...A Thousand Words

What a difference a week makes.

I spent most of last Sunday night lamenting the early demise of my national hockey team, and by extension, the nation of my birth. I said they were slow, inefficient and more than likely, overwhelmed by the burden of a country expecting nothing less than perfection on home ice in a sport they proudly call their own. I predicted that even if they made it through the qualifying game unscathed, they would likely be quickly dispatched by a formidable Russian squad waiting eagerly in the wings. Well, to paraphrase the words of a very wise man, may the words you speak always be sweet, because you never know when you may have to eat them.

Turns out I was wrong. Despite shaky goaltending and lackluster defense from some veteran players, Team Canada figured out how to score goals just in time to knock off Germany and Russia. The youth that was so sorely lacking four years ago in Torino came up big against the best offensive player in the game (Russia’s Alexander Ovechkin) and restored some measure of the confidence lost in the shootout to Switzerland and the loss to the United States. And after withstanding a last second Slovakian surge for a 3-2 victory, Canada found itself in a rematch with the United States for the only gold medal that truly mattered to Canadians. (I in no way mean to belittle any of the 13 other gold medals won by the host country, but if you asked ten Canadians if they would give up all those other golds for a single gold in men’s hockey, nine of them would answer yes, and the tenth would be silently offended that you even bothered to ask the question.)

They insisted on doing it the hard way, playing 50 minutes of solid Olympic-caliber hockey, then put an entire nation into cardiac arrest by allowing the United States to come back and tie the game with only 24 seconds left to play. Eight minutes into sudden death overtime, I watched Team Canada captain Scott Niedermayer turn the puck over in front of his own net covered my eyes, waiting for Team U.S.A.s celebration to begin. But it never came. Luongo knocked down the shot and Canada regrouped. Less than a minute later, a diving Jarome Iginla slipped the puck out of the corner to Sidney Crosby, who put immediately put it through the pads of tournament MVP Ryan Miller (no one has been more deserving of that honor in at least 30 years) to cement his place both in history and as a legend to his country.

Sidney Crosby had a rather quiet tournament. Often referred to as the heir to Wayne Gretzky, the superstar spent most his time doing work usually reserved for less distinguished members of a hockey team. He dug pucks out of corners, poke-checked pucks off the sticks of attacking forwards, blocked shots from the blue line and checked opposing forwards from in front of his net. In fact, Crosby only scored two goals in the entire tournament. The first to win the shootout against the Swiss. The second to win the gold medal in overtime against the United States. Paul Henderson, Bobby Orr, Gordie Howe, Wayne Gretzky, Mario Lemieux, and now, Sidney Crosby. That’s some damn fine company.

As great a story as hockey was for Canada, was there a more inspiring story for the rest of the world than that of figure skater Joannie Rochette? Merely hours after arriving in Vancouver to watch her daughter skate, Rochette’s mother - and by all accounts her best friend - suffered a heart attack and passed away. Distraught, Rochette considered withdrawing from the competition, and not one person would have second guessed her decision. But after consulting her father and her coach, she decided to stay and skate, to honor the memory of her mother in her own way. So, last Tuesday night, Joannie Rochette took to the ice following a record-setting performance by South Korea’s Kim Yu-Na and skated the performance of a lifetime. She totally Brett Favre’d her short program. And I don’t mean Favre’d in that she took an eternity to decide what she was going to do. On Sunday, December 21, 2003, Favre’s father died of a heart attack behind the wheel of his car in Mississippi. The following night, through tears of grief, Favre threw for four first-half touchdowns and 400 yards in a 41-7 thrashing of the Oakland Raiders - in Oakland, for which he earned a standing ovation from notoriously hostile Raider fans. What Rochette accomplished was no less impressive. Not one Canadian would have been disappointed had she decided to leave the games and return home to grieve with the rest of her family. Instead she chose to skate, to do what she had come to Vancouver to do. Her grief played out in front of the whole world, and the whole world cried along with her. Yes, two skaters outperformed her and finished ahead of her in the standings. But the color of her medal didn’t matter to anyone in that arena or anyone else watching on television. Joannie Rochette proved to the world that she has the heart of a champion. And for at least one night, that was better than silver or gold.

And now, back to Washington. I’m depressed already.

