English Premier League Skinny
1. Manchester United, 53. } THE CHAM-PEEONS!
2. Chelsea, 47. }
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3. Bolton, 39. }
4. Liverpool, 37. }
5. Arsenal, 36. }
6. Portsmouth, 35. } EUROPEAN DREAMIN'
7. Everton, 31. }
8. Tottenham, 31. }
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9. Reading, 27. }
10. Manchester City, 26. } THE GREAT MIDDLE CLASS. GOD MUSTA LOVED 'EM HE
11. Fulham, 26. } MADE SO MANY OF 'EM
12. Aston Villa, 25. }
13. Newcastle, 25. }
14. Blackburn, 25. }
15. Sheffield United, 23. }
16. Wigan, 22. }
-----------------------------
17. Middlesbrough, 21. }
18. West Ham United, 18. } CO-CA COLA!, CO-CA COLA!
19. Charlton, 16. }
20. Watford, 11. }
Saturday, December 30, 2006
Thursday, December 21, 2006
On "A Christmas Story"
On A Christmas Story
I usually re-read what I write, at least occasionally. I first wrote A Christmas Story in 2003. I have never been able to re-read it. It is the saddest story that I've ever heard.
I usually re-read what I write, at least occasionally. I first wrote A Christmas Story in 2003. I have never been able to re-read it. It is the saddest story that I've ever heard.
Rep. Virgil Goode's Letter on Muslims
Rep. Virgil Goode's Letter
on Muslims
This is the text of the letter with our comments in brackets.
"When i raise my hand to take the oath on Swearing in Day, I will have the Bible in my other hand. [ All religions are divisive and therefore objectionable to us. Some religions are more divisive than others, Islam much more so than Rep. Goode's Baptist strain of protestantism.]
"I do not subscribe to using the Koran in any way." [Neither do we but others do and should have the right to as long as it's not used for violent or treasonous reasons.]
"The Muslim Representative from Minnesota [Perhaps it was unintentional but this sounds depersonalizing. Rep.-elect Ellison should have been referred to by name.] was elected by the voters of that district and if American citizens don't wake up and adopt the Virgil Goode position on immigration there will likely be many more Muslims elected to office and demanding the use of the Koran." [This is an ill-thought and ill-written sentence. There is no substantive link between Rep. Goode's position and the election of more Muslims to office. Rep.-elect Ellison is not an immigrant. His election had nothing to do with immigration policy. More Muslims will not be elected to office because of justifiable voter disapproval of Islam's totalitarian philosophy, regardless of when they came to the U.S. "Demanding the use of the Koran" is unclear. American people have and should have the right to READ the Koran. There is not and should not be any law prohibiting the "use" of the Koran in a Swearing in ceremony. There are laws against using any book, the Koran, Mein Kamph, The Communist Manifesto, for violent or treasonous ends.]
"We need to stop illegal immigration totally [beside the point, see above] and reduce legal immigration [beside the point but disagree] and end the diversity visas policy pushed hard by President Clinton [Don't know if this is wholly or partly true] and allowing many persons from the Middle East to come to this country." [Perhaps unintentional again but as stated Rep. Goode would therefore be in favor of blocking Christian or Jewish emigrants from the Middle East. This page totally supports banning Muslims from immigrating to the United States because Islam, as it is preached and practiced today in the Islamic world, is warring against the United States. We would also end student visas and send home those who are here as visiting students. There is no or not sufficient evidence that American Muslims as a group preach or practice their faith in a way that makes them at war with America. Quite the contrary. If there is any model for a Muslim Reformation, for a non-violent Islam, it is in the way that it is preached and practiced in America. If individuals do advocate violence they should be prosecuted under law.]
"I fear that in the next century we will have many more Muslims in the United States if we do not adopt the strict immigration policies that I believe are necessary [ We do not share this fear. We support banning the emigration of Muslims from the Islamic world] to preserve the values and beliefs traditional to the United states of America and to prevent our resources from being swamped." [ Nonsense, nativistic nonsense.]
