HOF Finalists. This years Hall of Fame finalists were announced Tuesday. Dan Marino is a sure thing. Steve Young will probably be, but I wouldn't vote for him this year. You can't have two QBs go in in one year -- there should be a rule that says that.

So who else? Art Monk (940 receptions / 12,721 receiving yards) should be there, but probably won't. Yet if Monk doesn't make it, how can Michael Irvin (750 rec./ 11,900 yds) get in? (Of course, both lapped Lynn Swann [336/5,462], but that's another story.) [stats here] .

Yeah, but what about the real players, the offensive linemen? Guards Bob Kuechenberg and Russ Grimm. I'd put 'em both in. They'd both get my vote -- the one-at-a-time rule only applies to QBs, not linemen. If I had to pick Kuech this year, Grimm next.

On defense, I'd give the nod to first year nominee Derrick Thomas who was awesome at linebacker. The other linebacker nominated, Harry Carson, was very, very good, but not great enough to tip the scale. He had the advantage of playing for a great defense, a winning team.

This is something that Cardinal DB Roger Wehrli (although he did play beside the great number 8 for a few of those years) didn't have. I would pass over Wehrli in favor of Lester Hayes, but Lester didn't make the list this year.

Then there are three defensive ends: Richard Dent, Claude Humphrey, and L.C. Greenwood. All very, very good, however, none gets my vote this year. Dent should probably make it some year; he has the same advantage Carson had, playing for a great defense, yet it could be argued that he was the one who really made it great. L.C. Greenwood played on what was probably the greatest defense of all time -- trade places with Humphrey on Atlanta and see how he would do.

My votes:
1. Marino
2. Monk
3. Derrick Thomas
4. Kuechenberg

if you give me more, it would be:
5. Grimm
6. Lester Hayes (again, not on list)
7. Dent

Modern History Lesson. Mark Byron labels himself a "Bapticostal." What would a holy-roller Episcopalian call himself? Fr. Dennis Bennett, a major tool in the hands of the Holy Spirit (regarding the Episcopal Church) called them "Charismatics." Yesterday, the Washington Times had a good introduction to one of the truly influential books on the charismatic renewal: John Sherrill's They Speak With Other Tongues, still in print after 40 years. Fr. Bennett's book Nine O'Clock in the Morning is also still in print.

Sherrill's book (along with the Cross and the Switchblade) had a huge impact on the Catholic Church beginning in the 1960's at the famous "Duquesne weekend." This led, among other things to the founding of the Word of God community in Ann Arbor, MI. Pope John Paul II has embraced the Charismatic renewal saying,

The emergence of the Renewal following the Second Vatican Council was a
particular gift of the Holy Spirit to the Church. It was a sign of a desire on
the part of many Catholics to live more fully their Baptismal dignity and
vocation as adopted sons and daughters of the Father, to know the redeeming
power of Christ our Saviour in a more intense experience of individual and group
prayer, and to follow the teaching of the Scriptures by reading them in the
light of the same Spirit who inspired their writing. Certainly one of the most
important results of this spiritual reawakening has been that increased thirst
for holiness which is seen in the lives of individuals and in the whole Church

If you're interested in more on the subject, I recommend Richard Quebedeaux's The New Charismatics (1976).

R.I.P. My daughter came to me late this afternoon and wanted to know if radio stations ever just went off the air permanently. I asked why and she said she'd turned in 99.1 and it now seemed to be playing Spanish music. For the past few weeks we've have a running battle going over 99.1 because every time she'd want to listen to it in the car, it was playing rap or hip-hop -- and not good rap or hip hop. So I said good riddance. She wanted to call the station but couldn't find the listing in the phone book. I asked what were the call letters and she said "WHFS." It was then that it hit me.

WHFS used to be a great station, but in the past few years it seemed to go downhill and I hadn't realized it was the same one as 99.1 (I know it doesn't make sense but the station and I must've drifted apart without realizing it). Anyway, she looked it up, called and didn't get an answer -- but we soon figured out that it was indeed gone -- without warning. Now it's "El Zol."

The WaPo had a nice time of rememberance on-line today -- here's the transcript.

Like I said, 'HFS had already disappeared years ago, today just confirms the reality. Still, it will be missed.

More here.

Tireblogging. Since tireblogging seems to be all the rage, I should relate my tire story. Last night, I got a call from my wife who hit a pothole and blew out the tire. I grabbed my gloves and drove out to meet her and change the tire. It's a Toyota Sienna, so the spare and tools were difficult to find (it turns out you lift one of the seats and loosen a nut to lower the spare from underneath the van). Plus it was dark and wet. But we took care of things and she took the girls home in my car, while I took her van to the shop for repair. On the way, I realized that I had taken a lot longer than I had planned and there was no way to get Joe to wrestling practice last night, so I told him that we were going to miss it.

