Sunday, September 30, 2007

Global Warming and Darfur - More of the same...

On Warming, Bush Vows U.S. 'Will Do Its Part' - washingtonpost.com

President Bush's comments this week on global warming - acknowledging that it is a major challenge and caused by "human activities" while resisting any mandatory goals for reducing greenhouse gases - echoes his record on the genocide in Darfur. Bush has been great - at least when compared to former President Clinton's lies in Bosnia - about calling the atrocities in Darfur a genocide. But he's done little to actually live up to our obligations under the Genocide Convention to stop the mass murder, rapes, and expulsions.

Like peak oil - which is on its way - global warming demands immediate and dramatic investments in alternate fuel technologies, improved federal fuel economy standards, tax incentives for consumers and businesses to go "green," and major diplomatic efforts to bring China and India along as well. We all must come to realize that this is a matter of national security and an opportunity. New energy technologies and greater efficiency and conservation will reap major economy and security benefits for the U.S. and any other country that embraces these challenges rather than ignoring them...

Sox clinch home field!

Boston Red Sox - Red Sox - Boston.com

Well, it al came together this weekend - finally! After some serious anxiety the past month as th Sox allowed their lead over the Yankees to dwindle, the Sox secured the division and then home field advantage throughout the playoffs. Phew! Now it's on to the dance...

Dice-K appears to have been demoted to the #3 slot in the rotation, with Schilling moving up to #2. In a short series, that's a great 3-man rotation, especially if Dice-K and chill pitch like they did their last outings. And the Angels have been hurting lately - lots of players banged up or coming off injuries. And even JD Drew is on fire! Now that's a good omen! :-)

October baseball in Boston... it has meant so much to me. I went to my first Sox game the last game of the '67 Impossible Dream year - and my dad and grampy went to the home games of the Series - have two of the tickets hanging in my house! The end of the '75 series was the first time I saw my father cry. I was at the Bucky Dent playoff game in '78 - and had been at every game of the horrific September Massacre that led up to that nightmare. The Buckner '86 Series I was living in Mexico, so it was a bit surreal and cloudy for me - thankfully.

The 1999 playoffs were incredibly exciting - rejuvenating my love of the game. 2003 was the worst experience since '78. I was in a bar in NYC with a Yankee fan friend watching game 7 of the ALCS. Screamed when Grady Little left Pedro in the game - I still can't beliee it. And felt my heart being crushed in a staggering case of deja vu, with Aaron Boone playing the role of Bucky Dent.

But then came 2004. Redemption. Rebirth. that season felt special from early on. Things had changed in the fall of '03. Fans no longer fell silent when the chips were down - they got on their feet! '04 began to take on a feeling of a new destiny. The old Shakepearean tragedy or late season collapses was no longer to be. When then Sox swept the ALDS, I WANTED the Yankees in the ALCS! I wanted revenge. I wanted to beat the best. I wanted all the questions answered, all the doubts erased.

Falling 0-3 to the Yankees in the ALCS tested all of our faith, but it seemed like every at bat from game 4 on was like new blood coursing through the collective veins of Red Sox Nation. Looking back, this was the way it as meant to play out - the way it had to play out. To show the Sox fans and the world that the Sox no longer were destined to fall short, ripping out the hearts of their faithful. A new era had been born. The Yankees were the ones to choke, to fall jut short of nirvana. The Sox would prevail.

After that ALCS, the momentum was palpable. A sweep almost inevitable. My friend Martin, who was living in China at the time, called me after the ALCS and asked where I was watching game 1 of the WS. When I told him I'd be right there in my living room, he said it wasn't true: I'd be at Fenway! He had secured tickets to every game and was flying back to Boston. And I was the lucky person who would accompany him to see history being made - game 1 of the first WS the Sox would win in 86 years!

Yawkey Way was incredible! I got there very early to soak it all in. I collected every free thing - signs, magazines, newspapers - people were giving away to commemorate this historic occasion. Martin still gives me crap about all the crap I had in my arms that night. There was so much electricity. If ever I had doubted that the universe is really just made up of eneergy and that we humans can control our own energy, that night should have put it to rest. It felt like Red Sox Nation could power an entire country that night.

We moved inside the Park and found our seats. So there I sat - next to WEEI's Glenn Ordway and his family, right behind the Sox dugout!!! It was a cold, but that didn't matter. I was sitting in the same Park where my grandfather had sat when he watched the Sox win in 1918. I felt like some kind of cosmic family circle was now being completed. My father had lived his whole life and never seen his team win it all. But I would - right here, right now.

Game 1 was by far the most exciting - and high scoring, high energy game. From the introductions on, it felt like a unique moment in time and space. And it was.

The rest, as they say, is history. I passed on going to game 4 in St. Louis (money was tight) and watched at home as the Sox finished the sweep. I couldn't believe it. I cried, I screamed. My cousin Carolyn - who is my Red Sox soulmate - and I spoke on the phone. I was euphporic and a bit sad - my father had never known this joy and relief.

