Game 161: Rain, rain go away

OH: “Washcloths? Washcloths. WASHCLOTHS? Washcloths. And Towels.”



Five Things That I Think I Know:

1. There are a certain number of adults, who for some reason live near me, who never learned to use their inside voices. I can think of two reasons to shout in public-a small child or animal is about to wander onto a busy highway, or a sports team has just won a major championship.

2. There will never be major health reform in the United States. I don’t think anyone who has tried to obtain health care recently would argue that the US health care system is in good shape, though.

3. I will never receive Social Security payments. Nor retire. It has become increasingly clear to me that, aside from the system totally melting down, I’m just not going to live that long.

4. The Boston Red Sox are not going to win the World Series in 2008. The Angels and Rays are both better than they are, and fairly significantly so.

5. John McCain is going to win the election. I don’t believe the polls. I believe that Obama is going to lead right into election day, but a large number of people are going to lie to pollsters and vote McCain. This, of course, will be an unmitigated, terrifying disaster for the United States.



Someone in my company is doing a charity walk for diabetes next month, and they want us all to contribute as a group, to “show” our competitors, I guess, how serious we are. They even sent around an email chiding us because “less than 15%” of us have given so far. Now, I’m as anti diabetes as the Talented Mr. Roto is anti cancer, but this bugs me.

-I’ll be much more likely to give money to any cause when I am slightly more assured we’re not going to be heading for breadlines and soup kitchens and Hoovervilles. (However, if that leads to only 16 teams in the major leagues again, maybe its not all bad.)

-I would be much more likely to participate in these faux team building displays if I had the slightest hint that my company cared one whit about me aside from my ability to produce.

-Does anyone really believe that our competitors care one little bit about how charitable we are?


Just finished Jane Mayer’s “The Dark Side”. Chilling, as I expected it to be. She documents her claims very well, but even if she’s half wrong, there is enough material here to send Rumsfeld, Cheney, and several others to the Hague for war crimes trials. Don’t let anyone say that the United States does not, and has not, tortured innocent people and then lied about it. The evidence is clear, palpable, and deeply troubling. Another story that should lead the nightly news every night.

Fantastic Bill Moyers this week, featuring Andrew Bacevich, conservative author of “The Limits of American Power”. He had all kinds of interesting thoughts, including why Jimmy Carter (?) was the first one to really understand the threat of high oil prices and was scarily prescient about the financial collapse we’re in now.

Rachel Maddow’s radio show is available as a free podcast (one hour of it, anyhow) from a radio station in San Francisco. I love the Internet.

Alan Meltzer, an economist at Carnegie Mellon, had an interesting idea on NPR that echoes one that I keep having: why have a bailout at all? Let’s get back to local banks loaning to local people! Let the multinationals fail-someone with money will swoop in and snap up the assets at a distressed price.

New nomination, Greatest Song Title Ever, “I’m Home Getting Hammered, She’s Out Getting Nailed.”

Also placed in nomination:

“She Got The Gold Mine, I Got The Shaft”
“If The Phone Doesn’t Ring, It’s Me”
“Life Sucks, Then You Die”


In Boston, the Yankees-Red Sox game was postponed, which really, at this point, means cancelled.