2014

As with last year, let's review the things I said I'd like to see in 2013, with my new notes in ALL CAPS:

-Me take more time off.  A repeat.  Hoping it happens this time.
(I'M GOING TO STOP WRITING THIS ONE.)

-Compromise in the U.S. Congress.  After all, it's not an election year.
(NOT COUNTING THE ALLEGED DECEMBER BUDGET COMPROMISE, TEA PARTY REPUBLICANS TOOK US FARTHER FROM COMPROMISE, NOT CLOSER.)

-A reduction in U.S. government spending and subsidies
(SMALL REDUCTION OF WIND AND ETHANOL SPENDING, BUT THIS IS A FAIRY TALE.)

-Fewer reality TV shows starring hillbillys.
(COULD NOT HAVE GONE MORE IN THE OPPOSITE DIRECTION.  THEY ARE MORE POPULAR THAN EVER.  JUST LOOK AT MY PREVIOUS POST.)

-Successful planning and execution of all family weddings.
(NAILED IT.)

-An end to the central U.S. drought.

(A LESSER DROUGHT IS NOT AN END TO THE DROUGHT - BUT FARMERS BROUGHT IN A RECORD CROP SO I GUESS IT DOESN'T MATTER THAT MUCH ANYMORE.)

-The siding on my house to be repaired.
(GOT DONE IN OCTOBER, BUT ONLY THANKS TO MULTIPLE CALLS THROUGHOUT THE YEAR.)

For 2014 I'd like to see:

The (continued) fall of the so-called Tea Party conservatives.

Less Kanye / Less Miley.

Apple TV.

NCAA basketball Sweet 16 trips for either Iowa and Iowa State.

Better football from the Cyclones and Vikings - the bar is incredibly low.

Warmer Spring weather, at least where it doesn't snow again in May.

More legalization of marijuana beyond what's happening in Colorado on 1/1/2014.

A la carte cable TV channels.  It's only a matter of time before cable providers will have to do this to compete with computer streaming.  Why not in 2014?

If It Walks Like A Duck.....

There are so many reality shows on TV these days, nobody could possibly watch them all.  I'll watch one or two, but I don't watch any that glorify the dumb hillbilly persona, such as Here Comes Honey Boo Boo, Moonshiners, or everybody's current favorite, Duck Dynasty.

Today, Duck Dynasty is in trouble because the patriarchal member was openly quoted in GQ magazine saying some bad things about "homosexuals" and the gay lifestyle.  The show's network (A & E) is distancing itself from the comments, acting shocked (shocked! I tell you) that he would say such insensitive things. Conversely, the Duck Dynasty family and thousands of the show's fans are rallying around him, claiming he has a right to express his religious beliefs.

There are so many great things about this:

1) Screw A & E.  They struck gold by signing up and making famous a bunch of dumb Louisiana hillbillies, and they didn't consider that eventually, one or more of these idiots would say something insensitive?  They deserve all of the bad publicity they get, from both sides.

2) Screw the Duck Dynasty family.  They've had way beyond their 15 minutes of fame, and have been made rich by their stupidity.  Now the same thing that made them famous, their back-ways hillbilly-ness, is going to crucify them.  No one should feel sorry for them, and they probably don't want that from anyone, which leads me to.....

3) Screw the show's supportive fans.  No one would be complaining if this guy had simply said his religious beliefs did not support gay lifestyle, and that was his opinion.  But what he said in GQ (plus what has also been released on video from a church speech he gave) was completely mean-spirited and intolerant.  It's the real(ity) him, not the fake media version of him, and likely what the rest of the family believes.

At least one good thing might come from all of this - one less hillbilly reality TV show!

Performance Enhancing Post

A combination of illness and Christmastime business has conspired to keep me from blogging lately.  As an alternative, I'm going to post the text of a great recent column by sportswriter Rick Reilly on espn.com:

I'm so pumped up for next July in Cooperstown!

I can't wait to see who's going to be in the crowd at the Hall of Fame induction ceremony for new members Tony La Russa, Bobby Cox and Joe Torre.

Maybe Mark McGwire will show up?  It might be as close as he'll ever get.  La Russa managed him for 15 seasons in both Oakland and St. Louis and says he never saw McGwire do a single steroid.  Imagine that.

Maybe Alex Rodriguez will attend?  He probably won't get in, either.  Former New York Yankees skipper Torre says he didn't even notice A-Roid's alleged PED use in the four years he managed him.  A-Roid's got plenty of time to go to Cooperstown.  He's appealing a 211-game suspension for PEDs.  Torre?  No ban for him.  In fact, he's an executive vice president of Major League Baseball now.