"We had wrestling tonight?" he asked.

"Well, yeah, it's Thursday night."

"But it's Epiphany -- they have wrestling on Epiphany?"

Yeah, wrestlers don't seem to take many breaks, do they?

After leaving the van at the shop (which means this isn't really tireblogging), my wife came and picked us up. At home, she and the kids all had the rosca, which our neighbor had dropped off. In our house, we never take down the tree until after El Dia de los Reyes.

I'm hoping the influx of Mexican culture will help to give the Epiphany and the twelve feast days of Christmas greater prominence.

Best Movies - 2004. Realizing I haven't seen all the movies released in 2004 -- indeed, who has?* -- here is my list of favorite movies from the past year:

1. The Incredibles. I'm almost ashamed to admit that this beat out a fabulous movie which would've been number one in almost any other year, but it is everything a movie should be.
2. The Passion of the Christ. I know, I know, I'm a heretic to not rank this as number one, but it is so emotionally draining, that it is not a movie I want to see again and again. If this were Oscar voting or something I would rank this as number one, but I've got to give the prime spot here to the Incredibles. However, after these two, there is a steep drop off.
   
3. Peter Pan. Okay, this was released in 2003, but at the end of the year and I didn't see it until this year.
4. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. Still a big drop off from Peter Pan. I might rank this as higher than Pan, but I've read the book and I know how much better the book was than the movie.
5. The Notebook. Sweet movie -- James Garner was terrific.
6. Miracle. Well, really a great story.
   
7. Umm... that's it. I did see other movies, Butterfly Effect, Spiderman II, I Robot, Troy, etc. but none of them qualifies, IMHO, for a best of 2004 list.

* Apparently, no one has. Here's an article about a flick that only showed in Grand Rapids, MI last year, despite having heavy-weight actors Joe Mantegna and Anne Archer. The film is called Uncle Nino. The good news is that its being picked up for national distribution.

Oh, and when reading the article overlook the mistake calling Spidy 2, Superman II.

Theodicy - Tsunami Edition. The problem of evil which presents a question so difficult it gets it's own word - theodicy - has come to the fore with the terrible tragedy in the Indian Ocean region. Arts and Letters poses the issue (borrowing from MacLeish): "If God is God, he's not good. If God is good, he's not God. You can't have it both ways, especially not after the Indian Ocean catastrophe." Is this right?

Interestingly, one of the best responses is in a very short essay published in the Journal of Mammon by David B. Hart who observes: "When confronted by the sheer savage immensity of worldly suffering--when we see the entire littoral rim of the Indian Ocean strewn with tens of thousands of corpses, a third of them children's--no Christian is licensed to utter odious banalities about God's inscrutable counsels or blasphemous suggestions that all this mysteriously serves God's good ends."

On the other hand, Jeff Jacoby disagrees, while arguing for God's sovereignty, says we can be angry with Him: "To wrestle with God is not to abandon Him. To protest against the unearned suffering He inflicts or permits is not to reject His message -- quite the opposite."

That little phrase "or permits" is where I think Hart, Jacoby and I agree. And I appreciate Jacoby's message because this is one of many messages of the Scriptures: God is a loving God who does allow his creation to wrestle with Him.

Some of the other essays responding to the Tsunami and the problem of God: Michael Novak, Rowan Williams, Rabbi Daniel Lapin, Ron Rosenbaum, Edward Spence, and others. As always, GetReligion has a great summary of the writings on the religion pages (with links).

The Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, notes, in the opening of his essay: "...but what most painfully reaches our feelings is the individual face of loss and terror." Alex Beam reflects on this issue, as memorably summed up by Josef Stalin: "A single death is a tragedy; a million deaths is a statistic." While that may be a reflection of our human limitation on grasping a million tragedies, I believe that the Lord does feel each and every tragedy. And he weeps.


Theodicy on the Web:

• Catholic Encyclopaedia
• Wikipedia
• Gottfried W. Leibnitz

More

I debated putting in a link to Simon Winchester's article on the pagan response, "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry Gaia" but didn't because my link took me to the archives (and a 50 word abstract). However, I found another link that takes you to the entire article.

In addition, since I started writing this note, GetReligion now has additional entries on the theodicy question.

Welcome to Canada, eh?

Top 10 -- College Football. Without a doubt, it's SoCal -- I went to bed at halftime (like most of the eastern seaboard, I'm sure) with USC ahead 38-10. I see the final score was 55-19. Sorry Auburn, but the Trojans made their case, you're number 2. By bearly beating Va.Tech, you're lucky to be there and not number 3, which I'll give to Utah.

