Hi There:
Well we made it to President's Day weekend, 6 weeks into the New Year. That first day back to work after New Year's Day is tough, sort of like a colder version of the day after Labor Day. I usually console myself by saying that I just have to plow through the next 6 weeks, then I get (usually) a couple of days off. There's a certain accomplishment to making it to President's Day. Also, it usually means that you are about 6 weeks away from April, which theoretically at least is when the weather is supposed to get nice.
Except that so far, well, I don't want to jinx it, but let me put it this way: Saturday morning, all the weather people here in NY were saying "Be careful it is really cold out there." Well it's February, it's supposed to be cold. 28 degrees in February isn't supposed to be abnormal. But so far, it has been.
So we will see how the rest of the winter plays out. Like I said, I'm happy we got through the first 6 weeks and now we can take a deep breath and push on.
Now lets see what's going on....
POLITICS: The New Hampshire Primary
Bernie Sanders scored the first solid win this season. Solid in the sense that nobody is disputing he won. It was close, only about 1.5 percentage points separated Bernie from Pete Buttigieg, and because of the rules that award delegates based on percentages, Bernie and Mayor Pete get the same number of delegates from New Hampshire. And I know I say this every 4 years, but I'll be able to explain the meaning of life before I can explain the rules and regs of the Democratic Nominating process.
Amy Klobuchar came in third, Elizabeth Warren 4th (in a state bordering her home) and Joe Biden a distant and disappointing 5th. Now Biden is hoping to get a kick start from South Carolina in two weeks. Right now, folks are saying he and Warren are in trouble, and maybe they are. But I'm not declaring anyone of the top 5 in trouble till after Super Tuesday.
There are way too many delegates at stake that day to say that nobody has a chance to climb back in. Well, I mean those who haven't left already. Michael Bennet of Colorado, Deval Patrick of Massachusetts and Businessman Andrew Yang dropped out after New Hampshire.
I felt bad for Patrick, as it seems like a family illness is what kept him from declaring earlier. He may try again in the future. I didn't feel bad for Yang, except when I heard someone refer to his followers as "The Yang Gang." I love that stuff. I considered myself a McCainiac back in 2000 and 2008. In 2012, there was the Herman Cain Train, and even though I couldn't stand the guy, Howard Dean had his Deaniacs in 2004. The Yang Gang.: I'm sorry man, whatever you thought of his policies, that's freakin brilliant.
Bennet probably should have dropped out earlier, but who am I to tell people what to do? It probably didn't help that he got stuck in Washington on the Trump impeachment trial, the other three US Senators running, Sanders, Warren, and Klobuchar already had national profiles so I don't think it hurt them as much.
Of course the X-factor in all of this is former NY Mayor Mike Bloomberg, who is counting on dominating Super Tuesday to catapult him into the lead for the nomination. The idea is to let the others slug it out in Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina, while he spends a zillion dollars on ads. To me that will be the most interesting thing to watch come March 3. More and more and more I am hearing his name.
On the GOP side, I heard this week, much to my chagrin, that Joe Walsh ended his campaign to unseat Captain Orange at the head of the Republican ticket, meaning I'll either have to vote for William Weld, or write someone in. If Walsh is still on the NY Ballot, I still may vote for him, just so I can tell everyone I voted for Joe F-cking Walsh.
And again, as much as I may goof off during the primaries, I will vote for whoever the Democrats put up. I haven't made that decision so early in the process in a LONG time. But these are special circumstances.
BTW- If you need any other reasons to see why I'm not considering voting for Trump, observe the shenanigans going on in the whole Roger Stone mess. 4 top prosecutors resigned this week because the justice department is trying to reduce the sentencing guidelines for Stone, who was convicted in November on 7 counts of interfering in the Mueller investigation. Prosecutors had recommended a jail sentence of 7-9 years, but now the DOJ is saying that is "excessive" and will let the court decide with no real guidelines, if I'm understanding this all correctly-which it's possible I'm not. What I do know is that Stone is a guy that makes me feel the need to reapply my deodorant when I see him. Just an overall lowlife. I know you can't go to jail for being a creep, but Mueller found enough dirt on this dirt-bag to send him away for a while.
