Not going anywhere for a while?

Welcome one and all. (My all time favorite election season advertisement is the Snickers ad when it was Gore v. Bush. "My dad and I wear the same size pants." "I invented pants." Still makes me laugh way too hard!) As you may be able to guess, based on my moderate absence that I've been gathering blog fodder. What would my regular readers do if I didn't start with sports? (order: Baseball, Fenway, Cable TV, the Presidency, monopolies, Senator Edwards, Sicko)

The thing that drives me most nuts about baseball (apart from players who fill their bodies with illegal performance enhancers in an attempt to break one of the games most sacred records) is the "Proximity out." This play occurs at second base during a double play. For some reason, whether it is the short stop or the second baseman covering, they aren't actually required to touch the bag before throwing to first. Whether they do or not, the runner headed in their direction will be declared (falsely) out. The most grievous of these calls was when the Red Sox were in Atlanta. Edgar Renteria grabbed a ground ball hit by Jason Varitek. He ran toward second base and clearly threw the ball to first before actually reaching second. Mike Lowell was called out at second and 'Tek (who beat the throw that was scooped out of the dirt by the first baseman) was call out at first. So, because of the proximity out, instead of first and second with one out, it was the end of the inning. (if Edgar had actually been required to touch second, there is no possible way the first base umpire could have blown the call as 'Tek would have already past first base before the throw arrived.) Can anyone (Apu) explain this strange exception to the normally stringent rules of baseball?

It's obvious to me that the words "Fenway Park" have gone the way of "Super Bowl." While listening to the Red Sox on WTIC AM 1080 here in CT (Where they break in with a recorded "WTIC" whenever the announcers at the game begin to say "WRKO" or "WEEI Red Sox radio network") I've heard many commercials that reference Boston's home field. However, not one of them mentions it by name. Kevin Youkilis has an advertisement where he talks about his "home park" and "Boston's ball field." Other commercials refer to it as "the home of the Red Sox," "Big Papi's House," and "Boston's landmark stadium." Why is that? Because, in an effort to bleed every dollar they can from the investment that is the Red Sox, the owners now make people pay to say the words "Fenway Park." First Friday Night Baseball, then demanding to own part of WEEI, the Theo issue, now this! How many more ways can the Red Sox front office find to piss off a life long loyal fan like me? Only time will tell.

Speaking of money suckers... Why are there commercials on cable TV? I understand why they are present incessantly on free TV; someone has to pay for the drudgery that's aired on the six stations I get. But if I'm paying a premium to receive cable TV, and the cable companies are paying the stations to have the right to carry their "crap that comes in better," why are the stations also receiving extra funds by airing commercials? Really, it should be one or the other. If I'm going to pay $60 a month for your "service" and you are going to pay millions to ESPN2 just so you can carry their coverage of the National Backgammon Championships, don't let them air commercials! Tell them you won't pay to carry them and nobody's gonna see their money machines. If they want you, oh mighty cable company (who charges the public way too much), to be their conduit into millions of homes demand they remove the commercials! (**sidenote** has anyone else noticed how the only programming out there that has every commercial narrowcast to the specific audience watching is golf?! Every ad during every commercial break has a golf theme. Doesn't even matter what they're selling! If it's an ad for NASCAR, Jeff Gordon and Rusty Wallace are racing in supped up golf carts. It's crazy! **end sidenote**)

I've been thinking recently, (a dangerous past-time, I know), many times the Queen of Hearts has told me that if I begin a career in politics that she'd leave me. Well, I started to think about the reasons that I'd want to be President. Here's what I came up with. The top ten reasons that I would want to be President:
10) To win a "popular election" because just over 20% of the entire US population actually voted for me. (Another 17% voted for the other guy, and 63% stayed home)
9) To completely embarrass my children
8) To ensure that my every word would be scrutinized by millions
7) To have every detail of my past on display for the American public
6) To hit the entire talk show circuit while campaigning (making sure to get on Oprah twice)
5) To be considered wrong by at least 50% of the US population
4) To have every one of my physical imperfections characterized by political cartoonists
3) To spend $5,000,000 to get a job that pays $250,000 per year with a $100,000 per year pension once I'm done. All the while I get to age thirty years in the course of eight. Sign me up!
2) To know that at all times there are at least four people plotting my assassination and one Vice President who wishes one of them would succeed.
And the number one reason that I would want to be president:
1) To be impersonated on SNL!
Really, we have to ask ourselves why anyone would actually want to be President! I say we ask all the candidates and then vote for the one who tells the truth (IE doesn't say "to help the American people.").

