Monthly Archives: June 2021

IT’S ALL HAPPENING!

by John Walters | 3 Comments

by John Walters

When The Schiff Hits The Fan

In today’s episode of “Banana Republicans” we learn that Donald Trump had William Barr subpoena Democratic congressmen Adam Schiff’s and Eric Swallwell’s data from Apple. And Tim Cook handed it over.

This would seem like an absurdly gross misuse of power, no? Particularly since there was no evidence of any crime being committed. What was taking place is that Schiff was the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee investigating leaks about the White House and Russia.

As an aside, there’s no person in the world keeping a better secret than the American translator who was in the room with Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin in Helsinki. Whatever communication passed between those two world leaders in Helsinki in the summer of 2018 is invaluable.

Kamala Harris, here a senator, asked the right question but erred in letting Bill Barr off the hook. She should have remained silent and waited, as uncomfortably long as it took, to get a response.

It Goes To 12

College football has now decided to go from a 4-team playoff to a 12-team playoff. Guess what? Relative to the 4-team playoff, we are in favor of this (we’d return to the old system of the two top-ranked teams at year’s end and bowls and Brent Musburger and/or Keith Jackson, but that’s us). With one YUUUUGE caveat: you shouldn’t be asking the best players in college football to play two to three extra games, with exponentially higher risk of injury, without compensating them. That’s just unethical.

Al-CAT-raz

This is a fascinating story about people, the pandemic and pussycats. Here on Isla Fuhrtada, a small island off Brazil’s coast, live 100s of mostly abandoned cats. They are mostly feral now. What exactly they are eating, I don’t know. Maybe they should become pen pals with that elephant herd in China.

I think they could start charging cat lovers to visit the island and then use the proceeds to leave Nine Lives cans all over the island. Works for us.

The SuperFriends

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Clay Mation/Machine

In a few hours from now as the MH staff pecks this out, Rafael Nadal will be taking on Novak Djokovic in the French Open semifinal. A few notes, via The Kid…

—Nadal is 105-2 all-time in matches at the French

—Nadal has only dropped 22 sets in those 107 matches, or about one per five matches.

—Should Nadal beat Djokovic and win the final, he will surpass Roger Federer for the most Grand Slams in a career (21 to 20). Djokovic has 18. However, there are those who will always consider this mark somewhat dubious. Why? Because currently 13 of Nadal’s 20 career Grand Slams were won in Paris. He is the King of Clay, unassailable. But while he has won at least one of each of the other three Grand Slams, he’s not been anywhere near as dominant.

–No matter where Djokovic and Federer end up on the all-time list, and there guess here is 1st and 3rd respectively, Nadal is the greatest player on clay ever. Not even close. Whether he’s the greatest tennis player of all time is a matter of opinion. There will be those who will never shake from Fed. Djokovic will likely end up with the most Grand Slams and yet also the fewest fervent acolytes of the trio.

Say It Ain’t So, Bo

1989: “Bo Knows”

2021: “Bo Knew”

The news coming out this week about Bo Schembechler, arguably the most iconic coach (after Fielding Yost?) in Michigan football history, is truly disturbing. Some are saying it’s worse than the Joe Paterno news and that may be accurate. If you’re not up on what’s happening, read here. And remember that it’s Bo’s stepson making these allegations, with first-hand knowledge of being a victim as a child.

One suggested reason as to why coach Bo Schembechler never blew the whistle on Dr.Robert Anderson, why in fact he lobbied to have him reinstated: control (see our Vlad Putin item above). When you’ve got the goods on someone else’s sexual perversions, you can get them to do what you want.

Somewhere in heaven (or elsewhere), Woody Hayes’ spirit is saying, “All I ever did was punch a player on national TV.”

Hidden Figure

Her name was Judith Love Cohen. Born in Brooklyn in 1933, she excelled at both math and ballet. In college, she was the only female in her engineering classes and also dancing in the Metropolitan Opera Ballet. She moved to Los Angeles, where her dance career ended but she was the only woman in her engineering classes at USC.

She worked at TRW, an engineering firm, for more than 30 years. Her most important project was the Abort-Guidance System, which was used to get the Apollo 13 astronauts back home safely in 1970. A few months earlier she had given birth to actor Jack Black. Yes, this dude…

Pretty cool, eh?

The Kid...

…. is hot tonight! The world, is hot tonight! But where will he be tomorrooooooooow?

The Kid wins his fifth straight, I believe, to move to 16-7 and $1,335. He liked Vegas last night and they beat Colorado 6-3. You’d think he’d be up more than $335 for having won roughly 70% of his picks.

We’ll see if he gives us a call today. His favorite athlete is Rafael Nadal and he claims to have made boatloads of juju betting Rafa at the French Open over the years, so he might be incommunicado this morning.

