The NFL, and Roger Goodell, is a bad joke

My brother-from-another-mother Neil has already made mention of it, so these latest embarrassments are only shocking to those not inured to the Sunday afternoon gladiator competition that invigorates so many Americans every fall.

Junior Seau's Hall of Fame enshrinement went from awkward and sad to really messy with the release of a New York Times story on Friday afternoon.

According to the Times, Seau's family will not be allowed to speak at his Hall of Fame enshrinement ceremony. Only a video will be played for Seau, who committed suicide in 2012. The Pro Football Hall of Fame told the Times that's the policy for deceased inductees, that there will be no speech for someone on their behalf.

Seau -- pronounced SayOw, ironically enough -- shot himself in the chest and left a note saying he wanted his brain studied for possible signs of chronic traumatic encephalopathy.  The NFL has previously acknowledged that many of the sport's participants over the decades have had their lives ruined by playing it, and agreed to pay a massive sum to the NFLPA (the players' union) in order to make reparations.

But with this blackout of the Seau family's desires to participate in their patriarch's induction into the Pro Football Hall of Fame, the NFL is essentially playing the old "if we don't talk about it, it's not really happening" game.  That's the same one the NRA plays every time there's a mass shooting, and the same one many people play when it comes to the latest about Caitlyn Jenner.

Then there's the league's not-insignificant gambling problem.

This past week, ESPN.com reported that a search of public documents revealed examples of NFL lawyers making the claim in legal proceedings over the past 12 years that gambling on sports is a game of skill, not chance. That sounds like no small thing, a technical difference, but it's also a crucial one.

If sports gambling is legally determined to remain a game of chance, then it will remain illegal. But if it is found to be a game of skill, as NFL lawyers have claimed, then it has a path to being legalized. So why is the NFL, which ostensibly hates gambling and all its sordidness, making this claim?

"The NFL used to argue that gambling would screw up the integrity of the game,'' said Arnie Wexler, a compulsive gambling counselor who is a former compulsive gambler himself. "This whole country is turning into a gambling state and the NFL can just smell the money. It's all about the money.

"They just want a piece of the action. Where's the integrity? The hypocrisy has been going on for years; now they just have the balls to be more upfront about it.''

ShockedIsayshocked.  Meanwhile, NFL commissioner Roger Goodell is also choking on Deflate-gate.

One month has passed since Tom Brady's appeal hearing in deflate-gate. One month and Roger Goodell still hasn't announced a decision.

Nothing. No upholding the suspension. No reversing the suspension. No lightening of the suspension. This isn't a Supreme Court case. This isn't complicated. It shouldn't take a month of leaving a player hung out to dry, as the biggest storyline going into the start of training camp remains an overblown, self-inflicted soap opera from last season.

One month and Goodell still can't figure out what to do, which somehow isn't really all that surprising since if he knew what to do in the first place the entire story would have been snuffed out in a day or so – or however long it took the NFL to figure out it has no idea, let alone any actual proof, that the footballs at the AFC title game were even all that deflated.

The Washington Post is reporting some owners are trying to figure out how the NFL commissioner can come out of this appearing "credible and looking like he's dealing from a position of strength." They might try encouraging him to just rule on the evidence rather than go with that pipe dream, but whatever.

Meanwhile, ProFootballTalk reports that a "small group of influential owners" are pushing Goodell to uphold the suspension, so it's nice to see some lobbying of the commissioner by rival teams who didn't participate in the disciplinary process.

It's not a coincidence that Brady and the NFL Players Association are left to do their own saber rattling in the media, claiming they'll sue everyone and everything if the New England Patriots quarterback isn't exonerated.

There are three rings to this circus.

Like so many other American boys and men, I have played football and eagerly watched it played at the high school, collegiate, and professional levels ever since I was knee-high to a high knee.  Loved almost every minute of it.

But that's going to have to stop now.  I cannot continue to enable the bad behavior of the worst socialists in the United States.  You may be thinking, "But Perry! YOU'RE a socialist yourself!  Why wouldn't you support your comrades?"

The answer, obviously, is that it's just the expenses of their publicly financed stadia, and many (not all) of their other costs of doing business, that are socialized.  Their profits are privatized.  Only when they are sued, and the plaintiffs win, do some of their profits get nationalized.

That's not the socialist model I subscribe to.  I may elaborate on my own views about this at a later time, but for now it's important that I wean myself away from these brutal, Hunger Games capitalists -- note that I include the players in this indictment; they have willingly traded their health for gobs of money -- and boycott the sport.

