Ever wonder what a World Cup soccer team might look like if the roster was filled entirely with NFL players? Probably not, but this blog does some speculating for us. We know that, by and large, here in America, the nation’s best athletes are probably playing American football, hockey or basketball, and are not funneled toward soccer careers.

Adrian Peterson plays soccer with children in the township of Philippi on the outskirts of Cape Town, South Africa.

Soccer players are highly athletic, for sure, but given soccer’s still-lagging stance in comparison to other sports, it’s safe to say that our top athletes aren’t soccer players. Of this country’s nine World Cup appearances since 1930, third place is the team’s best finish so far. But that result, which actually took place in 1930, long escapes nearly everyone alive today. Nonetheless, here is the blog writer’s NFL-infused World Cup roster.

Goalkeeper: Larry Fitzgerald

Defenders: Ed Reed, Patrick Willis, Adrian Peterson and Maurice-Jones Drew

Midfielders: Tom Brady, D. Heyward-Bay, Nnambi Asomugha and Chad Ochocinco

Strikers: Vince Young, Andre Johnson and Michael Vick.

Not a bad list, and I think Fitzgerald would make a beast of a keep. I think these players should get some sort of nod as well: Randy Moss, Steven Jackson, Frank Gore, Beanie Wells and Drew Brees.

By the way, four NFL players, Peterson, Tommie Harris, Roy Williams and Mark Clayton have, indeed, kicked the soccer ball around on a recent trip to South Africa:

The visit included a friendly soccer game against school children from Mzamomhle Primary School in the township of Philippi on the outskirts of Cape Town.

No doubt, the NFL players got toasted by the young futbol hopefuls.

[Photo credit: Schalk van Zuydam/Associated Press]

Credit: Public Policy Polling

This just in: A majority of Democrats and Independents are rooting for the New Orleans Saints to win the Super Bowl, while a small majority of Republicans will be pulling for the Indianapolis Colts, according to this study.

Overall 32% of voters we polled on our last national survey said they’d be rooting for the New Orleans Saints this Sunday, with 22% going for the Indianapolis Colts and 46% expressing no preference.

There’s a significant partisan divide within those numbers, as Democrats prefer the Saints by a 36-21 margin while Republicans say they want the Colts to be victorious by a closer 26-25 spread. Independents lean toward the Saints as well, 33-20.

Here is the press release from Public Policy Polling.

I think these numbers can be attributed to a few factors. First, the majority of Americans are pulling for the Saints because it’s the team’s first trip to the Big Dance. Everyone likes rooting for the underdog or whichever Cinderella team is wowing fans. The second reason has to do with New Orleans itself. Obviously, America in general wants to see the team win because it would be good for the people of New Orleans. Not that well-wishes and winning a sports title is going to make up for the thousands lost in Katrina, but at least it’s something. Finally, Democrats and Independents are probably pulling for the Saints for the latter reason, given Commander Genius and FEMA’s ineptness in helping a city consisting of 67 percent black folk.

***

Interesting. Rarely do I check the “Politics” and “Sports” categories when finishing these posts. I’ll have to look for more opportunities to do so.

If you thought the NBA was well on its way to cleaning up its image after the 2007 betting scandal with official Tim Donaghy, the 2004 fight night in which fans and Indiana Pacers players got into a brawl during a game against the Pistons, among others I’m surely missing, think again.

The most recent PR disaster — and this one, if it’s true, would be unprecedented — came on Christmas Eve when Washington Wizards star Gilbert Arenas and teammate Javaris Crittenton allegedly drew guns on each other O.K. Corral-style when the two had words over a betting dispute:

