The SoapBoxers

My Rockies were 11 games out of first place on August 22.  At the end of the day on Sunday, they had pulled to within 1 1/2 games of the division leading Padres and Giants – courtesy of a 10 game winning streak.  A loss to San Diego on Monday dropped them 2 1/2 games back – but with 17 games left in the regular season, the Rockies could once again make some noise down the stretch.

As impossible as it seems, Carlos Gonzalez has been overshadowed in recent days by Rockies shortstop Troy Tulowitzki.  Tulo has reported that his wrist is now feeling completely healthy – and Tulo has provided evidence of this by hitting 9 homers in the last 11 games.  Tulo’s career has been sidetracked slightly by injuries and some slows springs, but he is going to be one of the elite shortstops in the game for years to come.

CarGo’s pursuit of the elusive triple crown also seems unlikely at this point, as a hot stretch by Albert Pujols of the Cardinals has put the home run race out of reach for CarGo – barring a Tuloesque stretch of homers.

With the playoffs in sight, we get very different pictures from the two leagues.  In the American Leagues, it’s a foregone conclusion that the Yankees, Devil Rays, Twins, and Rangers are going to the post-season – although there is a possibility that the White Sox could make some noise in the Central.  The Yankees and Devil Rays are locked in a tight battle for the division lead – the loser will be the wild card.

In the National League, the Reds are the only team that can be very comfortable at this point, holding a 7 game lead against the Cardinals.  The Phillies lead the Braves by a game in the East and the Padres lead the Giants by a half game in the West.  None of these four teams is guaranteed a playoff spot – one of them will definitely miss the playoffs, and a late surge by the Rockies could result in two of those four teams missing the post-season.  The sports world might be focused on football, but there is a lot of great baseball drama yet to unfold.

A bit of drama that will unfold after the season involves Yankees star Derek Jeter.  Although it doesn’t get the attention of A-Rod’s salary, Jeter’s 20M+ salary in 2010 is among the highest in the game.  He is a Yankees icon – accumulating more hits than any other Yankee in history.  His post-season heroics have been replayed again and again and again and again.  Jeter leaving the Yankees would be like Peyton Manning leaving the Colts.  If Jeter ends up in Boston, Yankee fans will be storming Brian Cashman’s estate with torches and pitchforks.

Jeter is a free agent at the end of this season.  How much will the Yankees need to offer him to retain his services?  Will they recognize his obvious PR value and keep him near his current salary?  Or will they realize that he’s a 36 year old player in the midst of the worst season of his career, and make an offer commensurate with those facts?  Can they expect him to bounce back in 2011 – or is 2010 the beginning of the end for Jeter?  The mid-30s are unkind to many baseball players, with marked decline in performance being a common occurence.  If Derek Jeter wasn’t Derek Jeter and was instead more of a nomad (thus not eligible for a “loyalty bonus” from his employer) how much would he get?  $6 million per year?  10?

And the interesting quirk is that since Jeter will be a type A free agent, he could draw minimal interest in free agency.  If the Yankees offer arbitration and Jeter declines it, a team signing him would need for forfeit a first round draft pick to the Yankees when they sign him.  The Mets may have been able to con the Braves into signing  a declining Tom Glavine, but I’m willing to bet that some teams paid attention and came to the realization that forfeiting first round talent for a few years of mediocre performance from a declining star is not a great deal.

I just feel that I have to make one more comment, well several actually. If someone owns a book and wants to burn it, they have every right to do so. If someone can buy a property and establish a place of worship, they have every right to do so. If they are doing something to make a statement and annoy other people, that is their right, at least in the United States. These decisions just make them jerks.

I am personally glad that the Koran burning did not happen. I also hope that it never does. Back in the 1950, when zealots took books from schools and public libraries to burn, that was a crime of theft and destruction of public property. When they go out and buy copies of the Koran to burn, that is just bad taste and poor economic choices.

As far as the Mosque goes, I tried to do a little research. There is very little hard data for the religious demographics of Manhattan or for that matter, the number and location of Mosques. Based on a Columbia University study, and Google Maps (neither professes to be a good source), there are roughly 102,000 Muslims in Manhattan with 17 Mosques. There are roughly 1,029,000 Christians in Manhattan with 173 churches. That seems to be parity. The existing Mosques and Churches are pretty evenly spread around the island, with only 1 Mosque on the southern tip, but 26 churches in the same area.

As far as parity goes, are we claiming that only Christians who work in the financial district deserve easy access to their places of worship? This would seem rather presumptuous. Is it bad taste to open one that close to ground zero? I don’t think so since there is one even closer according to Google Maps. Is it rude to make it a 13 store building and name it Cordoba House (referencing the first major victory of Islamic conquest in Spain)? To me, this starts pushing to towards jerkdom, regardless of how reasonable and calm the good Imam sounds on CNN.

We have to remember, we are in the United States, and that means anyone can act like a jerk any time they want as long as they do not actually harm anyone. This is not true for other countries. For example, in Canada, you can be put in prison for hate speech if you quote the Bible against homosexuality (interestingly, quoting the Koran for the same purpose has not resulted in prison yet, but give them time). In Saudi Arabia, bringing a Bible into the country can result in prison time, and opening a Christian church is forbidden (except in military bases for foreign armies and at foreign schools).

