Saturday, January 22, 2005
Coming Back to Get Us
It's a quiet morning here in Wisconsin--if you don't count the guys with the giant gas-powered snowblowers who felt the need to clear the walkways outside my condo at 4AM. (They'll be back tomorrow, I'd wager--out my office window at the moment is a scene of Arctic splendor.) It's a good morning to reflect on the fact, oft stated but easily forgotten, that while the Shi'ite Repugs currently running the country might think they can make of history whatever they want, they can't erase the names or the legacies of the people who have fought, are fighting, and will fight against their meanness of spirit.
If you're interested in helping a good fight yourself, go here and see if your Senator is on the Judiciary Committee. Then get in touch with him or her first thing Monday morning and express your opposition to the nomination of Alberto Gonzales to be attorney general. According to Liberal Oasis, only one Democrat, Ted Kennedy, has said how he will vote, and at this moment, all he will say is that he's leaning toward a no vote. It's important that Democrats hold the line and vote against Gonzales as a bloc--so much so that committee chair Arlen Spector has gone on record saying he's worried about the effect of a united Dem opposition. So get in touch already. The vote is going to be next week. The best thing to do is to call your senator's Washington office. E-mails are dime a dozen (although it couldn't hurt to send one, too), and if you write a snail-mail letter, it won't get through in time. All Congressional mail is still being irradiated to kill anthrax, and can be delayed for weeks before somebody actually reads it.
Predictions Sure to Be Wrong: I will go into less detail with my football picks for this weekend because there are only two games tomorrow, and because I was pretty wrong last week--although in the two games I picked correctly, Pittsburgh over New York and Philadelphia over Minnesota, I nailed the number of points scored by the winning team. (One must tout his successes even when modest--it's the American Way.)
Philadelphia over Atlanta. It's going to be cold and windy in Philadelphia with some snow. You'd think this favors a team that runs the ball, like Atlanta, but some experts say it actually favors a passing team, like Philadelphia. The more you listen to experts, the less you think you know. Philadelphia 21, Atlanta 14.
New England over Pittsburgh. Patriots quarterback Tom Brady reminds me of Bart Starr, the great Packers quarterback of the 1960s, who is still my favorite football player of all time. Like Starr, Brady rarely makes mistakes, runs the offense like it was a Ferrari, and is capable of carrying the team on his back when necessary. And after watching the Patriots' defense befuddle Peyton Manning last week, I am convinced that a Patriots' win is a close to a mortal lock as anything in recent years, no matter how talented the Steelers are. New England 28, Pittsburgh 17.
Keep in mind that at least one of these predictions is likely to be wrong, and also that one of these games could very easily be a blowout, rather than the fairly close games I am predicting and fans would like to see. That's because I have been listening to experts all week, and they've rendered me stupid.
It's a quiet morning here in Wisconsin--if you don't count the guys with the giant gas-powered snowblowers who felt the need to clear the walkways outside my condo at 4AM. (They'll be back tomorrow, I'd wager--out my office window at the moment is a scene of Arctic splendor.) It's a good morning to reflect on the fact, oft stated but easily forgotten, that while the Shi'ite Repugs currently running the country might think they can make of history whatever they want, they can't erase the names or the legacies of the people who have fought, are fighting, and will fight against their meanness of spirit.
...the renegades, the outcasts....the iconoclasts, the trail blazers, the visionaries and those we thought had lost their way...only to find that they had gone out so far in advance of us, sometimes to the good and sometimes to the bad, that they had to come back to get us....Kid Oakland and the readers of Daily Kos are in the process of assembling a list. That Oakland . . . dude can write.
If you're interested in helping a good fight yourself, go here and see if your Senator is on the Judiciary Committee. Then get in touch with him or her first thing Monday morning and express your opposition to the nomination of Alberto Gonzales to be attorney general. According to Liberal Oasis, only one Democrat, Ted Kennedy, has said how he will vote, and at this moment, all he will say is that he's leaning toward a no vote. It's important that Democrats hold the line and vote against Gonzales as a bloc--so much so that committee chair Arlen Spector has gone on record saying he's worried about the effect of a united Dem opposition. So get in touch already. The vote is going to be next week. The best thing to do is to call your senator's Washington office. E-mails are dime a dozen (although it couldn't hurt to send one, too), and if you write a snail-mail letter, it won't get through in time. All Congressional mail is still being irradiated to kill anthrax, and can be delayed for weeks before somebody actually reads it.
Predictions Sure to Be Wrong: I will go into less detail with my football picks for this weekend because there are only two games tomorrow, and because I was pretty wrong last week--although in the two games I picked correctly, Pittsburgh over New York and Philadelphia over Minnesota, I nailed the number of points scored by the winning team. (One must tout his successes even when modest--it's the American Way.)
Philadelphia over Atlanta. It's going to be cold and windy in Philadelphia with some snow. You'd think this favors a team that runs the ball, like Atlanta, but some experts say it actually favors a passing team, like Philadelphia. The more you listen to experts, the less you think you know. Philadelphia 21, Atlanta 14.
New England over Pittsburgh. Patriots quarterback Tom Brady reminds me of Bart Starr, the great Packers quarterback of the 1960s, who is still my favorite football player of all time. Like Starr, Brady rarely makes mistakes, runs the offense like it was a Ferrari, and is capable of carrying the team on his back when necessary. And after watching the Patriots' defense befuddle Peyton Manning last week, I am convinced that a Patriots' win is a close to a mortal lock as anything in recent years, no matter how talented the Steelers are. New England 28, Pittsburgh 17.
Keep in mind that at least one of these predictions is likely to be wrong, and also that one of these games could very easily be a blowout, rather than the fairly close games I am predicting and fans would like to see. That's because I have been listening to experts all week, and they've rendered me stupid.
