1496 Sport of Kings, Pharaos and Pharoahs

1496 Sport of Kings, Sport of Pharaohs and Pharoahs

(ELMONT NY) -- It was only a horserace. But what a race and what a horse.

On a warm spring evening two days ago, a horse that gleams in the fading sun, American Pharoah, did what had been done only eleven times before: won the Kentucky Derby and then the Preakness and then the Belmont and thus the Triple Crown.  It had been 37 years since that had happened.

And over those 37 years, we’ve seen some beautiful and able horses try and fail what Sir Barton started in 1919.

There’s scarce little in the animal kingdom to match the grace and power of a three year old running an oval.  But Belmont is a killer.

The Kentucky Derby’s Churchill Downs is a mile and a quarter.  The Preakness at Pimlico in Baltimore is one and 3/16ths. Belmont is a mile and a half.

Usually, horses that run in all three races are a bit tired after the first two and you can almost hear them think “What’s this? We’re not done yet?”  Many horses have no experience with an oval that long.

The Triple Crown is the World Series and the Superbowl and the U.S. Open and the Masters Tournament all rolled up into under three minutes. Owner, trainer, jockey and horse.

Jockey Victor Espinoza is no stranger to the winners circle.  At 43, he has a list as long as both his arms. And he’s ridden some of the best of the best: California Chrome, Tin Man, Behaving Badly and now American Pharoah.

He donates 10% of his win money to City of Hope where they fight kids’ cancer.  And he’ll give 100% of Saturday’s take to the group.

Bob Baffert, with snow white hair but the smile of a teenager at age 53 has trained winners at four Derbys, the Preakness six times and the Belmont twice.

Owner Ahmed Zayet is a wild man with plenty of wins along with plenty of lawsuits and, apparently, a gambling problem.  There are some bad loans to settle, but his spirit matches that of his horse. Zayat made his fortune in an unlikely way: making and selling beer in Egypt.  He’s not just any breeder.

So an orthodox Jew -- among those not chased out by the pharaohs of biblical times or their successors over the millennia --  ends the 37 year old absence of the Triple Crown.

Shrapnel (Beating the Bushes edition):  

--Can you trust anything anyone from this family says, ever?  How about “Read my lips, no new taxes”? Or “Mission accomplished.”

--Even mama Barbara -- the only one of them with a real brain -- isn’t exempt.  First she said there were enough president Bushes (Or was it presidents Bush?)  Now she says “vote for Jeb.”

--And there’s Jeb who is already trying to game the system by raising campaign funds before he raises a campaign organization.  Just a technicality, of course. But there are too many weapons of mass technicality among these shifty tree sloths.

I’m Wes Richards.  My opinions are my own but you’re welcome to them. ®

Please address comments to wesrichards@gmail.com

© WJR 2015

1495 Transmentalism

1495 Transmentalism

All this fuss about Caitlyn Jenner. S/he is all over, like pigeons in the park.  S/he’s bringing new attention to the problems of transsexuals.  But what about us Transmentalists?

I am a math professor in the body of a reporter.  

I long for the freedom to explore Fermat's Theorem. But here I am, retired from covering school board meetings, scandals, wars and market crashes. I long for a projected manifold.  But the best I can do is balance my checkbook (+/- 5%.) What a life.

Why, I can't even understand the difference between interest and annual percentage rates ... or why there IS a difference. Or how to subtract, well, anything from anything.

If one can change genders, why not mindsets?

Oh, being a reporter, then a commentator then a blogger has its high points.  But when you come right down to it, every news story is the same:  Who, what, when, where, why, how.  

Doesn’t matter whether it’s a meeting of the local sewer authority or the start of WWIII.  It doesn’t matter if it’s a gas station stick up or a global ponzi scheme.  Wal-mart or Ahmed’s coffee cart.  Any sport on the field or in court.

Opining has its high points, too.  Imagine, getting paid for spouting your opinion! And it’s okay to write while wearing pajamas and not shaving.  But after awhile, a sameness creeps in.

With math, things are different.

There are all kinds of unsolved problems begging for solution, each one different. Topology fascinates.  All you need to work on it is a calculator and a rubber band.  But you have to know what you’re doing.

Math is clean, elegant and usually much simpler than it seems.  E=mc2?  It doesn’t get any more basic than that. But finding it and divining its meaning and implications is endless novelty.

You have to have the right mental perspective.  And here I am, writing a piece about his or her s/he-ness.

I’ve been living my life with the wrong mind.  Maybe you have, too.  With sex changes, you remove and replace a set of body parts, inject glands with various hormones or other chemicals and go into analysis and psychotherapy for ten or 15 years.

