Sean and Soccer Save the World

Years ago, during the 2010 World Cup final http://somethingclever13.blogspot.com/2010/07/two-teams-one-cup.html, I commented that any part of life could be improved by employing the same yellow card/red card system used in soccer games.  I always meant to elaborate on that, but then we all got really into planking, and then the 2012 election happened and I just sort of forgot about it.  It's never too late to make the world a better place though, so here goes.

First of all, if you're not a soccer fan, let me briefly review how cards work in soccer (and if you are a soccer fan...ya know...why?).  If you're playing soccer and you do something mildly alarming, like accidentally kick a guy in the shin while going for the ball, or hold the back of someone's jersey so they try to get the ball but can't and it's pretty hilarious but also not allowed, then the referee may run up to you and waive a yellow card at you.  The referee will also write your name down, I've noticed.  A yellow card is basically a warning to please stop doing dickish things to your fellow soccer players or else.  Or else what?

Well, let's say you do something very alarming, like picking the ball up and spiking it onto the referee's head, or intentionally kicking a fellow soccer man directly in the testicles.  At that point, the referee (assuming his head isn't bleeding too badly) will run up to you and waive a red card in your face.  When that happens, you have to leave and no more soccering for you today.  I suppose you could go to a park down the street or something and play in a different game, but the people in the park would probably ask you why you left your original game, and you'd say you kicked someone in the genitals, and then they would probably say they don't really want to play with you.

You also get a red card if you get a second yellow card in the same game, and it seems that if you get a second yellow card in two different games in the same tournament you have to sit out the next game after that.  It seems odd that two overly aggressive attempts to steal the ball would result in the same penalty as punching a goalie in the face for no reason, but I guess it's the only way to make the yellow cards meaningful.

Clearly, this would be an excellent addition to everyday life, so the question is how do we implement it effectively?  First of all, I'm only worried about American implementation.  I can't control the rest of the world and for all I know Europe and South America already use soccer cards in everyday life, those people love soccer.  I can't force Canada to do anything, and honestly they're already so polite they may not need this.  So just America, at least for starters.

Step one is easy.  Just have the Department of the Interior mail every American citizen their cards.  I can't imagine two cards for everyone would be all that expensive, although they would need some technology in them and we'll get to that in a minute.  The technology probably rules out getting them online, although I guess we could just all use our phones.  I don't know, people like getting mail sometimes.  I've always wanted a pen pal.

This also raises the question of whether or not kids get cards.  I think we need to hash out the process and consequences a little more before we decide if we can trust kids with this responsibility, so let's put a pin in that and get back to it. 

Alright so everybody has cards, now what?  Well, I think, and some people are probably going to be a little uncomfortable with this, but I think the only way to do this correctly is for everyone to get chips implanted in their heads.  I thought about this for 30 or 45 seconds and I really can't think of a better plan.  Now before you say no, just think about a couple of things.  First of all, we're not putting chips in your brain, just in your head.  Under the skin somewhere, but outside your skull.  That's not so bad, right?  More importantly, this only works to improve the world if we all play along.  If you try to give a stranger a yellow card and they just run away and don't give you their name, the system ceases to work.  If there's a chip in your card and a chip in the stranger's head, his yellow card is immediately recorded in the card database and he can run all he wants, he still has a yellow card.

This brings us to the other piece of technology we'll be needing.  Hand held cards are good for work and grocery stores and stuff, but we would absolutely need to integrate the card system into driving.  This shouldn't be that hard.  Every car would need to be equipped with a sensor and a voice activated card system.  If you need to give another car a card while driving, you would just say "Car in front of me, yellow card" and then the car in front of you would get a yellow card.  Ideally, yellow lights would flash in his car for a minute to alert him.  This would be fun but not entirely necessary.

Whenever you get a chance, when you get home or whatever, you would just log into the database and put in the specific reasons for whatever cards you issued that day.  There has to be some review process.  We can't just have people issuing cards with no oversight.  We would need a team of card administrators reviewing all cards issued and reasons given, and either approving or disallowing them.  This leads to the next big element...valid reasons for giving a card.