I feel very fortunate to live in the Unites States, where anyone can stand on a corner and expose all of their prejudices for the entertainment of the all who will listen.

This story features the debut of Detective Erin Harker – the famed Master of the Obvious.  Erin will be a recurring character on Fiction Friday, using the obvious facts to solve crimes – in much the same way as the great Sherlock Holmes.  Without further ado, Master of the Obvious: Phoning It In.

Dwight was jerked back to reality by the shattered window. In a single moment, the relaxation from a month in Europe was completely reversed. He was stick to his stomach – his car had been violated by a vandal.

Dwight noticed that the car stereo had been yanked partially out before the thief had abandoned his efforts. He breathed a sign of relief – the thief had been interrupted in the middle of the crime. He’d just get the window repaired and all would be right with the world.

A minute later, Dwight realized that the thief hadn’t run off with his tail between his legs. The stereo had been abandoned in favor of a tastier prize – Dwight’s Droid was gone. It would have been useless in Europe, so he had left it behind. Now it was gone for good. Dwight could feel nausea setting in.

Dwight jogged back to the terminal and found a pay phone. He hoped that a quick call to his cell carrier would resolve the problem. Wiggity Wireless was happy to suspend service on the phone – but not willing to waive charges that the thief had rung up. It was his phone, and his responsibility.

Dwight’s bad day got worse when the customer service rep informed him that charges of $2315 had been incurred in the last month! Dwight angrily hung up, infuriated at the worthless phone company. Why couldn’t they have a safety net – notifying customers of extremely abnormal charges?

Dwight’s next call was to the Bayside Police Department. The case landed squarely on the desk of Detective Erin Harker. Harker assured him that the thief would be in cuffs within 24 hours.

“24 hours, boss? That’s a pretty aggressive timeline – even for you.”

Erin laughed at the comment. “Oh ye of little faith, Jacob. They don’t call me Master of the Obvious for nothing. Let’s starting combing through the phone calls made from the man’s phone.”

“Sure, but what’s the point?”

“To identify the thief, of course. The 900 numbers will be of limited value, but the others could prove quite valuable.” She perused the list for a moment. “Here we go – a couple of long calls on consecutive nights.”

“So we just call this person and ask them who they were talking to? Isn’t there a slight possibility that they might lie to protect their friend?”

“Oh, my young apprentice. Must I do everything for you?” Erin ran a reverse lookup on the phone number and grabbed her own phone to make a call.

“Shirley Dowd? This is Detective Erin Harker with the Bayside PD. We’re investigating an armed robbery two nights ago. We have a couple of witnesses who have placed you at the scene. Where were you around 8:30 PM on the night of the 17th?”

“You were talking with your boyfriend on the phone for about two hours that night? Can I get his name – we’ll need to verify your alibi with him.” Erin listened to the woman’s reply and scribbled information on the notepad in front of her.

“OK, Jacob. The perp has been identified as one Charles Wilson. Can you run by his apartment and bring him in for questioning?”

It was 9 years ago on a Tuesday morning, the weather not unlike it was for me here this morning in central NC – high 70’s, not a cloud in the sky. I awoke to my cat, Madison, nudging me that it was time for breakfast. I sat up quickly from my half-sleep and noticed it was 8:20. I was going to be late. Normally on such a beautiful day I’d get my cycling clothes on and bike down Smith Street to downtown Brooklyn where I’d catch the Brooklyn Bridge footpath and ride over to Manhattan, usually crossing the City Hall complex through the gardens and then riding down Broadway to work at 1 NY Plaza.

But not today, I was late. I fed Madison, scrambled to get some clothes on and half walked, half jogged to the F-line subway station at Smith and 9th, about 2 blocks from where I worked. I figured I’d be about 5-10 minutes past my normal arrival time of 9:00. The subway went underground after the next stop and I fell into my normal routine of staring at the NYC subway map on wall so as to not make eye contact with anyone. About 10 minutes later the train pulled into Borough Hall station and I quickly exited and climbed the stairs to transfer over to the N/R Borough Hall station (they are not connected underground, but because I used a MetroCard the transfer was free). Another subway trip, this time the N/R line to Whitehall Street station which was right on One NY Plaza, where I worked. It was just a few minutes after 9:00 when the train pulled into the station, I got out and did my usual rush to get ahead of the crowd and started going up the stairs 2 at a time. I was about halfway up the last staircase when it happened.

New York City, especially lower Manhattan during the day, is a noisy place. Living there for a while you get acclimated to strange and loud noises. I don’t think my mind first noticed the extremely loud jet airliner noise but I do remember focusing and pondering for a second or so when I heard a massive boom that sounded not unlike a piano soundboard breaking. Yes, a piano soundboard. It’s a pretty unique noise, because all the strings snap at once and create this massive cacophony of both resonance and dissonance at the same time. A second after that, just as I was coming up to street level I heard what was clearly the sound of people screaming – not just a few people, tens of thousands of people screaming. I looked north, where the noise was coming from, and saw hundreds of people in the streets, moving south. I looked eastward toward the large, open plaza part of One NY Plaza and almost immediately saw a co-worker; Myung, and he looked scared. I can honestly say in the 4 years I had known him while working with him he had never appeared scared before. I quickly walked up to him and asked, “What’s going on?”

