ANOTHER LINCOLN/KENNEDY CONNECTION

In June, 1963, Kennedy signed Executive Order 11110, which authorized the US Treasury to print its own money, unbeholden to the independent Federal Reserve Banking System. Most people don't realize that the Fed is not truly part of our government, but rather represents a syndicate of international banking interests, who were empowered by that doofus Woodrow Wilson in 1913 to establish a bank which would be able to print money on a whim and sell it to our government with interest. The government pays the interest on this debt by establishing a federal income tax, ensuring the consolidation of power with the elite and binding the rest of us to debt and servitude for the remainder of our days.

Nothing gets a country in debt to the bankers like war, so Oliver Stone was half-right when he appointed JFK's desire to withdraw troops from Vietnam as the reason for his assassination. Almost certainly, it was the combined prospect of a decrease in war debt combined with nullification of the Federal Reserve which hastened his demise in November. One of the first things the LBJ administration did was remove from circulation the Treasury notes that were already printed. This is reminiscent of the Andrew Johnson administration which took pains to make the Greenbacks worthless, as they also represented a threat to the European banking interests. Lincoln had done exactly what Kennedy would later do. He attempted to circulate fiat money backed by the government to help pay for the Civil War.

Otto von Bismarck, Chancellor of Germany, in 1876:

"It is not to be doubted, I know of absolute certainty, that the division of the United States into two federations of equal power was decided long before the Civil War by the high financial powers of Europe. These bankers were afraid that the United States, if they remained as one block and were to develop as one nation, would attain economic and financial independence, which would upset the capitalist domination of Europe over the world."

Meanwhile in Britain a truly incredible editorial in the London Times explained the Bank of England's attitude towards Lincoln's Greenbacks:

"If this mischievous financial policy, which has its origin in North America, shall become indurate down to a fixture, then the Government will furnish its own money without cost. It will pay off debts and be without debt. It will have all the money necessary to carry on its commerce. It will become prosperous without precedent in the history of the world. The brains, and wealth of all countries will go to North America. That country must be destroyed or it will destroy every monarchy on the globe."

Keep in mind, by this time the European monarchs were already chained to their private central banks, hence the bankers' concern to preserve their captive monarchs. Within four days of the passage of the law that allowed Greenbacks to be issued, bankers met in convention in Washington to discuss the situation. It was agreed that Greenbacks would surely be their ruin. Something had to be done. They devised a scheme gradually to undermine the value of the Greenbacks.

Okay, I digress, but I'm getting a pretty good grip on who "the man" is, and his name is Rothschilds, Rockefeller, Morgan, etc.

Wary Christmas!

ALEXANDER THE GRATUITOUS

In reality, the movie proved not so much scandalous as boring. The problem with Stone's lurid sexual narrative is not his historical inaccuracies, but the movie's obsession with sexual intrigue, which causes much of Alexander's amazing story to be lost.

Now I haven't seen the movie, so I am not a position to critique it. However, circa 1995, my gay mentor (who was helping me get sober, and only incidentally helping me love gays -- well, you know what I mean) gave me the book to read on which much of Stone's movie was probably based. It was historical fiction featuring a prominent storyline involving, if I remember right, Alexander's homosexual relationship with his servant boy. I forget the name of the book. I guess it was supposed to be a tender love story, the soft side of the bloodthirsty imperialist. What I remember most clearly is that the book sucked. As homosexual propaganda, maybe it worked, but as book, it sucked. Here's the thing: sure, the lewdness will stir up your helpful controversy and your advance press, but to get your $150m at the box office, the story needs to be interesting and the movie, as a movie, needs to be good. If the story is not interesting and the movie not good, the lewdness just comes across as all the more gratuitous.

This is why I still resent THE ENGLISH PATIENT. Everybody said Oh, such a beautiful movie, Oh, I was riveted, Oh, I can't wait to see it again. So I went to see it, and that was one of the sorriest movies I ever wasted what seemed like 5 hours on. Maybe it was great as visual art, but as a movie it sucked. I know my fellow juntoers are movie guys, and I'm sure you watch movies differently than I do, but for my part, I saw so many lame movies in a row that for years I have pretty much only gone to see James Bond installments and otherwise I watch the old black and white classics on video.

Alexander's legacy is agreed: he kicked a-- and took names. Make the movie he left you with or call it something else. It sounds to me like Stone has added nothing to the historical discourse and brings nothing new and interesting to the table except perhaps that you can always squeeze in a little more under an R rating.

IKE'S FAREWELL ADDRESS

Dude the born-again conspiracy theorist has been studying the UFO problem, which leads into a study of not only physics and the paranormal, but also has made me take a fresh look at the Cold War and the official history of the 20th century. What I have discovered is that some major changes in our country were effected by the defeat of Nazism. The Manhattan Project was the first instance of our government instituting a "black budget" by funneling funds into a project without direct Congressional oversight.

The crown jewel of WWII for the US, USSR, and UK was not the land acquired, but rather the intellectual capital, namely the military technology and by extension, the German scientists. Truman's National Security Act of 1947 created an incredibly powerful intelligence community. One of the CIA's first functions was "Operation Paperclip" which repatriated Nazi scientists to America. These scientists, lead by the esteemed Wernher Von Braun and Hermann Oberth, were the minds behind rocketry and jet propulsion. They were scientists first and foremost and happily moved on to America upon the collapse of the Reich, so that they could have fresh funding from a newly empowered regime. It was the fruits of Operation Paperclip that put Americans on the moon 25 years later.

So, beginning in the late forties, America's National Security State gained increasing power, and it could be fairly argued that the CIA became the true government for all intents and purposes. If this sounds like conspricay, then I invite you to listen to the farewell address of President Eisnehower in 1961. Ike held the highest elected office in the USA during the fifties, which coincided with the exponential empowerment of the military-industrial complex, which increasingly functioned "in the dark" without congressional interference or presidential oversight.

Excerpt from Eisenhower's farewell address:

A vital element in keeping the peace is our military establishment. Our arms must be mighty, ready for instant action, so that no potential aggressor may be tempted to risk his own destruction. Our military organization today bears little relation to that known by any of my predecessors in peacetime, or, indeed, by the fighting men of World War II or Korea.

Until the latest of our world conflicts, the United States had no armaments industry. American makers of plowshares could, with time and as required, make swords as well. But now we can no longer risk emergency improvisation of national defense. We have been compelled to create a permanent armaments industry of vast proportions. Added to this, three and a half million men and women are directly engaged in the defense establishment. We annually spend on military security alone more than the net income of all United States corporations.

Now this conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence -- economic, political, even spiritual --is felt in every city, every Statehouse, every office of the Federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources, and livelihood are all involved. So is the very structure of our society.

Now the really good stuff:

In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.

Akin to, and largely responsible for the sweeping changes in our industrial-military posture, has been the technological revolution during recent decades. In this revolution, research has become central, it also becomes more formalized, complex, and costly. A steadily increasing share is conducted for, by, or at the direction of, the Federal government.

Today, the solitary inventor, tinkering in his shop, has been overshadowed by task forces of scientists in laboratories and testing fields. In the same fashion, the free university, historically the fountainhead of free ideas and scientific discovery, has experienced a revolution in the conduct of research. Partly because of the huge costs involved, a government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity. For every old blackboard there are now hundreds of new electronic computers. The prospect of domination of the nation's scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present -- and is gravely to be regarded.

Yet, in holding scientific research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite.

We must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence by the military-industrial complex before public policy becomes captive of a scientific-technological elite - wow, these are strong words from the General! It is interesting to note that Ike's successor, JFK made a valient attempt to win back the country for the people. More conspiratorial ramblings in the next post...

PRO-AM, $100,000 PURSE

Let's see what the professional amateurs can do with this. The fun of it is that all of them will be at least partly wrong, and none of them certifiable, but think of the creativity this will unleash.

Or you could consider it a drain on the economy, depending on how much work time the conspiracy theorists consume.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Jimmy Walter has spent more than $3 million promoting a conspiracy theory the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States were "an inside job" and he is offering more cash to anyone who proves him wrong.

The millionaire activist is so convinced of a government cover-up he is offering a $100,000 reward to any engineering student who can prove the World Trade Centre buildings crashed the way the government says.

Next month, he also launches a nationwide contest seeking alternative theories from college and high school students about why New York's World Trade Centre collapsed. The contest offers $10,000 to the best alternative theory, with 100 runner-up awards of $1,000. Winners will be chosen next June.

Walter insists there had to be explosives planted in the twin towers to cause them to fall as they did, and also rejects the official explanation for the damage done at the Pentagon.

