SamSaid!

I am a sports fan. Maybe not a junkie, but an avid fan.  All sports. From my early days,  I grabbed the sports page before the funnies  and still do. In school years, I tried all of the ball sports and even won a few letters using my mediocre skills.  And I was a whiz in the sports trivia games  —  names and statistics. Eventually I became hooked on baseball, football and golf.  They are still my favorites.

Fall is my favorite time of the year  —  the World Series of baseball, big golf events  and the football bowl games.  The bowl games were special to me since the best teams were invited to the prestige Bowl games –  Rose, Orange, Sugar, Cotton, Gator, Fiesta , etc —based on the best records. Top Flight teams and quality games. Now all of that has changed and bowl games are sort of dime a dozen. This year there are about 40 games bearing peculiar titles and played by very average teams. How about Little Ceasars pizza bowl, Beef O’Brady bowl, MAACO Bowl, and other commercial titles. To use a time tested double entendre, four quarters make a dollar. All a team has to do to qualify for bowl selection is win 6 games out of 12. A bowl sponsorship  is simply a new way to get broad based product publicity whether there are any people in the stands or not. When it comes to prestige, can you imagine a trophy case featuring a pizza bowl triumph??  Or maybe a muffler repair?? The whole notion of a big win over a strong foe has been diluted and sacrificed to commercial advertising. If my home team is in a bowl, I might watch on TV.  Maybe. Maybe not.

Back in my formative years an unmistakable symbol of masculinity was blue jeans. All the guys had them and wore them on virtually all occasions.  Aside from military garb, these were the “he-man” outfits. Then it suddenly dawned on the apparel marketing gurus that the industry was overlooking  –  or ignoring  –  more than 50%  of the potential jeans market —-  women.

The advertising plans came quickly and the era of women wearing jeans arrived.  The marketing and advertising were both spectacularly successful and now we see women wearing jeans everywhere  –  schools, malls, grocery stores, movies, professional offices, hospitals,  stadiums, airlines,  —–  everywhere. there is no end in sight. Men still wear jeans, but increasingly jeans  are seen as female attire. But in all of this change I see no evidence of inquiry as to whether the female physique is really suited to jeans.  I am a skeptic.  Maybe 40 % could pass a basic test, but not the remainder. For most women, the jeans waistline looks more like a storage zone for Ford 250 tires, and the view from the rear looks like  two cats fighting in a gunny sack.  I will concede that for slender  ladies with an hour glass figure and a firm fanny, jeans are a winner. For the others it is a losing battle.

Now I am beginning to wonder what we will do with hundreds of thousands or millions of pairs of jeans when the fashions change. Pity the third world  people dealing with all of those used jeans. With his fancy to be more like the man in the street, do you think that Obama will start to show up in  jeans at press conferences?? Somehow, he does not strike me as a Wrangler or Levis kind of guy. Of course he still doesn’t react to good advice when he gets it.  Never know!

     Long before the Obama tsunami washed over John McCain in the fall of  ‘o8, his political skills and talents were well recognized.  But while conceding youth and verbal skills there remained serious reservations about his experience (or lack thereof) in  foreign affairs, economics, military matters and government spending  — and if anything, those reservations have been heightened over the past year. It seems as though anything he touches turns to mud.  His track record in both the Illinois legislature and the US Senate is very revealing. In both arenas, he has disdained Yes/No decisions and has opted to vote “present” . It seems to me that voting “present” is just one step short of “form a committee” or” hire a consultant.”  For sure it does not qualify as making a decision.   In thinking back to my academic years, there was an old adage that  said “never trust a politician who ducks tough issues by voting “present”.

      Come to think of  it, I don’t know whether it qualifies as an old political adage or not. But if it doesn’t, it should.  We don’t have to look far for proof.

Make no mistake, Prez Obama is formidable political figure –   he is youthful, energetic, well spoken, television talented, knowledgeable, and has PR savvy.  But if you put all of his considerable talents together they fall well short of quality experience, leadership, and common sense. Certainly his efforts at personal command of foreign policy has fallen flat. With all of the hoopla over Hillary as SecState, we might ask, “What does she do?” while Obama globe trots.

With all of that, he clearly does have one great talent  –  Spending huge amounts of money  –  someone else’s money  –  with scant attention paid to mere details like paying for his grandiose programs. At the base level of his schemes is a thorough knowledge of how to get his hands on lots of money. Three main ways. 1) Printing money  2) borrowing money 3) taxing citizens

Printing money …….   see US Mint

Borrowing  …….    see China

Taxes  …….  see Citizens of USA

The ABCs of  the Obama Administration.  No secrets here.  Most of us dislike 4 letter words like….”debt”, but not Obama. “Spending” is his priority. His flowery speeches are taking us down a very worrisome path. And are we safer under his military policies?  Not as far as I can see!!

At 8:40 PST on 3/28/10 Obama and his henchmen committed this country to a long one way road to socialized medicine. If you like bigger government, higher taxes,  higher insurance premiums, and higher medical bills, you will love it. He got it done via legislative chicanery, arm twisting, political bribery, and just plain threats. Now we will get a full treatment of flowery rhetoric.  And the word “socialism” will not appear. but that is what it is.  The last step was a couple of Executive Orders which amount to nothing.  Rep. Bart Stupak took the bait on the abortion issue and now we’ll have to wait and see how Obama weasels out of that commitment. Moral of the story  …  tomorrow means nothing. Only today counts.

     Stupak might think about that.    Obama has the votes and Stupak might wind up with a n empty bag. Next comes jobs, jobs and jobs. Despite all the fancy words, there is no such thing as a “job” until someone hires someone to perform a given task.  I wonder if it ever occurs to Obama et al, that the best way to get someone hired is to create an employment  environment favorable to  employers.  The answer certainly is not more regulations and heavier taxes from the heavy hand of government. Most people understand that, but Washington???

In  1954 a hit movie starring actress Judy Garland was “A star is born”. I don’t recall much about the movie, but the title registered with me and I have recalled it on occasion over the years. The most recent occasion was the appearance of Sarah Palin at the 2007 Republican Convention . She appeared as a relative stranger and over night became a household name.  She reinvigorated the Republicans and presented an unexpected force (challenge) to Obama and the Democrats who quickly undertook the task of trying to destroy her. That effort continues today via the hostile left wing press and media. However, her messages resonate among a healthy segment of the political population and her visibility remains high (see book sales).  In the 2012 elections she will be a force. Her star has been born and is thriving.

Now a new star has been born.  Scott Brown.  His huge win in Massachusetts  has catapulted him onto the front pages of newspapers and magazines all over the country. He has all of the attributes of  a successful candidate and a well spoken leader. Good looking, good vocabulary, good presence of mind, good sense of humor, and well versed on the issues of the day. For sure, a star has been born in Massachusetts. I wonder if Ted Kennedy is turning over in his grave.

Want to take any bets that both Sarah and Scott will be on the podium at the 2012 Republican convention?? The only thing better than a new star is two new stars.