Please welcome the new NFL Commissioner…

I had the family over to the house this year for the Super Bowl and it was a great game!  The only thing that would have made it better was if the Cowboys were playing and the opposing team was a mish mash of every team I’ve been taught to despise over the years and we beat them 147 to 3.

Nonetheless, I love it.  We all love it!  And while baseball is a great sport, football is really America’s game!  So after the last bottle of champagne was popped, I found myself a bit sad and empty…and then angry that the season was over and I had to wait a two months, two weeks and 1 day before Draft Day.  I found myself dreaming of being elected the Commissioner of the NFL… holding a press conference to announce all my awesome changes for the league…

“First off, let me thank Roger Goodell for the terrible job he did as Commissioner.  It’s going to be easy to follow in his footsteps.” 

“My first change as Commissioner of the NFL is to get rid of these girly uniforms.  Since when did teal become a terrifying color?  The NFC will wear prison jump suits that come in a variety of shades of black and blood, while the AFC will have a selection of biker outfits to wear.

“Secondly, players will have to stop invoking the name of God after a victory.  Many may not know this but God only cares about the Dallas Cowboys.  And besides, there’s been way too many crimes committed already while God was busy helping the Cowboys win football games.

“Thirdly, I am going to limit all pre-game shows to 30 minutes, max.  While the Super Bowl was fun, the 21-day-marathon-pre-game shows were a bit of a beat down.  I turned on the TV Sunday morning to make sure I recorded the Super Bowl and the pre-game show had already started… at 5:30AM!  I don’t think the return of Elvis being discovered alive – having been secluded for 40 years on an island filled with talking apes in the Bermuda Triangle with his lovechild he made with Amelia Earhart – could have matched the buildup to this game.

And the way the networks trotted out 14,000 neckless experts to dissect the game down to the molecular level seemed a little overkill… 

“Howie, If Drew Brees sticks to his pre-game routine of 3 slices of bacon and a blueberry bran muffin, the Saints should be able to pull off an upset.  It’s a little known fact that the very brand of bacon Brees eats is the same type of pig that Colts Defensive Coordinator, Larry Coyer, raised as a young child in Huntington, W VA.  This should be a great matchup!”

“Terry, I think you’re overlooking the fact that we’re in the waning moon period of the 7^th House of Aquarius.  And as everyone with an ounce of football sense knows, Dwight Freeney’s birthday is February 19^th, solidly in the window which clearly predicts that he’ll not only play, but have a monster game for the Colts.  Now that’s some bacon we all can sink our teeth into!”  (This would be followed by 3 straight minutes of inane laughter.)

“Fourth, as a part of our community outreach, the NFL will be selling Stadium Pals for use during the Super Bowl.  It’s come to my attention that most fans actually pee during the big game so they won’t miss the commercials… and I can’t have that.

“Fifth, cheerleaders will not be allowed to cheer unless they are actually facing the field and watching the game. 

“Sixth… players’ mothers will not be allowed to be filmed on TV.  I’m so sick and tired of watching Ray Lewis’ mother cringe and peek through her fingers and moan, “Use your words, honey.  Use your words.”

“Seventh…the number of interviews a player is allowed to be in during the weeks leading up to the Super Bowl will be in direct proportion to their IQ.  Last week I sat through 49 different interviews of Jeremy Shockey.  Here’s a recap of all 49 interviews… 

“So how does it feel to play in the Super Bowl again?”

“Well, for me to put it into words, you know, it’s like, damn…”

“Eight… I’ll be instituting a no-referee policy for the NFL.  The entire lot of umpires and referees in sports are useless.  Even WWF refs routinely overlook folding chairs to the back of the head.  Who needs these guys?”

“Finally, I’ll be ridding the game of that heinous crime called the field goal.  It’s a travesty that teams claw their way up the field, crashing through two tons of hell-fury, picking up ripped hamstrings and severe concussions along the way, only to call in a kicker who probably doesn’t even understand the game.  Most are from Venezuela or Spain where football is played without your hands and you’re always ripping off your clothes after you score. When I see shots of these so-called football players on the sidelines, they almost always have their back to the game, leg propped up on the bench, sharing a cigarette with a cheerleader.  Then he sees the fans pointing at him and he turns around, grabs a random helmet, trots out and ends the game.  He may as well come in and do a pirouette or pee for distance.”