Walter has spent millions of dollars to bolster support for his case, running full-page ads in The New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, The New Yorker and Newsweek, as well as alternative newspapers and 30-second TV spots. He points to a Zogby poll he commissioned last summer that showed 66 percent of New Yorkers wanted the 9/11 investigation reopened.

Walter has spent about 30 percent of his net worth on his efforts.

XMAS

Those who don't believe in slipper slope arguments need look no further than the Supreme Court's interpretation of the 1st Amendment's establishment clause.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof

The Supreme Court in the early 1960s held that the First Amendment's order that Congress make no law really meant separation of church and state. Wouldn't that be "prohibiting the free exercise therof"?

Their decision resulted with the outlawing of school prayer, and has mutated into the ban of Christmas on government property. Nay to Nativity scenes and forget using the word "Christmas" in public places. What's funny is that Christmas has become such a commercial holiday that the word hardly has religious connotations for the unbeliever. Still, the elite must adhere to the letter of the Supreme Court opinion, because someone somewhere is crying into their pillow over having seen the word in public.

The "play it safe" corporate culture has totally adopted this kind of political correctness re-labeling it "inclusiveness." Learning other people's culture is diversity, while expressing our own is bigotry.

We are absolutely the most guilt-ridden culture on the planet, convinced that our very existence is sending shivers down the backs of every helpless soul who just happens to be in the country at the time of our breathing.

No wonder so many people in America think the war in Iraq is unjust. How can you expect people to support killing enemies at a time when the high minded are camped in American classrooms pronouncing that we're the real problem?

But there are always groups Americans willing to fight anything.

ALMOST DENMARK

So now a parent does not have the right to know what their own child is doing in their own house. Who gains from this? How is society better served?

In the fall of 2000, two young men knocked an elderly woman to the ground and stole her purse. That happened in the small town of Friday Harbor, Washington. Seventeen-year-old Oliver Christiansen was convicted of the crime because he called his 14-year-old girlfriend and bragged about it.

The girl's mother was listening in on the conversation and testified against Christensen. But the Washington State Supreme Court has now overturned that conviction, ruling that the two teenagers had a right to privacy when talking on the phone.

BENJAMIN KEEPING QUESTIONABLE COMPANY

More than 2,000 new and revised word entries have been added to the online edition of The Oxford English Dictionary and a small contingent of them come from the P. Diddy and Eminem arena.

For example, the word "benjamin," meaning "a one-hundred dollar bill" and more generally, "large sums of money" made its way onto the list.

Other hip-hop words that were added:

-- "Hoochie," which means "a young woman who is promiscuous or who dresses or behaves in a sexually provocative or overtly seductive manner."

-- "Thugged out" is defined as "resembling a thug in dress or behavior, tough-looking."

-- And finally, the dictionary editors have added "crack ho," which is defined as "a prostitute addicted to crack cocaine."

Dictionary spokesman Jesse Shiedlowe says he expects a lot more hip-hop words to be added in future editions of the dictionary as long as the music genre continues to stay popular.

PRAISE FOR CLINT

Clint Eastwood's "Million Dollar Baby" is the best movie released by a major Hollywood studio this year, and not because it is the grandest, the most ambitious or even the most original. On the contrary: it is a quiet, intimately scaled three-person drama directed in a patient, easygoing style, without any of the displays of allusive cleverness or formal gimmickry that so often masquerade as important filmmaking these days.

TOWARD RELENTLESSLY FREE TRADE

As the previous posts have pointed out, the Web enables the ultimate free trade of ideas and the market decides. And the Web also enables the ultimate free trade of goods and services, although governments will always try to find a way to hinder and regulate and control and tax it.

I read this article this morning but didn’t have any pithy comments to make it blogworthy. But now I post it in the context of remarks already posted. Critics lament that new markets are opening up and that other countries are partnering with each other, which will hurt the US. It won’t hurt the US. Good old American capitalists will always find a way to make money wherever there is money to be made. Nobody does that better than us. Critics see developing markets as a threat. Bush sees them as fertile ground for US investment and eventually US exports.

Tectonic Trends in Trade

Two political tremors in recent days reveal that the global trading system may be creaking and groaning into isolated blocs of countries - without the United States.

South America's leaders met last week to declare the founding of a "South American Community of Nations," modeled on the European Union. They pledged to wrap the continent's 12 nations and 360 million people into a free-trade area (known generically as an FTA).

Just days before, China and a 10-member bloc of Southeast nations promised to set up the world's largest common market by 2010, with 1.9 billion people in the Far East.

The US helped set up the latest set of talks to expand global free trade, known as the Doha Round. But the Bush administration, whose free-trade credentials have been suspect, met with so much resistance in Europe and developing countries that it began to use a dubious tactic. It aggressively pursued FTAs of its own, sending a signal to recalcitrant nations that they would miss out on greater access to the giant US market if they didn't concede points in the Doha talks. After four years in office, Mr. Bush proudly declares he has set up FTAs with 12 nations, and is pursuing agreements with 10 others.

Cutting global trade into a patchwork quilt of too many bilateral agreements can create confusion and barriers to expanding global trade, and might make for regional protectionism. They also can create political blocs that divide the world. The US, for instance, might eventually find itself on the sidelines as China and the EU each becomes the center of a giant hub of economic activity and political partnerships.

In his second term, Bush needs to commit the US to finishing the Doha talks, either by making further concessions or pressing other nations to acknowledge the better path of further opening global trade. The game of dividing up the world in order to unite it just doesn't make sense anymore.

BLOCKBUSTER

Dude’s post below reveals some larger economic issues that can't be responded to in the comments section.

The Blockbuster situation is a good retort to those quasi-socialists that are more worried about capitalists than they are the growth of government. Here’s a mega corporation that is being made to change their whole business model due to an upstart business plan by a much smaller company.

Blockbuster was a real value when they began. Their prices were reasonable and their inventory was large. This was back when videocassette movies cost rental stores $80 per. Once they put the Mom and Pops out of business they got cocky and re-designed their business plan to raise prices and squeeze annoying late-fee money out of consumers that had no where else to go. They made sweetheart deals with the studios for cheaper videocassette copies for a split of the rental proceeds. It made it very difficult for the competition. Socialists would have used them as an example of every bad thing that happens when capitalism goes unchecked.

Only a funny thing happened, technology. Flat DVDs were invented and the costs were much less than the price for rental cassettes. Someone saw an opportunity to pick up market share by offering a better deal. Netflix brought back the value of the Mom and Pops by adding a larger supply than blockbuster and smaller per cost rental fee. The market solved the problem better than the government.

I started with Netflix in 1999 or 2000, but they were located in California and delivery was slow to Florida. I kept with them 6 months or so until I rented all of the obscure stuff I couldn’t get anywhere else and then cancelled. I re-joined in 2002 and was surprised that distribution points now existed in the East. The mail back addresses kept getting closer every few months – Georgia, then Fort Lauderdale, then Lakeland and finally Orlando. These days I get anywhere from 12-15 movies a month for 17.99.

Blockbuster is finally getting into the game of mail order rental and trying to use the 2 free store rentals per month to entice consumers back. I guess the late-fee drop is an indication that they have more ground to make up than they originally understood.

All of the Harvard Business School graduates in that company didn’t understand how Netflix was going to hurt their business. If they had reacted like this only 3-4 years ago, they would have stopped Netflix in its tracks. But big lumbering corporations are not good at anticipating market trends. Those kinds of CEOs are rewarded for playing it safe and driving up stock price in the short term. The result was that a company that would have been called a monopoly just a few years ago is losing market share today.

Contrast the video rental market with the shipping market. UPS and FedEx have ruined the Post Office’s business plan. The Post Office slowly adapted to the private sector model. Any real business at their speed wouldn’t have made it. These days we hear about how much better the Post Office is managed and that they actually make money with their short time package deliveries. What they don’t say is that their package deliveries were as unprofitable as first class mail before they had a private sector business model to copy. What’s further not said is that their monopoly on first class mail drives traffic into their locations and boosts their package delivery business. The monopolized first class mail is still just as unprofitable as the packages once were because they have no one’s business model to copy.

It’s the same with AmTrak that can only exist if the government pays them to exist. The airlines have long ago made most long train trips inefficient and yet here they are sucking up more than a billion tax dollars a year.

Consumers always benefit in a market full of people and companies competing to get their business. It results in lower prices and better services. If the government ran Blockbuster none of these changes would have been made. I suppose that would please our quasi-socialists just fine.

PROFESSIONAL AMATEURS

This kind of plays into the UFO angle that interested citizens are much more knowledgeable about the phenomenon than are our greatest scientists.

