Swung On and Missed

2007-07-22T19:05:00.000-04:00

2007-07-22T13:36:00.000-04:00

never mind

2007-07-22T05:06:00.000-04:00

You know that "John from Cincinnati" post below? After last week's episode, I have concluded that -- How can I put this delicately? -- I was wrong. Last week's episode was the kind of train wreck that doesn't happen to shows that are on the verge of becoming magical.

Yes, I will watch again tonight. But based on last week's episode, the show has moved from fascinating mess with a chance for greatness to potentially irredeemable disaster.

(As always, I reserve the right to pull a Gale Sayers and cut back against the grain again.)

(James Wolcott is on-point with some of his criticism of the show here and here. Though I still maintain that the opening credits are pure genius.)

An Oath to the President

2007-07-11T19:15:00.000-04:00

via Andrew Sullivan

You got to pick the notes you really mean

2007-07-11T16:32:00.000-04:00

From the New York Times Book Review essay by Haruki Murakami, "Jazz Messenger":

One of my all-time favorite jazz pianists is Thelonious Monk. Once, when someone asked him how he managed to get a certain special sound out of the piano, Monk pointed to the keyboard and said: “It can’t be any new note. When you look at the keyboard, all the notes are there already. But if you mean a note enough, it will sound different. You got to pick the notes you really mean!”

Hey Butchie. The less you have to say now, the less you have to take back.

2007-07-09T00:07:00.000-04:00

"John from Cincinnati" is an odd piece of art. It would be an odd play in an experimental space in Southeast DC. It would be an odd book from Coover or Barth. It would be one of those exhibits at the Guggenheim or the Hirshhorn that couples sit in front of for a few minutes, shrug their shoulders, and then wander down to the gift shop to by a Calder mobile.

The fact that it is on HBO, and is the putative replacement for "The Sopranos," is breathtaking. This was a network that cancelled David Milch's "Deadwood" -- the brilliant, profane, heart-stopping Western with a small but rabid fan base -- and decided to let him run with a show about, well, let's see:

surfing
levitating
God
Ed O'Neill, the "Married with Children" Dad, taking instructions from a pet bird

half the characters actors from "Deadwood" in supporting roles in a Southern California noir
Rebecca De Mornay as a grandmother (I agree with James Wolcott that De Mornay is about the same age as her "Risky Business" paramour Tom Cruise, and if Cruise were in this show, he would never agree to be cast as the grandfather (I am not on-board with the rest of Wolcott's thoughts about "John from Cincinnati," but, as always, he is fun to read on the arts and politics even when I do not come to the same conclusions)
coming back from the dead
Luke Perry ("90210" in the house)
the great LUIS GUZMAN, for about three minutes an episode. From PA Anderson and Steven Soderbergh to David Milch -- well played, Mr. Guzman.
Willie Garson, Stanford from "Sex & the City," for a few minutes an episode
Mexican wrestling
illegal immigration
drug addiction
Vietnam vets with post-traumatic stress disorders
oh, and a guy who might be an alien, or an apparition, or Jesus, or a charlatan

I can't even tell if the show is any good right now, though I suspect that it is turning into something magical. I haven't looked, but I can't imagine that many are watching. But it has David Milch's crazy genius at work, and for me, that's enough. He is working out his obsessions on a weekly series. It's part Tom Stoppard, part Thomas Pynchon, part James Joyce, and part the crazy guy who wanders up 19th Street NW on weekdays yelling angrily at the people lined up in 95-degree heat at the passport office who are waiting in vain for government documents allowing them to travel.

I'm not telling you to watch it. I don't want to have to defend how much I am enjoying it. But I'm going to hint that it is one hell of a fascinating mashup.

It's not tv. It's "John from Cincinnati."

(Oh, I will tell you to watch the opening credits. The Clash's great Joe Strummer sings "Johnny Appleseed" with his band The Mescaleros over the washed-out California images.)

There's Always Money in the Banana Stand

2007-07-08T21:29:00.000-04:00

I like this parody clip more than many parts of "Knocked Up." Anything with George Michael (Michael Cera, of "Arrested Development" fame) slays me. For future discussion: When did directors start filming parody scenes during the filming of the movie? My guess is that this started happening when directors realized that they could throw bonus materials on DVDs.

(For those that haven't seen the movie, Cera is in another Judd Apatow movie and just filmed this scene as if he had been hired for the lead role in "Knocked Up." There is a similar scene with Seth Rogan as the lead in the actual movie.)

Michael Cera gets fired from Knocked Up

For people who enjoy this kind of thing, see also James Franco of "Superman" and "Freaks and Geeks" doing a similar "fake take":

James Franco gets fired as lead role in Knocked Up

(I love that I write these posts as if thousands of people are reading.)

I don't know how to put this but I'm kind of a big deal.

2007-07-08T17:12:00.000-04:00

"The fundamental cause of trouble in the world today is that the stupid are cocksure while the intelligent are full of doubt." -- Bertrand Russell, via Julian Sanchez

See also Fred Kaplan ("The fact is, Giuliani has no idea what he's talking about."), K ev i n Drum ("Hmmm. That reminds me of somebody. But who? Push? Tush? Schmush? Something like that....."), and the Dunning-Kruger Effect ("The Dunning-Kruger effect is the phenomenon whereby people who have little knowledge systematically think that they know more than others who have much more knowledge.").

Letter from Birmingham

2006-01-16T12:34:00.000-05:00

Matt Welch at Hit & Run has a great post today that reminded me that my suspicion about the NSA's easedropping/wiretapping is grounded in recent American history. (It is grounded also, for some of us, in general distrust of the unchecked power of one branch of government to set its own limits on how it will gather and use information about Americans and specific doubts about this administration's veracity.) He notes an LA Times piece by LBJ Attorney General Nicholas deB. Katzenbach about J. Edgar Hoover's wiretapping of Martin Luther King Jr. The rationale for the wiretapping? National security, of course. It is a good read, both because of the King holiday and because of the NSA controversy.

Welch also points to the text of King's Letter from Birmingham. I don't remember the last time that I read it, and I had forgotten the power of its words and ideas. My favorite part deals with just and unjust laws, which I have reprinted in part below. But the whole thing is worth reading as an eloquent, important piece of American political and philosophical writing:

"You express a great deal of anxiety over our willingness to break laws. This is certainly a legitimate concern. Since we so diligently urge people to obey the Supreme Court's decision of 1954 outlawing segregation in the public schools, at first glance it may seem rather paradoxical for us consciously to break laws. One may won ask: "How can you advocate breaking some laws and obeying others?" The answer lies in the fact that there fire two types of laws: just and unjust. I would be the Brat to advocate obeying just laws. One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws. I would agree with St. Augustine that "an unjust law is no law at all"

Now, what is the difference between the two? How does one determine whether a law is just or unjust? A just law is a man-made code that squares with the moral law or the law of God. An unjust law is a code that is out of harmony with the moral law. To put it in the terms of St. Thomas Aquinas: An unjust law is a human law that is not rooted in eternal law and natural law. Any law that uplifts human personality is just. Any law that degrades human personality is unjust. All segregation statutes are unjust because segregation distort the soul and damages the personality. It gives the segregator a false sense of superiority and the segregated a false sense of inferiority. Segregation, to use the terminology of the Jewish philosopher Martin Buber, substitutes an "I- it" relationship for an "I-thou" relationship and ends up relegating persons to the status of things. Hence segregation is not only politically, economically and sociologically unsound, it is morally wrong and awful. Paul Tillich said that sin is separation. Is not segregation an existential expression 'of man's tragic separation, his awful estrangement, his terrible sinfulness? Thus it is that I can urge men to obey the 1954 decision of the Supreme Court, for it is morally right; and I can urge them to disobey segregation ordinances, for they are morally wrong.

Let us consider a more concrete example of just and unjust laws. An unjust law is a code that a numerical or power majority group compels a minority group to obey but does not make binding on itself. This is difference made legal. By the same token, a just law is a code that a majority compels a minority to follow and that it is willing to follow itself. This is sameness made legal.

Let me give another explanation. A law is unjust if it is inflicted on a minority that, as a result of being denied the right to vote, had no part in enacting or devising the law. Who can say that the legislature of Alabama which set up that state's segregation laws was democratically elected? Throughout Alabama all sorts of devious methods are used to prevent Negroes from becoming registered voters, and there are some counties in which, even though Negroes constitute a majority of the population, not a single Negro is registered. Can any law enacted under such circumstances be considered democratically structured?

Sometimes a law is just on its face and unjust in its application. For instance, I have been arrested on a charge of parading without a permit. Now, there is nothing wrong in having an ordinance which requires a permit for a parade. But such an ordinance becomes unjust when it is used to maintain segregation and to deny citizens the First Amendment privilege of peaceful assembly and protest.

I hope you are able to ace the distinction I am trying to point out. In no sense do I advocate evading or defying the law, as would the rabid segregationist. That would lead to anarchy. One who breaks an unjust law must do so openly, lovingly, and with a willingness to accept the penalty. I submit that an individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him is unjust and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect for law.

Of course, there is nothing new about this kind of civil disobedience. It was evidenced sublimely in the refusal of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego to obey the laws of Nebuchadnezzar, on the ground that a higher moral law was at stake. It was practiced superbly by the early Christians, who were willing to face hungry lions and the excruciating pain of chopping blocks rather than submit to certain unjust laws of the Roman Empire. To a degree, academic freedom is a reality today because Socrates practiced civil disobedience. In our own nation, the Boston Tea Party represented a massive act of civil disobedience.

We should never forget that everything Adolf Hitler did in Germany was "legal" and everything the Hungarian freedom fighters did in Hungary was "illegal." It was "illegal" to aid and comfort a Jew in Hitler's Germany. Even so, I am sure that, had I lived in Germany at the time, I would have aided and comforted my Jewish brothers. If today I lived in a Communist country where certain principles dear to the Christian faith are suppressed, I would openly advocate disobeying that country's anti religious laws."

Hi. I'm back.

2006-01-16T12:27:00.000-05:00

In honor of new Hall of Fame inductee Bruce Sutter. And his tremendous beards. (Thanks, Tony.)

I wish you luck with a capital 'F'

2005-11-11T20:29:00.000-05:00

According to my dictionary, "patriotism" means the following: "Love of and devotion to one's country."

According to George Bush's administration and his angry band of bloggers, "patriotism" means not criticizing the administration for its conduct during the selling of this war (Al Qaeda connection to Iraq, WMDs, and Saddam buying nuclear materials in Niger). It also means not saying anything that could lead the rest of the world to think that people in the U.S. have a lack of trust in this administration.

When the war was popular, Bush and his minions made it known that this was his war, and that the Democrats were weak. Elect John Kerry, Bush said, and you will be hurting America's war efforts. Now that Bush's popularity hovers around 36% and the war in Iraq is deeply unpopular, now that a majority of Americans wish that we had not waged war on Iraq, Bush is claiming that critics of the way in which we were lead into war give aid and comfort to the enemy and put our troops in further harm's way. We should all just pull together, the unpopular President says:

"The stakes in the global war on terror are too high, and the national interest is too important, for politicians to throw out false charges. These baseless attacks send the wrong signal to our troops and to an enemy that is questioning America's will. As our troops fight a ruthless enemy determined to destroy our way of life, they deserve to know that their elected leaders who voted to send to them to war continue to stand behind them."

This is utter horse hockey. And as someone who supported Bush and Blair based on my belief that they would never cook the books for the State of the Union or Colin Powell's UN speech, and who feels foolish now as I watch them drag the reputation of the United States through the mud because of its torture policies and its decision to thumb its nose at the rest of the world, it infuriates me.

Other people in the blogosphere had a different reaction. The wildly popular Glenn "Instapundit" Reynolds wrote the following:

"The White House needs to go on the offensive here in a big way -- and Bush needs to be very plain that this is all about Democratic politicians pandering to the antiwar base, that it's deeply dishonest, and that it hurts our troops abroad.

