, you're playing Peyton Manning.

These commercials are awful, I refuse to buy any of these products. If the Colts go 96 yards for a touchdown right here, we may be in for a long night. Two weeks ago, the Saints hit Brett Favre late on almost every play (and hardly ever got called for it, even the NFL is sick of Brett). This week, Peyton Manning looks pretty comfortable so far, but the Saints look like they're getting closer. Hey, where has Joseph Addai been all year? Three good runs on this drive, which is at least three more than I remember seeing from him this season. Touchdown, Manning to Garcon. You could kind of feel that one coming. The Saints defense looks pretty overmatched right now. If the Saints don't start scoring, this could get ugly, like Denver Broncos ugly, even Buffalo Bills ugly.

It's official, I'm never eating Doritos or drinking any Budweiser product again. Ever. I hate these commercials so much. Furthermore, I'd pay $12 to see Jackass 4: Jackass Forever before I'd see this new Robin Hood movie with Russell Crowe. Also, that cars.com commercial was like a lot of my blog posts. It just sort of wandered around for a while making jokes with varying degrees of success and hoping to stumble across a point eventually.

Late hit out of bounds on the Colts and Simms just made a good point; why are these sidelines so crowded? It's like they're playing inside a night club. Good drive working here for the Saints. Even a field goal could maybe get them settled a little. OK, Dwight Freeney just forced a field goal by dragging Drew Brees down with one hand after running over the left tackle. I think his ankle is at least decently functional.

We just learned that Jim Nantz is conversant in the CBS Monday night comedy line-up, that came right after a fantastic commercial for Letterman's show featuring him, Oprah and Leno. Did Jay lose a bet? Then we got an awful Hyundai commercial featuring Brett Favre. Finally a punt from the Colts, the fair catch by Reggie Bush caused the whole stadium to the do the disappointed sigh. Seriously, there may not be any Colts fans in Florida right now.

Brees just threw a rocket to Shockey, but since Jeremy isn't 9 feet tall, that one almost got picked. Brees isn't always great at being careful with the ball, that could be a problem tonight. Another catch for Colston, go Flying Dutchmen! You heard me. Pride? Eff that. What the hell kind of a team name is that? No wonder they had to cut the football program because no one was coming to the games.

I love how we a get "Uuuuuuuu" from the crowd every time Vilma or Shockey makes a play. If I was a big time high school football player, I'd tell all the other colleges to not even bother. The Saints just ran a play that seemed to be designed to lose 7 yards, and it worked perfectly. I guess they needed some more room for the 27 yard pass play that happened next.

Commercials during the two minute warning included the best line of the night so far: "flowers in a box? that's what cigarettes and dead people come in". I like that, what was it a commercial for? I don't know, I guess flowers not in a box. Also, CSI Miami is going to space. Could Emily Procter be even cuter in space than she is on earth? I guess we'll find out.

After the warning, a goal line stuff by the Colts D. A 6+ minute Saints drive gets nothing. Like a swift kick to the groin of every Saints fan. At least the Colts were trapped far enough down field they just decided not to try anything with the football before the half. Three and out for the Colts and it's Reggie Bush time again.

It looks like they're building either a Harry Potter theme park or a Harry Potter section in another theme park. Either way, how did that take so long? I'd have to invent a new number, like say, eleventy billion, to estimate how much money that place could make.

Here's something funny about me. I have almost no ability to feel empathy for other humans, but whenever I see a commercial involving a robot that's supposed to be depressed for some reason, I feel genuinely bad for the robot. What kind of psychopath does that make me? Don't answer that. Anyway, good job by New Orleans of getting a field goal before the half. I thought this was supposed to be a "shoot-out". Football experts everywhere said so. Am I watching the wrong game? Is this some kind of consolation game?

Halftime Comments:
I like The Who, everybody likes The Who, but can we please get some current music. OK, so the awesome Jay-Z/Rhianna/Eminem halftime show would scare the flyover states (and everyone else over 40). How about Kings of Leon, or Green Day, or Pearl Jam, or Velvet Revolver? (provided Scott isn't in jail, or high, or just missing for unexplained reasons, OK you'd need a back-up act if you scheduled Velvet Revolver) Of course, the Velvet Revolver show would end with the surprise GnR reunion. I will keep coming up with GnR reunion ideas until someone takes one and makes it work.

