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| NBC Peacock's feathers in disarray |
Jackspotpourri was all set to go out this morning with a seething denunciation of NBC's hiring of Trumpublican liar Ronna McDaniel, recently replaced as G.O.P. co-chairperson by Donald John Trump's daughter-in-law, Lara. Public opinion and NBC's professional staff of journalists got there before this blog did and NBC, recognizing the error of its ways, has announced that her hiring as a political analyst has been canceled.
As a replacement for our readers, Jackspotpourri is including a 2020 piece on alternate facts. Fortunately, Ms. McDaniel's cancellation is not an alternate fact, but other things that you believe might be.
JL
* * *
Bulletin from The Office of Alternate Facts
An apple, loosened from its attachment to its branch on an
apple tree, will fall to the ground. It
won’t shoot upward toward the sky nor remain hanging there in mid-air where it
was before its stem snapped. This is
because of what Isaac Newton defined as “gravity” in his laws of motion.
But, friends, hold on a second, please! Let us assume that at the same instant that
the apple falls from the tree, right here in the United States, a similar apple
becomes detached from its stem on an apple tree in Argentina. That apple will similarly fall to the ground,
but clearly, it is not falling in the same direction as its North American cousin
fell. That is because by just looking at
a globe, you can see that what is “pointing upwards” in the Northern hemisphere
is “pointing downwards” in the Southern hemisphere, and of course, vice versa. You can see the difference. You can’t tell me “up” and “down” are the
same thing directions in these two places.
To an extraterrestrial observer out in space with a very powerful telescope,
those apples clearly would appear to be falling in different directions! So clearly, just as some claim that “gravity”
is a fact, it can be proposed that there is an alternate fact stating that, at
a minimum, “up” and “down” are not the same thing as Newton claims they can be.
Well, for “believers” in what Newton suggested, there had to have been an explanation for the crazy idea of “up” equaling “down” in different places on our planet. The three “laws of motion” that he devised serve well to explain to “believers” that something called “gravity” is the force that brings this about. That is, of course, if they choose to believe in them. To back up these “laws,” an impressive formula is included to prove the theory. (This is included in the appendix.) Simply, they supposedly claim that every object in the universe that has “mass” exerts a pull, or force, on every other object that has “mass” and that that pull or force, in the case of the apples and everything else in the universe, is what creates the illusion of “up” and “down,” and also keeps the planets revolving around the sun rather than their falling haphazardly out into space and gives order to most other things in the universe.
Today, most people accept this
explanation of what “gravity” is as factual.
Newton did not, however, deal with the possibility that there might be
alternate facts, as your looking at a globe illustrates to anyone whose mind is
not closed. Someone standing precisely on the Earth’s
south pole clearly is upside down from someone standing precisely on the
Earth’s north pole, no matter how one claims otherwise. And of course, an empirical, objective look
at matters scientific requires such open minds.
Right? And that is precisely why our
group is dedicated to promulgating alternate facts.
When we next meet, our
agenda will include a new, revealing, paper on why, really, if you sail far
enough out into the ocean, you will indeed fall off the earth. This is contrary to the fake news which has
been circulating for about the past four or five hundred years claiming that
our planet is a sphere rather than a flat surface, as had previously been well
documented for many centuries by the revealing woodcuts made by many extremely learned
monks. (One of these woodcuts is
included in the Appendix.)
Meanwhile, let me remind you
that the deadline is approaching for registering for our 2020 worldwide seminar
on “Climate Change – The Greatest Hoax Since Noah’s Ark.” Originally scheduled for a lovely resort on Australia’s
southeast coast, we may be relocating that event since the “Happy Koala Lodge”
doesn’t seem to be answering the phone. Wherever we end up, be sure to bring your
alternate facts. Rumors that prospective
alternate locations have been subject to unexpected volcanic action, wildfires,
flooding or earthquake are clearly no more than fresh fake news originating
with supporters of the aforementioned Mr. Newton, whom it is rumored is
currently trying to understand the alternate facts recently reported in the
media that apples actually have been occasionally seen falling upward from
trees in Buenos Aires! Always, friends, please keep your mind open to
new ideas.
Jack Lippman, Acting Alternate Factotum
Appendix:
A: Newton’s three laws of motion may be stated as follows:
- Every
object in a state of uniform motion will remain in that state of motion
unless an external force acts on it.