A new breed of demi-expert is evolving, collapsing the distinction between an expert and a tinkerer. Cheaper technology offers amateurs increasingly powerful tools; the Internet allows them to collaborate globally and train themselves more rapidly. The upshot is that amateurs are increasingly holding themselves to professional standards and producing significant innovations and discoveries.

The Linux computer system was created by geeks working without pay in their spare time, yet it now rivals Microsoft's best products. Patients arrive at hospitals sometimes better informed about their diseases than their doctors. And amateur lobbyists promoted the Jubilee 2000 campaign, which helped persuade Western nations to cancel more than $30 billion in third-world debt.

Skywatchers are discovering nebulae from their backyards by peering through telescopes they purchase from the internet. This is real scientific progress. The nebula was there waiting to be discovered and cannot discriminate whether it is Joe Amatuer or Joe Astronomer who first sees it.

Pertaining to the UFO phenomenon in particular, it must be noted that since WWII, nearly all respected scientists are on the government payroll either directly, or indirectly with grant funding. They are not paid to look for UFOs, so there is little wonder that they are not seeing them. Undoubtedly, some scientists are paid to look for UFOs, but are not able to disclose what they find outside of government circles.

When Galileo looked to the skies and saw things that defied conventional wisdom, he was threatened with the stake, despite the fact that the pope was his good friend. Today, when citizens look to the skies and see things that defy conventional wisdom, they no longer fear the stake, risking only ridicule by coming forward. There is good data and debate on the UFO phenomenon in amateur societies far removed from official sanction.

In a way, pro-ams represent a return to our past: until the 20th century, much science was conducted by amateur societies. But the rise of pro-ams also reflects recent social changes. We're living longer, which gives us more time to grow bored with our cubicle jobs and to hunger for a richer life. You find people in their 40's and 50's going back to the things they always wanted to do in their youth.

Thus, Dude, in leaving the workforce, becomes immune to public ridicule and takes up research which is interesting even if not culturally approved.

PRAVDA MEANS TRUTH

As many of you know, now that I no longer work for a living, I spend a great deal of my time playing poker and researching the UFO phenomenon and its kissing cousin, quantum physics. Here is an interesting article I discovered that was written in Pravda in 2002 about Chernobyl.

The explosion was very large, but, luckily, it was a thermal blast. The fourth power generating unit was basically destroyed by overheated steam. There was no nuclear explosion. Roughly 180 tons of enriched uranium were in the reactor. If a large blast had happened, half of Europe would not currently be depicted on any maps.
 
There are many theories to explain such luck. One of the theories is that there was help from an Unidentified Flying Object. When troublesome events started to occur, some people saw a spaceship hovering above the fourth generating unit of the Chernobyl plant. Eyewitnesses say that an UFO was there for six hours and that hundreds of people saw it. People started writing about it only two years after the catastrophe. Of course, such information appeared in magazines on ufology. As it is generally believed, serious people don't read such magazines and journals.

Even if you don't buy into this sort of thing, it is interesting nonetheless that such a story ran in Pravda, of all places. Also interesting, and somewhat amusing is the last thought of the story, written by a citizen of an atheist state:

It seems that aliens are not worried with the fate of humanity. They are basically worried about the planets environment.

BLOCKBUSTER DROPS LATE FEES

I was working for Blockbuster when I got married ten years ago, so in a parallel timeline, I could be toiling still for a fading enterprise. The rentals cost three bucks, best I remember, and the late fees were substantial. In fact, the late fees were a substantial percentage of Blockbuster's overall profit.

It estimated that late fees would have contributed about $250 million to $300 million to revenue next year.

People used to bitch and moan about the fees, but I was in the business of collecting, so I could only point out that we make it very clear at checkout when the items are due. I had sympathy, but not much.

Every morning began with calls to customers on the list to remind them that their rentals are overdue and fees are accumulating. As manager, I spent time each day printing up and sending out letters to hint at the possibility of a collection agency getting involved. Sometimes, the late fees would add up to more than the price of purchase. There were always a percentage of patrons who were consistently late and happily settled upon their next visit. There were also customers who we never saw again after their first rental.

Michael Jackson came into the Orlando store one time when I wasn't working and rented a few titles which he never returned. The only one I remember was A VERY BRADY CHRISTMAS. He must have had a thing for Bobby Brady. I was the guy who had to phone his people and secure authorization to charge his Amex for the cost of the title. I wondered at the time what else I could get away with charging to Michael Jackson's Amex.

So, after I quit the job, I rarely rented movies from Blockbuster because their prices were so high. A couple of years ago, I rented a couple of titles, and returned them a day late, understanding that I would owe a late fee. Instead of the half-price penalty I was expecting, I was hit with the full-price cost of the rental. Seems their policy had changed over the years. Rather than tacking on a per-day late charge, they now simply re-rent the movie to you at full price, which gives you the full three days. I complained that I did not want to pay for three days, I simply wanted to settle for my one extra day. No luck, of course. I paid for the second rental period, but I took the movies with me so that I could return them at the end of the new rental period and the store would not be able to profit during that time by renting them to some other sucker. I have not been back to Blockbuster since.

I now enjoy my rentals via mail with Netflix. I pay a monthly fee to have three titles at any given time and I never pay a late charge, even if I keep a movie for two months, which I have done. This no-late-fee concept has really shaken the boys at Blockbuster the past few years. This year, they announced a Netflix-like mail order service, which had the delightful effect of driving down my Netflix subscription price. Now, I see that Blockbuster is doing away altogether with late fees. Of course, there is one catch...

The world's largest video rental company will still have due dates for their rental products -- one week for games and two days or one week for movies, depending on whether it's a new release. But customers will be given a one-week grace period after that to return the product. After that grace period ends, the chain will automatically sell them the product, less the rental fee. If the customers don't want to purchase the movie or game, they can return the product within 30 days for a credit, less a restocking fee.

RICH GETS RICHER

Billionaire Marc Rich has emerged as a central figure in the U.N. oil-for-food scandal and is under investigation for brokering deals in which scores of international politicians and businessmen cashed in on sweetheart oil deals with Saddam Hussein. Rich, the fugitive Swiss-based commodities trader who received a controversial pardon from President Bill Clinton in January 2001, is a primary target of criminal probes under way in the U.S. attorney's office.

The Rich connection is the latest wrinkle in a rapidly mushrooming scandal that has thrown the United Nations into its gravest crisis and has led to numerous calls for U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan to step down. Rich, who fled the country to Switzerland in 1983 to escape an indictment for racketeering and tax evasion as well as trading oil with Ayatollah Khomeini's Iran, has not set foot inside the United States since his pardon.

In January 2001, in the final hours his presidency, Clinton bypassed law-enforcement and intelligence agencies to wipe the books clean for Rich after being subjected to intense lobbying from former Israel Prime Minister Ehud Barak and Rich's jet-setting ex-wife, Denise, who donated more than $1 million to Democratic campaigns — including Sen. Hillary Rodham's first Senate race — along with an additional $450,000 to Clinton's library fund.

This UN scandal is so much fun. Democrats think it is the provincial domain of Republicans to amorally pursue the greenback in backroom dealings with sovereign dictators. No doubt, Republicans are just as crooked as Dems, but generally, the GOP hypocrite is financing some sort of personal liberty for the oppressed masses whereas the lib is simply pursuing money, power, or extramarital sex.

Liberals who see corruption only on the other side of the aisle have always amused me. Lately, the mainstream media has increasingly admitted its long-standing bias, which gives enjoyment to the more reasonable among us. And now the United Nations is wallowing in scandal, another source of quality entertainment. What's even better is that the corruption is bypassing W and heading straight for Teflon Bill.

WHAT PRICE FORTUNE? (cf. Mark 8:36)

Remember this feel-good story? It didn’t take long for tremendous wealth to send this guy down the path traveled by so many lottery winners.

Monday, December 13, 2004 • Last updated 12:01 p.m. PT

CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- The world's first glimpse of Jack Whittaker, winner of the richest undivided lottery jackpot in U.S. history, was of a boisterous, happy-go-lucky guy in a big cowboy hat who loved his family, work and God and promised to share his good fortune with the church and the poor. Two years later, the picture the public is seeing now is a mug shot of a haggard, somber Whittaker.

Although he was already a wealthy contractor, Whittaker became an instant celebrity on Christmas Day 2002 after winning a $314.9 million Powerball jackpot. He took his winnings in a lump sum of $113 million after taxes, and at a news conference in which he came across as a jolly saint, he promised to donate one-tenth to his church and contribute to other causes.

