Those Fantastic Foxes

The Premier League seasons has ended, and it's tempting to wonder what the world's most popular soccer league has up it's sleeve for next season. Leicester City, the miracle champions, weren't really the 5,000-to-1 shot that the bookies established; we know that the odds were simply set to get someone to put a longshot bet down on them. Had the oddsmakers really thought Leicester had a chance to win, they probably would have given them the obligatory 100-1 figure that usually typifies a team with no chance at a title. In reality, we'll probalby never know what the actual odds were - a million-to-one perhaps? - because you can't post odds on the occurrence of an impossibility.

Considering the millions of words from the thousands of stories written since the victory of those fantastic Foxes, it hardly seems as if there is anything more that could, or should, be added.  And yet, so astounding was their achievement, it almost compels one to say something, if only to provide further demonstration as to how inadequate words are when describing an event such as this.

Joe Posnanski's article shortly after Leicester clinched the title says it about as well as anybody can, when one is trying to describe an impossibility. As pundits struggled to come up with comparable examples of upset championships, their comparisons inevitably fell short. It wasn't like the Miracle on Ice victory of the 1980 U.S. Olympic hockey team, a team that had shown flashes of brilliance during the months leading up to the Olympics and displayed a work ethic that made them a difficult team to beat, particularly in a short tournament. Win seven games and you've got the gold medal, but try doing the same thing over the course of an entire season.

Others looked to the New York Mets of 1969, the Miracle Mets, who shockingly won the World Series after never having posted a wining season (or anything close to it) in the previous seven years of their existence. And yet that is ultimately found lacking as well; for in taking the title, Leicester had to overcome the so-called "Big Five" of the Premier League - Manchester United, Arsenal, Chelsea, Liverpool* and Manchester City, teams that had so dominated the league over the years that only one team outside of that group had ever won the championship in the league's 23-year history. During the 122 years the competition has been held, those five sides had, between them, won the top-flight championship 65 times. So the Mets comparison pales; imagine the Mets winning a league that contained not one but five New York Yankees teams, with a couple of Boston Red Sox thrown in for good measure. Yes, the Big Five may have had down seasons, but the point is that Leicester did not.

*Although Liverpool has yet to win a title since the formation of the Premier League in 1992, they took the championship 18 times before that.

European soccer's system of promotion and relegation makes the accomplishment that much more impossible; Leicester spent almost all of last year in last place before going on an improbably run of seven victories in their final nine matches to escape relegation; nonetheless, they were the consensus favorite to be one of the three teams relegated this year. Their new manager, Claudio Ranieri, a journeyman coach who had never won a major title, was favored to be the first manager sacked. At the beginning of this season, Ranieri's goal was simply to stay in the Premier League. Had he even mused about the possibility of winning the championship, he probably would have been locked up.

It's not as if Leicester bought themselves a championship, either. The payroll for the entire team was roughly equal to the salary of one of the big team's star players, and with no salary cap in European soccer, most teams are able to buy up promising players on the off chance they might turn out to be stars.Their roster was comprised mostly of players unwanted by other teams and picked up for relatively low prices. Some were late bloomers, others had simply gone unnoticed by bigger sides, most of them had never been given much of a chance.

It's safe to say, therefore, that one of last year's worst teams came into this season competing in a league that was basically rigged against them, set up so that only a member of the Big Five could win. There are no odds on that happening. You can't bet on the impossible.

Soccer fans are a loyal lot, living and dying with sides they have grown up supporting since birth, in many cases being the latest in a long line of family members rooting for their club. During the course of this season Leicester became almost everyone's "Second Team," and as their own side's title chances faded away, they threw their support behind the underdog Foxes to win it all. When defending champion Chelsea, coming off an extremely disappointing season, defeated second place Tottenham Hotspur to clinch the title for Leicester, it came after several of Chelsea's players admitted they wanted to defeat Tottenham in order to give the championship to Leicester. It's probably safe to say that there has never been a more popular team, either in England or anywhere else, to win a championship. Not only was it an impossible story on its own, it gave those fans hope that their own team might somehow rise from sporting poverty to greatness someday.

Leicester's own supporters, the ones who had stuck with them through thin and thin, were overcome with emotion, and it was common to see tears running down their cheeks as they watched their team raise the Premier League trophy at the final home match of the year, after having had Andrea Bocelli, no less, serenade them during a pre-game ceremony. No team in the Premier League had had such a rabid fan base during the season; in home games where Leicester scored, it wasn't uncommon for the stadium to shake from the commotion created by the cheering fans, so much so that it would register on the nearby university's Richter scale.

And so the impossible happened, and it's difficult to say whether or not anything like it will ever happen again - can ever happen again, for that matter. The story of Leicester City's Premier League win has passed into folklore, to be handed down from generation to generation. Songs will be sung about the heroic Foxes, ballads of Jamie Vardy and Riyad Mahrez and Kasper Schmeichel and Shinji Okazaki and Wes Morgan and all the rest, and Claudio Raineri will never have to buy himself a drink again. Books will be written, movies will be made, and everyone will say that they remember when. Even if it were to happen again, if Aston Villa or Newcastle were to recover from relegation and take the crown in two or three years, or if someone else were to come along in a decade or two and duplicate the achievement, it would merely be just that, an imitation of the original, in the same way that an art student might sit in a museum and copy a Monet. By definition, the impossible can never happen more than once.

Watching the joyous celebrations carrying on long into the night, someone was moved to remark that it was a shame people don't show that kind of emotion for more important things, but I think that misses the point. Yes, in the long run the winning of a championship in sports is relatively unimportant, but it's precisely for that reason that people can afford to let themselves go. It's a cruel world out there, one that can dash the hopes and dreams of a person with a figurative snap of the fingers, and sometimes we just need a little something to give us a life, a jolt of morning caffeine or a rush of sugar in the afternoon. Sports, at its best, is like that, a treat that one allows oneself. Unrestrained, undiluted, unadulterated joy is a rare thing, something that almost never happens in "real" life, and something that one can rarely afford to hope for outside of the spiritual realm. It's risky to open oneself to that kind of passion, and perhaps only when we know the stakes are relatively low can we allow ourselves that kind of vulnerability.

Perhaps that's something we ought to remember more often, and learn from it, for if there was anything truly important about Leicester's victory, anything to change the course of a person's life, it was the demonstration that anything truly is possible,

Even the impossible.

Opera Wednesday: JFK, the opera

DANIELA MACK AND MATTHEW WORTH AS JACKIE AND JACK IN FORT WORTH OPERA'S JFK.

It seems an unlikely proposition, an opera called JFK, and even after one ascertained that it was not a musical version of the Oliver Stone movie, that it was in fact set in Fort Worth, Texas on the last night of John F. Kennedy's life, it was still a bit hard to envision. But now it can be told, that the world premiere of JFK by the Fort Worth Opera justifies every risk taken, every doubt overcome.

