Driven

I'm not a racing fan per se. I don't dislike it. As a general sports nut, I will watch a bit of everything. A NASCAR race , maybe some motorcycling racing ... and occasionally a Formula One race. But it's been awhile since I followed it with any kind of regularity. About 10 years ago, one of my best friends was a big Formula One fan and this almost forced me to become aware of racers like Michael Schumaker. But I was sadly (and blissfully) unaware of the rivalry in the 70's between British driver James Hunt and Austrian driver Niki Lauda.

An interest in racing is not necessary to appreciate Rush. The race scenes are great but ultimately it is the interplay between the Hunt and Lauda characters that is the strength of this movie. Since watching Rush, I've done a bit more research into both Hunt and Lauda and see how well each of their characters were cast in both looks and demeanor. Thor's Chris Hemsworth has always had that natural charisma and rakish good looks that Hunt had. And Daniel Bruhl, now also being seen in The Fifth Estate, does a fine job in the role of Lauda. Olivia Wilde, while being in a smaller role as Hunt's wife (for a time), is gorgeous. Her acting is fine, but she just doesn't get a lot of screen time. I did find it fascinating that she left Hunt to go out with Richard Burton, revealing how big Formula One was at the time and the level of celebrity that it had attained.

The rivalry between the drivers is at the heart of the story. Though they were drastically different: Hunt, an unredeemable playboy and lover of life and Lauda, a prickly and calculating tactician, it was their relationship to each other that drove both of them. While not getting too in-depth into the events of the movie, it is the drive to race and beat each other that gives them strength in crisis situations off-the-track.

Racing is just the vehicle, pardon the pun, for the point of the story.  As the poster says, "Everyone's driven by something."  Both of the racers are driven by a need to rise above the expectations of their families.  Hunt has a maniacal need to experience everything to the fullest, something that makes him seemingly careless in real life and hard to beat on the track.  Lauda, from a family of high achievers in business and government, feels that driving is the only thing he can do well and he is going to prove that he is the best.  Good movies make a person think about your own life in a more immediate way than books do.  The best movies will even motivate us to action or to changing something in our own lives.  While I'm not intimating that Rush caused me to reevaluate my life in any substantive way, it was successful in getting me to at least think about the reasons that I do things in work and in my personal life.

It's one of the best movies I have seen this year.  You root for each of the drivers despite (and sometimes because of) their obvious shortcomings.  They are are so focused on their driving that relationships outside of racing are strained.  Their differences in style cause conflict between the racers early on but grow into a grudging respect.  While I believe this is done primarily for dramatics in the movie, as the drivers were actually quite close in real life and even shared an apartment early in their careers, there's no point in letting the truth get in the way of a good story.

Director Ron Howard knows how to tell a good story and I've always been a fan of his work (Frost/Nixon, A Beautiful Mind and Apollo 13 being my favorites).  The movie clocks in at about 2 hours but does not seem long.  The characters are established well and organically without slowing down the narrative.  I recommend Rush.  Grade:  A

(Expect a fairly rapid-fire barrage of movie reviews over the next few weeks.  I've finally gotten into a writing mood and will hammer out reviews of most of the decent movies I've seen this year.  No particular order ... I'm just going to let the subject matter or emotions of each lead me to the next in line.)

Focus on the hypocrites

As if we need any kind of confirmation that network television is a bottomless abyss bereft of either morality or courage, tonight in the 2nd quarter of the New England Patriots - Denver Broncos, CBS aired a Focus on the Family "pro-life" commercial where a series of small children recited John 3:16:



It was not too big of a surprise that Focus on the Family chose this game to run the ad considering that the 2nd coming of Christ was present, Tim Tebow. That a mainstream network would actually run such drivel by a hate group IS.

Would CBS have allowed advertisements by Planned Parenthood or an atheist/humanist group? How about a Muslim group? Every time I hear a Christian complain about how much they are persecuted or how they are not allowed to express themselves, I get sick. They are the forever favored majority with the Napoleon complex.

And don't even get me started about using small children to make this advertisement. Richard Dawkins has often made the point that religious indoctrination is tantamount to child abuse. Children are not born religious.

Final score: 45-10 Patriots over the Broncos. Apparently even God is sick of hearing about Tim Tebow and Focus on the Family.