He soon created a charity to help people find jobs, buy food or get an education; he split $7 million among three churches; and he gave money to improve a Little League park and buy playground equipment and coloring books for children.

But in August 2003, a briefcase containing $545,000 in cash and cashier's checks was stolen from Whittaker's sport utility vehicle while it was parked at a strip club, and police disclosed that Whittaker not only frequented strip clubs but was also a high-stakes gambler - which is why he was carrying so much cash. The break-in was the first of several thefts involving Whittaker's vehicle, his office and his house.

One of the thefts occurred at his home on the same day an 18-year-old friend of Whittaker's granddaughter was found dead there. Also, last week Whittaker reported that his 17-year-old granddaughter was missing.

In May, two men sued Whittaker, claiming they were injured when they were tossed out of a nightclub at his request. In another lawsuit, three female employees of a racetrack claim Whittaker assaulted them last year. In January, he was accused of threatening and assaulting a bar manager; on Monday, he was fined $100 and ordered to attend weekly Alcoholics Anonymous meetings.

In a December 2003 interview with The Associated Press, Whittaker said he had provided about $14 million to more than 900 families. Today, his charitable foundation is closed.

Whittaker has an unlisted number, and his lawyers did not respond to requests for an interview. He told the AP last year that he had been bombarded with requests for help, and the fame was taking a toll on his family.

HOW BLOGGERS HELPED THUNE BEAT DASCHLE

Interesting John Fund article that looks back at the campaign.

South Dakota Republicans decided that the Sioux Falls Argus Leader, which dominates the state's media since it's the only paper with a statewide circulation, was hopelessly biased in favor of Mr. Daschle.

"South Dakotas have for the first time been hearing a few things about 'ole Tom' that have surprised," reported The Wall Street Journal's Kim Strassel from South Dakota last October. "Mr. Daschle has assured voters he supports a state law defining marriage as between a man and a woman. Yet in July he voted against a similar constitutional amendment that two-thirds of South Dakotans support. He was a free trader, but now he's not. He's for legal change, but blocked every tort bill. He beats up on drug companies, though his wife, Linda Daschle, lobbies for them."

Randell Beck, executive editor of the Argus Leader, called some of the bloggers work "crap" and said they represented an organized effort by conservatives to discredit his paper. In July, he explained to readers that "true believers of one stripe or another, no longer content to merely bore spouses and neighbors with their nutty opinions, can now spew forth on their own blogs, thereby playing a pivotal role in creating the polarized climate that dominates debate on nearly every national issue. If Hitler were alive today, he'd have his own blog."

But Hitler didn't need a blog, because he owned all the newspapers.

GOLDEN GLOBE NOMINEES

Picture, Drama:

"The Aviator,"
"Closer,"
"Finding Neverland,"
"Hotel Rwanda,"
"Kinsey,"
"Million Dollar Baby."

Actress, Drama:

Scarlett Johansson, "A Love Song for Bobby Long";
Nicole Kidman, "Birth,"
Imelda Staunton, "Vera Drake";
Hilary Swank, "Million Dollar Baby";
Uma Thurman, "Kill Bill: Vol. 2."

Actor, Drama:

Javier Bardem, "The Sea Inside";
Don Cheadle, "Hotel Rwanda";
Johnny Depp (news), "Finding Neverland";
Leonardo DiCaprio (news), "The Aviator";
Liam Neeson, "Kinsey."


Picture, Musical or Comedy:

"Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind,"
"The Incredibles,"
"Andrew Lloyd Webber's The Phantom of the Opera,"
"Ray,"
"Sideways."

Actress, Musical or Comedy:

Annette Bening, "Being Julia";
Ashley Judd, "De-Lovely";
Emmy Rossum, "Andrew Lloyd Webber's The Phantom of the Opera,"
Kate Winslet, "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind,"
Renee Zellweger, "Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason."

Actor, Musical or Comedy:

Jim Carrey, "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind";
Jamie Foxx, "Ray";
Paul Giamatti, "Sideways";
Kevin Kline, "De-Lovely";
Kevin Spacey, "Beyond the Sea."

Director:

Clint Eastwood, "Million Dollar Baby";
Marc Forster, "Finding Neverland";
Mike Nichols, "Closer";
Alexander Payne, "Sideways";
Martin Scorsese, "The Aviator."

The absence of Mel Gibson's PASSION will certainly give some radio talk show fodder.

GOOD NEWS FROM THE FIELD? NOT IF WE CAN HELP IT

I see that the Boston Globe, in an article discussing the relatively light number of war wounds in Iraq that have led to death, did not just twist but actually reversed the slant of the article by applying the headline "Amputation rate for US troops twice that of past wars." But no media bias.

Improvements in battlefield medicine have saved many combatants who would have died in the past: Only 1 in 10 US troops injured in Iraq has died, the lowest rate of any war in US history.

TEN BEST OF THE YEAR

NEWSWEEK

1. Sideways - Still waiting
2. Before Sunset - Very Good
3. Osama - Token exotic film on the list
4. Million Dollar Baby - The Eastwood movie that hasn't arrived here.
5. Bad Education - I've seen 3 of Almodovar's films and I'm usually disappointed.
6. The Aviator - Looks Good
7. Friday Night Lights - Looked pretty standard
8. The Manchurian Candidate - Why remake classics?
9. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban - That Mexican director fresh from his soft porn movie.
10. Kinsey - Roger Simon said they shot the wrong script. He says another version of Kinsey's life has been floating around Hollywood for some years and it was much more tongue and cheek.

Kerik Withdraws His Name for Top DHS Job

In a surprise move, former New York Police Commissioner Bernard Kerik abruptly withdrew his nomination as President Bush's choice to be homeland security secretary Friday night, saying questions have arisen about the immigration status of a housekeeper and nanny he employed.

The decision caught the White House off guard and sent Bush in search of a new candidate to run the sprawling bureaucracy of more than 180,000 employees melded together from 22 disparate federal agencies in 2003.

Kerik informed Bush of his decision to withdraw in a telephone call at 8:30 p.m. EST. "I am convinced that, for personal reasons, moving forward would not be in the best interests of your administration, the Department of Homeland Security or the American people," Kerik said in a letter to the president.

He's such a tough G. Gordon Liddy looking guy. We'll almost need to get Liddy himself to project such an image.

There were a lot of questions about whether he abused his power as Commish. The Times was running stories early in the week about him using his personal power in the wrong ways. Law enforcement is a job with too much professional courtesy and not enough everyone equal under the law.

I have had enough run ins with two-bit cops with an attitude that I'm not entirely upset that a cop is walking, but it would also be nice to have tough-as-nails guys leading this department. Are we destined to wind up with another career politician or bureaucrat?

MEAN GIRLS

I wanted to like this movie. It was written by witty Tina Fey and received tremendously positive reviews upon release. Marci and I were looking for some light fare and we both had an interest in seeing this high school satire. It was watchable, but all in all it seemed very amaeurish. The script was not as smart as we were hoping for, although there were a few laugh out loud moments.

Gym coach doubling as the sex education teacher:
"Abstinence is the only way! (beat) Now everybody get yourself some rubbers."

Principal at assembly:
"Let me hear you! (beat) Okay, settle down."

It must have been the delivery. Skip this flick unless you are interested in the astonishing growth of Lindsay Lohan's bosom since FREAKY FRIDAY.

VAST RIGHT WING CONSPIRACY

Bill Moyers prepares to sign off at age 70.

"I'm going out telling the story that I think is the biggest story of our time: how the right-wing media has become a partisan propaganda arm of the Republican National Committee," says Moyers. "We have an ideological press that's interested in the election of Republicans, and a mainstream press that's interested in the bottom line. Therefore, we don't have a vigilant, independent press whose interest is the American people."

Bill Moyers is a respected journalist. The goal of any respected journalist is to appear completely objective. Why he would choose to call this the biggest story of our time serves only to taint his supposed objectivity. An argument can definitely be made that an increasing number of American news outlets take a transparantly biased conservative point of view. This has filled a vacuum created by decades of liberal "Eastern think" which in Moyer's opinion represents the interest of the American people. Another dinosaur dies when Moyers joins Rather and Brokaw in retirement.

WORD PICTURE OF THE DAY

TRAVELLERS’ tales about being suddenly swallowed by the desert sands may not be so fantastic as they appear.

Dutch scientists have recreated conditions that may sometimes arise when very fine sand is blown by the wind and settles to form a mass so loosely packed that it behaves like a liquid, swallowing up travellers and even vehicles whole.