The rest of the top 10, in my opinion, is
4. Oklahoma
5. Iowa
6. Texas
7. Virginia Tech
8. Georgia
9. Louisville
10. Cal.

Here's the AP rankings and here are the ESPN/USAT polls.

Triple Whammy. Sorry for not being around for the past few weeks -- I got hit by a triple whammy: sick (with a lingering bad cold/sore throat -- into my third week with it), work, and a personal thing that has me not wanting to chat. Basically, my sister's husband has decided he's not happy (or in love), so he's pulling an Amy Grant and moving out. I guess he thinks by devastating my sister and their three kids, he will find happiness.

Pray for her, for the kids, and for her husband. Abandonment of one's responsibilities does not lead to happiness.

USAToday is making a mistake. Walter Shapiro's nine year run ends today -- he will be missed, but I know a smart editor will pick him up. As I noted back in 2002, he wrote one of the best columns explaining the partisan divisions in the USA in this May 1, 1998 column.

In today's final column Mr. Shapiro notes

I also cherish the dialogue, which admittedly sometimes became fractious, that I had with readers. From the moment that I published my e-mail address at the bottom of this column, my goal had been to respond to every reader comment with a personal message. As is often the case with such high-minded intentions, I sometimes became overwhelmed by the volume of e-mail that I received.

I can affirm, from personal experience, that this was the case -- I was (pleasantly) surprised to see his reply to a message I sent once.

He will be missed, but hopefully for not long.

Sgt. Rafael Peralta, USMC. This is from the Marine Corps website, in it's entirety:

FALLUJAH, Iraq (Dec. 02, 2004) -- "You’re still here, don’t forget that. Tell your kids, your grandkids, what Sgt. Peralta did for you and the other Marines today."

As a combat correspondent, I was attached to Company A, 1st Battalion, 3rd Marine Regiment for Operation Al Fajr, to make sure the stories of heroic actions and the daily realities of battle were told.

On this day, I found myself without my camera. With the batteries dead, I decided to leave the camera behind and live up to the ethos "every Marine a rifleman," by volunteering to help clear the fateful buildings that lined streets.

After seven days of intense fighting in Fallujah, the Marines of 1/3 embraced a new day with a faceless enemy.

We awoke November 15, 2004, around day-break in the abandoned, battle-worn house we had made our home for the night. We shaved, ate breakfast from a Meal, Ready-to-Eat pouch and waited for the word to move.

The word came, and we started what we had done since the operation began – clear the city of insurgents, building by building.

As an attachment to the unit, I had been placed as the third man in a six-man group, or what Marines call a 'stack.' Two stacks of Marines were used to clear a house. Moving quickly from the third house to the fourth, our order in the stack changed. I found Sgt. Rafael Peralta in my spot, so I fell in behind him as we moved toward the house.

A Mexican-American who lived in San Diego, Peralta earned his citizenship after he joined the Marine Corps. He was a platoon scout, which meant he could have stayed back in safety while the squads of 1st Platoon went into the danger filled streets, but he was constantly asking to help out by giving them an extra Marine. I learned by speaking with him and other Marines the night before that he frequently put his safety, reputation and career on the line for the needs and morale of the junior Marines around him.

When we reached the fourth house, we breached the gate and swiftly approached the building. The first Marine in the stack kicked in the front door, revealing a locked door to their front and another at the right.

Kicking in the doors simultaneously, one stack filed swiftly into the room to the front as the other group of Marines darted off to the right.

"Clear!" screamed the Marines in one of the rooms followed only seconds later by another shout of "clear!" from the second room. One word told us all we wanted to know about the rooms: there was no one in there to shoot at us.

We found that the two rooms were adjoined and we had another closed door in front of us. We spread ourselves throughout the rooms to avoid a cluster going through the next door.

Two Marines stacked to the left of the door as Peralta, rifle in hand, tested the handle. I watched from the middle, slightly off to the right of the room as the handle turned with ease.

Ready to rush into the rear part of the house, Peralta threw open the door.

‘POP! POP! POP!’ Multiple bursts of cap-gun-like sounding AK-47 fire rang throughout the house.

Three insurgents with AK-47s were waiting for us behind the door.

Peralta was hit several times in his upper torso and face at point-blank range by the fully-automatic 7.62mm weapons employed by three terrorists.

Mortally wounded, he jumped into the already cleared, adjoining room, giving the rest of us a clear line of fire through the doorway to the rear of the house.

