The Sagamore Journal

THE Bowl Championship Series (BCS) commission recently rejected a proposal to create a four team playoff for the NCAA championship. One commissioner said the option was discussed, but that they decided to stick with the current plan. He was later quoted as saying, “When you look at the last 10 years of the BCS it’s clear that college football has never been healthier.”

Never been healthier? Are you kidding me? The BCS is like cancer to college football. It was supposed to be this great system that would finally eliminate debates over who the national championship team was, but instead it has only heightened the controversy due to flaws in the system and its exclusion of several conferences from consideration.

I am a huge college football fan, but the system is so messed up, I can scarcely bring myself to watch BCS bowl games . Despite being biggest grossing and most popular collegiate sport, the football national championship is not officially recognized by the NCAA.

The bowl system, with all its tradition must give way to a playoff system that provides both college football fans and participants with a satisfactory ending to the season.

Fryer Tuck is in favor of a 16-team playoff system so that the champion from every FBS conference gets a spot with 4 at large bids left over. To satisfy traditionalists, the major bowls could be used as conference championship games, while teams that don’t make the playoffs could fill out the minor bowls. Whatever the solution, anything is better than the BCS.

ON Tuesday, April 29, in a move that conjures up the bully days of Teddy Roosevelt, President Bush had harsh words for Congress and their inability to pass legislation that actually helps the American people or bolsters the ailing US economy.

Since he so rarely criticizes liberal shenanigans, I for one am always happy when Bush comes out swinging. The Bruce is frequently frustrated that a Congress with such an historic low approval rating should receive such little criticism in both political speech and the media at large while Bush himself (with a higher approval rating) is blamed for any and all problems.

*TSJ devotees will recall a past conversation regarding swinging one’s stick, which while referred to in a political discussion, was not a true example of TR’s proverbial “Big Stick“.

AFTER months of playing on voter emotion in speeches and referring to race on all possible occasions, Barack Obama has again declared we are indeed a racist people, except when it comes to the presidential election. The senator has thereby absolved those who voted for him out of guilt or along racial lines and they need not feel guilty anymore.

The Bruce is amused by Obama’s skillful avoidance of actually talking about the issues, simultaneously reminding us about racism, and making it appear that he is doing neither.

While Americans bicker and complain about high gas prices, men from Congo are waking to find their nethers threatened by warlocks and thieves.

Don Lando was incredulous at first, but who can argue with Reuters?

From that article comes this jaw-dropping lede:

Police in Congo have arrested 13 suspected sorcerers accused of using black magic to steal or shrink men’s penises after a wave of panic and attempted lynchings triggered by the alleged witchcraft.

Apparently, all you have to do to get lynched in Congo is be accused of trying to miniturize or steal a bloke’s tadger.

“When you try to tell the victims that their penises are still there,” explained the police chief, “they tell you that it’s become tiny or that they’ve become impotent. To that I tell them, ‘How do you know if you haven’t gone home and tried it?’”.

“It’s real,” said a 29-yr-old phone card salesman, “Just yesterday here, there was a man who was a victim. We saw. What was left was tiny.” 

I agree violence isn’t the answer here (though I would be enraged if I awoke to find someone had put a hex on my gear). Still, what happens when the accused are taken into the Penal System but the victims’ testamony fails to Stand Up under scrutiny?

Another recent penis story that made us say ‘lol wut?’   -> here

Tragically misguided motorists have recently been spotted with bumper stickers that read “Biofuel: No War Required”.

It is an interesting commentary, but incorrect. Let’s note the process currently playing out in our own neighborhood.

Inefficient biofuel production sucks up corn supplies at a time when US farmers are planting less. Grain prices rise, albeit not solely because of ethanol. Hungry Haitians riot, pillage, burn and generally wage war. Bumper sticker theory is repudiated.

See how quickly the biofuel argument fell apart? There may be a future salvation from fossil fuel dependency, but it’s not coming in the form of much-lauded ethanol. That seems certain. When something like 30% of the corn crop is needed to displace less than 5% of our current oil/gas needs, the technology is more than inefficient – it’s dangerous.

Perhaps the message needs a caveat.. something like “Biofuel: No War Required (but starvation possible)”

Now, who has an idea for reducing US dependence on foreign oil that won’t destabilize the global food market?

I agree with my liberal friends that the government should do things for us in exchange for all the money we give it. I also agree that for a society the size of the US to function, the citizens should pay some small tax* for the privilege of living in a free and safe nation. But not a personal income tax. The founding fathers railed against this sort of “prosperity tax” as a threat to freedom and liberty.

