Bush the Warmonger or Obama the Warmonger

In a recent article discussing the press coverage of caskets arriving at Dover Air Force Base in the Washington Examiner an interesting fact stuck out to me that wasn't even the main point of the story.

"So far this month, 38 American troops have been killed in Afghanistan. For all of 2009, the number is 220 -- more than any other single year and more than died in 2001, 2002, 2003, and 2004 combined."

For all of the talk about President Bush being such a warmonger and sending our troops to die for nothing, since President Obama has taken office more soldiers have died in the War in Afghanistan than during the war fought under the leadership of President Bush for the first FOUR years.

This begs the questions of what exactly our new President is doing to lead our troops in that theater of operations. For a man promising so strongly to end all war in the middle east he sure has a bad record of doing so, and it has been to the peril of our armed service men and women.

The Further Stupidity of Mr. Obama

Overshadowed by his appearance on every single Sunday morning show and Late Night with David Letterman, Obama gave an interview last week with Bloomberg News that reveals a very startling position that his administration may be taking regarding the continuing economic crisis.

“Why is it,” [Obama] asked, “that we’re going to cap executive compensation for Wall Street bankers but not Silicon Valley entrepreneurs or N.F.L. football players?”

Now at first this may seem like a rather innocuous statement made on the topic of capping executive pay compensation, and that is most likely why this received such little play in the MSM. But here is what I believe this statements means for further discussions and policies regarding our economy.

Obama was asked why he was being so tepid on demanding executive pay compensation and he replied with that statement. Which to me means one of two things:

A. Fixing our economic crisis is a black and white issue, to Obama it is either everyone's fault or no one's fault. Why blame the people who caused the problem (the bankers). You can't just punish the execs, so he wont punish anyone or fix any specific industry that may or may not have caused the collapse.

B. On the flip side of this is to actually blame everyone and begin down a path of mandating by law a cap on the salary of leaders of every industry in America, hence his comment about NFL players and Silicon Valley businessmen.

Now where this goes from a scary slope towards punishing business across the country to a remark of sheer stupidity is who he chose to single out in his comment. Silicon Valley Entrepreneurs helped invent the technology that runs our world today. They have created millions of jobs and an economic sector that generally speaking has been nothing short of outstanding since the industry began a few decades ago. How could you even think that Silicon Valley had anything to do with our current economic slump?

Furthermore he targets the NFL, how dare we cap bankers pay if we don't cap the pay of professional American Football players. The stupidity here is the simple fact that we do cap the pay of NFL players. In fact the NFL, NBA and NHL all have salary caps for players and teams. So on this remark Obama has just once more proven that he actually knows less about professional sports in America than he does about a global economy and how to fix it.

YES!!!!!!!!!!!

see more Funny Graphs
Truthfully, as an adult, you don't need to have kids to play with Legos...but it helps.

From GraphJam on FAILblog.

Thank You Mr. (Former) President

Thank you Jimmy Carter for this gem...

"When a radical fringe element of demonstrators and others begin to attack the president of the United States as an animal or as a reincarnation of Adolf Hitler or when they wave signs in the air that said we should have buried Obama with Kennedy, those kinds of things are beyond the bounds," the Democrat who served from 1977-1981 told students at Emory University.

But, just for my own edification - was this ok?


What about this...


This one?


Oh wait, I forgot...those are all just satire.

Read the rest of the former President's statements here...

A Truly Iconic Film Series

What if some of the iconic films of the later 20th century were made during the golden era of the industry?

YouTube user whoiseyevan answers that very question with a wonderful series of three (so far) re-worked movie trailers; Ghostbusters 1954, Raiders of the Lost Ark 1951 and Forrest Gump 1949. Utilizing black and white material from the period he turns Charlton Heston into Indiana Jones and Jimmy Stewart becomes Forrest Gump. Enjoy.







Via Neatorama.

This post is rated SPF 50.

1984 anyone?

Ever wondered how to insult the President of the United States by the book? Well Dem Congresswoman Louise Slaughter of New York has a handy rule book of what is allowed and what is not allowed to be said by your representative in Congress. From Politico:

House Rules Committee Chairwoman Louise Slaughter (D-NY) has released a helpful, updated primer for members regarding their conduct on the floor and in committees.

