I Don't Give a F%$# About Soccer or the World Cup

But the news that Donald Trump was ferociously booed when he showed up at the World Cup finals makes me happy.

Spain may be the 2026 World Cup official winner, but the game actually had two losers, thanks to Donald Trump. During a brief appearance on the jumbotrons around New Jersey’s MetLife Stadium, the crowd of Argentina and Spain fans booed the U.S. president, who is set to present the World Cup trophy itself to the winning team. The moment happened just after Jennifer Hudson performed the national anthem.

He was shown sitting in a box next to Melania Trump a few more times throughout the game.

This isn’t the first time Trump has been booed at a sporting event, and it certainly won’t be the last. Aside from UFC fights and stops on the PGA tour, most major sporting events have been hostile territory for Trump. 

 They hate him, they really hate him!

Good Move

The NAACP has called for college athletes to boycott schools in states that have engaged in racist mid-decade redistricting.

If this works, it's a good thing. 

The NAACP on Tuesday launched a campaign urging Black athletes, their families, alumni and fans to boycott athletic programs of public universities in states that “have moved to limit, weaken or erase Black voting representation”.

In the announcement of the “Out of Bounds” campaign, the civil rights giant name-checked eight states – Tennessee, Louisiana, Alabama, Florida, Mississippi, South Carolina, Texas and Georgia – whose flagship public athletic programs generate more than $100m in annual revenue. Each of those states has moved to draw new maps to limit Black voting representation, following the supreme court’s Louisiana v Callais decision severely weakening the Voting Rights Act.

“What these states have done is not a policy disagreement. It is a sprint to erase Black political power,” Derrick Johnson, president & CEO of the NAACP, said in a statement. “The NAACP will not watch the same institutions that depend on Black athletic prowess to fill their stadiums and their bank accounts remain silent while their states strip Black communities of their voice.”

The campaign calls on football and basketball players who are currently being actively recruited by targeted programs to withhold their commitments until the states “restore fair congressional maps and meaningful Black representation”, to ask coaches and athletic directors at targeted programs where their universities stand on voting rights and to visit and seriously consider committing to athletic programs at historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs).

It might work.  College sports is something sacrosanct in these states. 

………

The assault comes from the country’s highest judicial office, where the supreme court gutted the landmark Voting Rights Act of 1965 under the argument that protecting the voting opportunities of Black people is a discriminatory practice and not a restorative one, despite the hundreds of graves throughout the south, marked and unmarked, of Black Americans killed for trying to vote.

………

This week, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) turned to sports to join part of its dissent, calling for Black athletes to boycott public universities in the Southeastern Conference (SEC), arguably the most powerful football conference in the country and certainly its greatest incubator of Black athletic talent. The NAACP is responding to a political attack with a social and economic one, for no institution is as culturally relevant in the south as college football, and few economic engines gain as much public attention as sports.

 Here's hoping that this causes enough pain to create a political backlash against the racist dirt-bags.

Birnam Wood Comes to Dunsinane

I did not watch the Superb Owl this year.

I've never watched the half time show, except to see the ads.

That being said, the right wing melt down over Bad Bunny's half time show.

Specifically about how this show, particularly the walking bushes, parallel a quote from Shakespeare's Scottish Play. (We don't say the name of the play in our family, too many superstitious theater people.)

You know the quote, "……… shall never vanquish’d be, until Great Birnam wood to high Dunsinane hill shall come against him."

I'm wondering if there is a modern analogue to the downfall of what is arguably theater's greatest villain.

Maybe Great Birnam wood is coming for Donald Trump. 

Well, You Don’t Have to Spell It Out

I guess actually, you do, when you are writing in the snow with your urine.  To snaps up to Gus Kenworthy, Olympic athelete for the UK team and, exemplar of penmanship for his comment on ICE.

Team GB skier Gus Kenworthy has launched a blistering attack on US Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers by urinating the words “Fuck Ice” on the snow just before the start of the Winter Olympics.

In a post on Instagram the 34-year-old, who will compete for Team GB in the free-ski half-pipe in Milano Cortina, also urged Americans to write to their senators to “rein in” ICE and border patrol.