From the outset of this modern composition, a mixture of the melodic and the atonal which was occasionally harsh and jarring but never crossed the line into Schoenbergian territory, the listener knows things will not end well. It's not just because we know the ending, either - as Jacqueline Kennedy (a suburb Daniela Mack) stands before a window staring into the Fort Worth night while her husband soaks his ailing back in the bathtub, as midnight passes into the beginning of John Kennedy's last day on earth, there is a sense of grim oppressiveness combined with a wistfulness, a looking back that becomes almost a valedictory on a life that was better than some but often fell short.

Jackie is burdened with Jack's excruciating back pain, for which she routinely gives him shots of morphine; torn by the death a little over three months before of infant son Patrick after just two days of life; haunted also by the additional memories of a miscarriage in 1957 and the birth of a stillborn daughter, Arabella, in 1956. So powerful are the nightmares caused by these memories, she occasionally has to resort to morphine herself in order to achieve a dreamless sleep.

For John (baritone Matthew Worth), too, there is unease under the dashing surface. His medical problems, certainly (including the adrenal disorder Addison’s disease, ulcers, colitis, and allergies), but also the memory of a favorite sister, Rosemary, who underwent a lobotomy in 1941, and the knowledge that his father favors older brother Joe, the Kennedy destined for politics until his death in World War II. In JFK's dreams he is taken first to the moon with Rosemary (the Sea of Serenity), where he is harangued by a belligerent Khrushchev and his Red Army minions; then to Cape Cod, where the memories of the moonlight cause him to relive his initial meeting and subsequent courtship of Jackie, and finally a comedic confrontation with Lyndon Johnson and his posse of rhinestone-laden camp followers, with Jack constantly having to caution LBJ not to withdraw his "Jumbo."

All the while, the Kennedys are ministered to by two outsiders: a chambermaid (Talise Trevigne) and Secret Service agent (Sean Panikkar) who simultaneously serve two additional roles: first, that of  Clara Harris and Henry Rathbone, the couple who shared the box with Abraham and Mary Lincoln the night of his assassination; and second, as The Spinner and The Alloter, two of the three Greek Fates. The Spinner, it is explained, unspools the metaphorical thread of life, while The Alloter measures out the length of that thread. The third Fate, The Cutter, is the one who cuts the thread at the end of life. The Cutter is unseen in the opera; he awaits in Dallas.

In Act Two, as John speaks before a crowd gathered outside the Hotel Texas in Fort Worth, Jackie is brought face-to-face with her future self, Jackie Onassis (Katharine Goeldner), who helps the young Jackie dress in her iconic pink suit and hat. Together with the maid, the three women sing a poignant trio as Mrs. Onassis assures Mrs. Kennedy that her husband will love her "every day" of the rest of his life, not adding that this life has only hours to go. It, along with the love duet sung by the young Jack and Jackie, are the show-stoppers of the opera, the two pieces that triggered spontaneous and long applause from the audience.

While Jackie leaves with the luggage, Jack slips into his familiar grey suit and, musing on how much his wife has sacrificed for him and how unworthy he is, he sings of how lucky a man he is, before he joins her for the short trip to Dallas. If there is any truth to the theory that the two Kennedys were growing closer, that fatherhood combined with the tragic death of Patrick had caused JFK to strive to become a better husband, it likely came about in much this way.

The opera is far from perfect, as is the case with most premieres. The scene with LBJ, for example, is very broad, to the point that the audience is encouraged to laugh perhaps more heartily than the material justifies. Johnson was, clearly, a larger-than-life character; the attempts by men in Kennedy's administration to marginalize him, and the dual insecurity of the two men (LBJ by his desire to be loved, JFK by Johnson's suggestion that the younger man is too inexperienced to be president) deserves a bit more gravitas than is given.

The triple roles played by Ms. Trevigne and Mr. Panikkar are also overly complicated. Without the pre-opera talk from the director, it would have been virtually impossible to link the two to the characters of Harris and Rathbone, and the tangential connections made to Lincoln's assassination are not only tenuous but unnecessary, cluttering up an already-crowded storyline. For those of us accustomed to stories of angels assuming human form on earth, the idea of the Fates assuming the identities of a heretofore unknown maid and Secret Service agent are plausible enough; adding another layer is not.

The use of the Fates, though, I found to be highly effective, for in the end the story of John F. Kennedy is a tragedy of its own. The assassination itself is never depicted on stage; instead, the Fates, having sent their charges to meet their destiny, watch on a television set while a grainy copy of the Zapruder film plays on the set's backdrop. The fateful moment, when the gunshots of Lee Harvey Oswald - The Cutter - fatally strike the president's head, is hidden from the audience by a piece of furniture; the reaction of the Fates as they see the unseen drama on TV, tell the story eloquently.

Thaddeus Strassberger's set design is by turns garish, sinister and intimate, and the occasional use of rear projection images, especially during the Jack/Jackie duet, is striking. And we can't really end without a shout-out to the Fort Worth Symphony, conducted by Steve Osgood. The musicians performed a new and often challenging piece of music quite capably, and the long ovation that greeted them prior to the start of the final act was fully justified.

David Little and Royce Vavrek, responsible for the music and libretto respectively, blend the ongoing narrative and the numerous flashbacks well, though it's likely that continued performances will result in a more polished presentation. Musically, the opera reminded me a great deal of John Adams' Nixon in China, in that it combines lovely melodies with harder, bolder modern sounds. In addition, both operas eschew for the most part the classical structure of arias and duets, instead choosing to present the dialogue in what essentially amounts to an extended recitative.

Ultimately, whether or not you agreed with John Kennedy's politics, whether or not you saw Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis as one of the world's most glamorous women (and the sympathetic portraits given here would encourage you to do both), this is really about of a young couple who rose to the top but never had the opportunity to enjoy the quiet moments that life presents in the subsequent years, when all is said and done and days are spent reminiscing while sitting in rocking chairs enjoying the late summer sun. The sinister sense of foreboding presented at the beginning is fully delivered by the end. That we're unable to prevent it from happening has frustrated artists to no end over the years (see: King, Stephen, for example), but that very inevitability, augmented as it is by our knowledge of the assassination's aftermath, is what compounds the tragedy.

One of the objectives of JFK, Little and Vavrek explained, is to remind us that the iconic figures of American history are also mortals, human beings with human lives. Flawed though it may be, their effort presents this in a very moving, powerful way. The story of John F. Kennedy is, as I said, a tragedy, and there is no better vehicle to present tragedy than that of opera. If it failed in every other respect - and, believe me, it doesn't - it would have earned its place in the opera world from that alone.

Flashback Friday: The Penn State aftermath: the policy that protected Sandusky is still there

The Penn State scandal's roots began in the late 1980's, when Joe Paterno protected women's basketball coach Rene Portland and her “straight-edge” policy on the team – "no drugs, no alcohol, no sexually deviant behaviour allowed," resulting in complaints by sexual deviants about her program. Around the time, a generation after Stonewall was being infiltrated by the agenda of sexual deviants, and one book boasted of how the sexual deviancy activists would win this country away from the "hate groups" of Christians.

