Smythe's World

Her campaign is going nowhere fast, but Arianna Huffington has a blog, where she eviscerates the idiotic column by former Dukakis campaign strategist Susan Estrich. That follows on the heels of Gray Davis' wife, whose blog has to be seen to be believed. No word if Ahnolt, or someone who can write, will set one up, although if the reliquary he has advising him is any indication, he might be hard-pressed to even identify what the internet is.

With the college football season starting today, that can mean only one thing: the return of Condredge's Acolytes, America's premier college sports blog. It's collaborative; anyone with an interest is invited to write. Go Bears !!

As a new poll shows Ahnolt with a slight lead over Cruz Bustamante, he will now have to confront a seething backlash brewing against him among Latino voters. In this piece, the long-time anchor of Univision news, Jorge Ramos, denounces A.S. in no uncertain terms. The money quote [translated into English by Jusiper]: "Arnold is teaching us the classic lesson of what any candidate should to lose the Hispanic vote. Being anti-immigrant in California, sadly, keeps earning votes. But there is nothing worse than when an immigrant forgets his past and turns his back on others like him. And Arnold's back sure is wide." [link via Snark Attack]

Early this year, for a couple of months, I had the honor of writing a couple of college basketball-related posts for Off-Wing Sports, Eric McErlain's terrific sports blog, and a once-a-day stop for yours truly. His post today on what makes a good sports bar is well worth the reading:

So what makes a good sports bar? It's a place you go to watch the game with like minded folks who are looking for the same thing. It's not a place where catching the score is an afterthought. It can have pool tables and arcade games, but they can't be the main attraction...Music is fine, as long as it's in the background, and not dominating the scene.

What else? How about some character? Some history -- and it helps if you're part of that history too. How about some identification with the neighborhood the bar resides in? And how about a crew of regulars, not an ever-shifting cast of twenty-somethings looking for the next hot spot.

And, apologies to my friends who have recently become parents, a sports bar is for adults only. Points off if your favorite place has a kid's menu.

It is a source of irritation that reviews of sports bars always focus on the number of big screen TV's, or the number of extra-curricular activities that go on that don't involve sports. When I go to a sports bar, I don't care about air hockey or pool tables, and I don't want to have the juke box going full blast when my team is playing; I just want to watch the damn games, hang out with my chums, and drink as much Sierra Nevada as I can afford. Anyways, if anyone from SoCal has any suggestions for what their favorite sports bar is, let me know; I intend to publish a similar post shortly.

And for any and all who care, here's Hunter S. Thompson's take on the joys of being a 'Niner fan.

It's a shame that some bloggers do not feel the need to practice the same sort of due diligence that lawyers are ethically required to do before taking on a case. Making a rare trip to Instapundit this morning, I came upon this little gem, to an article by one Austin Bay: "The usual "international human rights crowd" has been slow to condemn the current horrors perpetrated by Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe. During the Cold War, Amin escaped their condemnation because he was "anti-colonialist."

Hello !! Idi Amin was one of the most vilified people on the planet while he ruled Uganda. Many of the stories about his regime, while he was in power, eventually mentioned rumors of cannibalism and the like. If, like most of the rest of the human race, his reference to the "usual human rights crowd" includes Amnesty International, they were quite outspoken about the monster, just as they have been in the forefront of the denunciation of Robert Mugabe (see also here, here, and here).

Another terrorist slaughter in Iraq, this time targeted at the U.N. This is starting to get out of control...Bush needs to start taking the war on terrorism seriously.

I reckon this is a common enough phenomenum: I can criticize the people of my state for wanting a do-over on the last election, but when it comes to the lame, warmed-over put-downs of this third-rate poor man's Peggy Noonan wannabe, I get pissed. I'm beginning to think that, like football games on a sunny New Year's Day, backyard swimming pools, and freeways, the recall is one more California innovation for which the rest of the country envies us.