Ignorant boisterous free speech is OK, but silence is not?

You'll have to forgive me, I'm confused. It's OK to for an elected official to yell at the President during a speech, and it's OK to carry guns, be rude and yell at town hall meetings, but it's not OK to exercise your free speech by not saying anything and by merely staying seated? What kind of bizarro country are we? I didn't sign up for this.

TRENTON, N.J. — Three teenagers who say they were tossed from a New Jersey ballpark over their refusal to stand during the song "God Bless America" are suing the minor league Newark Bears.

The boys argue that their constitutional rights were violated when they were asked to leave Newark's Bears and Eagles Riverfront Stadium on June 29 by Bears' president and co-owner Thomas Cetnar.

Cetnar acknowledged the boys were asked to leave but declined to say why. He also has denied making some statements attributed to him in the lawsuit.

The boys — Millburn High seniors Bryce Gadye and Nilkumar Patel, both 17, and junior Shaan Mohammad Khan, 16 — sued in federal court on Friday seeking unspecified damages.

According to the lawsuit, the boys were seated behind home plate when the song began playing. Once it ended, they say Cetnar approached them yelling.

"Nobody sits during the singing of 'God Bless America' in my stadium," the lawsuit quotes Cetnar as saying. "Now the get the (expletive) out of here."

... "The boys weren't trying to make any political statements, they just didn't get up," he said. "No one gave them an ultimatum. The song was sung, it was finished, then they were thrown out."

..."I think what makes it so horrible is that they were publicly humiliated for exercising a right that was guaranteed to them by the United States Constitution," Gadye said ...

And don't tell me it's the national anthem. God Bless America is not our anthem. I do stand during the Star Spangled Banner. I've got no problem with that. It's a matter of civic participation, rooted in ritual and has been performed at least semi-regularly at ballgames since the 1890's. God Bless America, however, is overtly religious and has only been played with any type of regularity at ballgames since 9/11.

If you ask me, Woody Guthrie's This Land is Your Land is a much more fitting anthem. Let's see ... on the one hand, we have a couple of "anthems" that glorify religion (specifically Christianity) and war. On the other hand, we have a song that talks about the natural beauty of our country and of brotherhood. The last couple of verses of This Land is Your Land are even oddly prescient (considering they were written in 1956):

"... As I was walkin' - I saw a sign there
And that sign said - no tress passin'
But on the other side .... it didn't say nothin!
Now that side was made for you and me!

Chorus

In the squares of the city - In the shadow of the steeple
Near the relief office - I see my people
And some are grumblin' and some are wonderin'
If this land's still made for you and me."

I'm grumblin' and wonderin' indeed.

Opening Day ... my favorite day

"People ask me what I do in winter when there's no baseball. I'll tell you what I do. I stare out the window and wait for spring." -- Rogers Hornsby

"I see great things in baseball, it's our game-the American game. It will take our people out of doors, fill them with oxygen, give them a larger physical stoicism. Tend to relieve us from being nervous, dyspeptic set. Repair these losses, and be a blessing to us." -- Walt Whitman

Cards are going to the Super Bowl!!

click image for some more pictures

Alex and I went to the Cardinals 32 - 25 win over the Philadelphia Eagles in the NFC Championship in Glendale. Had a blast.

Testify

I was watching tonight's national college football championship between Oklahoma and Florida and I couldn't help but be amused and confused by what I saw and heard from Florida's outstanding junior quarterback, Tim Tebow.

Let me preface this by saying from every indication that I have ever seen, Tim Tebow is pretty much the model student-athlete and even more a model citizen -- National Champion, Heisman Award winner, son of missionaries, homeschooled, assists father's missionary work at orphanages in the Phillipines, and by every indication, a nice kid.

What gets me is his need to let us know about his faith at every opportunity. Whenever he speaks he will say "God Bless" or something similar. His eye black said "John 3:16" tonight and has said "Phil 4:13" in the past.

"For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life." -- John 3:16

"I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength." -- Philippians 4:13

What is with the moral imperative of the Christian to tesify? You don't see atheist athletes thanking Nietzsche or writing "God is dead" on their eye black ... though that would be funny.