Granted all that is expensive, time consuming, risky  and oh so showy.  But it’s simple compared to attempted transmentalism.

You can't imagine the conflicts that could be resolved with some hormones and an operation or two.  Meantime, anyone have a spare inchworm I can borrow?

Shrapnel:

--Yeah, we’re in fine shape.  Four million federal workers’ personal info hacked and the Pentagon assures us that there’s no danger from all that anthrax they sent out.  This gives us the freedom and breathing room to concentrate on the really important minutiae like who can marry whom, who can be forced to carry an unwanted fetus to term and the war on Christianity.

I’m Wes Richards. My opinions are my own but you’re welcome to them. ®

Please send comments to wesrichards@gmail.com

© WJR 2015

1494 Capitol Offense

What’s Wrong with Congress?

Where to begin?  The subject is really too big for a 500 word Wessay™.  But let’s give it a shot anyway.

1. They do too much.  Most laws are meaningless.
2. They don’t devote enough time to not doing too much.
3. They’re all playing to the cameras, yet cameras don’t vote.
4. Too many committees, subcommittees and sub subcommittees.
5. Too costly.
6. They yell and blather and strut and are so busy making points for and against each other over nothing that we ought to start giving out dunce caps and “time-out” rooms.

What would help?  

Other than hall monitors, they could be required to read what little legislation they pass and take a test on it before being allowed to vote.

They could curb their enthusiasm for lobbyists or at least confine them to something like a classroom on parent-teacher nights.  Fast conferences.

Maybe Representative and Senator should become licensed professions, like doctors and barbers. And drivers.

A friend suggests that America has proven it doesn’t want to be represented.  After all, look who we elect.   

We joke about these people.  But there’s nothing funny about a hall full of men and women whose full time job is getting re elected and who moonlight by occasionally writing a law and voting on it.

We have stopped paying attention to issues. We have become philosophers who want only to know where a candidate stands on the left-right scale.

One of the potentially beautiful things about the American Democratic Republic: our representatives are free to vote their consciences regardless of campaign promises or other words of fiction.

But in order to vote your conscience, you need to have one.  There’s little evidence of that in the current mob.

It’s not fair to blame the sewer that is congress for all our problems.  After all, congress has to deal with Presidents who send us to undeclared wars, whether in Vietnam, the Middle East or Latin America.

And congress has to deal with a Supreme Court full of activist judges with scripted to-do lists.

Maybe it’s something in the water.

Shrapnel:

--World soccer czar Stepp Ladder fell off the top rung plenty fast when his consiglieri was caught funneling bribe money.  All of which goes to show that Fifa is no better than the NFL or the NCAA.   And neither is its sport.

--There are almost as many new phone and tablet apps popping up each day as there are new blogs.  How many is too many? How many do you actually use?

Grapeshot:

--RIP Jean Ritchie, 92, folksinger, folklorist and carrier of her Kentucky traditional music to the rest of America from her home on Long Island.

--There is no truth to the rumor that John Kerry faked his broken leg because Swiss restaurants don’t serve Heinz Ketchup.

--There is no proof to the rumor that Yoko Ono had an affair with Hillary Clinton or even directly claimed to.

--If you see Caitlyn Jenner on the street, sneak up behind her and call out “hey, Bruce!” and see if she turns around.

I’m Wes Richards. My opinions are my own but you’re welcome to them. ®

Please address comments to wesrichards@gmail.com

© WJR 2015

1493 Bob Schieffer

We’re rid of you at last.  We thought you’d never go. Open a newspaper, turn on a radio, turn on a TV and there you were.

Standing in front of a camera on the White House lawn.  Standing in front of a camera at the Pentagon. Or the Capitol.  Standing in front of a camera at this or that political event or natural disaster.  On the set at the CBS Evening News or Face the Nation.

You were everywhere. So often were you in our living room, we could have set an extra place for you at dinner. Sometimes, we even did.  You ate like a bird.

An aging white feathered carrier pigeon landing long enough to deliver a message, a bad one, usually. Yet however bad the message, there was a comfort that you were the bird with the vellum scroll attached to a tailfeather.

And our comfort sprang from your own, whether real or contrived.  There never was a deer in the headlights look on your face, nor one of one that said “I’m smarter than you are,” as is common among many younger newsmen and women, and usually a lie or -- to be generous -- an affectation.

But you knew more than we did until you told us, which is what they paid you for.

Seventy eight years is not old, not anymore. But you could have retired a dozen years ago and no one would have faulted you. You have said in at least two or three of your 800 farewell interviews that you wanted to leave while you still can do the job and not be led to your wheelchair by a nurse.