You have to understand that this system isn't meant to replace our criminal justice system.  If somebody shoots you in the face or robs your house or something, they would still go to jail.  Cards are for those things that are really annoying and everybody hates you for doing, but aren't necessarily illegal.  At the same time, we can't let people use the cards to be mean or get revenge for stuff.  If you ask someone to lunch and they say no, you can't give them a yellow card.  People have the right to not have lunch with you. 

We'd start with a committee to generate a starter list of valid reasons for cards.  The committee would consist of the following people:
Me (obviously)
Neil Degrasse Tyson
Norm MacDonald
Emma Stone
Ronald Reagan's Ghost (I know, but everybody has to feel represented on the committee.  We can't have an entire country of Republicans refusing to participate in the card system)
Beyoncé or Jay-Z, but not both of them
Slash
Ian Darke (for soccer knowledge and Britishness)
Elizabeth Warren
Stephen Hawking (I know we already have a scientist, but I'm just looking for smart people, multiple scientists were bound to happen)
The Pope (not the last guy, but definitely the current guy)
Gibbs
Stephen Colbert or Jon Stewart, but again, not both of them
Ellen Page
Hemingway's Ghost (as long as we're inviting ghosts)
Morgan Freeman
Tina Fey (I'm iffy on Tina, but the committee needs more women)

I'm open to other suggestions for the committee.  It clearly needs a few more women.  I thought about Kirsten Gillebrand but we already have a Senator and the Senate already has enough power.  I would think the committee could get pretty big, maybe around 30 people. 

Once the committee generated a starter list, we could roll out the system, but we could continue to add things to the list as they come up.  Any new reason entered into the database would be reviewed by an administrator.  If the administrator saw some validity, the reason would be submitted to the committee and it would need to be approved by a 2/3 majority.  Committee members would have lifetime appointments.  When they died, the remaining members of the committee would replace them in a very secretive process that I really can't tell you about because it's a secret.

Since I'm on the committee, I can give you a quick preview of some of the things that will earn you a card...

Yellow Cards
-Driving below the speed limit on a one lane road
-Using the self check-out at the grocery store when you clearly don't know how to use the self check-out at the grocery store
-Coming into my office without commenting on the awesome art that now resides in my office
-Watching Thursday night football when your fantasy team isn't directly impacted
-Telling people you're "from New York" when you're actually from upstate New York.  North of Westchester is just meth labs and broken dreams.
-Wearing a bike helmet as an adult
-Not being willing to admit that SVU is unwatchable without Stabler
-Playing video games as an adult
-Trying to get on the subway or an elevator before other people get off
-Walking slowly on the sidewalk (New York City only)

Red Cards
-Being mean to an animal in any way that falls short of breaking the law (stinging insects do not in any way count as animals and you can be as mean to them as you want)
-Leaving a crappy tip for no good reason
-Burping loudly in public and then reacting as though you've accomplished something or done something funny.
-Day drinking after you've graduated college.  You could literally say to people "go home, you're drunk" and they would have to listen to you.  How fun would that be?

What happens when you get a card?  Yellow cards are easy.  Yellow cards are just a warning, so nothing really has to happen.  We're not doing the whole two yellow cards equals a red card thing because I think that's silly in real life, so yellow cards have no concrete consequences, you just feel shame, which should be enough.  You could even issue some joking yellow cards to friends, but we'd keep an eye on you because too many joke yellow cards would corrupt the system.  If you issued too many joke yellow cards, me or Neil would show up personally to issue you a red card and take your cards away for some indefinite period of time.  Once you were cardless, people could do whatever they wanted to you.  You don't want that.

Red cards are tough though.  Part of the efficacy of the red card is the immediacy of the impact.  You get a red card and then you leave.  There's no appeal or second opinion, you just leave.  So, ideally, if you were driving and you got a red card, your car would automatically drive you to your house and then shut off and refuse to start again for 24 hours.  In general, a red card would ban you from participating in whatever activity you were doing incorrectly for some period of time.  We'd have to figure out how we define certain activities.  If you got a red card for being a crappy tipper, would you be banned from eating for 24 hours or banned from that particular restaurant for a year?  Something else for the committee to consider.  