In response, sexual deviant activists, both students and faculty, protested, and successfully the Faculty Senate at the university passed a series of policies where "sexual orientation" was added to the nondiscrimination clause at the school. As we've learned about sexual deviancy activists, legalising pedophilia is part of their cause, and protecting evil adults at the expense of children is their agenda. When college professors such as Ed Madden (a sexual deviant in my time at South Carolina) consistently push for such pro-sex offender policies, they disregard the price that generations will pay for future scandals that will erupt from such protection. Sexual deviancy special rights activists care about normalising pedophilia and other wicked sexual deviant behaviour at the expense of children.

The pedophiles took charge of Penn State after punishing Joe Paterno for protecting Rene Portland. And once that policy took place, Jerry Sandusky was scot-free because he had official school policy protecting him. When Mr. Paterno or others attempted to report the charges, they were stonewalled by the policy that protected Mr. Sandusky. Could anyone go after a child molester if official policy protected the molester?
The blood of this scandal is clearly on the hands of the Faculty Senate and the sexual deviancy activists that bullied the school into adding the policies that protected the molester. These policies are everywhere in many schools, governments, and corporations.

When a “pride” festival comes in with parades, celebrities, and other exhibits in an attempt to push their agenda down people's thoughts through textbooks. Under this Administration, a federal speech code has made speaking out against sexual deviancy a federal hate crime (Shepard-Byrd), and now there are some in Congress what want the same policy that created this scandal in protecting sexual deviants in policy to become federal law (“ENDA”). Furthermore, the the change of the military from a fighting force to defend this country from evil into a sexual deviancy indoctrination force was made complete by Public Law 111-321, where speaking for God's Word is a crime, and "soldiers" are now participating in full uniform in these sexual deviancy parades. Proud of what? Now the mayor of Boston is even vowing to ban the Cathy family's quick-service chicken sandwich restaurants from the area, which even offends the local CBS affiliate because they advertise heavily on national advertising during SEC on CBS broadcasts weekly, because of their pro-Bible stance.

The $60 million fine is necessary, but the unprecedented postseason ban for four years (which would affect this crop of freshmen just signed by the new administration, whom, if they are successful, will become this generation's 1980 United States Olympic Team) without fixing the problem that caused this mess is senseless. The sexual deviancy activists are working hard to ensure the policy that created this scandal (“sexual orientation” protection) stays – its removal is mandatory for the healing from the scandal to begin, and is crucial in preventing further similar scandals, since legal protections of pedophiles via official policy would be eliminated. And the beasts of ENDA and special rights activists will fight to the end to ensure pedophilia is a federally protected class, while Christians are punished.

Why is nobody looking at the policy that created this mess in the first place?

Andrew Dionne has this on the course list at Penn State, and how it helped the corrupt culture.

Originally published July 23, 2012

Sons of Katie Elder in hockey?

Now think about this.  The Pittsburgh Penguins defeated the Washington Capitals, 4-2, in the second round of the NHL playoffs earlier this week.

Now their farm systems are playing against each other.  The AHL second round features the Capitals' Hershey Bears playing the Penguins' farm team in Wilkes-Barre / Scranton.  The ECHL Eastern Conference Final features the Capitals' (Charleston) South Carolina Stingrays playing the Penguins' Wheeling Nailers.

Hershey leads, 3-2, as of this writing and Friday will be Game 1 of the ECHL Caps-Pens system. What a tangled web!

Now it can be told

Last summer, we announced a certain participant's entry to The Chase Grid with this introduction:


Now that we know the person associated with the theme has won, you wondered how Donald Trump was associated with Сергей Прокофьев. Consider the licences that the BBC paid to Mark Burnett, and even to Donald Trump, and see this introduction (from 2013, courtesy FremantleMedia/RTL Group), you will see where the reference comes!

Game changer

We can now officially make it evident the game changing moment of the 2016 Presidential Chase season was the murder of a woman in San Francisco's Pier 14 by an illegal alien who should have been deported after numerous incidents, but was kept in the city by a mayor and the "sanctuary city" policies of the liberal core.  Once Mr. Trump took that issue and ran with it, it seemed that was his core and people ran with it.  The second major point was easily the 30 years of Donald Trump's name recognition from the USFL, major combat sport events, golf tournaments (2015 Women's Open Championship the best known example), his real estate, and of course, The Apprentice, he had well known recognition the opposition did not have. Furthermore, as you would expect with a hockey fight, which always leads to momentum on the home side if the fighter took a decisive win, every Bernie Sanders supporter who started the twerk and bleep protests against Mr. Trump only allowed Mr. Trump to gain momentum.

So it's evident that the major turning point was the Steinle murder on Pier 14.  That was Trump's moment.

Flashback Friday: Throwing Christians to the lions

In the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, the word “pride” is defined as “a company of lions.” The mascot for the minor league hockey team in Florence that played in the East Coast league from 1997-2005, the Pee Dee Pride (“Pee Dee” is the name of the region in South Carolina that encompasses Florence), was a mountain lion.

Sexual deviancy groups and festivals will often use the word “pride” in their names. This is no accident; these organisations' activism targets Christians. They are the lions who devour Christians. They want to ban Christians from running foster care or adoption ministries at their churches because of their worldview (as we've seen in many states), they want to put Christians at the back of the foster care or adoption line while advancing sexual deviants to the front, and they have passed laws similar to those in other countries where ministers can be prosecuted for speech that violates the “civil rights” of sexual deviants. They want to drop Christians to a caste system where they and their followers are the emboldened class, while Christians are treated as the untouchables.

Equal Employment Opportunity Commission Commissioner Chai Feldblum has made it clear “sexual freedom” triumphs over religious freedom. In the new Utopia of this Administration, the three fundamental freedoms of Speech, Press, and Religion are wiped out by new government controls, and the only freedom that the nation will offer is Sexual Freedom.

At Eastman Kodak (a company that later was driven to bankruptcy, no less by the sexual deviancy movement), Rolf Szabo was fired for sticking up for Biblical Christianity at his office in Rochester, New York. Allstate fired Matt Barber for writing a column based on Biblical truth that the lions declared was offensive, and he is now the director of a major pro-family organisation. Other companies have fired employees for posting Bible verses. Now, with many countries have laws similar to the Shepard-Byrd Hate Crimes Act, ministers have been prosecuted for preaching the Bible, especially since activists have declared it hate speech, specifically targeting Leviticus Eighteen and Romans One.

With the arrogance of judges trying to impose same-sex “marriage,” implementation from humanist judges with an assist from the Autogol Strategy, or urban metropolis-run state legislatures (something the Founding Fathers warned would be a hazard and led to the Great Compromise, overturned at the state level in Reynolds v. Sims 50 years ago, thus leading to state legislatures being controlled by urban metropolises where one area may have ten seats in the upper chamber while some rural counties have no representation, something the Founding Fathers knew would be hazardous – can you imagine California having 12 Senators while South Carolina would be represented by one North Carolina Senator representing Buncombe County (a notorious liberal hotbed where they bought the NASCAR race track that is the site of the only win by a woman on a NASCAR Touring Series race -- 1988 by Shawna Robinson in the 4-cylinder Dash, or Baby Grand National, formula that was sanctioned from 1975-2003, who is battling breast cancer as of this writing -- and turned it into what Hall of Fame member Jack Ingram calls a drug park), and one Georgia Senator representing DeKalb or Fulton County), with the majority now from judicial activists who have taken their feelings to be priority over facts, they have made it clear they want Christians to be thrown to the lions.