To be fair, I just borrowed the Wyatt Earp reference from a Sporting News radio show I was listening to earlier, but if folks thought the NBA was too ghetto for them before this story broke, what will they think now? As the hosts of the radio show asked listeners, how should NBA Commissioner David Stern respond if the alleged stand-off is true? The concensus seemed to be that they two should be banned, not just from this season, but from the NBA … period, and that Stern should make an example of these two. Other questions remain. Have there been other instances where players have brought guns with them to work? Were Crittenton and Arenas’ guns loaded? Does it matter? It stands to reason that if players are worried about their security (and that is a very real issue for NBA stars because they are more visible and sometimes more connected to the fans than in other sports), they make enough money to hire body guards if they need them. And, to me, if one gets to the point of drawing a gun on another human being, he’s well past fist-fight stage or any other stage that doesn’t end in another’s demise. To continue the Wyatt Earp theme, as Doc Holliday would say in the movie, Tombstone, he’s “playing for blood.”

It’s especially unfortunate for Crittendon, who left Georgia Tech early to play in the NBA and was apparently a exemplary player and student at the time. Since being drafted, he drifted between three teams and hasn’t got much to show for his efforts thus far. That college degree would have come in handy.

If all this is true, I would say that banning them permanently would be about the only action Stern could take that would have any hope of bringing back any semblance of a future for the association. To say this fiasco is counterproductive to Stern’s attempts to clean up the NBA would be a large understatement. In my mind, it’s nearly the death knell of an organization that has been all but irrelevant, and frankly, not even very entertaining, since Michael Jordan retired.

Sports Illustrated, in its Nov. 2, 2009 edition, published an article titled “Harassment in The Workplace” by Joe Posnanski, which outlined some of the continued trouble refs have in trying to make good calls, but yet are still getting lambasted by fans, the media and sports administrators for , inevitably, and because they are human, periodically making incorrect calls.

Posnanski said,

When it comes to taking abuse, refs rival the Balloon Boy Dad and Bernie Madoff.

No argument there. Posnanski makes the case that MLB refs, perhaps, take the biggest verbal assault from fans in the face of the league’s seeming refusal to move into the 21st century and adopt more replay technology like the NFL.

Pic from the Waffle Fries Parfait blog

But in the NFL, seeing a coach reach for his challenge flag or for a play to receive an “official” review is about as certain an occurrence as the tides coming in and out. But the NFL’s adoption of increased replay during games has its drawbacks. As Posnanski notes,

In the NFL, officials barely even count anymore — coaches have their own flags, television cameras are the final arbiters, and after overturned calls referees are forced to stand before the crowd and admit their mistakes, like guilt schoolchildren. Next, there will be a giant chalkboard on the field for them to write, I promise to watch more closely, 500 times.

Touché. The replays in the NFL do get to be too much at times. But it comes down to this question: do administrators in sports leagues want cold truth on every single play (Taken to the extreme, this would mean that every single play would be verified as accurate in yardage, ball spots and penalties before the next play got under way) or do they want to maintain the human element. I think they are attempting to tread somewhere in between, but if so, leave the refs alone. We expect the players on the field to be human and make mistakes. Why don’t we give the same leverage to refs? If we just want to watch a perfectly played and refereed ball game, we might as well shutter the NFL’s and the MLB’s doors (along with every other sports league) and all go play video games.

By the way, since we’re talking sports, as of 10:15 EDT on Wednesday night, the Yankees are leading 7-1 in the top of the sixth and are likely about to win their 27th World Series.

Derek Jeter, left, and Johnny Damon scored on Hideki Matsui’s two-run single off Pedro Martinez in the third. Damon injured his calf on the play, and was replaced by Jerry Hairston Jr.

I’m not a big fan of the owner of that storied franchise, but I love the city. So, I can’t say that I’m too disappointed.

With major newspapers struggling to stay afloat these days, I thought it might be interesting to briefly take a look at a specific segment of the media: that of sports journalism, and attempt to figure how that branch of journalism is faring and the implications on the craft in general.