I find it ludicrous that even if God existed that he would care about a football game or would favor one side over another. But that doesn't stop pretty much every athlete from thanking God for their exploits.

When I was researching this post, I was dismayed to find that it was not just athletes that feel the need to testify, chapter and verse, as it were. In-N-Out Burger prints several passages on the bottoms of their cups:

In-N-Out prints discreet references to Bible verses on their paper utensils. The print is small and out of the way, and only contains the book, chapter and verse numbers, not the actual text of the passages. The practice began in the 1980s during Rich Snyder's presidency, a reflection of the beliefs held by the Snyder family:

Burger and cheeseburger wrappers -- Revelation 3:20—"Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear My voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will dine with him, and he with Me."

Beverage cups and replicas -- John 3:16—"For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life."

Milkshake cups -- Proverbs 3:5—"Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding."

Double-Double wrapper -- Nahum 1:7—"The LORD is good, a strong hold in the day of trouble; and he knoweth them that trust in him."

Paper water cups -- John 14:6—"Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me."

Of course, my disparaging of open acknowledgement of faith by Christians won't really bother Christians. Perhaps it shouldn't. After all, if they are going to buy into some of the Bible, they might as well buy into the whole damn thing. And Tebow must have at least believed God was in his corner tonight, as Florida won. "Chacun son goût" -- To each his own.

"The fact that a believer is happier than a skeptic is no more to the point than the fact that a drunken man is happier than a sober one." -— George Bernard Shaw

Just Finished Reading ...

With all due credit to Cyberkitten for his idea (and apologies, since mine will pale in comparison to his), I'm going to take a wack at reviewing a couple of my recent reads (check some of his out here):



Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game by Michael Lewis

Ostensibly about baseball and the economics that control player drafting and acquisition, Moneyball follows how a highly touted "golden boy" prospect, Billy Beane, went from a disappointment as a major leaguer to being one of the youngest major league General Managers and turned baseball convention on its ear.

Billy Beane and the A's ushered in the current era where you are just as likely to see a General Manager with a Harvard mathematics degree and no experience in baseball than by your classic "baseball guys". With a payroll a third or less of the big guns like the Yankees, the A's have been able to consistently go to the playoffs and have a profitable team. They did it by taking emotion, feeling and experience out of the job of picking players. By applying rationality and deep statistical analysis of all the minutiae of players, they were able to pick out undervalued players that weren't viewed as classic ballplayers because of the appearance, their age, whatever.

You can really take from the book an approach to certain life situations. Way too many people allow their ingrained prejudices (from religion, family, experience, etc.) to inform decisions where a rational, detached approach would serve their interests better.

I thought it was a great book and offers insights to people who don't even like baseball. I could especially see it useful in a business environment. Obviously, others agree as he's been called upon to advise others outside of baseball, including a software company and an MLS soccer team.

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21: Bringing Down the House by Ben Mezrich

This is the book that the movie 21 was loosely based on. Over the last 20 or so years, a secret group of M.I.T. math geeks have been tearing it up in Vegas at the blackjack tables through a sophisticated counting procedure and elaborate team play with spotters, dummy players, etc. -- all filling roles benefiting the the team as a whole. Bringing Down the House is the true story of one of those groups.

Counting cards is not specifically illegal because you are not influencing which cards are dealt, but casinos are within their right to ask you to leave if they catching you doing it. And if they repeatedly catch you doing it, the level of intimidation and coercion that they will proceed with varies. The casinos will employee security companies and private investigators to determine who may be taking their money.

Again, much like in the previously mentioned Moneyball, attacking a problem with deep analysis and rationality allowed this group to succeed. And that methodology can extend beyond the gambling arena. The main subject of the book, Kevin Lewis (real name: Jeff Ma), has done consulting work with the Portland Trailblazers (NBA) and San Francisco 49ers (NFL).

It reads like fiction with suspense, action, violence and egos. A very good book that keeps you entertained and that I read in a relatively short time (a couple of days).

Charles Barkley

You gotta love Chuck. He might say some dumb things sometimes, but he's always brutally honest. The contrast between Barkley and a wet noodle like Wolf Blitzer is painfully obvious here:


I absolutely detest people like Wolf Blitzer. In their futile attempts to look impartial and play it safe, they manage to stand for absolutely nothing.