"The Ten Commandments and "In God We Trust are on the wall in my office. [All religions divide]. A Muslim student came by the office and asked why I did not have anything on my wall about the Koran. My response was clear, "As long as i have the honor of representing the citizens of the 5th District of Virginia in the United States House of Representatives, The Koran is not going to be on the wall of my office. [The story sounds apocryphal but if true that is no way to treat a young visitor to a congressman's office. As stated here previously we should not be critical of our fellow Americans on this issue. As we would do with an adult we should ask them for their views and why they hold them and give them our thoughts. This is all the more true for young people.] Than you again for your email and thoughts."
We must not hate. This is Public Occurrences.
on Muslims
This is the text of the letter with our comments in brackets.
"When i raise my hand to take the oath on Swearing in Day, I will have the Bible in my other hand. [ All religions are divisive and therefore objectionable to us. Some religions are more divisive than others, Islam much more so than Rep. Goode's Baptist strain of protestantism.]
"I do not subscribe to using the Koran in any way." [Neither do we but others do and should have the right to as long as it's not used for violent or treasonous reasons.]
"The Muslim Representative from Minnesota [Perhaps it was unintentional but this sounds depersonalizing. Rep.-elect Ellison should have been referred to by name.] was elected by the voters of that district and if American citizens don't wake up and adopt the Virgil Goode position on immigration there will likely be many more Muslims elected to office and demanding the use of the Koran." [This is an ill-thought and ill-written sentence. There is no substantive link between Rep. Goode's position and the election of more Muslims to office. Rep.-elect Ellison is not an immigrant. His election had nothing to do with immigration policy. More Muslims will not be elected to office because of justifiable voter disapproval of Islam's totalitarian philosophy, regardless of when they came to the U.S. "Demanding the use of the Koran" is unclear. American people have and should have the right to READ the Koran. There is not and should not be any law prohibiting the "use" of the Koran in a Swearing in ceremony. There are laws against using any book, the Koran, Mein Kamph, The Communist Manifesto, for violent or treasonous ends.]
"We need to stop illegal immigration totally [beside the point, see above] and reduce legal immigration [beside the point but disagree] and end the diversity visas policy pushed hard by President Clinton [Don't know if this is wholly or partly true] and allowing many persons from the Middle East to come to this country." [Perhaps unintentional again but as stated Rep. Goode would therefore be in favor of blocking Christian or Jewish emigrants from the Middle East. This page totally supports banning Muslims from immigrating to the United States because Islam, as it is preached and practiced today in the Islamic world, is warring against the United States. We would also end student visas and send home those who are here as visiting students. There is no or not sufficient evidence that American Muslims as a group preach or practice their faith in a way that makes them at war with America. Quite the contrary. If there is any model for a Muslim Reformation, for a non-violent Islam, it is in the way that it is preached and practiced in America. If individuals do advocate violence they should be prosecuted under law.]
"I fear that in the next century we will have many more Muslims in the United States if we do not adopt the strict immigration policies that I believe are necessary [ We do not share this fear. We support banning the emigration of Muslims from the Islamic world] to preserve the values and beliefs traditional to the United states of America and to prevent our resources from being swamped." [ Nonsense, nativistic nonsense.]
"The Ten Commandments and "In God We Trust are on the wall in my office. [All religions divide]. A Muslim student came by the office and asked why I did not have anything on my wall about the Koran. My response was clear, "As long as i have the honor of representing the citizens of the 5th District of Virginia in the United States House of Representatives, The Koran is not going to be on the wall of my office. [The story sounds apocryphal but if true that is no way to treat a young visitor to a congressman's office. As stated here previously we should not be critical of our fellow Americans on this issue. As we would do with an adult we should ask them for their views and why they hold them and give them our thoughts. This is all the more true for young people.] Than you again for your email and thoughts."
We must not hate. This is Public Occurrences.