And yes, he should question their patriotism. Because they're acting unpatriotically."

Reynolds is claiming, therefore, that Americans who criticize the Bush administration's pre-war advertising campaign about WMDs are acting out of hate and treason toward the United States. Reynolds does not believe the people who say that they supported the war previously but now think that the administration appears to have been so hell-bent on going to Baghdad that it cooked the books and engaged in an unprecedented and successful PR campaign to win over the hearts and minds of the American people still reeling from the September 11 attacks. He think that they are lying. He thinks that they hate America.

Because I am one of those people, and because Reynolds thinks that he can look into my heart, I guess he knows that I am about to quote Elvis Costello:

"Are you a man now you wear a man's hat?
Are you a man now or are you a rat?
You go to church quiet as a mouse
You're a big cheese now in the workhouse
With these vulgar fractions of the treble clef
I wish you luck with a capital 'F'"

McCain Laughs

2005-11-08T23:15:00.000-05:00

The Daily Show, November 8, 2005

Jon Stewart: "Let me ask you a question: Is Dick Cheney insane?"
John McCain: (laughs)

. . . .

Stewart: "Where does he have the balls to sit in front of you and say [torture] could work."
McCain: "You know, I knew that this was a bad night to come on the program. (laughs)"

. . . .

Stewart: "Let me ask you something else . . . This is just a last question real quick: Is Dick Cheney a coward?"
McCain: (laughs)

Potential Autobiography Titles

2005-11-06T00:28:00.000-05:00

* It Seemed Like a Good Idea at the Time

* Mistakes Were Made

* I Blame Myself

* I Swear, I Did Not Finish the Meatloaf

* Whoops!

* As God Is My Witness, I Thought Turkeys Could Fly

Literature Quote of the Day

2005-11-05T23:44:00.000-05:00

"He talks relentlessly, and more or less everything he says is gibberish. He talks a lot about music, but also a lot about books (Terry Pratchett and anything else which features monsters, planets, and so on), and films, and women. Pop, girls, etc., as the Liquorice Comfits said. But his conversation is simply enumeration: if he has seen a good film, he will not describe the plot, or how it made him feel, but where it ranks in his best-of-year list, his best-of-all-time list, his best-of-decade list-he thinks and talks in tens and fives, and as a consequence, Dick and I do too. And he makes us write lists as well, all the time: "OK, guys. Top five Dustin Hoffman films." Or guitar solos, or records made by blind musicians, or Gerry and Sylvia Anderson shows ("I don't believe you've got Captain Scarlet at number one, Dick. The guy was immortal! What's fun about that?"), or sweets that come in jars ("If either of you have got Rhubarb and Custard in the top five, I'm resigning now."). Barry puts his hand into his leather jacket pocket, produces a tape, puts it in the machine, and jacks up the volume. Within seconds the shop is shaking to the bass line of "Walking on Sunshine," by Katrina and the Waves. It's February. It's cold. It's wet. Laura has gone. I don't want to hear "Walking on Sunshine." Somehow it doesn't fit my mood."

(38 seconds of cheering.)

2005-11-05T20:01:00.000-05:00

The title of this post comes from the transcript that I printed below of Vin Scully's call of the end of the Sandy Koufax perfect game. After Koufax nails it down, Scully went silent and let the crowd noise take over for 38 seconds. How many announcers have the sense of the moment and the confidence in their listeners to be able to let 38 seconds of ecstatic cheering take over the radio broadcast? On television, it would have been impressive, but on radio, it was downright courageous.

(For a contrast to this, listen to Milo Hamilton's 1974 call of Henry Aaron's 714th home run, which pushed Aaron past Babe Ruth and made him the all-time champion. The networks will show the clip this summer when Barry Bonds passes Ruth and heads towards Aaron's 755. Hamilton starts yelling about "a new home run champion" as Aaron circles the bases instead of letting the moment speak for itself. His voice is like sandpaper -- he makes his words the story instead of letting Hammerin' Hank have the spotlight.)

(Amazingly, Hamilton is still on the airwaves -- he is still harming the eardrums of Astros' fans in Houston. I’m sure that he is a great guy deep down, a fine American, but he sounds like a born corporate shill who enjoys reading advertisements ("This is Milo for Hi-Lo!") more than anything else. He sounds aggrieved regularly without bring any of the descriptive skills and pure passion of Houston's great, biased Rockets' announcer Gene Peterson ("Dream is backing him in, backing him in, HE’S HACKED! NO CALL! He shoots and scores!"). Hamilton neither expresses joy about what has happened on the field (like Gene Peterson) nor paints a picture and then leans away from the microphone to let the lack of announcer enhance the experience (like Vin Scully).)

What does this have to do with anything? Well, nothing. Except that whenever there is a gap in my posts, just think, "He's letting the audience cheer. It's just his version of 38 seconds of cheering.

You've Got Questions . . . I've Got Answers

2005-11-02T11:01:00.000-05:00

In response to the questions that have been pouring into Swung On and Missed World Headquarters:

1. yes
2. duh . . . of course
3. candlesticks are nice
4. but sunrises are better
5. comeback concert elvis (in between thin and fat elvis)
6. "raw deal"

Keep those questions coming!

Vast Wasteland Line of the Night

2005-11-02T01:41:00.000-05:00

For the first time ever . . . it's a tie!

"How come you never told me you won a beauty contest?"

"Every day I walk out of my front door I win a beauty contest."

"I come from a long line of fighters. My maternal grandfather was the toughest guy I ever knew. World War II veteran. Killed 20 men, then spent the rest of the war in an allied prison camp. My father battled blood pressure and obesity all his life. Different kind of fight."

Peter Gammons

2005-11-02T00:35:00.000-05:00

"Throughout my career I have tried to be guided by one principle, that because I am human I have the right to like people."

It occurred to me that one of the things I want to chronicle on this blog are words that move me. Many times those words are about sports. Peter Gammons was inducted into the baseball Hall of Fame last summer. I was one of millions who was turned on to baseball in part by Gammons' Sunday notes columns that were syndicated from the Boston Globe and appeared in papers across the country in the 1970s and 1980s, including the Des Moines Register. When he moved to Sports Illustrated, his audience expanded, and when he joined ESPN, it exploded further. Fans, players, executives, and struggling sportswriters all adore Gammons. And his Hall of Fame induction speech shows why.

His words are not especially poetic, but the emotion that underlies them moves me. Cynicism sometimes feels like it pervades sports these days. Some fans, owners, players, and journalists appear to enjoy puncturing the enthusiasm that so many of us try to carry for the games that bring us joy. But not Peter Gammons:

"Steve Jobs' advice at that time to a graduating class of Stanford this year was 'find what you love.' I am here today because I found what I love. Understand, I grew up in a household where when I got home from school my mother greeted me with, 'Can you believe they traded Jim Piersall for Vic Wertz and Gary Geiger?'

Ned weaned me on respect and reverence for the history and texture of the game. My sister Anne hit me fungoes in a small New England town where the Red Sox home opener was an acceptable legal excuse to leave school at 10 a.m. My father found what he loved in music and teaching and the goodness of man. He and Paul Wright, my godfather, teacher and mentor, remain the two greatest men I have ever known … teachers like Juney O'Brien and Jake Congleton. By the time I was 18, I knew my role models and my life's mission statement were defined.

When this award was announced, Mike Barnicle left me a simple message. 'Tom Winship would be very proud.' Winship was the editor of the Boston Globe, a Branch Rickey of a man who changed the newspaper business in Boston and opened a world for kids who were dying for a chance. Mine came as a summer intern in 1968. It started the day Robert F. Kennedy was shot. In those days you had a morning Globe and afternoon Globe, and when I walked in, I was introduced to my fellow intern Bob Ryan, basketball Hall of Famer. We were told to call every team in business, ask them what they would do for Robert F. Kennedy and write a story. We did. The 3:30 late stocks edition came up, and there on the front page of the entire paper Mr. Ryan and Mr. Gammons had their first bylines. We went to the Erie Pub, raised a couple of 10-cent drafts and decided, you know, what we found what we loved.

My career essentially has been very simple, Boston Globe, Sports Illustrated, ESPN. I have been fortunate enough to work for extraordinary people. There are hundreds, maybe thousands who I should thank, but it was Tom Winship and Fran Rosa who stuck their neck out to hire a kid who hadn't even graduated from college … Mark Mulvoy, who hired me twice at Sports Illustrated … Vince Doria, who brought me back to the Globe and anyone who I ever worked for believes is the best sports editor, if not the best boss who ever lived … John Walsh who had the crack-brained idea to bring a sportswriter into television because, as one of the businesses most creative visionaries, he understood that information is king. I am very proud to say today much of what ESPN is today is because of John Walsh and there are hundreds of people that have gone and followed me out of the print profession to ESPN because of Walsh.

I am not here as a television personality, but as an ink-stained wretch. Publishers and new editors have no clue. They have no understanding that the baseball beat is the toughest beat in the newspaper business. It means severe personal sacrifices. A few years ago Jayson Stark and I decided that over a 25-year period we probably talked to one another more than we talked to our wives and no one has sacrificed more than my wife Gloria, who saved me in an unpredictable storm of a business that knows no holidays.

The baseball beat today is much tougher now than when I was traveling with the Red Sox for the Globe. There is far less access, 10 times the bodies in the clubhouse. The Internet, radio, television have broadened the baseball information universe. And yet our business, I am proud to say, keeps producing generation after generation of young reporters who are tireless, good and fair. Throughout my career I have tried to be guided by one principle, that because I am human I have the right to like people. But because I am professional, I have no right to dislike any one. People ask me, as a New Englander, what was it like walking out there in the field when Aaron Boone hit a home run. To be honest, my first reaction was, I was ecstatic. I have known Aaron Boone since he was 13 years old, and that's my privilege. My second reaction, I saw Tim Wakefield, head down, and I felt despondent. He's one man who did not deserve that. As I walked out on the field to try to get introduced, I turned to my producer, Charlie Moynihan, and said, 'Look around here, you know what? I just got paid to cover the greatest game ever played in the greatest sporting venue in the world. I think I'm the luckiest man on earth.'

Jerry Coleman, I am honored to be in Cooperstown with you -- war hero, World Series MVP, announcer, gentleman. Ryne Sandberg, I think of a 40-home run season, a 200-hit season, a 50-steal season and the ego of a clubhouse kid.

But, to be here the day Wade Boggs is inducted is a special thing for me. This is a guy who played seven minor-league seasons, hit three something a ridiculous six straight years, went through three Rule 5 drafts and kept saying, 'my success will be measured in terms of dealing with adversity.' In the last half-century, Wade Boggs is the oldest position player to debut in the major leagues and make the Hall of Fame. He is the model for overcoming adversity of all kinds. I remember that afternoon in the spring of '86 when you and I were driving with Ted Williams over to have that night of discussing hits with Don Mattingly. Ted leaned forward in the car and said, 'Hey Wade, did you ever smell the burn of a bat?' Well, there are very few people who have. I have never forgot that. When the All-Century Team gathered around Ted at Fenway before the '99 All-Star Game, Ted asked Mark McGwire the same question. He retold the story. He said, 'Did you ever smell the burn of the bat?' There were six National League players in the room at the time around McGwire. What is he talking about? Well, let's face it, the burning of a bat is the lexicon of the gods.

