THE RIGHT HANDER: HEARTLAND
Central Illinois is like this: God made a giant mud-pie and it dried flat like the surface of a still pond and with soil black as midnight. Driving south from Chicago on I-57 the farmhouses resemble schooners sailing on a calm sea of corn and soybeans. A few hours south and the land begins to roll and just when you are reminded of the Ozarks because of the fjord-like lakes that begin to appear and the onset of actual hills, comes Illinois Route 13.
We came to the area to attend a wedding, see relatives and get out into the countryside. In one area near a fish hatchery, we saw both a Bald Eagle (the national bird) and a wild Turkey. Ben Franklin had preferred the Turkey to the Eagle as our national symbol, considering the Eagle to be a “Bird of bad moral Character” as excerpted from a letter to his daughter.
My wife’s Aunt F and Uncle W were the last visit for us before leaving. Both in their 80’s, she is bent and wrinkly as a prune and he has become little more than skin and bones. He was a sailor in WWII, a naturalist who for years tromped the woods and was near-kin to all that flies and swims and runs and slithers. She was a gifted artist and a whiz with numbers, an accountant and Scrabble wiz. He regaled us with tales, stories of body-surfing in the Mississippi by the wake of Riverboats and hitching rides on the railroads and encountering bears out in the wild. He barely touched on the issues of the day, but it was obvious that the widespread acceptance of things like homosexuality and abortion are beyond distasteful to him. They are, in fact, a mystery, for how could the country have fallen so far during his lifetime? When he was a boy, you pumped your water and carried it in buckets. Your bathroom was a shed out back, or sometimes it was just out back. You cut wood and maybe shoveled coal if you wanted warmth in the winter. You grew a large part of your food and hunted for much of the rest of it. You worked a long and hard day and your word was your contract with the local merchants. Most of us take our conveniences for granted and sadly have taken the moral decline of America for granted as well. I wondered what or if the country would be when I (hopefully) make it into my 80’s?
OFFICIAL CONCERN
There were more flags flying in the Tampa Bay-Carolina NFL game Sunday than over the UN! Then came the Monday Night game; you would think “pass interference” was the New York Giant’s bread-and-butter play. It is always frustrating for fans when the momentum of the game is slowed or changed by a rash of penalties. But why are so many borderline penalties being called this year? The NFL never has moved at the breakneck pace of the NBA but I don’t think slowing the games down to a baseball pace is going to be popular and any game with excessive penalties gets SLOW.
How ‘bout them Cowboys, though? You had to love that Monday Night game despite the penalties. The subplots (Bill Parcells comes back to New York, Jeremy Shockey faces the guy he referred to as a “homo” during the off-season) added spice to a game usually hotly disputed under normal circumstances. Bill Parcells made a huge mistake at the end of the first half and it almost cost the ‘Boys the game. With only 14 seconds left on the clock and third down, he could have had Billy Cundiff try a 43 yard field goal. He had no timeouts left. Instead, they throw a five yard pass, the receiver does not get out of bounds and the clock would have run out if there had not been a holding penalty on the Cowboys. That penalty took the ball back 10 yards and Cundiff missed from 53. It would turn out to be his only miss in 8 tries as he tied the NFL record for field goals kicked in a game!
The Giants’ Jim Fassell, ahead by 3 with 11 seconds left at the end of the game, instructed Matt Bryant to dribble-drive the kickoff after the kicker had made an apparent game-winning field goal. This despite the fact that Bryant had kicked one out of bounds earlier in the game. The ball snuck out of bounds at about the one yard line, the subsequent penalty gave the Cowboys new life at the 40 yard line and Quincy Carter took just 7 seconds to deliver a 26 yard pass to Antonio Bryant who went out of bounds in range of Cundiff’s leg. Billy the kid delivered, the ‘Boys got another from him in overtime and the Giants lose a game they had in their grasp. Jim, don’t blame the kicker, you should have had him kick away!
THE STATESMAN
Indiana lost a good man Saturday. Other than an old-fashioned Democratic machine culling votes from the dead and the imaginary in the East Chicago area, the typical Indiana pol is a conservative liberal or a moderate conservative. One remarkable politician was the late governor, Frank O’Bannon. He was a Democrat that Republicans and Dems alike often called “Grandfatherly” or “Impossible not to like” or “Someone who does not put on airs.” A description of him from The Times newspaper out of Hammond: “He is smart without being brilliant, clever without being cunning, pragmatic without being ruthless.”