- Force
equals mass times acceleration [f (t)
= m a (t)].
- For
every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.
B: Woodcut illustrating that the earth is flat.
(Translation of inscription: ‘A missionary from the Middle Ages, or
possibly a middle-aged missionary, announces that he had found the point where
the heavens and the Earth touch one another.’) This graphically confirms the flatness of the
earth. Our modern-day Alternate Fact Research Team
out in the field tends to place that point about three miles north of the city
of Manaus on the Amazon River in Brazil.
JL
* * *
The Race for the Presidency
The major issues that the 47th
president of the United State will face can be summarized as follows:
Domestic –
Immigration at our Southern Border, Inflation, the Economic Outlook, Abortion
Rights, Gun Violence, the Role of Government, Interpretation of the
Constitution.
Foreign –
Russian aggression in Ukraine, Israel reaction to Hamas, China as a competitor.
Both President Biden and his challenger, Donald
John Trump, should have positions on these nine major issues. The President’s positions are easy to pin
down because he, as president, is involved in them daily. Trump’s position can be ascertained from his
prior presidency and what he is saying in his campaigning, bearing in mind that
words are far less definitive than actions which, as the old saying goes 'speak louder than words.'
Let’s take a quick look at where they stand.
Both stand for limiting illegal immigration at our Southern border. Biden wants to do it within our system of
laws, as a Federal matter, bearing in mind the problem it poses for cities and
States impacted by it. Trump just wants
to shut it down, building physical as well as legal walls, nationally or in
individual States. Trump shuns
bi-partisan agree-upon solutions that might take away a campaign argument from him.
Biden counts on economic growth, less
unemployment, infrastructure improvements, more spendable income, and Federal
Reserve control of interest rates and the money supply to combat inflation. Slow to take effect, these steps enable
Trump to claim they are not working and that the problem is rampant, highly
visible in food and fuel prices.
Biden claims his administration is creating economic growth and the statistics, led by a healthy
stock market, prove it. Trump claims
things were better when he was President, and he deserves credit for economic
growth started when he was in charge.
Biden stands for abortion
rights. Trump is mostly silent on this issue, but his Supreme Court
appointees have turned this into a national debate, with most Republicans
seeking to restrict such women’s rights.
Biden is for Federal laws controlling gun violence. Trump wants it left to the States and cherishes
the support he gets at that level in the courts and from gun owners, some of whom are hostile to government involvement.
Biden’s administration favors government regulation that benefits the working
person, the environment, health, safety, and the economy.
Trump feels regulations stifle the economy, which left alone, will better
benefit the people, the old 'trickle down' con game.
While Trump believes in a literal,
‘originalist’ reading of the Constitution and
its Amendments, Biden feels it should be interpreted in terms of its
consequences for the present and the future. (The SCOTUS decision keeping Trump on the Colorado ballot was a flip-flop of these positions!)
Trump is not interested in supporting Ukraine’s battle against Russia, taking an ‘America
First’ approach. He continues not being a fan of NATO, even telling Russia to 'do what the hell you want' against those NATO states behind in their dues. Biden feels Russian
aggression must be stopped there with aid to Ukraine before it involves Europe and the United
States. Trump wholly supports anything Israel does to defend itself while Biden, while still
supporting Israel, still hopes for a two-state solution there, recognizing
Palestinian concerns. Trump supports a one-state solution, favoring Israel’s extremists and Bibi Netanyahu. Both
see China as a growing economic adversary but
Biden seeks a way of working with them, setting firm rules, while Trump
manifests hostility as the best course for us.
There it is.
Take your choice!
* *
Recommendation:
It is bothersome that Donald Trump admires autocratic
heads of state like Hungary’s Viktor Orban and of course, Vladimir Putin, whose
views of democracy differ from what has always prevailed in the United States. He
is a potential ‘strong man,’ if not a dictator, and that is reason enough NOT
to vote for Trump. While Trump may claim that
Biden has ‘weaponized’ the government against him, that is not so. Biden’s administration has merely executed the
laws passed by Congress, which is what these two branches of our government are
constitutionally designed to do. It is from such carrying out of our laws that the defeated former president's legal troubles come. But remember, no one is above the law, even a former president.