The problem with this government-provided-services theory in practice is that such governments grow up around us and inevitably encroach on taxpayer freedoms while offering ever fewer services. Simultaneously, citizens become increasingly dependent on government services, they stop contributing to the economy by dropping out of the workforce, and they open the door to further debt and immigration problems. 

Here is a Fact:
Of the income tax dollars that Americans must pay (or file extension on) by Tuesday, less than 10% will go to pay for services one typically expects from government. Income taxes go almost exclusively to putting a dent in the federal debt.

Now, what good does it do us to elect lawmakers who will legislate greater government control and bigger bureaucracy, when the government we have now can’t manage to live within its means? 

Whereas Americans once paid few taxes for solid protection and services, we now pay a lot of money for virtually nothing. Taxes go up while services go down. It’s a clockwork pattern: You give ‘em an inch and they take a mile. 

Our military now serves other nations. Our border guards now guard other nations’ borders. US-funded aid groups sustain unlimited numbers of non-Americans through every travail. What does the US income tax-payer receive?  A small refund on your free loan to the government.. maybe?

Americans are actually better off demanding fewer services before seeking lower taxes. Rarely do federal entities voluntarily surrender powers, especially powers that offer not just fortunes but 300 million debt-ridden slaves that are legally bound to pay government off the top, middle and bottom, and who are willing to fight in its wars and die for nothing.

We must recognize that government always seeks to grow its sphere of influence and must therefore be actively limited. Those who don’t recognize this all tend left on the political spectrum and, to my way of thinking, completely fail to see the point of living in a free democratic republic.

*Existing taxes on property, gas, sales, vices, corporate entities, etc should be sufficient

We at the Sagamore Journal occasionally find it prudent to gather up some of the many gems we’ve sown and bring them together with a overarching point, valid or not.
 
As an example, take three previous subjects at random. Let’s say crude oil prices, fat people and the feckless TSA. Now observe:
 
Runaway jet fuel prices have prompted airlines to evaluate cost-cutting measures. Alaska Airlines recently discovered it could save $10,000/year on fuel simply by removing five magazines per aircraft. What’s more, the company got itself new beverage carts, which – at 20 lb lighter than the old ones – could save upwards of $500,000/year in fuel costs.

 
Ho ho, now – are we to understand that by cutting a few pounds here and there, air travel could be cheaper? Do you see where I am going with this?
 
It’s high time the transport of human flesh was conducted on the same basis as any other cargo. You pay by the pound. If you exceed a certain weight or dimension, perhaps you pay double (i.e.: an extra seat). They do it for our luggage already, yes? That’s because of weight and passenger travel should be the same.

 I see no reason why the dietary habits or genetic makeup of an obese traveller should cause me to pay extra for a less comfortable airplane ride. The trip itself is what our money pays for; arrival is the assumed and hoped for result. Remember that.
 
My modest proposal offers greater justice than this current notion that everyone should suffer for the gluttony of a few. It’s not true for differently sized cars at the gas pump and it shouldn’t be true for differently sized people in air travel.

 We live not in a socialist commune as the ill-begot TSA would have you believe. This is a cut-throat capitalist machine, for better or worse.
 
He who chooses to move his 300-pound bulk across the skies should do so at greater personal cost than one who wishes to transport only 150lbs of flesh and bone. That’s economics.

I’ve got that old uneasy feeling that disasterous events of the past may soon revisit us.

It began shortly after Child Protective Services (CPS) entered the YFZ* Ranch near El Dorado, Texas to remove 219 133 women and 401 children from the compound of the secretive, polygamist FLDS** sect. At this time, Texas DPS and Schleicher County sheriff’s department have blockaded the road to the ranch.

 One can’t help but recall a similar scenario at the Waco compound of another Texas cult, the Branch Davidians, which concluded in fiery holocaust 15 years ago this month.

 Even the officials involved in this unfolding case are loosely talking around that point.

“In preparing for entry to the temple, law enforcement is preparing for the worst, ” said Allison Palmer, first assistant district attorney for the 51st District, adding that authorities want to have “medical personnel on hand in case this were to go in a way that no one wants.”

The FLDS takes their temple pretty seriously, it seems. Entry is prohibited to all but church believers. The group’s initial refusal to permit entry was disconcerting to Palmer because CPS investigators have yet to identify a 16-year-old girl or her roughly 8-month-old baby - which was ostensibly fathered by a 50-year-old man who had been previously convicted of underage marriage - among the over-200 removed from the compound.

“Anytime someone says, ‘Don’t look here,’” Palmer said, “it makes you concerned that’s exactly where you need to look.”
 

