Ivan "Pudge" Rodriguez has turned to the dark side!

Remember that scene in the first Star Wars (the 1977 one!), in which Princess Leia's home planet of Alderaan was destroyed by the Death Star? Remember how Obi-Wan Kenobi had sensed through the Force the destruction of an entire planet that so shook him that he had to sit down to gather himself? That's how we in Rangers Land felt when we heard the news of former Rangers catcher Ivan "Pudge" Rodriguez joining the New York Yankees.

Pudge had been with the Texas Rangers baseball team for years. He's still a fan favorite even now. But to hear that he joined the Evil Empire, the Dark Side, the Buttered Side Down of major league baseball - well, it was like hearing that the neighborhood kid that everyone liked had joined a gang. Pudge has had a fine career, and he deserves the Hall of Fame one day. But if he's wearing Yankee pinstripes in the Hall - sigh. It'd be like seeing Mr Rogers in a Nazi uniform.

Pudge, Pudge ... what hath thou done??

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UPDATE: I was hoping that it was just a vicious rumor, but...



There's no joy in Mudville tonight. <:-(

Election talk

It's been awhile since I talked about the election. The end of the Democratic primary kinda ended the fun of talking about the election, 'cause John McCain's boring, man! ;-)

Neither candidate has selected their running mate yet. I stick by my suggestion of Bill Richardson for Barack Obama, because the African American/Hispanic ticket would be historic in setting a precedent, and such a ticket is going to be too "juicy" for the media to resist gushing about. Forget the others - including Hillary. This ticket is the ticket.

For McCain, I thought about this some more, and it seems to me that he would need to pick either a Gen. Colin Powell or a Dr. Condolezza Rice, or perhaps Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison. OR, if McCain HAS to go with another white guy, then my suggestion is Sen. Joe Lieberman. Lieberman is a maverick for his party much like McCain is for the GOP. Their campaign slogan could be "Obama *talks* change; we've been delivering it for years!" The "maverick ticket" just might be enough to draw interest both from the media and from the voters. McCain's going to need something to counter Obama's rising star - especially if O takes my advice of selecting Bill Richardson.

Now let's examine how they're running their campaigns so far. Despite the generous coverage that O's been getting, he hasn't had a corresponding huge surge in the polls. Why is that? I really don't believe that it's because of race, because during the primary season, he managed to beat all of the white dudes, one Hispanic dude, and a woman to get the required number of votes to be the party's nominee. That is an accomplishment that makes anyone take notice.

Yet, O couldn't "get the job done" and put Hillary Clinton away right away. Granted, Hill's no slouch either, but O kept running into difficulties that made the primary season agonizingly long (but certainly entertaining for political pundits such as myself!). What at first looked like it was going to be a rout ended up a slugfest to the finish, with O finally lunging across the finish line on the last day of the primaries. He's locked up the nomination, and yet he's still not pulling them in like he's been expecting to.

Now let's look at Mac. While O and Hill were duking it out, he was on Easy Street, having wrapped up the GOP nod early. He should have been using that time to get his house in order so that he'd be ready for whichever Dem got the nod. And yet, he often looks very UNprepared, and is often reacting to something O said or did rather than making the news himself. Why was he so unready?

Any candidate with the free ride that he had should have been all over the respite preparing to do battle with the eventual nominee. To have not only been unready, but to look so bad is just plain unprofessional - especially for someone who has been in politics as long as he has. Someone somewhere in his campaign staff screwed up royally in this shocking lack of preparedness. Perhaps the blame should be on Mac himself. If he loses, then he really has only himself to blame.

As for myself, even if both candidates take my suggestions for running mates, I'm still not sure I'd vote for either one. Both candidates have views that I don't like - enough so that I might actually vote third party for the first time in my life. Yeah, yeah, "wasted vote" and all that, but change won't come about unless voters have the courage to express their dissatisfaction, and voting 3rd party is one way of doing that. Even so, I will be keeping up with the latest news and tidbits, as that is what political pundits such as myself live for.

I also need to get back to making editorial cartoons, because us edtoonists live for times like these. Plus, both O and Mac have faces that an edtoonist loves!

Cheech and Chong reunited; world safe for democracy

Okay, we can all breathe a sigh of relief, man. Cheech and Chong have reunited. Far out, man!

