Starting Five

1. So it’s probably no coincidence that the abbreviations for the two states that passed the marijuana reeferendum (credit to The Daily Show on that) are WA CO. Not as in David Koresh, but as in Wacko! Marijuana is now legal in 4% of the United States and it’ll only be a matter of time before the other 96% joints them. Why? As we’ll explore later (and, kids, listen closely: this is the answer to most questions) there’s simply too much $$$ to be made.

Currently seeking a room to rent in Durango…

2. Rookie quarterback Andrew Luck runs for two touchdowns and leads the Colts to a 27-10 victory at Jacksonville, their fourth straight win. Luck, who recently shaved his skull in support of cancer-stricken head coach Chuck Pagano, has led the Colts to a 6-3 record overall, although it should be noted that he ranks 25th in the NFL in passer rating. The win streak began after Pagano announced that he was leaving to battle leukemia, which is…weird.

The brothers are like, So you shaved your scalp? So?

3. Band of brothers, indeed: Roger Waters and a band of wounded military veterans perform three songs, including “Wish You Were Here”, at the Stand Up For Heroes benefit concert at the Beacon Theatre in New York City. Other performers (a few of these names may be familiar to you) included Bruce Springsteen, John Mayer, Ricky Gervais and Jon Stewart. We are not at liberty to say how we know this, but we have first-hand experience from this week of just how cool Waters is and can assure you that his time with these veterans was far from limited to this night onstage. Everything Waters, who lost both his father and grandfather in World Wars II and I, respectively, did this week was a total rock-star move in all the very best senses of the word.

Shine on, you crazy diamond

4. We are reading at this moment headlines on SI’s site. One says “Report: Kiffin’s future with Trojans in ‘real doubt'” and another reads “Report: Gruden could leave booth for Eagles job.” While we agree with Bomani Jones that any Gruden-to-_____ reports are not to be believed until he is actually standing at the podium, we wonder if you are thinking what we are thinking: the better job for a Gruden who wishes to return to coaching is in LA.

5. In our opinion, there was no greater president than Abraham Lincoln and there is no greater film reviewer than Roger Ebert. So why not sit back and enjoy Ebert’s review of Steven Spielberg’s “Lincoln?” Daniel Day-Lewis, in the title role, could become the first man to win three Best Actor Oscars this winter. No one but no one is less a slave to Hollywood than DDL. “Lincoln” is just his 11th film in the past 22 years (that’s half a year’s worth of work for Jessica Chastain) and yet he’ll soon be batting over .300 in Best Actor Oscars/appearance. He’s a thespian anaconda, he is.

“Oscar, Oscar, Oscar…” (for you fans of The Odd Couple)

Reserves

JUST IN: USA Today reporting that Los Angeles Laker coach Mike Brown has been fired. Beware the Kobe “death stare.” Or is it just the curse of coaching Dwight Howard? Either way, will another LA-based coach be axed this month?

Groupon stock is down almost 30% in trading today. It’s as if the New York Stock Exchange is offering a Groupon on Groupon.

A few thoughts on the potential inevitable nationwide legalization of recreational marijuana, a.k.a., “Romancing the Stoned”,  from someone who has never gotten, as Fox & Friends’ Steve Doocy put it yesterday morning, “potted up on weed.” 

— I currently earn a large share of my income thanks to the propensity of people to enjoy a good bottle of wine, or a few cocktails, with their dinner. If alcohol were to be made illegal — again — I’d be in serious financial trouble, as would the entire food service industry outside of fast-food joints.

— Doocy, on Fox & Friends, wondered aloud what might happen if someone were to “get potted up on weed and then get behind the wheel of a car.” We don’t know, Steve, but we’d love to ask the more than 10,000 Americans who died in alcohol-related driving accidents in 2011.

— Watch a World War II film. Any WW II film. Invariably there’s a scene in which the soldiers get liberty and a few of them go out and have a few. These scenes usually end with someone breaking a chair over someone else’s back because that’s what happens when you drink too many whiskies. No one smokes pot in these films, even though the cult classic Reefer Madness was released in the 1930s. Now go ahead and watch a Vietnam film. Notice a difference (besides the fact that chairs no longer shatter when broken over people’s backs)? Your parents, and their parents, fought in wars that America won and in which people got drunk, not baked (even in M*A*S*H, a Korean War depiction, the officers have set up a still but no one is smoking joints). For people over the age of 60, an inevitably shrinking demographic, weed is a symbol of the turbulent Sixties, when America lost its way, in their opinion. But those people are an ever-shrinking portion of the demographic. Which is why  it won’t be long before pot is legalized nationally.