Last Thursday, President Obama hosted an healthcare summit with congressional Democrats and Republicans at Blair House, across the street from the White House. It might as well have been held at Little House on the Prairie, or House of 1,000 Corpses. While the President wanted to talk policy, Republicans - most the most part - wanted to talk process, and how because they had been left out of it (even though they hadn’t) they were content to take their ball and go home. Of course, everyone has known since the summit was announced, that the purpose of this meeting was to give each side one final opportunity to draw their lines in the sand before moving forward. Tomorrow (Wednesday) the President will do just that. And if the Democrats have learned anything at all over the past fourteen months they will pass some measure of reform and move on to other business. Because if you you’re going to get hit for throwing a jab, and you’re going to get hit standing still, you might as well come out swinging.

In a related story, news organizations spent considerable ink discussing the findings of recent polls in which the popularity of the Senate healthcare reform bill was pitted against the individual elements of said bill. When asked if they supported the Senate bill in its current form, a majority (mid 50% range) indicated they did not. However, when asked about whether or not they supported individual reform measures contained within the bill, (for example, no denial due to pre-existing conditions, expansion of hig-risk insurance pools and applying strategies to reduce fraud and waste in the Medicare system), an overwhelming majority - in some cases in excess of 70% - claimed they did. So, this could mean one of two things. Either a majority of Americans are idiots and don’t realize they are opposing the very same initiatives they are supporting, or there is something about the form of the bill itself that turns people off. In an interview with NPR Wednesday afternoon, Tennessee Republican Senator Lamar Alexander summed it up this way (to paraphrase): “of course people are in favor of all those ideas, but when you tell then that in order to get them they will have to pay higher taxes, cut medicare, reduce the quality of service and add hundreds of billions to the federal debt they turn against it and say we should start over.” In other words, when you take any set of good ideas and lie to people telling them that those good ideas will bankrupt their children, pull the plug on grandma and usher in armageddon, most will completely freak out and act against their own interest. No organization is better at peddling fear of things we need not be afraid of than this crop of congressional Republicans. Unfortunately, no organization is worse at selling the merits of positive change than congressional Democrats.

The opposition continues to tout this number of more than 50% opposition to the Senate healthcare reform bill. But, like almost everything else Republicans have peddled during this entire process, that majority opposition is a little disingenuous. The polls do not ask that majority why they oppose the bill. And buried in that number is a significant number of respondents who oppose the current Senate bill because they feel it does not go far enough to control costs, expand coverage and limit the power of the insurance companies. There are many who are opposed to this bill because it never bothered to discuss the concept of a single-payer system and eliminated some sort of public option very early on in the process - an idea that continues to poll much more highly in many, if not most districts than the bill itself. It is not a stretch to say that those people - in spite of their distain for a bill sorely lacking in terms of their core issues - would still prefer some measure of reform to pass as opposed to no reform at all. Right now, Democrats have absolutely nothing with which to rally their base. Healthcare legislation would give them at least ONE thing to fight for in November. Passage of some type of healthcare reform will be far more beneficial to Democrats than abandoning the process altogether.

This past Friday the Senate was scheduled to pass an extension of unemployment benefits to over a million people that were due to expire over the weekend. This were going well. Majority Leader Reid worked out a deal with Republicans to pass the extension and brought it to the floor for passage under unanimous consent. Enter Kentucky Republican Senator Jim Bunning. While complaining about the college basketball game he was missing by making the motion, the former hall-of-fame Major League pitcher decided to object to the passage of the bill, demanding that Congress either cut spending or raise taxes by 10 billion dollars to pay for the extension. Bunning’s action stalled passage of the legislation, causing the furlough of 2,000 federal transportation employees and denied the unemployed the ability to apply for benefits or for the COBRA health insurance extension. Bunning claimed he was not opposed to the $10 billion extension, he just didn’t want it to add to the deficit. Now while the merits of Bunning’s argument are certainly debatable, it seems somewhat, “cold” to bicker over process while firing 2,000 more workers in an economy where 9.8 percent of the work force is currently unemployed. I’m sure all those people who were told not to bother showing up for work Monday morning are just broken up over the fact that you missed that Wildcats game while signing their pink slips.