Texas Rangers baseball

Fort Worth has three baseball teams. One is the semipro team, the Fort Worth Cats, and they have won 3 championships in a row in their league, and they hope to make it 4 this season. By the way, the Cats used to be a minor league team for the majors, so there's a lot of history here. I'll share some more of that later.

The second team is Texas Christian University's Horned Frogs. The Frogs have won 4 conference championships in a row. Frog baseball has vastly improved since we got our new field, which is a far cry from the old field, which barely qualified as a high school field.

Then there's the Texas Rangers. When it comes to being a fan of the Texas Rangers baseball team, "long suffering" and "fan" go together like "Hot" and "Texas Summer". Historically, we have been great on offense, and the opposite in pitching. This season is no different. Also historically, it is at this time of the year that the Rangers tank, which is just about the time that the Dallas Cowboys start camp, so we can at least look forward to that.

At least Fort Worth has championship baseball teams, but geez louize, just once I'd like to see the Rangers win it all. My grandmother was a diehard fan, and she never got to see them win the pennant. Through the years, the fans have come anyway, but this year has been different. Mainly because of the price of gas - why come all that way just to watch them lose? Anyway, even the management has taken notice, so hopefully they'll work harder to put better players on the field instead of trading them just as they're starting to shine.

Just once, fellas - just once. Let us know the feeling of winning a pennant. And then, somewhere in heaven, a diehard fan will finally get to cheer for her team.

Recommended reading

This blog --> False Hustle, is quickly becoming my favorite blog. Not only do I know the dude personally, but he is also a prolific writer, sometimes adding two or three entries a day. For the sake of disclosure, he used to be my opinion editor way back in the day when we both worked for our college newspaper. He's a man who loves the field of journalism, and it shows in his writing. I'm glad to see that that part of him hasn't changed since his time back in college when I first worked with him.

He's now linked in my sidebar. He's also linked my blog in his blog under the category, "Fellow Hustler." Ha! Love it! :-D

WNBA "Girls Gone Wild"

There has been much ink (metaphorically speaking) made in the sports world this past week of the brawl in the WNBA. Some were shocked and saddened by this violent turn of events. Not me, though - ya ask me, the brawl was probably the best thing to happen to the WNBA probably since its inception. Before the brawl, how many of you even knew that the WNBA's season had been going on? Yeah, me too. But you know now that the WNBA's season is going on, right? See? There ya go.

Now, if they can keep a once-a-week brawling pace, they might be able to make their own version of a "Girls Gone Wild" video after the end of the season... ;-)

Just kidding!





Sorta....

Death penalty again

My previous entry on the death penalty got a response from a Mr. Dudley Sharp, and I will take this time to respond to that response before any more time passes.

First, let me state here that I don't deny that there are certain bleeding heart types that try to get even the worst offenders out of prison much sooner than the time that they are supposed to serve. I also state here that I do not favor such practices - especially if the offender in question had committed a particularly heinous crime and does not seem to be remorseful for it. Charles Manson comes to mind. He should stay in prison for life.

I also object to "glorifying" high-profile prisoners as some sort of heroic victim of the "evil and corrupt justice system". Glorifying such people and trying to get such people out of prison before they've fully served their sentences only hurts the credibility of those who promote such views. They often sound insensitive of the victims and their families who suffered by the actions of those criminals. While there may indeed be a few who were unjustly imprisoned, the majority of those in prison are there for a reason.

That said, I can't accept the execution of even one innocent person. Like I said in my previous entry, executing an innocent person is not justice but a grave INjustice. Sharp's own response stated that "possibly we have sentenced 20-25 actually innocent people since 1973, or 0.3% of those so sentenced". Because of the finality of an execution that is carried out, that's 20-25 too many that could have been executed. While 0.3% may seem extremely low, what if you were one of those innocents scheduled to be executed? When you are strapped to the gurney about to have the lethal injection pumped into your veins, are you going to be calm and relaxed and satisfied with telling yourself, "At least I'll die knowing that these types of executions are extremely rare"? Or is it more likely that you're going to go down screaming that they are executing the wrong man?

