The Boston Celtics against the Lakers, both LA and Minneapolis

If you are not a Celtics fan, or even if you are but are too young to remember any of the past 16 championships, you probably don't understand how hard it is for some of us to fully enjoy what is taking place without Arnold Auerbach (who many people call "Red") and the long time Voice of the Celtics, Johnny Most.

Since we last assembled for one of these finals, both have passed away, Red scarcely two years ago. They approached the issues of a championship differently, but it all came out the same in the end: we should win and the other team and the officials are all that stand in our way. Nothing, not even being down 1-3 can stop us and, most times, often against the Lakers in one identity or another, we have won sometimes against all odds, and, frankly, reason.

Until 1987 we had never lost an NBA Finals to the Lakers (either as LA or Minneapolis.) The second of the 16 was against Minneapolis and was a sweep and then we won the next eight consecutive NBA Championships. Four times in the 1960s we beat them as LA and we also took the great Magic v Bird series in 1984.

In 1969, when the Cs were barely a .500 team, we got to game 7 in LA and they had all those damn balloons in the rafters but they never got to drop them because something, somewhere, allowed some stupid shot by Don Nelson to go through the basket and the Cs won. I loved watching those balloons as the Cs marched off the court.

And all of this had Johnny Most describing it, mainly on WBZ Radio, Group W, Westinghouse Broadcasting in Boston. Even a New York Times columnist could hear Johnny screaming from the grave "a--a---a---and Posey STOLE THE BALL!!!! JAMES POSEY JUST STOLE THE BALL FROM HIM. HE SAID IT'S MINE AND THEN HE TOOK IT" the other night in game 7 against Detroit or, "here's comes Pierce" when the fatally injured one returned to action after missing 1:30 of playing time.

Yes, LA has won the last two finals we played against them but we were getting old by then. Of course, the current team is just as old but it will be fun to see those stupid yellow unis again and Nicholson and all that.

I haven't watched much basketball since those great days so long ago. From what I have seen this year, the Cs can win this if the good Ray Allen shows up and we lose if that imposter who seemed to be playing in his uni in the East Finals is around. (This is, for us oldsters, the role formerly played first by Havlicek, then by Bird). Whether he knows it or not, Allen is channelling Red by getting into Kobe's head (and, again, showing my age, his stupid father, Jellybean, was such a waste of time when he was on the Sixers, that it is hard to believe this guy is as good as they say).

In the meantime, a few reading assignments for anyone who does not know what I am talking about but is interested:

First Bob Hohler from a few days ago. Then Ryan and Shaughnessy today: both classics already.

BEAT LA!!!!

Many Miles to Go

June is not a real good time to decide who will win an election because the Dukakis administration did not occur.

Yet if you read what at least some Appalachian blue collars are saying, now that it comes down to a Republican or a black man (maybe some of them use another word), my view that a tidal wave is on its way starts to look good.

I believe that the general election will be a rout. It will have no precedential value because, like 1932 and, to a lesser extent, 1976, there are aberrational forces at work which will alter normal voting patterns. (the 20% of Clinton voters who claim to be voting for McCain, will be down to 5, by September.)

What the Clintons did last week when Sen Obama won his nomination was so petty and disgraceful that she is going to have along way to go before she can be given the status within the party she otherwise would have earned. Saturday helped a bit, but Senator Clinton's husband has again brought the presidency down yet another notch. Nonetheless, given what Hoover/Bush, the current guy, has done it is hardly noticeable now. But wait.

It is early and things could change, but,as I have said before swiftboating ain't gonna cut it this time. They have gone to that well too many times and the disastrous results are almost universally recognized (I keep try to say that word the way Bush does: "reck-ah-nized" I think it is).

The Beltway people (almost always wrong, but not by being pessimistic) of Republican "color" (and their money, which almost always flows to the next administration) are getting ready for four years (or at least two) as the opposition party.

I am too tired to link to them, but David Brooks and today's Kristol in the Times and, of course, McCain-hater George Will who knows how much happier he will be in bashing a President Obama, then suffering through a President McCain, also are saying much the same thing. (I believe most of the Republican party establishment feels this way for differing reasons).

I have heard a lot of 1976 talk (since that comes with 1980, and a nice 1978, too). I heard Tom Davis suggesting, as he said he heard people wanting to do in 1976, of describing their presidential candidate as the Conservative Party candidate or some name other than the hated "Republican" name (or brand as they now call it.) That is why he is not running for the Warner seat, which will likely e filled by Mark Warner, but it also reflects what they expect from Sen McCain.

Memorial Day

Reposted from Daily Kos, May 24, 2008:

Since we are thinking Kennedy these days---in my view that is always a good thing to do---we can reassert that this country is our country, too. It does not belong exclusively to the right wing, or the self proclaimed patriots, to whom patriotism means flag pins, and the promotion of war as a foreign policy.