“F*cking terrorists, it had to be. They crashed a small Cessna into the North Twin Tower to get everyone’s attention, and then just now crashed an airliner into the South tower.”

I took that bit of news with about as much grace as anyone else would; my jaw probably dropped and I said, “What?!”

“Yeah, just now. 767 or something. It came from that way and slammed right into the twin towers.” He pointed South and drew a line through the air from the direction of Staten Island toward where the WTC would be if we had clear sight lines to it. I started walking toward Broad Street where I’d be able to look north and see the WTC. I didn’t get halfway across the plaza when I saw my boss and the other 5 members of my group. They had spotted me and were walking towards me.

Jim was my boss. He was only a few years older than me and was at first glance the perfect California surfer dude. He was tall, had perfectly spiked blonde hair, good looks, and was well tanned. I didn’t even have time to ask what was going on, when we were all within a few feet of each other he said, “We’re getting out of here, all of us, back to my place. We’re taking the ferry – it’ll be safer over in Jersey. I don’t think we should stay here or take bridges out of Manhattan. In fact, everyone in my group but myself and the other Netware/Windows guy, Phil, lived in central Jersey so it made sense that they’d all want to head back there. I thought about it for a moment and then told them that I had to get home to my roommates and to make sure my cat was safe if things got worse. I expected protest, even being ordered to go with them on the ferry to Hoboken, but Jim just nodded and said, “Ok, man, good luck. Keep in touch with the pagers.” Everyone in my department had two-way pagers with mini qwerty keyboards. Jason, my best friend at work, extended his hand, shook my hand and said simply, “good luck.”

I made my way through the crowd on the plaza to Broad Street and that’s finally when I looked up and saw the Twin Towers. The south tower almost completely obscured the view of the north tower, but I could clearly see the massive, smoldering hole where the 2nd airliner had hit. With the way winds are in lower Manhattan, this was the first time I could smell it too. Ever smell burnt electronics? It was pretty close to that, with a bit more of a sharp smell of metal burning. It was absolutely surreal to see a massive hole in what was the most iconic view of NYC for me. Jason had taken a few pictures of it before they left the 31st floor where I worked:

View from rooftop of One NY Plaza, looking north – note we were directly in line with both towers and you could only see the southern tower as it obscured all of the view of the northern one

 

View from 31st floor of One NY Plaza shortly after the first plane hit

 

A few minutes later, same vantage point

 

South tower after being hit by the 2nd plane

 

South tower just a few minutes before collapsing

 

I continued on up South Street, walking at a pace just slow enough that I could stare in disbelief at the WTC without bumping into anyone else. My plan was to take the Brooklyn Bridge footpath across and then walk down Court Street all the way home. It was about at South Street Seaport that I noticed a lot more than the normal clutter and mess on the street. The street was teeming with fairly fresh paper. I looked down and picked one up – it was a resume. I folded it up, put it in my pocket, and wondered if that particular person were still alive or not, or if they were even there. It could have been someone scheduled to interview next week. It could have been someone there for an interview that day. For all I knew in my state of disbelief and shock it could have been someone on one of the planes – I was always too scared to go back and look at that resume and see if the owner of it had died, and now I can’t find it after having moved from NYC. At this point police had started to organize the chaos a bit and there were more than a few of them directing pedestrian and vehicle traffic. I think it was at Beekman Street that I turned north-west and started to move toward the entrance of the Brooklyn Bridge footpath. I moved up Beekman for a few blocks, past Pace University and toward Park Row. I was just going past the Downtown Hospital where there were quite a few police officers gathered and I overheard one of them saying to someone else that emergency crews were using the Brooklyn Bridge and all civilian traffic was being routed up to the Manhattan Bridge. I decided to double-time it at that point. I also realized at that point that my family and my girlfriend would be worried about me. My parents were in England on a long overdue second honeymoon so they had almost no way of getting in touch with me.

While on the few blocks from St. James Place to the Manhattan Bridge I pulled out my phone and tried a few times to reach my girlfriend, getting nothing but busy signals. I pulled out my pager and wrote up a simple text message – “I’m ok, walking home to Brooklyn right now” and sent it to her e-mail. She’d later tell me that despite the initial panic and dread of hearing the news and getting nothing but busy signals trying to call me, she almost immediately thought of checking her e-mail. My sister wasn’t so level-headed or lucky. She didn’t have an e-mail address that I knew of or remembered back then, so I sent her a text-to-speech message that would prompt her to press “1” to listen as a computerized voice read off what I put in my pager. I would find out later that she must have thought it was some sort of automatic warning/emergency response and that they were calling her because I was injured or dead. I may be a pretty technical person, but apparently my sister isn’t.

