Footie News

bbc photo gallery: David Beckham enjoys a traditional Maori greeting as he arrives in Wellington, New Zealand, with the LA Galaxy
I always have to ease back into blogging after an absence. Easy topics like soccer.

Damarcus Beasley tore ligaments in his knee last weekend and is probably done for the SPL season. Hope he can rehab himself back into shape again.

Legendary women's soccer coach Anson Dorrance's sexual harassment trial scheduled for April 2008.

The groups for Euro 2008 were drawn this morning: Group C (Italy, France, Holland, Romania) nominated as "Group of Death".

The Guardian (uk) has a gallery of photoshopped pics of what the England players will be doing during Euro 2008.

No surprise here: Kaka wins the Ballon D'Or, Europe's top player; Christiano Ronaldo a distant second.

Mia Hamm and Nomar Garciaparra and their 8-month old twins visit the University of Texas. Cute!

Mia Hamm, Nomar Garciaparra and their 8-month-old daughters, Grace and Ava, with Mack Brown [UT head coach]

Depleted Uranium the Scourge of Colonie, New York: And Iraq and Afghanistan

The Observer (uk): 'Safe' uranium that left a town contaminated
They were told depleted uranium was not hazardous. Now, 23 years after a US arms plant closed, workers and residents have cancer - and experts say their suffering shows the use of such weapons may be a war crime

[] In a paper to be published in the next issue of the scientific journal Science of the Total Environment, a team led by Professor Randall Parrish of Leicester University reports the results of a three-year study of Colonie, funded by Britain's Ministry of Defence.

Parrish's team has found that DU contamination, which remains radioactive for millions of years, is in effect impossible to eradicate, not only from the environment but also from the bodies of humans. Twenty-three years after production ceased they tested the urine of five former workers. All are still contaminated with DU. So were 20 per cent of people tested who had spent at least 10 years living near the factory when it was still working, including Ciarfello.

The small sample size precludes the drawing of statistical conclusions, the journal paper says. But to find DU at all after so long a period is 'significant, since no previous study has documented evidence of DU exposure more than 20 years prior... [this] indicates that the body burden of uranium must still be significant, whether retained in lungs, lymphatic system, kidneys or bone'. The team is now testing more individuals.

[]

[I]nside the body DU travels around the bloodstream, accumulating not only in the lungs but also in other soft tissues such as the brain and bone marrow. There, each mote becomes an alpha particle hotspot, bombarding its locality and damaging cell DNA. Research has shown that DU has the potential to cause a wide range of cancers, kidney and thyroid problems, birth defects and disorders of the immune system.

When DU 'penetrators' - armour-piercing shells that form the standard armament of some of Britain's and America's most commonly deployed military aircraft and vehicles - strike their targets, 10 per cent or more of the heavy DU metal burns at high temperatures, producing oxide particles very similar to those at Colonie.

TV footage shot in Baghdad in 2003 shows children playing in the remains of tanks coated with thick, black DU oxide, while there have long been claims that the DU shells that destroyed Saddam Hussein's tanks in the 1991 Gulf war were responsible for high rates of cancer in places such as Basra.

As a side note, the plant in Colonie was owned by National Lead (now reconstituted as NL Industries), the same execrable company that brought you lead poisoning and brain damage from lead paint. And the feds have insulated them from paying for the depleted uranium cleanup. The article doesn't say so, but I bet they were insulated from paying the claims of the injured, too. Corporate welfare at its finest.

In 1984, having bought the factory from NL for $10 in a deal that meant the firm was exempted from having to pay for its clean-up, the federal government began a massive decommissioning project, supervised by the Army Corps of Engineers.

The Bush Library

Image from Channel Surfing

Bush Library

There's a show on C-SPAN about presidential libraries. Here're what the draft plans for the George W. Bush Library now call for:

The Alberto Gonzales Room - Where you can't remember any of the exhibits.

The Hurricane Katrina Room - It's still under construction.

The Texas Air National Guard Room - Where you don't have to even show up.

The Walter Reed Hospital Room - Where they don't let you in.

The Guantanamo Bay Room - Where they don't let you out.

The Weapons of Mass Destruction Room - Nobody has been able to find it.

The War in Iraq Room - After you complete your first tour, they can force you to go back for your second and third and fourth and fifth tours.

The K-Street Project Gift Shop - Where you can buy an election, or, if no one cares, steal one.

The Men's Room - Where you could meet a Republican Senator (or two).

To be fair, the President has done some good things, and so the museum will have an electron microscope to help you locate them.

When asked, President Bush said that he didn't care so much about the individual exhibits as long as his museum was better than his father's.

hat tip to Middle Earth Journal

What's In a Name?

This New York Times article has a nifty graphic that lets you see how common your last name is. I'm in the 3000s; of every 100,000 people, 4 will have my last name.

Of course, the point of the article is that are a lot more people of Hispanic origin in this country, which is why all this anti-immigration hysteria by the party of the white males is going to redound against them some day. Unless the Democrats are stupid enough to take the advice of the Democratic consultants, Hispanics should be solidly in the Democratic column.

NYTimes: In U.S. Name Count, Garcias Are Catching Up With Joneses

Stop Crazier-Than-Cheney Rudy Giuliani: An Ongoing Series

Rudy Giuliani is batshit crazy, and he's leading the Republican field to be their 2008 candidate. This scares the shit out of me, because George W. Bush was dumb as a stump and he lead the Republican field in 2000 -- and look where that got us. So we'll be collecting the stories about the nutjob in the race, so our readers can get the word out: Rudy is crazy, and he must be stopped.

Glenn Greenwald, salon.com: Rudy Giuliani's messianic paranoia

[F]ar more significant [is] Giuliani's expressed view of what he thinks his mission will be as President. After proclaiming that "America has a special, even a divinely inspired role in the world," Giuliani vowed:

It was this nation that saved the world from the two great tyrannies of the 20th century, Nazism and Communism. It's this country that's going to save civilization from Islamic terrorism.

So Islamic Terrorism is no longer merely "a threat to our freedoms." It isn't even just an existential threat to our country any more. It's been upgraded rather severely in Giuliani's mind: it's now a threat to civilization itself. And Rudy Giuliani is running for President because he is "going to save civilization" -- his words -- from the Terrorists.

In one sense, this isn't surprising. After all, Giuliani -- with barely any attention from the press -- has assembled a foreign policy team led by someone who just wrote a book declaring "World War IV" and whose "prayers" consist of the deranged plea that bombs be dropped now on Iran.

Boston Herald: Jakes to rip Rudy over 9/11 legacy
Converge on Granite State

A group of New York City firefighters who lost brother jakes in the 9/11 attacks is taking its anti-Rudy Giuliani message to New Hampshire this weekend, blasting the Big Apple’s ex-mayor for “exploiting” the catastrophe for political gain.

The New York City Firefighters & Families will be spreading its “Rudy’s No Hero” campaign at firehouses and diners in the Granite State tomorrow and will host a town hall forum at Dartmouth College on Monday.

“We want them to know about him. He’s saying he’s the big 9/11 hero. It’s a big fabrication,” said New York Fire Deputy Lt. Jim Riches, whose firefighter son Jimmy died at Ground Zero. “He failed to prepare us for 9/11.”

