Thursday, February 25, 2010

Rice Owls start 0-4

But my Lamar Cardinals are 4-0.
Eventually, Wayne Graham figures his team's pitching will sort itself out.

Through four games, including Wednesday's 13-7 loss to Lamar in Rice's home opener at Reckling Park, it's been the coach's primary cause for concern in this surprising 0-4 start. Specifically, he's fixated on the amount of walks his pitchers have issued. 

After another six Wednesday, the season total now stands at 25.

“We gave up (six) free passes,” Graham said. “Across the board, we didn't play well. But mostly, it was the pitchers.”
...
Seven Rice pitchers took the mound against the Cardinals (4-0), and righthanded starter Anthony Fazio never made it out of the first inning. He was knocked around for four runs — all earned — on three hits and two walks. The finishing blow was Pablo Salinas' three-run triple. His replacement, Mark Haynes, was better at the start. His three innings were inspired, but he surrendered three earned runs and four hits.

Abe Gonzalez managed five outs, serving up a three-run homer to Clayton Farhat. Doug Simmons got four outs, allowing an unearned run. Poor Tyler Spurlin – he faced two batters and walked them both before being yanked in favor of Holt McNair, the grandson of the Houston Texans' owner. The freshman faced three batters and induced a pair of outs.

I sat in the sun for yesterday's 4 p.m. first pitch but left shivering after four innings, when it was 9-3.

Lamar scored four runs in the first, fourth and seventh innings. Leadoff hitter Anthony Moore sparked the Cardinals with two extra-base hits and two runs in the first two innings. Clayton Farhat hit a 3-run home run in the fourth, and LU scored four runs with one hit in the seventh.

Starting pitcher Blake Ford lasted four innings and gave up three runs on five hits. Ford started a game against Rice last season and only lasted a third of an inning. 

By the way, Anthony Moore looks like a real player.

Lamar last beat Rice in 2003, when the Cardinals swept the two-game season series that season. Lamar advanced to the NCAA tournament that season, and Rice won the College World Series.

A little more on that.

Both Lamar and Rice have rich baseball traditions, having combined to play in 27 NCAA Tournaments and eight College World Series with all of those berths having been earned by the Owls. Rice has qualified for 15 NCAA Tournaments with the last one being in 2009, when the Owls reached the Super Regional level. The 2003 Rice team that lost both of its games against the Cardinals wound up going 5-1 in the College World Series to win the national championship. Lamar has qualified for 12 NCAA Regionals with the last being in in 2004. The Cardinals were eliminated 6-3 that season by the host Owls in the Houston Regional. Rice's last appearance in the CWS came in 2008 when they went 0-2.

Lamar and Rice play again March 30 at Vincent-Beck Stadium in Beaumont. I think that's a Tuesday without looking at a calendar.  I don't think I can get over there then but I'm sure as hell going to try.

Talking about health care is over

Now it's time to cram it down their throats.

Obama listened politely for six hours, with occasional flashes of temper, but in the end, the message was clear: It’s over. We’re moving forward without Republicans. ...

That was the subtle but unmistakable message of Obama’s closing argument. After hours of hearing Republicans repeat again and again that only an incremental approach to reform is acceptable to them, Obama rejected that out of hand.

Here’s the key bit from Obama:
I’d like Republicans to do a little soul searching to find out if there are some things that you’d be willling to embrace that get to this core problem of 30 million people without health insurance, and dealing seriously with the pre-existing conditions issue. I don’t know frankly whether we can close that gap.
And if we can’t close that gap, then I suspect Mitch McConnell, Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi and John Boehner are going to have a lot of arguments about procedures in Congress about moving forward.
Unless I’m misreading that, Obama is saying that unless Republicans support comprehensive reform as Obama and Dems have defined it — dealing with the problem of 30 million uninsured and, by extension, seriously tackling the preexisting condition problem — they will almost certainly move forward with reconciliation.

What’s more, Obama also essentially accused Republicans of approaching today’s summit in bad faith — after they had sat there with him for six hours. He said that even after the public option was taken off the table, Republicans continued to use the same “government takeover” slur.

“Even after the public option wasn’t available, we still hear the same rhetoric,” Obama said. “We have a concept of an exchange which previously has been an idea that was embraced by Republicans before I embraced it. Somehow, suddenly it became less of a good idea.”