It is no coincidence that sexual deviancy activists are called “pride” for a reason. They are the lions and they will throw Christians into their den to become their food. The persecution is the goal to wipe out Christianity and impose by courts, schools, and popular culture a new state religion of humanism. Look at the prosecution of Chick-Fil-A, Hobby Lobby, and now the Benham Brothers for their support of the Bible. While the First Amendment only bans Congress from imposing a state religion, it doesn't ban state legislatures, Hollywood, popular culture, or the courts from doing so. The pride is intending to use courts to overturn everything and impose a new belief system they dictate.

The judges running amok continue this danger. At this rate, are we becoming the New Humanist Nation with Christians being thrown to the lions, swallowed by the lions, as the activist groups want us to be consumed by them, henceforth their name?

Originally published May 22, 2014

Weekend reflections

Pop Culture Über Alles.  A recent WorldNetDaily article noted now CNN is now beating Fox News (and business) in the Nielsen ratings primarily because of coverage relating to the death of pop culture figures.  The key rating statistic was the 4 PM ET slot, because Fox News has the venerable and trustworthy business programme Your World featuring Neil Cavuto, who was one-thirds of what has been declared the best debate moderating team among all who led the “glorified press conferences,” as the late Tony Snow mentioned 20 years ago in an early Fox News broadcast.  (Gerard Baker and Maria Bartiromo were the other members of that trio.)  But to see how CNN trounced Fox in that slot shortly after a pop star's death showed how the country has become more Entertainment Tonight than "The Chase for the Presidency," let alone Wall Street.  Isn't hating Wall Street a popular “sport” among those what oppose Messrs. Trump or Cruz?

It's in the (rule) book!  The mocking of Sen. Cruz over his use of the term “ring” instead of “rim” forgets the most important factor of all.  “Rim” is not used in the rule book, “Ring” is the correct term in the rule book of basketball.  For an attorney such as Mr. Cruz, who pushes for a nation of laws by the book, and not by the feelings of a few people, it makes perfect sense for him to use the term “ring”.

Here is an example – NBA Rule 7, Section II, Paragraph c, “24 Second Clock:  Starting and Stopping of 24-Second Clock”:

c.  A team must attempt a field goal within 24 seconds after gaining possession of the ball. To constitute a legal field goal attempt, the following conditions must be complied with:
(1) The ball must leave the player's hand prior to the expiration of 24 seconds.
(2) After leaving the player's hand(s), the ball must make contact with the basket ring. 

We Remember.  8:17 AM EDT, May 1 always means, sadly . . .

Consider that the recent rash of celebrity deaths on the news recently will never reach the level of mourning that occurred of that moment.

It was sad when the great ship went down

One of the many good things about taking some time off, as I did last week, was in catching up with items that one needs time to appreciate. Such is the case with this extraordinary video that has been making the rounds, showing the sinking of the Titanic in real time.

Now, having had a longtime interest in the Titanic, this was something I couldn't resist. However, it called for watching at one sitting to really appreciate its full power, which is why I held on to it until last week, a few days following the 104th anniversary of the sinking. It truly is an amazing video, not just for the subtle signs over the two hours and forty minutes of the ship sinking deeper and deeper into the water, but for the eerie look of the ship absent any people (a decision by the software designers; this is, I think, an alpha version of the final product), particularly in the last minutes when all the lifeboats are gone, their empty davits - which were never intended to be used - standing in mute testimony to the ongoing horror. It is, and I don't mean to overuse the word, an extraordinary experience.

Erotic liberty payback

In 2014, shareholders at a major corporation voted overwhelmingly (81%) against New York's retirement system when they attempted to impose erotic liberty friendly policies at the corporation in question.  Shortly after the convincing win, the President imposed an erotic liberty mandate for all businesses with contracts.  Evidence came that the executive order imposing an SOGI policy ("ENDA") on corporations was a byproduct of payback for that major company's refusal to support the agenda.

When a dictator imposes his agenda on erotic liberty and forces corporations to impose it or be barred from business contracts at any level, we have clear evidence of a dictatorship.  Religious liberty would be endorsed by corporations as well as people if it was not for the bullies such as those in Seattle, San Francisco, New York, and Washington, and of course, The White House.

Things I don't understand

JESUS AT THE HOUSE OF THE PHARISEAN, BY JACOPO TINFORETTO, ESCORIAL

There are a lot of them, unsurprisingly. The Library of Alexanderia, vast as it was, wouldn't stand a chance at cataloging, not to mention collecting, all the things I don't know. Much of it is probably unimportant, at least to me, although if you were, say, an architect or a brain surgeon, they would probably be extremely important*. Some if it is out there, just waiting to be discovered - as my wife says, a day you don't learn something is a wasted day. And then there are the things I don't understand that frustrate me, because they seem so obvious to me that I have to wonder if I'm missing something. A couple of recent examples:

*On the other hand, I doubt they know or care much about the role of television in midcentury culture, so we're even.

First, the Pope, and I guess this isn't so recent because he's been talking about it constantly. In almost every one of his documents that touts mercy and forgiveness, he refers to mysterious Pharisees in the midst of traditional Catholics, people who can't wait to judge and condemn those who fall short of their standards. He also comments on priests who preach nothing but sin and negatives, urging them to talk more about compassion. I don't know about you, but I've been in very few parishes where I've heard priests say anything about sin, let alone abortion, homosexual marriage and the like. They're really too busy playing at being Mister Rogers than being scolds. And as for the modern-day Pharisees, I'm sure they do exist, but they have to be vastly outnumbered by the "do what feels good" Catholics who take the Ten Commandments to be more suggestions than anything binding, and tend toward the relativistic way of looking at "truth."

So I don't really understand just who the Pope is talking about, or where these people (phantoms?) happen to be. Perhaps he knows something I don't know*, but if that's the case, could he provide us with a few examples?

*I'm sure he knows quite a bit more than I do - but he's very bad at demonstrating it.

This leads more or less directly into the second thing I don't understand today. It comes from this Federalist column about former porn star Bree Olson, who's trying to create a new life for herself away from the industry. I think this is terrific, but apparently there are those who aren't as welcoming:

People look at me as if I am the same as a sex offender. They look at me as though I am less than in every way, and they assume the absolute worst in every way. I had never realized how progressive my mind was and how scared people were of sexuality until this. I also realized I could never go back and be a nurse or a teacher, or work for any company really that can fire me under morality clauses for making customers feel ‘uncomfortable’ because of who I am.

Now, I have no reason to doubt what she's saying, or that she's making all this up for dramatic purpose. So based on the assumption that this is all true, my question is: why? Why hold this young woman's past against her while she's trying to start her life over again? And how many people would really be that "uncomfortable" with who she is?

Most of us are familiar with Christ's words to the woman prostitute: "Go and sin no more." This is an important part of mercy, by the way; love can and should be unconditional, but justice often requires paying the price. When Christ promised the Good Thief that he would join Him this day in paradise, he did not free the Thief from the cross: there was still justice to be served. One of the things the Pope seems to overlook (or ignore, depending on what he really believes) is that God's Divine Mercy does include a commitment by the sinner to repent of his past behavior and to make the best effort to go forth as a new man without an attachment to sin, understanding at the same time that man is an imperfect creature and will fall back into sin many times. It is the desire to avoid sin that is paramount; if you have that desire, the grace to be stronger against sin will follow.

