Salon Magazine: Michael Lind: 'The South is Holding America Hostage'

Source:FreeState MD

I seem to be writing a lot of responses lately to people who are on the lets say on the social democratic left in America who do not like our form of government to begin with because we are a federal republic. Instead of a unitary government where most of the power is centralized with the federal government. With states and local governments only being left to do what the feds allow them to do. 

The United Kingdom of Britain is a perfect example of a unitary government. And I believe they are paying a heavy price for that now. With Scotland looking to break away from Britain all together. And when Social Democrats get the opportunity to say "look-see, we told you that federalism doesn’t work and we need to become like Europe. And basically take their form of centralize government and apply that to the United States". 

Under a unitary governmental system, we would  basically only have states in name only. You try a system like that in America and you would see states looking to break away and not just in the South. But you would see states that are more open to a strong progressive or socialist form of government looking to break away because they would say "we do not need Washington telling us what we should do. We can run our own domestic affairs".

The latest thing that Social Democrats like Michael Lind and others are critiquing about federalism,who I do respect in Michael Lind’s case because you always know where he’s coming from and he can back up what he believes, but now they are using the government shutdown and Southern-Anglo (for the most part backlash) in the Tea Party a combo of Libertarians and Neo-Confederates, to say that "federalism doesn't work and we need a more centralize form of government". 

But today's Progressives who are really not lets say, but their point against federalism is that. "Look because these Neo-Confederates are in power in the House of Representatives and because of this they can keep the government shutdown by themselves even though they can’t reopen the government on their own". Are saying, "because of these Neo-Confederates we need to change our Constitution and nationalize our social insurance system and tell the states to sit down and shut up. Because Uncle Sammy is now completely in charge".

As I blogged just last night the problem with America is not our Constitution. Or our federal republican, (small r) form of government. American liberal democracy is not the problem with America, but some of our so-called public officials who are in office are. And we have a good way to deal with people who are not responsible enough to govern in America. Which is to fire them and even if we can’t defeat all the Neo-Confederates in the House of Representatives, we can defeat enough House Republicans to put power back in the hands of Democrats who not only know how to govern, but who want to and would govern responsibly.

The Boston Globe: Ted Kennedy: Why do You Want to be President?

Source:The New Democrat

Anyone who doesn't know why they want to be President of the United States, should not run for President. It is too big of a job to have someone who hasn't put much if any thought into why they are running, or why they would be the best person for the job. Also anyone who doesn't want to be President, shouldn't run either because of all the work and sacrifices that go into to simply running for President let alone doing the job itself. Sacrifices that the candidate as well as their family make.

I believe Senator Ted Kennedy qualified for both when he was looking at a 1980 presidential bid against President Jimmy Carter who just happened to be from the same party the Democratic Party. He not only didn't know why he wanted to be President of the United States, because he didn't want the job in the first place. He felt some obligation to the Progressive Left in the Democratic Party to run for President against Jimmy Carter who was very vulnerable against the Republican Party for reelection. But also came from the center-left New Democratic wing of the party.

ESPN Films 30 For 30: Elway to Marino, the Story of the 1983 NFL Draft

Source:The New Democrat

The 1983 NFL Draft is famous for several reasons, but a big one is the fact that it produced three Hall of Fame quarterbacks. The most important position in football, but more than that, it produced two of the top five quarterbacks of all- time in John Elway arguably the best all around quarterback of all-time and Dan Marino the best pure passer of all-time. Then you add Jim Kelly to the draft a quarterback who won four conference championships and played in four Super Bowls and. 

Jim Kelly one of the greatest winning quarterbacks of all-time and then you add Tony Eason who played in Super Bowl 20 with the New England Patriots, we haven’t seen another NFL Draft like that before or since, but a draft that produces not just two of the best quarterbacks of all-time and in Jim Kelly arguably three of the best quarterbacks of all-time but, also in Elway and Marino two of the best players of all-time as well which makes it an incredible draft.