— Who wins, besides Harold & Kumar? Well, distributors of marijuana in the first place. And who will they be? Will cigarette companies get on board and begin manufacturing weed, as they know more about this business than anyone? Who else wins? How about taxpayers, because if marijuana is going to be sold it is definitely going to be taxed. Also, according to the Daily Show (where we get all our important information), America spends $8 billion annually on the incarceration of people for marijuana usage, possession, or distribution. This is, well, wack.

— Who loses, besides that kid down the hall in your dorm who has better Hollister gear than everyone else and who seems to be dating well above his pay-grade (or is that your campus bookie)? Well, to begin with, big pharma companies (who needs Adderall when you’ve got mary jane). And then there is the alcohol industry (not insignificant lobbying groups, this pair). And then there is the prison industry, which is in fact an industry even if the government supports it.

–We’ve served on a few juries and most of the trials we’ve sat for relate to buy-and-busts. Imagine how much less backlogged the American criminal court system will be once marijuana is legalized.

–Final thought, again, from someone who doesn’t smoke weed: If we can legalize alcohol, we can legalize marijuana. Legalizing marijuana probably won’t put a dent in the amount of people who smoke pot, because pretty much everyone who wants to already does. Also, legalizing pot will provide an economic boon both by the increased tax revenue and the decrease of resources spent fighting this crime. Easy, no?

Tasty wave? Check. Cool buzz? Check. He’s fine.

The 20 Best Stoner movies of all time, in which Seth Rogen appears an inordinate number of times…

“Tramps like us, baby, we were born to kvetch”? The New York Times incorrectly identifies The Boss as “Bruce Springstein.” The correction appears at the bottom of the story.

Johnny Football and Texas A&M are coming to Tuscaloosa to face the top-ranked Crimson Tide. How good are the Aggies? So good that all of the national columnists are able to avoid writing boring pieces about how Bear Bryant coached at both A&M and Alabama.

Apropos of nothing, I happened upon this Jackson 5 performance from the Ed Sullivan Show on YouTube the other day. I’m old enough to remember seeing them on The Flip Wilson Show in the early 1970s, and back then as a a lad I just took it for granted that talent like this existed. Alas, I was wrong. Even Michael Jackson the adult wasn’t as charismatic a performer, or as gifted a singer, as his childhood self. This is simply amazing to watch. If you’ve never seen the pre-pubescent MJ perform, you’re in for a huge treat.

An excellent starting five

Oregon State (7-1) visits Stanford (7-2). If the Beavers lose, they could end up with three losses as Oregon remains on the schedule. Stanford, too, still must play the Ducks and No. 18 UCLA (7-2). The Bruins still have Stanford, of course, and 6-3 USC. What does it all mean? It means that if the Eugene team runs the table, there is a good chance that no other Pac-12 school will have fewer than three losses, which would likely put the second-best Pac-12 school outside of the top 14 in the final BCS Standings, which would open up a spot in the Rose Bowl for a school from outside the Big Ten or Pac-12. Just a thought…

Our column on Crystal Ball Run on Lane Kiffin and how he exhibits many of the same qualities as a sociopath. He’s not unlike a non-violent version of Dr. H.H. Holmes, the charming but narcissistic and sociopathic serial killer in Erik Larson’s book “Devil in the White City.”

Starting Five

1. It was a week that began with Krystal Ball (she has gone from anonymous to ubiquitous on NBC/MSNBC this week) and has since devolved to discussion of deflated balls… which sounds painful. Apparently, after Stanford and Arizona let the air out of USC’s BCS bowl dreams, a Trojan student manager acted alone in deflating footballs before the Oregon contest last Saturday night. Slightly deflated footballs are easier to throw and catch, which would have helped the Trojans offset the handicap of having a former Heisman front-runner (Matt Barkley) at quarterback and the likely Biletnikoff Award winner (Marqise Lee) at wide receiver. USC has been fined and reprimanded, and a few people even believe Trojan coach Lane Kiffin when he says that he had no idea this was taking place. The lesson here, as always, is this: never allow your balls to be compromised.

Kiffin, misinterpreting the “How big are your balls supposed to be?” query

2. As long as we happen to be on the topic of compromised balls….

3. Night on Bullsh__ Mountain: Jon Stewart recovers from a dud live election episode of The Daily Show to confront Fox News with a double-barreled barrage of comic vitriol. Stewart refers to the cable news channel as “Bullsh__ Mountain News” (which sounds to us like something that would air replays of Colorado State-Wyoming games) and dissects the same five minutes of election night coverage that we discussed here yesterday. You can just feel Stewart’s glee. The key quote, from the Stepfordianly lovely Megyn Kelly to Karl Rove, “Is this just math that you do as a Republican to make yourself feel better or is this real?” (at 5:22 mark)

“Rove”, an anagram of “over”

4. The Los Angeles Lakers are 1-4 after last night’s loss at Utah, which gives them the worst record in the Western Conference. Their lone win has come against the Detroit Pistons, who themselves are 0-4. We don’t know about you, but pissed-beyond-belief Kobe is our favorite Kobe.

