Controlled Chaos

comments from another site I found interesting I got an email today with an article by Raymond S. Kraft in it. The article a historical perspective making a kind of comparison of WW2 and now, in how we handle war, the threats and some historical perspective. It’s very long and I do not have the resources to totally validate the facts or the timeline. I am certain it is mostly accurate, but I make no prepresentatoins beyond that. I have to also note some comments here and there pointing out accuracy problems, but at the same time, some of those commentors were complaining that the Evil Bankers orchestrated Pearl Harbor, so if I fail to take some of them seriously, you know why. In reading it, it occurs to me that we love to make comparisons. The left compares Iraq to Vietnam, whereas some on the right compare it to WW2. Both are right and wrong in some cases, it mostly depends on what they are trying to prove with their comparison. For example, the left points out the Vietnam comparison to prove we have a hopeless war we cannot win, and the public no longer supports it. The resonating lingering bitterness of a generation of hippies and war protesters has a new campaign and it clearly shows. They are right, it is like Vietnam, but not how they think. It is like it because we do not enable our troops to win, politicians demogogue the issue beyond the realities, and the public has taken a beating of negative reporting, resulting in a feeling of distaste, which is not surprising. It is not like Vietnam in that we are not aligned with one side of an internal power struggle. We invaded and displaced the government. This is not the commies moving in, and us trying to push them out. But, it is like Vietnam because the left wants us to lose, and are working hard to make us quit, just like Vietnam, My honest question lately has been "do you want us to win?" and few have taken the challenge on it from the left. I won’t post the whole thing, as found on Right Truth, but here are a few excerpts. Read the rest for yourself. Make your own conclusions. My thoughts are not going to please everyone and are my own opinions. Take em for what that’s worth. The US was in an isolationist, pacifist mood, and most Americans and Congress wanted nothing to do with the European war or the Asian war. Then along came Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941 and in outrage Congress unanimously declared war on Japan, and the following day on Germany, which had not attacked us. It was a dicey thing. We had few allies. This is not too far off of how we were in pre 911 days, in some ways. Terrosim was something most people hadn’t heard of, and it was something "over there". Clinton dealt with it like a police matter, there was no sense of war, even though we had suffered many attacks. We didn’t really understand the enemy or the depth of the threat. After 911 we did. America was not prepared for war. America had stood down most of its military after WWI and throughout the depression, at the outbreak of WWII there were army units training with broomsticks over their shoulders because they didn’t have guns, and cars with "tank" painted on the doors because they didn’t have tanks. And a big chunk of our navy had just been sunk and damaged at Pearl Harbor. Again, in a sense he is right, though not how he presents it. We were unprepared. The Desert Storm build up that we had in 1989 was gone, and the military troops strengths and weapons programs had been cut by the Clinton Administration. Even worse, the Intelligence branches were crippled by feel good regulations that prevented them from deal with clear threats, thanks to Jamie Gorelick, she of the 911 commission, who did not have the guts to admit her own contributions to the failures. There is a very dangerous minority in Islam that either has, or wants and may soon have, the ability to deliver small nuclear, biological, or chemical weapons almost anywhere in the world, unless they are prevented from doing so. France, Germany, and Russia, have been selling them weapons technology as recently as 2002, as have North Korea, Syria, and Pakistan. These weapons were paid for with billions of dollars that Saddam Hussein skimmed from the "Oil For Food" program administered by the impotent UN with the complicity of Koki Annan and his son. It is worse then that, since Russia is presently still selling to Iran. The Jihadis, the militant Muslims, are basically Nazis in Kaffiyahs. They believe that Islam, a radically conservative (definitely not liberal!) form of Wahhabi Islam, should own and control the Middle East first, then Europe, then the world; that all who do