………

“Innocent people have been murdered, and enough is enough,” said Kenworthy. “We can’t wait around while ICE continues to operate with unchecked power in our communities. 

In what will probably my last Olympic related post for a while, I will also note note that VP, and couch f%$#er, JD Vance, was booed by most of the stadium when his picture appeared on the Jumbotron.

Maybe there is something about the spirit of the games after all. 

No, Just No

Major League Baseball has reversed their bans on Pete Rose and the Black Sox, all of whom were banned because they bet on games that they were involved in.

I guess that they decided that the owners could make some money off Pete Rose and "Shoeless" Joe Jackson merchandise, so all is forgiven.

This is wrong.

Allowing them back into the sport, even posthumously is wrong, it is wrong now, and it is wrong forever.

That sound you here is former Major League Baseball Commissioner Kennesaw Mountain Landis  spinning in his grave at 4,256 RPM.

Just when you thought that America's Pastime could not get any more venal or corrupt ………

Rather unsurprisingly, it looks like Trump may have had a hand in this decision, he has been making statements supporting this for some time.

F%$# Donald Trump and f%$# MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred.

America's Finest News Source

The Onion both nails the zeitgeist of Philadelphia sports fandom, and is hilarious:

Nick Sirianni To Eagles Fans:
‘I Hate All Of You, F%$# You’

Delivering the fiery, expletive-laden remarks at a postgame press conference after winning Super Bowl LIX, Philadelphia Eagles head coach Nick Sirianni told Eagles fans Sunday, “I hate all of you, f%$# you.” “It’s sad to think how much greater the Eagles’ legacy would be if it didn’t have a worthless fanbase filled with such total fucking pricks,” said Sirianni, who added that Eagles fans were loud, rude, and obnoxious assholes before he went on to announce, “This is for you,” and flipped the double birds. ………

(%$# mine)

This is brilliant.

Let It Never Be Said That I Was Charitable to the Dallas Cowboys Football Team

I don't follow football much anymore.  Dan Snyder's perfidy put me off of the Washington franchise, and the increase in reports of brain injury for the players put me off the sport more generally.

That being said, I hate the Dallas Cowboys franchis, it's a holdover from my days as a Washington fan.

I don't generally follow Dallas' season, but when I heard that in addition to having a complete turd of a season, that they F%$#ed up honoring their first coach, Tom LaUndry at their most recent game, I feel an urge to do a happy dance:

The Cowboys made a mistake when honoring former head coach Tom Landry on Sunday.

In the first quarter, Dallas recognized Landry’s military service during a video montage, but they spelled his name wrong on the AT&T Stadium jumbotron. His name appeared as “Tom Laundry” on the big board.

On the next play, Cowboys quarterback Cooper Rush fumbled the snap, and it was recovered by Eagles defensive tackle Milton Williams at Dallas’ 17. Four plays later, Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts rushed for a 1-yard touchdown.

I am amused.

Who Had Arnold Palmer’s Penis on Their Election 2024 Bingo Card?

Lord knows that I didn't.

Heck, if you had presented this as a story to the editors of The Onion, they would have sent it back as too over the top.

Something is deeply wrong here.

The best comment about this comes from the Golf great's daughter, who noted that Arnold Palmer detested Donald Trump:

Golf legend Arnold Palmer’s daughter said she was “not really upset” by the lewd story former President Donald Trump told about her father at a rally in his hometown on Saturday.

Peg Palmer Wears, the 68-year-old daughter of the golf icon, told the Associated Press “there‘s nothing much to say” about the story the Republican nominee chose to open his rally in Latrobe, Pennsylvania, surrounding Palmer’s manhood.

“This man was strong and tough,” Trump told the crowd in a perplexing speech on Saturday. “And I refused to say it, but when he took showers with the other pros. They came out of there, they said, ‘Oh my God. That’s unbelievable.’ I had to say it.”

………

Palmer, a longtime Republican, died in September 2016 before Trump’s first electoral victory. He golfed with other presidents, including George H.W. Bush and Dwight Eisenhower—a man he looked up to as an ideal leader, The Washington Post reported after his death.