Barkley, however, as a prominent black man living in a largely conservative state, is not afraid to say he's for gay marriage and is pro-choice. Good for you Charles.

Sports

"Sports do not build character. They reveal it." -- John Wooden

Or perhaps the lack of character. I don't talk about sports very much here but I'm pretty much a sports nut ... especially baseball. Lately, it seems like the sports world is in some kind of bizarro universe and I'm not at all happy about it. My takes:


Michael Vick -- If the allegations that Vick participated in and approved of the activities that he has been accused of (and the preponderance of evidence seems to indicate this), you cannot kick him out of the league fast enough, in my opinion. Vick's black, but his tastes in the use of dogs is straight-up white trash. Anyone that will torture a defenseless animal and call it sport is the lowest sort of human being. And it is usually a pretty good indicator of how they will treat other humans.

About the only time that I wished I believed in God was when it comes to figuring out what circle of hell would be most appropriate for the type of people that torture any other living thing.

To make it worse are other retarded NFL players who seems to think it's no big deal. Clinton Portis when asked about it:

"I don't know if he was fighting dogs or not," Portis said in the interview. "But it's his property; it's his dogs. If that's what he wants to do, do it."

Portis, a native of Laurel, Miss., added: "I know a lot of back roads that got a dog fight if you want to go see it. But they're not bothering those people because those people are not big names. I'm sure there's some police got some dogs that are fighting them, some judges got dogs and everything else."

And someone else who should really know better, Emmitt Smith:

" ... Now, granted he might have been to a dogfight a time or two, maybe five times, maybe 20 times, may have bet some money, but he's not the one you're after. He's just the one who's going to take the fall -- publicly."

Tim Donaghy (NBA ref) - Anyone that watched the Spurs-Suns (MY Suns!) series this last year know that the Suns absolutely got jobbed by the refs in how fouls and technicals were called and how players were suspended. But after the series, there wasn't a whole lot that you could do about it. Just lick your wounds and go on and that would be the end of it. Try again next year.

Well ... not so quick. Turns out that one of the refs that worked that series is the very same Tim Donaghy, who was revealed this week to have been betting on games that he was officiating and to be associating with the mob. This is an ugly, ugly situation - probably the ugliest the NBA has seen. Even if it turns out that Donaghy was the only ref involved, it calls into question every game that he was involved in and ultimately the outcome of the playoffs.


Barry Bonds - Barry's about to break one of those records that most people thought was unbreakable, the career home run record, held by Hank Aaron. It should be a time for celebration, for remembering the sluggers of the past and to pass on the mantle to the new one.

But it's not. You know why? Because this man doesn't seem to understand that achievements done through cheating, through circumventing rules, through permanently damaging your body are not really achievements. Or, at least not ones to brag about. Bonds had all the talent in the world. He had proven that he was going to go into the Hall of Fame even before he started using steroids. But that wasn't enough. Hubris born of stupidity and arrogance (hmm ... where else have I seen that?) blinded him and started him down the path that will eventually strip him of everything that he has worked for and perhaps even his life. Congratulations Barry.


I could get into yet another biking doping scandal or the ridiculous circus that is Beckam, but I've grown weary. Is it wrong to long for the days where the worst that players would do was maybe play drunk?

Suns Win!!

Stoudemire, Marion combine for 53 points as Suns KO Lakers
I was lucky enough to be able to get a ticket for tonight's clinching game against the Lakers. It was exciting throughout even though the Suns never trailed. The Lakers got it close a few times because Kobe and Odom played pretty well. But after consecutive ally-oops from Nash to Marion in the 2nd half, the outcome was pretty much decided. Next up, San Antonio.

Cards 27 - Seahawks 21

Some pics of my first game in the new stadium.