I was listening recently to the radio interview of an ACC Sports Journal writer, who mentioned that one reporter, previously working as the beat writer for an ACC school at an independent newspaper, had recently taken a position to be the official “vessel,” as it were, for that school’s football coverage. I wish I could remember the reporter’s name who took the position. I think it was for Virginia Tech. The fellow interviewed on the radio was making the case, I would say quite ably, that the face of sports journalism was changing toward more, not less, bias. That’s to say that, while you still have independent media organizations covering college and pro sports, you also have many schools (and, obviously, professional ball clubs now hiring reporters, i.e. Zach Eisendrath with the Denver Broncos) to come on staff and be the “official” voice of the Hokies, Cavaliers, Broncos or whatever. The person interviewed said this practice, in ways, presented challenges to independent news organizations because, while the independents fish for information, colleges or professional clubs have their “inside men” (my quote) who, at times, have unrestricted access to practices, the locker rooms and have no trouble getting news because they are employed by the school or ball club. Thus, the news we have coming out of those ball clubs, at least from the “filtered” reporters, is largely positive, at least upbeat, and never scandalous, is a far cry from the scrutiny to which these clubs should be subjected.

Ball clubs and colleges are well within their rights to hire journalists to attempt to “control the message,” as it were, and journalists are well within their rights to seek greener pastures. As the person interviewed from the ACC Sports Journal said, some consumers care about the distinction between beat reporters employed by the teams and writers from independent sources and some consumers don’t. But there is an important distinction, and it creates the issue of bias regarding the out-feeding of sports news that comes out each day. That’s why seeking information from multiple sources is important to getting the truth of what is really happening. While there is much truth coming out of denverbroncos.com on rote football topics like who’s impressing coaches in practice or which quarterback is likely to get the starting position, other topics get more complicated. For instance, how the official Broncos Web site handled coach Mike Shanahan’s ouster after the lackluster 8-8 season in 2008. I attempted to find old articles from the official site about the story, but came up empty.

The four major U.S. sports now have their own cable channels and Web sites and contracts with television networks. All major colleges have communications departments, which issue press releases with their “messages” via their Web sites or hard copy releases.

Some major newspapers also cast a suspicious shadow over their sports writing with their various interests in sports teams:

Several prominent teams are still owned by media companies; Cablevision owns the Knicks and Rangers, The New York Times owns nearly 18 percent of the Red Sox, and the Tribune Company, pending a sale, still owns the Cubs. The relationship between teams and the sources covering them has unsurprisingly led to suspicions of bias. — “Examining the Future of Sports Media,” July 2, 2009

It’s a fair question to ask, as this story does, “What happens when the people we cover start to control the news?”

This makes the idea of independent journalism all that more important, and quite unfortunately, as big newspapers continue to struggle, less and less space is available for that coverage. This is compounded by the fact that newspapers are still the best source for detailed news about topics of the day. Or, as The Times’ magazine article (linked above) puts it,

Newspapers remain the primary source of news-gathering in America. And unlike so many Internet “sites,” they are firmly grounded in a geographical place. To read a newspaper is to know what town you’re in.

We can know this to be the case when we find Sean Hannity (CNN is guilty of doing the same, wham-bam-style interviews and news pieces) and Christopher Hitchens debating God in a five-minute segment. Two hours of discussion could not do that particular topic justice, but such is the world of television and radio news. “Just give us the talking points and no details so we can all get on with our lives,” seems to be the rallying cry. Newspapers, and to some degree, magazines, depending on the publication, compel us to sit down and spend time with the news and with the issues facing us today. Newspapers in hard copy form will one day go the way of the dodo, but I think it’s important for us to recognize the service they provide in holding those in high places accountable for their actions with our tax dollars. It’s important, at least to me, as it should be for anyone who appreciates and loves information, that they continue as long as possible. Or, if not, at least their online counterparts. Sports journalism, perhaps, doesn’t hold the same immediate consequence as, say, government beat writing, but the trend toward closer relationships between sports teams and the organizations covering them is troubling, and it makes the work of The Associated Press and others more laudable. Here is a detailed study of four newspapers regarding bias compared to the AP.