President Kennedy certainly did not see it that way: he lost a brother in World War II and almost lost his own life and those of men for whom he was responsible. When generals tried to stampede him into a war over Cuba---twice---he resisted them successfully (after making a mistake in the first instance---the Bay of Pigs---which he owned up to immediately.)

Yet, he, too, was cast as a youthful idealist with no practical experience, whose naivete endangered our country. In fact, two idiots trotted that garbage out again this very week a view that ignores the important reality that with the wrong person in the White House in October 1962, someone say, like the current president or even Richard M. Nixon, our civilzation might have ended right there.

Unlike the people running our current government, of course, President Kennedy knew a little something about the limits of military force. Nobody denies the need to be militarily capable of defending our country and on this weekend, we remember and honor those who were called to service in the moments of our country's greatest needs. The true patriots of our country: those who fought for our independence in pursuit of a new dream, those who fought to preserve our union as we entered a new era freed from the sin of slavery with which we were born, the soldiers who fought in far off lands when the oceans which had once protected us from the turmoils in a Europe freed from colonialism and despotism, could no longer stave off the same turmoils here, no matter how man people yearned for the past, deserve this day, and our eternal gratitude for sacrifices that go far beyond what anyone could expect from a fellow human being.

But our gratitude is not enough. We cannot send our fellow citizens into battle out of anger, just to make us feel better, to pursue some political goal, to assert a "strength", to send a signal, to help our friends make a few bucks, or to prove that we are better presidents than our father. And we have to oppose anyone who tries to do that in our name and to send other people's children to their deaths for such purposes.

We were attacked in 2001 and had every reason to prevent another attack and to punish those who attacked us so as to deter anyone who might want to try the same thing. Rather than pursue that righteous goal, fools who did not know the difference between Sunni and Sh'ite, between Afghanistan and Iraq, fooled our basically stupid countrymen into thinking that invading a foreign country other than where our attackers were or came from, was required or even justifable. And the "evildoer" who led this fight commemorates this solemn holiday with the same nonsense, even when almost everyone has finally realized its criminal foolishness.Thus, in his speech at Fort Bragg on Thursday he babbles on:

The enemy has made clear that Iraq is the central battleground of the great ideological struggle of our time. This is a struggle between those who murder the innocent to advance their hateful objectives and those of us who love liberty and long for peace. We saw that these enemies -- what these enemies intend for our country on September the 11th, 2001 -- and we must do everything in our power to stop the enemy from attacking us again.

That man is no patriot. He is a charlatan. I hope he enjoys his Memorial Day barbecue and parades while the rest of us mourn the loss of the lives of some of the best men and women to have been born and lived in our midst.

40 Years

Reposted from Daily Kos, June 5, 2008:

I have plenty to write about, but no time to do so, other than to note this sad anniversary. I was 16 in 1968, and, though I was and remain a devoted Kennedy-phile, for reasons I have and will write about, Senator Kennedy had not grabbed me yet, in that very confusing election year. But none of that mattered when the California primary ended in such a horrible way.

I remember the day vividly beginning with my 8 year old brother (whose daughter is today, roughly, the age I was then) waking me to tell me that both Senators McCarthy and Kennedy have been shot. I ran to a TV wondering how quickly the troops wold be coming, and learned the slightly more bearable truth.

And school that day was so weird, with everyone walking around in a daze and with radios on with the ok of the teachers and administration of the high school until Frank Manciewicz delivered the final, horrible news. We had some post season baseball game scheduled that day, I think, but we did not play and everyone went home and watched TV as we had almost five years earlier.

As Paul Simon has written "I can't remember a sadder day." Senator Edward Kennedy's eulogy remains etched in my mind forever.

By the next day, the Humphrey argument had begun and it led to the election of Nixon. There is a lesson there that Senator Kennedy would want us to recall.

Running Against Senator McCain

Reposted from Daily Kos, June 7, 2008

Before we go from ugly attacks on a great United States Senator to support the nomination of Senator Obama to ugly attacks on another United States Senator, a war hero and courageous fighter against the worst in his party, may I suggest another course?

I have supported Senator Obama since January, when my first choice, Sen Edwards, did not get enough support from my party. As I said then, much of my reasons for supporting Senator Obama was the tone of Senator Clinton's campaign.

Nonetheless, I was shocked and troubled by the attacks on Senator Clinton in the pages of DailyKos and other similar places. It was outrageous and wrong. She was and is more than qualified to be a great president. She is not a warmonger or a sleezeball or any of the other stupid names she was called by the supposed progressives who post here.