5. Puerto Ricans endorse, for the first time, a referendum to become the 51st state. Three other referenda in the past 45 years have all been rejected. The proposal would likely have no bearing on Washington D.C.’s decision to grant Puerto Rico statehood, mainly because no one can decide how this would alter the plot of West Side Story.

Reserves

Is this the proper time to remind everyone that less than two months ago Lane Kiffin told everyone that he did not vote his Trojans No. 1 in the USA Today/Coaches’ preseason poll, a comment that led the USA Today to out Kiffin as a liar by revealing his vote? Is Kiffin lying about the deflated balls? Who outside of the USC football program really knows, but as someone tweeted earlier today, “Lane Kiffin is the reason we all have to pay first before pumping at gas stations.” We wonder how long USC athletic director Pat Haden, who is widely respected for his intelligence, integrity and pure personability both in and outside of southern California, remains staunchly in Kiffin’s corner.

Anne Hathaway and Jason Sudeikis and some Ontological Break SNL promos. Are we weird to be hoping for a “Love and Other Drugs” sequel?

Tweetable:

“We’re about to get inundated with hoops games on boats. My take? It’s a lame gimmick that underscores regular season irrelevance.” Pete Thamel, @SIPeteThamel

Will Leitch loved Lincoln. Great, but will it do better at the box office next weekend than Wreck-It Ralph?

And not two minutes after our mention of Pete Thamel’s tweet, Dan Wetzel notes that “a number of ADs privately figure (college football) playoff will expand to 8 teams halfway thru upcoming deal.” So let’s play those round-of-eight games on an aircraft carrier, shall we?

A word or two more on last night’s episode of  The Daily Show. One, notice that no correspondents appeared, which is rare. Second, you cannot help but notice that Jon Stewart was genuinely irate about what Fox News attempted to do, at least in his view. Like most artists we have ever come across, Stewart does his best work when he is pissed off. That was the case here.

On the night after the presidential election, the face of NBC News appears first with the face of CBS. We love this because we love the both of them, but how does Scott Pelle feel?

Why do we find Good Morning, America’s Lara Spencer so darn annoying, narcissistic and phony? This clip sure helps explain why.

We’re just being catty here, but Spencer never feels genuine to us

Brian Williams, by the way, went after one of NBC’s own when he verbally abused Donald Trump on election night with his “has driven well past the last exit to relevance.” remark. For Williams, who like us is not only a Jersey boy but a Middletown, N.J., boy, exits are meaningful metaphors. And Williams is one of the more diplomatic and personable on-air news types. Kudos to him for speaking from the heart.
A little help, please, on tax rates: Unless we are mistaken, the threshold for the highest tax rate in the United States (35%, according to this information) is annual income of $388,351. Let’s distance ourselves from what the top tax rate should be and ask instead, this question: Why are folks who earn $400,000 per year asked to pay the same rate as those who earn $400,000,000 a year? In places such as Los Angeles and Manhattan there are people who earn both, and everywhere in between those sums (we are not those people), and we can tell you that while $400,000 goes quite some way in New York City, it does not exactly make you obnoxiously wealthy. Comfortable? Yes. But why are these people paying the same tax rate as the Koch brothers?

Starting Five

1. The final score: Barack Obama 303, Mitt Romney 206. President Obama becomes, by our math, the 16th president to be elected to a consecutive second term (Grover Cleveland was elected to two terms, but not consecutively. In the interim, we believe, he was a Hall of Fame-caliber pitcher in the National League. We may be wrong about that). One president (FDR) served three-plus terms; 11 presidents served two consecutive full terms, including three of the previous four; one (Nixon) resigned in the midst of his second term; and two (Lincoln and McKinley) were assassinated in their second terms.

Why is this man smiling? He just won his third presidential election.

2. So we woke up this morning and all we’ve heard is the term “fiscal cliff”, as if this hadn’t been a looming danger for the past 311 days. CNBC had glitzy promo ads discussing said precipice, and we highly doubt they were filmed and produced in the past 12 hours. Which is another way of saying that the past 18 months of campaign coverage has been a contrived distraction, as America now wakes up to a pile of bills that are due on New Year’s Eve. What exactly is the fiscal cliff? It is, as the Chicago Tribune says, “…a combination of a $600 billion package of automatic tax increases and steep across-the-board spending cuts that are set to take effect in January if Congress does not reach a budget deal.” Or, as Sgt. Barnes once said, “I AM reality.”

Thlema: “Let’s cut military spending.” Louise: “What I’d expect someone seated on the left to say.”

3. The 0-3 Denver Nuggets defeat the 0-3 Detroit Pistons, 109-97, rendering Detroit one of two remaining winless teams in the NBA (the Wizards are 0-2) after one week of play. So that explains Phillip Seymour Hofman’s t-shirt? (3rd pic down) By the way, the real Lester Bangs helped make that T-shirt, well, almost famous.