Maybe former Atlanta Braves manager Cox will look out in the crowd to see his old star Gary Sheffield. Probably not.  Cox says he never saw all the PEDs Sheffield was taking when he had him right under his nose in the Atlanta clubhouse.

In all, the three managers being inducted oversaw at least 34 players who've been implicated as PED users and never noticed a thing wrong.

You could build a wing with the admitted and suspected drug cheats they won with:  A-Rod, Roger Clemens (Torre), Jason Giambi (Torre and La Russa), McGwire, Jose Canseco (La Russa), Melky Cabrera (Torre and Cox), David Justice (Torre and Cox), Andy Pettite (Torre), Manny Ramirez (Torre with the Dodgers) and Sheffield (Torre and Cox.)

If we get really lucky, maybe disgraced HGH pitcher Darren Holmes will show up. He played under all three of them!

It's just another year in the Hall of Farce, where the codes of conduct shift like beach sand; where the rules for one set of men are ignored for another; where PED poppers can never enter, but the men who turned their backs to the cheating get gleaming, bronze plaques.

Hail The Great Enablers!

La Russa's slipping on the Hall of Fame jersey Monday is the sight that really tested my gag reflex.  He did more for juicers than Jack LaLanne.  He managed McGwire and Canseco -- the Wright Brothers of the Druggie Era -- for 21 combined seasons.  He made millions on their pimpled backs, won his first World Series title on their syringes and built his 33-year managing career on their artificially carved biceps.

Under La Russa, the Oakland clubhouse became a kind of leather-upholstered showroom for creams, rubs and injections that allowed players to work out harder, recover quicker and attack the game like a wolf in a hen house.  It didn't change much in St. Louis, either, where he says he didn't notice what McGwire, Troy Glaus, Fernando Vina and Ryan Franklin were doing.

He spent eight hours a day around these guys, eight months a year, and yet he never saw a thing.  Maybe he dressed in a different clubhouse?

But he goes into the HOF and those players never will.  Maybe he can send them some Instagrams.

Hey, you think any of the three skips will mention how PEDS helped them get to that sunny afternoon in Cooperstown?

Oh, and I can't forget to thank Katalina at Tijuana Pharmacy for all her help. Like my players always said, "We can't get cut without Kat!"

You won't even have to be in Cooperstown to smell the hypocrisy.  Even the faintest scent of a rumor of PED use is enough to sink a player now.

Managers?  Odorless.

Take Houston Astros great Craig Biggio. He had more than enough career to get in, and even though there isn't a stitch of evidence against him, the writers have kept him out because they have a niggling hunch he might've used.

Remember, kids:  If you play the game under even a single cloud of suspicion, you're out.  Manage it under one? Come on in and pull up a plaque!

Can you imagine this in any other sport?  Do you think for a second Johan Bruyneel, the manager of all of Lance Armstrong's cheating, champion Tour de France teams, didn't know what was going on?  You figure Bonnie and Clyde's driver just thought they were always running late?

Next month, the writers are expected to vote down McGwire for the eighth time and Clemens for the second time.  They're right to do it.  Those guys are tainted beyond any reasonable doubt, though Clemens still maintains innocence.  But for the expansion error committee to let these three managers in -- unanimously, no less -- after winning hundreds of games with better chemistry is the gold standard of double standards.

If you believe they didn't know, then you'll fit perfectly in Dupers Town.

Watching Basketball In Black And White

No sport does more to perpetuate white racial stereotypes than basketball.  They even made a successful movie about it years ago - White Men Can't Jump.

The conventional wisdom is, white players aren't as 'athletic' as black players, meaning they aren't as quick, don't jump as high, etc., and ergo, they aren't as good.

Oh, white players are still very good, just not as good, generally speaking. Considering the best of the best of today's players, it's hard to argue.

I can't help but think of this while watching this year's University of Iowa men's basketball team.  Let's just say it has a high proportion of pasty white, almost sickly looking players.  I'm talking tall-but-gaunt-looking players.

But very good, dare I say athletic, pasty white, almost sickly looking players.  All right, one of them is a bigger guy, which is important, because sometimes four of these whiteys are on the court at once.  And a couple of them are Iowa natives, so that's good, too.

So the question is, how long before someone in the mainstream sports media, or even the non-mainstream media, dare to assume verbally or in writing that this Iowa team isn't 'athletic' (Read: black) enough to compete against the best teams?

That mistake is made almost every year with Wisconsin.  I guess they'll be able to compete with them, huh?