Smythe's World

Probably no more posts 'til Tuesday ("Voices Carry" [1986]), as I concentrate on the other web site...the one about college football...you remember...TheBigHouse.blogspot.com. I'm still looking for contributors, particularly fans with an interest in Big 12 or Big East teams, although, truth be told, you can write about whatever you damn well feel like, as long as its related to college football. To the rest of you, have a safe and relaxing Labor Day Weekend !!!

Now that Michael Skakel has been sentenced from 20 to life, the most immediate thing that comes to mind is, what will professional ghoul and celebrity gravy-trainer Dominick Dunne do now? The Robert Blake trial isn't for another few months, and that outre tacky show he hosts for Court TV can't be all that time-consuming (btw, in each episode, at some point he exposes himself as the self-promoting fraud that he is by pronouncing, "the trial of [rich person] became the talk in all the boutiques and restaurants of Beverly Hills/Monte Carlo/Newport." Sorry, Nick, in the fashionable salons of BH, they're usually too busy talking about whether they can get Uncle Reza and Aunt Izat out of Tabriz to care about the Mendendez brothers or Joe Hunt). I don't see him covering the Winona Ryder shoplifting trial. Maybe, if he uses his imagination, he can use some of his dormant writing skills and pretend that he cares about the many unsolved murders that don't involve B-list society page denizens.

Anyone interested in a sneak preview of the just-released future bestseller by Katherine Harris should check here.

My new college football blog, Condredge's Acolytes, is now up and running. It is my goal that the site be an open, collective effort, with contributors chatting up their favorite teams, conferences, rivalries or whatever else they want to rant about. I have no claims to any expertise on the subject, having not even played the sport in high school, but then again, a lack of expertise has never stopped me from writing about the Middle East, the environment, or movies, either. If anyone is interested in participating, let me know.

SatireWire has shut down, or should I say, it is on permanent syndication. Fortunately, The Onion, The Borowitz Report, and "Michael Kelly" remain prolific in their output, and will more than pick up the slack for those of you who need a regular dose of humor, intentional or not.

Now Christmas is ruined !! No more sunrise football classics between two all-star teams made up entirely of players from losing college programs !!

Reading Alexander Cockburn wane ineloquently on "the Jews" is like reading Andrew Sullivan's frequent comments about the Bell Curve, African Americans and their supposed lack of intelligence. Why does anyone believe that "political correctness" still works as a term of derision?

I'm kind of getting tired of having this site discovered by Googlers looking for "Niki and Paris Hilton" or "Anna Pornikova". But at least I did mention those faux blondes in a post. I have never addressed the topics of "Monica Lewinsky gets spanked" or "Gay Hayden Christenson rumors" (is he?), or this topic, no doubt from a dyspeptic resident of Knoxville: "Spurrier AND toupee". Not surprisingly, no one has yet taken up my challenge of several weeks ago, concerning a certain Oscar-winning actress and a utility infielder.

Speaking of which, this Saturday is setting up to be a huge day, starting almost immediately with Washington and Michigan (9 a.m. Pacific), and running through the evening with Maryland and Notre Dame (5 p.m.). All of which I shall watch at Joxer's, of course; although I'm certain the management isn't picking up the college football package, the games I want to see this weekend are all on either direct cable or ABC. Of course, my old school, CAL, opens on Saturday against Baylor, but even if that were being broadcast somewhere, I couldn't inflict that on another human being.

Afterwards, the Samurai Homeboys perform at the bar, which will make the whole day perfect. If you haven't seen the Homeboys before, its kind of like what it would have been to see Springsteen play in New Jersey, circa 1973. 3-4 hours of solid, real R&B/rock, sung by a local bartender with the justified rep of being the "Irish James Brown". Sadly, the sort of music performed by the Homeboys (and Springsteen) is becoming as anachronistic as Big Band vocalists were in 1960. I don't mean to slight hip-hop in any way, since, for the most part, I really like it, but its a repudiation of rock, not a continuation. Does that make me sound old?

Thanks for all the interest in the college football blog. I hope to have something going by tomorrow. More info later....

One of the new sites I've permalinked to is TalkLeft, which specializes in legal issues. It's a terrific place to go for recent developments in death penalty cases, Patriot Act abuses, War on Drugs atrocities, etc. For those who are interested, TalkLeft provides information today on a thorough analysis of every US District Court judge since 1968, which is indispensible for any law office that does, or intends to do, significant work in the Federal Courts. Smythe's World= More billable hours !!!