And to stand here in front of the Hall of Fame players is like standing in front of the baseball dieties, and yet I feel so fortunate to have known so many of them as humans. I think of Carlton Fisk and I think of eight to 10 hours a day of rehab in the winter of '73-'74, mostly in the Manchester YMCA, to come back from a knee injury that very few humans could have recovered from. Eddie Murray, I think of the hours he took, watching him take BP, which allowed him to know all of those thousands of clutch hits which were only by design, not chance. I think of Robin Yount and the fastest he ever got timed to first was 3.9 seconds, the slowest 4.0. And I remember that George Brett always used to say he wanted his career to end on a ground ball to second base on which he busted his hump down the line. I think of Mike Schmidt mowing and lining the field in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida, so he can coach his son's high school team. Then there's Sandy Koufax telling me that I lived in L.A. the way he lived in Stonington, Maine. I think of Bob Gibson's handshake, of Tony Perez, Petuka Perez, I think he lived a quarter of mile from where I lived in Brookline, Massachusetts, and to this day not two weeks go by when someone doesn't say, you know, how are Tony and Petuka Perez? They are the greatest people who lived in this neighborhood.

I think of the hours and I thank Jim Palmer and Tom Seaver for discussing pitching with me. I will never forget the day that Orlando Cepeda hit four doubles in one game in Fenway Park and could barely walk. I think of Reggie Jackson and the two of us wandering around Kenmore Square in Boston after the Angels had lost the 1986 ALCS, outraged because Reggie Jackson's team had lost. I think of Dennis Eckersley and I think of his start in the 1978 Boston Massacre, when nearly 100 writers surrounded Frank Duffy because he made an error. He started pulling them off. He shouted, 'He didn't load the bases. He didn't hang a 0-2 slider. Get to the locker and talk to the guy who has an L next to his name.' Dennis Eckersley defines teammate.

I think of Kirby Puckett, my favorite days in baseball while the lights were still off in the Metrodome at 2 o'clock in the afternoon. Game Six, the night he won the World Series, probably the only guy in the world that called me Petey, says, 'Petey, get up in your SportsCenter and tell everyone that Puck is going to jack the Twins up on his back today.' Well, four hits, a game-saving catch, and a 11th-inning home run later, Puck took us to the greatest seventh game, World Series game I will ever experience: 10 innings, 1-0, Jack Morris. These players are great players whose success is measured in overcoming adversity, but no one had to be a great person, no one had to be a great player to be a great person stored in my memory bank. So I think from John Curtis to Bill Campbell to Jerry Remy, Buckethead Schmidt to Bruce Hurst, Ellis Hurst to George Lombard, I've been lucky to know thousands of people who loved the game as much as I do.

In 1985, the Globe sent me to Meridian, Mississippi, to do a story on Dennis 'Oil Can' Boyd's background. I had dinner with his father, Willie James, who was once a Negro League pitcher and maintained the field and team in Meridian. He was telling me how he financed his life in baseball by being a landscaper.

He told me a story of a day in 1964 when he was landscaping the yard of the grand dragon of the Ku Klux Klan. He remembered seeing the cars coming up. They all rolled up the street, up the road from Philadelphia [Miss.] to [Meridian] Mississippi to take care of some civil rights workers. Mr. Boyd looked me in the eye. He said, 'You know what? This is what makes this country great. Today that man is destitute and crippled with arthritis and my boy, Dennis Boyd, is pitching in the major leagues for the Boston Red Sox.' In my mind the Boyd family represents baseball's place in American society. Jackie Robinson was in the big leagues seven years before Brown versus the Board of Education and we should never forget it, just as we should never forget the important athletes of the 20th century, arguably one of the 10 most important Americans of the 20th century. I remember waking up to read the story of Roberto Clemente's death, a great baseball idol [who] died taking medical, food and clothing supplies to earthquake victims in Nicaragua. I was with Dave Stewart the morning after he won the third game of the 1989 earthquake series as he crawled through the rubble of the collapsed Cypress structure to hand out coffee and donuts to volunteers searching for bodies.

I walked the streets of Manoguyabo, Dominican Republic, with Pedro Martinez and viewed the churches, school, athletic complex, day-care center and houses that he built for poor people in his hometown. I was not far from Fidel Castro when he stood for the American National Anthem at attention, his hat across his heart because baseball came to Havana in 1989. I remember George Bush strode out toward the mound at Yankee Stadium before the third game of the 2001 World Series, weeks removed from the World Trade Center attacks, and turned and said to Karl Ravech and Harold Reynolds, 'We are among the 55,000 people who just experienced one of the great chills of anyone's lifetime.' When Bud Selig asked us to embrace the World Cup, it's not T-shirts in Taiwan. It's about celebrating that baseball, more than any sport, is who we are. It is reflected in our immigration patterns, our history because we're all immigrants. We should want the world to see us not for our politics, not for our business, but for baseball as our metamorphic soul, inclusive, not exclusive, diverse, not divisive, fraternal, not fractionalized.

If any of you are familiar with the Cape Cod League you probably might have heard of Arnie Allen, a special needs gentleman who for 40 years was a batboy for the Falmouth Commodores. He was diagnosed with brain cancer in the summer of 2002. Seventy-two hours later a duffel bag of Angels paraphernalia arrived in Falmouth, courtesy of two Falmouth players, Darin Erstad and Adam Kennedy. Of course, the Angels went on to the World Series in 2002 and after winning one incredible sixth game coming from a five-nothing deficit in the eighth inning. Before Game Seven, Erstad and Kennedy pulled me aside before they went out to stretch and told me, 'We know you are going to be speaking at the Hall of Fame inductions in two weeks on the Cape.' They said in unison, 'As you speak, could you do us a favor, Arnie will be there probably for the last time. Could you just tell him that Darin and Adam Kennedy said we are thinking of him before they went out and won the World Series?'

Every day at the ball park, for me, there's been something that's great. Ozzie Smith fielding ground balls, just seeing Willie Mays, watching Tom Seaver throw a 3-1 changeup to Don Baylor in his 300th win, George, Gossage in 1980. More important, what I have taken from all of these years is the knowledge that the people who play this game inherently care so much about that game, fellow players and those who love it. I am very fortunate to have baseball as a part of my life for 35 years. I thank you, Gloria, and all my family for standing aside me and all baseball writers for their friendship, support and maintenance of a great and proud profession. The game is also about players. I thank the thousands of players that I have known for making this ride better than I ever could have imagined. Ted Williams used to tell me, 'Hey, Bush, someday you want to walk down the street and have people say you have the greatest job in America.' Ted, it happens almost every day. For that I thank all of you, every one who read or listened to me, allowed me to try to be your eyes and ears, that allowed me to find what I love and hold on to it long enough to experience this, the greatest day of my professional career.

Thank you."

Theo Walks Away

2005-11-01T22:46:00.000-05:00

Theo Epstein was one of the "boy wonders" who was hired by the Boston Red Sox as General Manager three years ago at the tender age of 28. He hired Bill James (a hero to all of us who grew up reading his revolutionary statistical analysis and trenchant writing – he was the ultimate outsider who will someday be in the Hall of Fame), went on recruiting trips for players like a college football coach (famously convincing Curt Schilling to sign with the Sox after breaking bread with him over Thanksgiving), and in 2004 brought the rabid fan base of the Red Sox their first World Series crown in 86 years. He had his dream job and made the dreams of a legion of baseball fans who lived and died with the Sox come true for the first time. Theo Epstein was a God in Boston.

Yesterday, Epstein quit his job. Immediately, the gloating of the angry old guys on the sports pages and the sports talk radio airwaves (with the welcome exception in D.C. of Dan Patrick's national ESPN Radio show) could hardly be contained. Epstein (and people willing to question conventional wisdom in general) threatens the old guard of baseball, and so they relished his departure just as they cheer when Billy Beane's Moneyball Oakland Athletics don't make the Series and when Beane protégé Paul DePodesta is canned in Los Angeles. They gloat because people with a new approach threaten the world that they know. (Peter Gammons, the Hall of Fame baseball writer, is a notable exception.)

So I waited for the column of Bill Simmons, “The Sports Guy,” all day. Slate has called Simmons “the Bard of the Red Sox,” and he deserves the title. He has made fun of some of Epstein's moves and sometimes mocks statheads. Nevertheless, he also knows that Epstein and the movement that he represents have an important place in baseball. He just published a bestselling book looking back at his lifetime passion for the Red Sox that culminates with the title of which Epstein was a principal architect. And when his column appeared today, it did not disappoint. Simmons drives me crazy sometimes -- his attitudes can be juvenile, and he plays dumb sometimes even when he knows better. Today, however, he manages to compare himself to Theo Epstein and make it work:

"When you dream about doing something for a long time, and then it happens, it's never actually as good as you think it would be. There's almost a surreal letdown of sorts after the fact. And it's impossible to explain unless it's happened to you. For instance, ever since I was in college, I dreamed of having my own sports column and covering a Boston team when they won a championship. That's all I wanted. In the spring of 2001, ESPN found me. Nine months later, my beloved Patriots went to the Super Bowl and shocked the Rams in New Orleans. I wrote about it every day, and on the morning after they won, my column ran on the front page of this Web site. Greatest professional moment of my life, right?

Well, something weird happened. After that game, I couldn't stop thinking, "All right, what happens now? What do I do? How can I top my dream moment?"

And the thing is, you can't. The moment happens, it ends, you celebrate and feel good about yourself … and then it's on to the next day, and you have to figure out what the next challenge is, and deep down, you're wondering why you didn't enjoy that watershed moment more than you thought you would. I don't know Theo, I have never met him, and the experience of being the general manager of the first Red Sox championship in 86 years was roughly 100,000,000 times more profound and important than my experience in New Orleans. But the fact remains, after that Super Bowl column, I struggled writing this column for the next seven to eight months; eventually, I ended up moving to California to write for a fledgling late-night television show. That Super Bowl trip changed everything for me."

As Nasty As They Want To Be

2005-10-30T01:05:00.000-05:00

"The right's embrace in the Miers nomination of tactics previously exclusive to the left — exaggeration, invective, anonymous sources, an unbroken stream of new charges, television advertisements paid for by secret sources — will make it immeasurably harder to denounce and deflect such assaults when the Democrats make them the next time around." -- Hugh Hewitt on the New York Times Op-Ed Page, via Kevin Drum (emphasis added)

Wow. I am glad that the Republicans avoided using "exaggeration, invective, anonymous sources, an unbroken stream of new charges, television advertisements paid for by secret sources" when attacking John Kerry with those fun kids from the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, or that George Bush's henchmen played above board in South Carolina in 2000 when engaging in a push poll against John McCain about whether he fathered an illegitimate "black baby" (he and his wife had adopted their daughter out of Mother Teresa's orphanage in Bangladesh). And I hope sincerely that the Republicans don't stoop to the Democrats' level when attacking someone like Hillary Clinton. After all, if they did, then they would be engaging in something like Hillary hate-porn, to steal James Wolcott's phrase. Oh, wait . . . .

"BYE FOR NOW [John Podhoretz]
In news that will doubtless gladden many hearts, I must report that I am taking a leave from The Corner through the end of this year because, like everybody else on this website, I am in the process of finishing a book . . . . I wish you Godspeed. And buy my book on Hillary when it comes out in the spring!"

Here is a random and far from exclusive list of Hillary hate-porn, available from Amazon.com right now for your pleasure (note the Jonah Goldberg title for special fun)!

"Condi vs. Hillary: The Next Great Presidential Race
by Dick Morris, Eileen McGann

The Truth About Hillary: What She Knew, When She Knew It, and How Far She'll Go to Become President
by Edward Klein

Hell to Pay: The Unfolding Story of Hillary Rodham Clinton
by Barbara Olson

The Case Against Hillary Clinton
by Peggy Noonan

Ron Brown's Body: How One Man's Death Saved the Clinton Presidency and Hillary's Future
by Jack Cashill

Madame Hillary: The Dark Road to the White House
by R. Emmett Tyrrell Jr., Mark W. Davis

American Evita: Hillary Clinton's Path to Power
by Christopher Andersen

Hillary's Secret War: The Clinton Conspiracy to Muzzle Internet Journalists
by Richard Poe

Hillary's Scheme: Inside the Next Clinton's Ruthless Agenda to Take the White House
by Carl Limbacher

Liberal Fascism: The Totalitarian Temptation from Mussolini to Hillary Clinton
by Jonah Goldberg

The Hillary Trap: Looking for Power in All the Wrong Places
by Laura Ingraham

The Seduction of Hillary Rodham
by David Brock

Big Sister Is Watching You: Hillary Clinton and the White House Feminists Who Now Control America--And Tell the President What to Do
by Texe W. Marrs

Can She Be Stopped? Hillary Clinton Will Be the Next President of the United States Unless . . .
by John Podhoretz"

My Dad Reviews My CD Collection So You Don't Have To: Part III

2005-10-30T00:57:00.000-04:00

"* Beck -- Odelay -- wasn't crazy about it"

My First Time

2005-10-30T00:23:00.000-04:00

Two people have now linked to this page on their blogs:

* Mr. Tony Pierce, about whom I have written previously, gave me a shout-out and then published a gut-wrenching rant from a Cubs' fan dealing with the White Sox victory.