Carolyn and her daughter Tricia and I went to the parade together - extending the joyous celebration.

So here we are - sorry for the long trip down memory lane! But it's amazing what gets triggered when the Sox return to October baseball. Full of hope and possibility. Play ball!

Saturday, September 29, 2007

The Ugly Side of the G.O.P. - New York Times

The Ugly Side of the G.O.P. - New York Times

Wow... Bob Herbert has taken off the gloves with a provocative and hard-hitting reaction to Republicans blocking the bill that would have given DC representation in Congress.

Herbert not only condemns today's Republicans in the Senate but also the decades-old "Southern strategy" Republicans have followed to secure the elections of Nixon, Reagan, and both Bush presidents. It's a powerful piece, but perhaps the most striking evidence of long-standing GOP bias is a quote from the late Republican strategist Lee Atwater:

“You start out in 1954 by saying, ‘Nigger, nigger, nigger,’ ” said Atwater. “By 1968, you can’t say ‘nigger’ — that hurts you. Backfires. So you say stuff like forced busing, states’ rights, and all that stuff. You’re getting so abstract now [that] you’re talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you’re talking about are totally economic things, and a byproduct of them is [that] blacks get hurt worse than whites.”

Wow. I shouldn't be so surprised or shocked, I imagine, but it is stunning to see Atwater admit this so explicitly. Add in Herbert's reminder that Reagan launched his 1980 campaign at the site of an infamous Civil Rights era slaying of three civil rights activists, proclaiming in slightly veiled language that he supported "states' rights." Reagan was essentially telling wite voters that he opposed the federal government's interventions to protect blacks against state-sponsored segregation and racism. The stuff we forget...

I wish we could find a way to have a more honest and open conversation/debate about race and poverty in this country. People like Jonathan Kozol and bob Herbert are trying. But until we do, the politics of avoidance will continue. Democrats who fail to confront the realities of life for African Americans trapped in the legacy of Jim Crow or the growing gap between rich and poor (blacks, white, Latinos, and all poor Americans) are as complicit as the Republicans - even if the Dems don't court white bigots. They do, however, have a track record of 40 years of broken promises to blacks and the poor.

Other than John Edwards, who has made a serious attempt to address these issues?

ODAC-Oil Depletion Analysis Centre

ODAC-Oil Depletion Analysis Centre

One of the issues I am most consumer with is peak oil. This web site is for a British organization dedicated to educating the public on oil depletion and related issues. I just took a quick look around, but I saw it referenced in n article I read recently. Supposedly, they issued a report this year with analysis indicating that peak oil production could come in the next 4 years!

The article that really turned me onto this issue was this one by Peter Maass in the NYT in 2005:

http://www.petermaass.com/core.cfm?p=1&mag=124&magtype=1

Peter's always been a favorite of mine and his lengthy analysis on this topic is important and gripping. We do seem to be whistling past the graveyard. I have not heard a major presidential candidate address this in any serious fashion. Yet, if peak oil - or the point where demand outstrips supply - is just over the horizon, we are already far behind where we need to be in terms of deeloping affordable alternate sources of energy. We cannot change our economy from oil-based to something else overnight. The economic disruptions could be dramatic. Add to it the other fundamental economic challenges - $9 trillion federal debt, weak dollar, mortgage and housing crisis, personal debt crisis, infrstructure that needs repiar and replacing (bridges, electrical grid, water and sewage systems), etc. and our ability to deal effectively and efficiently with the peak oil "breaking point" could be quite limited.

So where's the leadership and vision on this issue?

Thursday, September 20, 2007

Boston Sports Blog - Boston.com

Boston Sports Blog - Boston.com

Eric Wilbur has a great blog entry about the Sox not wanting the division badly enough - I think he's dead on (see my post below). I've been one of those people talking about how the Cards and Tigers folded last season only to rise again in the playoffs. Hope the Sox can find some of that magic this year!

Boston Red Sox - Red Sox - Boston.com

Boston Red Sox - Red Sox - Boston.com

It's amazing how the Red Sox can bring either euphoria or that feeling of impending vomit. A 14 game lead down to 1 1/2. No sense of urgency or energy behind winning the division and/or securing home field advantage. It's not a winning mentality. If it were quiet confidence I would get it. But it's more like indifference or arrogance at best. And then there's Gagne, who perhaps cares too much and has forgotten how to pitch like a closer. He's just trying to throw heat - and throwing too hard while forgetting about his change-up. He' a mess. And his ineptitude sems to be contagious - Papelbon has caught it!

I am the eternal otpimist, however, and believe that as long as the Sox can get hot in the playoffs all will be well. But that means the bullpen finding it's earler dominance and at least some bats getting hot again.

Soon - please, soon!
This is a test post to try out the Mac widget for Blogger.  Just switched to a MacBook after a lifetime with Windows and am really enjoying it!