"Objects often make a splash as they hit sand,” the team reports in Nature. “In this case, there was no splash, as expected, but a straight jet of sand shot violently into the air after about 100 microseconds.”

PACKAGE DELIVERY

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) - A naked man was bit in the genitals by a police dog while being arrested for running nude and entering homes in a Minneapolis neighborhood.

"The dog did what the dog is trained to do, and that is protect his handler," Reier said.

COO COO CA CHOO

They came in the darkness and had bug-like faces. Stranger still, they left a weird egg-shaped object behind. Uri Geller recalls his friend John Lennon’s encounter with the unknown.

I have about as much faith in the powers of Uri Geller as in mangetic bracelets, but here is an irrestible anecdote about his old pal who once declared himself in song The Eggman.

Lennon:

"About six months ago, I was asleep in my bed, with Yoko, at home, in the Dakota Building. And suddenly, I wasn’t asleep. Because there was this blazing light round the door. It was shining through the cracks and the keyhole, like someone was out there with searchlights, or the apartment was on fire.

“That was what I thought — intruders, or fire. I leapt out of bed, and Yoko wasn’t awake at all, she was lying there like a stone, and I pulled open the door. There were these four people out there. Well they didn’t want my f---in’ autograph. They were, like, little. Bug-like. Big bug eyes and little bug mouths and they were scuttling at me like roaches.

I was straight that night. I wasn’t dreaming and I wasn’t tripping. There were these creatures, like people but not like people, in my apartment.”

Sounds like the classic abduction experience. Of course, Geller knows that and he also knows that any good quality abduction anecdote must be from a reliable source (Lennon offers the double whammy of very famous and long dead), and only in the rarest of instances has a paranormal experience been complete with mysterious artifact. Curious that Geller sat on this info for nearly 15 years after Lennon's death, and curiouser still that anybody of this earth would give up an item of supposed extraterrestrial origin. I would be interested to hear from Yoko on this.

EL PRADO

The Prado Museum is renowned as being the largest art gallery in the world. It houses more than 8,600 paintings, of which they exhibit less than 2,000 because of lack of space available. Many museums throughout the world have less artistic riches in their halls than the Prado Museum has in storage.

I'm embarrassed to admit that before today, I had never heard of this place. I will get the chance to spend several days there soon enough. The wife's multinational corporate conglomerate employment is paying off once again, as I will be afforded the opportunity to join her for ten days in Madrid, including New Year's Eve. My crash course has begun - any advice from fellow Junto members who know the city would be appreciated.

Now THIS is dirty politics! Ukrainian opposition leader Yushchenko before and after being poisoned by his foes. Story at http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-1393172_1,00.html.

BUSH - DEEP OR DOPE?

Good article today discussing how Bush likely has a higher IQ than Kerry, and how that just makes Kerry and the lefties crazy.

Democrats’ denunciations of the president’s IQ bemuse me because Bush strikes me as a lazy but clever and unscrupulous operator who, ever since he quit drinking in 1987, has contrived to get whatever he wants out of life. As I wrote in the Oct. 11 American Conservative in a review of John Sayles’s film “Silver City,” in which Chris Cooper portrays a moronic politician with Bush’s mannerisms, “In the president’s lone losing race, his 1978 run for Congress from West Texas, the victor stressed Bush’s two Ivy League degrees. Bush resolved never to allow himself to be outdumbed again. And the Democrats haven’t outsmarted him since.”

John Podhoretz made a book out of this premise. His BUSH COUNTRY masterfully debunked a slate of liberal arguments commonly used to discredit Bush. He convincingly argued that part of Bush's genius is playing dumb.

Sure, your typical liberal is smart, but typically has large blind spots. I know, I was one of them. Generally the left cannot understand the right. The right, however, generally can understand the left. The left thinks the right is wrong because they're stupid, simple, unenlightened, narrow. The right thinks the left is wrong because they're sincerely misguided. The guy who understands both perspectives is the smarter, and generally the more effective.

To demonstrate this point, on Thurs July 29, the day after John Edwards' convention speech, a colleague pulled me into his office and asked me to sit down. He was sincerely perplexed. Earlier that day in the break room, some people were discussing the speech and I mockingly asked whether Edwards had mentioned his father was a mill worker. That's all I said. Later that afternoon this fellow sits me down and says, "I'm confused about something and I wonder if you can help me. I understand you're a big Bush supporter (from that one small comment). Now you're an intelligent person. Explain to me, I really don't understand, how can an intelligent person support Bush?" He really did not understand. We talked, and he nodded, with the occasional "mm" or "I understand," but it was clear he did not and could not understand. That is the liberal elite's mentality in a nutshell. It bothered him so much that he needed to talk to me about it, yet there was no way he was going to be able to receive my point of view. The conversation ended with him suggesting I read a certain book that might bring me around to his way of thinking.

FORGET CLARENCE, WE WANT SCALIA

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid has some suggestions.

Incoming Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid on Sunday had harsh words for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.

When asked to comment on Thomas as a possible replacement for Chief Justice William Rehnquist, Reid told NBC's "Meet the Press": "I think that he has been an embarrassment to the Supreme Court.

"I think that his opinions are poorly written. I just don't think that he's done a good job as a Supreme Court justice."

But the Nevada Democrat said that he could support Thomas' fellow conservative, Justice Antonin Scalia, if he were nominated.

"I cannot dispute the fact, as I have said, that this is one smart guy," Reid said of Scalia. "And I disagree with many of the results that he arrives at, but his reasons for arriving at those results are very hard to dispute."

There's hardly a dime's worth of difference between these two guys philosophically. People have criticized Thomas in the past because he usually doesn't participate in the questioning of the attorneys, but to say his opinions are poorly written is a new one on me.

Thomas is the youngest Justice at 56 years old and Scalia is 68. Reid's comments seem to be a suggestion that Bush will have an easy time promoting the older Scalia. The only other reason would be the Democrats visceral dislike for black conservatives.

You still have to knock the ball over the wall.

M-W.com WORD OF THE DAY

epenthesis \ih-PEN-thuh-siss\ noun : the insertion or development of a sound or letter in the body of a word

Did you know?If you say "athlete" as "ath-a-lete," you've committed epenthesis. Some people consider the pronunciation to be unacceptable, but there's a perfectly good reason why it occurs; epenthesis is simply a natural way to break up an awkward cluster of consonants. It's easier for some people to say "athlete" as three syllables instead of two, just as it's easier for some to insert a "b" sound into "cummerbund," pronouncing that word as "cum-ber-bund." Epenthesis has even contributed to the evolution of recognized spelling variants, giving us such options as "cumberbund" and "sherbert" (for "sherbet"). The word "epenthesis" came to us by way of Late Latin from the Greek verb "epentithenai," which means "to insert a letter."
*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.

I must say my rate of vocabulary expansion has slowed considerably since I started using an online dictionary. I used to see new words while I looked up other words, but now I just get what I'm looking for.

(Courtesy of Trish)

The picture shows that this soldier has been thru Survival School and learned his lessons well. He's giving the sign of "coercion" with his left hand. These hand signs are taught in survival school to be used by POW's as a method of posing messages back to our intelligence services who may view the photo or video. This guy was obviously being coerced into shaking hands with Hillary.

TRIVIA QUESTION

What do General William Westmorland, Actor Eddie Albert, Boxer Max Schmeling, Musician Artie Shaw, and Economist Milton Friedman have in common?

HINT # 1 : It's an achievement but unrelated to their fame, and they haven't been widely recognized for it.

WINNER - E Head

THE ANSWER: All still alive and in the 90s.

Telltale jaw muscles.

I AM CHARLLOTE SIMMONS by Tom Wolfe (A Book Review)

To paraphrase Michael Barone, our society creates the most inept 18 year-olds and the most super competent 30 year-olds in the world. Tom Wolfe shows us in I AM CHARLOTTE SIMMONS how incompetent the 18 year olds of today are, in the setting of a prestigious University full of the best and brightest. His third novel should worry parents and enlighten the rest of us.

Those familiar with Wolfe’s style of new journalism will appreciate how he uses a combination of subtlety and action to reveal character traits and feelings. Wolfe’s characters are funny because they are mostly charlatans, egomaniacs or self-righteous bores. This novel and his last both introduce sympathetic characters and he puts them into a society that doesn’t understand their inherent goodness. Wolfe makes his heroes re-think their own values in a world that would just as soon stomp on them.