It was almost 10:00 and I was a few hundred feet from the Manhattan Bridge on Bowery Street by that point and the smell was already making it uncomfortable but not hard to breathe. I had been pausing to look up at the towers every so often and did so right then. With Columbus Park and City Hall Park being a majority of the land between where I was and the WTC, I had a clear view right at that point, and was staring right at the South Tower as it began to fall. From my vantage point I could more feel than hear the rumble of the collapse and the steel girders rattling around sounded not unlike a massive set of wind chimes. It was such an unexpected noise that I remember specifically thinking that exact thought: “wow, that sounds like a giant set of wind chimes.” A large woman in her 40’s next to me screamed, “oh, God!” and stumbled as she tried running toward the bridge in shoes clearly not meant for running. The white cloud of pulverized concrete, dust, ash, etc came rushing out in all directions and while it certainly reached where I was standing it wasn’t nearly as bad as what many saw and videotaped. One of my co-workers still in One NY Plaza managed to look down and take a few pictures of what that looked like:

Here’s the view northward, pretty much the same direction as the previous pictures sans WTC

 

This is looking down at Broad and Water Streets, covered in 5-6 inches of concrete dust, ash, and who knows what else. If I didn’t know any better I’d say it was winter and the whole area was covered in dirty snow.

 

I moved across the Manhattan Bridge footpath at a brisk pace at that point. About the middle of the bridge my pager went off, it was a message from Jason saying that he had seen the tower collapse and heard reports that the Pentagon and a State Department building had been hit as well. I thought the same thing he did: that it was raining airplanes and someone had declared war on us. I think I broke into a full-fledged run at that point to reach the Brooklyn side. I was thinking the worst: there would be more planes crashing and a lot more panic would devolve into looting and riots. I was going over a mental list in my head of things to do when I got home: break out the cat-carrier and get Madison into it, get some bottles of water together, get my baseball bat and pepper spray easily available, and then bunker down and prepare for armageddon.

I didn’t know what kind of chemicals I was breathing in at that point, having been in the dust cloud that spread when the south tower collapsed. The smell of burnt metal/electronics was even more pungent at that point, so as soon as I got to the Brooklyn side of the bridge I went into the first corner store I found and went to buy a bottle of water; I was going to get my bandana out of my backpack and soak it in the water and put it over my nose and mouth so I could at least have a bit of a filter from the stench. I went to the cash register to buy the bottle and a very rotund man with a thick Brooklyn accent turned to me and pointed to a small TV in the corner and said, “Didja see that sh*t? It just fell. Crazy.” He saw me getting out my wallet to pay and said, “Don’t worry about it. Pass on the good deed to someone else who might need it. We gotta all stick together with sh*t like this happening.” I gave him as heartfelt a smile as I could manage and was able to say thank you without my voice cracking too much at the really kind gesture he had just made. I went back outside and started for home, just about 2 miles straight down Court Street. I walked fast. I was in my late 20’s and in good shape but was still walking fast enough that my legs were burning a bit. All over there were police with traffic stopped letting various vehicles through. At the corner of Court and Atlantic there were police cars all over and they had quite obviously commandeered a bus and were loading it with police to drive across to Manhattan.

I don’t quite remember when I got home, I have to guess just after 10:30, because when I walked upstairs to our third floor walkup my roommate Andy was there – I hadn’t heard a peep from him before I left that morning so I thought he had gone to work. Turns out he was taking a mental health day and had only woken up around 10:00, not having any idea what had happened. He told me he kept hearing sirens go by (we lived a block from the Brooklyn side of the Brooklyn/Battery tunnel) and had half-slept through most of it, only turning on the TV to CNN when he saw the smoke coming from the direction of lower Manhattan out our back window.

“I saw the south tower fall. Collapsed.” I said to him.

“Both of them,” he said somberly. “North one just a few minutes ago.”

I got out both of my pepper spray canisters and set them on the kitchen counter. Andy didn’t seem too concerned, so I held off on my plan to get my baseball bat out, and picked up Madison and sat down on the couch to watch the news. Every few minutes I’d try calling my girlfriend and my sister. At some point that morning I sent a page to my co-worker Mohammed, a fairly devout Muslim, that said, “There’s going to be a lot of angry people today, and I’m praying that you and your family will be safe. I know that who you call Allah and who I call God are one and the same.” I was already angry that this had happened and I considered myself fairly rational and not the slightest bit hawkish – I could only imagine the epitaphs of “glass parking lot!” and “nuke ’em all!” that were being muttered all across our country right now out of anger in the direction of Mecca.

The rest of my day was a lot less exciting. I got a response from my girlfriend telling me she’d call when she could get through. I got a tearful call from my sister saying that she finally figured out I was ok and would tell my parents I was ok. My other roommate Louis came home ok – he had been working on a construction crew that would have been driving past the WTC a few times that day. Andy’s girlfriend Penny came home from her teaching job looking like she had suffered at least 1 nervous breakdown. I sent a pager message to my immediate co-workers that I was home safe and got replies from all of them that they were safe as well. I personally knew at least a dozen people that worked in and around the World Trade Center and all of them were ok. A co-worker of mine had an uncle who died at the WTC, you might have heard of him. There was a man in a wheelchair in the North Tower who was being helped down the many flights of stairs by a few kind souls who ignored emergency responder advice to get out ASAP. One of the people helping him down who did not make it out was my co-worker Henry’s uncle.

Late Wednesday night I took my girlfriend’s parent’s car from NYC to North Carolina (where I live today). I drove through the night and ended up taking the long way through Maryland and West Virginia because I had heard DC would be near impossible to drive through. I had been planning that trip for a few weeks later anyway, but it seemed as good a time as any with everything that went on. We discussed seriously what had been discussed in passing many times before: we loved each other enough to want to (eventually) get married.