[]

“America’s mayor” has been dogged by New York firefighters who claim he misrepresented his leadership before and after the attacks. Chief among the group’s complaints are that the New York Fire Department had the same malfunctioning radios on Sept. 11, 2001, that failed during the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.

“Why did they give radios to my son that didn’t work?” Riches asked. “I want him to answer all the questions and admit the mistakes that were made.”

The group also says Giuliani cut the recovery effort short, allowed human remains to be shipped to a Staten Island dump, falsely declared the Ground Zero air safe and didn’t provide rescue workers adequate respirators.

Here's a link to the video about how Giuliani's failure to get the FDNY new radios after the 1993 World Trade Center bombing contributed to 343 firemen dying on 9/11.

The Village Voice: Runnin' Scared
Crisis-Mode Rudy
Just wait till the rest of the country sees Giuliani unhinged


But what about Rudy's maxims? After all, a president has to have some moral touchstones for political action. Here's one of Rudy's: "Freedom is about authority. Freedom is about the willingness of every single human being to cede to lawful authority a great deal of discretion about what you do and how you do it."

Dexter Shoe Founder Dies

When I was in high school, we took summer vacations in Maine, and usually did some school shopping while we were there. Thus I was introduced to Dexter Shoes. They had outlets all over the state of Maine, and they were manufactured in Maine. And they were cheap!

Harold Alfond, who died yesterday, was the owner, and he sold out to Warren Buffet in 1993; less than 10 years later, those Maine factories were closed and the production offshored.

While all the obituaries pay tribute to his generosity, apparently he wasn't so generous towards the workers who made him rich:

BITTER FEELINGS

Alfond donations such as the one to MaineGeneral always bring favorable publicity — and rightfully so.

But whenever there's an announcement of his generosity, or another glowing television report, there is also grumbling from people who say they knew a different Harold Alfond.

There are many who knew him as a hard-driving boss. People who worked in his factories.

So if Alfond is now considered Maine's very own Santa Claus, there are a raft of former employees who still — years after they left shoe shops behind — consider him a real-life Scrooge.

"Sweat shops," said Royce Libby of Skowhegan, referring to the Alfond-led factories where he worked for 20 years. "That's the only way I can describe it."

Libby and others remember grueling days of hard labor that paid poorly and offered few benefits. They remember longtime workers fired for arriving a few minutes late. They remember unsympathetic foremen who pushed workers beyond their limits.

Workers remember Alfond as a boss who would visit the factories sporadically. Once there, he'd sometimes gather employees around, exhorting them to work harder in the face of foreign competition.

It's unclear if Alfond's factories were harder places to work than others during a time of heavy industry. It's equally unclear if it was Alfond's desire to compete and win that led him to push his workers.

But it is clear that hard feelings toward Alfond linger in some parts of central Maine.

Alice White, 63, of Clinton once worked in a Norrwock Shoe factory.

She was 17 and recently married when she went to work there.

"Was it a good place to work?" she said. "No. We worked like hell."

White jokes that everyone should have a chance to work in an Alfond-run factory, because the experience creates an appreciation for every other workplace.

But White was serious when she said many of Alfond's workers led tough lives. They worked hard to support their families. They did the best they could. And, White said, they could have used even a miniscule bit of the generosity Alfond now is so famous for.

I recall a pair of boat-like shoes with huge white soles (I think I'm wearing them in a couple of high school yearbook shots) fondly and with a little embarrassment -- they were really awful.

Anyway, that's why this obituary jumped out at me today.

Bangor Daily News: Maine philanthropist dies at 93; his generosity to live on

Boston Globe: Harold Alfond, gave generously for healthcare and sports

Kennebec Journal (2005): Historical Profile: Alfond’s pockets deep, more than likely open

Democratic Debate Highlight Reel

Couldn't stomach watching Wolf Blitzer bloviate or ask for a show of hands on irrelevant questions? Or watch Republican wife Campbell Brown (married to Republican aparatchick Dan Senor) questioning the Democrats last night? Here's a video of less than 10 minutes of the highlights. Hat tip to Talking Points Memo.



My summary: Hillary polished, Obama green, Edwards in attack mode, but crowd against attacking fellow Democrats (BOO! they said), Biden funny, "journalists" tried to play gotcha but failed.

And Dailykos is Junior High School Level....

And I pride myself on writing clearly. Maybe not so much.....

You can click on the link to test your favorite blog.

Sweeney Pleads To A Lesser Offense

Former U.S. Rep. John Sweeney, left, walks out of the Town of Clifton Park court with his lawyer, E. Stewart Jones, after pleading guilty to DWI Wednesday, Nov. 14. (Philip Kamrass / Times Union)

Amazingly, this multiple DWI loser only loses his license for 6 months (and he can petition to get it back once he attends drunk driver's school, what a joke), and only pays a $1,000 fine. You and I would have faced much harsher consequences, I imagine. The glasses are a nice touch. You always want to look serious after getting caught on the Northway drunk with a girl your children's age in your lap.

Albany Times-Union: Sweeney makes plea, apologies
Ex-congressman fined $1,000, has license suspended for driving drunk

CapitalNews9: Sweeney accepts plea deal (with video link)

Barroid Indicted

The Home Run Steroid King has been indicted by the feds in California, four perjury counts and one obstruction of justice, for lying in testimony to a federal grand jury in 2003. I can't decide. Is this a sad day for baseball, or a day of joy? I suppose it's both. Sad that baseball let itself get to this position by ignoring the rash of Mr.-Potato-Head home run hitters in the 1990s, and joy that the most brazen of the lot will be taken down. It's a little like Al Capone being jailed over back taxes, though; we really wish Barry could be charged with being a junkie, but we'll take the lying indictments.

And any excuse to post this picture:

"Ruth did it on hot dogs and Beer. Aaron did it with class. How did YOU do it?"

The Smoking Gun: Barry Bonds Indicted (the indictment itself)

San Francisco Chronicle: Barry Bonds indicted on 4 perjury counts, obstruction of justice

The Sporting News: Bonds indictment: How others see it
Excepts from commentary from news organizations across the web

Krugman to Obama: There. Is. No. Crisis.

Paul Krugman, NYTimes: Played for a Sucker

Lately, Barack Obama has been saying that major action is needed to avert what he keeps calling a “crisis” in Social Security — most recently in an interview with The National Journal. Progressives who fought hard and successfully against the Bush administration’s attempt to panic America into privatizing the New Deal’s crown jewel are outraged, and rightly so.

[]

But the “everyone” who knows that Social Security is doomed doesn’t include anyone who actually understands the numbers. In fact, the whole Beltway obsession with the fiscal burden of an aging population is misguided.

As Peter Orszag, the director of the Congressional Budget Office, put it in a recent article co-authored with senior analyst Philip Ellis: “The long-term fiscal condition of the United States has been largely misdiagnosed. Despite all the attention paid to demographic challenges, such as the coming retirement of the baby-boom generation, our country’s financial health will in fact be determined primarily by the growth rate of per capita health care costs.”

How has conventional wisdom gotten this so wrong? Well, in large part it’s the result of decades of scare-mongering about Social Security’s future from conservative ideologues, whose ultimate goal is to undermine the program.

[]

I don’t believe Mr. Obama is a closet privatizer. He is, however, someone who keeps insisting that he can transcend the partisanship of our times — and in this case, that turned him into a sucker.