Especially useful: The section on how to properly insult the executive branch in the in the chamber.

"Disgrace" and "nitwits" -- okay.

"Liar" or "sexual misconduct" -- ixnay.

Under section 370 of the House Rules and Manual it has been held that a Member could:

• refer to the government as “something hated, something oppressive.”
• refer to the President as “using legislative or judicial pork.”
• refer to a Presidential message as a “disgrace to the country.”
• refer to unnamed officials as “our half-baked nitwits handling foreign affairs.”

Likewise, it has been held that a member could not:

• call the President a “liar.”
• call the President a “hypocrite.”
• describe the President’s veto of a bill as “cowardly.”
• charge that the President has been “intellectually dishonest.”
• refer to the President as “giving aid and comfort to the enemy.”
• refer to alleged “sexual misconduct on the President’s part.”

Now you may be thinking along the same lines as I was before I read this: Isn't O.K. via the 1st Amendment to the Constitution to say whatever you like about the President (as long as you don't make a threat against his life)? Hasn't the opposition party throughout the course of history said very nasty things about the President? If you go back to the W administration, democrats not only booed W during a joint session of congress they called him a liar, compared him to Hitler and repeatedly made extremely derogatory statements about him personally and about his policies. Republicans did the same against Clinton with the sex scandal, Democrats against Reagan during Iran-Contra, Republicans against Jimmy Carter during the hostage crisis, Democrats against Nixon during Watergate and the list goes on.

So I beg the question why is it now so important that our representatives to congress be muzzled when they speak out against President Obama?

Now if you missed it, during a suspect and unusually timed address to a joint session of Congress about Obama's health care plan, South Carolina Congressman Joe Wilson shouted "You Liar" at the President regarding, well quite frankly a lie, or misrepresentation of the truth about Obama's plan.

On Tuesday the House formally reprimanded Congressman Wilson for his outburst. And following this reprimand Slaughter issued her updated rule sheet about what is and is not allowed in the oh so hallowed halls of Congress.

I will be the first to say that in floor debate and while listening to the President speak our representatives should maintain a sense of decorum to facilitate open and honest debate concerning the issues of the day. And Joe Wilson immediately agreed to this as he instantly apologized for his inappropriately timed outburst.

But to muzzle our congressman by telling them what they are allowed to say and not allowed to say is essentially muzzling you and I. Joe Wilson was elected in November of 2008 to represent the people of his district in Congress. Obama chose to address Congress he chose to go before a body representing the people of South Carolina and the United States. A number of whom I suspect agree that Obama was misrepresenting the truth when he spoke about health care. Therefore Joe Wilson was expressing that outrage directly to the President.

Our founding fathers put in place a system whereby our elected representatives in Congress have as much say as our President and a system where our president is not the sole voice of authority. They wanted us to question the government and question the president in whatever manner deemed necessary to maintain the union.

If any Congressman believes that the actions of the President are "intellectually dishonest" I want my representative to 'call him out.' And not be afraid of censure for doing so.

Now I understand that these House Rules for our representatives are not law and therefore not illegal under the 1st Amendment. But I for one believe this is a slippery slope towards banning what you and I can say about our elected leaders. And a slippery slope toward undermining our rights as Americans. (And yes I use the term Americans referring to people of the US not people of north, south and central America as the language police would like me to refer).

On a day-to-day basis it may not seem like our democracy is being eroded, but once you begin attacking our basic rights like speech, we shall soon all find ourselves in a state where we enjoy very few of the freedoms we once took for granted, and as President Ronald Reagan once said, "Freedom is a fragile thing and is never more than one generation away from extinction. Those who have known freedom and then lost it, have never known it again."

So keep a keen eye out in the future because though it may seem trivial to the average American, once it becomes O.K. to ban criticism of the executive branch, more and more freedoms will be banned for one reason or another.

You Won't Need Glasses

You won't need special glasses to enjoy this 3-dimensional scan of the Northeast Church at Hippos. The scan was conducted this dig-season and the following video shows a "fly-through" of the church. This technology is pretty incredible, I'm curious to see if they do anything else with this information!