In National Football League news Monday, former Atlanta Falcons quarterback Michael Vick was reinstated into the league by commissioner Roger Goodell, in a move that, frankly, I thought I would never see. I thought Vick’s football career, for all practical purposes, was one-and-done.

Former Atlanta Falcons QB reinstated

But Vick’s reinstatement didn’t come without a laundry list of baby-sitting type provisions, which, in turn, probably didn’t come without a certain measure of groveling on Vick’s part. They include:

… to have counselors and mentors guide him through his attempted comeback (former Indianapolis coach Tony Dungy is serving as the NFL’s liaison). Vick must keep Goodell apprised about his living arrangements if/when signing with an NFL team. Vick even needs to tell Goodell how he will “manage his financial affairs” and follow that plan. — Alex Marvez, FOX Sports

Financial affairs?!? Regardless in a touché-rendering comment, Marvez, of course, didn’t forget to include a hefty dose of facetiousness when writing on the topic, perhaps referencing Vick’s original offense of sponsoring a dog-fighting racket:

The only clause Goodell forgot was one forcing Vick to sit, beg and roll over on command.

The vote’s out on which unlucky NFL team might take on the baggage that is Mr. Vick, but it goes without saying that he’s not necessarily a prize catch, even without the dogfighting conviction. His stats are middle-of-the-road at best. That’s not to say that greatness can’t light on him once the ghosts flea from his shoulders, but it’s yet to be seen.

If you need or want an interesting detour from the daily grind at work, pick a topic and Google different media outlets’ reports on the same news item and look at how the accounts differ. For an especially entertaining detour, compare how the official vessel of a certain organization or government agency — say, the Obama administration’s official Web site — handles a news item versus a separate media outlet with no dog in the dog-fighting hunt.

Marvez, with FOX Sports, for instance, was particularly pointed on the Goodell decision when he said:

This isn’t a teenager we’re talking about. Vick is 29 years old. Provided he isn’t breaking the law again or violating NFL policy, Vick should be allowed to make his own financial and living decisions even if they’re bad ones (like squandering tens of millions of dollars en route to bankruptcy). Such is the responsibility — and privilege — that comes with being an adult.

Meanwhile, if we scoot over to nfl.com, we find Thomas George, senior analyst for the company’s official Web site playing a different tune:

We know this: The way the Vick story unfolded Monday assured that Favre’s decision would not be revealed on the same day. No way. The NFL is too smooth to allow these two mega stories to collide. It appears to be a cloaked orchestration across the highest levels.

And that’s OK.

Because if it all clicks for the league, if Vick gets it right and gets his shot and Favre returns, the NFL has a 2009 season that percolates well beyond its usual frenzy. Sure, there are plenty of curious tales across the league minus Vick and Favre. But this duo, these quarterbacks, can generate a blitz of coverage, spotlight and fan interest unlike anything we have seen in the previous 89 NFL seasons.

The difference doesn’t really matter, per se. The NFL is free to spin a fantastically unpopular fellow’s return to the league — as well as Brett Favre’s growing unpopularness, tiredness and unwillingness to fade into the Hall of Fame with dignity — anyway it wishes. That is, after all, in its best interest to do so. But it’s quite entertaining for the rest of us with the time and compulsion to bring to light the differences. And there’s a lesson in the Vick story that goes well beyond sports: there’s usually far more to any news story than the official organ or the supposedly objective news outlets care to admit. In all likelihood, the truth, if one had the omniscience to find its absoluteness, probably lies somewhere in between.

ABC News and The Associated Press report that the Atlantic Coast Conference has pulled baseball tournaments from being played in Myrtle Beach, S.C. in 2011-2013 in light of the Confederate battle flag being flown on the State House grounds. For years, the NAACP, which I argued here was all-but irrelevant today, has imposed “economic sanctions” (The organization seems to have dropped the term “boycott” to describe its sanctions) on South Carolina for its continued presence of the Confederate flag on the grounds. The flag was placed there via a bill passed by an all-white legislature in 1962. Since, the NAACP has lobbied for the state to remove the flag. In 2000, lawmakers did take it down from the State House dome — it was formerly third from the top, under the state flag and the United States flag — and place it on a  memorial site honoring the fallen during the Civil War. But to remove it completely from the grounds and place it in a museum would require separate legislation.