*Mr. Joe White, one of the few people I know who has strong opinions about both Frederich Hayek and Salma Hayek (for the record, he is a fan of both of their work), nodded in my direction as well before writing a little ditty about Scooter Libby and then analyzing the Texas ballot propositions. He is a great friend, and the first person I knew personally who could make web pages sing, dance, and talk.

I cannot imagine that Misters Pierce and White have much in common other than they both were kind enough to point their readers toward me. And for that, they have my thanks and hold my marker. "Only in America!" as the philosopher once said.

Please allow me to re-introduce myself . . .

2005-10-29T18:30:00.000-04:00

Hi. Okay, so you spend your whole life waiting for a forum within which you can howl at the moon or giggle at the sun, and then you find that forum, and you start writing. And then you realize that it may be true that in space, no one can hear you scream, but that on the Internet, everyone can hear you howl or giggle . . . but no one has to listen. Sure, a few old friends come to watch the show and some new ones crane their necks to see if they should stop the car to check out the show. And when they visit, they have been very kind. But at some point, they ask, "Hey . . . so . . . interesting . . . but . . . well, what's the deal?"

And someday soon, I hope to have the answer. In the meantime, I promise you this -- no more absences without leave:

"Pleased to meet you
Hope you guess my name
But what's puzzling you
Is the nature of my game"

My Dad Reviews My CD Collection So You Don't Have To: Part II

2005-10-20T18:46:00.000-04:00

"*Steely Dan - Can't Buy a Thrill - okay

*Marshall Crenshaw - Marshall Crenshall - okay

*Bruce Springsteen - The Wild, the Innocent, & the E Street Shuiffle - very good

*The Velvet Underground - Loaded - Excellent"

Poor Mr. Buddy's been murdered in his own stately home!

2005-10-20T17:26:00.000-04:00

Exhibit #1 -- Email from Swung On and Missed headquarters to Ms. Wonkette and her minions in response to her Indictment Contest, sent at 11:15 a.m. on October 19:

"Indictments guess contest: Perjury and obstruction of justice by Libby and Rove (committed in the lounge, with the assistance of Col. Mustard, with the wrench)."

Exhibit #2 -- Headline of a Swung on and Missed post plugging (in a good way) Wonkette's contest, posted at 11:44 a.m. on October 19:

"Wonkette Contest: Col. Mustard in the Lounge with a Wrench"

Exhibit #3 -- First line of Wonkette post (written by Michael Weiss as Ms. Wonkette relaxes in Puerto Rico as news about her novel spreads), posted on October 20:

"WaPo has all but fingered Mr. Green, in the library, with the candlestick."

Clearly, there are three explanations for this.

One, that Mr. Weiss, trying to stake a claim in the Wonkette universe, took the idea from my email and cleverly changed the Mustard to Green, lounge to library, and wrench to candlestick. (All of those changes make his Clue sentence funnier than mine, which is why he is a professional writer and I am a lawyer.)

Two, that he reads this blog. Clearly, that would show that young Mr. Weiss has good taste, but I find this idea dubious given that fewer than five people read this blog (and most are looking for scoop about Iggy Pop because of the "Blah Blah Blah" subhead at the top of the page).

Three, we both came up with the Clue idea independently. In other words, a coincidence. To this, I must paraphrase Spy Magazine from those heady days in the early 1990s: "Coincidence . . . or Worldwide Jewish Conspiracy?"

(Of course, like this poor chap, I am yet another Jew who was left out of the Worldwide Jewish Conspiracy. Although given that I have now typed that fun phrase twice, I imagine I'll soon be receiving comments from Neo-Nazi Iggy Pop fans.)

Tina Brown: Mad as Hell and Not Going to Take It Anymore

2005-10-20T10:17:00.000-04:00

As Tony Kornheiser said on the radio this morning, you should read Tina Brown's Washington Post column if you can handle more words spilled about Judy Miller and the NYT. Yes, Tina Brown. The column is funny and vitriolic. One passage is about Times Publisher Arthur Sulzberger:

"You have to feel sorry for Sulzberger. Like every spirited young man who inherits a newspaper, he hankers after something more exciting than sitting in the front office fretting over the price of newsprint. He wants to feel as real in his role as valiant publisher as his reporters -- those driven, passionate, sometimes reckless seekers after truth -- feel in theirs. When he threw his support behind Miller's fight to protect her sources, he didn't think he was in a bad reality show."

Joe Buck: The Anti-Larry David

2005-10-19T18:25:00.000-04:00

I have a free one-year "subscription" to The Sporting News but haven't read it in weeks. Now I remember why. The indispensable Deadspin points me toward Joe Buck's latest column in TSN. In the course of beginning his piece about how hard it is for him to put up with questions from fans while he travels, he throws out this little bon mot:

"I am sure the same thing will happen to me in about 2009 when I finally chuckle at one of Larry David's lines from that unwatchable HBO series -- I think I am the only person in this hemisphere who finds nothing on that show even remotely entertaining."

No, Joe, you're not the only person who feels that way. Many people -- even in this hemisphere -- feel that way. Comedy is subjective -- the vast majority of people in this vast country don't watch Larry David's show. Me, I love "Arrested Development" and "Extras" and "Curb Your Enthusiasm." Maybe you find "According to Jim" the best showcase for wackiness on the airwaves.

Later in the column, Buck tosses out some of the few questions that he doesn't mind receiving from fans:

"Hey, what's your name? What game you gonna cover? Where you off to next week? And those are just from my wife.”

Remember how I said comedy was subjective, Joe? Well, that's usually true. But in your case, I can say with all objectivity that you are not funny. The master of the preening, supercilious, holier-than-thou announcing style? Absolutely. But someone who knows funny? Nyet. No matter what Timmy McCarver tells you.

Buck ends the column by writing the following three paragraphs:

"Time to stop typing. We're about to land, and the flight attendant just gave me that look.

By the way, how is it possible that by leaving my iPod on I pose a threat to the safety of the plane?

Hard to . . . wait a minute . . . where . . . I thought this was the . . . this isn't Chicago?! Sorry, that was so Larry David of me."

No, actually, you're confusing a bad Catskills comic with Larry David. You see, I can understand why people don't like David -- it's no sin. But liking you? To paraphrase a comic you might appreciate, "Take Joe Buck. Please."

Bill King, the Voice of Oakland: RIP

2005-10-19T18:09:00.000-04:00

Bill King, longtime Bay Area announcer, died yesterday. I think a lot of us grew up listening to games on the radio feel a kinship with our old local announcers, who before the age of cable TV and SportsCenter served as lifelines to a world that we only saw through their words. I pass along the thoughts of a friend who grew up listening to the man who ruled the radio airwaves in Oakland:

"I could, like so many people, talk about how growing up in the 70s and early 80s I would huddle with my transistor radio “watching” as Bill described Barry’s free throws, Purvis Short’s arching jump shots, or a Bernard King fast break drive along the sideline into the lane for a dunk . . . . Stabler’s scrambles and passes in the “House of Chills,” Ray Guy’s soaring punts, Otis Sistrunk’s steaming head . . . story telling with Lon Simmons during A’s games, describing Rickey’s record breaking steals, Canseco’s blasts, Dwayne Murphy’s wizardry in center, Stewart’s masterpieces against Clemons . . . . All the while wondering about what seemed like a glamorous and exotic life as Bill would interject literary references, what he had seen in his travels, restaurants he had been to in NYC, the opera and all that stuff that seemed so exotic and crazy but also eye opening to a kid . . . . And more than a few times needing a dictionary to look up a word I had never heard that Bill used to describe something (and then proudly using that words immediately there after).

But when I think about it, that is what is uniquely special about Bill King. No doubt people who love Chick Hearn or Vin Scully or Jack Buck or Lindsey Nelson love them because they evoke a season or their favorite sport . . . . But with Bill King it is that he personified the city of Oakland – even if he never actually lived there – especially the Oakland of the late 60’s to early 70’s . . . that somewhat hip, worldly in a understated and under-appreciated way, defiant of authority, counter culture, not image conscience – everything that Oakland was - somehow he was a perfect fit for a city and I don’t think anyone, with the exception of Herb Caen, personified a city and its people like Bill did.

We say it all the time; we think people will be around forever that we don’t take the time to appreciate them fully while they are here . . . . In the Bay Area I don’t think that was the case with Bill. I think people did appreciate him and were thankful for this wonderful gift we were given . . . we would have just liked to have had it for a little longer and been able to say thank you one more time."

A Candy Store Filled with One Flavor of Bubblegum

2005-10-19T15:27:00.000-04:00

In honor of tonight's Cardinals-Astros game, I give you a snippet of Tony Pierce's classic anti-Bob Costas/pro-Harry Caray rant from a few years ago:

"but the worst thing that Costas has done, jay, is mess up the bell curve. he has made it okay for announcers to be soulless and bland and average and background filler. fakers like jack buck's son, and harry's grandson, step children of milo hamilton have polluted the airwaves with a lust for attention and a fear of life. corporations would never hire a man like Harry Caray when they could put their money on dull and hire a Bob Costas who would never get caught closing down a tavern buying a beer for a cop and chasing it down with a redhead.

People say that baseball has lost its edge because of spoiled players and high salaries and greedy owners, but i say it's because the storytellers only want to read from the children's library and live the lives of elves.

Rot in peas little man with all the potential in the world but sits on it like so many telephone books used for your pampered ass so you can see over the mic. All the vocabulary in the world but with no backbone to bring the game to life the way one would if chatting about it over a twelve pack in a basement.

That's what Harry did.

In fact when Harry realized that he had accumulated a ton of cash from being the best there ever was, he and his wife Dutchie (they never divorced) decided that no one would be a better saloon owner than Harry, and they were right.

What would Costas open if he could? A candy store, I bet.

Filled with one flavor of bubblegum."

Wonkette Contest: Col. Mustard in the Lounge with a Wrench

2005-10-19T11:44:00.000-04:00

Wonkette is running a contest where you can predict the indictments that Patrick Fitzgerald will be handing down. You can email your guess -- people who will be indicted AND for what crimes will they be indicted (obstruction of justice, conspiracy, etc.) -- to her at tips@wonkette.com. If you would rather play at home, she has created a handy bingo card. The New York Times says that Fitzgerald will not be issuing a final report, which means that indictments should be a near certainty, but that he will not be taking any action in the case this week, which will disappoint people around DC who were set to celebrate indictments the way that most people celebrate St. Paddy's Day. Then again, we are speaking about the Times. Given its coverage of this case previously, this morning's Times article likely means that Fitzgerald will issue a final report today saying "no indictments." And if that happens, we would need to start discussing Iraq, or social security privatization, or LaVar Arrington, which would lead us to drink again.

UPDATE: Via Josh Marshall (looking very serious in his new photo), The Hotline has a list of people "who have either testified or have been interviewed by Patrick Fitzgerald (or by FBI agents) in connection with the Plame probe." (I have had dinner with one of them!) Use for your guesses to Wonkette.