This post is rated SPF 0 because the scanning was all done at night!

Stove Repair with Dad

And now it's time for another thrilling episode of "Stove Repair with Dad." Enjoy.



This post is rated SPF 450 - If you can't stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen...especially when dad's in there.

That was Innocuous Enough

A few thoughts on the President's Speech to America's school-children...oh wait, let me rephrase that. According to the "Language Police" America is "banned because it suggests geographical chauvinism unless it refers to all people in North America, South America, and Central America; refer instead to people of the United States."

So, let's try this again...

A few thought's on the President's Speech to the school-children of the United States...

1. The speech was incredibly innocuous, and frankly, not overly inspiring.
2. I was never worried THAT the President was giving a speech. More so, I was worried WHAT the speech would be about. I had been afraid, based on the original lesson plan that was released, that the speech would be much more political and more agenda-driven. With that said, I am curious if the speech we saw today would have been the same if there had not been any controversy over the lesson plan mentioned above.
3. To me, as an educator and someone who has worked with children on a daily basis, the biggest issue here is the level of hubris that it takes for someone, even the President, to think that he can give a 15-minute speech and somehow accomplish something (namely encouraging and inspiring school-children)that a group of professionals has trouble doing over the course of a 180-day school year.
4. At it's core, the speech today encouraged students to "work hard" and "stay in school." However, I find it ironic that the National Government, and indeed this administration has made it so incredibly easy to NOT do these things. I'm talking here about food stamps, nationalized/free healthcare, cash for clunkers, loan forgiveness after the housing crisis, etc, etc, etc...
5. Finally, if this speech is somehow connected to a larger agenda (I know, now we are delving into the world of conspiracy theory), then it has occurred to me that the President really didn't have to say anything about this agenda because there are many out there who will spread this message for him...like the teacher in the video below or the little girl who was interviewed shortly after the speech who said that the President's message was "if you fail yourself, you fail your country." A startlingly nationalistic statement which seems to come straight from Orwell's 1984.

This video is from before the election last November, as you will see. The thing that is startling about it is that the teacher professes to allow her students to have whatever opinion that they want. She also says that she supports those opinions. However, as the video progresses and students begin to say that they support John McCain she appears obviously disappointed. Then she tells one girl, whose father was deployed in Iraq at the time, that if John McCain is elected he will keep the troops there as long as it takes, even if it takes 100 years. She basically implies to this girl that if John McCain is elected her dad will never come home from the war, but if Barack Obama is elected he will end the war (a campaign promise he has yet to make good on) and will, therefore, bring her dad home...



The President didn't HAVE To give a rousing speech today...The "bipartisanship" that he promised during his campaign has already so polarized the country that he doesn't have to do much to get his agenda discussed in the news, on the web or in the classroom...

This post is rated SPF 11,816,652,059,366. Find out why here...

Mike Tyson..er... Democrat activist strikes in Southern California

In what can only be described as a Mike Tyson style attack, according to reports out of Ventura, California today, during a protest over Obamacare, a pro-Obamacare supporter from a MoveOn.org supported rally bit off the pinky finger of 65 year-old William Rice.

According to Rice, during the course of his protest a member of Code Pink engaged him in a debate on the street. After a bit a man from the MoveOn.org rally came over and began to argue with the right leaning protest. What ensued was a street fight between the two men in which Rice had his finger bitten off. The man who did the biting took off down the road and his identity is still unknown.

After a quick trip to the hospital doctors could not reattach the severed finger.

Now I understand this is a heated issue, but seriously why would a grown man think it was ok to bite off another mans finger. You can't resort to violence like that just because someone disagrees with you.

I think as Obama goes before congress on Sept. 9th to "reset" his health care plan, he better come up with a way to tell his activists to stop biting off people's appendages, we don't have free health care yet, Rice had to pay for that doctors visit to find out his finger wasn't salvageable.

Happy, Healthy and Completely Unawares...