“Thank you and Go Cowboys!”

Geert Wilders vs Radical Islam

I’m a little reticent to post this entry.  Primarily because I’m not 100% sure of all the details around this story and what this person has been saying.  I’ve been reading a little about this Dutch politician/filmmaker Geert Wilders who is now on trial in the Netherlands.  He’s being accused of making anti-Islam remarks and inciting hatred against Muslims. 

Of course, racism in any form is insidious and must be called out.  But based on what I’ve read (again, disclaimer that I don’t know too much about this story) Geert seems to be a victim of an equally insidious practice – political correctness.  Story aside, Geert is an awesome name!  Anywho, I’m going to sit tight and watch this one from the sidelines until an opinion can be born. 

Nonetheless I am dismayed when I see the idiocies of the political correctness movement around the world.  This bastard child of identity politics and the self-esteem movement is an ideology based on the avoidance of hurting anyone’s feelings.  There are many ingredients in the crock pot of political correctness crap…and the chefs are joyless dullards blinded and benumbed by a childhood of sedentary, pseudo self awareness where, if Johnny’s feelings were hurt, it wasn’t because the world gave him grief for eating his own boogers.  It was because society didn’t understand the nutritional value of boogers… Johnny was just misunderstood!  The world should be more sensitive and understanding towards Johnny’s feelings and use soft, uplifting words to describe Johnny.  Words like “mucus masticator” or “nasal passage cleanliness engineer.”  Of course, this most likely won’t stop Johnny when he goes on a shooting rampage later in life to turn all non-booger eaters into snot connoisseurs as revenge for his bruised ego.

Newsflash.  Radical Islam, like any radical religious movement, isn’t noble.  And it’s nothing short of criminal when brainless morons leverage this p.c. crap for their own warped agenda against those who seek to stand up for their personal religious values.

Keeping an eye on this one…

Supreme Court – 1; Obama – 0

There was a day a long, long time ago when the Supreme Court of the United States didn’t get involved in politics.  Well, of course they’ve always been involved in politics per se – they ARE politics.  But not politicking.  Heck, way back when, the Justices didn’t even speak in public.

Now they’re being called out on national television by the President when he doesn’t agree with a ruling they make and a Justice responds real time during the State of the Union speech.  And this last Tuesday, Justice Thomas (one of my favorite robed figures) shot back at the President in a speech at a Florida law school.

His response was as powerful as it was simple and clear.  Corporations’ free speech is limited when they are restricted from contributing to a political candidate or issue. 

“If 10 of you got together and decided to speak, just as a group, you’d say you have First Amendment rights to speak and the First Amendment right of association,” he said. “If you all then formed a partnership to speak, you’d say we still have that First Amendment right to speak and of association.”

“But what if you put yourself in a corporate form?” Justice Thomas asked, suggesting that the answer must be the same.

Justice Thomas also noted (as did a brilliant blogger back last Saturday, 1/30) that it’s typically this President’s Party that is against free speech and historically discriminatory.  He noted that the original movement to limit corporations from contributing to political parties, candidates and issues stemmed from Senator Benjamin Tillman of South Carolina, who, per Justice Thomas, “was concerned that the corporations, Republican corporations, were favorable toward blacks and he felt that there was a need to regulate them.”

If you’d like to read up on Senator Tillman, there’s a nice article in Wikipedia that reveals what a pig of a guy he was…  “Combative, vitriolic, and openly racist.” 

This is the type of idea that Obama wants to promote?  Limiting of free speech based on a racist principle… whose origins are designed to 1) regulate blacks and 2) help solidify the Democratic Party’s power at the cost of basic freedom and civil rights?  Again, I invite any of my Democrat friends to defend Obama’s thought process here!

I guess when you live and die by the power of charm, steered by the rudder of emotion and fueled by the engine of a corrupt media, you end up with a President and a Democratic Party who wants to destroy America – either by choice or ignorance.  I can only hope it’s of the latter.  Unfortunately for us the results are still the same.