I would be remiss if I didn’t report the beginnings of a faint tremor I sense suggesting that Donald John Trump might not be the
Republican nominee in November, after all.
His increasing moments of irrationality, ignited by legal and money
problems that would torment and unnerve the most stable of people, may result
in a total mental collapse driving him over the precipice deeper into the false reality that has long captured
his mind. Just look at his face lately! Nikki Haley, Mike Pence, and Chris
Christie (now suddenly back in the fray) stand ready to replace him, if Republicans decide
to dump him before it is too late.
* * *
Locally, it is important to donate to Democratic candidates who are in close races where your support is crucial. In Florida, that means voting for Debbie Muscarsel-Powell for the United States Senate. She has a great chance of putting Rick Scott (who seems to be against everything good about America) out to pasture. Learn about her, and donate, at https://www.debbieforflorida.com/ or just CLICK RIGHT HERE.
 |
| Florida's next Senator, with your help, Debbie Muscarsel-Powell |
* * *
Poetry Corner Goes Political
A woman’s choice,
Put to the vote,
Defeats the lies
Shoved down our throat.
Should we allow
A gun or two,
Defense against
What some might do?
Make up your mind,
Don’t let it slide,
These are the things
You must decide.
It’s up to you,
It’s up to me,
It’s part of our
Democracy.
JL
* * *
College Sports Gambling - and Transfers
I continue to be dismayed by the number of online gambling sites advertised on television and of course on the internet. They all say that their customers must be age 18, but that is pretty difficult for them to accurately confirm. The net result is that betting on college sports events comes off as being a normal, legitimate, thing to do. It isn’t. And this misconception is being established in the minds of young people.
Back in the day (an expression I dislike
because your day may differ from mine), a guy who dropped by the corner candy
store each afternoon would take bets along with letting you pick the ‘numbers’
for that day. We knew it was illegal,
but the individual amounts wagered were piddling and nobody usually got
hurt. If someone did, they deserved it
for not paying what they owed if the local bookie had been dumb enough to
extend betting credit to them. This kind
of wagering is not to be confused in the well-regulated betting systems at
racetracks or in State-sanctioned ‘off track betting’ facilities.
There are many aspects of sports that can be
bet on, ranging from scores, total points scored, margins of victory, parlays
of several events, race results, to individual performances. This leads to fans screaming at a basketball
game for a coach to leave his starters in for the last minute of a game in
which his team is leading by twenty points, because the ‘spread’ was that they
were favored to win by at least nineteen and a half points, or a particular
player was just short of the number of points the oddsmakers had predicted he
would score.
Combine this acceptance of sports gambling as
legitimate with the ‘transfer portal’ whereby talented college athletes find it
easy to switch schools, usually for a better chance of making it to the NBA or NFL
or making more money from a better deal using their name, image, and location
(NIL) from marketers. Some of the
low-seeded teams in the current NCAA basketball tournament are performing very
well because of players who, were it not for the ‘transfer portal,’ would be
playing at schools where basketball is played at a higher level, although perhaps
sitting on the bench there. We consider
them to be ‘student-athletes,’ but ‘athlete-students’ might be a better way of
referring to them.
If *Podunk
College managed to recruit, via the ‘transfer portal,’ half a dozen Big Ten,
Big East, SEC, or ACC players who might be only the ‘sixth or seventh’ players
at their present schools, Podunk’s team would possibly rise to the top of
Podunk’s lower ranked conference, getting them a bid to the NCAA ‘March
Madness,’ and a rise in the national polls as well, especially if the players
they acquired through the transfer portal all were at least six foot nine in
height.
As for that ‘transfer portal,’ I continue to be
puzzled by ‘student-athletes’ like Jack Gohlke who led Oakland College, a
school no one really ever heard of before (it is a renamed version of Michigan
State’s satellite campus in Oakland, MI, founded in 1957) to an upset victory
over Kentucky in this year’s NCAA March Madness. He played for five years at Hillsdale College
(yes, that bastion of conservative ideas) at a lower competitive level and is
now doing ‘graduate’ work at Oakland, playing his sixth year of college hoops.
C’mon, this kind of ‘gaming the system’ creates what I would call a class of ‘professional
college athletes.’ Also in this
category, and there are many, is another wandering ‘professional college
athlete,’ the University of Connecticut’s Cam Spencer, whose basketball journey
has taken him through Loyola of Baltimore, Rutgers, and now a fifth year at
Connecticut, a team favored to win the NCAA championship next weekend.