However, Wears previously indicated her father was less enthusiastic about Trump‘s candidacy. In 2018, Palmer’s daughter said in an interview with The Sporting News that he was “appalled by Trump’s lack of civility and what he began to see as Trump’s lack of character” before his death.

 What a surprise.

Keep Him Out of the Hall of Fame

Baseball superstar Pete Rose has has died at age 83.

While there is no denying that Rose was a generational talent, but he gambled on baseball games both as a player and as a coach, and he was banned from baseball, and as such is ineligible for the Hall of Fame.

This ban should remain, not because he bet, but because he bet on baseball.

While there are many athletes who have done contemptible things, racism and bigotry, partner abuse, drug abuse, and murder, but these are crimes against the society as a whole, they are not crimes against the sport.

He keeps his record, the most hits of any ballplayer ever, but he should never be readmitted to baseball or installed to Cooperstown.

Ecch (Tweet) of the Day

Officials Ponder Combining Olympics And Paralympics Simply By Infecting All The Athletes Repeatedly With Covid. pic.twitter.com/oyBuu7MkXy

— The Vertlartnic (@TheVertlartnic) July 24, 2024

This, of course a parody account, and it's incredibly dark, and incredibly hilarious, or at least it is for me.

This is dark though.

Damn

Willie Mays, arguably the greatest baseball player of all time, has has died at the age of 93.

We will not see his like for a very long time.

Headline of the Day

Pakistan thought it was playing USA, turned out to be Team India H-1B

—The Indian Express, commenting on the shocking win of the Us Criucket team against Pakistan in the World Cup

I have about as much interest in, and knowledge of, Cricket as I do the subtleties of Zoroastrian theology, but I am interested in the H1B angle. 

This wasn't Pakistan losing to India B, it was Pakistan losing to India H1-B. That was the popular take on Friday at Dallas where USA shocked one-time world champions Pakistan in a nail-biting Super Over finish in a group game of the World T20. With as many as six cricketers of Indian descent, most of them on temporary H1-B visas that allow companies to hire overseas employees, featuring in the historic win, the joke would be a hit in the immigrant community.

Yeah, it's a pretty good joke.

Why I Haven't Commented on the Death of the Recent Death of a Very Public Person

While this individual achieved much notoriety in professional sports, and went on to have significant success in entertainment, he was, at the end of his life, best known for his involvement in a notorious crime, which involved a large number of interesting juxtapositions between fame, race, law enforcement, and media excesses.

I thought about posting, and was asked by someone about this, but I decided against it.

I placed him on my list of, "They who must not be named," in 2016, and I am sticking to that.

That is all.

I did Nazi that Coming

Bummer of a birthmark, HalIt appears that a football (soccer) team in Germany made an unfortunate font choice for their uniforms, which resulted in a rather problematic appearance for any player with a jersey number of 44.

Or maybe someone did it on purpose, I don't know: 

The German Football Association (DFB) announced Monday that it will redesign the font used on its soccer jerseys after comparisons were drawn to a Nazi symbol, outlawed in Germany.

Parallels between the number 44 and the SS rune of the Nazi Schutzstaffel paramilitary organization — similar to two lightning bolts — were first drawn last week on social media. The SS was the unit most responsible for overseeing and administering the Nazis’ crimes against humanity, including the genocide of 6 million Jews.

None of the parties involved in checking the numbers “saw any proximity to Nazi symbolism in the creation process of the jersey design,” the DFB said in a statement on X.

“Nevertheless, we take the comments very seriously and do not want to provide a platform for discussions … we will develop an alternative design for the number 4 and coordinate it with UEFA.”

Two additional comments here:

• I'm pretty sure that someone saw a proximity to Nazi symbolism.
• F%$# the Washington Post for not including a picture of the number 4 in their article.

I had to focus hard on that image not to see the SS runes.

Go Dartmouth!

I am not a fan of college hoops, but the Dartmouth Men’s Basketball just voted to unionize, and that is a good thing, both for unions and for the corrupt racket that is college sports:

At 13-2 in favor, it was not even close.