TRAVEL: To Recline or not to Recline...
A passenger on an American Eagle flight from New Orleans to Charlotte is suing the airline and looking to press charges against a passenger who repeatedly punched the back of her seat after she put the seat in the reclining position.
Wendi Williams is claiming that she suffered head and neck injuries due to the repeated punches to the back of her seat, but she's suing American Airlines (owner of American Eagle) for slander. American Airlines told TMZ that Williams knocked over the male passenger's drink.
I watched the video, and while I agree there was a much better way to handle the situation besides punching the seat, I have a very hard time believing that she suffered any sort of serious injury because of this. She kind of comes off as someone trying to cash in on 15 minutes of infamy. As I've said before, I fly very infrequently, so I may not be up to date on my ettiquitte, but I generally ask the person behind me if it's OK for me to come back. If you ask, 99 times out of 100 they'll say yes, I would imagine.
Sounds like you had two angry a-holes in this situation. I don't believe the woman was hurt as bad as she says she was, and I believe the guy overreacted. And of course you have your standard frivolous lawsuit. Just another day in paradise.
BASEBALL: Say it a'int so.
The Post's Joel Sherman reported this week that MLB is discussing expanding the baseball playoffs from 10 teams to 14, making an extra round of playoffs , with an even more bizarre twist...
From the post article:
In this concept, the team with the best record in each league would receive a bye to avoid the wild-card round and go directly to the Division Series. The two other division winners and the wild card with the next-best record would each host all three games in a best-of-three wild-card round. So the bottom three wild cards would have no first-round home games.
The division winner with the second-best record in a league would then get the first pick of its opponent from those lower three wild cards, then the other division winner would pick, leaving the last two wild cards to play each other.
I'll try to explain this using last year's records. The two best teams in each league, the Dodgers and Astros, would get a bye to the second round. The two other division winners, the Braves and the Cardinals and in the NL, and the Yankees and Twins in the AL, would then get to pick from the 3 teams from the bottom with the next best records who they will play in the opening round.
In the NL the Braves would get to pick first between the Brewers, the Mets and the Diamondbacks. The Cards would pick second. The Nats by virtue of having the best record of the non-division winners, would play whoever is left.
In the AL, the Yanks would get to pick between the Rays, Indians, and Red Sox. The Twins would pick second and the A's by virtue of having the best record of the non-division winners, would play whoever is left
Here's how I think this would go..
NL- Dodgers (bye)
Braves vs. Mets -best of 3 all games in Atlanta.
Cards vs. Brewers-all three games in St. Louis
Nats vs D'backs. all three games in Washington since the Nats had the best wild card record.
AL-Astros (bye) also (CHEATERS)
Yanks vs Indians-best of 3 all three games in the Bronx
Twins vs Red Sox-all three games in Minnesota
A's vs. Rays- all three games in Oakland
They would have a selection show, similar to the NCAA basketball tournament, televised. With the GM's of the four teams making their selections.
There are a bunch of things wrong with all this...
For starters, 7 teams in each league to make the playoffs are too many. When I first started watching hockey, there were 21 teams. 16 teams made the playoffs. Playing a whole season to eliminate 5 teams? That was asinine.
You are not quite there yet doing this, but you are getting closer. With this you'll have 14 of the 30 teams in the playoffs. That's too much. I think it's too many as it is now, but I can live with that. This would water it down. Baseball is the only sport to never have a sub .500 team make the playoffs. I'd like to keep it that way.
And having teams pick their opponents? I mean that's just asking for trouble. Curt Schilling was on with Marc Malusis and Maggie Gray the other day, and while calling the whole concept bull$hit, (which the producer managed to cut off) also said "As an athelete, I would love to have a team choose my team to play. What better motivation do you need? Love or loathe Schilling, that's a great point.
All of this of course has nothing to do with the good of the game and everything to do with $$$. Something new and different I know, but still. I really hope this goes the way of New Coke. I guess we'll wait and see.
Hope you enjoy the weekend. And if you are lucky enough to have a few days off, enjoy that too
either way Have a Great Week
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