That's not the message that most people pick up from the Pope, however, as Fr. George Rutler points out in this article on the recent Amoris Laetitia:

A lack of clarity in the text might endorse the conceit already expounded in some media interviews, which says contrition is not a necessary element in petitioning for mercy. [Emphasis mine.] Any parish priest should wonder at the description of the confessional as a torture chamber. . . Dramaturgic references like that to torture are straw horses, and a straw horse is the rhetorical device of a weak argument.

Ah, yes - a lack of clarity. Becoming the papal trademark, don't you think?

And so perhaps that's Bree Olson's problem, that she's been reading too much of the Pope's writing. Because people don't detect a sense of repentance in her words. Why should they, after all?

My biggest regret was leaving the industry. Leaving all of that money and trying to get the world to like me. They still don’t, and they never will. I should have just put in another five years at least so that in more my smart financial years as I was older, I could have saved enough to live comfortably for the rest of my life.

Bree, the fact of the matter is that nobody ever gets the world to like them. Christ warned His disciples that the world would hate them, as a matter of fact. As many a politician has discovered, the man who tries to please everyone winds up pleasing no one.

In general, I've found that Americans in particular love the idea of second changes, of people pulling themselves up by their bootstraps and overcoming past problems. Look at how many times we give someone a break in hopes it will help that person turn his or her life around? We're suckers for a good sob story, and I don't say that to be critical. We want to think that everyone can change, that they can turn away from their past sins or troubles or whatever skeletons exist in their past, that they can, indeed, start all over again - the prostitute, the thief, the addict, the philanderer, the goldbrick. All we usually ask from them is one thing, and that's for an honest effort to reform. Not everyone will be forgiving of a relapse, but most people will be - if that's what it is, a relapse and not a reversion.

An addict, for example, must accept the truth of who they are: that the addictive personality is an undeniable part of that identity, and that to deal with it means not returning to the addiction. It's the same for everyone who wants to turn away from an unfortunate past, whether caused by illness, psychological trouble, or simply misplaced desire. If Bree Olson sincerely wants to be accepted for who she is and not who she was, she has to demonstrate that willingness to separate herself from her past, to start over as a new person. If she can and does, and we still don't accept her - if we become the Pharisees that the Pope endlessly refers to - then shame on us. If she can't or won't do it, then shame on her - and one those who tell her it isn't necessary, those who should know better.

Either way, it's something I just don't understand.

Throwback Thursday: What if democracy, like higher education, is just a scam?

Yeah, don't remind me. I know I've been away for awhile. I'm reminded of it often enough by The Boss. (That's Mr. Hadley, in case you're wondering.) Just consider this a cameo appearance if you want, but I promise I'm going to try and come back here more often.

Anyway, I have a couple of pieces for your consideration.  The first hearkens back to the "Scam of Higher Education" series I did a couple of years ago, and it concerns the new director of Islamic Studies at Duke University. (I asked Mitchell if he wanted to take this one, since he used to work at Duke; his reply was more or less unprintable, but by and large suggested that if I wanted to write about Duke, now or at any time in the future, I was more than welcome to do so.)

Anyway, this gentleman, Omid Safi, compares recent Israeli "crimes" to the Holocaust. I'll let you read all about it here, but what bothers me about this is not only the dishonesty that apparently accompanies his "scholarship," but the laziness of it all. I mean, how many times do we have to read about something being compared to the Nazis or the Holocaust? It's just plain lazy - lazier than the number of F-bombs that show up in a Martin Scorsese movie. I used to think that just dropped them in there to meet the word count minimum, but it's a stroke of pure creativity compared to how many times liberals compare _________ (fill in the blank) to the Holocaust and equate ___________ (various conservatives) to Nazis.

Just give me an effing break, will you?

The second item this week is more thought-provoking.  It's by one of my favorite pundits, Judge Andrew Napolitano, and he asks a disturbing question: what if democracy is a fraud?

Yes, I know - there are a lot of conservatives who throw that question around the same way liberals toss around Nazis.  But, setting aside the provocative nature of the headline, there's some real food for thought here:

What if democracy as it has come to exist in America today is dangerous to personal freedom? What if our so-called democracy erodes the people’s understanding of natural rights and the reasons for government and instead turns political campaigns into beauty contests? What if American democracy allows the government to do anything it wants, as long as more people bother to show up at the voting booth to support the government than show up to say no?

He goes on to elaborate with a number of similar points, before he comes to the conclusion, which is a crusher:

What if the late progressive Edmund S. Morgan was right when he said that government depends on make believe? What if our ancestors made believe that the king was divine? What if they made believe that he could do no wrong? What if they made believe that the voice of the king was the voice of God?

What if the government believes in make believe? What if it made believe that the people have a voice? What if it made believe that the representatives of the people are the people? What if it made believe that the governors are the servants of the people? What if it made believe that all men are created equal, or that they are not?

What if the government made believe that it is always right? What if it made believe that the majority can do no wrong? What if the tyranny of the majority is as destructive to human freedom as the tyranny of a madman? What if the government knows this?

What do we do about it?

I've always been one to defend the United States from those (primarily very traditional Catholics) who charge that the nation was conceived in sin, so to speak, that religious freedom itself was license for the kind of hedonistic libertarianism we seem to have today. While the Founders may not have been Catholics, they were great Americans nonetheless. As someone once said, the United States is the worst country in the world in which to live, except for all the rest of them.

Nowadays, that defense is harder and harder to maintain. What do we do about it, indeed? Thoughts?

Originally published July 28, 2014

Don't be fooled on Al Jazeera's "demise": They are growing rapidly in the country

Don't be fooled with the announcements as Al Jazeera is shutting down its United States news channels.  While their news operation is being reduced to just working for their Middle Eastern channels, Al Jazeera is rapidly expanding in the United States via its beIN brand. Note how Al Jazeera has expanded its presence to both coasts.  Al Jazeera Sports (beIN) has acquired exclusive rights to motorcycle road racing in the United States, with the addition of MotoGP to its portfolio that includes World Superbike.  Both are managed by Dorna, and Dorna also has given Al Jazeera broadcast rights to the AMA MotoAmerica series, which is organised by Wayne Rainey's KRAVE Group in addition to Dorna.  The Miami-based channel also has added International Gymnastics Federation (FIG) world championship events and another #2 league, the North American Soccer League, to their leagues that include the Football League (#2 in the UK with the SkyBet Championship and the Capital One Football League Cup), the BBVA First Division in Spain, and the Telecom Italia Mobile Serie A.  The BBVA First Division, known simply as La Liga worldwide, is easily football's most powerful league considering the UEFA Champions League finalists in recent years is most often a Spanish team, while English teams have yet to find their way into the final.  In addition, top road FIFA Qualifiers for the United States National Teams also air on the Al Jazeera channel when the Qatar media giant owns broadcast rights of that country, and they also air the CONMEBOL (South America) World Cup qualifiers featuring powerhouses Brazil and Argentina.