If I don't, then their scrambled brains, mangled legs, feet, arms, and hands are not just on Roger Goodell and the NFL's team owners, but also on me.  And I don't want that.

Sunday Funnies

Thia toon by by Steve Sack of the Minneapolis Star Tribune appeared last Wednesday, the day before the Louisiana theater shooting.

Rick Perry gets halfway to the clear

We just shouldn't be surprised.

One of two felony indictments against former Texas Gov. Rick Perry was tossed out Friday, giving the Republican presidential candidate a potentially huge legal victory in the face of flagging polling numbers for the 2016 race.

The 3rd Court of Appeals in Austin sided with Perry's pricy legal team, stating in a 96-page ruling that the charge of coercion of a public servant constituted a violation of the former governor's free speech rights.

Perry, who left office in January, was indicted last August on the coercion charge and a separate charge of abuse of official power, which wasn't affected by the ruling.

For now, he'll still have to face the abuse of power charge — which could tie him up in court and eat into valuable on-the-ground campaigning time in the midst of his White House run. But Perry's lead attorney, Tony Buzbee, downplayed the future significance of the case, just as his client has for months, saying it will have "no impact whatsoever" on the campaign.

"One down, one to go," Buzbee said at a Houston news conference. "The court today threw out what we believe to be the greater of the two charges." He added that the abuse of power charge is "hanging by a thread."

Thanks goes to Justice Bob Pemberton, who declined to recuse himself from the case despite the glaring conflicts of interest.  I also had a conversation in a podcast with Brad Friedman of Bradblog about the indictments and their chances back in May.

Michael McCrum, the San Antonio-based special prosecutor leading the case, has long maintained it deserves to go to trial. He said he wasn't certain whether he'd appeal Friday's ruling since it affects an underlying statue that will impact many cases, not just Perry's.

"Obviously we're ready to proceed to trial on the other count," McCrum said, though he noted he doesn't yet know when such a trial would begin because Perry can appeal the abuse of power charge to the Court of Criminal Appeals, Texas' highest criminal court. With that court on summer recess, doing so is "going to cause an extended delay," he said.

Buzbee remains confident he can spring Goodhair.

Buzbee said he considers the remaining charge nothing more than a misdemeanor and said the Court of Criminal Appeals "will throw it out on its face." The abuse of official capacity nonetheless has a maximum sentence of 99 years in prison, while the voided coercion charge carried a 10-year maximum sentence.

I don't see a conviction sticking, I really don't even see a trial even happening anytime soon because of the possible appeal to the CCA, as McCrum mentions.  There are simply too many Republicans who have Rick Perry's back.

See DFW CBS and the Christian Science Monitor for additional insight, including the ramifications on his presidential bid.  And again Charles with more and many links to others.

We don't need another HERO referendum *Update*

But we will get one anyway.

The saga over a Houston city law that protects LGBT people from discrimination just took a sudden turn. The Texas Supreme Court intervened in the court fight over the effort to repeal the initiative, ordering that the Houston City Council must either repeal HERO on its own or allow it to be challenged at the ballot in the next election. Either way, the city can no longer enforce it.

[...]

According to the Court, all that mattered is that the City Secretary initially certified the referendum. It doesn’t matter what was discovered later about the validity of those signatures, or even the fact that the Secretary later acknowledged the flaws that were found. “The Charter requires the City Secretary to ‘certify’ her findings, and the only findings she expressly certified were her own,” the Court explained. It’s as simple as “no takesie-backsies.”

That's legal crapola, but SOP for nine Republicans on the SCOTX (I always enjoy typing that anagram because it rhymes with "Kotex", which is exactly what the Texas Supreme Court is).

It’s unclear if there is any remedy for LGBT advocates, particularly given the ample evidence that there actually were not sufficient signatures. This included video evidence that the petitioners were well aware of the rules they broke that should have invalidated the signatures they collected, evidence of possibly forged signatures, and a jury’s ruling that the valid signatures just did not add up.

Brad Pritchett, who runs the HOUequality site that has defended HERO throughout this process, told ThinkProgress, “The certification has been boiled down to ink on the page. If someone turned in 20,000 forged signatures, this ruling says that as long as there are 20,000 on that page, it counts. No other certification necessary.”

The city is still reviewing its options, but will likely allow the ballot initiative to advance rather than repeal it. Pritchett is optimistic that, particularly given all that it has endured so far, “If HERO is on the ballot this November, there is no doubt that Houstonians will do the right thing and reaffirm the need for HERO once again.”