Mr. Obama wanted a way to distinguish himself from Hillary Clinton — and for Mr. Obama, who has said that the reason “we can’t tackle the big problems that demand solutions” is that “politics has become so bitter and partisan,” joining in the attack on Senator Clinton’s Social Security position must have seemed like a golden opportunity to sound forceful yet bipartisan.

But Social Security isn’t a big problem that demands a solution; it’s a small problem, way down the list of major issues facing America, that has nonetheless become an obsession of Beltway insiders. And on Social Security, as on many other issues, what Washington means by bipartisanship is mainly that everyone should come together to give conservatives what they want.

We all wish that American politics weren’t so bitter and partisan. But if you try to find common ground where none exists — which is the case for many issues today — you end up being played for a fool. And that’s what has just happened to Mr. Obama.

England Pays Women Footballers a Pittance

BBCSport: England women angry at £40 wage

Teamtalk (uk): England's women earned £40 a day
England women's team can scarcely believe their talent is worth only £40-a-day each - the payment they received at the recent World Cup.

England's Football Association probably spent more money on airfare for all the mucky-mucks to go to China to pat themselves on the back about all they've done for women's football. While paying the players like counter help at McDonald's. Go ahead, wear the national team jersey for pride. Because you're not in it for the money, unless you're a man.

No wonder Kelly Smith kissed her boots -- she was looking for holes.

USSoccer Hires Pia Sundhage

USSoccer's search committee made short work of the search for a new coach for the USWNT, hiring Pia Sundhage yesterday. (BTW, her name is pronounced Soond-hahg-Eh.)

This is a good hire for so many reasons:

1. A woman should be coach of the national team. (I meant to link to this Christine Brennan column earlier. Yes, Christine, a woman should be the coach. You are late to the party, but correct.)

2. She has international experience as a player (Sweden's all-time-leading goal scorer, 6th in the 2000 voting for FIFA player of the century).

3. She has international experience as a coach (WUSA, Swedish league, China)

4. She wants the USWNT to play a possession style of football.

5. She has coached Kristine Lilly in the past (Boston Breakers) so will have that advantage in dealing with the change in strategy, Lilly's place on the team, and the reconciliation of Hope Solo.

6. I am cautiously optimistic that she will reunite Hope Solo with the team. She said in the press call announcing her appointment that Solo would remain with the team and that she is a good goalkeeper. Not exactly ringing endorsements, but given the strong positions taken on all sides it will be difficult to repair.

The woman was so popular in Sweden that they put her face on a postage stamp. Let's hope she leads the US to another gold medal at the Olympics next year.

NYTimes: New Coach for Women’s U.S. Soccer Team

USAToady: U.S. Soccer hires new women's team coach

ESPN: Sundhage to reshape U.S. team's offensive style

SoccerAmerica: Swede takes charge of U.S. women's coach [sic]

Gillibrand: Grants, Not Earmarks

Kirsten Gillibrand, the Congresswoman for NY-20, has come up with a great strategy for bringing money into her district. Rather than concentrate only on earmarks, she has her office helping her constituents apply for federal grant money.

In March, Gillibrand launched "grants central" on her Web site, and staff members in her D.C. office began counseling local officials on how to apply for grants.

Gillibrand's aides do not write the applications for the groups and officials seeking help. Instead, she said, she and her staff "facilitate" the grants by giving information to local residents and writing letters of support to accompany the applications.

Gillibrand jokes that half of her 15 staff members have become "experts" on grants. Staffers at the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service say no other office has contacted them for as much information about available grants.

Gillibrand also started up a regular electronic newsletter listing funding for farmers, firefighters, schools and local government. At first, the newsletter had about 30 subscribers. Now it has topped 1,000.

And the office has tallied up $11.7 million in grants to cities, counties and programs in upstate New York since she started the initiative.

They include:

$184,000 from the USDA to help the town of Schroon, Essex County, pay for the final upgrades to a wastewater treatment plant.

$172,900 from the Department of Homeland Security to help the Davenport (Delaware County) Fire Department buy new vehicles.

$278,000 from the USDA to help the small Catskill Mountain region town of Margaretville, Delaware County, replace a well destroyed by flooding.

That's what you get when you elect a smart person to Congress. A smart idea! And people who aren't trying to strangle government actually try to help it run properly. Competence!

Albany Times-Union: Gillibrand inspires $11.7M in grants
Representative builds ties with key groups through program that helps them apply for federal money

Congressman KickAss Arrested

The Union College party in 2006; trolling for a date?

Former Congressman John Sweeney was arrested Monday for aggravated drunk driving. He was pulled over on the Northway (I-87) and blew a .18 on the breathalyzer. No surprise given his history of drunk driving incidents:

In 1978, Sweeney, then 23, was convicted of driving while ability impaired after being stopped in Rensselaer County. That didn't keep him from becoming the county's Stop-DWI coordinator four years later. He was elected to Congress in 1998.

In 2001, Sweeney slammed a Jeep into a utility pole on his way home from the Willard Mountain ski area, cutting power to part of Washington County. At the time, State Police said Sweeney took his eye off the road to adjust the radio and lost control on the gravel on the right shoulder. No charges were filed.

[from earlier in the story]

In April 2006, the Union College student newspaper, the Concordiensis, ran photos of Sweeney at a college fraternity party. Students quoted in that story and in the Times Union said Sweeney appeared intoxicated, a charge he later denied.

[]

Sweeney and his ex-wife, Gayle, finalized their divorce in September. The pair exchanged allegations of domestic abuse last summer, with Gayle Sweeney saying she feared for her life. In 2006, the Times Union obtained a State Police dispatch report which showed Gayle Sweeney called police in December 2005, alleging her husband was "knocking her around."

Sweeney was also reportedly in a bar fight in 2004.

The surprise part of Sweeney's arrest is the 23-year-old woman on his lap. Maybe he met her at Union College last spring? Or one of his children introduced him to on of their friends. Local Republicans are probably just happy that it wasn't a 23-year-old man.
Albany Times-Union: Source: Sweeney passenger a shock
Arresting State Police officers in DWI case surprised to find a woman on ex-congressman's lap

Let's hope Sweeney sees the light and goes into alcohol rehab; at least the judge should take away his driver's license. He is a menace to society, thinking he can drink and drive and break the law with impunity.

Angela Davis: Don't Remember Me As A Hairdo

amazon
Guardian (uk): 'We used to think there was a black community'
With her towering afro and radical rhetoric, Angela Davis was one of the iconic faces of black politics in 1970s America. She talks to Gary Younge about Barack Obama, the racism of the black middle class, and how it feels to be remembered as a hairdo

Angela Davis was intrigued to see recently that a significant number of young black women to whom she was delivering a talk were wearing images of her from the 70s on their T-shirts. She asked what the image meant to them. "They said it made them feel powerful and connected to other movements," she says. "It was really quite moving. It really had nothing to do with me. They were using this image as an expression of who they would like to be and what they would like to do. I've given up trying to challenge commodification in that respect. It's an unending battle and you never win any victories."

Barney Frank Fights for Equality

Barney Frank makes an emotional speech on the House floor to get the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) passed.

