Thursday, July 28, 2005

The New "Struggle Against Extremism"   Last night on The Daily Show, they were making fun of the Bush administration for rebranding the war on terror as the struggle against extremism, which does seem more of a marketing effort than a change in tack.  But they missed an obvious point.  Take the administration at face value.  If their concern is with extremism, well...we have an extremist government in the United States.  This administration is so extreme that when members of it commit treason (and for those keeping score, we now know at least three administration officials were doing so), the President appears to regard it as harmless hijinks.  The Bush administration's extremism inspires extremism throughout the world.  The most devastating blow we could strike against extremism is if the Bush administration were to resign en masse. If they are sincerely struggling against extremism, then it's time for them to resign. 7:27:24 PM    comment []

New Challenges   My head knows that politics is more important than professional basketball; my heart sometimes has its doubts.  My favorite coach, Larry Brown, has agreed to coach the New York Knicks, who play in basketball's Mecca, Madison Square Garden.  In doing so, Larry Brown has taken on the greatest challenge of his career.  Even when he agreed to coach the Clippers, whose owner is notoriously the most stingy in the NBA, he had more to work with; for one thing, a team that was way below the salary cap, and so one with some room to maneuver.  The New York Knicks he inherits are that deadliest of combinations:  undertalented, underachieving, and yet wildly overpaid.  The team is way above the salary cap, more so than any other team, and none of the players who he might want to trade are likely to find any other team that is willing to pay them their current salaries, let alone offer much for them. The nominal star of the team, Stephon Marbury, the point guard, has the dubious distinction of being traded three times, and in every instance having the trade improve his old team, and damage his new team.  It is unlikely a fourth team would risk a trade for him.  So Larry Brown will have to teach Marbury what he has long since forgotten...that a point guard is supposed to pass the ball every once in a while.  Problems abound; the hard-working Knicks are not terribly talented; and the talented Knicks are not terribly hard-working.  This is a challenge fit for the greatest basketball coach in history, except perhaps UCLA's John Wooden (who won ten college championships). And, I stayed quiet while Larry Brown was fired, but I am inspired to say William Davidson, the owner of the Detroit Pistons, is a jackass.  More than that, he is the jackass di tutti jackasses.  When Larry Brown wasn't sure he'd be healthy enough to coach next year, he flirted with taking a job as a general manager of another team.  This is only disloyalty if illness itself is fundamentally disloyal.  When he learned that he'd probably be able to coach again, he wanted to stay with the Pistons, who performed better than anyone would have dreamed during Brown's coaching tenure.  Davidson said no, being the first person to fire Brown, who has coached 7 NBA teams (New York will be his 8th), the University of Kansas, and an ABA team. Detroit replaced Brown with Flip Saunders, who, while he was here in Minnesota, wasn't able to get the Timberwolves past the first round of the playoffs seven consecutive years, despite having one of the top five players in the league, Kevin Garnett, on the squad the entire time.  I like Saunders, and I think he's a good coach (though he was awful last year).  But Larry Brown is the greatest.  He could sneeze a better coach than Flip. I think this is probably Brown's last coaching job.  The Knicks won 33 games last year.  I predict they'll make the playoffs this year.  I think no other coach could manage such a thing.  I also predict the Knicks will win 49 games next year, which would be a 16-game turnaround.  Detroit will probably win 50; an 8-game drop. 5:50:58 PM    comment []

Renouncing Violence   In a response to the changed international environment toward terrorism, the IRA has renounced violence.  It's too soon to be sure this will have lasting consequences, but it should be applauded anyway.  Maybe some day our domestic terrorist organization Operation Rescue will follow suit. 3:12:03 PM    comment []

CAFTA Passes   The new free trade agreement, which lacks nearly all the environmental and labor provisions of past trade agreements, passed the House 217-215.  The lack of the environmental and labor agreements means that the White House missed its only choice to make lives better and safer for the people of Central America.  Bravo, White House! And the White House signed off on billions and billions of dollars in new highway funding as bribes in order to get some of the recalcitrant Republican Congressmen to vote for the Central American Free Trade Agreement.  (Never mind fiscal responsibility.)  They were also offered fundraisers by the Vice President, which will help their campaign funds, but is unlikely to keep their agriculture workers for being thrown out of their jobs. 12:54:39 PM    comment []

Quote for the Day, 7/28/2005   "Why am I hanging around in the rain round here Trying to pick up a girl? Why are my eyes filling up with these lonely tears When there's girls all over the world? Is she lying on a tropical beach somewhere Underneath a tropical sun Pining away in a heat wave there Hoping that I won't be long? I should be lying on a sun-soaked beach with her Caressing her warm brown skin And then in a year or maybe not quite We'll be sharing the same next of kin. I'll go the whole wide world I'll go the whole wide world Just to find her. I'll go the whole wide world I'll go the whole wide world To find out where they hide her."   -Wreckless Eric, "Whole Wide World"   One of my favorite songs ever.  From the glory days of Stiff Records (which was before my time, but it was a great label for a while). 9:00:42 AM    comment []

A Forgotten Priority   You've probably forgotten that in 2003, the President spoke before the United Nations and heralded the problem of international child sex tourism.  He addressed this problem right after talking about the war in Iraq, and spent about half as much time discussing it as America's war in Iraq.  So we know it must be one of the highest American priorities.  Close to a million people a year are sold into the sex trade, to give you some idea of the problem's scope.  But not to worry, because by April of this year, two years after passing the law the President trumpeted to the UN, we have answered the President's call on this pressing national priority:  why, there have been 20 indictments! Problem solved. (If there was child sex tourism on Mars, there would have been a manned mission there by now.) 4:51:47 AM    comment []