Wednesday, December 13, 2006
Fighting the Coming War with Islam
Fighting the Coming War with Islam
Iran is one of the major nations in the Islamic world. It is currently hosting a conference denying the Holocaust. Iran's President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has--again--proclaimed that Israel will soon be "wiped off the map." A New York Times article on the conference said this: "Across the Middle East, contempt for Jews and Zionism is widespread and utterly mainstream."
This is just the latest addition to the reams of evidence that the American people continue to ignore: The Muslim people are warring against us, not just al Qaeda, not just a few "rogue states."
By contrast during the Cold War polls and overwhelming anecdotal evidence consistently showed that the peoples of the United States and Soviet Union actually liked each other, even as their governments had nuclear missiles aimed at each other.
In the war with Islam it is the reverse. The U.S. government counts among its friends the governments of Saudi Arabia and Pakistan for example. The leaders get along fine but the people of Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, and the entire Muslim world, hate the American people. They have lustily butchered and burned our people and look forward to doing it again. They aim to destroy us.
Not since Neville Chamberlain, a good but naive man, has the West been so unprepared psychologically to recognize the nature of its enemy and what must be done. Not since before Pearl Harbor have Americans been so oblivious to the nature of the enemy and what must be done. At least after Pearl Harbor that generation of Americans united and responded with the merciless use of every weapon in its arsenal to obliterate its enemies. September 11 was this generation's Pearl Harbor, in fact we lost more people on 9/11 than on 12/07/41, but today's Americans have turned on each other, deny reality and can't think the unthinkable. They are afraid, some are cowards, but most are just afraid. They don't know what to do, some are paralyzed by analysis, but most just don't know. They just want peace, but so did Chamberlain, and like him they will be discredited and scorned by future generations. "What did you do during the war with Islam, mom?" "I was on the fat flush diet, honey," would be the honest response but they will just remain silent. "Dad, why didn't we use the atom bomb after 9/11 instead of waiting until after Islam detonated a dirty bomb in Manhattan?" We had our heads buried in the sand" would be the honest answer. "That damn Republican/Democratic president _____ was a coward!" will be the answer given.
The war is with Islam, with the Muslim people. We must acknowledge this fact. We are realists. We are also not vigilantes. We should not take violent action personally against Muslims in America, the Islamic world or anywhere else but we must elect a president and a government who say who we are at war with and what must be done. It is a war and must be prosecuted as such, not as a police action. A commentator recently acknowledged the above and said that he thought we were in store for a new One Hundred Years War. That is unacceptable. The war should be a one hundred days war. He said we must never split the atom. We believe (we would prefer conventional but similarly overwhelming force) that using atomic weapons will be necessary.
This is how the new one hundred days war with Islam should proceed:
We should take the opportunity of the Holocaust conference to bomb the gathering and thereby kill President Ahmadinejad and whichever number of his government colleagues are at the conference.
We should bomb and thereby decapitate the rest of the Iranian government in their offices or homes.
Those first two actions could be accomplished easily with conventional weapons.
We should also immediately bomb any suspected nuclear sites in Iran. We should err on the side of caution and bomb more rather than less. This will probably require the use of nuclear weapons. We should use them.
The entire Muslim world will then erupt because despite seventeen or so nations the Muslim world is essentially one. We will have chosen the time to fight our enemy, not have our enemy choose the time for general war to begin. We will have them on the defensive until, shortly, they will be as completely destroyed as were Germany and Japan.
As the war blows up--this will be in days--we must immediately decapitate the governments of our two greatest enemies, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. We should take out Pakistan's nuclear capability. We should decapitate the Saudi government. We should send the Rangers in to protect the Saudi oil wells from deliberate destruction by our Saudi enemies. That may not be possible. If not our economy will suffer a recession as we did during the Arab oil boycott of the 1970's, perhaps a depression. We will recover, we cannot recover the lives lost in 9/11 or those lost since, or those to be lost to future Islamic attacks.
In those first few days protests, riots and attacks on Americans and American interests will begin. We should systematically and overwhelmingly snuff them out with more bombing. We must acknowledge and accept moral responsibility for the tragic but necessary fact: Muslim civilians will be killed in overwhelming numbers, but it is they who we are at war with. In the first days of the coming war every time there is a gathering of protesting Muslims in the Islamic world calling for "Death to America!" we should bomb that gathering, in sorrow, but unhesitatingly, recognizing the necessity.