In fact, it was the enetation code that was causing the problems with the "comments" section, which they have promised will be fixed next week. I hope to have something up sooner than that. In the meantime, just e-mail me.

Those of us who had been looking forward to Dennis Prager hosting the L'Chaim for Life Telethon were awfully disappointed when he played it straight, going the entire seven hours without saying something like liberals being the true anti-semites, etc. The only highlight was when Dom DeLuise came out wearing his trademark white cap with a black yarmulke perched atop, and did a few minutes of shtick. The rest of the evening was a melange of Jewish reggae bands (which is appropriate during a telethon for a drug shelter), testimonials, and Sept. 11 images.

Another month, another best-seller by a wingnut, aimed at an audience incapable of thought. No doubt, reviewers will praise the author's "use" of footnotes.

Let's see, when I left Joxer's last night, bored out of my melon from the games that were on, and needing to meditate over the day's festivities, Florida State had a 31-14 lead over Iowa State. Dammit if the Cyclones didn't make a fantastic fourth quarter comeback and nearly pull off the upset of the season (granted, only five games have been played so far....) I will definitely need more Red Bull next week.

Sports fans like to dream of classic match-ups that because of time or distance are impossible, ie., Ali v. Marciano, the '60's era Celtics v. the Magic Era Lakers, McEnroe v. Sampras, Tiger Woods v. Bobby Jones, etc. Political junkies have dream match-ups too, of which one example would be a hypothetical race between Jeb Bush and Gray Davis, the nation's two most odious elected officials. Davis has pulled away in his reelection battle, mainly because the GOP managed to nominate someone who combined far right politics with a business background that out-sleazes the nation's reigning Kleptocrat. To put it another way, I'm pretty liberal (err, I mean, "populist"), but if Riordan had been the Republican nominee, I would have not only voted for him, but I would have contemplated walking precincts to elect him.

Jeb Bush, though, is in a different league altogether, as his recent attempt to appoint some religious wacko to head his state's utterly incompetent Child Welfare Department indicates. His defense of the nominee, as detailed in the above link, is to claim that his opponents are motivated by "bigotry against fundamentalist Christians". To which I add, GUILTY AS CHARGED, gov'na. There have to be some standards by which we can judge certain beliefs and behaviour, and I see nothing wrong with being prejudiced against Nazis, Klansmen, bullies, pedophiles, fans of the Washington NFL team, the Taliban, wife-beaters, and nutcases who believe that "smiting children with a rod" is acceptable government policy because the Bible tells them so.

I'm starting a college football blog, and I'd like to know if there is anyone out there who would like to contribute to it, hopefully someone east of the Mississippi. What I hope to have is a number of people who contribute on a semi-regular basis, with a focus on a particular team or region.

I guess if Gary Sheffield is a "cancer" in the clubhouse, he's awfully benign.

Two questions:

1. Why was Ariel Sharon going to Florida anyway, if not to "campaign" for Jeb Bush?

2. What exactly is wrong with AIPAC, or any other politically-interested group, targeting a politician they don't like? It's not like the voters in Cynthia McKinney's district were unaware of who was financing her opponent, or what its agenda was. They knew, they considered, and they voted the lady out of office. I don't happen to be a fan of the extreme agenda of AIPAC, but I do like the First Amendment, and as long as we allow people and interest groups the power to contribute to campaigns, AIPAC has the right and the duty to get involved, just as groups more sympathetic to the Palestinian cause have a right to get involved. Involvement should be based on principal, not whether it is tactically disadvantageous in the context of Jewish-Black relations. AIPAC is no different than NCPAC was twenty years ago, or the Moral Majority; in time, their extreme agenda will taint any campaign they contribute to. In any event, the political discourse in our country is not the poorer for no longer having Ms. McKinney in Congress.

Finally, a reason to keep going...the college football season has started, with the first game on TV (Fresno St. v. Wisconsin) being broadcast tonight. Some mediocre games Saturday and Sunday, but I intend to see as many as possible. Dodgers play the Braves, Angels battle the Red Sox, and the weekend culminates with the L'Chaim for Life Telethon Sunday night...TV Guide doesn't say who's hosting this year, but I assume its going to be Fyvush Finkel...maybe the Tokens will perform; you just know Norm Crosby and international comedy star Johnny Yune will show...some suspense as to whether Angelina Jolie's dad will raise that topic in the context of the Chabad House.