The State newspaper on Thursday published a telling letter to the editor from a writer describing himself as a “white Republican and graduate of an SEC school.” He had this to say on the topic:

Here’s what I’ve concluded after searching my soul. I don’t need to wait for the NAACP to make me understand that the Confederate flag deeply offends a huge percentage of the population of South Carolina and thus needs to be removed from the State House grounds. A person’s celebration of culture, history and heritage need not needlessly offend many of our fellow citizens. — Jay Glasgow, letter to the editor writer, July 16, 2009

In retort, a commenter on the newspaper’s Web site wrote (parenthesis mine):

Making an honourable (sic) symbol that many BRAVE (using all caps makes points more valid, doesn’t it?) men fought and died under a so called symbol of racism does not make it so. This flag at the monument is historically correct as it is a battle flag … I challenge you to stand up to the tyranny that manifests itself today to those who condemn our people who struggled against an invading army in a war that both sides should have avoided. … The real intelligence here Mr. Bubba (another commenter) is seeing that our heritage is being attacked and doing something about it. Black soldiers also fought for the Confederacy ,too.The monument educates the public on the REAL history of this struggle. — By Pawmetto

Some, like the following, again make the claim that the war was not about slavery:

A little history lesson: The succession of the southern states was about a lot more than slavery. The southern states had every right to succeed. It was that right that convinced the states to unite in the first place. — Pammiesue

Unfortunately, the writer, while stating the war was fought for “a lot more than slavery,” never gets around to mentioning any other causes.

I was going to let some of these comments go, but I should digress for a second. First, the Confederate soldiers, by and large, weren’t brave necessarily (some of them probably were), they were conscripted, or made to fight, by the first draft ever passed in American history. They were green (just like a lot of Northern fighters) and many of them abandoned the army. At one period, the South had an abundance of arms and equipment, but not enough men to use the stuff! It’s not exactly as if able-bodied men were flocking from their farms and families to join the Confederate cause. Most of them were forced to fight, and most of them didn’t even have a dog in that fight, as the Confederate cause was largely that of the slave owners. One of the first sentences a professor uttered to us during a Civil War class at Clemson University was, “The Civil War was caused by slavery and anti-slavery.” So, while states’ rights was an issue later, it wasn’t the issue. It was the reciprocal issue arising from the slavery question as a consequence. Northern lawmakers, of course, couldn’t allow slavery to expand into the western territories because they knew how corrosive a system slavery was to establishing any semblance of an industrial society. A minority of northerners had staunch moral objections to the peculiar institution, but most simply rejected slavery because of the former problem. Nor could lawmakers allow the South to invade parts of South America with intentions of setting up an entire sphere for slavery, in what would have been known as the Golden Circle, an ironic title in itself, since the kingdom would have been borne on the weight of black folks’ shoulders. And to speak on the black soldiers, most of them, as soon as they could, defected to the Union side, and again, like most of the white soldiers, they were made to serve. By that point in the history of slavery in America, I would imagine that at least some of the slaves had developed an institutional mentality, the same that long-time prison inmates develop, which suggests they are happier inside the institution (jail, plantation) than outside in the free world because it’s all they had known.

But back to the comments. Here’s another responding to the letter to the editor:

Applause for your thoughts, Mr. Glasgow! Sadly, most South Carolinians don’t have the intelligence to see as clearly as you do. SC will drown in its ignorance before aknowledging (sic) the error of leaving the flag up. — bubba

Finally, the most enlightening comment I’ve read thus far on this topic came from Sammy in response to another article about the NAACPs “sanctions” against South Carolina, who was noting, like The State’s letter writer, that the flag should be removed for good:

… a personal favorite moment of mine was when some guy in a car saw my anti-Bush bumper sticker and screamed “America! Love it or leave it!” He of course had a confederate flag on his truck. The irony was rather delicious. — Comment by Sammy, reader of ABC News article

In an article published July 3 by The New York Times, Sam Keller, former quarterback for the Nebraska Cornhuskers, has filed a lawsuit against the NCAA and Electronic Arts, claiming “they illegally profit from the images of college football and basketball players,” as reported in The Times article.

