Friday, October 07, 2005
Tell Your Stupid Ranch Tooth to Shut Up!
- It's officially winter hat weather here in MKE. The accuweather temperature this morning was a cool, crisp 42 degrees.
- I just hope he puts rims on his cars. They're spinning! They're spinning!
- I'm glad I have photoshop now. WTF? This photo poses so many questions: where is Alex Rodriguez's other hand? And what is he saying? "Yeah, who's the best shortstop in the AL? Say my name, say my name, bitch." Troubling.
- I think Charles Krauthammer - save for him describing the 43rd presidency as one "marked by a courageous willingness to think and do big things" - sums it up nicely.
Two vacancies on the Supreme Court - the most powerful judicial body in the United States, let alone the world (there's that good old American unilateral arrogance rearing its ugly head again). The vacancies, one voluntary and one not-so-much voluntary, came at an innopportune time. The Supreme Court is almost ready to go into session and to sum up the civics lesson
here, it is not made to perform short-handed (and neither are the Boston Bruins, but that's a completely different breed of cat altogether.)
So time is of the essence. Those seats needed to be filled. And while the days of John Adams' midnight appointments are long gone, the days of a President rewarding his friends and filling seats to the Court with those who share his political ideology are not.
The parallels between John Adams and George W. Bush are too many to mention. But in the case of Supreme Court nominees, at least the folks Adams nominated were qualified.
Take John Marshall, nominated to the high court just months before Thomas Jefferson was set to take office. Marshall was a former Secretary of State, worked to diffuse the XYZ Affair, and also served in Congress. He was well-rounded, intelligent, experienced, and ultimately helped to form a good bit of how we interpret constitutional law today. Sure, he was overly partisan, but if you looked at his resume prior to being nominated, you wouldn't have this feeling of someone who was grossly underqualified.
That, however, is the feeling when you look at Harriet Miers.
Harriet Miers has never engaged in any sort of constitutional debate or forum. She has never used the constitution as the basis for any decision she's made. If you don't have that as a basis, then you are simply a waste of space in terms of the job duties of a Supreme Court justice. I mean, I'm not qualified to take over for Theo Epstein should the Red Sox not re-sign him,
but at least I understand the game, have played the game and have even played fantasy baseball. Harriet Miers has no such fantasy constitutional law experience. (and to be honest, if there were "fantasy judicial games," I'd be real interested in seeing those demographics. Who would you draft first? Salmon P. Chase? Oliver Wendell Holmes? Johnnie Cochran?)
She has as much on-the-job-experience and business being a Supreme Court justice as I have being a member of Diana Ross and the Supremes.
- Maybe the Red Sox (check!) win today, maybe they don't. That's the problem. Even down 0-3 last year to the Yankees, you had that feeling that if they stole one - and they did in game 4 last year - that the ball could start rolling, hit a downhill, and cruise.
This year's team doesn't have that feel.
It's no indictment of anyone or anything. Two key components got hurt - Schilling and Foulke. The No. 1 guy up front and No. 1 guy in the back... That's a huge loss. One can also argue that the injuries to two ancillary components - Wade Miller and Matt Mantei - also made an imapct. Alan Embree not being effective hurt when he was with the team, but cancelled itself out when he honed his bad pitching in the bullpen in the Bronx.
But, where last year had some sort of magic feel, this doesn't.
Not to say that Wakefield won't get the knuckler dancing and the offense won't start mashing the ball. Not to say that Schilling won't follow that up with a stellar performance of his own, making the ALDS a best-of-one.
But I just don't think so. I hope they prove me wrong, I really do. But I'm not banking on it.
-----
That's all. Sounds like rain in Boston. Be sure to wear your rubbers.
One.
- I just hope he puts rims on his cars. They're spinning! They're spinning!
- I'm glad I have photoshop now. WTF? This photo poses so many questions: where is Alex Rodriguez's other hand? And what is he saying? "Yeah, who's the best shortstop in the AL? Say my name, say my name, bitch." Troubling.
- I think Charles Krauthammer - save for him describing the 43rd presidency as one "marked by a courageous willingness to think and do big things" - sums it up nicely.
Two vacancies on the Supreme Court - the most powerful judicial body in the United States, let alone the world (there's that good old American unilateral arrogance rearing its ugly head again). The vacancies, one voluntary and one not-so-much voluntary, came at an innopportune time. The Supreme Court is almost ready to go into session and to sum up the civics lesson
here, it is not made to perform short-handed (and neither are the Boston Bruins, but that's a completely different breed of cat altogether.)
So time is of the essence. Those seats needed to be filled. And while the days of John Adams' midnight appointments are long gone, the days of a President rewarding his friends and filling seats to the Court with those who share his political ideology are not.
The parallels between John Adams and George W. Bush are too many to mention. But in the case of Supreme Court nominees, at least the folks Adams nominated were qualified.
Take John Marshall, nominated to the high court just months before Thomas Jefferson was set to take office. Marshall was a former Secretary of State, worked to diffuse the XYZ Affair, and also served in Congress. He was well-rounded, intelligent, experienced, and ultimately helped to form a good bit of how we interpret constitutional law today. Sure, he was overly partisan, but if you looked at his resume prior to being nominated, you wouldn't have this feeling of someone who was grossly underqualified.
That, however, is the feeling when you look at Harriet Miers.
Harriet Miers has never engaged in any sort of constitutional debate or forum. She has never used the constitution as the basis for any decision she's made. If you don't have that as a basis, then you are simply a waste of space in terms of the job duties of a Supreme Court justice. I mean, I'm not qualified to take over for Theo Epstein should the Red Sox not re-sign him,
but at least I understand the game, have played the game and have even played fantasy baseball. Harriet Miers has no such fantasy constitutional law experience. (and to be honest, if there were "fantasy judicial games," I'd be real interested in seeing those demographics. Who would you draft first? Salmon P. Chase? Oliver Wendell Holmes? Johnnie Cochran?)
She has as much on-the-job-experience and business being a Supreme Court justice as I have being a member of Diana Ross and the Supremes.
- Maybe the Red Sox (check!) win today, maybe they don't. That's the problem. Even down 0-3 last year to the Yankees, you had that feeling that if they stole one - and they did in game 4 last year - that the ball could start rolling, hit a downhill, and cruise.
This year's team doesn't have that feel.
It's no indictment of anyone or anything. Two key components got hurt - Schilling and Foulke. The No. 1 guy up front and No. 1 guy in the back... That's a huge loss. One can also argue that the injuries to two ancillary components - Wade Miller and Matt Mantei - also made an imapct. Alan Embree not being effective hurt when he was with the team, but cancelled itself out when he honed his bad pitching in the bullpen in the Bronx.
But, where last year had some sort of magic feel, this doesn't.
Not to say that Wakefield won't get the knuckler dancing and the offense won't start mashing the ball. Not to say that Schilling won't follow that up with a stellar performance of his own, making the ALDS a best-of-one.
But I just don't think so. I hope they prove me wrong, I really do. But I'm not banking on it.
-----
That's all. Sounds like rain in Boston. Be sure to wear your rubbers.
One.
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