The beIN Media Group has also acquired the Miramax film studio, which gives them a major presence in Hollywood.  This will likely mean more power for the emirates in Qatar, allowing them to produce more films that fit their view.

So do not be confused regarding the demise of Al Jazeera's news channel in the United States;  rather, they are expanding their footprint with motorcycles and films.  Why do you think motorcycle companies are buying advertising on Al Jazeera more than Fox, which has the Supercross season (their two network television SX events are the next two rounds), and NBC, which has the Motocross season?

Microaggressions

There are some stories appearing on the wires that will amuse you.  One that had me thinking for a bit on this Tax Week was the University of Oklahoma human relations theory class that stated a white man cannot be singing songs from pop diva Robyn Fenty (see December 2010 commentary on Grammys) or he would be causing "microaggressions."

What type of indoctrination is happening in our schools now?  This reminds of a very popular sexual deviant male, British pop singer that at the time was well-known for his cover of another (now deceased; her daughter died in a similar suspicious behaviour) female pop diva of the 1980's hit (he has since been known for singing the theme to a Bond film).  We'd charge microaggressions for him singing that diva's hit under the logic of the Sooner Schooner.  And don't get me started on the numerous numbers of "wailing women and moaning men" who sing certain Top 40 songs on "religious radio" via the karaoke machine when men sing women's and women sing men's hits under this logic.  Can you imagine a big 90's femme hit I loved for many years being sung by a mixed quartet (which could fit)?  Pre-LaRoche Era Bobby would be guilty, but LaRoche and Beyond Era Bobby understands this tenor isn't designed to sing soprano songs!

That absurdity on the news reminded me of this in England a while back, where a man sang as the lead singer of their Life Enhancement Centre's rock band (it's no church, we know what these Warrenist types and Perry's House of Heresy do) a song from a 90's femme supergroup that I remember from college days seeing numerous times, resulting in a nickname for the venue where they performed the night before the first game of the ECHL championship series, the same venue where in January I attended the Fox Business debate well organised by Bartiromo and Cavuto. Knowing this is a femme song, I just had to wonder would he be guilty of a microaggression considering two members of that group at the time have sons who are gridiron-playing seniors, one of whom is signed to play at a top FCS school in 2016?

The pseudosport of professional wrestling reflects on absurdities

The fixed pseudosport of “professional wrestling” is now starting to run amok in regards to a pair of incidents on the news this week, in puns that those who watched “Championship Wrestling” could understand.

Exhibit A is the New York Daily News cover that denounced Ted Cruz, who had previously referenced “New York (City) Values” in regards to various issues, including his opponent in the Republican Primary.  This tabloid style newspaper (note how it resembles a tabloid and not a regular newspaper) has made numerous cover references that attack the rest of the nation.  The cover of the said publication on the morning of this post being written has a double-entendre that also cites “championship wrestling” in its veiled attack on Mr. Cruz.  All I could see from this through the eyes of the popular pseudosport was Ted Cruz responding with an Attitude Adjustment on the publication in light of them trying to deliver the same move on him.

Exhibit B is the California Attorney General Kamala Harris, who has now worked to arrest the filmmakers investigating Planned Parenthood selling baby parts.  She is running for the US Senate seat in the state, no less, and associated with Planned Parenthood, so she is working to arrest her opponents for uncovering the scandal of Planned Parenthood selling freshly slaughtered children for cash.  Don't forget also that she refused to defend the state's Constitution when it regards to legal unions of one male and one female only as Attorney General, choosing after being sued to jump to the camp of the sexual perversion camp to create an automatic squash of the laws she was to defend, a tactic now used by many state attorneys general when the erotic liberty crowd wishes to overturn laws based on their feelings based in Biblical standards and passed by supermajorities of over 60 percent nationlly, over 75 percent in man states.  This has the look and feel of a monster heel, as her name is reminiscent of a Mississippi “professional wrestler” of the 1980's who was a monster heel.  Freedom of speech isn't available if you are not in the Left's protected territories, no less, and the only freedom they desire is sexual freedom, so it's time to shut opponents.  What does it say?

In both cases, I see cases of “championship wrestling” coming.  In the former, I see the “Attitude Adjustment” reference, and in the latter, I see a “Ugandan giant” reference.  Has the pseudosport come to full fruition in these recent stories?

This just in

NBA Commissioner Adam Silver talks with reporters about the unexpected embarrassment of riches for this year's draft.

EVERY COLLEGE BASKETBALL PLAYER IN AMERICA DECLARES FOR NBA DRAFT

(NEW YORK, April 6) – NBA officials today confirmed reports that all 32,190 male college basketball players in the United States have declared for the NBA draft.

The number, which includes all 4,511 players competing at the Division I level, means increased competition for the 60 spots available when the draft takes place June 23 at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn.

“I admit we were a bit taken aback that every college basketball player in America has filed for the draft,” NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said on ESPN’s Mike & Mike show, “but it demonstrates how strong the NBA brand is. When every player in the country wants to be a part of your organization, you must be doing something right.”

“It’s an opportunity for every young man’s dream to come true,” Silver continued, despite the fact that less than two-tenths of one percent of the players will be wind up being drafted in June.

“I just have to do what’s right for me and my family,” said 6’5” center Sam “Slam” Duncan of Alice Lloyd College in Pippa Passes, Kentucky. “All my life I’ve imagined myself standing on that stage in front of my friends and family, wearing the hat and holding up the uniform of the team that drafted me,” even though the odds of him winning a roster spot in the league are approximately 3,400:1. “I’m going shopping for a suit tonight.”

Executives at TBS, which will televise the draft from the Barclays Center in Brooklyn beginning at 7:00pm ET, said they plan to use both Yankee Stadium in the Bronx and Citi Field in Queens to handle the overflow of NBA hopefuls, and to shuttle players to the Barclays Center if they are selected. “It might take a little longer than usual, but we can handle it,” network executive Bruce Wyler said. "Besides, the weather outside in June is usually pretty good."

At press time, it had not yet been determined whether or not the entire roster of the University of Connecticut women’s team would declare, although analysts said if they do, it would change the picks made by several teams.

Spin doctors

Bill O'Reilly is known for his "The O'Reilly Factor" being called the "No Spin Zone".  But the NCAA Final Four and Championship are now exclusively on pay television, ending over four decades of network television, means a reduced television audience for the Championship Game, which I believe is a big mistake.

North Carolina Tar Heels fans have long been associated with their team in Charlotte being on WBTV, the Raycom (and in preceding years, Lincoln Financial and Jefferson Pilot eras) station as part of the ACC syndication package.  From 1982 until 2015, Channel 3, the long-time CBS affiliate, carried the NCAA, but the NCAA has weakened it to the Turner TBS/TNT/TruTV trio, with this year ending with both the semifinals and finals on Time Warner's pay channels.