We live in an imperfect world, and yet the death penalty assumes that we can know with absolute certainty that we're executing the right person. Thing is, we CAN'T know, and even Sharp acknowledges as much with his 0.3% statistic of those who were later found innocent. The assumption of perfection is unacceptable and it is inconsistent with the concept of justice. Either we do the death penalty right, or we don't do it at all.

My views on issues: Environment

For this month, I'm going to give a brief rundown of my views on issues for those of you who might be new to my blog. Today will be on global warming and the environment.

What bugs me most about global warming prophets is people like Al Gore. Gore is the granddaddy of the environmental movement; and yet, he lives in an extremely energy wasting house. Can you say "hypocrite"? If he can't be bothered to fix his own house, why should we bother? Very few seem to be willing to bring that up to his face. Fortunately, Gore is not the example that I follow when it comes to adopting practices that are eco-friendly.

Let's go ahead and start with that. I favor protecting the environment. I want green grass, clean water, and blue skies. I want our factories to find ways to get rid of their waste other than by dumping it in our air, rivers and streams. I want cars that are more fuel efficient. What I don't favor is most of the methods that environmentalists often use to promote their cause. Prime example: Carbon credits.

"Carbon credits" have to be the biggest of all scams. What you're basically buying is air. That's it. You're buying AIR. In a nutshell, one person who has clean air sells it to someone with dirty air. Or the person with dirty air agrees to pay for having trees planted somewhere. This erases the offender's "carbon footprint" without the offender actually doing anything. That's what bugs me the most: the offender still goes about doing his offending, but gets a nice, shiny eco-badge from somebody.

No, if we're going to be serious about cleaning the environment, then it has to be through more than "carbon credits". The thing is, we've been researching ways to help the environment for decades. Why haven't we come up with something by now? And why was it global cooling that was the villain barely 20 years ago? If the scientists weren't right about the global climate then, why should we believe that they are right about it now?

These enviro-scam artists are doing more to damage the environment than helping it. I wish true environmentalists would point that out more. If they really want to protect the environment, then they should be doing their part to expose these charlatans. The longer they let them carry out their shenanigans, the more suspicious I become of their motives.

My views on issues: The death penalty

For this month, I'm going to give a brief rundown of my views on issues for those of you who might be new to my blog. Today will be on the death penalty.

In recent years, we've come across probably the greatest flaw that this issue can have: Sometimes the wrong person is executed. News reports have been coming out the past few years of genetic testing being done that exonerated death row inmates. The numbers are such that for a death penalty advocate, it's very uncomfortable to realize that we might have executed people that could have been cleared of the crime that they were accused of had genetic testing been done first. Given the numbers of executions that have been done in this country, I think it's highly likely that there are a lot more innocent people executed than we believe.

My friends, the justice system is supposed to free the innocent and punish the guilty. We do not punish the innocent - and we especially don't execute them. While there is no justice system that is perfect, the finality of an execution of an innocent person is worse than a miscarriage of justice, it's state-sanctioned murder. Since we've demonstrated the likelihood that we may have executed innocent people, that alone should be enough reason to at least cease the practice of execution. The people must have faith in our justice system, and executing the innocent does nothing to help inspire that faith.

My views on issues: Education

For this month, I'm going to give a brief rundown of my views on issues for those of you who might be new to my blog. Today will be on education.

As with health care, I feel that we need to get the federal level out of education, and instead concentrate on education at the state level. I would shut down the Dept. of Education, and I'd greatly reduce the influence of the teachers' unions, because they both have too many players who are more intent on pushing their political ideologies (both liberal and conservative) and their social experiments (again, both liberal and conservative) than on the education of our children.

The following has been said enough times that it probably qualifies as a cliché now, but the children are our future. But it's still true, and those with political ideological or sociological agendas are also aware that the children are our future - however, they are seeing that old cliché in a way that is different from us: they are seeing it as being the children as THEIR future rather than seeing it in the broad scope that that cliché was meant for.

One of the main messages that Senator Barack Obama has been touting as part of his campaign is that he is the candidate of change. He says that he wants to change how we do things, and he wants to change the level of influence that power brokers have on the goings-on in D.C. I believe that he is as sincere as any other politician making promises during an election season. Here's my take on today's politicians: I believe that they are all whores for special interest groups. I include Obama in that category, so you see what I think about his promises of change.