I found the little bit that I watched of today's White House summit breathtaking at times, as Democrats spoke eloquently and from the heart about the state of healthcare in the greatest nation on Earth.



Louise Fletcher on domestic violence and female hormones as a pre-existing condition. Oh, and the quote of the day.

Dick Durbin destroying the Republican argument that medical malpractice and the associated tort reform will reduce insurance premiums (hint: that's bullshit). Durbin describing the woman whose face and throat were burned away because the oxygen she was given during anesthesia caught fire, and whose damages were capped at $250,000. Durbin challenging Republicans to drop their own government-run healthcare programs if they are so paranoid about "government-run healthcare".

Obama himself busting Wyoming Republican and Dr. John Barrasso, asking him if he would feel confident dropping his comprehensive healthcare coverage in favor of catastrophic care only. And when Barosso stepped in the trap, slamming it on his head: "Would you feel that way if you only made $40,000 a year?"

Henry Waxman and the "prudent shoppers" of California who saw their Anthem premiums go up 39%.

And all we heard from the the GOP was the same old shit.

Fine. Fuck 'em and feed 'em fish heads. And let's get the public option back in there while we're at it.

The curmudgeon caucus

Got some links out of an e-list to which I belong and it set me off early this morning ...

Mark Levin to Glenn Beck: "Stop acting like a clown"
Politico - Conservative radio host Mark Levin is criticizing Glenn Beck’s widely publicized CPAC speech this weekend attacking Republicans.

Beck trashed the GOP as being “addicted to spending” during the keynote speech to the Conservative Political Action Committee Saturday and has been a major advocate of the tea party movement, even suggesting the formation of third party of grassroots conservative activists.

But on his show Monday night, Levin called on Beck to “stop dividing us” and suggested he "stop acting like a clown."

The Politico excerpt above comes from here. (Don't miss the Richard Viguerie missive either.) A choice bit from it:

For over three decades, the conservative movement consisted of three legs: (1) limited government/fiscal restraint, (2) national defense, and (3) traditional-values conservatives. However, many of the conservative movement’s leaders became an appendage of the Republican Party. Not so with the Tea Party Movement, which puts principle above loyalty to politicians.

The Tea Party Movement developed independently from the conservative movement, but is a natural ally to the cause of small, limited, constitutional government. The Tea Party has started where the conservative movement once did, as outsiders to the political establishment.

The Tea Party Movement is now the fourth leg of the conservatives’ big table. It not only brings millions of new people to the political process, it also brings more energy, enthusiasm and excitement to politics than we’ve seen in the last 100 years.

I have been working and waiting 50 years for this populist, principled and constitutional groundswell against big government and the quasi-socialistic, crony capitalistic establishment institutions that have been abusing power and trust at the expense of hard-working Americans, their children and their grandchildren.

In just one year, the Tea Party has become the fastest-growing political movement perhaps in history. It is getting bigger by the day, and efforts by the political and media establishment to denigrate it merely fuel it. I expect more defeats in primaries this year than ever in history.

Most big-government incumbents would be well advised to follow Senators Bayh, Dodd and Dorgan and voluntarily retire, or the revitalized conservative movement led by Tea Partiers will enforce retirement this November.

I love Dick Vig. He's been conservo-kooky since waaay back in the day, with Bill Buckley and John Birch and John Calhoun.  But regarding his POV on Republican Party's attempts to co-opt the Tea P, I agree that they are doing so and I disagree that the "movement" is anything but another balky bunch of bigots.  All I see is more of this purity test bullshit splintering an already fractured bunch of lunatics who only vary in their lunacy by tincture*.

*tincture: a chemical solution that has alcohol as the solvent

You Kossacks perhaps noticed Jed Lewison's analysis of Fox trashing the Paulites -- the original t-bags -- and by extension the Tea Party itself because Dr. No won last weekend's CPAC straw poll.

A little historical review: less than ten years ago the corporate media studiously ignored Iraq invasion protests numbering in the millions, in dozens of countries across the world -- before any of us ever heard the words 'Blackwater' and 'Abu Ghraib' -- because THOSE people marching and carrying sings and yelling were dirty fucking hippies.  They LOVE, however, to run video of old, white, conservative Americans screaming, especially when they are screaming at politicians. Since last summer it's been must-show teevee.

