U.S. Representative Jim McDermott: Affordable Care Act

Source:U.S. Representative Jim McDermott- talking about the House Republicans 37th attempt in 3 years, to repeal the Affordable Care Act. (Also known as ObamaCare)

"Rep. McDermott on Republicans' 37th Vote to Repeal the Affordable Care Act" 

From Representative Jim McDermott

You would generally have a better chance of seeing bird fly a real plane or win the Indianapolis 500 in a race car, then to see me agree with Representative Jim McDermott (Democrat, Washington State on anything. Perhaps a January heat wave in Wisconsin or a blizzard in South Florida, happens more often than I agree with Representative Jim McDermott on anything. 

Not that I don't like Jim McDermott, because I actually do, because at the very least you always know what the man is thinking. Which makes him as special as the Cleveland Indians winning the World Series. That just doesn't happen very often in Congress (House or Senate) so when it does, you meed to give the member credit for it. 

My broader and more serious point here is (and yes, I have one) is that Jim McDermott is not just right here, but he's damn right. House Republicans made the whole 112th Congress about reducing the deficit and repealing the Affordable Care Act. They won on deficit reduction and I give them credit for that. But even the U.S. Supreme Court believes the ACA the law of the land. 

House Republicans didn't gain seats in 2012, they lost 8. The Republican Party didn't win back The White House in 2012, they lost it again. Not only that, but Senate Democrats not only held the Senate, but picked up 2 seats. So what's the point on voting to once again repeal the ACA, when you know the legislation will never even get out of Congress, let alone get to The White House? 

Scott Scherer: ‘The Last Days of the Old Cleveland Browns’

Source:Scott Sherer- that famous 1987 AFC Championship Game between the Cleveland Browns and Denver Broncos, with Browns RB Earnest Byner's fumble.

Source:The Daily Journal

“With the recent start to the football season, Art Modell’s passing, and the recent showing of “Cleveland ’95” (NFL)

on the NFL Network, it seemed timely to put this video I made up for viewing. When I first heard the song “These Days”, the storyline of the Browns immediately came to mind.

“But its alright, yea its alright, say its alright…easy for you to say”

From Scott Sherer

This looks more like the story of the 1990s Browns before they relocated to Baltimore and became the Ravens and the New Browns came into existence in 1999. To me this looks like the story of the Bill Belichick Browns which is a good story because it’s about a guy who was getting his first shot as a NFL head coach and something he deserved, but he inherited a bad football team in 1991.

Coach Belichick’s first season where the good days of the Browns of the 1980s were gone and they had become a team that you could expect to lose ten plus games every year. And Bill Belichick didn’t get off to a good start in Cleveland. And started with three straight losing seasons from 1991-93 where progress was slow, but where it finally paid off.

In 1994 the Browns becoming winners and a playoff team for the first time in five years. But financial problems in Cleveland with the Browns playing at a mammoth, aging, stadium in Cleveland Municipal Stadium and these issues were real and the Browns simply wouldn’t have been successful in Cleveland playing in that stadium.

Jesse Shipp: Don Coryell- The Air Coryell Chargers

Source:Jesse Shipp with an NFL Films clip about former NFL head coach Don Coryell.

 
Source:The Daily Journal

“A short video about Don Coryell from the “History Of The San Diego Chargers”

From Jesse Shipp

I wouldn’t put the 1981 San Diego Chargers on the NFL Films list of teams that didn’t win Super Bowls, that would’ve and what they call Missing Rings. For the simple fact that they didn’t have a Super Bowl team, they had a Super Bowl passing game.

But so did the San Francisco 49ers, Los Angeles Raiders, Washington Redskins all teams that had Super Bowl passing games. But all teams that won Super Bowls in the 1980s because they had Super Bowl teams. They all had great running games as well as great defenses so they didn’t have to score 30-35 points a game and get into shootouts to win.

Great teams are able to put up a lot of points, when their defense has a bad game, or when they are blowing their opponents away that much it was, because they were blowing teams away because their defense is also playing well.

The Chargers at least of 1981 and look at their playoff games of 1982, 1980 and 1979 and when they became playoff contenders in 1978, they were a passing team without a great running game, at least at playoff time that struggled on defense in the playoffs as well.

So I would put the Chargers in the level of the Miami Dolphins of the early and mid-1980s. Great quarterback and receivers, but not much else that stands out as being part of a great team.

I would put the 1981 Chargers on a list of teams that what would’ve been if they had a good defense as well. And then maybe we are talking about the 1981 Chargers like we are talking about the 1999 St. Louis Rams. A team with basically the exact same offense, but with a great running game as well and also one of the best defenses in the NFL in 1999.

What Air-Coryell was, is basically what I call the Spread Vertical Offense: where basically everyone on offense except for of course the QB and offensive line, are receivers and targets in the passing game where you throw the ball to everyone all over the field.

With a spread offense the defense has to cover the whole field, but where there’s at least one deep option on every pass play sending at least one corner back to go downfield. And hopefully a safety as well leaving the rest field open to other players for the QB to get the ball too.

The problem with the Air-Coryell version of the SVO is that it was a warm dry weather offense. That once the weather goes bad, the Chargers running game wasn’t good enough to pick up the slack for the passing game struggling. When the defenses know that you have to run the ball. The 1981 AFC Final against the Cincinnati Bengals otherwise known as The Freezer Bowl, perfect example.

The reason why the Chargers lost the 1981 AFC Final to the Cincinnati Bengals in what’s known as the Freezer Bowl, horrible football weather is because the Bengals were a big running team that got their big pass plays off of play-action with QB Ken Anderson. That were better defensively and a tougher team than the Chargers and well-suited to win in bad weather.