On a side note, while Obama’s unprecedented calling out of the Supreme Court made the front page of almost every newspaper and online media outlet, Justice Thomas’ response was no where to be found on CNN, MSNBC, ABCNEWS or CBSNEW websites.  I found this story buried 13 articles deep into the US section of the NY Times online.

And the fun rolls on…

Gingrich in 2012?

Happy Day for all Republicans and Independent minded Americans out there. 

Are you like me?  Disgusted and frustrated with 30 years of wimpy, tail-between-the-legs conservative politicians – relying only on entertainers like Rush and O’Reilly to carry the ideals of Reagan onward?  You want a leader chocked full of progressive ideas, yet still grounded in morality and principle?

There may be a sliver of hope.  Newt Gingrich said yesterday that he’s considering running for President in 2012.  This may work people.  He’s been relatively under the radar for the last decade, out of the limelight writing books and giving speeches here and there… long enough to be out of the main stream media’s line of fire and long enough to have his red-hot polarizing image to cool down a bit. 

It’s still a long shot that he’ll decide to run.  But for the nation’s sake, let’s hope he can get this done.

A Reformed Cat Hater finally speaks out

I’m a dog person.  It’s just in my DNA.  Dogs rule and cats drool. 

When I was old enough to handle it, my parents shared with me the awful truth that there were people out there in the world who were cat people… strange, other-worldly beings that actually cared for these heartless, cold monsters who would eat you alive if the Fancy Feast supply ran low.

This concept was beyond comprehension for me.  Even in adulthood, I struggled with this notion of good and evil.  Cat people were the feline-Bizarro to the canine-Superman of my world.  Crazy-eyed, disheveled, hermit-liked beings that preferred the company of hundreds of cats over that of another human.  It was just too hard to understand.

And then I met my wife.  She had a cat.  And to this day, I’m still not 100% sure it wasn’t the Anti-Christ.  The cat’s name was Natasha and if she wasn’t pure evil, she was close. 

For the sake of my wife, I tried to make nice with Natasha.  I’d sit down, slowly extending my hand to her, secretly praying I wouldn’t yank back a bloodied, mangled stub.  She’d look up at me and… as God is my witness, peer right through me.  All I could see in those slit eyes was a hideously deformed thing that passed for her soul.  She’d leap up and arch her back, promulgating all types of obnoxious, spiteful hisses before goose-stepping away in what my wife tried to explain as “heat.”  (Though I always secretly suspected Natasha to be a member of the Nazi party.)

Over the years, Natasha and I had our battles, with no clear victor in the war.  We finally settled into an uneasy détente – with the bloodshed limited to an occasional cat-pee salvo into my shoe, to which I’d retaliate with an appropriately measured response by banishing her into the night rain.

She was always doing something that made me suspicious of her.  I’d wake up in the morning and, walking through the house, I’d expect her to jump out and attack me like Cato attacking Clouseau.  I don’t think it’s a coincidence that the character Cato has the word “cat” in it.  Invariably, just when my suspicions subsided, she’d bolt out at me, stopping my heart for a few seconds and then darting off while I tried to recover. 

As bad as our relationship was, I have to begrudgingly admit, she was fairly intelligent in her evilness.  While I can’t confirm this, I could have sworn that she once wrote, “Leave out a fish offering or the dog gets it tonight,” sprawled in kitty litter on the floor. 

Later in life, Natasha continued her campaign of hatred against all living beings except my wife.  The dog would chase her during the day, and she’d use my expensive leather recliner as her personal claw sharpener at night.  We’d run out of her favorite wet food and she’d howl incessantly from midnight to four in the morning.  We’d buy a new pet bird for our children and she’d ambush and slaughter the parakeet in front of our kids.  In short, she was evil.

Now I’m not saying that my dogs have been saints over the years.  I’ve owned dogs that live on the cutting edge of stupidity.  And I will have to work at least 10 years longer to replace all the household items my dogs have destroyed.  But Natasha topped them all.