Conservative clip-and-paste guru Instapundit compares MoDo to Fraulein Goebbels, in a bizarre example of moral equivalence. Let's see, a writer who occasionally makes silly statements about politics and culture in her columns is like a writer who wants to see the NY Times office building blown up, has called for the summary execution of all liberals and Arabs, and fabricates evidence in her books. I guess you can't take law profs from SEC football powers all that seriously....

POLITICAL CORRECTNESS, SMYTHE-STYLE: I've been dreading this day for awhile now, but I think its finally time that I yank Kausfiles from my set of links. I used to find his views on welfare, education, and the future of the Democratic Party provocative, even if I disagreed with him most of the time. As you might observe to the left, I have no problem linking to conservatives, warbloggers and the like. I do have issues with bloggers who link to hatemongers, like Fraulein Goebbels and Lucianne Goldberg. To put it another way, if MWO were to begin posting screeds calling for the assasination of Dick Cheney on a daily basis, I would yank that site too, as well as any site that continued to link to MWO.

I notice that I'm having problems accessing my own site today, which I am attributing to the server I use for your "comments" at the end of each post, enetation.co.uk. I can't get on their website, so I don't know if enetation is updating its program or what, but I'm going to give it another 24 hours before I remove their code. If there are other bloggers who use enetation who happen to be reading this, but do not have the same problem, please, let me know.

ED. Note: Screw it--Enetation is gone !! If you need to respond or retort, use e-mail.

Although I have abdicated the responsibility of using my public forum as a cut-and-paste service for liberals, I would be remiss if I didn't point out the significance of the N.Y. Times in our country. The Democrats have pretty much abandoned any efforts at being a serious opposition movement, the Greens are basically just the left wing of the GOP, so the "Gray Lady" is pretty much it right now. Particularly with respect to the pending invasion of Iraq, the Times is asking the appropriate questions, and providing the same skepticism about what may be an unnecessary war that it did last year in covering W's tax cuts for the rich. It is what used to be called, "speaking truth to power", and that is why the far right is so pissed.

Ken Starr's latest victim...Bob Barr !!!

A couple of weeks ago, I marveled at an LA Times review, by a "critic" named Andrew Malcolm, puffing Fraulein Goebbels' discredited opus, Slander. Today, Bob Somerby picks up the trail as to who Andrew Malcolm is: a former campaign advisor to George W. Bush !! I kinda wish the Times had told us that at the time it published the review.

No wonder he loves Ann Coulter so much, and believes that Media Whores Online and Al Qaeda are linked...Mickey Kaus writes last night that "cultural populism", of the type historically practiced by Richard Nixon, Joe McCarthy, Theodore Bilbo, and George Wallace, is preferable to the "economic populism" that characterizes 20th century liberalism (see below). A good rule of blog: if it's worth writing, it's worth writing at a time other than 1:30 a.m.

As a word, liberalism can't seem to catch a break. In the '80's, and particularly after the Dukakis debacle in 1988, the right was able to transform the term that had once been embraced by FDR, Harry Truman, and Hubert Humphrey into something derogatory. Those of us who were to the left of center hastened to either embrace the term "progressive" to describe our politics, or would react with outrage that any sort of label was being used. After a wildly successful two-term Presidency, by someone who was generally (but clearly not always) a political southpaw, and a campaign where the combined left of center(Gore + Nader) vote constituted a clear majority, my compatriots now identify themselves as "populists". The distinction between the two terms, as they are used now in common parlance, is barely worth mentioning; historically, of course, "populism" has generally been a politics of demagoguery, often focused on the sort of bigotry and intolerance that liberalism opposes. At least until the next time we get our asses kicked in an election, liberals don't have to remain in the closet, cloaking our identity before a public that has been willing in recent elections to elect our candidates.