“You’ll meet them all again on your long journey to the middle…”

4. So tomorrow China, that little nation to the far east (or immediate north and west for those of you in the Pacific Time Zone) of us, is also staging an important election for control of the country this week. But, you know, who cares about China?

5. Congratulations to Brophy College Preparatory (Phoenix, Arizona), our alma mater, for winning its 25th consecutive state championship in swimming and diving. Its most famous Speedo’d alum is Gary Hall, Jr. The Broncos, who last lost a dual meet in the 1980s, have now won 38 state S&D championships overall. Our friend since high school days, Colin Williams, is the proud father of the state’s 200 freestyle champ, Lucas Williams.

Reserves

Mitt Romney, who claimed to not have written a concession speech, actually delivered better –and briefer– rhetoric late last night (maybe he should’ve spoken more off-the-French-cuff during the campaign). “Honesty, charity, integrity and family. We look to our parents. From the final analysis, everything depends on the success of our homes.” Romney’s entire speech, both video and transcript, may be found here. 

“Gimme Mitt! Gimme Mitt! Dark hair, temples gray, lips so thick!”

President Obama’s victory speech will be remembered mostly for three things: 1. his offsetting of two prepositional phrases (“for you” to “by you”) to make a larger point, 2. his ad-lib –or was it?– concerning the unnecessarily long voting lines (“By the way, we need to fix that”) and 3. for the bizarre lady who thought it would be a good idea to use her weave as a place to plant the American flag. We have now found the polar (lunar?) opposite of Neil Armstrong.

Flag planter

Our favorite presidential moment of the week starred Louis C.K. as Abraham Lincoln (your move, Daniel Day Lewis). “You know, you’re all emancipated, it’s good, right?”

Fox News’ Megyn Kelly actually wandered off set and into the offices of Fox’s election-results numbers crunchers to verify that Obama had indeed captured Ohio (politically) as Karl Rove, on-set, insisted that it was a premature call (CNN and NBC declared for the president at 11:18 p.m., and Fox News a minute or two later). This was classic television, if not the finest moment in impartial reportage. Chris Wallace: “I’m going to ask you a straight-out question… Do you believe Ohio has been settled?” Rove: “No, no I don’t.” As Rove spoke these words, even Fox News was running the graphic “Barack Obama re-elected president” This was like watching one of those SNL opening monologues in which the host walks backstage to seek out Lorne Michaels.

Our three favorite cinematic fiscal cliff metaphors. We invite you to submit your own…

1.

“Obamacare is going to ruin us allllllllllll!”

2.

“That’s a long way down. Our only chance of survival is to increase middle-class tax rates.”

3.

“We can probably endure a recession as long as it’s accompanied by a Cat Stevens soundtrack”

((For the kids, the three films in question are “Thelma & Louise”, “Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid” and “Harold & Maude.” Why films with ampersands seem to always include cliff-diving scenes is a question for Leonard Maltin)

Former University of Texas coach Darrel Royal, one of the true legends of SWC football, dies at the age of 88. Hook ’em. Royal was an Oklahoma alum but a Longhorn coaching legend. He finished 184-60-5, meaning he won more than 75% of his games. A World War II vet, Royal led Texas to a pair of outright national championships in the 1960s and to a 15-14 win over Arkansas in the 1969 “Game of the Century.” At a time when coaches were as famous for their colloquialisms (Lou Holtz is the last surviving member of this group) as their success, Royal was famous for saying, “Dance with the one who brought ya’.”

Darrel Royal, 1924-2012

Leftovers from election night coverage: GOP consultant Alex Castellanos, on CNN, saying, “I’m going for the hemlock” moments before CNN projected Barack Obama as the winner. MSNBC’s Chris Matthews foolishly saying, “I’m so glad we had that storm”, a reference to Sandy and to the idea that it helped propel Obama past Romney; Fox News’ Bret Baier and Megyn Kelly asking White House spokesman Robert Gibbs why Republicans in the House should in any way accede to President Obama just because he won a second term.

It must be said: as consistently and reliably smart and incisive as The Daily Show is, last night’s live election night special was a dud. It was the Seinfeld series finale of Jon Stewart’s career.

Colorado and Washington approve recreational marijuana use. The PAC-12 really is forward-thinking. As soon as we figure out how to tax it, the feds will be on board.

A gallery of angry celebrity election-night tweets, from Ted Nugent and Donald Trump to Patricia Heaton and Stephen Baldwin…

How ’bout them AAPLs? The world’s wealthiest company has lost 20% off its stock value since achieving an all-time high of $705 on Sept. 21. For some people Sept. 22 was the first day of autumn, but at Apple it was definitely the first day of fall.