Ok, I'm convinced - I don't want Swine Flu...I don't want any flu. The flu's no fun, but seriously; why are my tax-dollars paying for this ad as well as www.flu.gov; which, apparently, provides "One Stop Access to U.S. Government H1N1, avian and pandemic flu information."

Last I checked, the flu is the flu, and, according to this report from May -

Swine flu is not hyper-virulent. While it spreads relatively easily it does not appear to be any more virulent that the strains we have circulating every year around the world....

Currently [remember - May] in the US it appears that for every 1000 people who get infected, about 40 people need admission to hospital and about one person dies. This is a still an aggressive virus, but no more so than the Flu viruses that change slightly every year or so, and then circulate around the world, mainly causing problems in winter....

Given this Swine Flu strain is H1, we would expect many in the population to have some immunity because variations of H1 strains have been recirculating in people since 1918. This appears to be the case and is reflected in the relatively small numbers of people over the age of 30 who have been infected.

So, don't forget to use those rudimentary hygiene skills that Elmo and Obama reminded us of and I'm pretty sure you won't die...

This post is rated SPF Death because swine flu is going to kill us all...and then the pigs will rule the world...kind of like Animal Farm.




If you liked the image above, visit the Neatorama store. I personally won that shirt for having the best swine flu related pun - "Chicken's cry fowl as swine flu hogs world spotlight."

The Longest Amendment

This past evening I was helping out my younger brother as he was working on a 'getting to know the constitution' worksheet for his American Government class. As we went through the sheet it became very apparent that he was not exactly appreciating the 'historical' context that I was adding to his work, he just wanted to fill in the bubbles and move on to other things.

It may seem like the constitution is a dusty old piece of parchment written by men who wore wigs and make-up, sitting in a non-air-conditioned brick building in the late 18th Century, but I was reminded tonight that there are some very interesting stories of how our constitution was written and why it has stood the test of time to uphold our republic. With that said here is a story you may or may not know about the US Constitution, and hopefully it will be slightly more appreciated than Monday night at my house.

At 24 words, the 27th Amendment of the Constitution may not be the longest Amendment in word count (the longest being Amendment 14 at 432 words and the shortest the 8th at 16 words) but after ratification on May 5, 1992 it became the longest a proposed amendment had been sent to the states for ratification after a resounding 202 years. (Not a typo, years, not days).

In September of 1789 during the First Congress in New York City, James Madison proposed the "Congressional Pay Amendment" and it was approved by two-thirds of both the House of Representatives and the Senate. It was then sent to the states where 7 states (Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina, Delaware, Vermont, Virginia and Kentucky) ratified. Unfortunately for James Madison and what would have been the 12th Amendment, 10 states were needed at the time to place it into the Constitution.

Now fast forward 192 years to Austin, Texas. Where an undergrad student at the University of Texas Gregory Watson happened upon this 'lost amendment' while doing a research paper on the Equal Rights Amendment effort of the 1970's. His paper focused on the idea that Article 5 of the Constitution didn't set a timeline or deadline for ratification of Constitutional Amendments that passed Congress. He received a C on the paper for not convincing his teacher his interpretation of Article 5 was correct.

Upon deciding that the "Congressional Pay Amendment" was something that could be used to stop corruption of elected officials in Congress, Watson set out to get the remaining 25 states needed (32 overall) to finally ratify Madison's proposal. He tackled the issue state by state beginning first in Maine, then Colorado and down the list until he convinced two-thirds of the states that the "Congressional Pay Amendment" was the right thing to do.

After several lawsuits challenging the timeliness of the Amendment, none of which were even taken up by the judiciary, on May 5, 1992 when Alabama ratified, the "Congressional Pay Amendment" became the 27th and newest member of the US Constitution. It wouldn't be officially added until May 18th, 1992 when official certification was completed by the Archivist of the United States. (And interestingly enough Don Wilson, Archivist at the time, did not request Congressional Approval of the ratification before placing the Amendment into the Constitution, due to ambiguous language in Article 5. Wilson was reprimanded for his actions and the House and Senate both passed questionably unnecessary resolutions accepting the ratification of the Amendment on May 20th, 1992, two days after it had already been placed into law.)