Terrell Davis will make a token appearance, then retire, during Denver's pre-season game tonight with the 49'ers. It's best to remember that before he came into the league, football experts thought that John Elway was an overrated stiff who always choked in the "big game". Sad to say, opinions similar to this writer's will probably prevail concerning his Hall of Fame chances. Counter-balanced against the two Super Bowls the Broncos won while Davis was their M.V.P., his 2000-yard season, and his dominating performances in the four seasons he was healthy, is the argument that Davis' career was too short (which is a fair argument), and the claim that Davis compares unfavorably to players who are in the H.O.F. but had even shorter careers, such as Gale Sayers and Ernie Nevers. It is a prime example of a sportswriter not being able to justify his opinions according to any objective criteria, so he makes subjective arguments that he will abandon when it comes time to argue in favor of some other player.

Sayers was indeed spectacular, but arguing, as that writer does, that he should therefore be in the H.O.F. ahead of Davis would be like a baseball writer arguing that Frank Howard should be in the Hall over Kirby Puckett, because his home runs traveled further (or more to the point, that Lynn Swann should be in the Hall over Steve Largent, b/c Largent had no highlight reel grabs). It wasn't Gale Sayers' fault that the teams he played for were lousy, but one can only speculate how he would have done in a game that really mattered; of course, there is no need to do so for Terrell Davis. Sayers is in the HOF for three reasons: 1) he was exciting to watch; 2) he was a famous player in Chicago; and 3) Brian's Song. If Billy Sims had played for the Bears, and had befriended a tragic white teammate, he would have been elected to Canton ten years ago. And the notion that any running back from the Jim Crow era in NFL history, such as Ernie Nevers or Cliff Battles, should rank ahead of any modern-day player is absolutely nuts. None of the players referenced in that article had quite the impact on a team or a season that Terrell Davis did, or more importantly, did as much to help his team win. And that, not whether he looks great in the highlight film, is the only relevant criteria to use in determining a player's qualifications for the Hall of Fame.

A belated happy b-day to my beloved sister, Cat, who turned...a year older yesterday. She will soon be moving to the Berkeley Hills with her hubby. It means I will have yet another place to crash when I visit the Bay Area.

According to the broadcast of their game last night, the expansion Houston Texans make their home debut this Saturday at the brand-spanking-new Reliant Stadium. I don't know what kind of business "Reliant" does, but that company could do me a huge favor if it files it's Chapter 11 petition in the Central District of California.

As you might have noticed, I have published less and less over the past two weeks. I am becoming increasingly uncomfortable with the direction my blog is taking, towards becoming little more than a clipping service for liberals, and away from something that actually reflects a sense of who I am. There's nothing wrong with websites acting as "clipping services", mind you; it would be great to see a southpaw version of Instapundit develop, especially for small websites like this one. I will still visit blogs that attempt to perform that role, and will not discourage visitors to this site from so doing. I assume, however, that most of the visitors to this site know how to find the most recent Krugman column in the NY Times without my having to link to it. I don't want to do that for you anymore, and the political sites that I will link to in the future, will, regardless of politics, be of a more analytical bent, like MaxSpeak and Rittenhouse Review, rather than sites that simply link to other bloggers and to newspaper columns that the blogger finds interesting; in other words, less linking, more thinking. And of course, anyone who links to me gets linked back, because I'm a narcissistic whore who's grateful for the attention.

Damn courteous of baseball to threaten to cancel its season on August 30, the day before the first full week of college football games. It'll be easier on the fans that way. But remember, the next time you hear a writer complain about "small market" teams, the Minnesota Twins, future Central Division champs, are one of the teams he's referring to. There are no small market teams, only small-time owners.

Apparently the unofficial newspaper of my alma mater, the Daily Cal, was able to mau-mau its way into having the ASUC building renew its lease. For some inexplicable reason, the normally reliable TAPPED seems to think that this is a victory for "free speech" over the forces of "political correctness"(whatever that means), rather than a well-funded student rag being able to prevent less fortunate student groups from being able to occupy some choice campus office space.

Uneventful weekend planned, with a family barbq Saturday and a trip to the Skirball Center (for a food festival !!) on Sunday; anything to avoid the malignancy of R****** fans at Joxers. In any event, I will be there tonight.

This guy wasn't a bad actor, although I hope Phil Gramm doesn't try to emulate him. My favorite Thompson performance was in the TV series, Wise Guy, when he played a white supremacist con-man; it was the only role of his I can remember when he didn't play either a government official or a lawyer.