Funny that 9 years later and hundreds of miles away the weather would be almost identical.

[Editor’s note: Photos courtesy of Jason Consorti. Check out Jason’s WTC page. Click on images to see an enlarged version.]

[Editor’s note: The Angry Squirrel’s column was originally scheduled for this weekend.  However, he has already been forced the rewrite once because of the fluid nature of this situation, so his article is running today to ensure the timeliness of his writing.  Fiction Friday will occur on Sunday this week.  A new recurring character will be introduced.]

It’s times like these that I always have to remind myself of the five percent doctrine – that no matter what five percent of the population will always be crazy and it is an untreatable disease. Saturday is the ninth anniversary of the attacks on September 11th and dubbed by Pastor Terry Jones of the Dove World Outreach Center as International Burn The Koran Day. After much time publicizing the event and recent media attention and backlash from many, the wacko Jones decided to back off and cancel his event. Obviously he was looking for a graceful exit and thanks to figures like the former half term Governor of Alaska Sarah Palin earlier in the day helping him link in his mind a correlation between the community center to be built not even within view of ground zero and his little stunt, he found that out in stating he would was cancelling the event because they had promised to move the center if he cancelled his burning of the Qur’an. Granted, now once the truth be told he had no such agreement, he now is back to praying about the event and it is suspended until he can sort things out.

The gist of it to me seems that the Iman in Florida got him a meeting with the people in NYC about the center and possibly moving it, and he took that to mean they were going to move it, or more likely the case he went ahead and used that as the reason for him to have a further backtrack towards doing the event again since the truth would come out immediately after his announcement. Obviously in my opinion he was like a deer caught in headlights now with all the pressure against him and wanted his way out.

Then again if there was really a ploy from the Iman in Florida and the parties in NYC to get him to cancel it by promising him what he wanted –  which I don’t believe to be the case – I really could not blame them one bit. After all you’ll tell the guy with the gun pointed at you what you think he wants to hear so maybe he’ll lay down his gun and spare you. So even if it was all a ploy on their part, who cares.

But have no fear Pastor Jones, your movement has truly gone national at least – as many supporters of his cause on Facebook and many others across the country have vowed to burn the holy book of the Islamic faith on Saturday. And best of all for Jones an even nuttier Pastor who has a small congregation of hate preaching individuals is taking up the cause, and luckily for Jones and unluckily or the country as a whole these guys don’t know how to back down off of anything.

The Reverend Fred Phelps and his merry band of misfits are taking up the cause now. Here are some excerpts from interviews this evening from the Church’s usual spokesperson, Phelps’ daughter Shirley Phelps-Roper. In talking about Jones cancelling his event she said, “The false prophet Terry Jones caved – like all false prophets do, and like we told you he would.” She the continues to talk about how everything as usual for them will everyone else’s fault and will not be their own, “While you sissy brats browbeat and jockey with the false prophet Terry Jones–pretending like the lives of those soldiers are your political and personal pawns–we will tell you the truth. The blood of the dead soldiers is dripping off the hands of General Petraeus. The blaspheming talking heads (politicians, talk show hosts, false prophets, arrogant Pentagon-perverts) of this nation of proud sinners have put the bulls-eye of God on the backs of these soldiers. Burning the Quran could not possibly imperil your soldiers any more than you have.” Then she goes on about Muslims as well in the interview stating, “It’s time to talk to the false religious systems of the world–we’ll start with the perverted Muslims and their pedophile prophet Muhammad! We will burn your Quran on 9/11/10. To tell the world that the Muslims are the servants of God — and they will bring the final affliction to Israel and the Jews according to the promises of God.”

Now I grew up in Topeka and am quite familiar with Phelps and his clan well before they became an international sensation. They really don’t give a damn what anyone thinks of them and hate everyone under the sun that doesn’t belong to their church. They won’t back down like Jones has seemed to have done so we as a nation and mainly our soldiers abroad will have to pay the consequence for the actions. The blood will be on the radical Christians hands this time around for inciting a worldwide riot of response from their actions.

Man I wonder why whenever I heard Phelps and Jones on the news today I kept having the voice of Bobby Boucher’s mother from the movie The Waterboy going over and over in my head saying “Islam is the Devil.”

Like I said though it will not just be the Phelps’ taking up Jones’ cause now and he may choose to continue to do so himself as well with his original event. Although major media outlets have vowed not to cover images of the actual events that are to take place, it is the modern age of “journalism” and the videos will be up and they’ll spread like wildfire and cause the radicals on the other side to have many International Burn and American days.

That last point is what my main focus of this column this month was going to be (until the recent changes in the event changed how I was going to write this), which is why should outsiders not view Americans or Christians by their worst elements, when Americans and Christians want to judge Muslims by their worst elements.

Corporation: An ingenious device for obtaining profit without individual responsibility.

-Ambrose Bierce

When I hear the phrase “we the people” I think of your average Joe Citizen. I think of people down on their luck in the inner city, struggling to make ends meet. I think of a guy living in Westchester county with an acre of land and a beautifully manicured lawn. I don’t think of Exxon. Or Pfizer. Or Halliburton. Strangely enough, though, the Supreme Court of the United States thinks of those corporations – all corporations, really – in the same category as “we the people.”