My Dad Reviews My CD Collection So You Don't Have To: Part I

2005-10-18T23:58:00.000-04:00

"*Pulp Fiction - terrific

*Jimi Hendrix - very good

*The Strokes (Room on Fire) - good

*Creedence Clearwater Revival - good to very good

*Pearl Jam - terrible, no stars

*Arrested Development - I like them

*Merle Haggard - I'm not at all crazy about him

*Otis Redding - fine

*The White Stripes - good

*The Mighty Quinn (soundtrack) - one of my all-time favorites, especially Guess Who's Coming to Dinner

*Belle and Sebastian - I didn't fall in love with them

*Badly Drawn Boy - I rather liked

*Prince's (Musicology) - clearly very talented but I'm not all that crazy about it

Like a lot:
*Ron Carter - All Alone
*Hello I'm Johnny Cash
*Marvin Gaye - What's Going On
*Beatles - Rubber Soul

Liked:
*Nirvana - Nevermind
*The Band - Music from the Big Pink
*Rolling Stones Now
*Stevie Ray Vaughan - The Sky is Crying
*Michelle Shocked - Short Sharp Shocked

Didn't like:
*Nirvana - Unplugged in New York"

Dancing with Myself

2005-10-18T22:44:00.000-04:00

So, about this blogging thing . . . .

"Dumb move, man . . . dumb move, but it's like them old reflexes coming back."

I know that no one is reading this. So what am I doing? Reprinting Vin Scully calls from 30 years ago? Making political yucks? Trying to do serious political commentary? Doing a 180 on Lou Piniella in the course of a couple of days? Writing about TV like a geriatric "TV Guide" subscriber? Spending 45 minutes looking for the perfect photo of Billy Idol?

The post I spent the longest on -- about Judy Miller -- is the one that makes the least sense. I like photos way too much. I desperately need a proofreader. I still don't know the proper usage of "lie" and "lay." And I come up with headlines -- "DePalma Long Shot", "Jerome Dome It Is", "Why Is Chucky Brown Shooting the Ball?", and "There Is No Way That We Can Lose This Game" -- without knowing what I would write under them.

Yet, as I once told a very dear friend in a different context, "On a scale of 1 to 3, I give it a 2 . . . but I can dance to it."

And I take requests. Even for "Rosalita."

"Somehow, you know, you just end up where you are."

Quote of the Hour

2005-10-18T19:41:00.000-04:00

"I can’t die with dignity. I have no dignity. I want to be the one person who doesn’t die with dignity. I lived my whole life in shame. Why should I die with dignity?”

Two Cheers for Sweet Lou

2005-10-16T22:35:00.000-04:00

Maybe it's exhaustion caused by too much racquetball, but Lou Piniella is starting to grow on me as an announcer. During games three and four of the Angels-White Sox series, he pointed out a couple of times that the Angels were being hampered by their inability to draw walks, thereby deviating from the Joe Buck-Tim McCarver company line that on-base percentage is an overrated Moneyball concept that real baseball men disregard.

Tonight, he seems to be getting his announcing legs under him. He is anticipating managerial situations -- should your catcher throw to third base if a runner tries to steal it with two outs late in a close game? should you pinch run for a slow-running slugger if he gets on base late in the game with the potential game-winning run? -- and adding information that the person watching on TV would not have otherwise. Was I too hasty in dismissing him? Of course. The rule with my opinions, is, as always, "Trust, but verify."

Miller Time: "Don't Go There"

2005-10-16T10:03:00.000-04:00

(* update at bottom of post)

Judy Miller should have listened to Jack Shafer back in July: “Listen to a real criminal defense lawyer and not a First Amendment legend.”

It's not as much fun as Mad Magazine's old "Spy Vs Spy" feature, but one of the many things to emerge from the Miller-palooza in today's New York Times is a lawyer vs. lawyer battle between New York Times' attorneys Floyd Abrams and George Freeman on the one side and Miller lawyer Robert Bennett and Scooter Libby lawyer Joseph A. Tate on the other. An in-house corporate lawyer usually takes pains to tell employees that the lawyer represents the company and not the individual. The reason for this, of course, is that the company's interest might diverge from the interests of the employee. Here, Abrams and Freeman's advice to the NYT and Miller – to not accept Scooter Libby’s waiver (according to Miller); to not seek a more “more voluntary” Libby waiver of confidentiality or even tell Libby’s counsel that Miller had not accepted Libby’s more general waiver of confidentiality; to not try to negotiate with Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald; to counsel against agreeing to testifying – might be interpreted as moves designed to please the First Amendment community (which sees Abrams as a legendary figure and the approval of which both Miller and top newspaper brass is always seeking) at all costs. Regardless, Miller says that strategy changed after she hired started listening to Bennett and disregarding Abrams and Freeman’s advice. (Maybe she was reading Mickey Kaus.)

After Miller was subpoenaed in August 2004, Abrams met with Tate:

"According to Ms. Miller, this was what Mr. Abrams told her about his conversation with Mr. Tate: "He was pressing about what you would say. When I wouldn't give him an assurance that you would exonerate Libby, if you were to cooperate, he then immediately gave me this, 'Don't go there, or, we don't want you there.’"

Mr. Abrams said: "On more than one occasion, Mr. Tate asked me for a recitation of what Ms. Miller would say. I did not provide one."

In an e-mail message Friday, Mr. Tate called Ms. Miller's interpretation "outrageous."

"I never once suggested that she should not testify," Mr. Tate wrote. "It was just the opposite. I told Mr. Abrams that the waiver was voluntary."

He added: "'Don't go there' or 'We don't want you there' is not something I said, would say, or ever implied or suggested."

. . . .

"You never told me," Mr. Tate wrote to Mr. Abrams recently, "that your client did not accept my representation of voluntariness or that she wanted to speak personally to my client.” Mr. Abrams does not dispute that.

. . . .

The two sides did not talk for a year.

Ms. Miller said in an interview that she was waiting for Mr. Libby to call her, but he never did. "I interpreted the silence as, 'Don't testify,' " Ms. Miller said.

She and her lawyers have also said it was inappropriate for them to hound a source for permission to testify.

Mr. Tate, for his part, said the silence of the Miller side was mystifying."

Abrams admits never going back to his learned adversary, Mr. Tate, and saying, "Hey, my client thinks that your client was pressured into waiving confidentiality," because Abrams, on behalf of Miller, could not "hound a source for permission to testify." A criminal defense lawyer would ask, "I need to present to my client all of her options, including testifying and staying out of jail?" Perhaps a media lawyer who believes lawyers should never testify about what a source says asks, "How can I make sure that my client does not have to testify?"

"Ms. Miller recalled Mr. Bennett saying while he signed on to her case: "I don't want to represent a principle. I want to represent Judy Miller.""

Even with Miller finally itching to obtain a clear waiver from Libby and get out of jail, the NYT's lawyers were worried about perception rather than legal consequences:

"While Mr. Bennett urged Ms. Miller to test the waters, some of her other lawyers were counseling caution. Mr. Freeman, The Times's company lawyer, and Mr. Abrams worried that if Ms. Miller sought and received permission to testify and was released from jail, people would say that she and the newspaper had simply caved in.

"I was afraid that people would draw the wrong conclusions," Mr. Freeman said.

Mr. Freeman advised Ms. Miller to remain in jail until Oct. 28, when the term of the grand jury would expire and the investigation would presumably end.

Mr. Bennett thought that was a bad strategy; he argued that Mr. Fitzgerald would "almost certainly" empanel a new grand jury, which might mean Ms. Miller would have to spend an additional 18 months behind bars.

Mr. Freeman said he thought Mr. Fitzgerald was bluffing. Mr. Abrams was less sure. But he said Judge Hogan might release Ms. Miller if Mr. Fitzgerald tried to take further action against her."

If this account is to be believed, Abrams and Freeman advised her that she should stay in jail and play a game of chicken with a special prosecutor because of a fear of the conclusions that people might draw. According to Miller, Abrams and Freeman didn't want her to go back to Libby and ask for a specific waiver and didn’t want her to agree to testify without that waiver. They thought that she could outlast Fitzgerald, apparently.

Of course, Abrams has forgotten more about media law than most of us will ever know, and my knowledge of this case comes from journalism exclusively. Moreover, much of the NYT’s account is dependent on Miller as a reliable witness, of course. Miller had her own reasons to avoid testifying, which might include her own First Amendment views, a desire to take the focus off her disastrous WMD reporting and put it onto her role as a martyr, and sympathy with her friend and source Scooter Libby. And regardless of her legal advice, she seems singularly unworthy of anyone's sympathy (to take just one example, she arguably lied to the grand jury, her editors, and her readers, as Kevin Drum (among others) explains).

UPDATE:

Josh Marshall notes that Abrams in Monday’s Washington Post has taken the extraordinary step of accusing his (former?) client (or at least his client’s employee – it is unclear to me from the stories whether Abrams represents Miller or just the NYT) of twice coloring the truth in the previous day’s NYT:

"In an interview yesterday, Abrams declined to endorse Miller's account that Libby did not want her to testify unless she was going to exonerate him. "That's Judy's interpretation," Abrams said. Tate "certainly asked me what Judy would say, but that's an entirely proper question."

Abrams also minimized Miller's assertion that another source may have given her the name "Valerie Flame," as she recorded it in the same notebook used for her first interview of Libby. Abrams said others may have mentioned Plame only "in passing. . . . The central and essentially only figure who had information was Libby.""

Dick Cheney: Ham Sandwich?

2005-10-16T00:13:00.000-04:00

Last week, in discussing Patrick Fitzgerald's investigation of Scooter and the rest of the Gang that Couldn't Testify Straight, Wonkette wrote,

"We hear Cheney . . . . We hear "Watergate-esque." We hear 'perjury.'“

I gasped when I saw it -- I couldn't imagine that Cheney would leave his fingerprints on this mess. Libby? Sure (he signs his letters "Scooter," after all). Rove? Maybe. But Cheney? Does he even have fingerprints?

Today, I learn via Tom Watson that Judy Miller's first-person love note to herself in the New York Times contains this nugget:

"Before the grand jury, Mr. Fitzgerald asked me questions about Mr. Cheney. He asked, for example, if Mr. Libby ever indicated whether Mr. Cheney had approved of his interviews with me or was aware of them.”

Mr. Watson then points us to the AP story, which nails this point in its lead paragraph:

"The prosecutor in the CIA leak probe repeatedly asked New York Times reporter Judith Miller how Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff handled classified information in their discussions, and asked whether Cheney knew of their conversations.”

I'm sorry to repeat myself, but . . . wowsa. How about this for a crackpot unified theory of Plame-Miers: If George Bush and Andy Card knew that Prosecutor Fitzgerald was sniffing around not only the Office of the Vice President but the Vice President himself, then maybe the President and Card (sans Bush's Brain and the Dark Prince) saw the potential for a weakened Bush to limp into a Supreme Court nomination battle without the firepower to overcome a Democrat filibuster to an Edith Jones or Priscilla Owen nomination, which prompted Bush's choice of the Harry Reid pre-approved Harriet Miers. (Under this theory, Mickey Kaus would be right that Reid's potential change of position from supporting to opposing Miers would be a "double-cross." I'm still wondering, however, if, Plame-gate aside, Bush might like to see a Reid reversal on Miers to help him attempt to change the nomination paradigm and line up the Republicans in a partisan battle.)

(Don't worry -- I'm not going to try to wrap DeLay and Frist into this discussion . . . yet.)

Eliazabethtown: 'Not as Horrible as My Fellow Critics Said'

2005-10-15T04:40:00.000-04:00

You sense a theme here?

"Hey, Elizabethtown Isn't That Bad" says Slate's homepage headline to David Edelstein's review

"Cameron Crowe's latest isn't as bad as you've heard, but it's still a desperate mess of a movie" says the Salon headline to Stephanie Zacharek's review

What's funny about these headlines is that they presume that a large number of readers will know that the latest Cameron Crowe picture received a brutal reception at the Toronto Film Festival before being re-cut. Wouldn't it make more sense to focus on whether the critic liked the movie now? Or am I underestimating the number of non-critics who know about the pre-release buzz?