Charlotte has been given the immense gift of fleeing her poor rural life and living amongst contemporary geniuses. What she assumes will be discussion groups on philosophy and science is, in fact, a campus of frat parties and hooking up. She’s isolated and clings to her own small town values, but as her loneliness grows deeper, she compromises little things and later bigger things to better fit in. Wolfe gives us 700 pages to watch Charlotte’s strength get sapped by the unforgiving realities of contemporary life.

Along the way we meet jocks, geeks, frat boys, sorority girls, genius professors and radical hippy ones. We meet college coaches and rich parents and famous politicians and very few of them come off looking noble. Wolfe can be salacious when he describes the goings on and it’s a big plus for the book, because we can enjoy the description and later feel morally superior to the acts themselves. It’s not too unlike how Cecil B. DeMille created biblical epics to get away with all kinds of lasciviousness.

This is an unforgiving look at how modern colleges have adopted ancient Greek Bacchus like behavior, while ignoring the virtuous Socratic philosophy. Some writers may have used this material to endlessly moralize, but Wolfe seems more like one of those ancient Greek Gods laughing from Mount Olympus.

BONDS MATURES

See today's espn.com cover story for a visual journey from scrawny Bonds in Pittsburgh to massive Bonds today.

“AMATUER” ATHLETICS

A co-worker and I were talking this morning about how we couldn't remember an equivalent time of college coaching turnovers. Tyrone Willingham and Ron Zook were both coaching at schools that have won the National Title in the last 20 years and they were both fired before the end of the season. Willingham only missed the bowl game while Zook was made to stay and take his medicine for another 6 weeks. On top of that, South Carolina has hired their second consecutive high profile coach, the two men (Lou Holtz and Steve Spurrier) who won those National Championships at Notre Dame and Florida.

It looked at first like Florida was going to woo Spurrier themselves, especially with the mid-season firing of Zook. Spurrier never got the call. It didn't make sense until you realized that University of Florida President, Bernie Machen, was once the President of the University of Utah and there he hired the undefeated football coach, Urban Meyer.

When word got around that Florida was going to woo Urban Meyer, Notre Dame fired Willingham, because Urban Meyer was an assistant under Lou Holtz at Notre Dame and he has a clause in his contract that he can leave that post at any time to coach at Notre Dame.

Joe Paterno and Bobby Bowden are a dying breed. Seldom do college coaches at big programs last all that long anymore. The University of Miami has won National Championships under Jimmy Johnson, Dennis Erickson and Butch Davis and they all used it as a stepping stone to the NFL.

And its not just football. College Basketball coaches like Rick Patino and PJ Carlisimo have used their College success to get a job in the pros.

And its not just coaches. The lion share of college players are there with the hopes of playing in the pros. Most take softball classes even at the top universities and are segregated from the student body as a whole. They aren’t there for an education or career training unless that career is pro athletics. It’s no longer a bunch of guys getting accepted to college and going out for the team. In those days teams like Harvard and Yale could go undefeated. Nowadays college athletics are about money. The NCAA and the colleges make millions of dollars parading their mercenaries around the country.

College athletics is big business and big business means an infusion of money. The money has resulted in college players getting gifts and money for their efforts. The semester that Dude and I were living at UWF, a high school friend transferred to the school and was living across the hall. His first Semester was as a Defensive End in a Eastern school known for academics. They’ve never been competitive at football. He was handed more than $10,000 in cash by alumni to go there. He played the whole season, but blew off his classes and flunked out.

Shawn Kemp was a year behind me in high school in my Indiana days. He was headed to Kentucky to play after high school but couldn’t make the 700 on his SATs. It didn’t prevent someone in the University from giving him a vehicle. And although the local paper went to great lengths to sugar coat the fact, even they couldn’t keep the truth down forever. Kentucky was more than willing to let him sit out a year (the written rule for someone who doesn’t make the 700) but he got into some disciplinary problems, of which details Steve Whitaker could better recall than me, and went straight to the NBA instead.

I don’t blame either of these guys from taking the cash and prizes. The universities and alumni weren’t expecting them to be students. They were being hired as professional athletes with a wink to academics. The thing that irks me is that the NCAA will get high and mighty and penalize teams that hide the fact least effectively. These penalties are less about the nature of amateur sport and more about keeping the façade of amateur sports alive. Let’s face it. If you’re watching the game on national television, then 99 times out of 100 the people on the field or court are being paid, only at much lower amounts than acknowledged professionals. Maybe the Little League World Series would be an exception. I cannot think of another.

If these organizations weren’t being fronted by respected educational institutions they’d probably be in trouble for unfair labor practices. Where else can you make that much money from someone else’s labor without paying at least minimum wage? But I have no problem with these guys playing for free if that is what they want to do. But since they want to be paid and since people are already paying them and since the overall organization is making big money in the process, I don’t see how it’s fair to selectively penalize those schools who blow the cover of the rest.

You have to respect a guy like Joe Paterno that pushed for the 700 SAT score. He remembers the old days in which these games were regional celebrations and athletes were students as much as anything else. We’re just not there anymore. The typical student athlete 50 years ago looked like the average non athlete student at the same school. As the money flowed into the schools, the athletes more and more began to resemble the genetic mutants that can be spotted in the pros.

There are still some guys that get a decent education out of the thing or even a degree. Sometimes that degree can even lead to a good job. I met a former pro athlete that went to an Ivy League college, and he has a nice executive job. He’s probably smarter than most, but I’m sure it was his celebrity more than his brain that landed him the offer.

But most of these students are used up and spit out. You could say that it’s their own fault and I wouldn’t argue that they squandered the best opportunity life ever offered. But even if they did want an education, they are more than likely going to the very best school their transcripts will allow, meaning that they’re at the lower level of that school’s ability. For instance, an athlete could score in the top 25% nationally and get into the University of Michigan for athletics, but the college will be full of students who score in the top 5-10% nationwide. This particular player might be better than average nationally, but he’ll be doomed to struggle at a school like Michigan anyway. He won’t have the time to take the real challenging classes to get the best education, because he’ll need extra effort to keep up. He’ll be forced to take the softball classes in order to get the grades.

How much is an education worth at a top University? Why can’t it just be put into a dollar amount and given to the players on the up and up? Why force them to take this money and spend it on an education they might not want or might not be able to fully utilize? Why not just pay these guys whatever the alumni or schools want to pay them? Why must it be a black market?

The original purpose of college athletics was to fully round out a young man’s character. It was supposed to be an augmentation of the educational experience. Knute Rockne taught Chemistry at Notre Dame. How many of today’s college coaches even took Chemistry?

These coaches moving around are telling a bigger story than that reported by the media. College coaches no longer see themselves as academics or teachers. They’re in the business of professional athletics, and they freely move from the NCAA to the NFL or NBA. They get their million dollar plus salaries above the table and no one accuses them of ruining amateur athletics. But the fact that they can command that much money already tells you that their jobs are no longer about shaping America’s youngsters into better citizens. College coaches are there to win or leave.

Ronald Reagan’s football coach at Eureka could be arguably the most important college football coach of the 20th Century. Reagan always felt that his experience on that mediocre football team shaped him as much as anything else. He learned teamwork and leadership and the value hard work. These are all the things that amateur athletics once promised and delivered. These are things people talk about when arguing against paying athletes. The character qualities are probably still learned in the non-televised sports, but they have very little relation to what happened at the Ohio State – Michigan game.

I’m not lamenting the good old days, but saying that we should be honest about the nature of college athletics. This could start by letting the market dictate what players get for making their colleges rich. It would be fair to everyone and it would better teach children and adults the real nature of the market and its benefits.

SOWELL ON HEROES

Like most of what Dr. Sowell writes, it's hard to quote short passages because each paragraph is as good as the last. Here is my best shot:

You cannot fight a war without many brave men taking risks with their lives in order to try to accomplish their mission. Yet can you name a single American hero in either of the two wars going on today in Afghanistan and Iraq?

Chances are you can't -- not if you rely on the mainstream media. You may be able to name someone from the little band of people involved in the prison scandal in Iraq or perhaps Jessica Lynch who was rescued, but not those who rescued her.

There are apparently no heroes among the more than 100,000 men and women fighting for us overseas -- only victims. At least, that is how the news gets filtered and spun in most of the media.

Enemy casualties, no matter how large, seldom get as much publicity as even a handful of American casualties. A whole ghoul school of journalism was preparing for the thousandth death among American troops in Iraq, so that they could run big features on it.

The New York Times covered page after page with the names of those thousand dead. The television wing of the ghoul school did similar things in their broadcasts. The rationale for this is that they are "honoring" the dead troops and perhaps showing that the media, too, are patriotically "supporting our troops."

Those who are busy "honoring" the deaths of American troops in Iraq seldom have much to say about what those troops accomplished.