But all these TeaBaggers are, and all they will ever be, is a bunch of retirees and a few of their grown children and grandchildren complaining far too loudly about the good old days long gone away. "I want my country back" was "those uppity n-----s ain't never gonna get to vote in OUR town" (substitute "go to OUR colleges/sit in the front of OUR busses/eat at OUR lunch counters") fifty years ago, and "The South shall rise again" and "Hell no I ain't fergettin'"150 years ago. The names and the issues change but it's the same old muttering.

Today's iteration just happens to be John McCain and Jack Cafferty and Ron Paul in a circle-grumble. The curmudgeon caucus. That younger, prettier faces like Sarah Palin and Rick Perry and Tim Pawlenty are all trying to leverage the outrage to their personal advantage is just a display of craven opportunistic pandering.

These people are angry, all right. They're bitching about the tide going out and grousing about the cold weather and arguing with each other about what time the sun will rise tomorrow. Sound and fury signifying nothing. All they really want is low taxes and their guns, to paraphrase Good Time Charlie Wilson. Well who doesn't?

When these chronic bitchers are finally carried screaming and kicking off to assisted living and some younger, less pale people -- of whatever party; Dem, Repub, indy, it doesn't really matter --  get elected, this sad chapter of American history can be mercifully closed. Until my generation's conservatives pick up the torch of their forefathers, anyway.

As part of our planning for the Senate district convention next month, I visited the hosting location yesterday, a high school in Katy -- the heart of John Culbersonland, mind you -- and the brown kids outnumbered the white kids about 4-1 by my admittedly "scientific" (in the conservative definition of the word) observation. I can't wait for those little fuckers to grow up and start voting, though. You know that even the Caucasian kids are appalled at what their parents do and say and who they vote for.

There's some that are indoctrinated and inculcated, certainly.  I read on my 15-year-old nephew's Facebook status earlier this week the ever-popular Al Gore pejorative: "Snowing in Houston? Must be global warming." *slaps forehead*

What really gets my goat, though, is when Democrats are intimidated by all this bluster and cowed into not running for office, even and especially when they are a sure thing. Exhibit A: Beau Biden.

 What a pussy.

Monday, February 22, 2010

Credit where it's due

To Scott Brown, Olympia Snowe, Susan Collins, Kit Bond (!) and George Voinovich for breaking with their party and voting to advance the jobs bill.

Four Republicans joined Democrats in a key cloture vote moments ago, allowing debate on a jobs package to move forward. After overcoming this hurdle, debate on the bill can begin.

Sen. Scott Brown (R-MA) broke with his party and voted with the Democrats. So did Sens. Olympia Snowe (R-ME), Susan Collins (R-ME), Kit Bond (R-MO) and George Voinovich (R-OH).

Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE) was the only Democrat to break with his party.

The final vote tally was 62-30. 

Our two Texas morons Corndog and Kay Bailing-Out, naturally, voted against unemployed Americans. Only slightly less disgraceful than the execrable Nelson.

"I hope this is the beginning of a new day here in the Senate," (Senate Majority Leader Harry) Reid said.

The bill, which is much smaller than some original proposals, would exempt businesses from paying Social Security payroll taxes this year after hiring from the nation's pool of millions of unemployed. The Build-America Bonds Act of 2009 would be renewed by the jobs bill. The scaled-down bill would also extend some tax breaks for small businesses, renew highway programs through December, and put $20 billion in the highway trust fund.

Go to the link to see Scott Brown's statement and expression of hopeful bi-partisanship. Let's see if his colleagues denounce him for it. With the announcement that HCR will be presented shortly for a vote again, this is, dare I say it, a good sign.  A healthcare bill -- without a public option and with the odious Nelson abortion amendment in -- appears to be on the docket and subject to a majority vote (what's referred to as reconciliation, meaning of course that 51 votes is all it will take to pass it).

If that's all that can be done, then get on with it, ladies and gentlemen.

Update: Eight more Republican senators found their way over to the light.  Let's not accuse them of being against it before they were for it ...

But Kay Bailey skipped out on the vote.  I believe that''s called 'cutting-and-running'.