Did Peggy Noonan Really Say That?

2005-10-15T03:52:00.000-04:00

Am I the only one bothered by the passage in Peggy Noonan's latest column when she compares Miers’ decision whether to “take a hit” and withdraw her nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court to the decision of a Secret Service agent to take a bullet intended for the President? "An excellent moment of sacrifice and revenge," indeed.

"The Miers pick was a mistake. The best way to change the story is to change the story. Here's one way.

The full Tim McCarthy. He was the Secret Service agent who stood like Stonewall and took the bullet for Ronald Reagan outside the Washington Hilton. Harriet Miers can withdraw her name, take the hit, and let the president's protectors throw him in the car. Her toughness and professionalism would appear wholly admirable. She'd not just survive; she'd flourish, going from much-spoofed office wife to world-famous lawyer and world-class friend. Added side benefit: Her nobility makes her attackers look bad. She's better than they, more loyal and serious. An excellent moment of sacrifice and revenge."

Josh Tries to Make Democrats Spontaneously Combust with Joy

2005-10-15T01:48:00.000-04:00

From Josh Marshall's Talking Points Memo:

"What did Harriet Miers know about the White House plan to bulldoze Joe Wilson and reveal his wife's identity?

Even more interesting, what does she know about what the president knew?"

According to Josh (quoting Texas Lawyer), Miers' position as Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy

"gave her 'more one-on-one contact with the president than nearly any other staff member in the West Wing' and made her 'the ultimate gatekeeper for what crosses the desk of the nation's commander in chief.'

. . . .

Given her role at the White House at the time, Miers would seem uniquely placed to give some read on just what he knew and when he knew. Indeed, what she knew and when she knew it."

A month ago, this would have sounded beer-nuts crazy to even the most conspiracy-minded of the Democratic Underground gang. George Bush would nominate his personal lawyer to the U.S. Supreme Court even though she might have to testify under oath (to the Grand Jury? to the Judiciary Committee?) about what she and the President knew about the Joe Wilson-Valerie Plame matter? No chance. But after DeLay, Frist, Miers, and Rove/Libby, not to mention a 3-1 start by the 'Skins, nothing seems impossible in the crazy little town full of dreamers, where liberal kids, who came to DC thinking that the closest they would get to real power was winning the trivia contest at The Pour House, now -- close their eyes and cross their fingers! -- imagine themselves getting drunk with Sally and Ben and taking back K Street!

Fugging Hilarious

2005-10-14T22:54:00.000-04:00

One of the Fuggers on Michael Stipe's latest ensemble:

"It's like a child's half-assed George Washington costume from the waist down, and, like, Baked Communications Professor on Graduation Day from the waist to the neck, and then, god, I don't even know, like, MY GRANDPA from the neck up."

Good stuff. Even The Wall Street Journal acknowledges their influence.

Misleading Drudge Headline of the Night

2005-10-14T22:05:00.000-04:00

No, it's not, "Meet Five Toes, the Two-Tongued Cat!" That one seems spot-on.

Instead, it is "Rove 'No Target'".

If you click through to the AP story, however, you learn the following:

"Prosecutors had warned Rove before his latest grand jury appearance that there was no guarantee he would not be indicted. The grand jury's term is due to expire Oct. 28.

. . . .

His lawyer, Robert D. Luskin, said Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald "has not advised Mr. Rove that he is a target of the investigation and affirmed that he has made no decision concerning charges. The special counsel has indicated that he does not anticipate the need for Mr. Rove's further cooperation.""

This is an example of Kevin Drum's "Always Click the Link" rule of thumb. Why am I guessing that Karl Rove isn't as convinced as Drudge about not being a Fitzgerald target?

(We need a Kausfiles' review of Rove's Jag. One thing is certain -- Rove is taking a different tact than John Roberts, who tooled around DC in a PT Cruiser, much to Mr. Kaus's disdain.)

P.S. -- Speaking of Kevin Drum, he seizes upon the key nugget in the Post story:

"Rove's defense team asserts that President Bush's deputy chief of staff has not committed a crime but nevertheless anticipates that special prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald could find a way to bring charges in the next two weeks, the source said."

Wowsa.

McCarver and Fox Strike Again

2005-10-14T21:07:00.000-04:00

Tonight, in the third inning of Game 3 of the Angels-White Sox Series, McCarver narrated a video montage of sloppy play from the series. He once again showed Vladimir Guerrero throwing the ball past Adam Kennedy and Orlando Cabrera and said that Guerrero "overthrew" both fielders. Yet when I watched the play live, and then watched the replay several times, it seemed clear that Vlad didn't overthrow Cabrera. He overthrew Kennedy, but Cabrera, the secondary cutoff man, simply missed the in-between hop.

The play ended up not hurting the Angels, but what bothers me about this is McCarver's (and Fox's) laziness. (And this isn't limited to McCarver and Fox. You see it on NFL telecasts on all networks.) It's fine to not notice what really happened when you are announcing it live. McCarver just keeps repeating what he thinks he saw instead of actually watching the play again on replay, however, because he is sticking to a storyline that he assumes applies and never takes the time to look closely again. He has already decided in his mind what happened. Are you going to believe McCarver or your own lying eyes? Moreover, Buck and Piniella just sit there and agree. They "know" what happened because McCarver said so. Had McCarver said instead, "Let's take a look at this replay and see what happened on that throw," they would have noticed.

I compare this to Jon Miller and Joe Morgan on ESPN. I don't think that both of them would keep repeating something that, once they saw the replay, was inaccurate. Morgan has his obvious liabilities as an announcer, but he is strongest when analyzing something that happened on the field -- I have heard him many times say, "Well, you know, looking at it again, I think I was wrong." And if he doesn’t, Miller will. (Part of this may come from having better people in the truck who tell the announcers, “Hey, look at the replay again – I think something different happened.”)

P.S. -- Read King Kaufman on more baseball love from Fox -- as the Salon subhead says, "Fox hates baseball, exhibit 3,442."

Miers' Remorse*

2005-10-14T12:44:00.000-04:00

(* shamelessly stealing Mr. Kaus's line even after John Fund used it in The Wall Street Journal because I added an apostrophe to make the headline possessive and no one is reading this anyway)

Last week, Wonkette found a fun 2004 Legal Times profile of Ms. Miers that contained this fascinating nugget:

"She always remembers everybody's birthday."

That talent would undoubtedly help on the Court, because Justice Stevens always remembers holidays and Justice Ginsburg is always wandering the halls talking about "this day in baseball history," but no one has been good with birthdays since Justice Black left the Court (he was always passing around oversized “from all of us” birthday cards for everyone to sign the morning of someone's birthday and then organizing a "surprise" cake in Justice Stewart's chambers for the afternoon).

Except . . .

(Via The Smoking Gun and the NYT.) It turns out to be yet another left-wing MSM lie! If Miers is so good at remembering birthdays, how could she have forgotten the birthday of “the most brilliant man she had ever met” and "the best Governor ever"?

Don't let Drudge find out -- he'll start those sirens on his site and get everyone excited that a Rove indictment might be imminent.

What Happens When You Never Invite George Will to Play Golf

2005-10-13T23:56:00.000-04:00

"Q Who gave you the hat, sir?
THE PRESIDENT: Forty-one gave me the 43 hat.
Q And you gave him?
THE PRESIDENT: "Thank you, sir." (Laughter.)
FORMER PRESIDENT BUSH: A guy in Fort Worth gave me the 41."

"The unpleasant sound Bush is emitting as he traipses from one conservative gathering to another is a thin, tinny "arf" - the sound of a lap dog." -- George Will on George Herbert Walker Bush, 1992

"He has neither the inclination nor the ability to make sophisticated judgments about competing approaches to construing the Constitution. Few presidents acquire such abilities in the course of their prepresidential careers, and this president, particularly, is not disposed to such reflections." -- George Will on George W. Bush, 2005

Quote of the Hour

2005-10-12T11:17:00.000-04:00

"Let's leave it all alone. I'm stupidest when I try to be funny."

Because Don Zimmer Wasn't Available

2005-10-12T10:26:00.000-04:00

I said that it couldn't get more painful for me than Buck and McCarver. (Other than a doomsday scenario of Berman and McCarver.) Fox decided to up the ante by having Sweet Lou Piniella join the Buck-McCarver booth last night.

Besides being a bit of a mush-mouth, which is always a fun condition for an announcer to have, Piniella said nothing of substance. It was like sitting next to a guy at the game who tells you obvious or unsupported things as if he is imparting "insider" information ("This is a bunting situation . . . He'll probably waste a pitch here . . . Bud Black looks like he would be a good manager [why, Lou, because of the part in his hair? the crease in his pants? why, why, why?] . . .). (I know this because I am often that guy at the game saying the inane stuff. But only one or two people have to listen to me, rather than the millions who are subjected to Piniella.) He is Bret Boone from 2003 -- the "baseball guy" who adds nothing to the booth and actually manages to make you appreciate McCarver a little more. He sounds like he has been on cruise control for years, which is what can happen to you when you manage in Tampa Bay, I guess.

(The one possible benefit -- and it's a long shot -- to having Piniella in the announcing booth is the chance that he will lose his mind at some point and start screaming at Buck and McCarver like they were umpires who just called a balk on Lou's pitcher. Fox could turn this to its advantage by having Hugh ("House") Laurie limp into the booth and administer a sedative to Piniella while McCarver said "Amazing!" and Buck said, "Only here on Fox, folks.")

Breaking the Law, Breaking the Law

2005-10-12T01:46:00.000-04:00

A reason for Washingtonians to consider moving to the suburbs, from today's Washington Post:

"Debra Bolton had a glass of red wine with dinner. That's what she told the police officer who pulled her over. That's what the Intoxilyzer 5000 breath test indicated -- .03, comfortably below the legal limit.

She had been pulled over in Georgetown about 12:30 a.m. for driving without headlights. She apologized and explained that the parking attendant must have turned off her vehicle's automatic-light feature.

Bolton thought she might get a ticket. Instead, she was handcuffed, searched, arrested, put in a jail cell until 4:30 a.m. and charged with driving under the influence of alcohol.

Bolton, 45, an energy lawyer and single mother of two who lives in Alexandria, had just run into a little-known piece of D.C. law: In the District, a driver can be arrested with as little as .01 blood-alcohol content."

There, but for the grace of your personal deity, goes any of us.

I heard about Ms. Bolton's arrest the day that it happened, and I couldn't believe it. Now that I've read about it in the Post, I still can't believe it. Understand that Ms. Bolton is an accomplished lawyer with friends all over town. And it took her four months and thousands of dollars to fight this after a terrifying and humiliating night in jail. You can imagine how it turns out for those people without such intestinal fortitude or education.

So, my friends, if you want a glass of wine with dinner, do it in Virginia or Maryland. Moreover, if you see Ms. Bolton out in the suburbs, buy her a drink. She deserves it.

Managerial Miscue of the Night (Bill James is right again)

2005-10-11T23:37:00.000-04:00

In the 1984 Bill James's Baseball Abstract, James discussed a quote from then-White Sox Manager Tony LaRussa. Known as The Boy Genius (because we all know that a law degree makes you brilliant), LaRussa’s “Winning Ugly” team had been thrown out of the base paths a couple of times during Chicago's unsuccessful 1983 AL Championship Series with the Baltimore Orioles. LaRussa said something to the effect of, "We took the extra base during the season, and we can't change the way we play in the playoffs." James wrote something to the effect of, "You must change the way you play when you are playing against the best teams. The things you do during the 162-game season won't always work in the postseason."