UPDATE: The Kid likes MILWAUKEE (35-27) -270 against Pittsburgh (23-38) in the Senior Circuit. To win, $100. To lose, $270. The Brewers put Brandon Woodruff and his 1.42 ERA on the hill at home.

THERE IS NO “TRY.” THERE IS ONLY “DO”

by John Walters | 2 Comments

by John Walters

I saw something late last night, I believe it was during Brian Williams’ “The 11th Hour” broadcast, that said Democrats would continue trying to persuade Republicans to quit obstructing every initiative of President Biden’s simply on the basis that they’re his.

There is no try, as everyone’s favorite little green man, Yoda, once said. There is only do.

Mitch McConnell, who may be the most evil man ever to occupy a chair in the U.S. Senate, understands this. Democrats still do no.

Yesterday the transcripts of former White House counsel Don McGahn’s testimony from Friday were released (McGahn negotiated a deal in which he’d only testify if it was not televised, because he’s smart enough to know that his words would then live forever in infamy on YouTube). McGahn, in case you missed it, testified that his boss, Donny Trump, had ordered him to fire Special Counsel Robert Mueller in the midst of his investigation. McGahn chose not to do so, explaining that such a maneuver would be a textbook example of obstruction of justice, the very thing that Mueller was investigating.

Then, when word leaked, Trump wanted McGahn to write a release saying that it was he, McGahn, who wanted to fire Mueller and that Trump had nothing to do with it. That Trump had never ordered this. A direct and outright lie, confirmed by one of the two men involved.

This on top of listening to tapes, released earlier this week, in which Rudy Giuliani explicitly states the “quid pro quo” that Trump wants from the Ukraine. And then Trump went out publicly and said, “No quid pro quo.”

I don’t know how many more pieces of evidence anyone needs to see that Trump is an outright crook and that Republicans are hell-bent on destroying democracy in exchange for returning to power. And, having learned their lessons from the past four years, never relinquishing it again short of an outright war.

Democrats cannot just try. They must do. If that means putting Donald Trump in shackles now and worrying about the ramifications later, do it. If that means openly investigating every last aspect of January 6th and holding the powerful people (in Congress and in the White House) accountable, do it. If that means telling McConnell and Joe Manchin to go f*ck themselves and pressing ahead with legislation anyway, do it.

You’ve got the will of the majority of the American people on your side, do not squander it. There is no try. There is only do.

On this same Brian Williams’ telecast last night a former U.S. Attorney, I believe her name was Joyce Vance, argued the merits of Attorney General Merrick Garland opting against prosecuting Trump with, “If we begin prosecuting former presidents, we’re going to look like a banana republic.” Dear Ms. Vance. See the picture below. We’re already there.

IT’S ALL HAPPENING!

by John Walters | 2 Comments

by John Walters

The Paul Guy

Suns point guard Chris Paul’s line in Phoenix’s Game 2 win versus Denver last night: 17 points, 15 assists, 0 turnovers. It’s Paul’s third career playoff game of at least 15 assists and zero turnovers, each of which has taken place in a different decade. Since 1984, every other player in the NBA combined has a total of two such games in the postseason.

Think about that. That’s encompassing the careers of Magic Johnson, John Stockton, Isaiah Thomas, Steve Nash, Mark Jackson, Jason Kidd and LeBron James. The rest of them all? Two. Paul? Three.

Much of that has to do with the zero, not the 15. And that’s what stands out about Paul, from watching him all season. He makes fantastic decisions. He only passes when he’s found someone open and he only takes shots that he knows he can make. I cannot remember anyone who was so deadly from mid-range.

TNT showed a graphic last night that said the Suns have won more playoff games (138…now 139) than any franchise that has never won the NBA Finals. Similarly, Paul has the most assists of any NBA player who has never advanced to the NBA Finals… with one exception: Steve Nash. The irony there being, of course, that Nash won a pair of MVPs as a Sun and looks as if he’ll be coaching this year’s NBA Eastern conference champs, the Brooklyn Nets.

I was not in favor of the Kelly Oubre for Chris Paul trade last summer. Paul, after all, is 36. I was dead wrong. Chris Paul has brought stability and toughness and confidence to a young Suns team that, since losing Game 3 in LA, has won five in a row, the last four by at least 13 points.

Coveni, Covidi, Covici

Yesterday India registered the most deaths of any one country in a single day since the pandemic began more than 15 months earlier: 6,148. Now, sure, 6,000-plus deaths in the world’s second-most populated country ain’t all that much relative to the entire population, but that’s still still almost 3 people dying per minute all day. Dropping like flies. The pandemic curtain call has not yet begun.

Stupid Human Tricks

That dude directly over her left shoulder in the white top is all of us… who are sane. It’s the curious thing about full-blown Trump cult members: there’s that mixture of sinister intentions with abject stupidity. Their minds are simply fried.