Before I digress any further, let me state why I'm bringing up Obama here. If Obama really wants to lessen the impact that power brokers have on Washington, then eliminating the Dept. of Education and transferring control of our schools to the state level is one of those ways to affect change. As with health care, the states are closer to their citizens than bureaucrats in D.C. would be, so the state level is better qualified to know the educational needs of their students.

With power over health care (as a national health care plan would be) and education (as it is now) concentrated into one D.C. location, it makes it much easier for the power brokers and those with political and sociological ideologues to implement their agendas onto our society. To dilute their power and influence, we need to remove the one central location paradigm that they favor. We then need to spread out control over health care and education so that they have to tackle 50 state capitals instead of one federal capital. That way, if these political and sociological ideologues still want to implement their agendas, then they'd have to work a lot harder in doing it. I think it's a pretty good idea to make things difficult as we can for those with less-than-noble intentions, don't you?

I also favor tuition vouchers for the poor. I know all of the old arguments against it, both from the left and the right. The left says that it will take money away from public schools that need it. But the public schools are not doing their job, and the best way to prod them into doing better is to give them competition. If the public schools do better, then more parents will be more likely to let their kids stay there. If they don't do better, then the poor deserve better in terms of education, and if it comes through private schools, then so be it. Our desire should be that our kids get educated one way or the other.

The right says that allowing tuition vouchers will allow the government to step in and control private and parochial schools. We have, however, a precedent in this. After World War II, the gov't had the GI Bill, which allowed the nation's soldiers to go to the college of their choice - public or private. The soldiers got their education, and the gov't didn't have to step in and control the schools - they let the schools handle the education of their students. That's the way it worked then, and there's no reason why it can't work that way now.

And last is the argument that "it's the government's money" that is being given back. Wrong. It's our money. What a tuition voucher would become, then, is a limited-use tax refund. A tax refund is yours totally, right? To do with as you please, without gov't influence. The same with a tuition voucher - for you to do with as you please, so long as it is spent at an educational institution.

A tuition voucher plan will take some time to implement, especially since there's so much resistance against it. But if done correctly, I think it will ultimately be the best plan. Our future literally depends upon us making the right choice, and a tuition voucher gives us the option to decide for ourselves - after all, the "right to choose" should not be limited to just abortion.

New look for the blog

I'm trying a new look for the blog - especially the header above. Do let me know what you think.

My views on issues: Healthcare

For this month, I'm going to give a brief rundown of my views on issues for those of you who might be new to my blog. Today will be on healthcare.

I had given this some serious thought, and here's what I came up with: Nationalized health care or socialized health care would be a bad idea, because such a top-down imposition pretends that what works in the state of New York will work in South Dakota. But NY has vastly more people than does SD, as well as a great deal more money in their budget. Also, their populations are vastly different. Thus, with all that in mind, the healthcare demands for each state are going to be vastly different. Funding for a national health care program is going to go largely to the superstates of New York, California, and Texas, because their populations are so much bigger. But someone in need of cancer treatments in Idaho is just as much in need of that treatment as someone in California. So, what to do?

My idea is to eventually phase out Medicare completely and let the states take it up. DON'T FREAK OUT - I'm not saying that we should leave certain needy populations in the lurch! Rather, what I think we should do is take the federal gov't out of the equation, and with all those taxes that are freed up from that, let the states deal with healthcare. AND, we'll let each state decide what kind of healthcare to provide - but with the stipulation that each state MUST come up with a plan to take care of as many of their citizens as possible. That is, each state must provide at least their version of Medicare to help the neediest of their population.

In order for a state-by-state strategy to work, we must allow each state to tailor their healthcare programs to meet the needs of their respective populations. That is, if New York and California want to have socialized medicine in all its glory, then they'll need to sell their plan to their respective populations, along with their ideas on how they plan to fund it. But if Texas and Missouri decides that they prefer to largely leave healthcare to HMOs, then they can do that - but again, with the stipulation that these HMOs provide some means of covering everybody. Other states could try a combination of the two, of having HMOs for most people, but a state Medicare plan for the most neediest.