The Saints started the second half with an onsides kick. That's balls right there. After about a two minute scrum for the ball, the Saints come out with it. How awesome was that? 13 out of 10 on the awesome scale. Jim Caldwell's reaction? Blank stare. The Saints reaction? Marching right down the field for their first touchdown. And what does coach Caldwell think of this start to the second half? He thinks it's a good time to stare blankly.

Peyton Manning used to be good for a self-destruction in this kind of situation. Recently though, he's been pretty unflappable. Man, the Colts are just calmly marching right back down the field like nothing even happened. I'm not a Manning fan at all, but that was pretty impressive. They just sliced through the Saints D and took the lead back, completely blunted all the Saints' momentum, stunning, I'm stunned.

We're getting pretty close to adding Coca-cola to the list of products I'm never buying again. It's tougher, because I like Coke, but these commercials are pretty unbearable. Also, they've played Metallica at least three times during highlight packages. Why couldn't we get them for halftime?

The Saints seem to have found a little something here, they're moving down the field again. It's possible the Colts D is getting a little winded, they've been out there quite a bit. Settling for the field goal here doesn't feel great. If I had money on the Saints, I'd be nervous right about now. By the way, I really liked that Google commercial, well done.

"This could only be one place; A tradition like no other; Hide the women because Tiger's coming. The Masters on CBS."

The Saints aren't getting anywhere near Peyton Manning right now. The Colts went for it on 4th&2 and made it look easy. Simms commented "Jim Caldwell isn't afraid to make a bold decision". Really? I don't think I saw Manning even look over at the sideline before going for it. Kudos to the Saints D for stepping up, the Colts were looking unstoppable, then all of a sudden we see a 51 yard field goal try go wide left and the Saints are left with excellent field position.

Did Emerald Nuts and Pop Secret have to pool their money for a superbowl spot? Are they even owned by the same company? Am I supposed to eat them together? That was weird.

Here come the Saints again. I'm not sure the Colts D has much left. Another nice catch by Colston. The dude's pretty good, he must have gone to an awesome college. A Saints TD is looking pretty inevitable right now. I have a prediction, if Shockey scores here, this pro-Saints Miami crowd will completely lose it's collective mind. And there it is. Way to score and work the crowd at the same time. The Saints missed the two point conversion though, that can't be good. That looked close, I might have challenged that. Sean Payton might have challenged it too, and, in fact, he did. That looks like a catch to me, Lance Moore had it for a while before that guy kicked it away. Play overturned, Saints up by seven. Great play by Lance Moore too. That almost makes up for the week he gave my fantasy team a big fat 0.

Five years ago, there's no way Manning pulls off this comeback. Now? I'm terrified for the Saints. I couldn't tell if the green police commercial during the injury timeout was pro-environment or anti-environment, but then we found out it was just pro-car (what kind of car? I already forgot. Volkswagen maybe). And there's the Peyton Manning I remember from my younger and more innocent days. INT returned for a TD by Tracy Porter. 31-17 Saints. No one is going to work in New Orleans tomorrow. No one.

The Saints are spending the last few minutes just trying to hang on and giving up huge chunks of yardage. Stupid late hit penalty stopped the clock. Luckily for the Saints, that was immediately followed by an offensive pass interference penalty that moved the Colts back ten yards and forced them to use a timeout. After a ridiculous run call on 3rd&Goal, incomplete pass on fourth down and it's officially over.

After the first quarter, once the Saints got their heads in the game, this was a pretty hard ass kicking. The Saints dominated the last three quarters of this game. Drew Brees is the pretty obvious MVP. The Gatorade bath guys almost killed a few people on the sideline trying to get the bucket to the coach, but they got it done. There really isn't anything else to say. Solid game, great outcome, crappy commercials. Everything you could ask for in a superbowl.

