The Poor Man Institute

The self-similarity of wingnuttery:

It’s all like this.  Everything is just like this.  Some blank young person who has memorized a 5″x7″ index card of focus group-approved phrases, yelling, yelling, yelling over everyone.  And you can say what you want, and be as right as you want, but he’s going to keep yelling, and yelling, and yelling until you get sick of it, and at the end of the day everybody knows that Barack Obama goes to secret Muslim church.  Everything is like this.  An election won’t fix it.  This rules the world.

Via.

NFL professionals watch the tapes:

Trying to steal signals is nothing new in the NFL. All teams have advance scouts who watch and log opponents’ personnel groupings and record the signals they see from the sideline. The Patriots, however, took things to another level with their videotaping of opposing coaches. [...]

However, these videotapes likely were not used to make in-game adjustments because there simply is not enough time during game action and a 12-minute halftime to decipher and decode what those tapes contain. At halftime coaches and personnel staff are barely able to get a drink, use the restroom and relay to players the most basic things they saw in the first half, before the team heads back onto the field. Where the advantage lies is in the time it takes to prepare for the next game against the particular opponent being filmed: What would normally require watching and splicing hours of tape was already done in one fell swoop during a previous game.

If Scouts Inc. were running the scouting department of an NFL team, this kind of video would allow us to chart tendencies, personnel variations and play calls in a shorter time. Answers to questions about the opposing team would appear more quickly. What’s important to remember, though, is that teams eventually glean this kind of information from film study anyway: The video in question would simply be a shortcut in a process that is already under way. There is an advantage, but it is minimal. [...]

We don’t know for sure whether more tapes ever existed in New England, or how these tapes were broken down and used. But after reviewing the material released by the league, this much is clear: We saw nothing in that video that would allow us as a scouting department to provide a team with an unfair advantage over an opponent.

Yes, preparation time was reduced and film study was streamlined, but not in a way that single-handedly turned the Patriots into one of the premier teams in the league. In the end, the Patriots’ success comes down to having better players who make full use of the information provided to them.

But, of course, Mark Schlereth (of the great Denver Broncos) knows how these tapes could be used to great advantage at halftime, which is why NFL teams are constantly banging down his door to offer him coaching gigs. Oh, wait.

… Aaaand the Herald retracts. The Boston Herald, for those who don’t know, is often compared to the NY Post, but that’s not quite right. The NY Post actually does reporting. The Boston Herald is the journalistic equivalent of This Weird Dude I Met On The Bus Who Wouldn’t Stop Talking To Me, except you can clean up after your dog with it. It’s basically ten pages of transcribed Bill O’Reilly monologues followed by 5,000 pages of sports reporting, all of it ungrammatical and 99% made up. “According to an anonymously-sourced Boston Herald report” is not the way Great Tales of Journalism begin.

UPDATE: Why does Ted Kennedy hate America?

“With the war in Iraq raging on, gasoline prices closing in on $4 a gallon, and Americans losing their homes at record rates to foreclosure, the United States Senate should be focusing on the real problems that Americans are struggling with,” Kennedy said through a spokesman in response to a question posed by a Globe reporter. “I’m looking forward to another great Patriots season where they can let their play on the field speak for itself.”

Well, you all have made so much progress on this stuff over the last 18 months, it would be a shame if you got distra … Oooo! Steroids in Baseball! *Fap! Fap! Fap!* Face it: Senator Kennedy is just trying drown this young investigation before it has had a chance to blossom and mature, just like … hmmm. Well, just like something.

Wow. That was very ‘white working class‘. I believe I will spend the rest of 2008 like this:

Defibrillate me when it’s over.

Because we called a weatherman, and he told us which way the wind blows.

Former U.S. presidential hopeful John Edwards has endorsed Barack Obama for the Democratic presidential nomination, saying it is time for the party to come together behind the Illinois Senator.

Edwards, a former senator from North Carolina, told a cheering crowd in a stadium in Grand Rapids, Michigan Wednesday that Obama can create lasting change in America by “taking down the walls” that divide Americans along class lines.

Also, he can fly. It’s a good skill set.