Frank O’Bannon, 73, died Saturday following a stroke he suffered the previous Monday morning while attending a conference in Chicago. When politicians throughout the state learned of his illness, they uniformly praised the man and mourned his passing. Can you imagine that happening in California? We Hoosiers, whatever that means, are going to miss having such a man in public office. Frank O’Bannon was a statesman and they don’t make many of them any longer.
BASEBALL MILESTONES
Bobby Bonds hit his 655th homerun Monday, putting him exactly 100 behind Hank Aaron and 5 behind his godfather, Willie Mays.
Rafael Palmeiro hit his 500th American League homer on the same evening.
The Cubs announced that they were retiring the uniform number (10) worn by Ron Santo, despite the fact that he has not been elected to baseball’s Hall of Fame. Are the voters prejudiced against diabetics? How can the best NL third baseman of his era be kept out of the Hall?
AMNESTY REMEMBERED
It was 29 years ago that President Ford announced a conditional amnesty for Vietnam-era draft evaders. I remember it well, for I was stationed at Fort Benjamin Harrison in Indianapolis, Indiana attending the Radio/TV/Print journalism school there when the draft-dodgers began to arrive. Yes, there was a section of the fort set aside to house the erstwhile amnestiacs. I was one of many military personnel that had been drafted and chosen to serve. Did we resent the Dodgers? Do cats hate being shot with aerosol cans of hair spray? (My brother and I tested this as kids; the answer is a resounding YES)! But I must admit from today’s vantage point that the amnesty process helped the country heal from the open wound that was Vietnam.
People today do not flee to Canada to avoid fighting against communism, they flee to experience communism in the form of nationalized medicine and increasingly censored news media. But more often, it is the Canadians that flee. Canada, the land of legal pot and political correctness, gains one US citizen for every five that leave Canada to come here. Therefore, the Canadians let pretty much anyone that wants to immigrate to their fine shores. No identification? Fine, Canada will provide some for you. Is it possible for terrorists to enter Canada and then slip across to the USA? Do police officers resent having their cruisers pelted with snowballs hurled by small boys? (My brother and I tried this one out, too, and the answer is also YES)!
ACLUN AMERICAN
The Alliance of Communists, Liberals and the Ungodly is now sponsoring ads in publications like Rolling Stone and on the airwaves in which celebrities like Richard Dreyfussbudget criticize the Bush Administration. The ads all begin with the line; “I am not an American…” Makes you wonder why Johnny Depp hasn’t signed up!
One example is the Dreyfuss television ad, in which he states “I am not an American who believes in selective due process.” Concerning detaining suspects in the wake of 9/11, Dreyfuss claims that the definition of crisis had been changed in order to allow for the denial of constitutional rights for certain individuals. Of course, many of these individuals took part in 9/11 or are suspected of plotting other vile actions. Also, there has not been another 9/11 in large part because the Bush administration has taken the responsibility of security seriously.
One theme that runs through the ads concerns the typical liberal whining about being criticized for being critical to the Bush administration. If you can’t take the heat, get out of the kitchen. A Democrat by the name of Harry Truman used to say that, in case you didn’t know.
TWO MINUTE WARNING
Someone in the Chicago Bear’s organization thinks a play-action fake to a running back, followed by a throw to that same running back, is a good play. That doesn’t even fly in playground football! Here’s another one: Fake a run into the line, and then run the Quarterback on a draw into that same line. Maybe it fooled the Bear’s defense, sad to say, but it won’t work against the rest of the world.
Hey, New York Stock Exchange? You think Richard Grasso is worth $140 million? Who do you think he is, Alex Rodriguez?
Jamal Lewis makes Baltimore a tough team to play in the NFL this year, even with a rookie QB at the helm. After Jamal went all JimBrownBoJacksonWalterPayton on the Browns on Sunday, you best believe defensive coordinators are going to make him the main focus of their schemes against the Ravens.
Wes Clark is running for President as a Democrat! Oh boy, another Arkansas Liberal! We sure had great results with the last one, huh? This guy is a four-star general, but critical of the war in Iraq. Why does Jimmy Carter come to mind?
Martin Gramatica. Buccaneer fans may wander by aimlessly chanting this phrase. Pay no attention, they will recover.
The clock says 00:00