I am quite familiar with all of the “dog versus cat” arguments.  Dogs are loyal and cats are independent.  Dogs are more useful and cats are smarter.  The list goes on and on.  As matter of fact, there is a great article that discussed the scientific studies underway to settle the dog versus cat argument once and for all.  I won’t ruin the results for you but suffice it to say… “woof.”

After Natasha passed at 18 years old, I experienced a strange void.  It’s hard to explain but the balance of good and evil was tipped.  Our family equilibrium was off.  So when a friend of the family mentioned to my wife that she had a free kitten she was trying to find a home for, my wife jumped at it and brought him home. 

We’d never had a boy cat.  I didn’t know what to expect.  My years of misery during the Dark Ages of Natasha had me extremely on edge about this newcomer.  But when he arrived, there wasn’t a goose-stepping, howling, buzz saw coming at me.  Just a sweet, gentle little meow and this odd, soft, sputtering sound like a muffled 1960’s Volkswagen Beetle coming down the street.  My wife said it was this thing called a “purr.”  What a strange animal this cat was!

We named him Jack-Jack-Attack …probably a subconscious nod to what we figured would eventually be coming my way.  And… things were fine.  The era of Jack the Jovial finally ended the nightmarish reign of Tasha the Terrible.  He showed himself to be a pleasant, amiable and funny little guy who has panache for purging our house of mice and for snuggling with the children. 

While Natasha treated us as her own personal pin cushions, Jack treats us as …well, family.

Life comes full circle.  I’ve changed my tune now on cats and I consider myself a reformed cat-hater.  So much so, that I even purchased another cat at the pound… a fluffy, sweet older calico that yips rather than meows; and who loves to sleep with me and purrs all day long.  There’s hope for us all.

Edwards sex tape

Democrat John Edwards had an affair.  Strip away the moral issues around that for a second and let’s examine the affair on a professional basis.

It’s a bad thing of course.  I understand that.  But what boggles my mind is the sheer, overwhelmingly gasping stupidity of Edwards.  It’s not as if he’s a night shift stocker at Wal-Mart.  The more public persona you have, the more likely you are to get caught in something like this.  And what’s more public than running for President? 

Now wrap your head around this… Edwards has an affair but he goes one step further and…

Makes a sex tape?!?!

Really???

I just don’t get politicians who do this.  I’ll never be famous nor a politician so I am able to remain blissfully ignorant to the breathtaking, mind-numbing stupidity of his experience, but man!  An affair is like playing with fire and making a sex tape is like trying to sooth your burns with gasoline.

This is not the “W” we were hoping for…

Uncle Sam had some good news and bad news for the nation this week.

Good news is job growth has picked up a bit and the GDP showed unexpected rise at 5.7% over the fourth quarter.  That’s awesome.

The bad news is many are predicting a slow recovery and most likely another downturn before we see full revitalization – like a big “W” shaped recovery.  Why?  Take a look back thirty years for the answer…

The last time we had double digit unemployment was 1981.  Reagan had just been sworn in and ended the era of ineptitude also known as the Carter administration.  While Carter dithered with government intervention to control the recession of the late 70s using price controls, heavy regulations and windfall profit taxes, Reagan’s approach was to aggressively cut taxes and deregulate over-regulated industries like energy, banking and telecom.  The result?  America’s unemployment levels rebounded to their previous peak within two years and the financial boom of the 80s was born.  And again in the early 2000s, when the dot com bust ended, our unemployment levels peaked back up in two years.  Bush didn’t tax our way back to normalcy.

This time around, our government’s response is the polar opposite – higher taxes and massive regulation not seen since FDR.  Modern Democrats point to the New Deal as the successful model for the solution to recessions.  The problem is, FDR’s regulation and government intervention didn’t break us out of our economic downturn.  World War II did.

The simple fact of the matter is that we are a consumer driven economy.  And when we buy stuff, jobs are created.  Yet we can’t buy stuff without money.  And it’s tough to have money if you don’t have a job… unless you have a three color printing press. 

So this job creation problem is the lynchpin to our recovery.  And Obama’s stimulus simply can’t solve the issues because his stimulus doesn’t create jobs.  It does provide a slight injection of cash by easing the ability of suffering banks to lend money.  But that’s it.  And then how are those loans paid downstream if folks don’t get a job?   Uh oh.