I like Obama slightly better than Hillary. Neither one seemed particularly interested in my vote - not that anyone who courts my vote has ever won shit, so probably a smart strategy - but Obama seems to come along slightly less reluctantly to the Editorially-correct line on things; occasionally volunteers that he’d like to leave Iraq, and says so in ways I find mostly believable; and is just marginally more appealing to me as a candidate and a President than Hillary. Mostly, though, I don’t really care who wins, and think they should both drop out and endorse The Dodd for Supreme Eyebraufuhrer of the Universe. That’s what I think, and - apart from the Eyebraufuhrer thing - that’s apparently what the Democratic electorate thinks. The chicken cordon bleu sounds tempting, but we’ve decided on the caesar salad. Thanks for your time. And now we’d all like to bitch about football, more football, and maybe the progressive rock of the 1970’s, because after listening to the asshole chorus for the past several million years months, we’re pretty much sick of politics for a good, long, while. Oh, there’s a general election after this? And it’s going to be a billion times stupider more annoying? Wonderful. Excuse me while I go play in traffic.

Anyway. Hillary: whatever. You win some, you lose some. This is the latter case. Don’t be the last on your block to figure it out.

Bob Barr? Present. Ron Paul? He’ll be along shortly. Bob Dornan? … B-1 Bob? … Hello-oo? …

All signs point towards a Democratic landslide in 2008. Which is fine: a humiliating defeat would do the Republican party a world of good. But what would do that party - and the country - even more good would be a shattering defeat, the kind where the faithful abandon the party in droves, and vote instead for a bunch of wingnut space cadets. OK, maybe it wouldn’t be good for the Republican party at all, but fuck ‘em. Only: how can this happen unless Bob Dornan returns from Pluto to explain how John McCain is a brainwashed Vietcong agent:

Sen. Arlen Specter (WAH-WAH):

Sen. Arlen Specter said he thinks an independent investigation into Spygate is warranted, but he described this as “one man’s opinion” and not an indication that he will pressure anyone in Congress to take up an investigation. He said he’ll leave it up to colleagues to make up their own minds as to the merits of an investigation.

Whatever the fuck that means. For what can a mere senior Senator do?

The senator [Specter], who is up for reelection in 2010, is the ranking Republican member of the Senate Judiciary Committee. Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) briefly attended Specter’s meeting with Walsh on Tuesday and is fully aware of the situation.

A Judiciary Committee aide noted that Specter, as the committee’s ranking member, controls a minority of the committee budget and can therefore fund some congressional action. Specter said Leahy has also agreed to authorize committee money.

Make of that what you will. Specter has a few reasons for wanting to inconvenience the NFL, as Josh Alper explains:

Arlen Specter was very upfront about part of his motivation for calling for an independent investigation into Spygate. He’s a Senator from Pennsylvania and he’s concerned that tapes made of the Steelers in 2004 may have contributed to their loss in the AFC Championship game. [In violation of league rules, and the laws of space and time - Eds.]

He was less forthcoming about another potential reason for his anger at the NFL. Specter has very close ties with Comcast, based in his state, and they’ve been fighting with the league about the placement of the NFL Network on their cable networks.

On ESPN’s NFL Live, Sal Paolantonio said “the NFL Network, just last Tuesday, filed a complaint with the FCC against the Comcast Corporation for discrimination. They want those NFL Network games to go on the regular tier.” Because they’re dealing with the federal government and because Specter is so close to Comcast, they need to tread lightly lest the league make more of a mess for itself in Washington.

Please, please, please conduct an independent league-wide investigation of the NFL. You could start here. Also, while I personally know a ton of guys who are 270 lbs and can run a 4.4 40, I have heard certain wags suggest that there is rampant steroid use in the NFL (and the NCAA, and in high school, etc.) What will wags say next? That the most common blood type in the NFL is anabolic? That the official breakfast cereal of the NFL is Intravenous Elephant Testicle Crunch? That you’d have to be a fucking lobotomite not to know this? Still, if you happen to run out of mescaline, and begin to suspect that Mark Schlereth is a complete fucking lobotomite, you might want to take the investigation in that direction. Just a suggestion.