Fair enough, Ms. 1st Asst. District attorney, few can argue with CPS once they’ve played the sexual abuse card.  But may we advise restraint.  Righteous indignation aside, nothing will be accomplished in a raid that can’t be done with wily diplomacy.

Lawmen at Waco compound on April 19, 1993

 
*Named after leader Warren Jeffs’ song “Yearning For Zion”
**Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints

UNITED STATES jobless claims rose by 38,000 in March and the media has wasted no time reminding us that they haven’t been this high (407,000 total, initial claims) since Hurricane Katrina struck. This has naturally become a popular talking point for many.

The Bruce is disgusted by this blatant, fear mongering attempt to spur on recession and compel us to despise Bush and vote Democrat.

When beholding the tranquil beauty and brilliancy of the ocean’s skin, one forgets the tiger heart that pants beneath it; and would not willingly remember, that this velvet paw conceals a remorseless fang.* And in the grueling world of the Alaskan fishing industry, Melville’s proverbial fang can strike all too suddenly. So it came as a surprise to me to hear that many employees of Fishing Company Alaska were fiercely loyal to their company and to it’s reclusive, female owner, Karena Adler of Mercer Island, Washington.

Alder has been known to send care packages of Playboys and candy to fisherman at sea over Christmas, is rumored to have donated over $250,000 to upgrade the clinic at Dutch Harbor, Alaska, where her ships dock, and to send roses to the widows of employees lost at sea on the aniversaries of their deaths.

FCA has it’s share of problems, to be sure. In March, FCA’s Alaska Ranger sank in the Bering Sea, killing 5. Add to that allegations of tampering with government regulatory paperwork, keeping live tanks of king crab (apparently a crime), failure to report the deaths of Northern fur seals, and the refusal to join the H&G cooperative, a particular bone of contention with other fishing companies. (H&G stands for “head and guts” a fishing method that drags the bottom of the sea for rock-fish, mackerel, and other bottom species. The catch is gutted and frozen on board the ship.)

But regardless of risks and short-comings, the small, human resource touches of Karena Adler have gone a long way for those brave men living the life aquatic.

*Herman Melville, Moby Dick

On this day of trickery, the The Select Committee for Energy Independence and Global Warming is meeting to discuss and stew over high fuel prices and the idea of energy independence. I sincerely wish I could say our elected officials were intelligent enough and insightful enough to ask the correct questions and approach the real problems behind US energy dependence, but I cannot.

We all know fuel prices are up, this is no mystery. Everyone is well aware that oil values have doubled. What none of these cads seem to grasp is that federal intervention is the problem, not the companies that fuel the world. We will be trapped in an April Fools’ Day version of “Groundhog Day” unless we wake up and force these federal tentacles out of our free market.

So here are some questions that should really be addressed today (thanks to an objective, like-minded industry observer):

Who voted to delay drilling ANWR so we could have a $36.5 billion bigger trade deficit, a weaker dollar and higher crude prices?

Who voted to not drill into proven reserves off of California? Florida? The East Coast?

Who voted to increase the cost of gasoline blending by 48¢/gallon so we could have cleaner, lead-free air to breathe?  

Who debated increasing CAFÉ for years so America could need more gasoline and be more dependent on imported oil supplied by nations that do not like us?

Who voted to increase the use of ethanol - which increases NOx and VOC emissions and at best gives back 1.5 times the energy required to make it – while essentially ignoring renewable diesel fuel, which could reduce NOx, VOC, PM, CO and Air Toxics emissions while giving back 3.5 times the energy required to produce it?

When do we investigate the corn farmers who are reported (DOA in this morning’s WSJ) to be conspiring to plant 8% fewer acres this year? **Don Lando personally spoke this week with refiners who explained that ethanol is a foolish and unsustainable energy alternative that ultimately consumes more energy than it can provide

Who formally thanked the refining industry for making fuels that decrease automotive pollution 99%?

It seems to me that the all-seeing eye of US government is missing a few steps here. They should be handed a mirror before being allowed to place blame for what is essentially a socialist nightmare and the centralized regulatory destruction of our energy sector, independence and freedom.

Write or call your congressmen and women and hold their feet to the fire with FACTS, not feelings. It’s easy to blame oil companies on account of their huge returns. But we must remember that the truly free market will always manage these intricacies better than a bunch of special-interest serving lawmakers.
 

Post script: While Don Lando sees evidence that the oil companies are not primarily to blame for rising gasoline prices, he agrees that with less government intervention those companies should be willing and allowed to drill proven reserves without regard for flawed American foriegn policy decisions.