But that’s not the whole story, this draft was also about workers rights. In this case football players do they have the right to decide who they work for and in this case who do they get to play football for and in John Elway’s case a California boy from Los Angeles who played college football at Stanford in the Bay Region, should he be forced to play football on the East Coast in Baltimore, Maryland for the Baltimore Colts. 

The Colts offered him a job, but the question posed by John Elway’s management team was. Can an employer force someone they’ve just offered a job to, to work for them or does the potential employee, in this case a football player have a say in who he works for and in this case play football for. And that’s what the Elway team was going to find out. Where are football players rights to decide where they can play football for. And Elway won in the fact that he wasn’t forced to work for the Colts. 

The whole draft brings up a more important point. What rights do workers including football players and pro sports athletes in general have in determining where they get to work. Because it’s really only pro sports where the franchises or employers basically have all of the power. As far as deciding who works for who and where with the players not having much if any say in deciding where. They work coming out of college.

CBS News: Walter Cronkite's First CBS Evening Newscast

Source:The New Democrat

CBS News making history and for good reasons in 1963 with the first half-hour newscast. Which was a huge deal back in the early 1960s when TV networks were all about entertainment and sports, because that is where the money was back then. And whatever time they had left over and the minimal amount of time that the Federal Government required them to cover current affairs, meaning news, that is what they would dedicate to news coverage. Which back then was news in the morning and covering major events like press conferences, presidential speeches and political conventions.

CBS Evening News: Dan Rather-George H.W. Bush Tiff The Day After

Source:The New Democrat

I haven't seen this video in about three years and I saw it then on YouTube. And if I heard anything about it as a kid in 1987 when this interview was conducted when I was 11-12 at the time, I don't remember. So I don't remember this interview very well to say the least, but a post about that interview and the interview itself will be on this blog in the future. What I can say about it is whatever you think of Dan Rather, the man was a tough hardball interviewer who liked to go after people in power. George H.W. Bush was Vice President of the United States at the time, so he obviously qualified.

NFL Films: Johnny Unitas- The Master of the Quarterback Position

Source:NFL Films- Baltimore Colts QB John Unitas. 

Source:The Daily Journal

When you talk about the greatest quarterbacks of all-time as well as greatest players of all- time who ever played, whether they are still playing, or not you have to talk about John Unitas as well or it's a meaningless conversation. Because John Unitas changed the way the game was played and introduced things that were never done before. He called his own plays, was the field coach, everyone on the Colts teams knew who was their most important player and the one guy they couldn't afford to lose, every team that played the Colts knew who was the one player that they couldn't let beat them.

Without Johnny Unitas, the Colts are a solid team perhaps a winning team but with Unitas the Colts were a championship contender from the mid 1950s until the early 70s, he was their Larry Bird or Earvin Johnson, Jim Brown whoever you want to put on that list. That one guy who was the Colts MVP every year he was there practically and a guy who could've won the NFL MVP almost every year he played, because he was that guy he was that great the difference in the Colts winning the championship or being a mediocre team.

The only other two guys that I would compare to Unitas after he retired as as far as what they meant to their teams and how great they were would be, Joe Montana and John Elway. You take those two guys away from the San Francisco 49ers and Denver Broncos and you can make a very good case that both franchises are still looking for their first Super Bowl Championship.If you judge players by whether they were great or not and should be in the Hall of Fame or not, I have four standards that players have to pass just to be eligible with me.

Was the player one of the best players at his position during his career?

Was he one of the best players in the league during his career?

Would he be a great player in any era that he played and was he a great player based on the previous standards for a long enough period of time?