Following college football's push to pay television a few years ago, the Time Warner trio is masking the loss of widespread mainstream coverage in the same way Disney is treating the College Football Playoff by having one channel dedicated to each of the two teams with "cheerleaders," similar to the very unprofessional homers that dominate radio sports today (think of someone such as Bob Lamey of the Indianapolis Colts, best known for the famous Turn 4 call at the 1992 Indianapolis 500, and his notorious homer calls) sitting around a professional broadcaster, at each game.  We saw that at the CFP and now at both the Final Four and Championship.  Yes, they can boast more viewers combined, but what does it say when you take big game voices and relegate them to pay television that considerable fewer people watch?  Jameson Nantz (who isn't even three months old) might wonder why daddy's coverage is on far fewer homes now than it was even five years ago.

OK, NCAA.  This idea of pay television for the finals is a failure.  When WBTV becomes an afterthought, allowing WSOC to become the area's top channel as WBTV loses its "home of the NCAA" honours as they air more reruns on weekends, what does it say?

What does it say when TruTV, a channel about "reality" television, is more relevant than WBTV, a channel that is the voice of Charlotte, when it comes to March Madness?  Our culture is in arrays when "reality" channels, not general audience channels, air the biggest games in sports, does it?  And ignore the spin, they base their audience numbers on how many are watching the "cheerleaders" channels.

You don't see the Super Bowl with "cheerleader" channels with cheerleaders watching the games. Why have we stooped so low in college sports with this?  Time for a return to network television for the big ones.  The R&A and NASCAR have learned their lesson.

The April Fools

April Fools Day has never been a favorite day of mine. I don't have much time for April Fools jokes myself, and the attempts that one runs across online are seldom very funny. Most of them are either too labored or not labored enough, stupid or just lame, with the result that at least a third of the people who read them are sucked in and have to have it all explained to them. (Just ask Google.) They really are monuments to people who aren't as clever as they think they are.

That's not to say I don't enjoy a good joke or bit of satire; I think those of you who read "This Just In" when it appears on this blog will understand that. I was looking for one that might be good to offer as a "Flashback Friday," but the best of them have been rerun recently, so I don't think I'll dip into that well just now. One of the very best bits of April Foolery I've read today was this one from the F1 blogger par excellence Joe Saward, who offered this outrageous one on the new sport of bus racing. It made for a terrific way to start the day. (UPDATE: This one from the University of Oregon isn't bad either.)

One of the problems with good satire, which is what a lot of these April Fools jokes try to be*, is that the world itself has become so ridiculous and absurd that what passed for satire even a few years ago has become plausible enough that it loses its sting, and winds up looking no different than the hour's headlines on CNN. Then, in order to get your laugh, you have to explain to your readers that they shouldn't panic, it's all just a joke, and at that point you might as well throw your hands up and walk away.

*For example, when I was a kid (and maybe it's still the same way today), the quintessential April Fools joke had to do with a green and yellow bug, or something like that, crawling up your back. I suppose the equivalent in today's digital world is be telling people that opening this post has given them a virus that will wipe out their entire hard drive, but nowadays you'd probably get shot before your readers got to the punch line.

Jokes of any kind also run the risk of being labeled politically incorrect, which nowadays is a crime worse than murder, equal to treason, and falls just short of child molestation. It is tragic that humor, which is, according to the good Bishop Sheen, a divine attribute, has fallen victim to this purging of anything that deviates from the new norm, the norm that has been declared for us by our new thought police. I don't know where this is going to end; if the people simply roll over and accept it with docility, that would be the effective end of America as the Founders knew it, If, on the other hand, it is met with the same verbal and physical violence with which it is being administered, which seems increasingly likely, that could bring us civil unrest the likes of which we haven't seen since 1968 - or 1861, if you want to take it to its logical conclusion. The people responsible for this atmosphere are surely April Fools.

One of the truly disturbing aspects of today's world is that there does not seem to be any support coming from those we usually turn to. Literally all of our institutions have failed us: politicians, of course, are useless - they're the ones responsible for most of this in the first place. The one man running who ostensibly isn't a politician, Donald Trump, is thought by many to be a cure worse than the disease, although in truthfulness it's hard to see how he could be any worse than what we already have. Our courts and jurists are a joke, finding rights that were never thought of before while ignoring the Constitution meant to keep things together. Religious leaders are no better: the Church is being run by a man who seems bent on destroying eternal truths. Our law enforcement officials seem more comfortable establishing a police state than anything else, and often cause more fear in law-abiding citizens than they do criminals. Our schools have completely capitulated, either giving in to the PC fascists or promulgating their beliefs in the first place.* Bankers, investors, businessmen - all of them are seen as caring more about lining their own pockets than doing anything for those less fortunate, who are just a speed bump on the way to wealth. The streets themselves are jungles in many of our large cities, and there seems to be no standard American culture anymore. Speaking of which, what passes for culture couldn't fill a petri dish, and merely panders to the lowest common denominator. What's not to be depressed about? Our institutions are run by April Fools.

*Leading to the new aphorism that no student's mind is safe as long as schools are in session.

No amount of April Fooling with paper over this fact, that America seems to be at a crossroads, with the choices being the frying pan or the fire. That's not to say, as I find myself telling people, that we should be living as nihilists; even in Communist countries, people often found a way to live without attracting the attention of the authorities, and if it was a life that is unlike what we've become accustomed to, it did nonetheless allow for a certain degree of security and satisfaction. We've seen the persecution of Christians throughout Christianity, and yet Christianity persists. For those Christians remaining firm in their beliefs, Christianity will remain until there are no Christians left*, in which case there likely will be no world left either. The world may be run by Fools, but Paul reminds us that we can be fools as well, fools for Christ. Every generation has imagined the world would end, for one reason or another, during their lifetimes, and while this era has new and disturbing qualities which others lacked, we've managed to hang on so far.

*Although the truth of Christianity exists whether there's anyone to acknowledge it or not.

We too are fools, in April or any other month, if we don't acknowledge how bad things are. We shouldn't let it get to us, though; capitulation is the worst thing we could do. If America is no longer worth fighting for, no longer worth saving, it remains the case that many of the people living in it are worth saving, and that's what we have to do, however we can. It starts with your family, your friends, your neighbors, your co-workers, the people in your church. Some call it the Benedict Option, others have different words for it. It exists, however, and it's up to us to make sure it comes to fruition.

I started out talking about how April Fools Day isn't my cup of tea, and neither are the biggest fools of all, who try to fool us all with the world they're creating. Ultimately the joke will be on them, but until then, no matter what we've done before, hang firm. I won't channel my inner Dan Rather and urge "courage" for everyone, but I will offer this piece of advise: you know who the Fools are - don't let them fool you again.

Mother Mary Angelica, R.I.P.

SOURCE: EWTN

As most of you probably know by now, Mother Angelica passed away on Easter Sunday. My obit of this remarkable woman can be read over at the It's About TV blog.

Holy Week: "All Glory, Laud, and Honor"

All glory, laud and honor,
To Thee, Redeemer, King,
To Whom the lips of children
Made sweet hosannas ring.

NOTE:  The above refrain is sung at the beginning and after each verse below.

Thou art the King of Israel,
Thou David's royal Son,
Who in the Lord's Name comest,
 The King and Blessed One.

The company of angels
Are praising Thee on High,
And we, with all creation,
In chorus make reply.