Anyway, I think we could only let people give red cards for pre-approved reasons.  If somebody does something you think should be a red card, but it isn't on the list, then you can't give the card.  You can give them a yellow card and suggest that the committee make the offense a red card, and then maybe it would be a red card in the future.  We'd all have to have some patience with the system at first while we worked out the kinks.  I promise it'll be worth it.

Erroneous red cards would be very bad.  If you're caught giving somebody a red card for something they didn't actually do, you would most likely have to serve significant prison time.  Same goes for ignoring a red card that has been appropriately issued to you. That's really the only way to keep people in line.  Everybody needs to respect the system or it won't work. 

Back to whether or not kids get cards.  I feel like they should.  Bad parenting isn't punished nearly enough in our society.  I think allowing kids to give red cards to their parents would really raise the bar a little bit.  Remember, you could only give red cards for pre-approved reasons, so there's a defense in place to keep kids from inappropriately using the cards against their parents.  I think for kids, instead of prison time for an erroneous red card, we would probably just have to take their cards away until they turned 18.  I think this would all work out just fine.

Once we get the system in place and we get a good working list of red card offenses, I think this is going to go really well.  The best part is, people are always complaining that Americans don't respect soccer enough, and we still won't, but now we can give those people yellow cards for complaining.

Disappointment

Before I get into this, a quick Oscars note. I could stay on topic by manufacturing some disappointment over a few of the winners, but I really wasn't disappointed. The Hurt Locker was an awesome movie and I'm glad it won (if that other movie about blue people, which I refuse to see or mention by name, had beaten The Hurt Locker for best picture, I would have done 5 blogs complaining about it). Sure, I would have liked to have seen that girl from Precious win, just because she seems really nice and it might have made Oprah so happy she would have given us all cars, but I like Sandra Bullock so I can't even really complain about that. And yes, 500 Days of Summer was easily my favorite movie of the last year, and it didn't get nominated for anything, but that has more to do with there not being a comedy category than anything else. So I was really pretty fine with the Oscars. Oh well. Anyway, onto things that do disappoint me.

Everyone knows New York is the best city in the world. It's an undisputed fact. Being from somewhere else doesn't mean you're from somewhere that sucks, it just means you're from somewhere that's less awesome than it could be. Like a cheeseburger without bacon, or a gun without bullets, or a milkshake without bacon, really anything without bacon is a solid example here. I was in the middle of a thought, now I'm just thinking about things I could add bacon to, where was I? Oh yeah, my hometown is great. That's why I'm so disappointed in New York politics lately.

I submit that all these problems started with New York's Senators. No scandals there, but I wasn't impressed with either of them. I once heard someone (Jon Stewart maybe) refer to Chuck Schumer as a human strip mall. I'm still not sure exactly what that meant, but it sure sounds right. Senator Schumer used to visit the university I worked at in New York sometimes and give little speeches. I remember always being underwhelmed.

The other Senate seat currently belongs to someone named Kirsten. That's really all I know about her, but I had a friend named Kirsten when I was a kid, so Senator Kirsten is plus one with me so far. But her predecessor, Hillary Clinton, was another disappointment for me. A carpetbagger from Arkansas and Washington who was clearly using the state as a stepping stone to a run for the White House. We elected her because we knew her name and it had a D next to it. I thought New Yorkers were smarter than that.

Now, you could look at both of those elections and say they weren't really so bad, and you'd probably be right. But I don't know, maybe if we had examined these two little mistakes more closely, we could have avoided the rest of this nonsense.

Eliot Spitzer wasn't really a disappointment (at least not for me) so much as he was an embarrassment. Governor Spitzer liked whores. I don't like whores, but some people do, and that's really between them and their wives. I mean, it's not like it's a crime. What? It is a crime? Oh yeah, that's right. OK, so maybe a slightly disappointing embarrassment.