There are one and one half billion Muslims. We agree with Daniel Pipes that we are at war with a "significant minority" of those one and one half billion. Regrettably, many, many, many of those one and one half billion will have to die. We say that with the sincerest sorrow but with the conviction that it is necessary. Perhaps the Muslims will cut and run in a real war as they have done so many times before, in wars with Israel, with us in the Gulf War, with us again in the current Iraqi war. Maybe significant numbers will just surrender. We sincerely hope so but doubt it. For them this will not be a war on behalf of a mere state, like Egypt or Iraq or Syria. This will be a war on behalf of their ideology (it is much more than a religion), with the spiritual impetus of jihad from their sacred book. We must be psychologically prepared to kill millions of our Muslim brothers and sisters who are our brothers and sisters still even if they are our enemy. We must never hate. We must be prepared to kill as many Muslims as we did our Japanese and German brothers and sisters until there is unconditional surrender as there was by them.
The military phase of the war will then end quickly, with a substantial portion of Islam dead and the survivors bleeding. We should then outlaw the preaching and teaching of Islam as it is currently being done, just as the Nazi party and the advocacy of Nazism was outlawed. Thus Islam will go through the Reformation that Christianity experienced but which it never has.
We must fight this war in this manner because we must, not because we want to. Throughout it all we must never hate. This is Public Occurrences.
Iran is one of the major nations in the Islamic world. It is currently hosting a conference denying the Holocaust. Iran's President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has--again--proclaimed that Israel will soon be "wiped off the map." A New York Times article on the conference said this: "Across the Middle East, contempt for Jews and Zionism is widespread and utterly mainstream."
This is just the latest addition to the reams of evidence that the American people continue to ignore: The Muslim people are warring against us, not just al Qaeda, not just a few "rogue states."
By contrast during the Cold War polls and overwhelming anecdotal evidence consistently showed that the peoples of the United States and Soviet Union actually liked each other, even as their governments had nuclear missiles aimed at each other.
In the war with Islam it is the reverse. The U.S. government counts among its friends the governments of Saudi Arabia and Pakistan for example. The leaders get along fine but the people of Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, and the entire Muslim world, hate the American people. They have lustily butchered and burned our people and look forward to doing it again. They aim to destroy us.
Not since Neville Chamberlain, a good but naive man, has the West been so unprepared psychologically to recognize the nature of its enemy and what must be done. Not since before Pearl Harbor have Americans been so oblivious to the nature of the enemy and what must be done. At least after Pearl Harbor that generation of Americans united and responded with the merciless use of every weapon in its arsenal to obliterate its enemies. September 11 was this generation's Pearl Harbor, in fact we lost more people on 9/11 than on 12/07/41, but today's Americans have turned on each other, deny reality and can't think the unthinkable. They are afraid, some are cowards, but most are just afraid. They don't know what to do, some are paralyzed by analysis, but most just don't know. They just want peace, but so did Chamberlain, and like him they will be discredited and scorned by future generations. "What did you do during the war with Islam, mom?" "I was on the fat flush diet, honey," would be the honest response but they will just remain silent. "Dad, why didn't we use the atom bomb after 9/11 instead of waiting until after Islam detonated a dirty bomb in Manhattan?" We had our heads buried in the sand" would be the honest answer. "That damn Republican/Democratic president _____ was a coward!" will be the answer given.
The war is with Islam, with the Muslim people. We must acknowledge this fact. We are realists. We are also not vigilantes. We should not take violent action personally against Muslims in America, the Islamic world or anywhere else but we must elect a president and a government who say who we are at war with and what must be done. It is a war and must be prosecuted as such, not as a police action. A commentator recently acknowledged the above and said that he thought we were in store for a new One Hundred Years War. That is unacceptable. The war should be a one hundred days war. He said we must never split the atom. We believe (we would prefer conventional but similarly overwhelming force) that using atomic weapons will be necessary.