Now you may be thinking along the lines of my brother earlier, "if it's not in my textbook, I do not need to know it" but I would say that Gregory Watson worked for 10 years to prove that just because it happened in 1789 doesn't mean it's irrelevant today. Sometimes just knowing that a mere undergrad at UT helped to ratify the Constitution of the United States is enough to make you realize that the halls of power aren't among the marbled columns of Washington, but everywhere else.

As Paul Harvey would say, AND NOW YOU KNOW THE REST OF THE STORY.

This post is rated SPF 202, thats in years, not days.

The Author's Quiet Birthday

Ray Bradbury turned 89 last week. His iconic work, Fahrenheit 451 - first published in it's entirety in 1953, turned 56 this year.

"So what?" you're probably thinking, and you wouldn't be wrong in thinking that this post seems somewhat random. Unless, of course, you knew that I just finished reading this book, for the first time actually. It was never part of the required reading as I was moving through school (and, even if it had been, there is a good probability that I would have only skimmed). I am surprised that I had not read the book, but glad that I waited until now because I do not think that I would have understood it or seen its poignancy had I read it previously. How did Bradbury do it? How did he foresee an era where electronic media would foreshadow the written word in ink (yes, I understand the irony of writing this electronically)? How did he foresee a time when snippets of information, for example knowing Napoleon's Birthday, would become more valuable than actually knowing who Napoleon was?

For those who haven't read the book it follows Guy Montag, a fireman in a futuristic society. However, he is not the kind of fireman that we think of today. Instead Guy, and all of the others in his profession, move around the city starting fires. Specifically, they burn books.

The reason for this is explained by the Fire-Chief on pages 58-60 of the book:
"We must all be alike. Not everyone born free and equal, as the constitution says, but everyone made equal. Each man the image of every other; then all are happy, for then there are no mountains to make them cower, to judge themselves against. So! A book is a loaded gun in the house next door. Burn it. Take the shot from the weapon. Breach man's mind"..."Colored people don't like Little Black Sambo. Burn it. White people don't feel good about Uncle Tom's Cabin. Burn it. Someone's written a book on tobacco and cancer of the lungs? The cigarette people are weeping? Burn the book. Serenity, Montag. Peace, Montag. Take your fight outside. Better yet into the incinerator."

At its core the book is about censorship, and the author's absolute love of books. A secondary theme is the encroachment of technology, and it's overshadowing of literature and the written word. Finally, the book also discusses the concept of the police state and the inability of it's people to think for themselves. Ironically, the book was itself censored in the mid-1960s. The publishing company removed all of the "damns" and "hells" in order to make the book more appropriate for the classroom. Another ironic outcome of the book comes from more recently. Various people have been trying to bring Fahrenheit 451 back to the screen for 15 years. The process began in 1994 when Mel Gibson signed on to play the role of Guy Montag. Eventually, after a few scripts were worked up and turned down, Gibson moved into the role of producer. Eventually, Tom Hanks signed on to play Montag, but he has also moved on. The irony is outlined in a 2001 article from Variety magazine which says: "Gibson said he couldn't find a "451" script that worked. Adding to his reluctance: the realization that, in the age of computers, the crucial plot element -- burning books in a futuristic society to permanently erase their existence -- might no longer play." Source. How ironic - a book about book burning...about technology overtaking page and ink...a book warning of the perils of conformity and a lack of free-thinking individuals has been deemed obsolete because of the technology that seems to have overtaken our lives.

Ray Bradbury turned 89 last week...did anyone notice?

Oh, since I'm sure you're wondering, Napoleon's Birthday is August 15, 1769.

This post is rated SPF 451, I hope for obvious reasons.

Sportscenter and Brett Favre

Well I hate to put two posts up in one day but I just saw this Sportscenter commercial on ESPN today and couldn't resist.

A Few Words on Term Limits

According to Politico, with the passing of Sen. Kennedy, the state of Massachusetts will have its first opening in the Senate since John Kerry was elected in 1984. Which means that throughout the course of my life I have literally never seen anyone but Kennedy and Kerry representing the state of Massachusetts in the US Senate.