And here’s a woman who probably wouldn’t be this outspoken in her hatred and racism before Donald Trump became president. Just flying that ignorance and bigotry flag with pride.

“It’s Okay”

https://twitter.com/SimonCowell/status/1402446249500897280?s=20

Meet Jane. She’s from Zanesville, Ohio. She has cancer in her lungs, spine and liver and says that the doctors are giving her a 2% chance of survival. It’s not stopping her from bringing a little beauty into this world. She said two things that really stuck with us: 1) “It’s important for people to know that I’m more than just the bad things that have happened to me,” and 2) “You can’t wait until life isn’t hard any more before you decide to be happy.”

Contrast that with the two women (“ladies?” Ha!) above who are stoked by fear and insecurity and anger and hatred. We have a choice about how we react to the world. We can react with love and hope or we can react with anger and hate.

The Kid

… won again as the Islanders prevailed in Hempstead and knocked out the Bruins.

So he’s now at 15-7 and up to $1,235. Cooking with gas.

Tonight he’s sticking with the NHL and he likes VEGAS minus-135 over Colorado. $100 if he wins, down $135 if he loses.

IT’S ALL HAPPENING!

by John Walters | 3 Comments

by John Walters

Fields Of Gold

Joe Pompliano, who is one of the better Twitter follows out there (“For he’s a jolly good follow...”), asked his followers to submit their “most beautiful sports venues in the world” last week. The results are magical. That’s Henningsvaer Stadium in Norway above.

Hitzfield Stadium, Switzerland

Jock Itch? No, Jokic

Denver Nuggets center Nikola Jokic, who was selected 41st in 2014 while a Taco Bell commercial aired on ESPN, was named NBA Most Valuable Player (MVP) yesterday. Jokic, 6’11” and from Serbia, becomes the fifth foreign-born player this century to be named league MVP. A superb passer as well as owner of the softest shot in the NBA, Jokic averaged 26, 10 and 8 this season.

Personally, we had Steph Curry as our MVP, which means we must be xenophobic but not racist. Right?

Magnet School

In Ohio, a woman testifies in the state legislature that being vaccinated causes one to be magnetized, and that forks and car keys will this be stuck to your forehead. Why they wouldn’t be stuck to your fingers is a question apparently no one asked. Is there a scintilla of evidence of this? No. But if you’ve been paying attention, you know evidence no longer matters to the GOP.

Chipotle Off The Old Block

Chipotle, which had revenue of $6.1 billion in 2020 and a net profit o $355 million, announced today that it will be raising prices 4% to cover the cost of increasing labor costs. Never mind that the company’s share price is up 400% since 2018. The lesson here is clear: stock price is sacrosanct.

Obviously, Chipotle could easily cover the cost of the increase in labor costs (i.e. higher salaries) within its net profit output, but that would potentially damage the share price. And in this era of capitalism, nothing is allowed to harm the share price. So Chipotle passes that cost on to consumers as if to say, “Nothing we can do about it.”

Two days ago on CNBC Jim Cramer, who has made roughly $100 million in the stock market, was lamenting that he could not find a bartender at his Brooklyn-based Mexican restaurant, Bar San Miguel. Co-host David Faber pushed him on this, asking him if he’s willing to offer a better wage to a potential bartender. Said Cramer, “That’s negotiable.”

I can’t say it enough: the naked greed of the uber-wealthy is head-spinning. Cramer claims he was helping out at his restaurant last night because they’re understaffed. So a dude who could easily afford to double everyone’s wage and not miss a dime at a tiny hole-in-the-wall bistro (I’ve been there; it is tiny) would rather give up his nights to work there than to pay his employees more. I’ve worked at a number of restaurants and I’ve always thought the same thing: If I owned a restaurant, I’d have the smallest staff possible of the best employees possible and then I’d pay them way more than they could make anywhere else. Quality employees who are happy at a restaurant makes all the difference in service. I imagine it works this way at other companies, too.

But employers never practice this approach. They’re too addicted to profits. And yes, the idea of a business is to make money, but at what cost to the quality of the product?

The Kid

…won with Brazil so he’s now back to .667 at 14-7 and above water at $1,120.

He’s taking the Islanders at home tonight versus the Bruins (we disapprove when Gerrit Cole and the Yankees at Minnesota are there for the plucking.

He’s got them at +115 so if he wins, $115, if he loses, $100 down.

IT’S ALL HAPPENING!

by John Walters | 3 Comments

by John Walters

Full Durham

Had an insight yesterday that I posted on Twitter that sorta went viral. So I thought I’d add it here.