San Francisco Chronicle: House approves bill banning bias against gays in workplace

Celtics Fans: This Year, Arrive Early

Boston Celtics forwards Kevin Garnett (L) and Paul Pierce smile during a time out in the third quarter of their NBA basketball game against the Denver Nuggets in Boston, Massachusetts November 7, 2007. REUTERS/Brian Snyder (UNITED STATES)
Last night the New and Improved Boston Celtics massacred the Denver Nuggets, a good old fashioned throttling, 119-92. The score of the game was 38-22 at the end of the first quarter, and and unbelievable 77-38 at halftime. Yes, the game was over not only by halftime, but midway through the second quarter. Celtics fans, you've been warned: For this year's team, you've got to arrive early, or the game will be in the bag.

As a fan from the good old days of the 1980s Celtics, I actually enjoyed watching the game. I haven't watched the Celtics since Antoine Walker left, because there's been no spark. Last night, there was passing -- passing! -- and lo and behold, something never seen in the modern NBA, commitment on defense! When Chad Finn wrote that Kevin Garnett was going to restore Celtic Pride and make Celtics fans happier than they could imagine, I scoffed. Now I'm a believer. The big man has the team united as a team, everyone heads up, cheering for their mates from the bench, and giving it all on the floor. Is this the NBA? Can I be dreaming? A team playing as a team and not as a talented group of individuals all seeking to pump up their personal statistics, team and result be damned?

The announcers got into it, with Bob Cousy doing one of his rare full game appearances. They were talking about the playoffs by the 3rd minute of the game, and Cousy made a Larry Bird reference in the second quarter! I'm going to have to make some time in my winter schedule for watching the Celtics. They could make me stop hating the NBA.

Boston Globe, Jackie MacMullan: Another big step forward

Boston Herald, Steve Buckley: Hopes for title ring true
Pierce keeps it real with Garnett, Allen

Civil Rights Pioneer John Lewis: "To discriminate against someone because they are gay: It is wrong, it is wrong, It. Is. Not. Right."

John Lewis makes me proud to be an American:

Baseball Notes, Mostly Sawx

Boston Red Sox' Jacoby Ellsbury hoists the World Series trophy prior to the Boston Celtics basketball game against the Washington Wizards in Boston Friday, Nov. 2, 2007, as teammates Manny Delcarmen, left, and Tim Wakefield, right, look on. (AP Photo/Winslow Townson)

- Curt Schilling takes the hometown discount to sign with the Sox; he inserted a weight clause that pays him:

$2 million in bonuses for 6 seperate [sic] weigh ins.

I inserted the weigh in clause in the 2nd round of offers, counter offers. Given the mistakes I made last winter and into Spring Training I needed to show them I recognized that, and understood the importance of it. Being overweight and out of shape are two different things. I also was completely broad sided by the fact that your body doesn’t act/react the same way as you get older. Even after being told that for the first 39 years of my life. Now I can’t get on Dougie anymore, which sucks, and I am sure the clause will add 15-100 more jokes to Tito’s Schilling joke book.

Maybe that's what I need to lose weight, a $2,000,000 incentive? I'll just declare free agency and see how that works out for me. I feel the pounds dropping already.

- Kevin Youkilis wins his first Gold Glove; only George "Boomer" Scott ever won the award playing first base for the Sawx. Too bad the Sawx didn't keep Orlando Cabrera after the 2004 World Series; he won the Gold Glove at SS in the National League.

- Charlie Pierce (the man who gave us "C+ Augustus") on the Sawx winning the Series: Slate: The Red Sox Win Again
And it feels great, thanks for asking.

- Alex Beam, dyspeptic columnist but true Red Sox fan, gloating about the Yankees in the Globe: The sorrow and the pity: a Bronx tale

- And my non-Sawx note, just another reason why the Sawx MUST NOT SIGN Me-Fraud: A-Rod's recent post-season performance (hat tip to Red Sox Stats Guy):

Since Game 4 of the 2004 ALCS — the night Boston began its epic comeback from three games down against the Yankees — (Alex) Rodriguez has come to the plate with 38 runners on base, over the span of 59 at-bats. He left every single one on base, going 0-for-27, right through the Yanks’ Division Series loss to Cleveland this month.

Joke of the Day

Q: What's the difference between a cow and 9/11?

A: Rudy Giuliani doesn't know how to milk a cow.

What Color Is This Woman?

NYTimes: Chicago Police Taser 82-Year-Old Woman

Not just a 82-year-old woman, but one with a) schizophrenia and b) dementia. Big strong police officers scared of a little old lady (5'1"). What have we come to? They're lucky they didn't kill her.

They came to her apartment on a "wellness" check, and she didn't want to let them in. For this she gets tasered? Cops don't see the public as people any more, just terrorists. And who are the scariest people? You know.

Here's the answer to the post title question:

Chicago Sun-Times: Cops wouldn't take 'no' for an answer

Photo

More Red Sox Videos

Manny Ramirez on Jay Leno:



David Ortiz (The Bedazzler) on Conan O'Brien:



Manny's walk-off home run that ended Game 2 of the ALCS:

Falafel Me This

Weapons of Mass Destruction?
Wikipedia: Falafel

What percentage of American falafel eaters are terrorists? The FBI thinks it's a connection worth pursuing. In 2005 and 2006, the FBI actually looked at grocery story sales in the San Francisco area to see if they would find terrorists because they were purchasing falafel ingredients. (And what of hummus?)

The CQPolitics article about the FBI tracking grocery store sales is not from the satirical newspaper the Onion. No, it is a statement of fact. The FBI actually looked at who bought the ingredients to make falafel in order to find Iranian terrorists.

Because falafel eaters....oh, never mind, it's so mindnumbingly foolish that it seems superfluous to comment on it.

Because really, falafel ingredients? Why didn't they look at, oh, I don't know, visas, flight schools, purchases of guns, ammunition and bomb-making materials, or bank records, just to name a few.

And shouldn't they have looked carefully at Bill O'Reilly, a self-confessed lover of the falafel (last line, paragraph 78)?

CQPolitics: FBI Hoped to Follow Falafel Trail to Iranian Terrorists Here

Like Hansel and Gretel hoping to follow their bread crumbs out of the forest, the FBI sifted through customer data collected by San Francisco-area grocery stores in 2005 and 2006, hoping that sales records of Middle Eastern food would lead to Iranian terrorists.

The idea was that a spike in, say, falafel sales, combined with other data, would lead to Iranian secret agents in the south San Francisco-San Jose area.

The brainchild of top FBI counterterrorism officials Phil Mudd and Willie T. Hulon, according to well-informed sources, the project didn’t last long. It was torpedoed by the head of the FBI’s criminal investigations division, Michael A. Mason, who argued that putting somebody on a terrorist list for what they ate was ridiculous — and possibly illegal.

We Love Lists

From Project Censored, the Top 25 Censored Stories of 2008

# 1 No Habeas Corpus for “Any Person”
# 2 Bush Moves Toward Martial Law
# 3 AFRICOM: US Military Control of Africa’s Resources
# 4 Frenzy of Increasingly Destructive Trade Agreements
# 5 Human Traffic Builds US Embassy in Iraq
# 6 Operation FALCON Raids
# 7 Behind Blackwater Inc.
# 8 KIA: The US Neoliberal Invasion of India
# 9 Privatization of America’s Infrastructure
# 10 Vulture Funds Threaten Poor Nations’ Debt Relief
# 11 The Scam of “Reconstruction” in Afghanistan
# 12 Another Massacre in Haiti by UN Troops
# 13 Immigrant Roundups to Gain Cheap Labor for US Corporate Giants
# 14 Impunity for US War Criminals
# 15 Toxic Exposure Can Be Transmitted to Future Generations on a “Second Genetic Code”
# 16 No Hard Evidence Connecting Bin Laden to 9/11
# 17 Drinking Water Contaminated by Military and Corporations
# 18 Mexico’s Stolen Election
# 19 People’s Movement Challenges Neoliberal Agenda (Free Trade through Central and South America)
# 20 Terror Act Against Animal Activists
# 21 US Seeks WTO Immunity for Illegal Farm Payments
# 22 North Invades Mexico
# 23 Feinstein’s Conflict of Interest in Iraq
# 24 Media Misquotes Threat From Iran’s President
# 25 Who Will Profit from Native Energy?