Pritchett recently left the Harris County Democratic Party to take a job with the ACLU of Texas.  His husband is Noel Freeman, the former chair of the HGLBT Caucus.  I believe he's correct that a ballot up-or-down vote will favor the proponents.  The good news is that the issue should boost turnout for municipal elections just four months away that heretofore have not been generating much in the way of news coverage.

As for the political English (i.e. cue ball spin) I see Chris Bell gaining some advantage over Sylvester Turner, who has been a latecomer to the human rights issues of LBGTQ people.  Update: Towelroad details Turner's bumpy history, including the old rumors of his being homosexual himself.  But the community doesn't seem to be holding any of his past against him, and he has packed the Caucus with over six dozen purchased memberships in advance of the endorsement vote.

Former congressman Chris Bell has been actively encouraging supporters to join and show up for the August meeting, while City Councilman Stephen Costello has pursued what his campaign described as a "low-key effort" to get people to join the caucus' ranks.

Turner, on the other hand, opted to write the group a $3,040 check two weeks ago - enough for at least 76 memberships, according to spokeswoman Sue Davis.

"It's something that's done every year," Davis said.

Not to this extent, Ms. Davis (as we will see in the next excerpt).

Does HERO hate get goosed?  Does this development help Ben Hall, or is Bill King going to try to seize back the mantle of Anti-HERO Crusader?  As referenced in the previous excerpt, it probably doesn't do much for Stephen Costello, despite one of his backers being the afore-mentioned Mr. Freeman.

Former caucus president Noel Freeman, a Costello supporter, said campaigns also purchased or sponsored memberships during his tenure, though not enough to sway the outcome of the endorsement process.

"I never saw an endorsement vote that was so close that (it) would have made a difference," he said, adding that he never saw a campaign purchase more than 45 memberships during his tenure from 2011 to 2013.

We'll also have to watch how this goes with the At-Large city council posts.  AL-1, for example, has Democratic County chair Lane Lewis -- you may recall that a former Texas blogger, to his discredit, demanded and others as well suggested Lewis' resignation -- squaring off with Tom McCasland, who is supported by a large contingent of the most conservative Houston Democrats that I know.  So far he's all about mobility (though there's this Tweet from yesterday).

Charles has more and more linkage to other reactions.

Latest poll shows top ten GOP contenders for first debate

Just two weeks before the first Republican presidential candidate debate and the latest from Pew Public Policy Polling shows the top ten -- the only ones who get in -- as these:

Trump 19%
Walker 17
Bush 12
Carson 10
Rubio 10
Huckabee 8
4% each for Cruz, Fiorina, and Paul
3 each for Christie and this week's entrant, Kasich.

That's eleven, with Rick Perry, Bobby Jindal, and Rick Santorum at 2%, outside looking in.  Jim Gilmore (who?), Lindsey Graham, and George Pataki all have 1%.

This ABC/WaPo from Monday only ranks nine, in this order: Trump, Walker, Bush, Huckabee, Rubio, Paul, Carson, Cruz, and Perry.

Establishment Republicans are already cringing in agony at the thought of a debate where Trump's mouth turns into a flamethrower directed at everybody else on stage with him.  Thus, I'm pulling for former governor Goodhair and Glasses to make the cut, because he's been the only Rethug willing to rumble with The Donald over Ill Eagles.  Speaking of trolls, the leader is in Laredo today -- completely surrounded by gobs of various law enforcement officers -- to tour the border.

"I've been invited by the border patrols, and they want to honor me actually, and thousands and thousands of them, because I'm speaking up," Trump said Wednesday on Fox News. "I may never see you again, but we're going to do it."

[...]

“I hope he can find the border because I’m not sure he’s ever been there before," Perry said.

No mention of Greg Abbott joining him, as he did with Walker four months ago.

The dynamic with Ted Cruz forswearing 'Republican-on-Republican violence' in refusing to criticize Trump is your basic Cruz-styled political calculation: he plans to sweep up the Bigot Caucus when Trump eventually quits the race (and hopefully runs as a third-party protest).

Donald Trump says the chances that he will launch a third-party White House run will “absolutely” increase if the Republican National Committee is unfair to him during the 2016 primary season.

“The RNC has not been supportive. They were always supportive when I was a contributor. I was their fair-haired boy,” the business mogul told The Hill in a 40-minute interview from his Manhattan office at Trump Tower on Wednesday. “The RNC has been, I think, very foolish.”

Pressed on whether he would run as a third-party candidate if he fails to clinch the GOP nomination, Trump said that “so many people want me to, if I don’t win.”

“I’ll have to see how I’m being treated by the Republicans,” Trump said. “Absolutely, if they’re not fair, that would be a factor.”

Primary season is so much fun, isn't it?