not bow to Allah should be killed, enslaved, or subjugated. They want to finish the Holocaust, destroy Israel and purge the world of Jews. This is what they say. True. You want gas in your car? You want heating oil next winter? You want jobs? You want the dollar to be worth anything? You better hope the Jihad, the Muslim Inquisition, loses, and the Islamic Reformation wins. If the Reformation movement wins, that is, the moderate Muslims who believe that Islam can respect and tolerate other religions and live in peace with the rest of the world, and move out of the 10th century into the 21st, then the troubles in the Middle East will eventually fade away. A moderate and prosperous Middle East will emerge. This isn’t an idea discussed much but it has some merit. The real war is with the fanatics against the moderates, but the moderates really are not fighting yet. If we were smart we would work on that. (1) We deposed Saddam Hussein. Whether Saddam Hussein was directly involved in 9/11 or not, it is undisputed that Saddam has been actively supporting the terrorist movement for decades. Saddam is or was a terrorist, a weapon of mass destruction, who is responsible for the deaths of probably more than a million Iraqis and two million Iranians. True. (2) We created a battle, a confrontation, a flash point, with Islamic terrorism in Iraq. We have focused the battle. We are killing bad guys there. The ones we kill there we won’t have to kill here, or somewhere else. We have a good shot at creating a democratic, peaceful Iraq, which will be a catalyst for democratic change in the rest of the Middle East, and an outpost for a stabilizing American military presence in the Middle East for as long as it is needed. I will say I am not a big fan of the idea "fight them there so we don’t have to fight them here". We fight there because that is where they are. The Europeans could have done this, but they didn’t, and they won’t. We now know that rather than opposing the rise of the Jihadist, the French, Germans, and Russians were selling them arms - we have found more than a million tons of weapons and munitions in Iraq. If Iraq was not a threat to anyone, why did Saddam have a million tons of weapons? And Iraq was paying for much of these French, German, and Russian arms with money skimmed from the UN Oil For Food Program that was supposed to pay for food, medicine, and education for Iraqi children. True. The UN has still not answered all the questions about that. The very countries who obstructed so many UN resolution had their hands deep in his aresenal. The Axis of Weasels. Americans have a short attention span, conditioned I suppose by 60 minute TV shows and 2-hour movies in which everything comes out okay. The real world is not like that. It is messy, uncertain, and sometimes bloody and ugly. Always has been, and probably always will be. True. The bottom line here is that we will have to deal with Islamic terrorism until we defeat it (or are defeated by it), whenever that is. It will not go away on its own. It WILL NOT go away if we ignore it. True We can be defeatist peace-activists as anti-war types seem to be, and concede, surrender, to Jihad, or we can do whatever it takes to win this war against it. The history of the world is the history of civilization clashes - cultural clashes. All wars are about ideas. Ideas about what society and civilization should be like. The most determined always win. Those who are willing to be the most ruthless win. The pacifists always lose, because the anti-pacifists kill them. True. In the 20th century, it was Western democracy vs. communism, and before that Western democracy vs. Nazism, and before that Western democracy vs. German Imperialism. Western democracy won, three times, but it wasn’t cheap, fun, nice, easy, or quick. Indeed, the wars against German imperialism (WWI), Nazi imperialism (WWII), and communist imperialism (the 40-year Cold War that included the Vietnam War, itself a major battle in a larger war) covered almost the entire century. True. Senator John Kerry, almost daily, makes three scary claims: (1) We went to Iraq without enough troops. Actually, we went with the troops the US military wanted. We went with the troop levels General Tommy Franks asked for. We deposed Saddam in 30 days with light casualties, much lighter than we expected. Kerry, however, is right. We did go short handed in some respects. But the next paragraph shows why this was so critical. The real problem in Iraq is that we are trying to be nice - we are trying to fight a minority of the population that is Jihadi, and trying to avoid killing the large majority that is not. We could flatten