Unfreaking believable!!! While Andrew Sullivan is on vacation, reputed "scholar" Camille Paglia is pinch-hitting. Its just as good as those old Sanford & Son episodes when Redd Foxx couldn't be bothered to show up on the set, so Grady would be the star that week. Highlight of her debut post: her oft-repeated but bogus claim that she is a "disillusioned Democrat" who voted for Clinton twice !!! As far as I could tell, though, she failed to refer to any of her adversaries as "Stalinists", so this might be the work of an imposter.

As noted in this space last week, Delaware is rightly called the hellhole of the universe, in part because of its lax incorporations laws. From the perspective of a bankruptcy lawyer, it means that a whole grip of Chapter 11's get filed there, and are heard before judges with a sycophantic bent toward those debtors with the good fortune to be incorporated there. This article proposes a reform that makes too much sense: federalizing corporate law, thereby making all corporations that conduct interstate commerce susceptible to the same standards and practices, and giving shareholders everywhere the same protections. Ideally, of course, the federal standards would be the bare minimum; states could adhere to even higher standards, if they so desire.

For a nation supposedly formed around the principal of opposing "taxation without representation", I have always been amazed that our great experiment in democracy never blessed the District of Columbia. This good piece eviscerates the arguments against DC statehood; although he doesn't say it in so many words, I think its safe to say that if DC were a predominantly white city, it would have had its two senators and representative some time ago.

Concerning the title of this article, isn't "sushi cook" a contradiction in terms?

For those of you who want me to quit whining about the "Bankruptcy Reform" act currently before Congress, and want me to let you know what you can do about it, check out this site (thanks Sir Mix-A-Lot !).

Having busted the budget with an unnecessary tax rollback for his friends in Newport and Waco, W. now decides to push the "fiscal responsibility" cart with a veto of a spending bill that consists, in large part, of programs that he originally pushed. With all the talk about Ashcroft threatening to roll back civil liberties, its stories like this that actually offer some reassurance: can a moronocracy truly be feared?

A word of caution to those of you who were directed to this site by Google: this blog mainly concerns politics and sports, with occasional forays into Alias, Phoebe Nicholls, my drinking bouts at Joxer Dalys, and my fledgling write-in campaign to be SF Valley Mayor. I do not typically write about "Paris Hilton" (four hits !!), "Anna Pornikova"(two hits), or "The Miller Sisters"; that was from last month's Miss Overrated 2002 contest, and, in any event, my references to them were not too kind. I have never written on the topics of either "Klum Being Screwed" or "Gretchen Mol rumors", so you should take that up with Google.

This Krugman column explores the old adage (I think it's the Kinsley Law of Scandal) that holds that the real scandal isn't the illegality; its what's perfectly legal.

Last week, I mentioned, almost in passing, stories published about two public figures, Jose Offerman and Gwyneth Paltrow, that I thought were so poorly sourced that it offended me that any reputable journalistic venture could have published them (by the way, I believe this blog is the first to ever put those two individuals together in the same sentence; I can't wait to see if someone reaches me through a Google search for " 'Jose Offerman' AND 'Gwyneth Paltrow' "). Its not a big deal, unless you're the subject of such a hitpiece; the journalistic standards regarding "anonymous sources" for sports and entertainment/gossip are so low anyway that the public has already developed an ingrained skepticism about such stories. Then again, I came upon this story and this story today, which only show what a strong shelf-life the most odious of lies can take on.

Anyway, I'm sure a lot of you have already heard about the Fox.com smear of Al Gore last week: that he and his wife attempted to use influence to get some freebies to the opening Springsteen concert, and had a fit when he didn't get the tickets. Coming as it did on the heels of a campaign season when false stories were printed about the former Veep taking credit for inventing the Internet, or for having been brought up in a luxury hotel, I was amazed that anyone with a sense of fair play could have believed that allegation even for a second. To that end, I would propose a hard and fast rule concerning any published story that uses anonymous sources: unless it involves a whistleblower, or a Mafia informant, anything that you read that contains a reference to an unnamed "friend", "teammate", "source" or "insider" must bear the presumption that it is a lie, unless the journalist can show elsewhere in the story that the anonymity was granted to protect the source, not the reputation of the journalist.
(Ed. I would be happy to discuss with anyone who e-mails or comments, below, why I believe the stories involving Gore, Offerman and Paltrow were untrue in whole or in part)

Look who might have to give up his Second Amendment rights....