Earlier this year in January with the ruling of Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, when the John Roberts led supreme court ruled that corporate funding of independent political broadcasts could not be limited under the First Amendment. This ruling was absolutely unprecedented, but was yet another small step in giving corporations power at the expense of the people. This was an absolutely partisan ruling that struck down the previous bi-partisan McCain-Feingold act that prohibited all corporations from broadcasting “electioneering communications.” In very simple terms the Supreme Court ruled that anyone is essentially “an individual” in terms of campaign donations and political broadcasts. The First Amendment, one of the few things that still separated people from corporations, was now declared by the majority opinion (5-4 almost strictly along party lines) to apply to corporations too.

Since that ruling any group whatsoever can now spend any amount of money on political advertisements that they so wish and do so in a fashion that allows them to obfuscate where the money is coming from. Combine this with the Florida court ruling that says media agencies – even ones specifically devoted toward broadcasting “the news” – are allowed to lie under the first amendment, and you have an environment perfectly set to have corporate shills and puppets running our country.

Not that they don’t already.

One of my favorite authors, William Gibson, often writes about a dystopian future where corporations rule the world by propping up cardboard cutout governments that are technically legal but amount to nothing. In these books no one thinks twice about the fact that these corporations field standing armies, assassinate anyone they deem a threat, and produce products that are known to be harmful to humans simply because they make a profit. We’re not too far from that today. This country was originally set up to be run for the people by the people – a vote by the masses would ensure the brightest would lead this country and have only the best interests in mind for the people. There already are politicians associated with certain high-power corporate entities. Joe Lieberman is widely known for being the senator from Etna, not Connecticut. The Cheney administration seemed to have the best interests of Haliburton and the military-industrial complex in mind rather than those of the country. Now that donation money can flow even more freely you’re going to see a lot more political attack ads against people the corporations don’t want in power and the people they do want in power winning more offices.

What’s one of the biggest ways a corporation gains money and power? At your expense. When Major League Baseball’s Expos were shown to be floundering economically it was decided by a consortium of MLB owners to move the team. They already had the buyer picked out, and through tax breaks, outright grants, and local government donations the Lerner Group effectively purchased the team for no money. Based on the value of the Nationals compared to the Expos it can even be argued that they were paid to take the team. Taxpayers in DC were told a stadium would boost income and revenue for the local economy, they were repeatedly told a popular lie the money would “trickle down.” from the rich to the poor. Yet here we are years later and the income gap between the poor and rich has widened, even more so in Washington DC than other areas.  [Read David Cay Johnston’s book A Free Lunch for more background on the Nationals sale].

In the 1940’s, corporations typically paid around 33% of our government’s tax income. This had failed to 15 percent in the 1990s. On the flip side, the individual tax burden has risen from 44% to over 70% in that same time frame. Corporations feel no remorse, feel no pain, don’t age, don’t worry about the environment, don’t care about the quality of food, and have only one goal: to gain as much money as possible for the few that run it. Corporations are considered people and have all those advantages, yet they don’t have the built-in regulation that most people have: a conscience. A sense of what is right and wrong. How many times can you think of a corporate disaster that cost lives or greatly damaged lives where before any government interaction that corporation jumped to do the right thing and fixed their damage. I honestly can’t think of any. Now how many times can you think of where the reverse happened, where a corporation caused massage damage or death and then dragged their feet doing the right thing and in the end never did make things whole? The Deep Horizon oil spill, the Exxon Valdez, Toyota’s acceleration/brake problem, Union Carbide’s Bopa disaster. In each of those situations I clearly remember more effort and possibly more money going into telling us they were working on fixing the problem than actually fixing the problem.

Think of how scary a world we already live in, in terms of corporate power.

Now think that the vast majority of politicians get the vast majority of their money from corporations with the express intent that the money given is to sway political decisions in corporate favor.

William Gibson, we’re not far from the ethics of Neuromancer while still being pretty far away from the technology that makes that world a wonder. I’d call that a horror book.

I’m deviating from the politics just for today. There is plenty to write about, but I’ve been pondering refinancing our home mortgage a lot and maybe someone can counsel me.

First of all, we refinanced our home in December 2009 and have an incredible rate of 4.75% for a 30 year fixed mortgage. I was happy with that and never intended to touch our mortgage again. However, that changed last week when I received a call on my cell phone.

A representative from Amerisave.com called and began talking to me about refinancing. Apparently, they still had my information from two or three years ago when I was interested in a refinancing our mortgage. Todd (the rep) told me that rates were even lower now and sent me a “personalized quote”. I looked at my Droid and found it in my Gmail spam folder. I clicked on the link and I am able to obtain a 30 year fixed mortgage with around $1800 in credits. If I were willing to pay for closing costs, I could have an even lower rate.

The questions that I continue to run through my head are: How much will the closing really cost? Will that $1800 in credits cover it? How much deviation could there be from those estimated costs that they provide on the website? I understand that escrows are in addition to the closing costs, but those should pretty well wash when we get our escrow back from our current mortgage company.