“We signed a paper at the beginning of college saying we couldn’t benefit from our name,” said Keller, who is now 24 and living in Scottsdale, Ariz. “So why was the N.C.A.A. turning a blind eye to this and allowing EA Sports to take our likenesses and make big bucks off it?” — The Times, July 3, 2009

For one, names and likenesses are not the same thing. As a semi-famous football player, your likeness, Mr. Keller, as a college player, was in the public domain, just like any Little Leaguer or recreational player across the country. Any one, a reporter, someone interested in sports or someone off the streets can frequent a public recreation department, and take as many sports pictures of you and publish them as he/she likes. College players do not get paid, and last I checked, play on public, state-funded property (As opposed to private college athletes, who, for the most part, indeed, play on private property.) So, the image of your face is public property. Your name, however, cannot be the source of reaped benefits, and EA Sports, from what I understand, has done nothing of the sort. I do understand the frustration, but suck it up, Mr. Keller.

You played football in the public domain, just like any Little League or recreation-league player in this country. Your image, and their’s, was likely profitted upon in some form or fashion. Surely, pics of you playing football appeared in some newspapers. News flash: Newspapers, like EA Sports, are in the business of making a profit off your amateur image and others. This is no news.

I want to comment on some comments I heard recently while listening to Micky Plyler’s radio sports talk show (link to his blog) on The Drive, WCCP 104.9, based in Clemson, S.C. For the next few weeks, I will be working in one town and living in another state, which affords me ample driving time to catch some talk radio. As a side note, it’s disheartening that the news talk radio station once pulsing through Greenville, S.C., known as The Peak, shut down several years ago and reformatted to a popular music station. Meanwhile, a 24/7 sports talk radio station in WCCP seems to be thriving and growing. Examples abound, but this shows one where our interests as a society are: not on the truly important stuff, but on the escapist stuff. And lest one should question such a statement, I say that as a fan of WCCP.

Regardless, Plyler runs in the early morning on weekdays. He’s a solid sports analyst, and I’ve enjoyed listening to him. But during a segment while talking about sports salaries, he began talking about University of North Carolina basketball coach Roy Williams and how some had critized guys like him for their seemingly exhorbitant salaries. Plyler then went on a five-minute or so tangent, veering into politics, saying how guys like Williams should not be hated for their wealth, but rewarded because they clawed their way up, working hard and making it: the American dream. As he was drifting ever away from sports, I wondered to myself, to paraphrase my own early-morning thought, “What the heck is a sports talk host doing commenting on politics?”

He then implied we were laying the groundwork for socialism — Wonder where he could have heard that?? — and that we seemingly reward those who sit on their butts and do nothing and are going to begin taxing those who have worked hard and scratched their way to the upper echelon.

First, let me make President Barack Obama’s tax policy clear: families earning less than $250,000 per year will get a cut, leaving the wealthiest 3 percent of Americans to see an increase. Now, by comparison, and just for fun, I make in the neighborhood of one-sixth of $250,000. Of course, my taxes will be cut come April 1, but so will the taxes of numerous families who draw enough money to afford lake houses, and heck, second houses, of which, I do not … not by a long shot. So, people who will actually get tax cuts include, not only those who’s fiscal belt may be tight, but those who’s fiscal belt may be quite comfortable. I would be doing jumping jacks if I made $240,000 per year, and these very folks will get cuts! For couples making more than 250k, if you feel you will be financially hurt by the new tax hikes, get real.