A lot of people will think I’m saying “fuck the fucking NFL”, but that’s not really true. The NFL has always taken very seriously its mission to popularize the sport of professional ice hockey. It has also understood that professional football’s main competition on Sunday is the Methodist church c. 1890, and so has worked hard to ban dancing, and enjoyment of life generally. Because the fans demand it! These accomplishments are all the more impressive when compared with MLB, where a powerful players’ union does most of the really important sport-ruining, leaving the league free to do other things, like uh, fellate the players’ union. What I’m really saying is “fuck the fucking NFL, and the Congress can’t going to accomplish shit until Bush is gone, so they might as well give us a circus.” Bring it on, Arlen. Bring it on.

… Elsewhere, and elsewhere.

ROFL Cohen is making sense:

In 2000, I boarded John McCain’s campaign bus, the Straight Talk Express, and, in a metaphorical sense, never got off. Here, truly, was something new under the political sun — a politician who bristled with integrity and seemed to have nothing to hide [*coughcough* Keating Five *coughcough* - eds]. I continue to admire McCain for those and other reasons, but the bus I once rode has gone wobbly. Recently, it veered into the mud. [...]

At 71, McCain would be the oldest man ever elected president, and so age has to be a consideration. My concern for the moment, though, is not McCain’s physical age but his intellectual age — his willingness to revise his views and grapple with the new. Thus far, he has shown scant desire to do any of that.

He’s been running around the country costumed as a George W. Bush conservative. McCain’s tax plan is a joke [...]

And ROFL knows from jokes. He’s a funny guy.

Bingo:

Missouri and at least 19 other states are considering passing laws that would force people to prove their citizenship before they can vote. These bills are not a sincere effort to prevent noncitizens from voting; that is a made-up problem. The real aim is to reduce turnout by eligible voters. Republicans seem to think that laws of this kind will help them win elections, but burdensome rules like these — and others cropping up around the country — pose a serious threat to democracy and should be stopped. [...]

There is no evidence that voting by noncitizens is a significant problem. Illegal immigrants do their best to remain in the shadows, to avoid attracting government attention and risking deportation. It is hard to imagine that many would walk into a polling place, in the presence of challengers and police, and try to cast a ballot.

There is, however, ample evidence that a requirement of proof of citizenship will keep many eligible voters from voting. Many people do not have birth certificates or other acceptable proof of citizenship, and for some people, that proof is not available. One Missouri voter, Lillie Lewis, said at a news conference last week that officials in Mississippi, where she was born, told her they had no record of her birth. [...]

As with Missouri’s proposed amendment, the driving force behind strict voter ID requirements in general is not a genuine effort to prevent fraud, since there is virtually no evidence that in-person voter fraud is occurring. It is, rather, the Republican Party’s electoral calculations. Barriers at the polls drive down voter turnout, especially among the poor, racial minorities and students — groups that are less likely than average to have driver’s licenses, and that are more likely than average to vote Democratic.

See also Gonzales, Alberto - embarrassing resignation of. But the bullshit won’t stop. The bullshit never, ever, evereverever fucking stops.

Hilarious:

NEW YORK — After meeting with former Patriots video assistant Matt Walsh for more than three hours, NFL commissioner Roger Goodell said no new information had come to light as a result and indicated that the Spygate scandal had run its course.

Goodell also said he was told by Walsh that the Patriots did not have a videotape of a walkthrough practice of the St. Louis Rams prior to the 2002 Super Bowl.

Also, the tapes were not used in-game, something regular visitors to planet Earth had already come to suspect. However, there was the bombshell announcement that the Patriots had been taping the opponents’ cheerleaders. Teh oh noes! Evil Bill Belicheat is stealing our dance moves!

This shocking announcement does lend some credibility to the mysterious NEInsider, who either had access to the Patriots tape library or is a very good guesser:

We were wrong and made a mistake. We as an organization failed and it will never happen again. Every NFL memo is now processed, analyzed, passed thru legal, and presented to both Bill, Scott., and all the coaches with the potential legal ramifications so EVERYONE knows what not to do.