Fallujah in minutes with a flight of B52s, or seconds with one nuclear cruise missile - but we don’t. We’re trying to do brain surgery, not amputate the patient’s head. The Jihadis amputate heads. That’s why more might have been better. We went in short and hampered by too many constraints. (2) We went to Iraq with too little planning. This is a specious argument. It supposes that if we had just had the right plan the war would have been easy, cheap, quick and clean. That is not an option. It is a guerrilla war against a determined enemy and no such war ever has been or ever will be easy, cheap, quick, and clean. This is not TV. Perhpas the speed of Desert Storm and the speed at knocking out Saddam’s government in the early stages of Iraqi Freedom contributed to that. (3) We proved ourselves incapable of governing and providing security. This too is a specious argument. It was never our intention to govern and provide security. It was our intention from the beginning to do just enough to enable the Iraqis to develop a representative government and their own military and police forces to provide their own security, and that is happening. Well true, but the Iraqis are not stepping up as we expected. World War II began in 1928, lasted 17 years, plus a ten year occupation, and the US still has troops in Germany and Japan. World War II resulted in the death of more than 50 million people, maybe more than 100 million people, depending on whose estimates you accept. The US has lost about 2,100 KIA in Iraq. The US took more than 4,000 killed in action on the morning of June 6, 1944, the first day of the Normandy Invasion to rid Europe of Nazi Imperialism. In WWII the US averaged 2,000 KIA a week for four years. Most of the individual battles of WWII lost more Americans than the entire Iraq war has done so far. See this is why comparisons are dangerous. His numbers are likely accurate aside from being out of date. But the reality is that WW2 was a completely different war. I am not sure that using such comparisons to make us see the number of dead in Iraq as not that bad, even if accurate, is how I want to address the picture. Yes, in terms of a war of this magnitude our rates of casualties are low, and their’s much higher, but they are still not insignificant, though I don’t think he means it in that sense. Today, in Iraq, the stakes are at least as high . . . a world dominated by representative governments with civil rights, human rights, and personal freedoms . . . or a world dominated by the radical Islamic Wahhabi movement, by the Jihadist under the Mullahs and the Sharia. Frankly while that sounds like a Clancy or Orwell plot, I think there is some real truth in there. I do not understand why the American Left does not grasp this. Don’t they know that the Sharia considers women as property, that the whim of the Mullah is the law, that there is absolutely NO freedom of choice? The American left seems to favor human rights, civil rights, liberty and freedom, but evidently not for Iraqis. In America, absolutely, but nowhere else. The 300,000 Iraqi bodies in mass graves in Iraq are not our problem. The US population is about twelve times that of Iraq, so let’s multiply 300,000 by twelve. What would you think if there were 3,600,000 American bodies in mass graves in America because of George Bush? Would you hope for another country to help liberate America? "Peace Activists" always seem to demonstrate where it’s safe - in America. For this privilege, they should thank US veterans. Why don’t we see peace activist demonstrating in Iran, Syria, Iraq, Sudan, North Korea, in the places in the world that really need peace activism the most? Why? Just look at what happened to the four peace activists from the Christian Peace Maker Teams recently taken captive by the Muslim "insurgents" near Baghdad. The Liberal mentality is supposed to favor human rights, civil rights, democracy, multiculturalism, diversity, etc. But if the Jihad wins, wherever the Jihad wins, it is the end of civil rights, human rights, democracy, multiculturalism, diversity, etc. Americans who oppose the liberation of Iraq are coming down on the side of their own worst enemy. If the Jihad wins, it will be the death of Liberalism. Sadly, American Liberals just don’t get it. An interesting piece. His conclusion has some merit. It is often lately that we are seeing the Liberals shoot their liberal values in the foot in the name of liberalism. My bottom line is I think we need less senationalism and politicing and more focus on clear objectives and goals. Less use of cliches and more plain talk. And we really need unity behind the boots on the ground.