In America, we have laws against monopolies. And, unlike some laws, these are actually enforced! However, there is one huge, massive, gigantic monopoly that no one seems to notice. In fact, they are so oblivious to this monopoly that, not only do they look the other way when it swells, they actually want to bestow it with even more monopolies! And it's not even a successful monopoly! It's a business that loses the equivalent to a moderate nations GNP every year! It holds a monopoly on some of the services that our nation requires and it keeps trying to get more and more! So, if we have anti-monopoly laws that are designed to protect Americans from these very practices, why is it that the US government is allowed to be the largest monopoly in the nation and we want to allow it to control more and more?! If the government were a company, would anyone buy stock in it? Is there a more wasteful entity in the country? Just like politics that the only organization allowed to have a monopoly is the very one that is designed to destroy them.

Senator Edwards was on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno (Probably the only thing that he and I have in common). Of course, he took the opportunity to spew some talking points. While being lobbed pre-discussed softballs from the host, he said "the war in Iraq has been a huge equipping tool for our enemies. The White House even admits that we now have more terrorists and [fewer] allies than we had before the war." (The senator actually used the grammatically incorrect term "less" allies. I have corrected it for his benefit.) His purpose with this statement was that these changes were simply due to the fact that we were in Iraq. When, in actuality, this statement simply proves that the strategy of the democrats has been successful: Oppose the war, convince enough people that it won't work, and it will fail. There weren't idealists flocking to join the Nazis when the US people supported their nation's involvement in "Europe's War." There wasn't nation after nation bowing before the altar of Communism while Americans backed their government's handling of the Cold War. However, the South was emboldened the more the Doves in the North protested the Civil War. The North Vietnamese recruited countless soldiers as our young people treated war vets like last weeks garbage. Of course there are going to be more terrorists when they think the US public is divided against itself! Hundreds of soldiers refused to reenlist after Valley Forge, but hundreds more signed up to serve when it looked like the fledgling Continental Army had a chance against the Red Coats. With the activities of the "we're not against the soldiers, we're against the war" lefties, no one should be surprised by the increase in the number of our enemies. Especially not those who were hoping for it.

Michael Moore's new movie Sicko opens in July. He, too, was on The Tonight Show (soon to be "With Conan O'Brien"). Brace yourselves: I liked most of what he had to say! While, on one hand, in pure Michael Moore fashion: He exposed a massive problem while either offering a completely ignorant solution or no solution at all. On the other hand: he did not make it political. He pointed out how Hilary was once a major stumper for Universal (read: governmental) Healthcare and now that she is a Senator, she receives the second most Pharmaceutical money from lobbyists in the Senate. Anyone hear her talking about Healthcare anymore? He also lobbed his attacks at Republicans as well, such as Bush II and Nixon. But his documentary is more about the problem then it is about his proposed solution. (**sidenote** one aspect of the solution must be a cap on malpractice suits. If insurance companies knew that they'd never pay more than, say, $1,000,000 per suit, they'd be able to lower their premiums. If physicians and hospitals that now had less insurance to pay weren't allowed to simply pocket that money as profit, then the cost of procedures would drop. If the cost of procedures fell, health insurance companies would either be able to offer more coverage, or lower premiums. Hence the cost of healthcare drops for all. But we'd rather just put a company that has a trillion dollar deficit in charge of the nations health. Good plan. **end sidenote**) I am actually looking forward to seeing Sicko.

Once again, I've bitten off a mouthful. And while chewing it all, I must admit that it's just my opinion.