This is how the new one hundred days war with Islam should proceed:
We should take the opportunity of the Holocaust conference to bomb the gathering and thereby kill President Ahmadinejad and whichever number of his government colleagues are at the conference.
We should bomb and thereby decapitate the rest of the Iranian government in their offices or homes.
Those first two actions could be accomplished easily with conventional weapons.
We should also immediately bomb any suspected nuclear sites in Iran. We should err on the side of caution and bomb more rather than less. This will probably require the use of nuclear weapons. We should use them.
The entire Muslim world will then erupt because despite seventeen or so nations the Muslim world is essentially one. We will have chosen the time to fight our enemy, not have our enemy choose the time for general war to begin. We will have them on the defensive until, shortly, they will be as completely destroyed as were Germany and Japan.
As the war blows up--this will be in days--we must immediately decapitate the governments of our two greatest enemies, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. We should take out Pakistan's nuclear capability. We should decapitate the Saudi government. We should send the Rangers in to protect the Saudi oil wells from deliberate destruction by our Saudi enemies. That may not be possible. If not our economy will suffer a recession as we did during the Arab oil boycott of the 1970's, perhaps a depression. We will recover, we cannot recover the lives lost in 9/11 or those lost since, or those to be lost to future Islamic attacks.
In those first few days protests, riots and attacks on Americans and American interests will begin. We should systematically and overwhelmingly snuff them out with more bombing. We must acknowledge and accept moral responsibility for the tragic but necessary fact: Muslim civilians will be killed in overwhelming numbers, but it is they who we are at war with. In the first days of the coming war every time there is a gathering of protesting Muslims in the Islamic world calling for "Death to America!" we should bomb that gathering, in sorrow, but unhesitatingly, recognizing the necessity.
There are one and one half billion Muslims. We agree with Daniel Pipes that we are at war with a "significant minority" of those one and one half billion. Regrettably, many, many, many of those one and one half billion will have to die. We say that with the sincerest sorrow but with the conviction that it is necessary. Perhaps the Muslims will cut and run in a real war as they have done so many times before, in wars with Israel, with us in the Gulf War, with us again in the current Iraqi war. Maybe significant numbers will just surrender. We sincerely hope so but doubt it. For them this will not be a war on behalf of a mere state, like Egypt or Iraq or Syria. This will be a war on behalf of their ideology (it is much more than a religion), with the spiritual impetus of jihad from their sacred book. We must be psychologically prepared to kill millions of our Muslim brothers and sisters who are our brothers and sisters still even if they are our enemy. We must never hate. We must be prepared to kill as many Muslims as we did our Japanese and German brothers and sisters until there is unconditional surrender as there was by them.
The military phase of the war will then end quickly, with a substantial portion of Islam dead and the survivors bleeding. We should then outlaw the preaching and teaching of Islam as it is currently being done, just as the Nazi party and the advocacy of Nazism was outlawed. Thus Islam will go through the Reformation that Christianity experienced but which it never has.
We must fight this war in this manner because we must, not because we want to. Throughout it all we must never hate. This is Public Occurrences.
Monday, December 04, 2006
Greg Schiano to Stay at Rutgers
Greg Schiano to Stay at Rutgers
A couple of years ago the Big East college tackle football conference was eviscerated by the defections of perennial national champion contender Miami, recent and mid-term power Virginia Tech, and perennially respectable and big market Boston College. The Atlantic Coast Conference, the recipient of the defectors largesse, was supposed to become a "Super Conference," while the Big East, sarcastically dubbed the "Big Least" was expected to survive on a technicality or dissolve.
Then Larry Coker ran out of Butch Davis' recruits and his own career assistant coach's ability finally caught up with the program. Last year concluded with a humiliating bowl-game slaughter by L.S.U. and this year U.M. lurched to a 6-6 record and a birth in the Micron P.C. Bowl or something like that.