General Motors announced last week that they will be shutting down the Hummer brand after a deal with a Chinese firm interested in purchasing it fell through. I have only two words to describe my feelings toward the demise of Hummer. Good riddance. I sincerely hope General Motors rebounds substantially and soon, so that all the workers displaced by the closing of Hummer plants (particularly here in Indiana) might find work. But I have never been happier to see a vehicle disappear than I will be when Hummer is gone. They symbolized the worst General Motors had to offer. Hopefully, by relegating the Hummer to the same scrap heap as the Hyundai Pony and the Ford Pinto will do for GM what it did for Hyundai and Ford.

Finally, last week a trainer at Sea World was killed when a killer whale grabbed hold of her ponytail and dragged and held her underwater. As much as we as spectators enjoy watching these animals do tricks and flips and splash us with their tail flukes during their shows, we need to remember that they are indeed, wild animals. And perhaps the wild is where they belong. Although they may seem cute and cuddly from a distance, they are bigger, stronger and faster than we are, and they really don’t understand how frail we human beings actually are. They aren’t mean, or cruel, just wild. Wild animals are unpredictable, and in working with them, bad things are going to happen. All the evidence points to incidents like this being rare. Let’s pray that is indeed the case.

A Snowball's Chance in Hell

It’s finally snowing in Vancouver. In February. Ordinarily, that wouldn’t be news.

I’m going to mix things up a little this week. I’ve decided to comment on the week’s news stories in order of least to most infuriating. Usually I do things the other way around after the first paragraph, but I’m going to let the rage simmer a little bit before releasing it to the page.

Today is Fat Tuesday! New Orleans is in full party mode. Although, anyone living in or around the Crescent City might not have noticed the difference, since New Orleans has been partying since Super Bowl Sunday. I mention this only as an opportunity to once again congratulate the New Orleans Saints on their first NFL Championship victory in their 43-year history. Couldn’t have happened to nicer guys in a nicer town. I know that talk has already shifted to the off-season and the draft and which players will be cut and which will remain. But the Saints should enjoy this one as long as they possibly can. Super Bowl championships don’t come around all that often. Ask the New York Jets.

The Winter Olympics finally kicked off in Vancouver last Friday night. While not nearly as bellicose or expensive as the opening ceremonies in Beijing two years ago, Canada’s bite at the apple came off as warm, friendly and sophisticated all the same. Despite a technical glitch, the torch lighting ceremony was dignified and uniquely Canadian, as four torch lighters shared in that most solemn duty. Congratulations to the host nation on a job well done, and here’s to hoping the weather begins to cooperate for the remainder of the games.

On a sad note, on the morning the games were to begin, 21-year-old Georgian luger Nodar Kumaritashvili was killed when he lost control of his sled near the end of his training run and was launched out up over a wall, off the track and into a concrete column supporting the canopy. Instantly, questions were raised regarding the safety of the track and what measures could have been taken to prevent the accident. As a result, additional safety features were added to the track and the start position of the men’s race was reduced by more than 600 feet, while the women’s start was pushed back to the junior level. Few spectators and laypeople will argue with the additional steps taken. For most of us, more safety is always better. But there is an argument to be made that often the first reaction to a sporting tragedy is over-reaction.

While expressing regret over the death of the Georgian rider, at least several of the other competitors complained about the change of the starting point and the accompanying reduction in the speed of the course. They felt it detracted from the quality of the race. They cited the fact that World Cup events were held at Whistler last year without incident and expressed their confidence in riders’ abilities to race cleanly and safely on the original track. While that statement may seem ludicrous to some, there is something we need to understand about athletes – particular those that choose to participate in extreme sports. They simply are not wired the same way the rest of us are. Most of us avoid risk like the plague. We purchase the biggest, heaviest SUV we can find, we scour the shopping cart handle with the disinfectant wipe before we touch it, we don’t take a walk down the street after dark and we insure everything we own. For athletes, it is the risk that makes whatever it is they do worth doing. Of course skiing down an icy mountain at 90 miles-per-hour is dangerous. So is jumping out of an airplane, or bungee jumping off a bridge, or bumping another driver in a left turn at 200 mph. But that’s what makes those things fun. That is what makes them worth doing. If auto racing took place in ’84 Cadillacs at 35 miles-per-hour, nobody would do it. Athletes are not like the rest of us and we should not baby them as if they are. They are special people with special skills and that’s why we love to watch them do what they do. When we allow them to do that, sometimes, bad things will happen. But if you asked 100 lugers or skydivers or snowboarders or race car drivers if they would prefer to die on the track, in the sky, on the mountain or asleep in their beds, I doubt you could find two that would answer the latter.