Good follow-up piece to NYC's efforts to scam the Oscars from LA, using 9/11 as a crutch. Its pathetic that Gov. Davis and Mayor Hahn are willing to allow the ceremony to be split, although Davis' motivation is obvious: Harvey Weinstein must have "contributed" to his campaign. I'll make it easy for Hahn: your job is to do things (like govern) that are good for LA; if New York City is willing to share the Giants or Jets, or allow the Tony Awards to come to LA the next time we have an earthquake, than we can talk about having the two cities host the Academy Awards.

Staggering, moronic review in the LA Times today of Slander, the bestseller by the writer I've come to know and love as Fraulein Goebbels. Someone named "Andrew Malcolm" wrote the puff piece, which praises the author's rigorous use of footnotes and her provocative and ironic style. No doubt his review of Mein Kampf would marvel at the writer's wit and clearheaded social and political criticism. I'm not an LA Times basher (I have to go someplace for my sports scores), but its book review section really is a pit of mediocrity.

Well, I spent a good deal of the evening Saturday at what is arguably the happiest place on earth, watching a full panoply of pre-season football and the like. Since Joxer's is unofficially a "R******" bar, the place filled up with transplants from the Virginia/Maryland/DC area, all of whom were disappointed big-time when the management couldn't pull down the game from their satellite. With two exceptions, they all left by 6:00 p.m. What a vile specimen of rodent excrement is the Washington football fan. They root for a team whose nickname is a racist obscenity, they never show up at any other time except when their team is playing, they sing that idiotic (albeit catchy) fight song, and then leave without paying their bar tabs. Simply sharing a sports pub with them over the years has practically turned me into a hard-core fan of "America's Team", which is an almost unthinkable turn of events in my life, considering how I grew up believing that Roger Staubach was the anti-christ, and that Tom Landry was the person about whom Lucas based the evil emporer from the Star Wars movies.

'Cause it feels so empty without me: I've gotten quite a few hits the last couple of days thanks to a mention by Matt Welch of my ongoing campaign to be mayor of the SF Valley. As some of you might be aware, I did not garner enough (or any) signatures to get my name on the November ballot, as it appears my efforts in that regard were foiled by my sworn enemy, Molly Johnson O'Keefe, Carolyn H.'s evil twin. That woman has ruthlessly sought to avenge my having disclosed her true identity as a KGB-sponsored assasin, which I discovered after she seduced me on the island of Mustique back in 1987, while her sister was studying in France. Nonetheless, I shall continue to campaign as a write-in candidate, and pursue my platform of bringing an NFL franchise to a stadium to be built in the Encino Hills.

How is the President like Anna Nicole Smith? Check out this review....

When I think about the center of evil on this planet, it is not to Iraq or Tora Bora that I focus, but on the satanic kingdom of Delaware, home of MBNA, lax incorporation and usury laws, and Joe Biden.

Why do I think that this is really about some hotshot East Coast producers being too lazy to get on a plane and fly to LA. If it was really a tribute to the 9/11 dead, why not have part of the Oscars in D.C.? Or better yet, Jerusalem? AMPAS has already had one ceremony where it pretended that the only victims of Bin Laden were in New York City, so how many more of these are we going to be forced to sit through.

As part of the desperate, scorched-earth tactics used (hopefully) by the opponents of the "bankruptcy reform" measure currently before Congress, a sweetheart loan made by MBNA to a powerful Congressman is being hyped. To summarize, Rep. Moran (D.-VA), who had run up some Smythian debts on his credit cards, was able to get a large, relatively low-interest loan against his home just before he signed on to sponsor the proposed law. The suspicious timing of the loan has caught the attention of the bill's opponents, who hope to focus on the budding scandal as an exemplification of everything wrong with the law. To which I add, DUH !!! This measure is not going to get passed because our elected officials carefully and scrupulously weighed argument and counter-argument on the problem of increased bankruptcy filings, and came up with this bill. Its going to pass because the credit card industry bribed (err, I mean contributed to) an overwhelming majority in both houses of Congress, as well as to the President, who, when he wasn't campaigning two years ago out of the back pocket of Enron and the oil companies, was practically giving monicas to MBNA and Providian. And so endeth this evening's civics lesson....

In what could move the Lakers a step closer to a fourpeat, it appears that CWeb may be indicted for lying to a grand jury over his relationship with UM booster Ed Martin. If convicted, he will face up to five years in the slammer. Now, we just need to get something on Tim Duncan.