This is the approach that gave the media their biggest triumph and ego boost -- the discrediting of the war in Vietnam.

More than 50,000 Americans died trying to save that country from Communist attacks. Their achievements included victories on the battlefield that were negated politically by the way the American press reported the war.

In recent years, Vietnam's Communist leaders themselves have admitted that they lost that war on the ground but hung on because the American anti-war movement gave them hope that they could win it politically. It was a well-founded hope that the American media helped make come true when we withdrew both our troops and our financial and political backing for the Vietnamese under attack.

At that time, the media had not yet come up with the gimmick of "honoring" American war dead but they were nevertheless able to throw away the victory for which those men sacrificed their lives.

Will they repeat that heady achievement a second time in Iraq? They certainly seem to be trying. And it is no honor.

MORE STEROID TALK

DUDE WRITES:

Steroid use produces big offense which puts butts in seats. Gambling produces wary fans which removes butts from seats. Baseball's morality correlates precisely with fan attendance.

The baseball brass is certainly interested in gate, and maybe they turned the other way to boost attendance after the 1994 debacle, but if the media plays this story up like the did the Rose story baseball will regret their short-term profits.

I doubt Rose’s gambling was going to make fans question baseball’s integrity. Pete's gambling addiction was a part of his competitive personality and fans knew he wasn't throwing games. But once the media uncovered it and reported it like a sin, baseball had to do something. They probably could have suspended Rose for a year and made the appropriate contrite remarks had Pete told them the truth up front. I think it was his cover up that hurt him. It pitted him and baseball against the reporters who uncovered the truth and it forced baseball to part with Rose.

I think MLB was angrier with the lie than the behavior, because it made them look inept. They would have gladly soft-pedaled it had Pete given them a chance. It's well known in the baseball annuls that Ty Cobb and Tris Speaker probably conspired to throw a 1925 game. Cobb had actually bet on other games before 1919. Without an ESPN to muckrake, MLB could easily ignore it.

And I also say this because even with the cheating, Charles Commiskey was lobbying the other owners to go easy on his 8 Black Sox players and the other owners didn’t mind. The agreement was set, but Commissioner Landis had absolute power and he vetoed the deal. Unlike Selig or Fay Vincent and the rest, Landis had a lifetime contract and despot-like power.

If the players now in question for steroids were suspected for gambling on baseball what would the league do? They’d really be in a pickle. They’d almost have to let them go, but they would do so screaming. The precedent is set between 1919 and Rose. If it had not been for Landis forcing that medicine down their throats, baseball might not have any credibility today.

That’s why the penalty for steroid use should be the same. Without throwing the fear of God into the rest of the players, the temptation of steroids won’t go away. Right now players take steroids to turn $2 million contracts into $15 million contracts. The only disincentive to that is turning $2 million contracts into Customer Service jobs at Target.

Yeah, the homers may be fun for a while, but once you get use to them in greater numbers, they're no longer exciting. Baseball fans are not like NBA fans. You can't just give them the equivalent of the slam dunk to build a lasting fan base. Fans of other sports may pay more attention to Sosa-McGwire face-offs, but they’re not going to stick with the game for the long run.

The real hard core fans of MLB have a greater sense of history than fans of other sports. Does any sport hold more precious their age-old records? DiMaggio, Maris, Aaron give us a bridge to that past. Who held the record for most touchdown passes before Dan Marino? Who recorded the most lifetime assists before Magic Johnson? The average adult wearing a football or basketball jersey is not likely to know either.

Old time players? The guy wearing the baseball cap knows Babe Ruth, Ty Cobb, Lou Gehrig, Mickey Mantle, Jackie Robinson, Willie Mays, Hank Arron etc etc. Does the average basketball fan even know Oscar Robertson or Bob Cousey or even Bill Russell?

The conventional wisdom might state that Rose’s gambling could crumble fan confidence. Maybe if fans thought long and hard about Rose’s use of Mario Soto, they might come to the conclusion that they were had. They will never take the leap that Rose lost games on purpose. But if Rose’s possible selfish use of players is enough to alter games and erode fan confidence, won’t fans become cynical that the sacred records of baseball are crumbling with the use of illegal drugs?

Maybe I’m alone in thinking that baseball has lost something over the years. I should have been crushed when the Bosox beat the Yankees this year, but I stopped watching after Boston took the big lead and didn’t lose an ounce of sleep worrying over it. The Yankees loss to the Mariners in the 1995 playoffs and the lousy umpiring in that series made me angry for a year. I didn’t feel that bad last year when I paid $200 a ticket to see the Marlins beat the Yankees in Game Four. It was more like, “Oh, well, at least we got to see a World Series game.”

Baseball owners will do whatever it takes to keep the sports press happy on this one. The fans won’t be outraged until the press is. The press made the Black Sox scandal and the Rose scandal. They weren’t scandals until they told us they were. If ESPN and USA Today are writing stories about how MLB is encouraging drug use with their soft penalties they will do more to curb this behavior. But a player can lose a year or two and still gain more by cheating. Only a lifetime ban will stop the best players; the ones that can break the records dishonestly. The little guy who can’t play at all without drugs might still take a chance, but the star athlete won’t take a risk if the penalty is everything.

It will be up to the media (sadly) to decide how honest the game is going to be.

Pre-War Cracker Jack Set

A complete set of 1914 Cracker Jack baseball cards featuring "Shoeless" Joe Jackson and Ty Cobb has been sold for a record $800,000. The cards did not have the usual caramel stains found on many Cracker Jack cards and were in pristine condition.

The set includes a rare Christy Mathewson card that looks "like it was printed yesterday." Sportscard Guaranty, which evaluated the cards for authenticity and quality, called the set "monumental." "It's hard to find words that would do this set justice, "said SGC president Dave Forman, in a statement. "The Joe Jackson card ... is the finest pre-war card our firm has ever graded. In my opinion, it is the best pre-war card in existence period."

I visited a relative this past summer who astonished me with his pre-war baseball card collection. I believe he had this set, although it was marred by the predictable caramel stains.

Wheel of Misfortune Befalls Theo Van Gogh

Who knew Pat Sajak had anything worthwhile to say? This is a mighty fine piece pointing out hypocrisy in Hollywood. A Dutch filmmaker produced an anti-abortion piece and was brutally murdered in return. The Hollywood elitists, who would tear the Bill of Rights to shreds if this happened to Aaron Sorkin, have nothing to say.

Is it just possible that there are those who are reluctant to criticize an act of terror because that might somehow align them with President Bush, who stubbornly clings to the notion that these are evil people who need to be defeated? Could the level of hatred for this President be so great that some people are against anything he is for, and for anything he is against?

As nutty as it sounds, how else can you explain such a muted reaction to an act that so directly impacts creative people everywhere? Can you conceive of a filmmaker being assassinated because of any other subject matter without seeing a resulting explosion of reaction from his fellow artists in America and around the world?

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind


I have been looking forward to seeing this film for some time and finally did see it yesterday on DVD. I must say that while I did enjoy it, I wasn't so impressed as I had hoped I would be, despite the raving 92% approval rate at Rotten Tomatoes.

Ever since being blown away by BEING JOHN MALKOVICH, and fancying myself a bit of a writer, I have followed with interest the career of screenwriter Charlie Kaufman. Malkovich was directed by noted music video impresario, Spike Jonze, who did a genius job at the helm of his feature debut. Kaufman was instantly regarded a genius as well, and his scripts were brought out of the desk drawer and produced as quickly as possilbe.

Another big music director, Michel Gondry directed HUMAN NATURE from a Kaufman script. The premise was amusing, and the script possibly was clever, but the film doesn't work at all. I came away thinking Gondry was a hack.

Next came CONFESSIONS OF A DANGEROUS MIND based on the semi-fictional (perhaps) autobiography of Chuck Barris, and marking the directorial debut of George Clooney. I really enjoyed this film. I thought Sam Rockwell did a great job acting, and Clooney did a great job directing, and Kaufman's script was good.

ADAPTATION was another pairing of a Kaufman script to a Spike Jonze joint. Again, the result was no less than genius. Despite a bit of confusion in the third act, the story was enjoyable while being delightfully avant garde. As a frustrated writer, I will never forget the sequence in which the Nicholas Cage screenwriter struggles with his tendency to want to include billions of years of prehistory into his backstory of the orchid thief. Every time I get the desire to write a screenplay, I instead get trapped in the research phase, which compels me to read dozens of books to learn as much as there is to know about a subject before I delve into the script. This is not a recipe for writing, only a recipe for getting lost inside your own head.