On that note... Humans are the only species on earth that have face-to-face sex.

Good to see some fire and emotion back on the board, regardless of which side you're on. That could only mean one thing.....spring is here....Pitchers and catchers....2 days.

Building, winning don't mix Williams' moves, geared toward 2008, weaken Sox's attempt to compete this year February 14, 2007 For one period of time this off-season, way back in November, before the Cubs and other teams started doing crazy signings, Ken Williams was on the right track. Williams, the general manager who constructed the White Sox's 2005 World Series winner, remained confident in the makeup of his roster even though the Sox had just missed the playoffs. "We probably played as bad as we could, and we still won 90 games," Williams said. He was right. He was also right to state that the only way it made sense to trade any of his players was if the deal brought back parts that would help the team both in 2007 and in years beyond. But, like Ozzie Guillen in the midst of a conversation, Williams has a hard time stopping himself. So instead of playing it safe, or at least limiting himself to the effort to upgrade in the three positions that contributed heavily to a good team falling short in 2006—center field, left field and shortstop—he started trading pitchers. Out went Freddy Garcia. Out went Brandon McCarthy. In came … well, no one who is likely to replace Garcia or McCarthy, at least not this season. Doesn't Williams realize this is a huge year? Jermaine Dye and Mark Buehrle can be free agents after this season. Joe Crede has two years to go but could price himself out of the organization's plans after one more year. Jim Thome is not going to get younger. This is a year in which the Sox should be marshaling their resources to win every game they possibly can. It could take 95 wins to make the playoffs in a division that includes Detroit, Cleveland and Minnesota. But Williams decided it was time to amass young pitching prospects to soften the blow in the likely event that Buehrle, Jon Garland and Javier Vazquez get their next contracts elsewhere. He's trying to achieve two objectives at once: winning and building. Good luck with that. Williams made a move he didn't have to a year ago, and thus far it has backfired on him. Vazquez, the owner of great stuff but minimal grit, did not justify sending Orlando Hernandez, workhorse reliever Luis Vizcaino and center fielder Chris Young to Arizona in exchange for him. The deal will look worse if Young becomes a Rookie of the Year candidate this year, which is possible, but it was bad enough when Vazquez went 11-12 with a 4.84 ERA last season. Had the Sox just put McCarthy in the rotation, which seemed likely after he rolled through the second half of 2005, he would have done better than that—book it. But McCarthy was shoved into the bullpen, where his poor second half led to his being traded to the Texas Rangers for three pitching youngsters, including lefty John Danks, the Rangers' top prospect. There's a pattern here, and it's not good. Another pattern worth considering is the work of baseball's most consistent starting pitchers. Only two big-league starters have won at least 12 games, made at least 31 starts and worked at least 200 innings the last six seasons. Can you name them? Greg Maddux? Close, but not quite. Ditto Barry Zito and Livan Hernandez. The only two starters who meet this criteria: Garcia and Buehrle. What a luxury to have two of those guys on the same staff the last 2½ years. Yes, neither was nearly as sharp in 2006 as in '05, but Garcia—traded to Philadelphia for pitching prospects Gavin Floyd and Gio Gonzalez—will be missed badly. You can count on that. Buehrle seems likely to leave at some point, and Garland will follow him after 2008 if Williams doesn't help Chairman Jerry Reinsdorf get over his fear of signing starting pitchers to four- or five-year contracts. At least the Sox do have some intriguing options in the wings. Knuckleballer Charlie Haeger, a 23-year-old throwing an old man's pitch, could beat out Floyd for the fifth starter's job this spring if he's given a fair shot. It doesn't help that Williams traded the one catcher who can handle him, Chris Stewart, but Haeger looks ready. Ditto left-hander Heath Phillips, who was a big winner for Triple-A Charlotte and Team USA last season. Yet it's clear Williams doesn't quite trust the guys coming from his own farm system, including first-round picks Lance Broadway and Kyle McCullough. Otherwise he would have used what he judged to be a pitching surplus—yeah, right—to fill outfield holes rather than add the likes of Floyd, Gonzalez, Danks, Nick Masset and Andrew Sisco. If the Sox make another playoff run this season, it will be because they get good seasons from guys they already had rather than the guys they acquired in recent moves. Toby Hall, the new backup catcher, will help, but Darin Erstad? He hasn't played a significant role as an outfielder since 2002. It's hard to believe Williams couldn't find a better option. Brian Anderson and prospects Ryan Sweeney and Jerry Owens all seem like better bets in center field than Erstad, who hopes ankle surgery will revive his career. Josh Fields, likely to get a long look in left with Scott Podsednik recovering from a sports hernia, could also have an impact. After managing a .257 on-base percentage last season, the lowest among players with 250 plate appearances, shortstop Juan Uribe should hit better, though his continuing legal problems can't help his focus. This is an excellent team, and it should be for at least a little while longer. But the off-season raised more questions than it answered. Copyright © 2007, The Chicago Tribune

QUOTE(Texsox @ Feb 14, 2007 -> 10:27 AM) http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,251782,00.html No way. The fact this is even in the courts is ridiculous.