Typically great NFL Players play around 10-13 seasons. So for me, most players aren't great as soon as they walk in the league. They need about three seasons to see whether they can be a great player or not, sometimes longer than that. And a lot of great players aren't great towards the end of their career, Jim Brown would be an exception to that. So for me if a player is great 6-8 years lets say, as well as meeting the other standards I just laid out then they are a Hall of Famer as far as I'm concern. But John Unitas had all of that plus so much more. You're not going to find a tougher QB or a better QB in the clutch. Plus the fact that he was the Colts offensive coordinator on the field. He called their plays, he invented the two minute drill and made fourth quarter comebacks popular and exciting.

John Unitas wasn't a QB but a great player who played QB. "What do I have to do to win the game", that's all he cared about. If you took the lead late in the fourth quarter against the Colts in the fifties and sixties with Unitas, you were probably going to lose. Because now you have to face the master and you have to figure out how to defend one player with eleven and most teams couldn't do that. The New York Giants found that out the hard way in the 1958 NFL Championship. They tried to take away the pass and Unitas calls a trap play up the middle and Alan Ameche runs for 20 plus yards that put the Colts in field goal position. Which would've won the game in overtime. But they had Unitas and were thinking touchdown and that's why the Colts won the most important game in NFL history.
Source:NFL Films: Johnny Unitas

Real Time With Bill Maher: New Rule - Stupid People

Source:The Daily Journal  

Bill Maher loves to make fun of the Christian Right, or does a damn good job of impersonating someone who loves to make fun of the Christian Right, so good he should win an Oscar. Why not they are big easy target, kinda like aiming at an ocean from a beach. So why not shoot, instead of comedians and bloggers actually sitting down and putting their hand to their chin and going "hum what should I write about now". How about just listen to ignorant people talk and make fun of them instead. Thats what I always say anyway, or just said it actually thats the first time I just said that, but who's counting, well I guess I just did.

I mean think about who's easier to make fun of then ignorant people, especially when they're in charge like I don't know in the White House, or Congress.

Examples of doing dumb things-

Sending the country to war based on false intelligence to use as an example. Trying to link Iraq with Al -Quada, which is like trying to link a prostitute with the Southern Baptist Convention. They don't go together, sure there are Southern Baptists that like Prostitutes, but they generally don't go together. Or trying to link homosexuality with the 9/11 Attacks. If these people weren't so stupid, I might be mad at them just because of their hate. But since they are so stupid, its hard for me not to feel anything, but sorry for them. They are victims of our public education system and not being raised right.

And because of this, the rest of society gets to laugh at them and put up with them. Here's another one, Catholics can't go to heaven because they aren't Baptist. Isn't Heaven meant for good people. When we don't raise our kids right, or make sure they get a good education, they suffer the consequences of that of course. And a lot of them end up in our criminal justice system generally as guests. But the rest of society, sure gets some new easy big targets to shoot at, like a blimp over a stadium. (In other words Rush Limbaugh) But we have to deal with their stupidity, their lack of intelligence. Like what we had on Iraq before we went to war. Especially when they are pressured to run for high office to help their party. Because of their name recognition and who their father is and they end up having to make decisions.

The presidency isn't  ignorant politicians, or it sure as hell shouldn't be.  Can you imagine what it must of been like for Condolezza Rice to explain intelligence reports to George W. Bush. She must of had to use drawings or try to compare military combat with football games or something. This whole idea, or attacking another country because they may attack you in the future. First of all our national defense is so strong that would never happen. Because any foreign fighter plane or planes or warships that attempted to invade the United States because of our radar system would first be warned before they got close or could launch an attack. And then we could blow them away as well. The rest of the world knows this, which is why we haven't been attacked by a foreign military inside America since 1941.

Ignorant people on the Far-Right and Far-Left are fun to make fun of, lets just admit that. We can't or shouldn't be nice to everyone. For every Saint that we have, we need a few (pardon the term) assholes to keep it real. So most of the country can stay within striking distance of reality. (When they aren't high) But we need to remember that we pay a price for ignorance as a country, especially when it reaches high office. Because we as a country or state lets say, have together paid a price for their stupid decisions. So lets do our part to prevent as many future ignorant people in the future as we can.