We opened fire, adding the bangs of M-16A2 service rifles, and the deafening, rolling cracks of a Squad Automatic Weapon, or “SAW,” to the already nerve-racking sound of the AKs. One Marine was shot through the forearm and continued to fire at the enemy.

I fired until Marines closer to the door began to maneuver into better firing positions, blocking my line of fire. Not being an infantryman, I watched to see what those with more extensive training were doing.

I saw four Marines firing from the adjoining room when a yellow, foreign-made, oval-shaped grenade bounced into the room, rolling to a stop close to Peralta’s nearly lifeless body.

In an act living up to the heroes of the Marine Corps’ past, such as Medal of Honor recipients Pfc. James LaBelle and Lance Cpl. Richard Anderson, Peralta – in his last fleeting moments of consciousness- reached out and pulled the grenade into his body. LaBelle fought on Iwo Jima and Anderson in Vietnam, both died saving their fellow Marines by smothering the blast of enemy grenades.

Peralta did the same for all of us in those rooms.

I watched in fear and horror as the other four Marines scrambled to the corners of the room and the majority of the blast was absorbed by Peralta’s now lifeless body. His selflessness left four other Marines with only minor injuries from smaller fragments of the grenade.

During the fight, a fire was sparked in the rear of the house. The flames were becoming visible through the door.

The decision was made by the Marine in charge of the squad to evacuate the injured Marines from the house, regroup and return to finish the fight and retrieve Peralta’s body.

We quickly ran for shelter, three or four houses up the street, in a house that had already been cleared and was occupied by the squad’s platoon.

As Staff Sgt. Jacob M. Murdock took a count of the Marines coming back, he found it to be one man short, and demanded to know the whereabouts of the missing Marine.

"Sergeant Peralta! He’s dead! He’s f------ dead," screamed Lance Cpl. Adam Morrison, a machine gunner with the squad, as he came around a corner. "He’s still in there. We have to go back."

The ingrained code Marines have of never leaving a man behind drove the next few moments. Within seconds, we headed back to the house unknown what we may encounter yet ready for another round.

I don't remember walking back down the street or through the gate in front of the house, but walking through the door the second time, I prayed that we wouldn't lose another brother.

We entered the house and met no resistance. We couldn't clear the rest of the house because the fire had grown immensely and the danger of the enemy’s weapons cache exploding in the house was increasing by the second.

Most of us provided security while Peralta's body was removed from the house.

We carried him back to our rally point and upon returning were told that the other Marines who went to support us encountered and killed the three insurgents from inside the house.

Later that night, while I was thinking about the day’s somber events, Cpl. Richard A. Mason, an infantryman with Headquarters Platoon, who, in the short time I was with the company became a good friend, told me, "You’re still here, don’t forget that. Tell your kids, your grandkids, what Sgt. Peralta did for you and the other Marines today."

As a combat correspondent, this is not only my job, but an honor.

Throughout Operation Al Fajr, we were constantly being told that we were making history, but if the books never mention this battle in the future, I’m sure that the day and the sacrifice that was made, will never be forgotten by the Marines who were there.

Come as a Child. We went down to my parent's place in NC for Thanksgiving and had a wonderful time. My mother is really into sewing and embroidery -- she has these powerful machines that can embroider practically anything on cloth (even toilet paper, but that's another story). In the months prior to Christmas, she really gears up and sews all kinds of fabulous gifts for the family. She (and my Dad) also buy us gifts (as you see, they go all out); so she's always looking for an indication of what we'd like.

This year she sent out a request for wish lists from the family and added, if we didn't respond, we'd get embroidered underwear. She followed this up with several e-mails asking for our lists and then sent this e-mail out before Thanksgiving:

I have received Christmas wish lists from Ann, William and Debbie, the Gallahans, and Brian. For the rest of you this Tuesday I will be purchasing the underwear--maybe socks too! :-)

My wife told the kids about these messages, seeking to compile their wish lists for Grandma.

When we arrived at my Mom and Dad's, the two little kids went scurrying off with their bags, while Debbie and I were greeting my parents and sister (who arrived before us). Pretty soon, Emilie (age 3) and Joe (age 6) were tugging at my Mom. She leaned over to see what they wanted. They each handed her a stack of clean underwear.

Mark 10:13-16

He's Back. Chris Muir's Day by Day is back.