If You Lived In Iowa or New Hampshire: Barack Obama

Not a bad ad except for the "Social Security has a problem" framing. That's the right wing message. The Democratic/progressive message is "There is no crisis."

Anucha Browne Sanders and Sudden Fame

NYTimes: Browne Sanders Is an Inspiration After Winning a Lawsuit

This heightened public profile has become its own trial for Browne Sanders, a fiercely private woman who is used to blending into the back row of a basketball team picture or a corporate group photograph.

[]

In conversations with others who have been thrust by circumstance into the public eye, Browne Sanders has sought answers to one of the few questions left unanswered during her three-week trial: How can she be a symbol without sacrificing her personal life?

“You wonder what the reason is that you were identified as the person to go through this,” she said last month in Midtown Manhattan at a lunch interview conducted in the presence of one of her lawyers, Karen Cacace.

Her conclusion? Perhaps, she ventured, it was to validate the substance of her life while slightly altering the course of it toward public advocacy.

“I was talking to Coach Stringer,” Browne Sanders said, referring to C. Vivian Stringer, whose Rutgers women’s basketball players were the subject of racist and sexist remarks by the radio host Don Imus. “She was saying how much work remains to be done. She kept driving home the point that there is so much unfinished business.”

Bush Administration Reinstates Draft

wikipedia: Fall of Saigon
For Foreign Service Officers, that is. State Department Foreign Service Officers are being informed that because of a shortage of diplomats at the US Embassy in Baghdad, they are being ordered to go to Iraq. Of course, this means living in the Green Zone which is shelled daily by the Iraqis who want us out of their country. Essentially, they are being asked to live in the place where George Bush is afraid to go; his last few visits have been in secret to other parts of the country. And some of them must have in mind the way the embassy emptied at the end of our last imperial war.

At a town hall meeting in the department's main auditorium attended by hundreds of Foreign Service officers, some of them criticized fundamental aspects of State's personnel policies in Iraq. They took issue with the size of the embassy -- the biggest in U.S. history -- and the inadequate training they received before being sent to serve in a war zone. One woman said she returned from a tour in Basra with post-traumatic stress disorder only to find that the State Department would not authorize medical treatment.

Yesterday's internal dissension came amid rising public doubts about diplomatic progress in Iraq and congressional inquiries into the department's spending on the embassy and its management of private security contractors. Some participants asked how diplomacy could be practiced when the embassy itself, inside the fortified Green Zone, is under frequent fire and officials can travel outside only under heavy guard.

Service in Iraq is "a potential death sentence," said one man who identified himself as a 46-year Foreign Service veteran. "Any other embassy in the world would be closed by now," he said to sustained applause.

WaPo: Envoys Resist Forced Iraq Duty
Top State Dept. Officials Face Angry Questions

Papelbon on Letterman, Updated

For those of you who, like me, fell asleep on the couch waiting for Papelbon's appearance on Letterman. Transcript; video:



hat tip on the video to Cursed to First

Update: Centerfield has Papelbon's appearance on QVC hawking World Series gear. The guy who interviews him is a total QVC tool; see if you make it any farther through the video than I did (about 2 minutes!)

Wait 'Til Next Year

Listen to the Captain - Re-Sign Lowell. (Actually the sign says "RESIGN LOWELL", kind of like "SURRENDER DOROTHY", but I know what it means.)
Boston Globe
The baseball season is officially over. The rallying cry in Red Sox Nation used to be "Wait 'Til Next Year". Doesn't really seem appropriate any more. How 'bout "Let's Go 3 For 5!" It's so....positive...and so unlike the old Red Sox mentality.

Some final Red Sox goodness:

Tom Verducci's great article summarizing the Sox season, with this prize nugget:

Or maybe, just maybe, they won it when a very large, angry man cleared the clubhouse of everybody but Red Sox players after Game 3 of the American League Championship Series in Cleveland, which Boston had lost to the Indians to go down 2-1.

"Listen," designated hitter David Ortiz began, "we're not just a good team. We're a great team. And don't you f------ forget that. And let's go play one at a time and go prove that. Because let me tell you something...."

Ortiz pulled on the sides of his gray road jersey. "There's a reason why you wear this Red Sox uniform...."

Ortiz paused for a beat, letting the suspenseful silence fill the rapt room.

"Because you're a bad mother------."

Now I ask you, who among us does not love Big Papi?

Boston Globe photo galleries:

Papelbon (that boy is crazy); Rolling Rally; the plane ride home.

Nice piece from Basegirl about the joys of watching the Sox win it all, with family; and another one from Sawxblog about taking his dad to Game 1 of the World Series.

World Series Heroes

After several signature moments in the World Series, Jacoby Ellsbury took time out to have his teammates sign his jersey.

(Globe Staff Photo / Stan Grossfeld)


Hope he is enjoying the parade today. Every local TV station is showing it live. Papelbon is dancing up a storm. Varitek is holding a "Sign Lowell" sign that must have been passed to him from the crowd. Boston loves their Red Sox.

I went to the Celtics championship celebrations in 1984 and 1986 and those were pretty special, but I bet there were 1/20th there compared to the huge crowd of people at this rally. Maybe 1/100th. This is a one team town. We love the other teams when they're successful. but everyone is a Red Sox fan, no matter whether they're world champs or 86-76 (that would be last year, folks).

Oh, 'Bama: I'm So Disappointed In You

Image from MakeThemAccountable.com
Wow, Barack Obama is trying to kill his own campaign. I didn't see this one coming.

First, Obama picks an anti-gay pentacostal minister and gospel singer to participate in a fundraising tour in South Carolina. Progressives called him on it -- you can't say you favor equal rights based on sexual orientation, and solicit money from those people, and turn your back on them. To put it more directly: You wouldn't have a Klan member raising money for you, would you. Then don't use a gay hater.

OK, maybe that's just a stupid decision that they didn't really know how to get of, so they punted. But the second mistake is HUGE. Obama is now saying that there's a Social Security crisis and it needs to be fixed.

Oh. My. God. Hello, Mr. Harvard-Law-School-educated, supposedly smart guy Senator, THERE IS NO CRISIS. That's a right-wing message used by Republicans who want to, you know, GUT SOCIAL SECURITY. They hate it. HATE it. DIdn't you pay attention to GWB's "I'm going to use my political capitol" anti-Social Security crusade? Or that it got beaten down by smart Democrats?

My candidate is shooting himself in the foot. I'm hobbling. See why I haven't been blogging about politics? One little issue and I'm so mad I keep turning on the internet scream, ALLCAPS.

