Of Politics and Playoffs

Friends,

I love this time of year for one reason only: playoff baseball. It's a core emotion for me, like hunger or hotness. October + basbeall +Tim McCarver = inner peace and joy. (That's not to say I like Tim McCarver, its just his voice always reminds me that its playoff time). So, that's to say I know a thing or two about championship baseball, which got me thinking about politics and what Mr. W said recently (this quote is taken from CNN.com)

"We're not going to let [Democrats and anti-war people, referred to in the original article as "excuses"] stop us from staying on the offense"

Now, if there is one thing I know about baseball it is pitching and defense wins championships. It happens every year. Good pitching always beats good hitting, its a fact of life, like the ground getting wet when it rains. Now, what does this have to do with the president?

W once owned an operated the Texas Rangers...a marvelously craptastic organization. Say what you will about the Royals, but they won a championship or two in their lifetime....can't say that about the Rangers. Anyways, the Rangers, under W, were just awful because all they knew how to do was hit. They would mash the shit out of the ball, rip the cover of it, and all that....but they couldn't pitch or catch to save their lives (I concede Ivan Rodriguez, but he's a catcher and probably wasn't doing much about those balls hit in the hole to short...and A-Rod was there post W)...therefore, they stunk. They still stink because it has nearly become the pervading wisdom that the Texas Rangers are an offense only club, one-dimensional, so for some reason they keep bringing in big hitters, no matter who owns them or manages them and pitchers want nothing to do with them because of that stank. I mean, they had to pay 60 Million dollars to Chan Ho Park to come pitch for them. Who's Chan Ho Park? Precisely. And what about A-Rod...he can defend...very solid defender actually...well...they had to pay him 250 Million dollars to play for them...they had to overpay him so much it crippled the team for years, just to get somone who can hit the ball and make a defensive stop, unlike everyone else in the organization.

So that means to me that W has America on the Texas Rangers path. I mean, we are offense, go kill'em on their soil, defending freedom (which terrorists hate by the way), and all that other business...the long ball if you will, homeruns. And because of that we will become known as heavy hitters, the Juan Gonzalez of the world (or worse yet a Mark Whiten (who thought he was a slugger after hitting 4 homers in a single game, then sucked hard the other 161 games). And once sufficiently branded that way, it will become the pervading wisdom that hitting the long ball is the only thing we do....we don't defend, we don't pitch (diplomacy)...we just smack the hell out of ya and hope for the best...completely undoing years of Cy Youngs and gold gloves. We may sneak away with a few minor victories (kinda like division championships, or captured terrorist leaders) but we will never win a championship (ending terrorist ideology).

So whoever is the next president, they will be stuck with the idea that we're bashers instead of a quality all-around team...sure, a president may try to change the course, but they will be working against an already established idea, like trying to switch to the metric system. Then we will overpay for someone who will think will help, and they will end up crippling us in the end (Patriot Act?) But, why, why is W making us into a homerun hitting DH of the international politics game of baseball?

Chicks dig the long ball.

Or maybe it's because the Texas Rangers were in the `Merican League, and the `Merican League has the DH...and Bush knows the market value of a three-run homerun is much higher than a late-inning double switch or other solid strategies. (Nevermind that everyone knows that `Merican League bashing is an inferior product to National League strategic baseball. ) Whatever the reason, we'll be 10 and a half back at the All-Star break pretty regular now...but we'll lead the league in HRs.


VIVA EL MUSTACHE!!