QUOTE(Milkman delivers @ Feb 13, 2007 -> 11:48 AM) I must know who else voted for .38 Special because you're awesome. I am. Thanks I would have to say Bob Seger fits in this category as well.

QUOTE(Steff @ Feb 13, 2007 -> 11:26 AM) They cut the F&F section down by 70 seats this year. I think they sold a lot of those seats as full season packages so it might be a bit harder to get those. Yes, I'll be happy to take 2 off your hands for the friday game.

QUOTE(NorthSideSox72 @ Feb 12, 2007 -> 10:20 AM) Opening Day and Cubs all gone by 10am, except scattered singles. Heck, even trying to get seats for 8/11 vs Mariners of all games, the best available for 4 was Row 25 in 108, RF corner, with an obstruction warning. I don't get this. If the season base is roughly 22k, and a few thousand go to promos... where did the other 15k seats go? Did the premium holders get all of them in the first HOUR??? Not happy. I don't know one season ticket holder that was able to get extra Cubs or Opening Day tickets and all of them tried.

QUOTE(Gregory Pratt @ Feb 12, 2007 -> 02:46 PM) Don't forget that he fell down twice, too. I can't believe those counted as sacks! He fell down trying to get away from McFarland who was in the backfield about 1 second after the snap and about to clobber him anyway. The other time he fell down it was on one of the botched snaps. I love how you make it seem like he just fell during a routine handoff or something.

QUOTE(LowerCaseRepublican @ Feb 12, 2007 -> 11:46 AM) The Supreme Court says that I legally cannot force them to stand. They do not have to give a reason to me. Forced compulsion to stand is un-Constitutional. They need not give a reason as to why they don't want to stand, per dictum of the W VA case. And 7th grade. It came from a parent whose kid was standing and who felt others should be as well. The classes know they can stand or sit. It is during homeroom so there isn't much time for discussion (there's barely enough time for lunch count, getting kids their missing lunch numbers, announcements, the pledge and calling kids down to the office) OK I shouldn't have used sleepys quote cause I wasn't specifically looking for the legalaties of the whole thing. I know the parent wrote in about kids not standing and I know the student doesn't have to give a reason, but how did the kids know they didn't have to stand. Did it start at the beginning of the school year with a couple kids not standing or did one day after all the kids always standing one kid just stopped?

QUOTE(StrangeSox @ Feb 12, 2007 -> 10:47 AM) The only reason they need is the desire not to. They don't have to prove their case and its really none of the teachers' and school's business. I'm not talking legally. I'm just curious what it was like one day when one kid just decided not to stand up. Was the student asked what he/she was doing or was it just assumed they knew their rights? Was it then explained to the class that they can stand or not? Was there a class discussion on there? Did the discussion on standing for the pledge happen before the students decided not to stand?