Democrat’s policies and political platform circle around the idea that the government should spend money with the hopes it will jump start our consumer-driven market.  But this is money that must eventually be paid back.  How will the government get this money?  Taxes.  Despite 1 out of every 4 American’s believing that the government has it’s own money (a fact that still makes me want to throw up through my eyeballs), we are the lender of choice for Uncle Sam, and our note is about to come due.

So what can we do to get out of this mess?  Practice some political prudence.  On November 2, 2010 the nation will have to wake up and elect Republicans who believe in cutting taxes and deregulation.  Small and large businesses alike will have more money to expand, creating the need to hire workers.  More people will become employed and will begin to purchase more products and services, driving more business expansion and so on and so on.  Our national debt will be reduced because more people will be employed and thus, paying taxes.   Duh.

Obama’s Bumper Sticker State of the Union Speech

All the political aficionados are up in arms about the President calling out the Supreme Court during his State of the Union speech on Wednesday.  Personally, I didn’t watch it.  I’m keeping to my New Years Resolution to not waste time.  I was busy getting the armpit stains out of my undershirts.  I did catch the highlights on ESPN… and wow!  Some nice jabs back and forth between Obama and Alito. 

On a side note: for the children of America, can we please elect the Republican’s back into the majority of Congress?  America can’t take looking at Pelosi any longer.  Her botoxed face was burned into my TV after I turned it off and her eyes followed me around the room like one of those creepy paintings in a haunted house.  But I did love her as Miss Havisham in Great Expectations. 

I’ve been reading a lot of commentary from the right talking about the sanctity of the Supreme Court and how the President shouldn’t be criticizing the Court on national television, etc.  Whatever.  I don’t have any issues with a President who calls it like he sees it.  He may be wrong, but he’s obviously passionate enough about this to tell the world.  Problem is, a passionate mistake is nonetheless a mistake.

Obama said, “Last week, the Supreme Court reversed a century of law to open the floodgates for special interests – including foreign corporations – to spend without limit in our elections.  Well I don’t think American elections should be bankrolled by America’s most powerful interests, or worse, by foreign entities.  They should be decided by the American people, and that’s why I’m urging Democrats and Republicans to pass a bill that helps right this wrong.”

Now I’m no genius, as I’ve said many times before, and this statement confuses me.  The Court’s ruling said that a corporations’ free speech is limited when the amount of money they can contribute to a campaign or political parties are restricted.   So… is the President against free speech?   Wait!   Oh!   I get it!   Businesses usually contribute to Republicans because Republicans believe in the free market!   That makes sense. 

But it’s not even really true.  If you want to take your critical thinking skills out for a mental jog, read this awesome blog on the facts and interesting omissions of Obama’s speech.

Now try this one on for size.  “…They [elections] should be decided by the American people…” 

I can’t wrap my brain around this one.  I mean, what’s one of the largest voting blocks for the Democrats?  Illegal aliens!   I’m calling out B.O. here.  That’s just downright hypocrisy.  Elections decided by the American people… pul-lease.  The Democrats haven’t believed in elections being decided by the American people since the dawn of time.  Heck, Lyndon Johnson’s campaign registered dead folks from the cemetery to vote for him – several times in the same election.  And as recently as 2000, Al Gore went to court to block soliders and sailors absentee votes from being counted.  Dems don’t want Americans deciding elections.  They know they’d lose every time! 

This State of the Union was a long, drawn out bumper sticker presentation – nothing more, nothing less.  Short on ideas and long on rhetoric.  Someone call Newt Gingrich please.  We need to turn this thing around, and fast.

Air America – Rest in Pieces

This morning I was reading the Huffington Post blogs (yes, I do read the Huffington Post… you need to know what the other side is up to and it’s great for a long and deep belly laugh).   I came across one of my favorite topics recently… the end of Air America.

The author of the blog, Nathan Harden, bemoaned the death of “the great liberal hope in talk radio” as if this was a shocker.  My dog could have told you from the high pitched squeals coming from Air America that it couldn’t last.  Listening to Janeane Garofalo, Rachel Maddow and Al Franken trying to keep up with Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, and Bill O’Reilly was like watching a donkey race Secretariat.