So, ETERNAL SUNSHINE reunites Kaufman with Gondry, and while the script touched on genius, I was less than impressed with the director's handling of the material. The result is a good, but not great film. I looked up Gondry, to see what this hack was all about, and I discovered that he is considered a visual genius, with an impressive resume of music videos, short films, and commercials. In his short form work, he was the first artist to employ the visual trick that would later gain fame as "bullet time" in THE MATRIX. He may be a visual wunderkind, but it hasn't yet shown in his two features. Neither film is a visual extravaganza, and both of them suffer from pacing issues which often plague a short-from artist stepping up to features.

Can We Tax It?

Since the volcano began erupting in early October, it has been pumping out 50 to 250 tons a day of sulfur dioxide, the lung-stinging gas that causes acid rain and contributes to haze. At peak, that's more than double the amount from all the state's industries combined.

Normally, the state's No. 1 polluter is a coal-fired power plant owned by the Canadian firm TransAlta. The plant churned out 200 tons a day of sulfur dioxide until regulators demanded $250 million worth of renovations, bringing the level down to 27 tons a day.

Tough to get those kind of results from a volcano.

Good News For Mason

Results from an animal study conducted at Johns Hopkins show that stem cell therapy can be used effectively to treat heart attacks, or myocardial infarcts, in pigs.  Stem cells taken from another pig's bone marrow, when injected into the animal's damaged heart, were able to restore the heart's function to its original condition.

If further animal studies and human clinical trials prove equally successful, the Johns Hopkins researchers believe this could be a new, widely applicable treatment to repair and reverse the damage done to heart muscle that has been infarcted, or destroyed, after losing its blood supply.

"Among its many benefits are that adult stem cells are readily available, meaning they can be extracted from the patient, no donor is required, and the cells can be simply reproduced if more are needed.  In our animal experiment, the treatment regimen was relatively simple, requiring only injection to the damaged tissue. The therapy was extremely effective, allowing for almost complete recovery, with no serious complications, such as immunosuppression, which is a problem in organ transplantation. Now, we need to see how it works in people."

I asked a heart doctor what he thought about this, and he predicted we are at least ten years away from seeing anything like this at UCLA, but it is undoubtedly something which bears watching. It may not save Liz, but if I can get Mason to his teen years, this holds promise.

Outsource to This Canuck

Vincent Tao, an engineer at Toronto's York University said he has invented a mapping and surveillance tool called SAME (see anywhere, map anywhere), that produces images so sharp that geographic co-ordinates typed into a Web site can reveal the make of a car parked on the street.

Tao said SAME works by taking satellite images of the Earth and combining them with real-time remote sensors that monitor traffic and weather. The information is reformatted on a searchable Web site that can capture ground-level images of the Earth with little or no time delay. The resolution is 60 cm (2 feet) -- fine enough to determine the make of a car, though not the details of a human face, according to Tao.

The Pentagon wants to spend $200 billion to do this same thing.

Malibu, Baby!

Since we have been married, Marci has received no less than half a dozen summons for jury duty, while I have received none. The trend followed us from Florida to California, even as Marci's schedule ramped up and mine wound down. She was again ordered to appear at a Chatsworth court this past summer. Her unpredictable travel schedule forced her to reschedule several times until finally getting the chore over with about a month ago.

I have opined my inability to receive jury duty. I'm not working, I'm not doing anything that wouldn't be spiced up by a day or month of civic duty. Finally, it arrived. My first ever summons, set for the week of January 10, 2005 - and Malibu, no less. All kinds of good stuff happens in Malibu. Maybe I can finally get Robert Downey Jr the help he deserves. Perhaps I can protect Barbara from the invasive paparazzi, so that she can demonstrate against our government unmolested. I can't wait. I'll update in January.

Revised NBA logo.

RATHER POIGNANT

Peggy Noonan has a poignant reflection on Dan Rather's career in today's WSJ.

Two things to be said here. One is that CBS News hasn't changed that much, and the other is that the media world in which it operates has changed completely. The whole context has changed. No one has to accept the enforced corporate liberalism of the networks anymore, as they did from 1950 through 1990. They have options, from cable to Fox to the Internet to hundreds and thousands of radio shows, newspapers, magazines. The old network hegemony is over. That's why network news viewership is down, that's why the evening news isn't appointment TV anymore. America didn't turn crazily right, Americans just finally got political options in how they'd get the news, and took advantage of them.

BASEBALL'S BIGGEST PROBLEM

New York Yankees star Jason Giambi told a federal grand jury that he had injected himself with human growth hormone during the 2003 baseball season and had started using steroids at least two years earlier, The Chronicle has learned.

Giambi has publicly denied using performance-enhancing drugs, but his Dec. 11, 2003, testimony in the BALCO steroids case contradicts those statements, according to a transcript of the grand jury proceedings reviewed by The Chronicle.

The onetime Oakland A's first baseman and 2000 American League Most Valuable Player testified that in 2003, when he hit 41 home runs for the Yankees, he had used several different steroids obtained from Greg Anderson, weight trainer for San Francisco Giants star Barry Bonds.

How can you ban Pete Rose for life and ignore this?

ZERG!

Who finally beat Jeopardy king Ken Jennings? (actually in September but just aired)

What a splendid epitaph:

He combined an extraordinary breadth of knowledge, uncanny skill at sensing the precise instant to ring his buzzer, and a sharp competitive instinct hidden behind his grin and polite manner.

I have often thought Dude would be unstopple on Jeopardy. But this man redefined unstoppable. Hats off to the king.

FREE TRADE GOOD

Gee, now that the election's over, turns out Bush was right about everything.

I hate to be the bearer of good news, because only pessimists are regarded as intellectually serious, but we're in the 11th month of the most prosperous year in human history. Last week, the World Bank released a report showing that global growth 'accelerated sharply' this year to a rate of about 4 percent.

Best of all, the poorer nations are leading the way. Some rich countries, like the United States and Japan, are doing well, but the developing world is leading this economic surge. Developing countries are seeing their economies expand by 6.1 percent this year - an unprecedented rate - and, even if you take China, India and Russia out of the equation, developing world growth is still around 5 percent.

This is having a wonderful effect on world poverty, because when regions grow, that growth is shared up and down the income ladder. In its report, the World Bank notes that economic growth is producing a ''spectacular'' decline in poverty in East and South Asia. Less dramatic declines in extreme poverty have been noted around the developing world, with the vital exception of sub-Saharan Africa.

It now seems quite possible that we will meet the U.N.'s Millennium Development Goals, which were set a few years ago: the number of people living in extreme poverty will be cut in half by the year 2015. As other research confirms, these rapid improvements at the bottom of the income ladder are contributing to and correlating with declines in illiteracy, child labor rates and fertility rates. The growth in the world's poorer regions also supports the argument that we are seeing a drop in global inequality.

What explains all this good news? The short answer is, this thing we call globalization. Over the past decades, many nations have undertaken structural reforms to lower trade barriers, shore up property rights and free economic activity. International trade is surging. The poor nations that opened themselves up to trade, investment and those evil multinational corporations saw the sharpest poverty declines. Write this on your forehead: Free trade reduces world suffering.

BEST BRITISH PM OF THE 20th CENTURY

1 Clement Attlee (Lab. 1945-51) 8.34
2 Winston Churchill (Con. 1940-45, 51-55) 7.88
3 David Lloyd George (Lib. 1916-22) 7.33
4 Margaret Thatcher (Con. 1979-90) 7.14
5 Harold Macmillan (Con. 1957-63) 6.49
6 Tony Blair (Lab. 1997- ) 6.30
7 Herbert Asquith (Lib. 1908-16) 6.19
8 Stanley Baldwin (Con. 1923-24, 24-29, 35-37) 6.18
9 Harold Wilson (Lab. 1964-70) 5.93
10 Lord Salisbury (Con. 1895-1902) 5.75
11 Henry Campbell-Bannerman (Lib. 1906-08) 5.01
12 James Callaghan (Lab. 1976-79) 4.75
13 Edward Heath (Con. 1970-74) 4.36
14 Ramsay MacDonald (Lab. 1924, 29-31, 31-35) 3.73
15 John Major (Con. 1990-97) 3.67
16 Andrew Bonar Law (Con. 1922-23) 3.50
17 Neville Chamberlain (Con. 1937-40) 3.43
18 Arthur Balfour (Con. 1902-05) 3.42
19 Alec Douglas-Home (Con. 1963-64) 3.33
20 Anthony Eden (Con. 1955-57) 2.53

Clement Atlee? A leftwing fantasy. Any poll that doesn't have Churchill number one has no credibility.