Your colleague Walter Cronkite was 65 when he stepped down.  But he was an exception at CBS and by all accounts, he regretted it.  Morley Safer has a handful of years on you but is still at it.  Mike Wallace was 89 when he retired but they had to hold him down to prevent him from returning during the remaining four years of his life.

So what will you do?  Can you really sit still and just watch the lunacy of your home state Texas continue to unfold? Don’t you want to grab some of the Senators and House members you know by the throat and ask “What are you thinking?”

Maybe you will.  But probably not.  After all, in your own words, it wasn’t about a paycheck.  And it wasn’t about being on TV.  Turn on your set.  You see anyone can do that these days.

It was about informing, whether from the anchor desk or the field.  And it was about curiosity.  And that stuff is not going to retire with you.

So find something to do.  Maybe learn to raise carrier pigeons.

Note to the Grammar Police: There are nine fragments in this post.

I’m Wes Richards. My opinions are my own but you’re welcome to them. ®

Please address comments to wesrichards@gmail.com

© WJR 2015

1492 Church on Sunday or Jail on Monday

Meet the Ultimate Church lady, Sylvia Allen.

Ms. Allen is the president pro tempore of the Arizona state senate where she represents her home town, Snowflake.  And she’d like it if you went to church every Sunday.  In fact, she’d like it so much that she’d make it a crime not to.

She also is a Republican “activist.” Among her activities: (allegedly) violating the state’s “clean elections law” on behalf of her son-in-law, charged with improper conduct with female inmates whom he supervised as a detention officer.  Always nice to have your mother-in-law on your side.

So, messing with incarcerated women isn’t a crime. But missing church is.

Now why would a frumpy grandma type with hair the color of dollar store red and highlights by Sherwin-Williams or Crayola, someone you might mistake for a middle school cafeteria lady, want such a law?  Why to fight gun violence, of course.

Huh? Well, she says the real problem is corrupted souls.  Going to church once a week would be just like going through the car wash. At gunpoint.

Three things come to mind:  

--You can’t clean up in a soul-wash.

--You can’t establish an official church.

--You can’t run around clucking about getting the government off your back by clucking to get the government on your back.

Doesn’t the US constitution just say no to establishment of official religion?  Doesn’t that apply to states as well? (It does.)

But, she says, her proposed law doesn’t specify a religion, only forced attendance somewhere. And she wants it even if it’s unconstitutional.  Even if it’s unconstitutional enough for Scalia to oppose.

And,  Sylvia, what about those who observe the sabbath but not on Sunday?  Like Arizona’s Jews (both of them) and Arizona’s Seventh Day Adventists (they’re out there somewhere) and Arizona’s Muslims (ask the FBI, they’re on a first name basis with all of them.)

Arizona is the Hudson County, New Jersey of the southwest.  Hence, we get special people like Evan Mecham or John McCain and 23 politicians convicted of federal corruption charges over a ten year period.

This proposal has no chance of becoming law. And Sen. Snowflake knows that.  You want to go to church, of course go to church.  You want not to? Fine. Make room in the pew for someone who won’t fall asleep during the sermon.

Grapeshot (who cares edition):

-Question for Dennis Hastert:  Where does a former high school wrestling coach get all that money in the first place?

-George Pataki and Rick Santorum have declared they are candidates for the Republican presidential nomination.

-The governing body of soccer may be corrupt, say investigators in Switzerland and the US but the real problem isn’t Fifa, it’s Qatar.

Shrapnel:

--Here’s a job you don’t often see in the classifieds or on Craig’s List: Executioner.  Saudi Arabia is advertising for eight to add to its staff. Experience helpful but will train promising beginner… own Kubikiribōchō and accessories, please.

I’m Wes Richards. My opinions are my own but you’re welcome to them. ®

Please address comments to wesrichards@gmail.com

© WJR 2015

1491 Your Phone Records

The battle of the bids is underway.  The NSA has been ordered to wind down its collection of everyone’s phone records.

Time-Life records and K-tel are already in Maryland, ready for the auction of rights to produce the compilation CDs. iTunes is expected.  So is YouTube. Pandora is planning a whole new channel for them and Netflix can’t be far behind.

K-tel is famous for its vinyl records.  They wore out in two weeks even if you didn’t play them.  When digital media came along the company spent $40 million to develop a CD that would wear out in a month.  They never could match the short life span of their LPs.

Time-Life is already preparing a script for the hour- long infomercial.  They’ve hired the washed up politicians, Dick Cheney and Sarah Palin instead of the washed up rock stars they usually use.

Dick and Sarah will sit and reminisce about the wonderful days of yesteryear when everyone’s phone calls were secret, but weren’t.