My wife sent me this. It is presented below as an argument for re-instituting the draft.

I certainly have no desire to be dragged off to fight a war I don’t believe in, in a foreign country too many American couldn’t find on a map. But perhaps if more of us were confronted with the true costs of war, we might be a little more discriminating regarding the conflicts we chose to involve ourselves in.

In an interview over the weekend, former vice president Richard Cheney stated that he had indeed been an advocate of waterboarding. For those of you who are not aware, waterboarding is an internationally recognized form of torture. Cheney admitted to advocating torture. You might think this would rate higher on the rage-o-meter, but frankly, I expected at least this from the former VP, so I was neither surprised nor disturbed by his admission. The only surprising part about this story is that it’s taken him so long to come out and say what we’ve all known he’s been thinking and advocating behind closed doors for at least nine years now, if not more. It is sad, however, and terribly disconcerting that so many people in this country are so anxious – even giddy with anticipation – over the prospect of torturing another human being.

Last week, the mid-Atlantic region of the country was paralyzed by as much as three feet of snow. According to talk radio, Fox News and members of Congress with an (R) in front of their names, the fact that the District of Columbia is in the grip of a white February is proof that Climate Change is a hoax. I can’t be sure whether this latest foolishness represents merely ignorance of the science or willful misinformation of their constituents, but I’m leaning toward the latter. Snowstorms are a weather event. Weather changes from day to day, week to week, month to month and year to year. It varies by time of day, season and geographic location. Climate is a measure of long-term change. Change in average global temperature over decades, centuries and millenia. Two snowstorms in Maryland do not disprove the warming theory any more than a lack of snow in Vancouver this February proves the warming theory, or the lack of sunlight streaming through my window at this moment (1:30 am) proves that the world has been permanently plunged into darkness. Seriously, what is it going to take to get past the loopy, flippant bumper-sticker rhetoric and take some kind of action on this issue?

This past Monday morning I heard a news report noting that the healthcare bill passed by the Senate late last year with absolutely no Republican support is remarkably similar to the healthcare counter-proposal offered by Republicans to the Clinton healthcare proposal in 1994. Ideas central to the bill, like the individual mandate, outcome-based medicine and the healthcare exchanges, were created by Republicans as a “reasonable, market-based alternative” to what they termed “Hillary-care” 17 years ago. Some of those same Republicans now refer to their own ideas as irresponsible, unconstitutional socialist practices designed to “pull the plug on grandma.” Unfortunately, the media has only “discovered” this six months after it might actually have been useful to point out the hypocrisy of the “death panel” crew.

In a related story, President Obama has invited Democratic and Republican leaders of House and Senate to a televised healthcare summit to be held at the White House on February 25th. Republicans have responded by stating they believe the President’s invitation be a “trap.” Whaaa? An invitation to come to the White House and explain your ideas of what healthcare reform should look like to Americans on national television is a trap? Why? Can one Republican please explain to me what the “trap” is in standing up in a room full of television cameras – including those from at least one network sympathetic to your point of view – and explaining why your ideas for healthcare reform are superior to those being proposed by the President and the Democratic Party? Is it because they are afraid that the “mainstream media” will edit their responses in such a manner that makes them look foolish? Because according to all manner of research, the “most watched, most trusted, fair and balanced name in news,” would surely broadcast whatever Republicans said in whatever manner they would like it presented. So there must be something else. Is it possible, that the reason Republicans seem concerned about appearing in public with the President to discuss healthcare reform, is that they are nervous about what people will actually say and do if they get a clear, thoughtful, reasoned non-hysterical explanation of Republican proposals versus Democratic proposals?