Now, Plyler and others have made the claim that the rich help keep the country afloat, have done the work and deserve to be where they are. Why tax them more? Isn’t that self-defeating for the economy? On this, here’s two points. First, every person who makes 250k or more did not get it through their own work ethic. Every person who is rich did not necessarily get it through some effort of themselves, as Plyler seems to claim. Some were simply born into privileged positions or families (i.e. members of the Kennedys, Bushes or Tony Blair’s four children, etc.) Yes, many in sports, like Alex Rodriquez and Roy Williams, likely worked hard to achieve their level of success, but let’s face it, others did not. They were simply born and privilege followed. Here’s where the argument against taxing the hard-working and relieving the destitute breaks down: not every person who is rich clawed up the ladder to get that way and not everyone who is poor or needy is lazy.

I saw a bumper sticker recently that read, to paraphrase, I’m too poor to vote Republican. That should be true of anyone making less than 250k or so per year. If it’s not clear by now, the Republican calling card goes something like this: tax cuts for corporations and for the rich; deregulation of big business; personal freedoms, like gun rights, unless such rights, (i.e. censorship, gay marriage or abortion) contrast with the Bible’s teaching, which consequently, has nothing at all to do with running a country. See: Thomas Jefferson’s “wall of separation between church and state,” which has become quite permeable.

To end, the common Republican ideology of letting poor folks and middle class folks fend for themselves (in the belief that church and other civic groups will and should come to the aid of the most needy) is, not only flawed, but cruel. Churches and other groups are limited in who they can help, and government programs, while sometimes mired in bureacracy and inefficiency, are some folks’ only means to survival. Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and others can talk tough all they want about personal responsibility, but when was the last time they were in a Medicaid office or a health department office? Plyler claimed the private sector can perform worlds better than anything the government can offer, and I’m inclined to agree. But I don’t see any private industries waiting in line to help the indignant or the unemployed or those who need insurance for their children. So, for some, government aid is the only alternative. Republicans who bemoan the welfare state should take a trip down to the local health department, hospital or Social Security office to get a big whiff of humanity.

Obama, of course, probably hasn’t seen the inside of one of these offices in years, except to visit, but at least he seems to understand the need that exists, not only for those who are the neediest among us, but for the working families who are putting bread on the table and yet worried about tomorrow. The Republican ideology, as I have outlined, simply doesn’t work, and Plyler and others are out of their element in praising the private sector over the public one, for the former certainly has its own means toward an incongruent end.

First, apologies for not being terribly consistent with the blogging as of late. My personal writing time has been largely devoted to some short stories I’m working on.

Today, I wanted to comment on Matt Millen’s commentary during the Super Bowl pregame show. The content of said commentary is not my concern, of course. The fact the he was and is commentating is my concern.

What broadcast executive would give this guy a job at NBC after he, for all intent and purposes, ran the Detroit Lions farther into the abyss? What would make someone think, “Eh, he failed at running a football team. Maybe he will be OK at commentary?”

I don’t know the answer there, but he started talking on NBC during the pregame show, and it was a distraction for me, as I’m sure it was for many others, knowing the history of the Lions, etc. I think NBC took some hits for that … if not in the ratings, at least in untangible viewer perceptions.

To make it worse:

Every time a certain familiar face showed up on camera Sunday during NBC’s Super Bowl pregame show, Channel 4 ran a scroll at the bottom of the screen:

“Matt Millen was president of the Lions for the worst eight-year run in the history of the NFL. Knowing his history with the team, is there a credibility issue as he now serves as an analyst for NBC Sports? …” — Detroit Free Press

Ok, so, knowing his history with the Lions, we might agree with this statement. But what of Channel 4? A television news channel should not be running editorial content to supplement its coverage. And believe me, both of those sentences were nothing but opinion. Channel 4 was unquestionably in the wrong. But, to be sure, this is a symptom of many local news television channels. The only potentially truly objective news medium is newspapers (Broadsheet, not tabloid). While the word “money” rules the day no matter where you get your news, newspapers seem to still hold the purest form for objective news.