Right now, in the headlines, read about how
baseball star Shohei Ohtani’s interpreter is in deep doo-doo for swiping big
bucks from his employers to pay off gambling debts to the tune of about half a
million dollars. While Ohtani wasn’t
involved, it is very difficult to separate the worlds of gambling and
sports. I find it hard to believe that
this guy’s bookie (an illegal one, not the online version) let him run his tab
that high without knowing that his boss, multi-millionaire Ohtani, would
eventually be good for it. This story is
still a work in progress, but the aroma has already arrived.
We are no longer in the naïve age where the
Cincinnati Red’s Pete Rose was banned from baseball’s Hall of Fame for betting
on his own team to win, not lose, baseball games, which was what he was being
paid a salary to do, anyway.
Who wants to take bets on when the inevitable
major scandal in college football or basketball takes place? The lure of
getting more now-acceptable money from more lucrative ‘Name, Image, and
Location’ (NIL) compensation deals at other schools, and hope for a six or
seven figure professional contract, fuel the transfer portal in an environment
that encourages gambling. And these
kids, most of whom will never ‘make it big,’ have an opportunity to cash in by
playing not quite up to their abilities while still in college. It is only a matter of time.
The first step to a solution would be a
four-year contract (or maybe five), locking them into any school giving them an
athletic scholarship, but the agents of the ‘student-athletes’ have great
lawyers who have fought that successfully in court. I wonder how many of these agents’ and lawyers’
phone numbers are included among the contacts on prominent gamblers’ smart
phones.
Elsewhere, a while back on Jackspotpourri, I
explained that colleges and universities were in the ‘education’ business and
not the ‘sports’ business, and that all athletic activity above the intramural
level should be dropped by them. The
University of Chicago and MIT are good examples. If an alumni group, or another group of local
supporters wanted to hire coaches and athletes with no connection to the school
whatsoever to don uniforms and represent the school on the gridiron or
basketball court, that would be fine.
They would purchase or lease the school’s stadium and other sports
facilities and even provide a professional marching band and cheerleaders, all
dressed up with the school’s colors, and that would be fine too. They could even continue to use the school’s
traditional ‘fight on’ songs. The NBA and the NFL might even want to subsidize
such teams, from which they would recruit players, and the colleges and
universities would get a cut of whatever money such teams would make, and then
get back into the business of providing what they were established for,
providing higher education. If you are offered a bet on this happening, take my
advice, and bet against it, however tempting the odds might be.
*There is a community in central
Massachusetts, not too far from Worcester, named Podunk, but to my knowledge,
there is no college there, and little else.
JL
* * *
Housekeeping on Jackspotpourri
Strange “Hits’! The large number of those accessing Jackspotpouri from Singapore has suddenly ceased. In their place, however, there have appeared large numbers of ‘hits’ on each posting in the hundreds, as was the case with those from Singapore, but this time from Hong Kong! I suspect that the Chinese are playing around with internet transmissions, possibly to try to identify who is reading them.
Email Alerts: If you are NOT receiving emails from me alerting you each time there is a new posting on Jackspotpourri, just send me your email address and we’ll see that you do. And if you are forwarding a posting to someone, you might suggest that they do the same, so they will be similarly alerted. You can pass those email addresses to me by email at jacklippman18@gmail.com.
Forwarding Postings: Please
forward this posting to anyone you think might benefit from reading it.
Friends, relatives, enemies, etc.
If you want to send someone the
blog, you can just tell them to check it out by visiting https://jackspotpourri.blogspot.com or
you can provide a link to that address in your email to them.
There’s another, perhaps easier, method of forwarding it though! Google Blogspot, the platform on which Jackspotpourri is prepared, makes that possible. If you click on the tiny envelope with the arrow at the bottom of every posting, you will have the opportunity to list up to ten email addresses to which that blog posting will be forwarded, along with a brief comment from you. Each will receive a link to click on that will directly connect them to the blog.
Either way will work, sending them the link to https://jackspotpourri.blogspot.com, or clicking on the envelope at the bottom of this posting.
Again, I urge you to forward
this posting to anyone you think might benefit from reading it, particularly if
they are a registered voter. This is
an election year. Spread the word.
JL
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