QUOTE(LowerCaseRepublican @ Feb 10, 2007 -> 05:39 PM) Legally, I can't force them to stand. But way to read the thread and get all the facts before snapping off. It isn't a question about authority as a teacher. It is a question of legality and civil liberties that students have. Schools cannot make it a rule to have all students stand because it is illegal. The US Supreme Court of the United States ruled that mandatory and forced flag salutation is antithetical to the Constitution. Yanked from Wiki: The Majority opinion in Barnette was written by Justice Robert Jackson and it is Jackson’s eloquent remarks that have become the legacy of the decision. Justice Felix Frankfurter authored the opinion three years earlier in Gobitis and his opinion rested squarely on four legs. In Barnette Justice Jackson systematically knocked each leg off Frankfurter’s Gobitis decision. Jackson began with Frankfurter’s designation of the flag as a national symbol. He did not question Frankfurter’s designation of the flag as a national symbol instead he criticized the pedestal Frankfurter put such national symbols on. Jackson derided symbols as a “primitive but effective way of communicating ideas,” and chided that “a person gets from a symbol the meaning he puts into it, and what is one man’s comfort and inspiration is another’s jest and scorn.” Next Jackson denied Frankfurter’s argument that flag-saluting ceremonies were an appropriate way to try and build the “cohesive sentiment” that Frankfurter believed national unity depended on. Jackson utterly rejected Frankfurter’s argument, citing the Roman effort to drive out Christianity, the Spanish Inquisition of the Jews and the Siberian exile of Soviet dissidents as evidence of the “ultimate futility” of those historical efforts to coerce unanimous sentiment out of a populace. Jackson continued, warning that, “Those who begin coercive elimination of dissent soon find themselves exterminating dissenters. Compulsory unification of opinion achieves only the unanimity of the graveyard.” Then Jackson dealt with Frankfurter’s assertion that forcing students to salute the flag, and threatening them with expulsion if they chose not to, was a permissible way to foster national unity. Jackson’s rejection of this section of Frankfurter’s argument has proved the most quoted section of his opinion. In his Gobitis opinion Frankfurter’s solution was for the dissenters to seek out solutions to their problems at the ballot box. Jackson responded that the conflict in this case was between authority and the individual and that the founders intended the Bill of Rights to put some rights out of reach from majorities, ensuring that some liberties would endure beyond political majorities. "The very purpose of the Bill of Rights was to withdraw certain subjects from the vicissitudes of political controversy, to place them beyond the reach of majorities ... One's right to life, liberty, and property, to free speech, a free press, freedom of worship and assembly, and other fundamental rights may not be submitted to vote." The last leg of Frankfurter’s Gobitis opinion reasoned that matters like saluting the flag were issues of “school discipline” that are better left to local officials rather than federal judges. In an oft-quoted passage Justice Jackson knocked out the final leg of Frankfurter’s opinion, sending the Gobitis decision to the grave. "But freedom to differ is not limited to things that do not matter much. That would be a mere shadow of freedom. The test of its substance is the right to differ as to things that touch the heart of the existing order. If there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation it is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion." You still haven't answered this question? So what are the specific, valid reasons that some of these kids aren't standing? Was it becuase they are Jehovah's Witnesses? I know you said that could be a reason, but you didn't say if it was THE reason some of your students didn't stand Oh and what grade is this?

QUOTE(RockRaines @ Feb 12, 2007 -> 09:55 AM) WHY even post this? They are clearly not even close to one of the worst teams to ever play in the superbowl. Nor did they lose the game by as much as many other teams before them, which were clearly worse team than they were. And saying they are in the worst conference in the league? Duh there are only 2 conferences genius, one of them will be the best and the other will be the worst, thats how it works. Stupidity