Harden goes on to give two excuses why Air America couldn’t keep up. First, he said the average age of those who listen to talk radio are older and youngins just don’t listen to talk radio…they like that devil music coming out of the Victrola.  I can buy that.  Of course, what he doesn’t say is that 9 times out of 10, the older you get, the wiser you get… and that’s why there are more Republicans the higher up the age chart you go… but that’s another blog.

Second, there’s that massive (sarcasm) liberal monopoly, NPR, competing for the minds of Air America listeners… well, ears at least.  Harden says that NPR is such a juggernaut that Stuart Smalley couldn’t compete.  Yes, it’s tough to compete against “A Prairie Home Companion” and NPR radio juggernauts like Steve Inskeep and Terry Gross.  Doesn’t NPR also suckle off the government breast?  Let me get this straight… NPR is the equivalent of the welfare recepient of talk radio and that’s the beast that helped slay Al Franken and Al Gore? 

Or could it be that the product just stunk?

Harden does admit, “Talk radio is a tough gig. You have to sustain three hours of conversation, five days a week, in defense of your ideas. Conservatives like to say that liberals aren’t successful on the radio simply because their ideas don’t hold up.”  He could be onto something there.

The reason why talk radio is conservative (and successful) is because all other media (except FoxNews) is overwhelmingly liberal.  It’s the only place where Americans can hear another point of view.  Rush, Hannity, O’Reilly, Hewitt, Levin, Beck, Ingraham, Prager, Medved and others like them are successful because of the simple law of supply and demand.  There’s just no demand for liberal philosophy outside of the Washington beltway.  That’s also why FoxNews regularly massacres all other TV news stations.  Air America found out that, in order to survive in the real marketplace, you need to have a product that folks will buy. 

Harden finishes his article saying, “So, my liberal friends, dry your eyes. You lost Air America. You lost the safest Democratic Senate seat in the nation. But all is not lost. You still have the young on your side. And you still have Terry Gross.” 

Wonder if he knows that the youth in this country eventually smarten up?

They can keep Terry Gross though.

Joanie may love Chachi, but Democrats want him dead

Often I’ll tell my liberal friends they’re nuts.  And then they usually threaten to cut off my … um, feet.  I should know by now not to engage my fellow countrymen with leftist persuasions but every now and then I just get in the mood to stretch my political legs a bit.

So it didn’t surprise me when I read that Scott Baio (aka Chachi from Happy Days) has received hundreds of death threats from liberals all over the country for making a joke about Michelle Obama on Twitter. 

Chachi tweeted the caption, “Wow  He wakes up to this every morning” under this photo…

Baio received notes calling him a racist and telling him to kill himself.  Nice. 

And calling him a racist?  What’s racist about that joke?  There’s no reference to the color of her skin…only an opinion that she’s not very attractive.  Of course, if you don’t think that Michelle Obama is attractive then you’re naturally a racist – it helps to draw that conclusion if you’re a liberal and the offender is a Republican.

Question to my liberal friends… would it have been ok if Baio had posted the same tweet 15 years ago with this picture?

One of the great mysteries of life is why libs are so freaking uptight.  Everything is personal to them.  Baio makes a joke (albeit a mediocre joke) about the President’s wife and they take it as a personal affront and call for the guy’s head?  Where have I heard that before? 

Oh yeah.  The Muslim extremists calling for killing of innocents who bought a newspaper with a cartoon of Mohammed in it. 

And there’s the tie in.  To a liberal, politics is their religion.  You offend their god and you will suffer the left wing jihad.  You can’t have a different point of view, otherwise you’re an infidel, an ignorant bigot, racist bastard who should just kill yourself.

What kills me (pun intended) is that the liberal mantra is that they’re the “tolerant” party.  When you have the power of most of the media behind you, you can get the country to forget that it was a leftist Supreme Court that passed Dred Scot; that the Democrats were for slavery; that it was the Dems in Congress who fought for segregation and against civil rights.  Note to the world – there’s very little tolerance on the left.

But history and facts don’t matter when you’re fueled by only emotion and hatred.  Just ask Scott Baio.