Ironically, "Michael Kelly", whom I've linked to in the Humor Dept., actually wrote what appears to be an intentionally, albeit mildly, amusing column this week. If only Andrew Sullivan could do the same....

Joe Biden, Stephen Ambrose, Mike Barnicle, and now...Wayne Newton?

I love a good cat fight as much as the next guy, but there's something about this article that doesn't ring true, cause if it is, "Gwyn" should fire her publicist for allowing this story to get out, cause he/she has just made her client seem like the dimmest bulb in all of christendom. (incidentally, the story that follows, about "Elmo" and NY taxicabs, might well be the most blatant use of an "anonymous source" as a disguise for the opinions of the author in the history of American journalism)

Regarding Chick Hearn, MC Hammered writes in requesting a favor:

Do you remember a rap song using nothing but Chick Hearns' basketball play by play calls and a drum machine? I don't remember the actual title of the record or the exact year (mid to late 80's) but I can still hear some of the song in my head (I also hear voices sometimes but that's a different matter altogether). If you have any info, oops, I mean 411, for me(I always try to stay as lamely hip as is possible for a 36 year old white man) then get back to me. Por favor.

I believe it was from 2Live Crew, or maybe Public Enemy, but I'm not sure. I definitely remember the song. If anyone has a more definite answer (or better yet, a link !!), let me know.

Gerri Kasparov, who will forever be remembered as the chess champion who got his ass kicked by a computer, has a well-thought out plan to take on Iran, Syria, et al., after we get finished taking care of Iraq. Just a warning, Comrade Gerri, don't turn you're back on Rosa Klebb.

Sometimes MoDo can actually be a brilliant social critic, and sometimes she just phones it in, like she does here, a column as bad as her Hollywood articles last week. Perhaps a gentle reminder is in order: Al Gore may not be well-liked among the beltway set, but he was the people's choice in the last election. Dowd doesn't need a fact checker; she needs a sense checker.

Outstanding set of posts and links from Eschaton about this week's hip rationale for doing a Pearl Harbor on Iraq: to "humiliate" Islam. Believe it or not, this idea is actually gaining currency in D.C.; that is to say, the U.S. / "west" needs to pick a fight with the Muslims and give them such a staggering defeat that the Arab World will throw up their hands and say, "oops, we were wrong about Allah and the Koran, screw the Palestinians, let's embrace western ideals, etc."(ed.-I always thought capitalism was supposed to do that). This is sort of a variation of Snitchens' "war against Islamofascism", and is based on a rather bizarre misreading of the aftermath of WWII, that the Allies needed to fight Germany and Japan so as to deliver an humiliating defeat, after which our former enemies embraced democracy, tolerance, et al. Perhaps it bears repeating that prior to our getting the chance to "humiliate" Germany and Japan, they fought rather tenaciously for six years, and killed lots of innocent people. Before we decide to go chain the entire Arab World to the back of our pick-up truck, metaphorically speaking, maybe we need to start listening to a broader spectrum of opinion on this issue, especially now that it seems that the crack epidemic has spread to the editorial board of Commentary.

Its sad to think that there are those who only came to know Chick Hearn as a Laker announcer in the last few years. Even before the stroke last December, he clearly wasn't half the announcer he used to be, and anyone who pretends that he was still any good on the radio is lying. Back in my youth, only a few Laker games a year were televised, and I had the pleasure of listening to his broadcasts on a small transistor radio. His vivid, imaginative calls created images in the mind of a nine-year old boy that were indellible; long before I saw my first basketball game, I had a distinctive view as to what was going on at courtside, whether it was West "yo-yo-ing the ball up the court", or Goodrich putting an opponent "in the popcorn machine", or Wilt attempting a "finger roll" or a "slam dunk", thanks to Chick (and some of the phrases he invented).

UPDATE: Check out this tribute to Chick Hearn, with the passion and elegance I wish I could bring to the subject.

Do ya think its even theoretically possible to drive a nail up this guy's ass with a sledgehammer?

Smythesworld is now ad-free, thanks to media tycoon James Capozzola of the Rittenhouse Report, who bought out the ad from Blogger. Much appreciations and the like...and here's another reason lawyers are truly the world's saddest victims.