The benefit of a state-by-state plan is that we get to see what type of health plan works best, and what doesn't work at all. A federally-imposed "one size fits all" plan does not allow for such experimentation, and it's guaranteed to fail, because the healthcare needs are different from state to state. States that manage to develop successful healthcare programs will draw more doctors and healthcare providers, along with an influx of new people once that state gains the reputation of providing excellent health care. This will also pressure underperforming states to do better, or they'll suffer a drain of medical staff as well as population.

So what I'm suggesting is not totally a free-market solution, but it does try to tap into what makes the free-market philosophy work the best. What we as Americans try to do is to serve the greatest number of people in the best way possible, and I think my plan is the best way of going about that.

Topic for July 2008: My views on issues. Today: Iraq and Iran

For this month, I'm going to give a brief rundown of my views on issues for those of you who might be new to my blog. Today will be on Iraq and Iran.

War in Iraq:
I was opposed going to war, because I am opposed to war in general. I'm not necessarily a pacifist, but I'm pretty close. I also feel that we should have not "put all our eggs in one basket" by committing our troops in one country, when the terrorists reside in other countries in the world - and not just in Iraq. However, now that we are there I do not favor an immediate pullout. We made the mess there, and we have the responsibility to clean it up. Lately Iraq has been asking for a timetable, and if Iraq is ready for us to move on, then maybe we can finally leave while saving face. We'll have to wait and see.

No War in Iran!
It's because of our experiences in Iraq that I am opposed to going to war with Iran. They've been experimenting with missles lately. I have no doubt whatsoever that Iran is trying to goad someone into attacking them so that they have their excuse to play the victim and fire back. We should not fall for it. Also, the GOP has proven woefully inept on running a war and on inspiring the country into backing it. I also have absolutely no faith in the Dems doing any better - if anything, they'll make things worse. Based on what I've seen Dems do in recent years, I don't know if they really believe that we're that stupid, or whether they themselves are that stupid, and a war is the worst way to find out which of the two it is.

Who is Big "T" Carlito"?

Near my house is a restaurant that has a name that's been scraped into its sidewalk for years. It was written, of course, when the cement was still wet. Anyway, for years I've walked by that restaurant, and for all that time, I've wondered who that person was whose name is scraped into the sidewalk. I speak, of course, of Big "T" Carlito. Here's a pic I took of the name:



In case you have trouble seeing the letters, here is the same pic with the letters outlined:



So... Who IS Big "T" Carlito? And since he says "Big 'T'", does that mean he spells his name "CarliTo?" What would be the significance of capitalizing that one letter? Why not CarLito? Or CaRlito? I also have to wonder if he has a son - otherwise known as "Little 't' Carlito"?

This may be one of those mysteries in life that we will never know. Imagine years from now, or even decades, when that restaurant may be a memory for only the oldest people at that time. Maybe there is a faded newspaper article about that restaurant. And on that sidewalk, there will still be that name, Big "T" Carlito.

No doubt the younger folks will ask the older folks who still remember the restaurant about who that person was. Probably none of them will know. One or two might mention that it was brought up in a blog one time, but no one stepped forward to claim to be that man - the one Big "T" Carlito. Then those young people will wonder what a "blog" was. At least that, the older folks can explain.

But the mystery of Big "T" Carlito will live on. Was he a regular at the restaurant? Was he the owner? Was he a gangster? Was he some kid who happened to catch the cement when it was wet? Was is a drifter, or a homeless man? Or was it the man who poured the cement in the first place? We will probably never know, but his name will live on as one of the mysteries of the ages, along with Bigfoot, the Loch Ness Monster, and those darn crop circles.

And now my news: My column got published!

Now time for my news!

A couple of weeks ago, the Fort Worth Weekly published a column by E.R. Bills titled "KPAX Romana". Well, of course I had to respond to it!

So without further ado, here's my response column! The Catholic Church is causing global warming. Riiight.

In the tagline of my column is the address to this very blog. If you are reading this blog because you came across it on the tagline, let me say,

Hello! Welcome to my blog!

Some of you no doubt think I'm a conservative based on that ONE column. That happens to me a lot. However, I'm not right-winged. Nor am I left-winged. I'm also not moderate, because moderates avoid taking sides, and I do definitely take sides. So what am I? As I tell people who ask, I use "both wings" - that is, I'm both liberal and conservative. After all, birds can't fly just flapping one wing, and I feel the same way about ideas - they need both wings to fly.