The question is whether or not this is a good or a bad thing for our country. Do the people have a right as President Reagan always said to "vote for someone as often as they want to do."

Or should we be placing into law restrictions on the number of terms someone can serve to fulfill the wishes of Thomas Jefferson and are term limits our nations modern way of ensuring that "the tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time."

Term limits began in 1951 with the passage of the 22nd Amendment to the Constitution, limiting the number of terms a President can serve to two. Since then 21 states, beginning with California, Colorado and Oklahoma in 1990, have enacted term limits legislation on their State Legislative bodies and executive branches of government. And further down in elected bodies, across this country we have term limits on city Council seats, school board seats, public service commissions and just about every elected body of government out there.

Now as a disclaimer, as someone who makes a living based on the frequency, not the infrequency of elections, it is better for the political consultants out there to hold elections as often as legally possible. And the best way to have contested open primaries and open general elections is of course through term limits. A great example of this is the State of Louisiana. In 2007 their term limit legislation went into effect and of the 105 seats in the state house 67 of these seats were open in 2007. And across the state you had 5 or 10 candidates vying for a seat they would never have had an opportunity to hold before term limits (based on skill, qualifications or resources). And now every 12 years in Louisiana far more than half the state house and state senate will be up for election in what will be open seats with good and bad politicians forced into retirement.

In my experience term limits are a double-edged sword. The power of incumbency can protect seemingly horrendous politicians from the hands of electoral defeat where no term limits exists, but on the other side great statesmen and thoughtful political stalwarts get replaced by inexperience and opportunistic pols with little idea of what they are getting into when term limits force the good guy out of office early.

For all its worth Massachusetts have had the opportunity to replace both Ted Kennedy and John Kerry in my lifetime. Once in 1994 when Ted Kennedy ran in a heated general election against future Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney. Truth be told since 1962 I would put money on the fact that Ted Kennedy has most likely represented the State of Massachusetts exactly how they wanted to be represented. And if a representative is not doing to right thing the people generally do a good job of voting them out of office.

Another Louisiana example: It may have taken an election or two longer than it would have elsewhere, but in the end "Dollar" Bill Jefferson (D-New Orleans) was voted out of office by his constituents after being indicted on 16 counts of federal crimes. And to some it may be laughable he held the seat in the first place, but he had one of the most powerful political machines that power, money and corruption could buy and in a city more than 70% African-American and more than 80% democrat a Vietnamese Republican named Joe Cao beat him in 2008.

So for me I take Ronald Reagan's side in this debate. Let the people decide. Vote for someone as much as you want. Term limits should not be preventing genuinely great politicians from representing us based on some random number, thats the decision given to the voting electorate by our Constitution.

R.I.P. Sen. Kennedy

It has been reported late Tuesday night that Senator Ted Kennedy (D-MA) has passed away after having battled brain cancer and ill health for some time now. He was 77 years old and the third longest serving member in the history of the United States Senate.

One of only two brothers in the Kennedy household to live long enough to see old age Ted Kennedy led, in my opinion, one of the most storied political careers of all time.

I had the privilege of meeting Ted Kennedy at a leadership conference in 2005. And hearing him speak and watching the way he interacted with members of the audience was astonishing. In spite of his sometimes radical and left leaning policies and agendas Ted Kennedy was truly one of the very few members of congress over the last hundred years who was not a politician, but a statesmen.

While I rarely agreed with his policies, and he rarely agreed with the policies of the Republican party he was always listening to the other side of the argument looking for any gem of wisdom that could help our country. And he became one of the few members of congress who was genuinely bipartisan and would cross party lines to do the right thing.

For all of his faults and what seemed to be the Kennedy curse, The Senate has lost it's 'Lion of the Senate' and the country has lost a political giant this evening.

It aint Over 'til it's Over

As the great and profound Yogi Berra once said of his 1973 Mets division run against the Cubs, on Monday night the Colorado Rockies truly proved that 'It aint over 'til its over'

Game 4 in a 4 game series against the San Francisco Giants, had an early 6:40 PM start. Holding a 3 game lead against San Francisco in the National League Wildcard race, and being only 3.5 games behind the Los Angeles Dodgers, the Rockies desperately needed a win to close out the series with 3 wins and send the Giants packing.