Virginia Tech has regressed since joining the A.C.C. and Boston College has merely maintained it's status as a top-20-25 team. So this year the A.C.C.'s automatic B.C.S. birth goes to the football factory of Wake Forest. Officials at the Orange Bowl have been observed drinking heavily.
Completely unpredictably, the Big Least has arisen Phoenix-like. The West Virginia "Products of Incestuous Relations" beat S.E.C. champion Georgia in last year's Sugar Bowl at UGA's Georgia Dome home away from home.
Rutgers had a miracle season and barely missed out on a B.C.S. bowl in a triple-overtime loss at Incestuous Relations stadium. Head Coach Greg Schiano won the Coach of the Year award. Since he had left the Miami program as an assistant to take the head job at the State University of New Jersey it was thought that Coach Schiano would naturally gravitate back to U.M. after the firing of Coach Coker. Instead Coach Schiano announced today that there's nowhere he'd rather be than Piscataway and took himself out of candidacy for the Miami job.
A program and ultimately a conference's success rides on the quality of its coaches. The Big East had already lost Cincinnati's Mark Dantonio to Michigan State of the Big Eleven. It could not afford to lose Schiano to a "better" job and cannot affort to lose U.S.F. coach Jim Leavitt to Miami or some other "better" job. If it does, it is in danger of becoming the Mid-American Conference, a minor league known only for its incubation of coaches such as Ara Parsegian, Woody Hayes, Bo Schembechler, and most recently Urban Meyer.
What a break for Rutgers, if it lasts. The latest report has it that Schiano shrewdly has bought time, money, and prestige for the job he really wants, as head coach of Penn State once Joe Paterno retires. If so, that is the next test of the Big East's credibility. I am Benjamin Harris.
A couple of years ago the Big East college tackle football conference was eviscerated by the defections of perennial national champion contender Miami, recent and mid-term power Virginia Tech, and perennially respectable and big market Boston College. The Atlantic Coast Conference, the recipient of the defectors largesse, was supposed to become a "Super Conference," while the Big East, sarcastically dubbed the "Big Least" was expected to survive on a technicality or dissolve.
Then Larry Coker ran out of Butch Davis' recruits and his own career assistant coach's ability finally caught up with the program. Last year concluded with a humiliating bowl-game slaughter by L.S.U. and this year U.M. lurched to a 6-6 record and a birth in the Micron P.C. Bowl or something like that.
Virginia Tech has regressed since joining the A.C.C. and Boston College has merely maintained it's status as a top-20-25 team. So this year the A.C.C.'s automatic B.C.S. birth goes to the football factory of Wake Forest. Officials at the Orange Bowl have been observed drinking heavily.
Completely unpredictably, the Big Least has arisen Phoenix-like. The West Virginia "Products of Incestuous Relations" beat S.E.C. champion Georgia in last year's Sugar Bowl at UGA's Georgia Dome home away from home.
Rutgers had a miracle season and barely missed out on a B.C.S. bowl in a triple-overtime loss at Incestuous Relations stadium. Head Coach Greg Schiano won the Coach of the Year award. Since he had left the Miami program as an assistant to take the head job at the State University of New Jersey it was thought that Coach Schiano would naturally gravitate back to U.M. after the firing of Coach Coker. Instead Coach Schiano announced today that there's nowhere he'd rather be than Piscataway and took himself out of candidacy for the Miami job.
A program and ultimately a conference's success rides on the quality of its coaches. The Big East had already lost Cincinnati's Mark Dantonio to Michigan State of the Big Eleven. It could not afford to lose Schiano to a "better" job and cannot affort to lose U.S.F. coach Jim Leavitt to Miami or some other "better" job. If it does, it is in danger of becoming the Mid-American Conference, a minor league known only for its incubation of coaches such as Ara Parsegian, Woody Hayes, Bo Schembechler, and most recently Urban Meyer.
What a break for Rutgers, if it lasts. The latest report has it that Schiano shrewdly has bought time, money, and prestige for the job he really wants, as head coach of Penn State once Joe Paterno retires. If so, that is the next test of the Big East's credibility. I am Benjamin Harris.
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