Posted this in TalkBears, but I know a lot of you don't make it over there. It's a pretty good read. Bears bashing boggles the mind Mike Downey In the wake of the news February 11, 2007 Jay Leno and David Letterman have made Bears jokes almost nightly. A columnist from the Los Angeles Times referred to the Bears as "Da Bums" and as "the Munsters of the Midway." A gentleman from ESPN said of the Bears, "You wonder how they reached the playoffs, much less the Super Bowl." A fellow from a Chicago paper proposed after the Super Bowl that it might be best for all concerned if Rex Grossman went to a different team. A football writer for Sports Illustrated suggested the Bears try to trade for Houston's David Carr, who is the quarterback of one of the NFL's worst teams. A guy from Fox Sports cracked "if Grossman were added to the presidential ticket, Barack Obama probably couldn't carry Cook County." A columnist for the Denver Post wrote Grossman "stinks" and, furthermore, "Truth is, the Bears are vastly overrated." That guy put those last two comments on the record before the Super Bowl. Forgive my foul language on a Sunday, but what the hell is going on here? How did the Bears go from being one of the top teams in football to the butts of jokes and to the targets for all sorts of verbal and critical abuse? How did a seven-point underdog lose a game by 12 points and suddenly turn into a different kind of dog? How did a team win its division a month early, win its conference championship game by 25 points, win 15 of its games and lose four, only to end up on the receiving end of an almost daily bashing? A week ago this day, the Bears were on a wet field in Florida with the favored Indianapolis Colts, a team led by perhaps the best quarterback of the 21st Century. At the end of a quarter, the score was Bears 14, Colts 6. Chicago's fans must have been as proud as punch. Their heroes were up by eight. A 92-yard kickoff return put the Colts in a hole. Grossman threw a touchdown pass. Thomas Jones broke a 52-yard run. In a word, the Bears looked super. At halftime, the Bears were behind, but only by two. They didn't touch the ball much. But there was a Colts fumble and a missed field goal. It was still anybody's game. At the end of three quarters, the score was 22-17. It wasn't a blowout. It wasn't a Bears embarrassment. The favored Colts were up five. They did not score a touchdown on the Bears' defense in the third quarter. Manning passed for 54 yards in this quarter—big deal. In the end, Indianapolis did win. A team that was expected to prevail by a huge majority of NFL analysts—many of them former pro coaches and players with a certain amount of expertise—did, in fact, beat the Bears. It was not an upset. And I, for one, was not upset. I was sorry to see my guys lose but grateful for a great season, as many of my Bears brethren were. Bob Newhart, the comedian, a true-blue fan, called up to joke, "I've just entered a 12-step Bears recovery program." We both expressed surprise at the way the team was knocked and mocked in the game's aftermath. Hadn't the Bears had a spectacular season? Weren't the Colts supposed to beat them? Why did the Bears suddenly seem to be getting a worse beating in the postgame than they did in the game? I have been to Super Bowls decided 42-10, 46-10, 48-21 and 52-17. I saw a team John Elway quarterbacked be torn to shreds 55-10. Now that's the kind of thrashing a team could get embarrassed about. Denver obviously should have gotten rid of that Elway bum. Twenty-three teams lost games from Super Bowls I through XL by margins as bad or worse than the Bears' just was. But now they are bums? They were lucky to make the playoffs? They were vastly overrated? They ought to dump a quarterback who went 15-4 and go get the quarterback of the Houston Texans? Madness, madness. Look, no one likes to lose. In the painful first minutes after last Sunday's game ended, Bears wide receiver Bernard Berrian said that where winning the Super Bowl is concerned, "Anything less is failure." No, it is not. Did we imagine those division and league championships? Did we imagine Virginia McCaskey having the George S. Halas Trophy placed in her hands? Did we imagine beating Super Bowl XL runner-up Seattle twice? Did we imagine winning in Green Bay 26-0, in St. Louis 42-27, beating the two New York teams on the road by a combined 48-20? Did we imagine pounding Detroit 34-7, Buffalo 40-7, San Francisco 41-10 and New Orleans 39-14? Did we imagine Grossman passing for 3,193 yards and 23 scores in the regular season? Did we imagine Jones and Cedric Benson rushing for 1,857 yards? Did we imagine Robbie Gould making 32 of 36 field-goal attempts and Devin Hester returning six kicks for touchdowns? I don't know about you, but—please pardon my language again—I thought Chicago had one hell of a team. [email protected] Copyright © 2007, The Chicago Tribune

Happy Birfday everyone!!!

I still don't get how some kid took it all upon themselves to not stand. I mean if everyone in the class is always standing, how did some kid just come in one day and decide to buck the trend and see what happens. That's a ballsy little kid.

QUOTE(SoxFan562004 @ Feb 8, 2007 -> 07:47 AM) Is she the blonde or the dark haired singer? Dark haired rocker chick. She's good. I've seen Catfight a few times...

QUOTE(mreye @ Feb 9, 2007 -> 10:27 AM) That would be great. I figured you were waiting on Monsters Inc.

RIP.

You should keep your hoe on a leash. Hey, hey, hey, b****'s runnin' wild, man.