25 albums that are now 30 years old

Here's something to make you feel old for those of you who remember these! 25 albums that are 30 years old. For those of you born after that, those were the days before iPods!

The untapped potential of our minds

I had a dream last night that got me thinking about dreams and on how our minds work. In short, I dreamt of an attractive woman that I know personally. Now, I’m not going to say her name, because I value her presence in my life that I don’t want to expose her to embarrassment. Really, the only reason that she probably was in my dream was because I came across her profile on Facebook earlier in the day, and one of her interests was “dancing”. I also happened to see a promo for one of those TV dancing shows (probably Dancing with the Stars), so as our minds are often wont to do at dreamtime, it combined my having seen this woman’s dancing interest and that dancing show promo into my dream of dancing with her in a contest.

Before I continue, let me say here that I knew this was a dream, because I dance with all the grace of a walrus. In real life, I can’t see me participating in any sort of dancing contest, not so much to spare myself the embarrassment, but that of my dance partner. I can only see disaster resulting if I should ever try, and I would live on in notoriety on YouTube for eternity – or at least until I learned how to hack YouTube’s server to crash it.

But this was dreamland, and the only reason that I’m mentioning my dream here is because of all the detail that was in it. It was like the HD version of dreams. The ballroom we danced in was gorgeous. It was the stuff of the ballrooms in Europe; it was so beautiful – and HUGE!

I had on a tuxedo – not the kind that you rent for a buddy’s wedding, but one of the fanciest tuxes that I’ve ever seen. It had a tail and one of those high, fancy collars. I also remember the red cummerbund, and that the tux fit closer than I’m used to. I like my clothes to be a little roomy, and I remember raising my arms to shoulder level to cross them in front of me to test how tense the fabric was in the back, as is the usual test of how tight one’s blazer is. It was tighter back there than I liked, and I remembered complaining to the tailor. He simply said that that was the way it was cut. It looked good on me, don’t get me wrong. I just like my suits to fit a little looser.

Hey, but if I looked good – oh, man – my dance partner looked stunning! She had on a black sequined dress that was cut pretty high on one side to allow her legs to move. It was a strapless number that hugged her pretty tight (probably so that it would stay up!). I remember sticking my hand just underneath my lapel so that I would pop it up and down like a rapidly beating heart. She just smiled and took my hand and said, “It’s showtime.”

We took to the floor, and even though I was a half step behind her (she is the dancer, remember – not me), we didn’t show it. I don’t think I can ever dance like that in real life. And like I said, even though it was only a dream, it FELT real. I remember feeling her body’s weight as she shifted from one side to the other as we danced, and I remember how narrow her waist was. I remember hearing her count steps as we moved along as well as the clicking of our heels on the dance floor in rhythmic steps. I remember the tugging of our arms as the dance steps required us to fly apart from each other stopped only by our linked hands, and then I remember tugging her back to me, and our bodies colliding.

Then, as the dance ended, I remember putting one arm behind her shoulders and the other arm around her waist as we ended with her arching her back in a kind of dip, with one of her legs up in the air, bent at the knee in an elegant pose. I remember the burst of applause, her hugging me, and then we went back to wherever dance contestants go when their turn is over. She was breathing hard, but beaming.

And then I woke up! I don’t even know if we won!

But look at all the detail that I remember. That’s more detail than I usually remember. I still hear the music in my head, and I can still feel the movement as we danced – that’s how real it felt. Who knew that my head could create such a gorgeous ballroom, and that it could produce such detail of me and my dance partner, right down to feeling the weight of her body as we danced? And who knew that it could create such a gorgeous outfit for her to wear? I know nothing about designing women’s fashion – certainly no more than I know the details of European ballroom architecture!

So how do our minds do something like that? It makes me wonder about the untapped potential in our human minds, and what we may ultimately be capable of if we are able to tap that potential. Maybe later we will, but perhaps now we are not ready to handle such a massive amount of information that having such a heightened potential would bring. Perhaps our dreams are all that we can handle at this point in regards to that kind of potential. Maybe so, but wow, if my dance with that beautiful woman is an example of what our minds are ultimately capable of doing, I can’t wait to see what we could do in real life instead of in just our dreams!