But I was certainly heartened when two comments I posted on DailyKos about eschewing attacks on Senator McCain were well received, with the suggestion that I diary on the issue. I don't have time this weekend to diary as thoroughly as I would like, but I would like to repost somewhat edited versions of my comments.

It is based on my view, and that of many people, including Senator Obama, that John McCain is a great American, a hero, and an example of the best we have had in the military.

His political career has not been as great, though it has had its sensational moments.

He has, unfortunately, aligned himself with the fools and knaves who humilated him in North Carolina in 2000 for reasons that only a psychiatrist might be able to explain.

I wish he had agreed to run for Vice President with Senator Kerry, since he would be running for re-election now with my full throated support, but despite his awareness of the consequences of his failure to respond to a call to patriotism which would have saved many lives and helped in so many causes he has supported (stopping global warming, reducing the interest of lobbyists, etc,) he punted when we needed him the most.

He is now serving the interests he opposed in 2000. He has disqualified himself for consideration to be President of the United States. Let's stick to that, and skip the personal attacks, especially of a person who has given more to his country than most people will ever be called upon to do.

The now famous commercial where he all but calls the President and his advisors fools or frauds, is certainly something on which he and I both quite agree as I have with many other comments he has made over the years and positions he has taken, sometimes at great cost to him.

My problem is that because the party he is in was unhappy that these views conflicted with their chosen candidate, and that candidate defeated him in primaries (rigged to the hilt in, for instance, SC and, my own state, NY) he then decided to abandon his views and blindly follow the lead of "fools and frauds" in his words.

If I could speak to him, I could only say that, my friend, you can't have it both ways. You identified the evils in your party and you took them on, and for that you deserve enormous credit. But then you let them beat you and you joined them. If the religious right were destroying your party, your changed views about them so as to get their approval and this nomination, disqualifies you for higher office.

The reason that Senators Hagel and Webb, one a Repubican, the other a former Republican, two men you respect and who respect you, cannot support your election is because you have abandoned them, and sided with, well, "fools and frauds" who used the lives of our soldiers for their political gain.

I did not agree with many of the Johnson Administration's reasons for not finding a way out of Vietnam, but any idea that they acted to help the President's political standing is preposterous. It was Nixon's emissaries who tried to prevent progress in ending the war in 1968 which would have elected Vice president Humphrey and who timed their absurd, phony "peace is at hand" crap for just before a 1972 election, they had already rigged.

You missed so much of that, through no fault of yours, that it is not surprising that you have a slightly skewed view of who and what prolonged your imprisonment. But the rest of us, including Senators Hagel, Kerry, Kerrey, Webb and others, know much better, and understand that that experience dictated that the Bush "fools and frauds" had to be stopped.

You did not. And when you had the chance to make amends by running with Senator Kerry in 2004, you did not.

We need no lectures from you, my friend. You are a hero and have given much to this country. But you are not qualified to be President of the United States. Not by a long shot.

Isn't this the point?

Jon Lester

It is not about cancer, of course, and it is really unfair to Jon and his achievement to hae to mention this tonight, but it cannot be denied that this is something that is terribly moving to anybody who has had cancer, knows someone who has had cancer or loved and lost someone to cancer.

The rest of this blog entry belongs to Jon:

"Words can't describe it right now," Lester said on the field at Fenway Park. "I really didn't (think about pitching a no-hitter), just tried to focus on throwing one pitch at a time and going after guys and staying focused and not worrying about the score or how many hits or whatever they were doing."

Lester talked about what it was like to come out in the ninth inning with just three outs to go.

"Just try to finish the game... I can't lie, it went through my head a couple of times in the ninth but it just worked out," Lester said.

The Sox lefthander, who threw 19 of 28 first pitch strikes, talked about the importance of getting ahead in the count tonight. "Very important," Lester said. "That's one thing John (Farrell) and I have worked on all year, just try to get after guys and if you get ahead, you can dictate what you want to do with them."

Lester was asked if he had a special gift for Jacoby Ellsbury, who made a great catch in the fourth inning. "We'll work something out," Lester said.

Red Sox manager Terry Francona shared some words with Lester when the game ended.
"He just said he was proud of me," Lester said. "I've been through a lot the past couple of years, and he's been like a second dad to me, it's just a special moment right there."

Explaining things to New Yorkers

1. The Yankee Stadium that is in its last season is not "the House that Ruth built." That place was knocked down in the early 1970s. If I go across the river and play whiffle ball in the courtyard of the apartment buildings under Coogan's bluff, I cannot say that I played in the Polo Grounds. There are two things that connect the current Stadium to the one where, for instance, Maris hit his 61st home run: it is one the same ground and has the same name. Aside from a few storage rooms, and its foundation, that's all there is.

2. A "subway series" only deserves to be called that when the winner of it has won the World Series.

3. How did Wilie Randolph get the great seat he has to watch the Mets games?