The Craziest Thing I've Ever Seen

We see crazy things on TV all the time. Sometimes MSNBC runs old episodes of To Catch a Predator on the weekends. Every segment of that show ends with the police tackling a surprised pervert. It's fantastic. It's also pretty crazy to see a bunch of guys show up to have sex with 13 year olds on national TV. We're like two, maybe three steps away from killing someone on live TV, right?

By the way, what do you think goes through a pervert's mind when the little girl disappears and Chris Hansen pops out and tells him to have a seat? His first thought would have to be "uh oh, that's her dad and he's definitely going to kill me". So, when he finds out it's just Chris Hansen, there have to be some mixed emotions. On the down side, no sex with a 13 year old today, and he's about to get tackled by policemen dressed as trees and hauled off to jail. On the plus side, he's probably going to live.

Last night I was watching the Colbert Report and I found out that J.D. Salinger died last week. I watch as much news as anyone, it took me a week to find out that J.D. Salinger died. The death of one of the Jersey Shore cast members would get more media coverage. I know, Salinger was a recluse and the State of the Union was last week. Plus, we're still getting more information on just how much of a scumbag John Edwards is (I used to like John Edwards too, I felt like he really gave a crap about poor people, then he cheated on his cancer surviving wife, had a baby and denied paternity. There's a special level of hell just for him. You know, if hell were real).

Still, the death of Michael Jackson was on every channel on my TV for like a week. If Michael Jackson had died last week, I think we would have had to postpone the State of the Union. I'm only half kidding about that. But Salinger gets hardly anything. He wrote Catcher in the Rye. How does that not at least equal Thriller? (obviously, it's like 78 times better than Thriller, and I like Thriller. I'm just trying to be fair-minded) Seriously, sometimes I wonder what's wrong with us.

Last week ole Goldmember Beck was at it again. I didn't watch most of this episode, but it seemed he was doing an entire hour on the evils of elitism. My favorite part was when he called Woodrow Wilson a "dirtbag racist" (Beck really doesn't like Wilson, or Teddy Roosevelt). I don't have a problem with that, it was pretty funny to see, but weren't many of Glenn's heroes, the founders, slave owners? Anyway, that's not the crazy part, and Beck's constant attack on elite people isn't the crazy part either.

Going after elites is good politics. Most people aren't elite, most people are actually pretty average, and many of them are just plain stupid (I've said this before, look around you right now, do you see stupid people? You bet your ass you do. I rest my case). There's a lot of political hay to be made in making the stupid people think that they're not stupid and actually somehow better than the smart people. It's nonsense, but a lot of populism is nonsense and it always seems to work.

The crazy part was right at the end. Glenn and his guests were talking about what people should read to get informed. Someone suggested The Federalist Papers. That's not a bad idea. Glenn suggested that someone would have to translate The Federalist Papers into words regular people could understand. So Glenn's argument is that the "people" are smart, and they know what's best, and anyone who calls them stupid is an elitist jerk, and possibly a communist who wants to kill everyone. But those same "people" are just too stupid to understand The Federalist Papers without someone translating the essays into smaller words. Glenn even made fun of himself for saying it. Something has to be pretty crazy to give Glenn Beck a moment of self-awareness.

I saw something else last week. The President reminded us why being elite isn't a bad thing, why we want the smart guy in charge. He reminded me why I voted for him and why, even though I'm a registered Republican, I refuse to vote for anymore Republicans until we get the idiots out of the party (I've said this before too, it may be a while). Last Friday, the President went to visit the House Republican caucus and took questions on live TV. He mopped the floor with those morons. It was awesome, like watching the President debate a group of hostile third graders. Here's how you know last Friday didn't go well for the Republicans. They haven't even been trying to spin it this week. They're just pretending it never happened and moving on. It got to be such a one-sided ass kicking that Fox News stopped covering it in the middle.

So what was so crazy about this? You had Republicans asking questions and listening politely to the responses. You had the President talking on TV without prepared lines or going over everything with his staff. Politicians, having an open and honest debate, unscripted, in front of TV cameras, for the whole country to see? I don't know about you, but that's the craziest thing I've ever seen.