I have been waiting all season for an opportunity to go down to Denver and watch Jason Marquis pitch, so despite the rain, overcast sky and chilly August temperatures, my Dad, brother and I all went down and sat in the left field bleachers to watch the game.

The game started out rough with Marquis giving up a hit and a run to the Giants in the first inning. Going into the 5th still down 1-0, the Giants started to get sloppy, off a fielding error and a couple walks the Rockies finally got on the board to tie the game at 1-1. And thats where the score would stay for another 8 innings.

Pitch after pitch the Rockies or Giants just couldn't get the go-ahead run across the plate. In both the 8th, 9th and 10th innings the Rockies had runners in scoring position with 1 out. And each time they did what they seem to do best and hit into a double play or struck out.

Jason Marquis had been great through 8 innings. Giving up only 6 hits and 1 run, he had thrown 121 pitches, far above the red line for a pitcher these days, but having gone a fill 8 innings he would not get his 15th win for the season.

So Manager Jim Tracy had to go to the bullpen in the 9th. He pulled out Rafael Betancourt, Frankling Morales, Huston Street, Matt daley, Jason Beimel, and at the beginning of the 13th inning, in came Adam Eaton to relieve Beimel. With few or no remaining pitchers in the bullpen we all knew Eaton would be in for the win or loss.

As each extra inning went by and midnight approached the crowd of 27,000 dwindled to 15,000, then 10,000 and by the time the 14th inning had begun a crowd of about 5,000 people sat across the ballpark as we waited to see if Adam Eaton could continue his outstanding 13th inning performance. Eaton began strong, striking out batter 1. But the night was late and his pitch count was climbing. After all he is a bullpen pitcher he shouldn't be throwing 40 pitches. After that strike out he gave up a triple. It was still ok though, it was a tie ballgame, then Eaton walked the second batter. With runners on the corners and one out, we all began yelling for Eaton to get the next out. Unfortunately his curveball didn't curve enough and he gave up another triple scoring two runs in the top of the 14th for the Giants.

With a runner on third, down 3-1 hoping to force a double play, Jim Tracy calls for Eaton to intentionally walk the next batter for the Giants. The pitch came and the hit went straight to Barmes at second base. The base runner seemingly ran out of the base path (which is illegal) to dodge a tag from Barmes as the runner on third ran home giving the Giants a 4-1 lead going into the bottom of the 14th inning.

With the crowd still booing and hissing at the bad call half an inning earlier Dexter Fowler stepped to the plate and on a 3-2 pitch fouled the ball of of his foot. But knowing the only player left on the bench was needed as a pinch hitter for the injured Gonzales later in the inning Fowler stood up and continued to bat. As he limped toward 1st base after being walked, the team stood on their feet in the dugout to join the already standing crowd. With one runner on Clint Barmes flied out to center field and the crowd began to lose hope. And down by 3 runs with one out the back-up catcher, Chris Iannetta stepped up to pinch hit for Carlos Gonzales, who should have been sitting on the bench due to a steak knife injury two nights earlier. (He was doing the dishes, tried to catch the steak knife as he dropped it out of the sink, sliced open his throwing hand). Iannetta and his .221 batting average drove a single into right field that put Gonzales to second.

Next up was the star of the team. Troy Tulowitzki. Representing the tying run, if there was anyone on the team to have at the plate in that moment it was Tulo. But the Giants had other plans, so Tulo walked. Next up was our pitcher Adam Eaton. Since becoming a Rockies player he hasn't held a bat in a game. And here he was with one out, the bases loaded down three runs in the 14th inning. And the bullpen for San Francisco walked him to drive in a run. It was now 4-2, bases still loaded, one out on the board.

The Giants manager made his walk to the mound and made the call to bring in a new pitcher. The crowd of 5,000 at Coors Field began cheering louder than a sell-out crowd. Ryan Spilborghs stepped to the plate. Sporting a .250 batting average and only 6 home runs on the season, Spilborghs is not necessarily the guy you would pick in this situation, but someone needed to be the hero and make this a game for the books.