One of the little scandals that took place recently in blogistan concerned a prominent writer who falsely accused a former Clinton Cabinet member of having been involved in some questionable dealings with Enron while he was the president of Citicorp. When it turned out that the official hadn't joined Citicorp until months after its rather complicated business arrangement with Enron went into effect, the blogger retroactively altered his posting, without comment. That is considered to be a tad unethical, since the visitors who read the original piece might not pick up on the later change unless a retraction had been posted. Still, not a huge deal in the long run, since the truth eventually does get out, and the site in question is only going to be read by a few thousand people a day. However, when the government does the same thing, it is a big deal, as the latest column by Paul Krugman makes clear. Propelled by approval numbers in the stratosphere, the Bush Administration seems to believe it has been liberated from the modest obligations that the rest of us have to at least be consistent with the lies we tell each other. At least Clinton didn't try to claim that he never denied having sexual relations with that woman.

In the last week, the following search terms linked actual users to my site, thanks to Google:

1. "Julia Roberts" spanked
2. Why Brazil won and not Turkey picture "girl in crowd"
3. Soccer Referree test
4. "Michael Bolton" and "Naomi Campbell"
5. p-whipped and men

and, lastly, with Smythesworld listed at the very top...
6. cover slam tennis Moby

I've been writing a lot about baseball recently, and little about politics, so here's something that ties the two together, a follow-up to the excellent Krugman column from a fortnight ago on some perfectly legal kickbacks W got back when he was governor of Texas. I knew there must have been a reason he traded Sammy Sosa !!

I dunno Davey...this is great news. I can't wait to see if they contemporize the characters, ie., have D & G "rap", give Goliath a soul patch, etc. My favorite episode concerned the time they went to a state park, and thought it would be funny to dump a can of paint into a drinking well; that day, they learned a hard lesson about the consequences of their actions.

I may have been too kind to the media concerning my post the other day about the release of Jose Offerman. It seems the front office of that team put out the story that Offerman had refused to enter last Monday's game in the 9th inning to pinch run as a rationale for cutting the bastard four days later, and as a justification for making him travel with the team to Texas, rather than releasing him in L.A., where he lives in the off-season. The media, which tend to dislike uppitty dark-skinned players, fell for it hook, line and sinker, reporting the allegation without sourcing it. As I wrote earlier, if Offerman was white, or spoke English as a first language, I am certain that this story would have been covered differently; that is to say, it would have been reported that he was cut by the Red Sox because his batting average sucked, but that the team's decision to force him to make the trip to Texas, and inventing a smear afterward about his willingness to play, was classless.

Some friends of mine told me last night at Joxers that I have a standard pose that I go into (as seen here) when I'm about to "meditate". I guess that's what friends are for. By the way, did anyone notice that the new Washington uniform looks a lot like Florida State--did Spurrier do that deliberately?

It's only an exhibition game, but football is back tonight, which also means the real season starts in five weeks, the first college game is three weeks from today, and baseball can go to hell, for all I care, at least until the playoffs start. For about 2 1/2 months every year, between the end of the NBA/NHL playoffs and the first NFL game, baseball has a practical monopoly on the attention of sports fans, and its always the least interesting part of the season, when players and teams seem to run on fumes. This year, with the threat of a players' strike, the owners engaged in their usual lying and racketeering, and the commissioner deciding to call the All-Star Game b/c the managers didn't know how to utilize their rotation properly, I have decided to place baseball on the level of priority that I put MLS games: as a time-killer until something more interesting comes on, like pre-season football or The Iron Chef.

You can tell this article was written by a Boston sportswriter; there is no way it would have been published if the subject was a white athlete...

Just two days after I announced the start of my campaign for SF Valley mayor (oops, sorry, announced the formation of my "exploratory committee"), another blogger has decided to seek election to be mayor of D.C. This guy might have an easier race; the incumbent wasn't able to generate enough signatures to get his name on the ballot !!!

The incomparable Henry Raddick has a new book review out.

Once again, Mr. Bolkcom wins the month in the Home Run Pool. For the first time since April, I managed to stay out of the cellar.

Ohmigod !!! He wore a toupee. Who knew??

Did Rush Limbaugh honestly say that "liberals hated the sight of the rescued mine workers". What a turd.

I am without a car today (long story), so I'm not going to post much the next few days. However, some of you might be interested in this link, which presents a "sneak preview" of the next Ann Coulter book.