Tonight, Ozzie Guillen set his team loose on the base paths and saw them thrown out twice. He also insisted on keeping the bunt on in the bottom of the ninth inning with a pinch runner on first and no outs. As a former true believer that the bunt was almost always the waste of a precious out for the smaller gain of a base, I have come around to the notion that there are times when it is a good, wise play. Here, Chone Figgins was playing about 30 feet from home plate and KRod was throwing BBs down the middle of the plate (eschewing his devastating curveball), however, because they KNEW that Aaron Rowand was going to bunt. Figgins, KRod, and Mike Scioscia knew that Rowand would bunt, even with one strike, even though Podsednik had been unable to bunt in the 8th on Scott Shields, because Rowand was telegraphing it and because everyone in the park and everyone watching felt confident that Ozzie Guillen would not take the bunt off. The White Sox had been playing tight all night. Maybe Guillen thought that bunting was the best way to win in that particular situation. More likely, he thought, “This is how we play. We aren’t changing now.”

Chicago played this way all year, but it killed them tonight:

5th: Podsednik thrown out stealing when Scioscia called for a pitchout.
6th: Jermaine Dye -- 31 home runs on the year -- pops up a bunt to lead of an inning.
7th: AJ Pierzynski is thrown out stealing by five feet with one out.
8th: Podsednik fouls off two bunt attempts before striking out.
9th: Rowand drills his bunt right to Figgins, who almost turns a double play with Adam Kennedy.

As much as Scioscia loves small ball as well, I would suspect that he would have taken the bunt off if Crede had been playing as close to the plate as Figgins was.

It is always dangerous to extrapolate too much from one baseball game. That won't stop me here. I get the sense that the White Sox and the Angels play similar games: good starting pitching, very good bullpens, good defense, and managers who like to play "small ball" and who try to steal bases more than is wise. Scioscia likes to play veterans at any expense. (See the perceptive Matt Welch for the best analysis of the Angels – his comments about game 5 of the Angels-Yankees series brought new things to light.) And Ozzie loves to steal and bunt (sacrifice, squeeze, drag, you name it).

None of this will matter if Vlad the Impaler begins wreaking havoc, or if Paul Konerko and Carl Everett start taking apart the exhausted Angel bullpen. But if this series comes down to the small ball that both managers love, then I’ll be interested to see if Ozzie is willing to adapt to the strategy that got him there.

P.S. -- I see that I am in good company with Matt Welch and the ESPN "Second Guessing" boys (Neyer and Schoenfield).

Vast Wasteland Line of the Night

2005-10-11T23:15:00.000-04:00

"I hope the war goes on forever and Ryan gets drafted."

Desert Island: The Vast Wasteland

2005-10-11T20:50:00.000-04:00

"Never mind what people are like, what do they like?"

Hall of Fame

Arrested Development -- The best sitcom ever. (Yeah, I said it.) The acting is sensational, from top to bottom – there really is not a weak link in the cast, from Jessica Walter and Jeffrey Tambor to little Michael Cera and Alia Shawkat. (Jeffrey Tambor deserves his own post -- hell, he deserves his own mountain -- for portraying Hank "Hey Now" Kingsley on The Larry Sanders Show and George Bluth here.) I start giggling just thinking about AD. The direction, the writing, Opie's narration. So far, the third season has been the weakest, and it is still the best thing on television. As the man says, if loving this show is wrong, I don’t want to be right.

Deadwood -- Shakespeare in the West. I'm not a big fan of Timothy Olyphant's Gary Cooper impersonation, but the women, mostly forced to be wives or prostitutes, are amazing (especially Paula Malcomson as Trixie and Kim Dickens as Joannie Stubbs). Ian McShane deserves all of the accolades that he receives as Al Swearengen -- he is the heart and soul of the show as a man with a damaged heart and soul. The use of music (from Jelly Roll Morton to June Carter Cash to Mississippi John Hurt) is outstanding. And the writing . . . well, David Milch works out his demons for all of us to see, and I'm sure as hell richer for it. It’s high art.

All Star

Curb Your Enthusiasm -- A little too smug sometimes, but Larry David’s creation is like nothing else on TV. "The Survivor" episode from Season 2 will always be a classic. From Gina Gershon slurring, "Shlomo is in shul, Larry," to the argument between the Holocaust survivor and Colby from "Survivor" about who had the tougher time, it was perfection in 22 minutes.

Extras -- I have seen three episodes and it is already in the pantheon because of Kate Winslet's performance in the premiere as the star who works in a Holocaust film in an effort to win an Oscar (she may take on the role of a "mental" to take another stab at a statuette, she says). In between takes, she explains to one of the extras the best way to talk dirty on the phone (it involves cleaning out the basement and polishing an Oscar). Is there anything that Ricky Gervais can't do?

Lost -- At its best when it is funny and scary. I don't think that the creators have a coherent view of what it all means -- I believe it when Entertainment Weekly reports that they are making it up as they go along. But the acting is solid, the colors are vibrant, and use of backstory to deepen our appreciation of the characters is innovative and tremendous fun.

The Office -- Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's not the British original, which was one of the most extraordinary things ever shown on television. But during this season, it has reached its own level of quiet brilliance. The episode about the Office Olympics illustrated all of the show's strengths -- laugh-out-loud moments of silliness, pitch-perfect glimpses of the richness of the humans dulled in an office park, and moments of grace (Michael receiving a "gold medal," his eyes glistening with tears, not understanding but touched by it all the same). Don't be afraid of it.

Scrubs -- I want to drop this, to let it go, but even with its missteps (Heather Graham, bless her, err, heart, was out of her depth), it has a sublime luminance that make me happy. Not a classic? Maybe. Nevertheless, it's quirky and different and manages to combine silliness and pathos in a way that is almost unheard of for a popular American sitcom. Whenever Zack Braff's mannerisms start to grate, John C. McGinley or Neil Flynn come roaring to the rescue. And who knew that out of the whole cast of Roseanne, it would be one of the Beckys who would make it big. Oh, and The Todd rules, of course.

The Sopranos -- The gaps in between seasons makes me forget sometimes how brilliant and startling it was when it came on the scene. Gandolfini and Falco’s scenes together are remarkable. I sometimes find myself gasping at their intensity.

Veronica Mars – Joss Wheedon is right (as he usually is, despite his Serenity misstep). The first season was a slice of perfection -- a perfectly contained little world full of surprises and emotional resonance. It deserves to take the audience from one of the shows where they walk around analyzing hair fibers.

Overrated by the Fans, but Solid Middle-of-the-Rotation Guy (and we do mean "Guy")

Entourage -- Other than Ari, is there any reason to watch this? Probably not (unless they develop Debi Mazur's character, as Dana Stevens suggests). But, as pointed out by Bill Simmons, the second-to-last episode of last season (when Ari's career goes up in flames) featured some fantastic acting by Jeremy Pivan. I won't soon forget him thinking, eyes closed in his office, and then leaping up from his sofa, collar askew, to begin his ill-fated coup attempt. (Now, about that hair, Jeremy . . .)

Fun Guys to Have in the Clubhouse

Grey's Anatomy -- Cheesy music, ER-like medical drama, inconsistent acting. Yeah, I know. I'm not all in, but I'm calling the ante. In spite of Patrick Dempsey.

The OC -- No excuses. The Cohen household is a gas. And Rachel Bilson gets funnier and funnier. She'll outlast Mischa in Hollywood, if not on Page Six.

Old Players Falling Apart Fast

Alias -- Oh dear. The curse of Affleck. A former guilty pleasure, its fastball seems long gone.

Nip/Tuck -- A high-wire act from the beginning, this season seems . . . boring. Which is amazing for a show featuring post-op transsexual sex, a regular threesome, lots of plastic surgeon-on-young-woman action, and a family where the biological dad is the best friend of the dad . . . I'm even bored typing all of this . . . .

I Read The Corner So You Don't Have To*

2005-10-10T01:03:00.000-04:00

(* in homage to Ana Marie (Wonkette) Cox's mostly deserted old blog The Antic Muse)

JPod strikes the deepest blow yet against Ms. Miers. He compares her legal abilities to his acting talent. Which makes sense, you know, because Miers, regardless of whether she is qualified for the U.S. Supreme Court, was the managing partner of a law firm and the counselor to the President of the United States. And Jpod once got an ovation at the McLean Community Center. "Brilliant," as Andy might say.

"Let me offer you an analogy. I was a talented high-school and college actor. I even considered trying it as a career at one time. As an adult, I've been in community theater productions (favorably reviewed in the Virginia local weekly supplement of the Washington Post, yet!) and spent a year or so performing improv comedy in New York. I'm a more than decent semi-pro. But if you took me today and gave me a leading role in the Royal Shakespeare Company where I would have to stand toe to toe with, say, Kenneth Branagh, Kevin Spacey, Meryl Streep, Kevin Kline and others, I would be hopelessly out of my depth. I would be able to give some kind of performance. But it would be a lousy performance, a nearly unwatchable performance.

Would that be because I hadn't acted at their level for a few decades? Would it be because I don't really have commensurate talent? Who knows? Who cares? I would stink. And based on the words she herself has written -- the clearest independent evidence we have of her capacity to reason and think and argue -- as a Supreme Court justice, Harriet Miers would be about as good."

Rules of Television

2005-10-10T00:19:00.000-04:00

If the world were like television, then all women who did not want to keep their babies -- especially single women who were dumped recently by their beaus -- would have miscarriages. The latest lesson in this: Grey's Anatomy. I like Sandra Oh a lot -- she has come a long way from playing an intolerable assistant on the intolerable Arliss, and was fun in the fun Sideways. Her character's plight on tonight's Grey's wouldn't frustrate me off so much if it didn't happen to almost every young unmarried pregnant woman on television (at least network television -- I don't count examples of excellence like Deadwood).

Was the last single woman to have a baby on network TV (and feel okay about it) Murphy Brown? Was the last woman to have an abortion on network tv Bea Arthur? Look, I am okay if we do not want to encourage people to have unsafe sex on network television. I'm okay if we don't want to discuss abortion during prime time. But then stop using pregnancy and miscarriage as a cheap plot device.

Yes, I am 268 years old.

(I would worry about giving away the plot on Grey's Anatomy if anyone were reading this.)

The Blech of Baseball

2005-10-09T20:05:00.000-04:00

It only took five minutes for the Fox broadcast of tonight's Yankees-Angels game to drive me to drink. I am not a Tim McCarver fan. I remember liking him before he hit the big time, but I think that he has been on cruise control for years now and now gets most of his stories from pre-game bull sessions with Joe Torre instead of research or hard thinking. He has become part of the Old Guard. At his worst, you get the idea that he thinks that he is doing all of us a favor by announcing the game. I am sure that Yankees' fans disagree. And so does Roger Angell, undoubtedly, who wrote a love song to him in the New Yorker a couple of years ago. I love reading Roger Angell -- discovering him added a new dimension to my love of the game -- but he is off-base on McCarver, I think. At least Joe Buck isn't doing the game as well -- with those two egos at work, I'd rather listen to the game in SAP. And I don't understand Spanish.

Moreover, courtesy of Fox, I'll have the pleasure of all sorts of cartoon characters, sounds effects, and bizarre camera angles that confuse more than inform. Plus, lots of promos for "Prison Break."

Yes, I'm 268 years old.

P.S. -- McCarver just quoted Mae West. I am now switching to the Hard Stuff and going to start re-reading some Roger Angell. I know that my fellow baseball fanatics in the blogosphere love to ride Joe Morgan’s anti-stathead stance. But doesn’t Morgan bring more to the table than McCarver? At least with Morgan, you usually get Jon Miller, as opposed to one of the Fox Fun Bunch. Although with Morgan, there is always the chance that Chris Berman will be along for the ride, and I think we all know how painful that can be. Were McCarver ever to work with Berman, I might have to turn off the television. And I think that we all know how painful that would be.