I am sure that there are some people who wringing their hands over the end of, "Student Athletes," but big time college athletics was really little more than slave labor, and has been so for decades:

Dartmouth College’s men’s basketball team voted 13 to 2 Tuesday to unionize, a potentially significant step in undermining the long-standing amateur model of college athletics. The National Labor Relations Board said in a statement that college officials must now “bargain in good faith” with the union, but Dartmouth officials signaled they were far from ready to concede the matter.

The director of the NLRB’s Northeast regional office, Laura A. Sacks, ruled last month that Dartmouth’s players were employees because “Dartmouth has the right to control the work performed by the men’s varsity basketball team, and because the players perform that work in exchange for compensation.” It made that declaration even though athletes in the Ivy League do not receive athletic scholarships, unlike most other athletes who play in the National Collegiate Athletic Association’s Division I.

The big time college coaches are getting 7 and 8 figures a year to manage players who work for free.

This is a step in the right direction.

Elections Have Consequences, Dartmouth Edition

NLRB Region 1 Director Laura Sacks has issued a ruling that members of their basketball team are employees, and as such they can organize a union.

A National Labor Relations Board regional official ruled on Monday that Dartmouth basketball players are employees of the school, clearing the way for an election that would create the first labor union for NCAA athletes.

All 15 members of the Dartmouth men's basketball team signed a petition in September asking to join Local 560 of the Service Employees International Union, which already represents some other employees at the Ivy League school in Hanover, New Hampshire.

Unionizing would allow the players to negotiate not only over salary but working conditions, including practice hours and travel.

"Because Dartmouth has the right to control the work performed by the Dartmouth men's basketball team, and the players perform that work in exchange for compensation, I find that the petitioned-for basketball players are employees within the meaning of the (National Labor Relations) Act," NLRB Regional Director Laura Sacks wrote.

Sacks is a Biden appointee.

Biden has been pretty good on labor and antitrust.

He Should Have Been Hung on a Flag Pole by His Tongue

The NFL has fined former Washington Football Franchise owner Dan Snyder $60 million for sexual harassment, the ensuing cover up, and defrauding other teams from the proper amount of revenue sharing.

Make no mistake about it, mostly he is being fined from the other owners.

Let me say something on behalf of all the people who were driven away from the team by the shear awfulness of the man, this is not nearly enough.

Let me also say that, "The Washington Commanders," is a stupid f%$#ing name, and should be changed.

Daniel Snyder was fined $60 million, by far the largest penalty ever levied against an N.F.L. team owner, after he was found to have sexually harassed a woman who was both a former cheerleader and a marketing employee for the Washington Commanders.

A league-sponsored investigation released Thursday found credible claims made by Tiffani Johnston, the former team employee, who said that Snyder put his hand on her thigh without her consent at a work dinner in 2005 or 2006, and that he later attempted to push her toward the back seat of his car after the event. According to the report, her account was supported by evidence and contemporaneous witnesses.

The findings were reported by Mary Jo White, a former federal prosecutor and chairwoman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, who spent 17 months looking into allegations of widespread sexual harassment against executives at the team, including Snyder, as well as claims of financial improprieties.

The N.F.L. released White’s report immediately after the 31 other clubs unanimously approved the sale of the Commanders to an investment group led by Josh Harris for $6.05 billion, a record for an American pro sports team.

“The conduct substantiated in Ms. White’s findings has no place in the N.F.L.,” Commissioner Roger Goodell said in a statement. “We strive for workplaces that are safe, respectful and professional. What Ms. Johnston experienced is inappropriate and contrary to the N.F.L.’s values.”

White’s report also substantiated claims made by a former Washington ticket executive, Jason Friedman, who said the team had intentionally shielded and withheld revenues that were intended to be shared among the league’s 32 teams. According to the report, about $11 million in shareable revenues were confirmed to have been improperly withheld.

………

“Dan Snyder has been forced to sell the team he said he would never sell, pay a massive fine to the N.F.L. and there now exists an extensive public record of his personal wrongdoing and the misconduct that occurred under his leadership,” Lisa Banks and Debra Katz, the lawyers representing more than 40 former Commanders employees who spoke out about workplace misconduct, including Johnston and Friedman, said in a statement. 