Does anyone have any feedback of suggestions? Are the specific questions that I need to ask that will help me catch any shell games that may be happening? I know this is a high pressure industry and they’re pushed to sell. However, if I can get a “no cost” refi am I truly getting a no cost refi?

Johnny went with a LOT of upsets last week and that was a mixed bag. Still a good start for the Goodman.

Straight up –11-4
Against the Spread – 9-6

College

South Florida @ Florida (-18.5) Gators have to bounce back this week after poor showing in the opener. FLA – 35- South Fla – 10

Georgia Tech (-9.5) @ Kansas – Wow Kansas looked HORRRRIBLE. GT-28- KU -7

Georgia @ South Carolina (-3.5) Early SEC Matchup…gimmie the ol ball coach. SC- 21- GA -17

Idaho @ Nebraska (-25.5) – Wake up call for Huskers before they head to Washington next week. Nebs – 35- Idaho – 21

Florida State @ Oklahoma (-8.5) – Sooners were sleepwalking last week waiting for this game. OU – 42 – FLA St – 28

Iowa State @ Iowa (-14.5) – The Battle of the cornbelt….Gimmie Herky!. IA- 28- ISU – 10

Michigan @ Notre Dame (-4.5) – might be the most interesting game of the day. MICH – 45- ND- 41

Miami (FL) @ Ohio State (-10.5) – Too tough at the horseshoe – Bunkeyes 24- MI – 21

Penn State @ Alabama (-13.5) – Roll Tide! Bama 31- Penn St – 14

Oregon (-8.5) @ Tennessee – They won’t score 70 this week but it will be enough – Ducks – 35- Tennessee – 20

NFL

Vikings @ Saints (-5.5) – Just like last year, Who Dat!?!?!? Saints 30- Vikings – 17

Oakland @ Tennessee (-6.5) Titans are way better dan da raiders….Titans 28- Raiders 10

Atlanta (-2.5) @ Pittsburgh – Steelers Defense wins this one. Pitt – 17- Atlanta 14

Baltimore @ NY Jets (-3.5) Revis Island won’t matter against the much improved Ravens attack. Balt – 21 Jets 14

On Sunday, I announced the intention to form a worldwide network of local reporters.  I neglected to mention a few things in the original article.  The first is that reporters are free to decline any opportunity for any reason.  The second is that I will attempt to suggest a few relevant questions whenever I give an assignment.  These are intended to be thought starters – you are not forced to answer these questions.  Drop me a line at kosmo@ObservingCasually.com if you have any questions.

Martin Kelly tried his hand at short story writing with The Bomber Pilot.  I like it – give it a read.

My Rockies swept the division-leading Padres over the weekend and nabbed a win against the Reds on Monday.  They are now just 4 1/2 games back in the NL West, thanks to an 11-4 record over the past 15 games.  The Padres have been free-falling as of late, and the Rockies might find themselves battling the Giants (whom they trail by 3 1/2 games) down the stretch.

Carlos Gonzalez has 10 hits in 19 at bats during the 4 games, boosting his league leading batting average to .340.  He trails NL home run leader Albert  Pujols by 4 homers and RBI leader Joey Votto by just a single RBI.  A hot stretch by CarGo would give him a legitimate shot at becoming the first NL player to win the triple crown since Ducky Medwick in 1937.  That year, Medwick paced the senior circuit with a .374 batting average, 31 homers, and 154 RBI.  If Gonzalez does win the triple crown, many people will point to his huge home/road splits.  However, as has been point out several times in the past, Coors Field boosts a typical player’s OPS by about 120 points.  The 450+ point differential enjoyed by CarGo must be due to some non-physical factors.

Today is the day that CarGo’s teammate Troy Tulowitzki will officially become one of his closest pursuers for the batting title.  Due to injury, Tulo falls just short of the threshold for plate appearances required to qualify for the batting title.  After yesterday’s game, Tulo had 424 plate appearances and the required number of PAs was 424.7.  4 plate appearances in today’s game will make him an official qualifier.

Rockies ace Ubaldo Jimenez finally notched his 18th win on Monday, in his 6th attempt.  After roaring out of the gates to a 14-1 record by the end of June, Ubaldo has run into a bit of a rough stretch, going 3-5 with a 3.98 ERA in the second half.  It hasn’t all been his fault, though.  he has lost the opportunity to win several games because of offensive struggles or bullpen woes.  In the 5 games prior to Monday, Ubaldo was 0-4 with a very good 3.00 ERA.  On the other hand, the offense has taken him off the hook in some games where he hasn’t been at his best (such as yesterday, when he gave up 4 early runs), so I suppose it all balances out in the end.

In NFL news, the Arizona Cardinals parted ways with quarterback Matt Leinart.  The Cardinals expected Leinart to be a cornerstone for them to build around – but in reality, he simply delayed their success by keeping the ball away from Kurt Warner.  Warner retired after last season, meaning that the Cardinals head into the season without their top two quarterbacks from last season.  Derek Anderson will be the starter and will be backed up by rookie Max Hall.