Oscar-Winning Monster Mouths Off By Megan Basham Thursday, February 8, 2007 In a rare example of journalistic integrity, CNN correspondent Rick Sanchez actually called A-list actress Charlize Theron (most famous for her Oscar-winning portrayal of serial killer Eileen Aileen Wuornos in the film Monster) on the carpet for the anti-American idiocy she proceeded to spew during their interview last Sunday. Promoting her latest project, East of Havana, a film about Cuban rappers, Theron went on a tirade about her adopted home country that left even the broadcast veteran embarrassed. Asked about Cuba’s lack of freedom under Castro, Theron said to Sanchez, "I would argue that there's a lack of freedom in America." Stunned, the anchor checked to make sure he understood the actress correctly. But even after Sanchez sensibly pointed out that people aren’t incarcerated for their political beliefs in the U.S., Theron stumbled on, comparing Castro's jailing of dissidents to media outlets firing reporters for failing to meet appropriate standards of objective reporting (or in television’s case, just for pulling low ratings). Sanchez then pressed the star further, offering her every chance to recant her ridiculous statement, but the blonde refused to take the bait. (Apparently nobody bothered to tell Theron that Sanchez is of Cuban descent, and like many of his heritage, probably not as inclined to idolize the communist dictator as most of Hollywood seems to be.) “Do you think the lack of freedoms in Cuba are parallel to the lack of freedoms in the United States?” he asked. “Well, I would,” answered Theron, “I would compare those two. Yes, definitely.” Finally Sanchez stated the obvious: “It sounds like you don't have a very high opinion of the United States.” Theron tried to claim otherwise despite her disparagements, but seconds later, completely flummoxed, the woman Harper’s Bazaar called “a smart, down-to-earth dame” fell back on the ploy so many actresses before her have resorted to. Said the South American bombshell to Sanchez, “I want to make out with you right now.” She may be an Academy Award winner, but subtle, she ain’t. And there is more reason to applaud Sanchez than for merely his impressive interview techniques and that is for his rare-in-his-business willingness to call them like he sees them. Rather than cover for a powerful film industry insider (and a stunning one at that) like many of his colleagues have in the past, Sanchez observed that Theron’s bizarre outburst was simply, ``A way for a beautiful woman to get a guy to change the subject.'' No doubt the sexy Ms. Theron was doubly surprised. Not only did a member of what is supposed to be the fawning entertainment media insist she back up her audacious statements, but he was then completely unmoved by her clumsy attempts to appeal to his, ummm, baser nature—and he wasn’t even from that horrible Fox network. So kudos to you, Mr. Sanchez. You may never get the chance, but if you do, can you go after fellow Castro-lovers Steven Spielberg and Robert Redford next? If you’re lucky, neither one will offer to make out with you..............................................................

QUOTE(mreye @ Feb 8, 2007 -> 09:30 AM) I'm not ticked off at the cold. I'm ticked off at the people that prefer the cold. Hey that's me!

QUOTE(mreye @ Feb 8, 2007 -> 07:00 AM) I can't believe how many people have said "You can always put more clothes on." No, you can't. Not comfortably. I don't know why, but this ticks me off. I'm walking to work today with thermal socks, long johns, pants, shirt, sweatshirt, pullover, coat, scarf, stocking hat, gloves. My face was still cold in the bitter wind. What else could I have put on without having to use a blindman's cane to find my way down the sidewalk? Huh? Really! Ugh! haha... I read about the colded getting to people but sheesh. Don't get ticked off.... How far do you have to walk? My walk is about 15 minutes....and I just have on Jeans, regular socks, hiking shoes, undershirt, button shirt and my coat. ear clips and gloves. I put my hood up on my coat and I'm all good. Totally beats the days when I get to work and I'm dripping with sweat all over and I can't take a shower.

QUOTE(Texsox @ Feb 7, 2007 -> 08:52 AM) 35 in Chicago, 10 in Texas. I was an avid winter outdoors person. From ice fishing to black and white winter photography I found every excuse to be outdoors. It is so much easier to deal with the heat and humidity than the cold. Never having to say, crap I forgot my gloves/hats/scarf/boots etc. But you have to pay your dues with one summer. Once you are acclimated, it makes all the difference in the world. 100 degrees with 40% humidity means drinking an extra glass of water and the ice in your margarita melts faster. -10 with wind means bundle up or die. When it's -10 you NEVER "forget" gloves/hats/scarf/boots etc. I think Chicago is the perfect example of living in both extremes. We get ridiculous cold like the past 3 weeks and we get the ridudulous hot and humid days in the summer.

DOH!!