The Chargers were too single-dimensional, too reliant on the passing game to win. With not enough of a running game and defense to pick up the slack when the passing game was off.

The New York Times: Can Diversity Survive Without Affirmative Action?

Source:The New York Times at the University of California Berkeley.

Source:FreeState MD

“The Supreme Court is expected to rule soon in a case involving the University of Texas on the use of race and ethnicity in college and university admissions nationwide. California, Florida, Michigan and Washington have already outlawed affirmative action in admissions decisions.

If a conservative Supreme Court curtails the ability of universities to use race in admissions, could there still be a liberal result with greater emphasis on economic disadvantage in admissions, more financial aid for low-income students, better outreach and reduced emphasis on legacy preferences?”

From The New York Times

With all due to respect to The New York Times: I don’t think this is the right question. I don’t think this should be a choice, I don’t think we should be looking for a diverse society, or a just society.

To be a true, liberal democracy, free society, we have to be a just society. And in a country that’s as diverse as we are, not just racially, ethnically, culturally, religiously, politically, we have to be a just society.

In a just society, everyone is entitled to a fair shot at achieving their own freedom and everyone is treated equally under law. Not rewarded or punished, simply because of their race, ethnicity, gender, religion, culture, sexuality. But we’re all treated equally under law. And rewarded based on what we contribute to society, what we do for ourselves. But also justly held accountable for our bad behavior.

ABC Sports: FBS 1984-Sugar Bowl-Nebraska Cornhuskers @ Louisiana Tigers: Full Game

Source:ABC Sports 1985 Sugar Bowl intro.

Source:The Daily Journal

“This video is a telecast, broadcast, and production of ABC. I claim no ownership of this material, and do not profit from it in any way. This video is intended for historical and educational viewing purposes.”

From BM Boldt

An interesting matchup for a Sugar Bowl, because you have a power football oriented Big 12 football team in the Nebraska Cornhuskers, on both sides of the ball, where they probably ran the ball seventy to eighty percent of the time, including their quarterback, with a big strong offensive line as well and big and strong on defense.

The Cornhuskers essentially playing a spread offense Louisiana Tigers team, that spread the defense out with three receivers or more, looking for one on one mismatch advantages that they could take advantage of, with their speed receivers and running backs and throwing the ball quickly.

So in a matchup like that where both teams move the ball very well and score a lot of points, but does it differently, it is the defense that plays the best and adjust the best that generally wins the game.

Janet Jackson: The Pleasure Principle

Source:Janet Jackson's The Pleasure Principle official video from 1986.

Source:The Daily Journal

“Music video by Janet Jackson performing The Pleasure Principle.”

From Janet Jackson

To be completely honest with you: if you were to judge The Pleasure Principle as just a song and listened to Janet Jackson just sing the song standing in front of a microphone and without the dancing, we are not talking about a very good song.

I’m a Janet fan, but the song itself is not that great and maybe that is just part of the era that it came from which is the 1980s, which wasn’t a very good decade for American music rhythm and blues, or anything else. And I think this song is somewhat cheesy compared with the 1990s which was great decade for American music.

I’ve seen this video and heard this song countless times and I’m still not sure what this is about. But if you judge the song by just the video, this is a great video, song or no song. The music to the lyrics are very good and you throw in Janet herself and I don’t know if there is a better singer/dancer than Janet Jackson. Easily one of the best musical dancers of all-time and one of the sexiest as well if not the best of all-time.

Janet is a very attractive beautiful baby-face woman with a great body. Who almost thirty-years later after this song came out, she hasn’t lost a thing anywhere. And if anything she is a better entertainer now than she was in 1986.

Chuck Collins: George McGovern 1972- The People’s Campaign

Source:Chuck Collins with a 1972 George McGovern for President ad.

Source:FreeState MD

“This is about the truth of it, sadly. Yet even knowing all that, we re-elected him in a landslide. What does that say about us?”

From Chuck Collins

Just because Senator McGovern didn’t have a snowball’s chance in hell of winning the 1972 presidential election because of how popular President Nixon was then and with his foreign policy success. Including ending the Vietnam War and opening Russia and China.

And with the state of the Democratic Party thanks to the emergence of the New-Left in it that became todays Green Party and Occupy Wall Street movement. It was as if what Democrats were saying with George McGovern:“We’re not going to win anyway. So we might as well nominate our heart and go down big, but swinging.”

Just because you probably aren’t going to win an election, it doesn’t mean you have to prove to the wold how unqualified you are to not just govern a huge divided country, but to even win the presidency. And go out-of-your-way to do what you can to make that happen for yourself. And not run the best campaign that you can. Otherwise you might as well not have bothered running for president in the first place. And stay in the Senate and continue be part of the loyal opposition in Congress instead.

But what happened with the McGovern Campaign is that they never gave themselves much of an opportunity to win this election. And neither did the Democratic Party with the division between the Center-Left and Far-Left in the party.

I have a lot of respect for how George McGovern as far as how he managed his life and career. He truly was a public servant and a people’s politician and always believed in doing what was in the public’s interest. Also as far as what he accomplished politically and moving the Democratic Party from being dependent on racists anti-minority Dixiecrats to win presidential elections. By bringing in ethnic and racial minorities, as well as women and men. And making the Democratic Party very competitive in the North.

But the McGovern presidential campaign represents what can happen to the Democratic Party when their leadership is weak. And they don’t have a strong Center-Left establishment. And as a result they become divided and their Far-Left takes over. And they nominate George McGovern as their leader in 1972.