Atrios, Mr. Pithy, says it best with his post title: Anti-Gay Bigots for Social Security Reform

Krugman shot down the Social Security stupidity on ABC yesterday.



C'mon, Barack, get your head out of your ass and pick a real issue. Healthcare, Iran, torture, there are important things going on in the world. Right the ship and get back to work. No more money from this supporter until you get it together.

BTW, good work on MTV tonight. But those kids don't vote. Social Security voters vote.

Peter Gammons Calls Out A-Fraud

The dean of baseball reporting rips A-Fraud a new one live on SportsCenter last night for announcing his contract opt-out in the middle of the World Series (which, as Gammons says twice, Rodriguez has never played in). Sweet.



hat tip to Red Sox Monster

Sox Sweep 2007 World Series 4-0

Again, I am exhausted by another exciting, nail-biter of a game. Congratulations to the Red Sox and their organization. I was also really impressed by the Rockies fans who never gave up on their team. They were still cheering lustily with two outs in the bottom of the 9th.

Mike Lowell wins a well-deserved post-season MVP. Perfect. He was the regular season MVP, and he did everything right, especially in those two close games. You'd think he was fast from the way he ran the bases. But he was better than fast -- he was fundamentally sound and he took every inch the Rockies gave. Please God let the Sox resign him. At least don't sign the odious A-Fraud. Please, please, I'm begging you, don't sign him. Just step away.

Reason 728 why I love Jerry Remy: On the postgame show on NESN he is asked about Alex Rodriguez's agent announcing during the 7th inning of the World Series that Rodriguez is opting out. Remy spits out: "It's disgusting....disgusting and despicable." And of course the dopes at Fox were happy to hijack the attention from the Sox to the attention whore Rodriguez.

Like most of Red Sox Nation, I would be physically sick if the Sox signed the pretty loser, PayFraud. Although it would be fun to see how he gets along with Mike Timlin. I can see Timlin impaling him with the bullpen rake if they really got into it. Why would the Red Sox, a team that prides itself on character, associate the franchise with the hooker-patronizing StrayRod? And it's not like you'd be getting him for post-season production, 'cause he disappears when the stakes are high. Do you need to know more? That's why fans last night were chanting two things: "Re-sign Mike Lowell" and "Don't Sign A-Rod." Good advice, Theo. Take it.

Oh god, I'm pulling a Fox and getting distracted by He-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named. Done with that.

Didn't you love Timlin's Ode to Wake, while standing right next to him, making them both cry? That was awesome.

Speaking of MVP performances, while I agreed that Lowell was the man, it was close. Coach Mom thought it would be Ellsbury. He did hit a scorching .438 in his first World Series, with an OBP of .500 and a SLG of .688. Those are just phenomenal numbers for our phenom. And he fielded every position they put him in like a pro, and his speed terrorized the Rockies pitchers and fielders. I wanted him to get MVP just so he could win the Rookie of the Year award next year after winning World Series MVP.

My friend G wanted Pedroia to get the award, but I think that was sentimental as much as anything. DP had a better shot at MVP of the ALCS. My favorite quote of the postseason by far is Julio Lugo in the clubhouse after the ALCS clinching game, speaking of Pedroia: "That little midget is THE MAN!"

The third player who should have gotten serious MVP consideration has to be Papelbon. Nails didn't give up a run, only 2 hits in 4.1 innings, with three consecutive saves to close out the four game sweep. He did get a lot of help from one Jacoby Ellsbury catch in the 9th inning last night at the wall. Can't wait to see Pap dancing on the duck boat tomorrow!

Final thought: People who weren't here for the entire season who deserve a full World Series share: Kason Gabbard -- his four wins while Schilling was out were huge, and Bobby Kielty -- the guy had one chance in the World Series and really had that one shining moment, a one-pitch home run that was the winning run of the clinching game. Seven years in the majors, four different teams, one pitch to win the World Series. Priceless.

Cloud Nine

Papelbon flies in triumph after closing out Game 4 for the World Champion Boston Red Sox.
(Getty Images Photo / Jeff Gross)

WaPo: Red Sox Have the World at Their Feet
Four-Game Sweep Clinches Second Crown in Four Seasons: Red Sox 4, Rockies 3

I Should Have Bought a Couch

Our new hero.
Boston Globe
Exhausted by another very satisfying, very late night Red Sox win. I wonder how many other people are thinking like me -- I should have bought a couch! Because the Red Sox are going to win this Series going away, and all those people who bought furniture at Jordan's in April are getting their money back.

Those rookies at the top were simply amazing. Ellsbury will be Boston's starting centerfielder for a long time to come. You knew he was special when he scored from second on wild pitch in his very first game in July, but setting records in the World Series? Who could have predicted this from a kid who was carrying his own equipment in Double A In Portland, Maine in April? And how is it possible that he was the 23rd pick in the baseball draft in 2005? That's like Tom Brady being a 6th rounder; it just defies the imagination. 22 teams saw that blinding speed and mad skills and said, nah, we'll pass. (Just looked it up; Troy Trulowitzki went #7. I can justify picking him. What an arm.)

Fucking Fox is trying hard to ruin my World Series experience. We ignore their lame pregame (except for the lineup announcements) and mute the commercials, but to hear the crowd we are forced to listen to dumb and bum, Buck and McCarver. Why do they hate Manny Ramirez so? Is it because he's hitting the lights out in the postseason? I think it's racial racism (edited 10/29/07 to be more direct). He's not a tight-assed white guy like them and they just don't like it. Why were they going on and on about his helmet falling off as he rounded the bases in the third inning? They started talking about his dreadlocks obsessively. They were this close to calling him a nappy-headed ho. Hey, morons, he's got dreadlocks because that's the way his hair grows. Read Pam Spaulding's terrific piece on The Politics of Hair to see how all this white obsession with cornrows is just plain old discrimination against black people. STFU and stop exposing your KKK attitudes.

Back to single Ks. Dice K was awesome. Love that little butt waggle he does before he delivers. When he's really on he does it before every pitch. It's so cute! I don't think I'd have pulled him as quickly as Francona did, but it worked out so I can't complain. He gets his first major league hit -- and in the World Series no less -- so he not only pitched for the win, he had two RBIs and until next year at least, his World Series batting average is .333.

Tonight I'm rooting for cancer survivor Jon Lester to cap his year of amazing comebacks with a win in Game 4 of the 2007 World Series. Plus, I need to start going to bed before 2:00 a.m. I need a win tonight, boys.

Yeah, the angst is gone. This year, I'm not afraid to say: We're going to win it all. One of my friends reminded me last night that I predicted this in July. I don't remember that, but I'm old and I don't remember much any more. But I'm pretty sure I'll never forget the 2007 Red Sox.

Somewhere Sherm Feller is smiling. Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, welcome to Fenway Park and your 2007 World Series Champions, The Boston Red Sox.

Blogroll Updates

He's ready.
flickr: eurodana
A little housekeeping on a Saturday afternoon. Light rain, cool & grey, waiting for that 8:35 p.m. first pitch.

Removed: The Soul of Baseball. Joe Posnanski has suspended his original and is now posting at this eponymous JoeBlog, which has been added to the blogroll in its place. He still writes at length and obsessively. I look forward to his every post, even though sometimes they're so long I have to skim.

Removed: Don to Earth. Don last posted in March that he is not dead yet, but his blog appears to be.