Remember that call you made to Sardi’s?  Yes, the one where you made reservations for a Thursday evening.  Or that pizza or Chinese takeout order you placed just last week?  They’re all going to be there on this set of 18 CDs.   So will be those calls you got from the collection agency and from the cops asking you to pick up your children and bring along $5,000 in bail money.

But wait.  There’s more!  The first 10-thousand people who call will receive this free BONUS CD, “Calls of the Rich and Famous.”

Tracks will include Jeff Zucker’s call to Jay Leno telling him his show was moving to prime time.  You’ll hear David Koch sing “Happy Birthday” to his estranged twin brother Bill, and both Charles and David singing “Happy Birthday” to their estranged older brother, Fred.

You’ll hear Cary Grant and Randolph Scott on the phone fighting over the affections of some waiter from the Coconut Grove.

So, eventually, you’ll be able to buy the data and a handy guide to which number belongs to which person.

But this is going to mean a slight bump in the unemployment rate.  It takes 852 NSA employees to collate all the information.  And when they’re done, they’ll have nothing else to do.  So they’ll be tossed away and forbidden from listing their former jobs on their resumes.  National Security remains a worry.

Shrapnel:

--This got a lot of Facebook traffic, but in case you missed it: the PacSun incident angers me but not for the usual reason. The flag turned upside down is an approved distress signal, and who can deny this country is in deep distress? The backlash over the shirt is itself a perfect example of the fatal combination of ignorance and stupidity that's killing us.

-- Our old fave Sick Rantorum is to declare for the Republican presidential nomination today and we can hardly wait. The aging frat boy is always fun to cover because he’s so quotable.  Here’s one beautiful head-scratcher: “...a third of all the young people in America are not in America today because of abortion.”

I’m Wes Richards. My opinions are my own but you’re welcome to them. ®

Please address comments to wesrichards@gmail.com

© WJR 2015

1490 Antisocial Media

It’s time for us cranks to get our own version of Facebook or Twitter. The only problem left is what to call it.

The easiest out is Back-of-the-Head Book.  Or maybe A*s Book.  Or Heelbook. But two of those are awkward and the one in the middle is mildly offensive. And, goodness gracious, we wouldn’t want to offend anyone, would we?  (Well, yes we would, but that doesn’t attract the right kind of advertising.  And running a runaway website isn’t cheap.)

Get-Your-Dog-Off-My-Lawn Book?  Nah. Tough to say.

Okay. We’ll try to resolve that issue later.  Now about content.

We define the page not by what you can post but what you can’t.  

No pictures of kids under 18.  That’s not an age of consent issue.  It’s a cuteness issue.  You may think your kids are cute, but they aren’t.  Who wants to see them perform in the fourth grade presentation of Camelot?  Or hit the foul balls in Tinyleague Baseball. Or showing their honor society diplomas from the Mary Soakem Charter School.

Throwback Thursday is banned. You weren’t any cuter back in Miss Murray’s fourth grade class picture than your kids are today.  And nobody wants to see that picture of you and the rest of the staff at Carvel from 1970.

Food pictures are banned.  No one wants to see how well you barbecue.  No one wants to see a plate of mystery vegetables you ate at the Lucky Golden Chopstick on Stockton St. during your visit to San Francisco.  Or the positively delicious sandwich you had at Up And Down Burger in Circleville, Ohio.

Pet pictures are banned. Puppies and kittens do cute things.  But they all do the same cute things.  You’ve seen one cat chase a dust mite, you’ve seen them all.  You’ve seen a Schnauzer or Yorkie with the caption “He thinks he’s human,” and wearing something that looks like a human expression or the latest fashion coat and hat from Pets R Us, you’ve seen them all.

Nobody cares about your wedding, your anniversary, your senior prom, your catered divorce.

Nobody wants your war stories, your illness stories, your tax worries, your political views or you crossing the finish line in the 5k Run for Ingrown toenails.  Even if you win.  Even if you’re over 75 or under 15 or have bladerunner blades instead of feet. Especially if you have blades for feet.

The question is: what DO you put on Crankbook?  Cranky stuff, maybe.  Or better yet, nothing.

Shrapnel:

-Today is Memorial Day, at least officially, and we thank the men and women who died in wartime, especially those who served against their will in unnecessary shooting matches too numerous to mention.  

-They’re coming out with a new humane weapon, the Tickle Taser, so when the cop tases you, you fall over in gales of laughter giving them a chance to cuff you, and beat the tar out of you while you’re still conscious.

I’m Wes Richards. My opinions are my own but you’re welcome to them. ®

Please address comments to wesrichards@gmail.com

© WJR 2015