Go Go Sox

2005-10-09T20:04:00.000-04:00

I was driving home on Friday, stuck in miserable DC traffic, exhausted, stressed. The announcers on ESPN radio (the names escape me right now) were doing a serviceable job describing the incredible bottom of the sixth inning. You could feel it happening -- the White Sox blowing the lead, the Red Sox winning the game, the Series turning around, and then a weekend full of rainouts and stories about the character of this Red Sox team, the City of Boston, blah blah blah. I was happy for my friends who were Red Sox fans after last year, but by this year's playoffs, I was rooting for bat-nuts crazy Ozzie and the South Side kids (at least in this series -- I don't know if the Cubs contingent arising out of LaGrange, Glen Ellyn, and Downers Grove, Illinois can handle three years of

a) Dusty's disaster (Bartman gets all the blame, unfairly),

b) Red Sox miracle,

c) White Sox win it all).

(Plus, I speak on behalf of a world full of baseball fans by saying that we needed this series to be over to stop Chris Berman from announcing baseball games. It's nothing personal . . . well, actually, it is personal. Berman seems like a nice enough guy, but hasn't he made enough money from being ESPN employee number one to stop announcing baseball? Can't we convince him to move to Boca and announce bocce games? The nicknames, the yelling, the lack of any sophisticated baseball knowledge, THE YELLING! . . . it would all be perfect for bocce.)

I got home in time to watch El Duque get two infield popouts and a gut-wrenching 3-2 check swing strikeout of Johnny Damon. It was so exhilerating that I didn't even hear Berman. Wowsa, what a tremendous performance, followed up by two more innings of great pitching against a team with two of the scariest hitters in the game and a crowd dying to explode.

Anyway, I'll shut up now and let Matt Welch take over. I've read Mr. Welch since he started his "war blog," back when a lot of us were more warlike than we are now. He is a funny writer, a sweet guitar player, a non-crazy libertarian, a contributor to Reason's Hit & Run blog, a Bill James disciple, and a California (Anaheim, LA) Angels fanatic. He also gets off a good rant every now and then. Saturday, writing to Red Sox fans the day after their team was booted from the playoffs, is one of those times:

"Good Riddance: El Duque is my very favorite pitcher in baseball -- the best ever in Castro's Cuba, and one of the five best in that island's incredibly rich history; has pitched some great ball in the States (especially in the postseason), and is just a mess of athleticism, unnecessary physical flourishes, and miles of secret guile. When the radio told me he was coming in with the bases loaded and nobody out to protect a one-run lead in Fenway, I knew it was time to check out the teevee. What I saw was one of the single best one-inning pitching performances in my lifetime, which he followed up with two more scoreless innings.

The main Yahoo sidebar story? No Repeat in New England. The ESPN announcers, as the White Sox were celebrating their first postseason win in EIGHTY-EIGHT years, and the camera was following a jubilant Duque? "And the Red Sox championship season is finally over! The Nation blah blah blah blah blah blah!"

Good-wickedy-bye, Afflecks. And yes, I will use that cheap shot -- in fact, if I use it for every time I've heard some Masshole talk to me about Donnie Moore, it's gonna be all Affleck, all the time, for several months around here.

Look, I know you're hurting, and that this little display of mine is unseemly. Fair enough. But Johnny Damon on a popsicle stick -- has there been any recent champion so thoroughly insufferable, so impervious to hearing the rest of the "nation" collectively say "OK, we're really done having to listen about the Curse & the Stephen King & Drew Barrymore & all the rest of it"? The story of the Sox-off is about crazy-ass Ozzie Guillen screaming wild-eyed obscenities at the umpire. It's about goofy Paul Konerko hitting home runs, scary rube Bobby Jenks throwing the ball 100 miles per hour, and El Duque pulling out one for the ages. Sometimes it's just not about you.

I rooted for the Loser Sox last year after they eliminated my boys, and I'm still fond of many of their players and haircuts. But man. Imagine how annoying you find the Rally Monkey, multiply it by 100, and then force every national broadcaster to see the entire history of the Western World through an epic storyline of Gene Autry, Jim Fregosi, and Darin Erstad. Go on, try it."

It Depends on the Meaning of the Word "Named"

2005-10-09T19:52:00.000-04:00

This is via Tony Pierce, who covers more ground than Garry Maddox did in Veterans Stadium in the 1970s. The cartoon is old but not dated (unlike me -- I am old and dated). I first "published" it in a 'beta' version of this blog several months ago and republish it here because I do not want to deprive Mr. Pierce of his much-deserved link.

His passions spill out of the margins of his blog. He is a huge baseball fan (his takedown of Bob Costas and defense of Harry Caray is pure genius -- criticism doesn't get better) and a huge music fan and a huge fan of interesting writing and a huge fan of pretty women and a huge fan of smart women. He thinks that OJ didn't do it, goes mano-a-mano with the President (among others), and taught a lot of us that we could blog in our own voice and didn't need to go to Columbia or Northwestern for credentials.

Swung on and missed, a perfect game!

2005-10-09T19:47:00.000-04:00

Undoubtedly, if I ever do begin posting to this blog, I will do my fair share of complaining about sports announcers.

(I may complain more about sports directors, who refuse to follow Buck's First Rule of Televised Sports: "Show. The. Game." If you want to show me little kids praying in the stands, or old men with their rally caps on, or Leo Mazzone rocking in the dugout, or the hitter's eyes, fine . . . but please do not do it when the pitcher is in his windup! The windup is part of the play. In fact, the catcher giving the sign behind the plate as the hitter stares intently at the mound -- THAT's the beginning of the play. I want to watch it. Show it to me. Trust me, the 13 people waiting to see a close-up of the star of "Fox's Breakout Hit 'Prison Break'!" instead of the game can handle it. But I digress.)

(I would apologize for the digressions but I am well aware that no one is reading this.)

Anyway, Vin Scully is an announcer. He doesn't hype the game, he doesn't pontificate about his view of how the world should work, he doesn’t demonize the athletes or umpires, he doesn’t engage in hyperbole in describing the larger than life figures between the white lines. What he has done for decades (and what he still does in L.A. -- lucky bastards – they get good weather and Hollywood and Scully) is describe the game. He tells you what is happening -- score, situation, weather, if the infield is in for the play at the plate or deep for the double play, who is guarding the line, whether the starting pitcher’s curveball has flattened out now that he has thrown 75 pitches. (If you listen to a lot of different announcers, you know how rare it is to receive this information.)

And he does it with the language of a poet. And so, for my first baseball post, courtesy of an old (in Internet years) article in Salon, here is Mr. Scully. For many announcers, I would need to set the stage, but Vin does it for me in the first paragraph:

"Three times in his sensational career has Sandy Koufax walked out to the mound to pitch a fateful ninth where he turned in a no-hitter. But tonight, September the 9th, nineteen hundred and 65, he made the toughest walk of his career, I'm sure, because through eight innings he has pitched a perfect game. He has struck out 11, he has retired 24 consecutive batters, and the first man he will look at is catcher Chris Krug, big right-hand hitter, flied to second, grounded to short. Dick Tracewski is now at second base and Koufax ready and delivers: curveball for a strike.

0 and 1 the count to Chris Krug. Out on deck to pinch-hit is one of the men we mentioned earlier as a possible, Joey Amalfitano. Here's the strike 1 pitch to Krug: fastball, swung on and missed, strike 2. And you can almost taste the pressure now. Koufax lifted his cap, ran his fingers through his black hair, then pulled the cap back down, fussing at the bill. Krug must feel it too as he backs out, heaves a sigh, took off his helmet, put it back on and steps back up to the plate.

Tracewski is over to his right to fill up the middle, Kennedy is deep to guard the line. The strike 2 pitch on the way: fastball, outside, ball 1. Krug started to go after it and held up and Torborg held the ball high in the air trying to convince Vargo but Eddie said nossir. One and 2 the count to Chris Krug. It is 9:41 p.m. on September the 9th. The 1-2 pitch on the way: curveball, tapped foul off to the left of the plate.

The Dodgers defensively in this spine-tingling moment: Sandy Koufax and Jeff Torborg. The boys who will try and stop anything hit their way: Wes Parker, Dick Tracewski, Maury Wills and John Kennedy; the outfield of Lou Johnson, Willie Davis and Ron Fairly. And there's 29,000 people in the ballpark and a million butterflies. Twenty nine thousand, one hundred and thirty-nine paid.

Koufax into his windup and the 1-2 pitch: fastball, fouled back out of play. In the Dodger dugout Al Ferrara gets up and walks down near the runway, and it begins to get tough to be a teammate and sit in the dugout and have to watch. Sandy back of the rubber, now toes it. All the boys in the bullpen straining to get a better look as they look through the wire fence in left field. One and 2 the count to Chris Krug. Koufax, feet together, now to his windup and the 1-2 pitch: fastball outside, ball 2. (Crowd boos.)

A lot of people in the ballpark now are starting to see the pitches with their hearts. The pitch was outside, Torborg tried to pull it over the plate but Vargo, an experienced umpire, wouldn't go for it. Two and 2 the count to Chris Krug. Sandy reading signs, into his windup, 2-2 pitch: fastball, got him swingin'!

Sandy Koufax has struck out 12. He is two outs away from a perfect game.

Here is Joe Amalfitano to pinch-hit for Don Kessinger. Amalfitano is from Southern California, from San Pedro. He was an original bonus boy with the Giants. Joey's been around, and as we mentioned earlier, he has helped to beat the Dodgers twice, and on deck is Harvey Kuenn. Kennedy is tight to the bag at third, the fastball, a strike. 0 and 1 with one out in the ninth inning, 1 to nothing, Dodgers. Sandy reading, into his windup and the strike 1 pitch: curveball, tapped foul, 0 and 2. And Amalfitano walks away and shakes himself a little bit, and swings the bat. And Koufax with a new ball, takes a hitch at his belt and walks behind the mound.

I would think that the mound at Dodger Stadium right now is the loneliest place in the world.

Sandy fussing, looks in to get his sign, 0 and 2 to Amalfitano. The strike 2 pitch to Joe: fastball, swung on and missed, strike 3!

He is one out away from the promised land, and Harvey Kuenn is comin' up.

So Harvey Kuenn is batting for Bob Hendley. The time on the scoreboard is 9:44. The date, September the 9th, 1965, and Koufax working on veteran Harvey Kuenn. Sandy into his windup and the pitch, a fastball for a strike! He has struck out, by the way, five consecutive batters, and that's gone unnoticed. Sandy ready and the strike 1 pitch: very high, and he lost his hat. He really forced that one. That's only the second time tonight where I have had the feeling that Sandy threw instead of pitched, trying to get that little extra, and that time he tried so hard his hat fell off -- he took an extremely long stride to the plate -- and Torborg had to go up to get it.

One and 1 to Harvey Kuenn. Now he's ready: fastball, high, ball 2. You can't blame a man for pushing just a little bit now. Sandy backs off, mops his forehead, runs his left index finger along his forehead, dries it off on his left pants leg. All the while Kuenn just waiting. Now Sandy looks in. Into his windup and the 2-1 pitch to Kuenn: swung on and missed, strike 2!

It is 9:46 p.m.

Two and 2 to Harvey Kuenn, one strike away. Sandy into his windup, here's the pitch:

Swung on and missed, a perfect game!

(38 seconds of cheering.)

On the scoreboard in right field it is 9:46 p.m. in the City of the Angels, Los Angeles, California. And a crowd of 29,139 just sitting in to see the only pitcher in baseball history to hurl four no-hit, no-run games. He has done it four straight years, and now he caps it: On his fourth no-hitter he made it a perfect game. And Sandy Koufax, whose name will always remind you of strikeouts, did it with a flurry. He struck out the last six consecutive batters. So when he wrote his name in capital letters in the record books, that "K" stands out even more than the O-U-F-A-X."

I Ain't Here for Business, Baby, I'm Only Here for Fun

2005-10-09T19:38:00.000-04:00

Hi. What brought you here?