Wait, the voice in my head wants to know how I can say I don't like whores if I've never tried one. That's an interesting point, voice in my head. But I have a somewhat related counterpoint. I've never tried hepatitis either, but I'm fairly certain I wouldn't like it. Hey, voice in my head! How come other people have a conscience that tries to get them to do good things but you're always doing things like trying to get me to try a hooker or betting me I can't drink a whole bottle of Jack Daniels on St. Patrick's Day in college without blacking out (mission accomplished, by the way)? The voice doesn't have an answer, that's what I thought.

Spitzer's shameful resignation ushered in the David Paterson era, which has been like a Lollapalooza of unethical behavior. On the main stage, there was his immediate admission of cheating on his wife, followed by his admission to trying almost every drug ever invented. And just as the main stage show was winding down, we found out that he allegedly used state police to intimidate a woman who was making accusations against one of his staffers. Oh, and did I mention he's also legally blind? Blindness isn't funny, but you have to see the irony in a blind Governor so blatantly misusing officers of the justice system.

What actually got me going on this are the commercials I've been seeing about this stupid soda tax they've proposed in New York. I know, they already tax cigarettes and alcohol and 17 other things that people like even though they're bad for us. That doesn't mean I have to like it. How does the awesome, cool state become the no smoking in bars, soda tax state?

I should mention, at this point, that I won't make fun of that Massa guy from the 29th district. For one thing, New York's 29th district could easily be called northern Pennsylvania, it barely counts. Also, what I've heard so far about what he supposedly did doesn't really sound that bad. Most importantly, that dude has cancer, so I think I should leave him alone.

OK. So far, I can't really be disappointed in the voters. They haven't voted on the soda thing yet, and even if I could blame the Governors on them, I could just blame it on the voters from the weird upstate part of New York, and not the good part where the people are. Is there anything specific to the city that can be reasonably blamed on voter stupidity?

Well, how about Charlie Rangel? It would be easier to list all the House ethics rules he isn't accused of violating. And Congressman Rangel's been re-elected something like 52 times. Specific to the city? Check. Voter stupidity? Probably not. Even with the story out there for weeks, it's still a little hard to get your head around exactly what the Congressman did. I'm not sure you can blame voters for electing him when it was still a secret.

Oh, I got it! Bloomberg! Mayor Mike ignored his term limit and then bought an election, which the good people of New York were more than happy to let him do. Yeah, that's not good. Bloomberg's the first non-Democrat I've mentioned. It's not that I'm intentionally picking on the Democrats. New York Republicans are no picnic. Peter King is a New York Republican, he's also completely out of his mind.

You can say other states are just as bad, maybe even worse. We know South Carolina is a mess. Mark Sanford is still the Governor there (seriously, I swear I'm not joking). And there's Minnesota. They've got Michelle Bachmann, who's crazy enough all on her own, but they've also got Al Franken and they had Jesse Ventura. What's wrong with Al Franken? One day, maybe I'll make a big list of rules to live by, like Leroy Jethro Gibbs. When I do, one of the rules will definitely be, "if the best option you can find for Senator is a stand-up comedian, look harder".

But that's sort of my point. Disappointment is all about expectations. I know New York isn't any worse than many other states, but that's not good enough. New York is supposed to be the best, the Empire state, home of the greatest city in the world. Now, it seems, New York is no better than anywhere else. That's a disappointment.

I'm not doing this to bash New York. My home state needs an intervention. How about Governor Giuliani? Hear me out. I know Rudy's gone pretty crazy lately, but I think it was leaving New York that turned him crazy, and I know how he feels. When he was the Mayor, he was a little crazy, but he was our kind of crazy. Oh, but he had scandals too. That's the sad part, I could spend the next year doing nothing but searching for a truly clean politician and still never find one. So, I'm still going with Governor Giuliani. It's just my first idea, I'm open to better ones. Maybe we need someone who would come with expectations so low, he couldn't possibly disappoint us. Hmmm, Harry Reid should be available after November.