Patriotism

After former NFL player Pat Tillman's death in Afghanistan, the Republicans used his sacrifice as a political tool, perverting the circumstances of his death for their own gain. They were in awe of his sense of patriotism for giving up a promising professional career to go and fight for his country. But for them, patriotism is a punch line, a means to an end. It means nothing. The people that die mean nothing. Only what things you can get from it mean anything to them. But Pat and his brother Kevin WERE patriots ... just not in the way that the Right would have you think. The Tillman's were willing to die for the ideal of this country. They were willing to die for the things that this country actually stood for. Things that this government has forgotten. Let's remind them on Nov. 7:

After Pat’s Birthday
Kevin Tillman Honors Late Brother's Birthday with Plea to Speak up for Democracy

by Kevin Tillman

It is Pat’s birthday on November 6, and elections are the day after. It gets me thinking about a conversation I had with Pat before we joined the military. He spoke about the risks with signing the papers. How once we committed, we were at the mercy of the American leadership and the American people. How we could be thrown in a direction not of our volition. How fighting as a soldier would leave us without a voice… until we get out.

Much has happened since we handed over our voice:

Somehow we were sent to invade a nation because it was a direct threat to the American people, or to the world, or harbored terrorists, or was involved in the September 11 attacks, or received weapons-grade uranium from Niger, or had mobile weapons labs, or WMD, or had a need to be liberated, or we needed to establish a democracy, or stop an insurgency, or stop a civil war we created that can’t be called a civil war even though it is. Something like that.

Somehow America has become a country that projects everything that it is not and condemns everything that it is.

Somehow our elected leaders were subverting international law and humanity by setting up secret prisons around the world, secretly kidnapping people, secretly holding them indefinitely, secretly not charging them with anything, secretly torturing them. Somehow that overt policy of torture became the fault of a few “bad apples” in the military.

Somehow back at home, support for the soldiers meant having a five-year-old kindergartener scribble a picture with crayons and send it overseas, or slapping stickers on cars, or lobbying Congress for an extra pad in a helmet. It’s interesting that a soldier on his third or fourth tour should care about a drawing from a five-year-old; or a faded sticker on a car as his friends die around him; or an extra pad in a helmet, as if it will protect him when an IED throws his vehicle 50 feet into the air as his body comes apart and his skin melts to the seat.

Somehow the more soldiers that die, the more legitimate the illegal invasion becomes.

Somehow American leadership, whose only credit is lying to its people and illegally invading a nation, has been allowed to steal the courage, virtue and honor of its soldiers on the ground.

Somehow those afraid to fight an illegal invasion decades ago are allowed to send soldiers to die for an illegal invasion they started.

Somehow faking character, virtue and strength is tolerated.

Somehow profiting from tragedy and horror is tolerated.

Somehow the death of tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of people is tolerated.

Somehow subversion of the Bill of Rights and The Constitution is tolerated.

Somehow suspension of Habeas Corpus is supposed to keep this country safe.

Somehow torture is tolerated.

Somehow lying is tolerated.

Somehow reason is being discarded for faith, dogma, and nonsense.

Somehow American leadership managed to create a more dangerous world.

Somehow a narrative is more important than reality.

Somehow America has become a country that projects everything that it is not and condemns everything that it is.

Somehow the most reasonable, trusted and respected country in the world has become one of the most irrational, belligerent, feared, and distrusted countries in the world.

Somehow being politically informed, diligent, and skeptical has been replaced by apathy through active ignorance.

Somehow the same incompetent, narcissistic, virtueless, vacuous, malicious criminals are still in charge of this country.

Somehow this is tolerated.

Somehow nobody is accountable for this.

In a democracy, the policy of the leaders is the policy of the people. So don’t be shocked when our grandkids bury much of this generation as traitors to the nation, to the world and to humanity. Most likely, they will come to know that “somehow” was nurtured by fear, insecurity and indifference, leaving the country vulnerable to unchecked, unchallenged parasites.

Luckily this country is still a democracy. People still have a voice. People still can take action. It can start after Pat’s birthday.

Kevin Tillman joined the Army with his brother Pat in 2002, and they served together in Iraq and Afghanistan. Pat was killed in Afghanistan on April 22, 2004. Kevin was discharged in 2005.

New Stadium Pictures

They raised the big part of the roof over the weekend at the football stadium. Alex and I took these pictures this evening.

Pic 1
Pic 2
Pic 3

ISU 63 -- Kansas 61

Go Cyclones!! They just beat #2 Kansas ... in Kansas!!

ISU 63--Kansas 61

Hockey season uncancelled?

So is this really going to happen? Jeremy is way more on top of this than I am. But hopefully it's true.

NHL