Removed: Informed Comment, Booman Tribune, I Blame the Patriarchy, Overheard in New York, Tree Hugger, and Crooks & Liars. I've stopped reading them regularly so they're off the roll. It's not like any of them blogroll me, anyway. I think the only blog on this entire blogroll that blogrolls me is skippy the bush kangaroo.

Additions: Boltgirl on the Loose, who I have grouped with the women's soccer blogs, though she posts on gay issues as well as personal stuff. A good read. Plus my blogroll's not gay enough. I won't blogroll Americablog because I'm banned there (for complaining about John Aravosis insulting someone by calling them a "Big Girl"; what a maroon.)

Sideline Views, for Andrea Canales reports on women's soccer (she also writes for ESPN's Soccernet, but I won't blogroll ESPN as they hate soccer. Maybe if they fire Dave O'Baseball as soccer announcer I'd reconsider.

Kickster, another women's soccer blog.

I Wish I Wrote This

Esquire: TheSide: Blog
Why You Should Root for the Boston Red Sox
Because they represent everything that is good about America. (Of course, not everyone agrees with this.)

Read the whole thing; it's hilarious. For this:

I've left out some people, I'm sure, but that's basically your 2007 Boston Red Sox: two Japanese exchange students, a feisty runt, a tough-looking Jew, a Navajo Indian, an idiot-savant, a right-wing asshole, the human embodiment of charisma, and a man named after a breakfast cereal. That's America, right there. And, ain't that something worth cheering for?

And this:

Eric Gillin: The Colorado Rockies? Seriously? How can anyone cheer for the Colorado Rockies? They're like a bag of Wonder Bread with a jar of Miracle Whip -- a bland collection of forgettable ballplayers with candy-ass names like "Taylor" and "Jamey." If you could buy the Colorado Rockies in the grocery store, they'd come in a white box with giant black letters across the front saying BASEBALL TEAM. Their lineup looks like it came off a Mattel production line, a ball-free collection of multicultural Kens with the occasional goatee and the underwear already stamped in.

I know this is unfair, but I still consider the Rockies a bush league marketing ploy that allowed baseball to sell more black merchandise when all the pro sports leagues overexpanded in the 1990s. I know I'm going to regret this later, but right now I have trouble taking the franchise seriously. They play 5,000 feet above sea level. They've never won their own division. Their Website crashed when World Series tickets went on sale. Their uniforms don't have sleeves.

And this immortal video of Manny Ramirez petting Julian Tavares' head:

Manny pets Tavarez
Uploaded by bjs1234

Hat tip to Cursed to First.

Random Red Sawx Notes

Boston Globe
- I just drove by two girls, maybe 10 years old, in a park on the edge of Main St., holding up a sign that said "Honk if you Love the Red Sox", both outfitted in Sox shirts and sunglasses, screamingly gleefully at each car that honked as it went by. Pure joy.

- What's with Clint Hurdle and the bobbing cap? I've never seen anyone chew their gum so intensely that those little muscles on the side of your temples could move your baseball cap. It's really weird to watch.

- Someone please give Tim McCarver and Joe Buck a big cup of STFU. I would pay extra for a TV that let me mute announcers and listen to nothing but the crowd noise.

- What's with all the limp dick ads during the World Series? Pee medicine, erection medicine, ewwwwwwww. Last night I noticed that the first one came on at 10:00 p.m. Luckily the two kids in the room were already asleep, so I didn't have to explain weak stream or four hour erections to teenagers. Are baseball fans the target audience? Is there a high percentage of men with defective equipment watching the Series? Personally, I'm sick of hearing about it.

- Jonathon Papelbon is married. Can you imagine living with him? Does he make that face at home? Is it his Baby let's do it face? (That question is definitely influenced by all those limp dick ads I've been forced to watch for the last two weeks.) Dance? Talk crazy? I'd imagine that he is exhilarating, infuriating and exhausting, all in the same day.

- Did anyone else feel kind of icky hearing the bullpen band banging out the Atlanta Braves Indian tom-tom rhythm while Jacoby Ellsbury was batting? And a couple of them were doing the tomahawk chop. To me, that's racist and not cool. John Henry: a little education is in order here.

- Ellsbury a/k/a Tacoby Bellsbury wins America a free taco with an uncontested steal. Appropriate as he is the fastest guy on the field. This NYTimes writer is offended by the taped conversations in the dugout about the Taco Bell challenge; to me they make sense. These guys didn't come from money. They probably still go to Taco Bell while making their million dollar salaries.

- I love love love Pedroia the Destroia. Especially since I'm convinced I can look him in the eye. He's listed at 5'9", but Francona says he's 5'7", and on ESPN the other night Peter Gammons said what I believe to be true: He's 5'5". He's the Muggsy Bogues of baseball! Some other guy on ESPN said Pedroia has the smallest hands he's ever seen on a major league baseball player. They don't look freakishly small to me, but the camera does put on 10 lbs.

Feel the Pedroia love: Arizona Republic, USAToady, Boston Globe, The Republican, Braves.scout.com, East Valley (AZ) Tribune, Boston Herald (his mom), Dallas Morning News, Los Angeles Times, San Diego Union Tribune.

- Best sign of the night had to be the giant dancing Papelbon puppet. The swinging legs! The compression shorts! Two-dimensional Cinco Ocho.

- Hope the Sox resign Mike Lowell, if just to save me from the horror of having to watch Alex Rodriguez, the pretty loser. I just can't cheer for the guy. Let the Cubs have him; let the Cubs prolong their agony.

Boston Globe: Photoshopping the Sox

Genarlow Wilson: Free at Last

ABC: A handout photo from the office of his attorney, shows 17-year-old Genarlow Wilson, now 21. Wilson has currently served more than two years of a ten-year prison sentence for having consensual oral sex when he was 17 with a 15-year-old girl in 2003. (Genarlow Wilson)
cnn.com: Court says teen sex conviction 'cruel and unusual' punishment

ATLANTA, Georgia (AP) -- The Supreme Court of Georgia ordered Friday that Genarlow Wilson be released from prison, ruling that his sentence for a teen sex conviction was cruel and unusual punishment.

ABCNews.com: Court: Free Teen Jailed for Consensual Sex
Georgia Supreme Court Found a 10-Year Sentence for Oral Sex With Fellow Teen 'Cruel'

Chief Justice Leah Ward Sears wrote in the majority opinion that the changes in the law "represent a seismic shift in the legislature's view of the gravity of oral sex between two willing teenage participants."

Sears wrote that the severe punishment makes "no measurable contribution to acceptable goals of punishment" and that Wilson's crime did not rise to the "level of adults who prey on children."

Edited to add: Click on the label "Genarlow Wilson", below, to read all posts on this travesty of justice. This kid served two years for a blow job; Scooter Libby committed treason & he's sitting home free.

Turkeys Everywhere

Boston Globe: Turkeys take to cities, towns

I saw a turkey on my daily walk yesterday, along with a circling redtail hawk, a kingfisher, and plenty of crows. The turkey had just drunk from the Wachusett Reservoir and was hurrying back to a copse of trees as I came along the path.

Greg Ryan

WaPo Soccer Insider: Ryan Out As Women's Coach

Better late than never. The guy should have been fired in the middle of the World Cup for pulling that stunt of changing goalkeepers midstream. I wouldn't want to go hunting with Sunil Gulati. By the time he decided to shoot, it would have changed seasons.