Jets cornerback Darrelle Revis finally ended his holdout with the Jets.  I don’t begrudge professional athletes their money (are they overpaid?), but I despise holdouts.  A contract should be respected as a legally binding agreement.  So what if you outperform the contract – you agreed to a salary and should stick to it.  If you think you’re going to outperform your contract, just sign a one year deal with a tiny signing bonus in anticipation of cashing in with the next deal.  Interestingly, there’s a posion pill in the contract.  Id Revis holds out in the next few years, the 4 year deal becomes a 7 year deal – with the final 3 years at low salaries.  Sure, you might say that a player could still hold out anyway, but this posion pill gives the team considerably more leverage, as the player cannot negotiate with any other team while they are under contract.

On this Labor day, I thought I would take up Kosmo’s challenge to write short story. For your enjoyment, a story called “The Bomber Pilot”

Forty four hours since they had taken off and just one hour way from home. Captain Andrew Decker was proud to be the pilot of a B-2 Spirit Bomber. Major Walter Hampton was his commander sitting in the left seat for this leg of the mission. They had been the flight crew for take off, the bombing run and now for landing. Captain Zachary Wetherby and Lieutenant Catherine Miller were the second crew sleeping after their trans-pacific effort.

Andrew loved flying and loved being part of the strategic bomber command. All those hot shot fighter pilots might get the girls, but he was home four nights a week in the loving embrace of his wife Rosalyn (Rosie) and playing with his kids, Emily and Andy junior.

Forty five minutes out. “Call for clearance, then wake them up,” Major Hampton ordered. “Little Rock, Spirit of Ohio, forty five minutes out, requesting clearance,” Andy broadcast. “Ohio, ping IFF,” was the instant response. Andy activated the identification device. “Ohio, we confirm, clear runway four nine, you are next in line, no traffic.” “Roger runway four nine, g’day.” Andy switched to the intercom, “Wake up, we are home.” Andy didn’t hear the groans from the sleeping area as they sat up and fastened their harnesses. They still had to de-brief before finally getting home to sleep. Cathy was single and lived in the single officer’s dorm, Zach was on deployment, his family was in Dover, Delaware. Andy and Walter had taken the last leg to be awake when they got home.

Andy remembered a Navy story of a sailor coming home after a long deployment. His letter home was “you had better meet me at the dock with a mattress strapped to your back.” The response letter was “you had better be the first man off the boat.” After two day missions, Andy felt the same way.

They landed and got through de-brief. The mission had been perfect. The target was verified destroyed, there was no politically incorrect collateral damage, and for once, the French agreed with the target. Andy had called home as soon as they had landed, and again after de-brief, but there was no answer. Rosie must have been getting Emily from school. They could never plan his return since is take off and landing schedule were classified. Oh, well, he would just surprise her.

The drive across the base to married housing was quick. Kids were out playing, other air force jockeys doing their things. Rosie’s car was parked in front of the house, she must have just gotten home. Well if she listened to the messages, she knew he was back, no surprise. He parked the bright yellow Corvette next to the little blue Prius and hopped up the steps of the front porch.

The front door was slightly open. That was odd, he would have expected it if the kids were out front playing, but they were inside. He pushed it open and called out in a booming voice “DADDY’S HOME!” There was no response. He didn’t smell supper cooking, didn’t hear the kids. He walked through the house to the kitchen and looked into the back yard, not there either. Maybe they were next door with the Wilson’s. Rosie and Jackie were best friends and the kids were about the same ages. Andy decided to clean up a bit before heading over. He went to his bed room taking off his flight suit as he walked. At the door to the bed room he stopped.

Rosie and the kids were lying on his bed. They looked like they were sleeping, but Andy knew that they were not. The spread was soaked with blood. It took him a long time before he could move, then suddenly he rushed into the room and scooped his wife up in his arms. He held her lifeless body against him, her blood soaking his flight suit and shirt. He stood, holding her and crying. He didn’t notice as his body slowly sagged down and he set her back on the bed.

When his world came back into focus, he had to do something. He ran next door and started pounding, screaming for Jackie. Jackie’s smile flickered on when she saw him, then off when she saw the blood. “Andy what has happened?” “They are dead, they are all dead,” he stammered between sobs. Jackie backed up and grabbed the phone. She called the base police without taking her eyes off of Andy. As calmly as she could, she told the dispatcher the address and that she believed that three people had been killed.

Andy just stood there, shaking and sobbing. He had been out protecting his country and he had not been there to protect his family. His energy gave out and he collapsed on Jackie’s porch.

When he awoke, he was in a hospital bed, clean, and dressed in a hospital gown. There was an MP outside the open door and a Colonel sitting next to him. “Welcome back Captain.” “Yes, Sir, have you found out what happened to my family?” “We thought that you might be able to fill us in on that Captain.” “I walked in, saw them…” he sobbed, “I tried to pick up my wife … hold her…” Andy started to cry again. “Hm, Captain, please control yourself. We would like to know what happened during the hour between your debrief and you arrival at the Wilson front porch?” “What do you mean? It was only a couple of minutes.”

“Captain, we understand the stress that missions can cause, we are just trying to determine what happened.” “I told you, I walked in and found them,” there was some desperation in his voice as he realized that the Colonel was suggesting he had killed his own family. The Colonel leaned close, “Captain, there was no forced entry, the knife was cleaned and in the sink, and the time of death matches when you were there. What happened?”

Andy realized then that the killers had heard his message. They had killed his family as he pulled up. He had warned them so they could get out the back door. He was now the only suspect.