As the first strike went by, Spilly wanted to get a feel for the new pitcher. He remembered grounding into a double play with runners in scoring position in the 10th inning, and he knew he was lucky to be getting a chance a redemption. So he tapped his bat to the plate, looked at pitcher Justin Miller as the ball was thrown toward him.

And on the second pitch of the night from Miller, down by 2 runs at the four hour, fifty-seven minute mark in the 14th inning of play, Ryan Spilborghs hit the baseball over the head of the center fielder and deep into the Rockies bullpen for a walk-off Grand Slam and a 6-4 Rockies win.

Now other than this being above and beyond the most exciting come from behind win I have ever seen, I had the chance to actually be there and watch that ball go over the fence in deep center field. This game gave the Rockies a 4 game lead over the Giants in the Wildcard race and gained half a game on the Dodgers in the divisional race.

If the Rockies end up winning the NL West Division Title this year, which I believe they will do, when people ask when it was that the team decided they were going to beat the Dodgers this year, I think you can go back to 11:37 PM on a cold Monday night in August when Ryan Spilborghs hit a Walk-Off Grand Slam to win 6-4 in the bottom of the 14th inning against the Giants.

For those that want to see a great clip of this exhilarating grand slam from Spilborghs here is a great clip of it from ESPN.

The Un-Assist

It's only been officially recorded 15 times in MLB history; which is saying something because, depending on who you ask, Major League Baseball has been around either - since the Cincinatti Red Stockings were established in 1869 or since 1903 when the National Agreement was signed. Either way you figure it that's over 100 years and a lot of games to consider...So, what is this amazing feat that has only happened a few times? The unassisted triple-play.

And in case you missed it, the most recent unassisted triple play happened on August 23, 2009.



Now, upon doing some research, one will find that this has actually happened one time in each of the past three seasons, so maybe it's not THAT special. However, what makes Eric Bruntlett's unassisted triple-play that much more exciting is the fact that it was a game-ender...and it's only the second time in MLB history that that has happened.

This post is rated SPF 95 because the Mets just got burned (what else is new).

Now That's Dedication

I don't know much about this clip - all I know is it's incredible and you should watch it.



Link via Neatorama.

This video is rated SPF 85 for brilliance and contorsionism.

Would you survive a zombie attack?

I don't want to speak for all men out there, but generally speaking I think it is safe to assume that if you are a male between the age of 15 and 35, not only have you pondered if you would survive a zombie attack but thought out detailed plans of how you would go about surviving said attack.

Well for those out there that have always guessed as to whether or not you would survive a zombie attack, Philip Munz, Ioan Hudea, Jow Imad, and Robert J. Smith, mathematicians at Carleton University and the University of Ottawa have taken the guesswork out of this question and spent the time determining the statistical probability you or I would survive such an attack. 

In this scientific article published in the book Infectious Disease Modelling Research Progress these mathematicians, with a keen zombie survival instinct, pose this abstract and conclusion:

"Zombies are a popular figure in pop culture/entertainment and they are usually portrayed as being brought about through an outbreak or epidemic. Consequently, we model a zombie attack, using biological assumptions based on popular zombie movies. We introduce a basic model for zombie infection, determine equilibria and their stability, and illustrate the outcome with numerical solutions. We then refine the model to introduce a latent period of zombification, whereby humans are infected, but not infectious, before becoming undead. We then modify the model to include the effects of possible quarantine or a cure. Finally, we examine the impact of regular, impulsive reductions in the number of zombies and derive conditions under which eradication can occur. We show that only quick, aggressive attacks can stave off the doomsday scenario: the collapse of society as zombies overtake us all."

 

Now before you start wondering why a seemingly top rate Canadian University is spending student and taxpayer dollars to study the outbreak probabilities of a Zombie invasion, I just want to clarify that I think these fine gentlemen have done the heavy lifting and forward thinking that we will all need someday to survive an inevitable zombie attack. We have the mathematical proof that complete eradication is the only option.  So grab your baseball bats and lets go zombie hunting. 

I rate this post SPF 75 because we must have all the facts to be prepared.