Alexander the Bomb. Ollie Stone's new movie is getting terrible reviews -- "puerile" "uninspired, repetitious, tedious" "a 178-minute-long wall hanging" and "a bad movie of truly epic proportion." I like Stephen Hunter's review best:

[Stone's] Alexander, as expressed through the weepy histrionics of Colin Farrell, is more like a desperate housewife than a soldier. He's always crying, his voice trembles, his eyes fill with tears. He's much less interesting, except as a basket case, than Richard Burton's Alexander of far less enlightened times -- 1956 -- in Robert Rossen's "Alexander the Great." Burton got Alexander's dissipation, but also his martial spirit; this was, after all, one of the great light-cavalry commanders of all time and a general who fought by leading his troops, sword in hand, not directing them from some safe hill. But in this one you think: Teri Hatcher could kick this twerp's butt.

* * *

Then there's Angelina Jolie as Mom. Really, words fail me here. But let's try: Give this young woman the hands-down award for best impression of Bela Lugosi while hampered by a 38-inch bust line. Though everyone else in the picture speaks in some variation of a British accent, poor Jolie has been given the Transylvanian throat-sucker's throaty, sibilant vowels, as well as a wardrobe of snakes.

The whole review is witty and a work of art which should be read. [More: Read Mr. Bradley's take as well.]

Nevertheless, Alexander, the subject, should not be written off, even if Stone's flick is.

Stephen Pressfield has just released a novel of Alexander, The Virtues of War. Based on my read of one his prior novels, Gates of Fire, a novel about the stand at Thermopylae, I have moved this to the top of my reading list. In Gates of Fire, Pressfield not only tells the story of the stand, but he conveys a sense of the philosophy, the religion, and the social structure of the men and women of that period of time. It also makes the USMC's reading list.

Here's an excerpt from an interview with Pressfield on Alexander:

But for me, Alexander's defining preoccupation wasn't sex or power or subjecting other peoples to his will (as I've read in other books, and which are all legitimate approaches.)

I believe his life was about heroic ambition, and I use the word "heroic" in the Homeric sense, that is, derived from an era of legend and from characters like Achilles and Heracles, who were semi-divine and who lived their lives according to a code that transcends what we would call justice or morality. Alexander did that too, but not in an era of legend, in a real historical era. He's accessible to us. He's "modern." But he lived, I believe, according to that ancient heroic code. In the loftiest terms, I think, he sought to achieve undying glory, to set a mark for the ages. But justice, or at least the concept of conventional justice, took a back seat to glory.

And this comport with my study of the ancient Greeks. Don't waste time with bad movies, read a good book instead.

Congratulations! According to this article, more women over 40 are having babies. Amy Welborn certainly backs this up. I'm excited for her (and she kind of hits home for me -- I'm the same age as her husband, she's the same age as my wife).

...and another "best album list" This one, best discs for 2004, from the publishers of Chritianity Today. My daughter disses it -- "too pop," but I think it's not a bad sample -- it's got Buddy Miller, for example. Pay attention to the one's that missed the cut. The blithering daughter likes Todd Hertz's pick.

Make it Sing. I love the new U2 disc. Great review here.* See also CT's review, here. The song that's currently on my repeat button, Yahweh:

Take these shoes
Click clacking down some dead end street
Take these shoes
And make them fit
Take this shirt
Polyester white trash made in nowhere
Take this shirt
And make it clean, clean
Take this soul
Stranded in some skin and bones
Take this soul
And make it sing

Yahweh, Yahweh
Always pain before a child is born
Yahweh, Yahweh
Still I'm waiting for the dawn

Take these hands
Teach them what to carry
Take these hands
Don't make a fist
Take this mouth
So quick to criticise
Take this mouth
Give it a kiss

Yahweh, Yahweh
Always pain before a child is born
Yahweh, Yahweh
Still I'm waiting for the dawn

Still waiting for the dawn, the sun is coming up
The sun is coming up on the ocean
This love is like a drop in the ocean
This love is like a drop in the ocean

Yahweh, Yahweh
Always pain before a child is born
Yahweh, tell me now
Why the dark before the dawn?

Take this city
A city should be shining on a hill
Take this city
If it be your will
What no man can own, no man can take
Take this heart
Take this heart
Take this heart
And make it break

______________
* This link take's you to Kenneth Tanner's review as republished by the National Review Online (I figure they've got bandwidth). In the alternative, you can read the original here.

Some Great Harry Potter Links. In honor of today's release of the Prisoner of Azkaban:

• The Official J.K. Rowling Website. (text only version).
• The Leaky Cauldron. (a HP-News blog).
• The Hogwarts Professor.
• Everything there is to know about Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.

If you haven't seen Azkaban and haven't read the book, I strongly recommend reading the book. While director Alfonso Cuarón did a fine job, he did leave out a number of key points and scenes -- my daughter and I figure it would've only taken another 2 to 5 minutes of movie time to have added these.

Cool (Adult) Toy: All I want for Christmas is the Oakley Thump.