We're Melting

WaPo: At the Poles, Melting Occurring at Alarming Rate

For scientists, global warming is a disaster movie, its opening scenes set at the poles of Earth. The epic already has started. And it's not fiction.

The scenes are playing, at the start, in slow motion: The relentless grip of the Arctic Ocean that defied man for centuries is melting away. The sea ice reaches only half as far as it did 50 years ago. In the summer of 2006, it shrank to a record low; this summer the ice pulled back even more, by an area nearly the size of Alaska. Where explorer Robert Peary just 102 years ago saw "a great white disk stretching away apparently infinitely" from Ellesmere Island, there is often nothing now but open water. Glaciers race into the sea from the island of Greenland, beginning an inevitable rise in the oceans.

Animals are on the move. Polar bears, kings of the Arctic, now search for ice on which to hunt and bear young. Seals, walrus and fish adapted to the cold are retreating north. New species -- salmon, crabs, even crows -- are coming from the south. The Inuit, who have lived on the frozen land for millennia, are seeing their houses sink into once-frozen mud, and their hunting trails on the ice are pocked with sinkholes.

"It affects everyone," said Carin Ashjian, a Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute scientist who spent early September with native Inupiats in Barrow, the northernmost town of Alaska. "The only ice I saw this year was in my cup at the cafeteria."

At the South Pole, ancient ice shelves have abruptly crumbled. The air over the western Antarctic peninsula has warmed by nearly 6 degrees since 1950. The sea there is heating as well, further melting edges of the ice cap. Green grass and beech trees are taking root on the ice fringes.

Antarctica's signature Adelie penguins are moving inland, seeking the cold of their ancestors, replaced by chinstrap and Gentoo penguins, which prefer open water. Krill, the massive smorgasbord for a food chain reaching to the whales, are disappearing from traditional spawning grounds.

Hope Solo: The Backstory

Watch this video telling the story of Hope Solo and her father, who died this spring. And think about how abysmally her teammates treated her for daring to tell the truth, that their coach made a huge mistake by replacing her in goal for the Brazil game. Once you see this story, you'll see that their treatment of her was especially cruel. Like kicking a puppy. Just wrong.

Hat tip to Kickster.

Fire Him Or Else

If USSoccer doesn't fire Greg Ryan, they reveal themselves to know NOTHING about soccer. Nothing. I won't go to a USWNT game until he's gone.

WaPo: Greg Ryan Announcement Monday

USSF President Sunil Gulati and Secretary General Dan Flynn will address U.S. women's national team coach Greg Ryan's status during a media teleconference at 4 p.m. (Eastern) on Monday.

The sins of Greg Ryan:

(1) Adopting bootball tactics instead of the beautiful possession game.

(2) Blowing the 2007 World Cup by putting in rusty, over-the-hill Brianna Scurry for hot, best-goalie-in-the-world-right-now Hope Solo. Stupidest decision in the history of sports. Brianna Scurry was the best goalie in the world in 1999. Not 2007.

(3) Hired all male assistant coaches.

(4) Had the players practicing separately by position. What?

(5) Played Kristine Lilly too many minutes, in the wrong position. She's a midfielder, you dope.

(6) Losing to Brazil in a win-or-go-home game against Brazil, he made DEFENSIVE substitutions. Moron.

(7) Inability to adapt tactically, like having Cat Whitehill come from the back to take throw-ins while the US was down a man to Brazil (lead directly to the third goal in the game).

(8) Choked under pressure. Who can forget him chattering like a monkey on the sidelines during the North Korea game? I'd freak out if my coach acted like that during a game.

(9) Humiliating Hope Solo after she spoke the truth. She would have made those saves.

(10) Destroying the reputation of the greatest women's sports team in the world. Unforgivable.

Sweet

boston.com:
ALCS celebration
Red Sox closer Jonathan Papelbon celebrated on the field after the Red Sox won the AL pennant.
(Getty Images Photo / Al Bello)

USA Women Need A New Coach

Greg Ryan is the coach of the USA women's World Cup team, and he thinks he's a great soccer tactician. He DELIBERATELY has the US playing a bonehead, boot the ball up to the forwards style. Like Sir Alex Ferguson is a fool for teaching his players to possess. Guus Hiddink -- clearly knows nothing about soccer. Ditto Klinsmann. All those managers have it wrong. Greg Ryan has the superior tactical knowledge -- he thinks.

So if someone asks you why the US team is playing such ugly soccer, you tell them: BECAUSE THEIR COACH IS AN IDIOT. He doesn't believe in technique or possession. Let's hope our team's pure talent lets them win the Cup despite their coach's 80s tactics.

FIFA.com: Direct US reflect new realities

With Wambach's 78 goals in 96 internationals, this reliance on her forward power seems to have its benefits, even if it provides a contrast with the days when Hamm, Tiffeny Milbrett and Joy Fawcett were moving the ball around the field in a short-passing style. According to coach Ryan, though, the new way is simply a reflection of an overall improvement in the level of the women's game worldwide. "The game has changed so much in the last seven or eight years," Ryan told FIFA.com ahead of the Group B leaders' game in Shanghai against Nigeria.

"Back then, you could get away with playing little passes all over the field and have success doing it. But in the modern game, a team that just knocks the ball around the middle of the park is going to get killed doing it," continued Ryan, who replaced 1991 world champion-turned-coach April Heinrichs in 2005 and signalled a shift from the technique-driven short-passing game to a more physical and direct style.

The only way
"If you spend all your time trying to look pretty, you're going to end up with big problems the other way," said Ryan, who lined up alongside Franz Beckenbauer and Carlos Alberto in his playing days with New York Cosmos. "We try to attack, exploit the space and turn it into goals," he said. "This is the only way to play now. Look at what happened to China when they were risking things right in front of their own goal against Brazil. They got stuffed 4-0."

Wambach's second goal against the Swedes, her third in two matches, was as direct as you will see - a long ball from Lilly in midfield, controlled with the chest and hit ferociously on the half-volley. Far from ugly or overly simple, the strike was an artistic and elegant statement about the efficiency that has crept into the women's game.

Far from the backward step that some have labelled it, USA's new direct style speaks to improvements across the board - largely inspired by the Americans' previous dominance. But opponents and fellow contenders like Brazil, Germany, and Korea DPR, who still play an attractive short-passing game, would be mistaken if they thought the Americans had become a one-trick pony.

"Every game is different," said Lilly, who has seen it all in a career spanning nearly 20 years. "If we get something out of going up over the top, then we'll do that. But if we can get the ball down and move it around and beat a team that way, that would be great too." As the women's game undergoes undeniable changes and rapid shifts - all visible here in China - USA's desire to be the best is the same as it ever was.

The Decider on 9/11/01

I'm too enraged about politics, Bush's War Without End, Amen and the dithering Democrats to write much these days. So here's my 9/11 post.

From Buzzflash:

A 9/11 Reminder from a 2004 BuzzFlash Editorial: "Minutes of Silence That Should Live in Infamy: As Americans Leapt to Their Deaths from the Twin Towers, George W. Bush Sat Cluelessly in a Florida Classroom, Endangering the Lives of the Children Around Him, Until His Handlers Could Figure Out What to Do With Him."

I wish I had written this, but I'm just too pissed off:

Lawyers, Guns and Money: Anniversary