That said here are the simple facts I know about Spygate and WalkthruGate:

1. We taped defensive signals and offensive formation signals and we still have video of other teams taping us. They are of little value since no team uses the same signals even from game to game, quarter to quarter, and sometimes from series to series. We do it to FORCE the opposition to stay on thier toes and change signals hoping they mix up signals and have a bad play that results in a big play for us. There are no offensive signals only formation signals which are useless and they were taped at the same time as offensive signals and WERE possibly even on the Spygate tape. Any claims are baseless on this. [...]

3. We did not want the tapes destroyed. We preferred they be released since they basically proved we did nothing since some of the tapes destroyed were processed tapes that prove there was little value to us other than aggravating the other team . Several showed coaches waving to our videographer, several other with obscene gestures, coaches laughing at us, and some hot cheerleader video for the enjoyment of those given the boring job of proecessing video that had zero intrinsic value.

I doubt it was purely a mindfuck, or else you wouldn’t bother editing the tapes and keeping them for years (although this does jibe with Jimmy Johnson’s take, who might possibly know more than you or I.) You could probably study them to figure out if an opponent’s coaching staff was able to read your playcalling and adjust, or if they were just flailing. Also, this guy could be a full-of-shit-fanboy like the rest of us. As he spends all the rest of his time having a five-alarm orgasm over the Pats’ draft class, you’d better hope so.

It’s never going to end. It will never, ever end:

From Day 1 of the Spygate saga in September, the controversy over New England’s illicit videotaping practices has centered on the Patriots’ efforts to steal their opponents’ defensive signals. But the tapes delivered via FedEx to NFL headquarters in New York on Thursday morning also include evidence of an effort by New England to steal offensive signals, which would broaden the extent of the team’s surveillance operation.

It would have to broaden it into some other sport, as Pro Football Talk explains:

[T]here’s no such thing as “offensive signals.” At least there aren’t “offensive signals” in the same sense that there are (or, given the coming use of radio receivers for defensive players, were) “defensive signals.” On defense, the coaches signal in the play to the players on the field. On offense, the play is called into the quarterback via the radio in his helmet.

Presumably, the tape created by Walsh shows the hand signals made by offensive coaches to alert the players on the field, and on the sidelines, to the personnel groupings that would be used, such as two running backs, one tight end, and two wideouts, or two tight ends, one running back, and two receivers.

Here’s how one source explained the process to us: “A play ends and the offensive coaching staff yells out on the sideline and simultaneously puts up a hand signal. Let’s say they want ‘regular’ personnel, which is two backs, two receivers and one tight end. The signal would be something like putting one finger in the air. The coach holds it up, but generally so do the players that are running on the field. The whole world sees it.”

And one group of folks who see it are the advance scouts from other teams who are attending the game for the purposes of, among other things, figuring out the number of fingers that are put in the air for each type of offensive grouping. It’s a simple process, and it’s a code that doesn’t require much effort to crack.

That’s in sharp contrast to the signals used by defensive coaches to call in defensive plays, which entails a level of intricacy that would require Rain Man-style abilities to decipher on the fly. [...]

So there’s really nothing to it. And, as others have pointed out, the rule that the Pats broke relates to taping generally, not to the taping of offensive or defensive signals. Thus, the presence of one tape with “offensive signals” doesn’t constitute the kind of new evidence that will land the team or coach Bill Belichick in a fresh vat of boiling water.

We know that plenty of folks who don’t like the Patriots and/or media figures who want to see a compelling story fill the slow months because now and July hope that some previously undisclosed proof of cheating will emerge. If it does, it most likely won’t come from the Walsh tape with the “offensive signals.”

Maybe they are tapes of coaches “flipping the bird”? In any case, I eagerly await the existance of game film to be held up as evidence that the Patriots are stealing their opponents’ uniform designs, or their secret “snap-the-ball-to-start-the-play” signal, or perhaps their super-top-secret plan to put 11 players on the field. Isn’t it time for Pacman Jones to beat up somebody in a strip club already? The vultures are getting stupid.