Sunday Funnies (Make this War More Gay edition)

"Better to be thrown accolades than shoes"

The bellowing indignation over Obama's Nobel certainly -- and rather successfully -- minimizes the intolerable hell the rest of the world endured during the previous eight years.

"Certainly from our standpoint, this gives us a sense of momentum — when the United States has accolades tossed its way, rather than shoes."

That's the take of Hillary Clinton's State Department on President Obama being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, according to her spokesman, Assistant Secretary PJ Crowley.

Crowley was referring to the incident last December when an Iraqi journalist threw his shoes at President George W. Bush during his final visit to Iraq of his presidency.

Muntader Zaidi, who worked for the Iraqi television station Al Baghdadiya, hurled both his shoes at Bush and called him a "dog" during a press conference with Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. He narrowly missed the president, who quickly ducked.

The shoe-throwing, considered one of the highest insults in the Middle East, illustrated the deep anger toward the United States over its invasion and occupation of Iraq.

Crowley's comments suggested a recognition by the Obama administration that the Nobel Prize was as much an indictment of the Bush administration as it was an effort to praise President Obama's outreach to improve the US image around the world.

Echoing comments by the White House, Crowley said the award was not just an "affirmation" of the Obama administration's foreign policy strategy of engagement, but also on its robust foreign policy agenda, which includes non-proliferation, dealing with Iran and North Korea, and pursuing peace in the Middle East.

"There is an opportunity here," Crowley said. "The tone has changed — but obviously we recognize that, while the tone in the world has changed, the challenges remain. They are very significant."

Forget the missing weapons of mass destruction and the Nigerian yellowcake and the smearing of an ambassador and the outing of his wife as a CIA agent. Overlook the torture of Iraqi POWs and the warrantless wiretapping of Americans (after all, Obama isn't moving nearly fast enough on either of those to satisfy me, for certain). Disregard even the photos of Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse that continue to be shielded from public view, perhaps forever if Congress gets it way.

Consider only the non-American lives lost: the millions of innocent Iraqi civilians whose misfortune was to be in the way of the bombs and the bullets from both sides, the "coalition of the willing"'s soldiers whose leaders were browbeaten into supporting the war of lies, the deaths by torture and rape at the hands of American troops.

By all means, I expect Obama to actually accomplish a hell of a lot more than he has to this point. President Kumbayah has maxed out on victories by smile and speech.

But if the Nobel committee wants to bet on the come, good on 'em. It's their money. And if anybody wants to keep on playing the tear-down game, they're just stuck in Sore-Loserville.

And Harvey Wasserman, via The Rag Blog, is correct: this Nobel is a pay-it-forward request from the international community to get out of Afghanistan.

Clerk Kaufman retiring

Harris County Clerk Beverly Kaufman, a one-time Waller County farm girl who oversaw record-keeping and election functions of the nation's third largest county, announced Friday she will not seek a fifth term next year. ...

n 1994, Kaufman was appointed to fill an unexpired term as county clerk after the death of Molly Pryor, who had been appointed eight months earlier after the death of longtime clerk Anita Rodeheaver.

Duties of the county clerk include maintaining records for commissioners court, probate and civil courts; overseeing records of real property, tax liens and vital statistics, and supervising elections.

Congratulations and enjoy your retirement, Ms. Kaufman.

Let the speculation begin on her 2010 potential successors. Councilwoman and Vice Mayor Pro Tem (and DNC member) Sue Lovell is widely rumored to be interested in the post, though we likely won't hear anything about it from her until after the November municipal elections. Hector de Leon, Kaufman's director of communications and voter outreach, could have an interest; 2006 Clerk candidate and 2008 judicial candidate James Goodwille Pierre may as well.

Republicans will line up to replace Kaufman, too. Their ranks could include former and very temporary District Clerk, Theresa Chang; the man she replaced when he unsuccessfully challenged County Judge Ed Emmett, Charles Bacarisse; and Tom Moon, whose long record of both Republican activism and government service includes a stint working for both Kaufman and former tax assessor/collector Paul Bettencourt.

Dwayne Bohac and Ed Johnson probably have ruined their chances.

What names are you hearing bandied about, from either side of the aisle?

Update: Carl Whitmarsh advances the name of Sue Schechter.

MLB realllly needs instant replay

Jeff Passan:

On Friday night, a bad call might have cost the Minnesota Twins a chance to beat the New York Yankees on the road in their American League Division Series. In the 11th inning of Game 2, Minnesota catcher Joe Mauer sliced a ball down the left-field line that not only glanced off Melky Cabrera’s glove in fair territory but also bounced at least 6 inches inside the line and then into the stands for what should’ve been a ground-rule double. Umpire Phil Cuzzi, standing 10 feet away, called it foul. (See photo above.) And even though Mauer singled and the Twins managed to load the bases with no outs, they didn’t score, and the Yankees won 4-3 on a Mark Teixeira home run later that inning.

The Twins were here, of course, because of an umpiring error earlier in the week. A pitch glanced off the jersey of Detroit third baseman Brandon Inge with the bases loaded in the 12th inning of the Tigers’ one-game playoff with Minnesota. Umpire Randy Marsh didn’t call it. The Twins scored in the bottom half of the inning. Marsh claimed not to have seen the video, and MLB’s umpiring boss, Mike Port, said he stood by Marsh.

A pair of bad calls, one completely hideous, as all after-the-fact evidence easily reveals.

So that’s what baseball has come to: supporting egregious flubs to protect their own. It’s the epitome of an old-boys’ network, and it’s insulting to the game. MLB says it uses a grading system during the regular season that rewards the best umpires with playoff assignments. That alleged fair and impartial grading system, mind you, rewarded a postseason series to C.B. Bucknor, about whom a player once said: “My grandpa would be a better umpire than him. And my grandpa is dead.”

Bucknor, by the way, blew three calls at first base in Game 1 of the Red Sox-Angels series. Bungling one call is bad. Mangling two is unconscionable. Blowing three in a single game is fireable.

All of this, again, has happened within a half a week’s time. Two game-defining calls and three more that could have led to … well, no one knows. That’s a wall MLB hides behind: that even if Mauer were on second, who’s to say Jason Kubel and Michael Cuddyer would’ve followed with singles?

Baseball has to start getting these right.

Technology exists to ensure that such errors are rectified before they cost a team. If Cuzzi is willing to admit he’s wrong after the game – “There’s a guy sitting over in the umpire’s dressing room right now that feels horrible,” crew chief Tim Tschida said – then it behooves him and others to allow their calls to be vetted in-game. In no way does it subvert their authority. Players will respect their fallibility, a grand quality for so many who try to play god.

Take the cue from football. Use a red replay flag. Each team gets two per game. If the manager throws them too early, or misuses them, and can’t overturn a poor call later, it’s his mess. ... Accompanying the technology is the urgency. Nobody inside baseball wants a postseason defined by its umpiring screw-ups, and yet year after year, they happen. Ignoring the issue won’t make it go away.

Watch for the next blown call, and whether the outrage is sufficient to drive baseball out of the 19th century and into the 21st. Next season. Perhaps.

The human element. That’s the best argument purists muster against widespread instant replay in Major League Baseball. Let’s see how that works: Umpires make mistakes because they’re human, and ... that makes it OK! Somehow, it’s difficult to believe such reasoning would stand up in a court of law or, say, anywhere in the world not populated by baseball’s dopey decision makers who don’t understand that a huge integrity problem is about to smack them in the face.

I just hope he donates the prize money to ...

ACORN.

That would result in emergency rooms crammed full of conservative stroke victims from coast to coast, wouldn't it? A bonafide health care crisis for the Right.