The people of the Hebrews
With palms before Thee went;
Our prayer and praise and anthems
Before Thee we present.

To Thee, before Thy passion,
They sang their hymns of praise;
To Thee, now high exalted,
Our melody we raise.

Thou didst accept their praises;
Accept the prayers we bring,
Who in all good delightest,
Thou good and gracious King.

Flashback Friday: Prisoners of love?

Budget Cuts Force British Government To Shut Down Mysterious Seaside Village

(via The Onion)

LONDON—Officials announced this week that the country's ongoing financial crisis would necessitate the closure of a mysterious seaside village operated by the British government since 1967. "In light of the current economic downturn, it is unwise to maintain this secret locale any longer," said a man identified only as Number Two, referring to the bucolic village whose sole aim appeared to be the recovery of desirable information from former intelligence agents. "Plus, the cost of maintaining human chessboards, outdated penny- farthings, and our state-of-the-art escapee- retrieval sphere just proved too much. We would have closed this whole place down years ago had it not been for one particularly uncooperative resident." The man refused to directly answer any questions about the village, instead using surreal imagery and oblique references before ending the press conference with a quiet and ominous "Be seeing you."

*****
However, we have it on good authority that before the project was forced to shut down, they were able to make this promotional video:

Wish I'd written that

Today's horoscope, courtesy of The Onion calendar:

"You will be jolted as if hit by a brick when receiving bad news next week, but only partially because it arrives wrapped around a thrown brick."

Flashback Friday: Pope releases NCAA bracket

POPE FRANCIS DISCUSSES HIS NCAA BRACKET WITH THE MEDIA (HNS)

(VATICAN CITY, MARCH 21) - New Pope Francis announced his NCAA Basketball Tournament bracket today, and revealed that he thinks the championship will be won by the University of Notre Dame Fighting Irish.

In an exclusive interview with the Vatican newspaper L’Osservatore Romano, the Holy Father admitted that although he hadn’t had as much time to work on his bracket as he has in the past, he still feels confident about his selections.

“Notre Dame,” Francis said without hesitation when asked who he had winning it all. “I just have a feeling this is their year. If they can get past Ohio State in the second round, I think they will go all the way.” The pontiff added, however, that top-ranked Gonzaga should not be overlooked. “Never bet against the Jesuits,” he said with a smile.

In addition to Notre Dame, Francis’ other Final Four picks are Saint Louis in the Midwest, Georgetown in the South, and Marquette in the East. “I almost chose the Louisville Cardinals in the Midwest, but ultimately I stayed with Saint Louis,” he said.

The new Pope revealed that he had discussed his predictions with Emeritus Pope Benedict during a phone conversation the two had on Tuesday, but declined to reveal who the former Holy Father had winning the title. “I know he followed the selections avidly on Sunday. He and I disagree on some of the regions, but if he wants to share his choice with the world, I assume he will do so at the proper time.”

Francis expressed appreciation that this year’s Final Four, to be played in Atlanta on April 6 and 8, does not conflict with Easter. “With the liturgies on Holy Thursday, Good Friday, Holy Saturday and Easter Sunday, it can be difficult to keep up with the results. Thankfully, this year that will not be the case.”

The Pope chuckled when asked whether his election as Supreme Pontiff of the Roman Catholic Church means that his bracket is now to be considered infallible. “The Catholic faithful are under no obligation to follow my predictions,” Francis said. “In fact, my colleagues in Buenos Aries might suggest one would better off if they didn’t. But it has been a good month so far - perhaps it is a sign that my luck is changing.”

Originally published March 21, 2013

Don't take us down the path to defeat again

The other day, as I was reading about Mitt Romney's diatribe against Donald Trump, I couldn't help but be reminded of a speech given many years ago by the great Republican Senator Everett Dirksen. I wasn't quite sure of the time or the details, but I was fairly certain I could recall the gist of Dirksen's speech, and a well-placed Google search confirmed the rest.

It was at the Republican convention of 1952, which had developed into a two-way contest for the presidential nomination between Dwight D. Eisenhower, the hero of World War II, and Ohio Senator Robert A. Taft, known to one and all as "Mr. Conservative." The issue in question was the seating of the disputed Georgia delegation, which was being contested between competing groups of Eisenhower and Taft delegates. Dirksen, one of the most influential conservatives in the Senate and a supporter of Taft*, had risen to defend the decision of the Credentials Committee to seat the Taft delegation. All this is background, but there are only two things that one needs to understand to appreciate the moment, which comes just under 18 minutes into this clip, when Dirksen turns and points toward New York Governor Thomas E. Dewey, who had sought the Republican presidential nomination three times, winning it in 1944 and 1948 before losing the general election, the second time to Harry Truman in the famous "Dewey Defeats Truman" election.

*Dirksen nonetheless vowed to enthusiastically support whomever the Republican candidate was, as indeed he did.



"You took us down the road to defeat," Dirksen shouted at Dewey and his New York moderates, supporters of Eisenhower's candidacy, and indeed one wonders if the same words shouldn't be applied to Mitt Romney. It's one thing to come out against Donald Trump, as is Romney's right, although when juxtaposed against Romney's words about Trump just four years ago, one can see it as a bit ironic.

"This is just act one," an insider remarked after Romney's speech last week, and one wonders when the failed candidate from four years ago will just go away. In the great tradition of politics, the candidate from four years ago should do one of two things: either jump in the race as a candidate, or shut up.

As I've said, I don't have a real horse in this race. I have a candidate I favor, and I'm perfectly willing to allow that candidate to win or lose based on the results of the primaries and caucuses. I don't know whether or not Donald Trump is the real deal, but there's no question he's shaken up the establishment and challenged the conventional wisdom of party leaders, and that's something that badly needed to be done.

Political parties really don't much like conventions. Aside from allowing party leaders and delegates a chance to hand out favors and money to their friends and allies, to collect the same from hangers-on and moneyed interests, and to party for a week in a location where free food and booze are overflowing, conventions don't really accomplish much, not the way they did in 1952. Party leaders see conventions as messy things where dirty laundry can be aired, where delegates sometimes have the nasty desire to think for themselves rather than be controlled by the party establishment. No, they much prefer something cut-and-dried, where everything goes according to plan and we're left with boring, mostly ignored soundbites. Honestly, except for the graft, I think they'd be happier if there were no conventions at all.

Even so, one can hope, and if it should come that there's a fight over the convention rules, or if Romney (or another establishment surrogate) gets involved in a brokered convention, one could imagine a courageous speaker taking to the podium, pointing in the general direction of Mitt Romney"

"How dare this man, who four years ago snatched defeat from the jaws of victory, try to define what it is to be a Republican.

"How dare this man, who seems more at ease attacking fellow Republicans than the Democrats against whom he runs, try to tell us who is and isn't a Republican.

"How dare this man, who asked for your support four years ago, stand here now and try to tell you that your vote doesn't count, that you have no business deciding who the Republican nominee is.

"Governor Romney, there is only one thing to be said to you, and that is this: Four years ago we followed you, and you took us down the path to defeat. It is now time for us to be done with you, and I say to you, 'In the name of God, go.' "