In yet another related story, the Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday morning that at least 12 Republican Senators and about 100 Republican House members – including the House Minority Whip – sent letters to the White House begging for a share of the very same American Recovery & Reinvestment Act (stimulus) dollars they were decrying as socialist welfare to every microphone and television camera they could find. Much of this BEFORE the vote was even held! Again, information that might have been considerably more useful 12 months ago. But I guess timely accurate reporting isn’t quite as exciting as audio of Chuck Grassley babbling about “pulling the plug on grandma.”

A few weeks ago, President Obama attended the House Republican retreat and fielded questions for over an hour. It is a fantastic piece of educational political theater, and if you haven’t yet seen it, find it on YouTube and watch it. One of the questions he fielded on deficit reduction and the budget proposal came from Wisconsin Representative Paul Ryan, who offered the President an alternative Republican budget he claimed would lower taxes and eliminate the deficit entirely. Not having had the opportunity to read Ryan’s budget proposal, the President instructed the Congressman to send it to him. Several days later, he did. And what a proposal it is. Paul Ryan’s budget does indeed eliminate the federal deficit and reduce the federal debt – in 50 years. And in order to do so, Ryan would substantially raise the retirement age, privatize Social Security and eliminate Medicare and Medicaid completely. Now, those are all valid proposals worth of debate, and that is exactly what Democratic lawmakers should do. Every single Democrat running for office this fall should take a copy of Paul Ryan’s budget proposal with them to every single town hall meeting he or she attends and make the following point. In spite of what Republicans tried to tell you during the healthcare debate - that they wanted to prevent cuts to Medicare and protect Social Security – this is in fact what they want to do to the federal entitlements. This is their “solution” to the federal deficit. Physically point out – right there in black and white - to all those semi-retired yahoos carrying homemade picket signs reading, “keep your government hands off my (government-provided) Medicare” what their heroes like Sarah Palin and Michelle Bachmann really want to do to their Medicare. Point out to them, in no uncertain terms, what would have happened to their retirement in September of 2008 had their Social Security pensions had been privately invested with Citigroup, Bank of America and AIG, as former President Bush had suggested be done in 2005. Ask them, point blank, is Paul Ryan’s vision for America, their vision for America. If so, then it is what it is. The smart money says that it's not. This budget counter-proposal is a gift Democrats need to unwrap and put to use immediately if they are to have any hope of averting disaster this coming November.

My final grievance this week is with what somehow passes for the modern Democratic Party. These are the sorriest, most pathetic excuses for politicians I can remember watching in my entire life. For 12 months they have floundered, unable to accomplish a single legislative feat despite a 50-seat majority in the House and a filibuster-proof 60 votes in the Senate. They have somehow managed to make a twelve point positive swing in GDP (from –6% growth to +6% growth) look like a failure of administration economic policy. Despite positive growth in the stock market, the housing market and, for the first time in almost three years, the job market, they still have a sizeable majority of Americans convinced the economy is headed in the wrong direction. They have even failed to put aside their petty differences and unite on one issue all Democrats traditionally agreed on, quality healthcare coverage for all Americans. The cold, unflattering truth is that the Democratic Party is a train wreck. They couldn’t sell snow cones to the devil in hell. At some point this fall someone is going to stand up at a town hall meeting and ask a Democratic candidate to give them ONE reason why he or she deserves to be reelected, and he or she will have absolutely no response, because there simply is no affirmative reason ANY Democrat should be reelected in November. Sure, they will point to bad economic circumstances and brazen Republican obstructionism, but as a point of comparison, President Bush had a mere two vote majority in the Senate, yet still accomplished pretty much whatever he damn well pleased. This party needs to grow up. Fast. They need to realize that while it’s all fine and good to be a party made up of many different people from many different backgrounds and with many different interests, there comes a time when they have to put the ridiculous punitive differences aside and do something to benefit the people who voted for them – even if the legislation they pass doesn’t contain everything each of them is looking for. Paralysis is bad for business. I realize there are some Democrats afraid to act because they feel it may cost them their seat. I’ve got some bad news for them. Refusing to do anything is also going to cost you control of the House – if not the Senate as well. So, if you’re going to lose your seat for acting, and you’re going to lose your seat for refusing to act, you might as well accomplish SOMETHING before the voters send you back to your room without any supper. It is always better to be known as someone who accomplished something – even if it wasn’t very much – than someone whose fear of failure prevented him from ever attempting anything.