In a just world, he's be in the dock for fraud, perjury, and a myriad of other charges.

In an even more just world, he would be taken to the former site of RFK stadium, (I don't blame him for abandoning the District, it was the previous owner, Jack Kent Cooke, who did that) surrounded by disgruntled fans, and I would have the baseball bat concession.

It was Inevitable That

Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones could end up involved in bribing Clarence Thomas.

In 1994, Jerry Jones gave Thomas a Superb Owl ring.

They cost something north of $7,500.00 to make, and, at least according to sports memorabilia enthusiasts, that ring could likely now go for more than $100,000.00.

Thomas has been taking bribes for a very long time:

Long forgotten until last week, the Super Bowl ring Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones gave Justice Clarence Thomas in 1994 has skyrocketed in value.

One memorabilia expert says it could be worth upwards of $100,000.

The rings the players themselves got after Super Bowl XXVIII each cost $7,500, most of which came from the NFL. Thomas, who’d proclaimed his Cowboys fandom at his confirmation hearing a few years earlier, was on hand for the presentation of the bling.

But the specs of his ring are lost to history, which makes its current value a matter of some speculation.

“Typically, a non-player ring would go for $20,000 to $25,000,” said Ken Goldin, known to Netflix viewers as the “King of Collectibles” and founder of a leading auction house. “Due to the significance of Justice Thomas, I would say $100,000 or more in this case.”

………

The story set off a flurry of social media chatter and breathless news articles, the assumption and implication being that this, too, was a gift Thomas never disclosed.

It turns out that he did disclose it — on his 1994 ethics form, according to an Associated Press account from May 1995, when the court released the annual filings.

That form is no longer available for inspection.

………

At his September 1991 confirmation hearing, he declined to state his views on abortion but readily testified under oath that when it comes to the NFL, he is not impartial.

“I’ve been a Dallas Cowboys fan for 25 years,” he told the senators.

It’s not uncommon for longtime members of Congress to become devoted fans of the local team. Then-Sen. Alan Simpson, R-Wyo., quipped that “to have you in this nest of Redskins fans, to be a Dallas Cowboys fan, certainly discloses a degree of independence which will serve you very well on the court.”

A year later, Thomas was in Jones’s box for a Cowboys-Redskins game. Over the next few years, he would attend training camp sporting a jersey with the number 106 — he was the 106th justice. He would fly on Jones’ private jet.

Jerry Jones has been a complete bucket of putrescent slime his entire life.

That he was bribing Clarence Thomas, it kind of seems inevitable, or, to quote Zathras, At least there is symmetry."

As Anna Russel Would Say, "I'm not Making This Up, You Know"

As you may have heard, Elon Musk challenged Mark Zuckerberg to a MMA cage match, and Zuckerberg accepted?

Well, it is not gonna happen because Elon's mommy said that he couldn't.

My guess is that this involved some, "Because I'm the mommy, that's why," explanations by Maye Musk:

The potential bout between Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg has set the world on fire! What started as an innocent humorous tweet is now raging into a possible fight between two of the world’s top CEOs.

Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg are revolutionaries in their own right. While one is bringing massive changes to the world via Tesla and SpaceX, the other has changed the world virtually with his inception of Facebook. Hence, there aren’t many who will turn away from the contest. However, one person who seemingly has no interest in the potential billion-dollar bout, is Musk’s mother, Maye Musk.

There have been multiple instances where Maye has called the fight off. Her recent Tweets reflect this. She mentioned her son will not be engaging in any ‘cage fights’ as she has canceled them herself.

Any better on whether Elon pleaded with his mother to do this?

Zuck has actually trained in Jiu-Jitsu and MMA, and he makes an effort to stay in shape.

He would have humiliated Musk.

Tweet of the Day

As part of the merger, the PGA will control holes 1-8 and 12-18.

The Saudis do 9-11.

— James Hesky (@JamesHesky) June 6, 2023

This is in reference to Prince Bonesaw of the House of Saud buying out the Professional Golf Association and merging it with their LIV golf tournament, of course.

The joke is cold as f%$#.

The joke is also funny as f%$#.