Mike Krzyzewski began coaching at Duke in 1980-81 and in 40 seasons has compiled a record that perhaps only John Wooden surpasses. Coach K, 74, has won five national championships (second only to Wooden) and 1,097 games in Durham (1,170 overall). But here’s what’s interesting, as Coach K’s success translates to the NBA:

• With the exception of Kyrie Irving and his 27.1 ppg in the 2016 NBA Finals, no Duke player has really impacted an NBA championship team in the past 40 years. Outside of Irving, who only played 11 games for Duke, the next best scoring average in an NBA Finals on the winning side by a Dookie is Shane Battier’s 11.6 ppg in the 2012 Finals. And after that it’s Dhontay Jones at 1.6 for the Warriors.

• Since 1980-81, four different players from three different schools INSIDE THE STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA have been named NBA Finals MVP (a total of 11 times). None of those players were from Duke: Cornbread Maxwell, Celtics, 1981 (UNCC), James Worthy, Lakers, 1988 (UNC), Michael Jordan, Bulls (UNC), and Tim Duncan, Spurs (Wake Forest).

•Since 1980-81, three different players from North Carolina schools have been named NBA MVP (you can probably name them) a total of nine times. Again, none played for Duke and Coach K: Michael Jordan, UNC (5), Tim Duncan, Wake Forest (2), Stephen Curry, Davidson (2).

Am I implying that Coach K is overrated as a coach? I’m not implying anything, but if I were to draw a conclusion, I’d say that this actually further enhances his reputation. He won with team basketball and without overwhelmingly dominant talent (Wooden had Lew Alcindor and Bill Walton, a pair of future NBA Finals MVPs and regular season MVPs). Of course, you might argue that Coach K did not develop his players to excel at the NBA level. I’d disagree. Outside of Laettner and Hill, he never had a 3- or 4-year player with All-Star potential. Battier, perhaps.

Capra Corn

A few months ago Phyllis read Frank Capra: The Name Above The Title, after my cousin gave it to her. It’s the autobiography of one of Hollywood’s most celebrated directors (It’s A Wonderful Life, It Happened One Night, Meet John Doe, You Can’t Take It With You, Mr. Smith Goes To Washington, Mr. Deeds Goes To Town, etc.). Phyllis brings up the book plenty so I figured I’d pick it up for a read.

Wow.

I’m only 80 pages in, and this may surprise you, but Frank Capra’s life story reads not unlike the script of a Frank Capra film. This early gem of an anecdote hooked me. Capra graduated from Cal Tech, but after WW1 and some health issues, was down on both his luck and money. It was 1922. He was 25 and staying at a seedy hotel in San Fran, down to his last day that he could afford his room. Hopped a trolley car, where the conductor handed him a leaflet about a theater troupe. Capra had zero experience in drama or film, but he headed over.

Inside an abandoned gym, Capra found a doddering middle-aged Shakespearian thespian who told he was looking to turn poems into short films. This was in the era of silent films. Capra, in his early 20s, introduced himself as being “from Hollywood.” He was from Pasadena. Showing moxie that I’d never had, Capra told the gent that he’d like to help him but he just couldn’t, that he was too busy. The man begged him to help, gave him $75, and put Capra in charge of producing and directing his film.

Again, Capra had zero experience. He went to a theater, watched The Sheik four times to study how it’s done, then hired a buddy who had camera experience. His one direction to said buddy: “Whatever I tell you to do, say, ‘Yes, Mr. Capra’, so that everyone on the set will think I know what I’m doing.”

The result is the 11-minute short that, thanks to YouTube, you can watch above. Capra made this film entirely on instinct and what he thought should work. It launched one of the most successful careers in Hollywood history.

Zero Fox Given

We don’t know why Fox News would accept a company’s $185,000 for an ad buy and then refuse to run its ad. Oh, yes we do. Some day when the history of America’s decline is written, historians will wonder aloud about the power of the First Amendment and how an Australian-born TV mogul was able to manipulate it so as to gaslight half a nation (the predominantly white and undereducated half).

Rat’s All, Folks

Mee Magawa, the Cambodian landmine-sniffing rat who is retiring after five years of exemplary duty. That Magawa is around to have his photo taken attests to the outstanding job that he did. In his half-decade Magawa, designated as a HeroRAT by the Belgian non-profit that trained him and oversaw his duties, sniffed out 71 land mines and 38 other items of “unexploded ordnance” while clearing some 2.4 million square feet of land.

It’s a testament to how poor a job God did as the designer of man being “in His own likeness and image” that we need vermin to save us from ourselves, eh?

The Kid

…I’m sure I need not tell any of you that Vietnam defeated Indonesia, 4-0, in its World Cup qualifier yesterday. The Kid’s intel runs far and deep. He’s back to approaching .667 at 13-7 and back above the surface at $1,020. We’ll wait to see what he has for us today.

The Kid likes Brazil -185 over Paraguay in more World Cup qualifying today.

That’s risking $185 to win $100. This could get The Kid up to .667 win percentage for the first time in awhile.