THE SUPERBOWL---2017

New England (-3) vs. Atlanta

This (let’s hope), is a classic.  The 2017 Superbowl pits the best Adjusted-Yards-Per-Pass team in the NFC against the best AYP team in the AFC.

Atlanta, with Matt Ryan and friends, notched an 8.1 AYP for the regular season.  (Second best in the NFC was Dallas, with 6.9.)  The Patriots dominated the AFC with a 7.7 AYP, with Oakland in second place at 6.2.  If nothing else, this Superbowl validates the theory that what is needed to get to the championship game is an ability to make big plays.

Other statistical measures suggest the teams are evenly matched.  New England has an edge in point differential---they are +12 while the Falcons are +8.5.  Over the last ten games, however (eight regular season and two playoff), both NE and Atlanta are +14.3 points.  The Falcons have also played a slightly tougher schedule (48% opponent win percentage) than the Patriots (43% opponent win percentage).

On the defensive side, there can be little doubt New England has an edge, having given up the fewest points of any NFL team.  Throughout the season, Atlanta has been near the bottom of that (scoring defense) list.   However, the gap has been closing rapidly, largely because the Falcons’ defense has gotten steadily better.  Throughout the first half of the season, New England gave up 16 points/game; over the second half, it was basically unchanged at 15.1.  Atlanta, however, allowed its opponents 29 points/game over the first eight games, but over the last ten games cut that number by more than a touchdown to 21.6 points/game.

People who know about such things attribute Atlanta’s improvement on defense to its secondary, which had to reinvent itself after Week 9 when all-Pro shutdown corner Desmond Trufant went down for the season.  Atlanta’s cover-3 zone is still the foundation of its pass defense, but the use of man-to-man coverage has increased every week, with noticeable results.  It is a very young group (two rookie LBs, a rookie safety and a rookie corner), but it is extremely fast and athletic, which is a prerequisite for successful man-to-man coverage.

Those same people (the ones who know about such things), point out that the only way to beat the Patriot offense (not that it’s easy), is with man-to-man coverage.  Patriot receivers are not necessarily the fastest in the league or the most superior athletes, but they are extremely skilled in the New England system of exploiting zone vulnerabilities and finding empty places in the coverage scheme.  Brady is viewed as the best in the league at picking zones apart.  Only a defense that can play man-to-man (and not every defense has the speed to do it), can potentially give Brady problems.

I’m taking Atlanta in this Superbowl, largely because there is little to choose from between these teams and with the Falcons, I get three points.  An additional rationale is that Atlanta still seems to be improving week-to-week.  I expect a close game, and a last-minute field goal could well be the difference.

What I don’t expect is a shootout.  The average score of the last eight New England games was 28 – 15, for a total of 43 points.  The average of Atlanta games was 35 – 22 (total=57).  So how do we get an over/under of 59 points?  The defense for both of these teams has been improving as the season and the playoffs have unfolded, so why, suddenly, are we to expect an Arena Football game?  In addition, many coaches become a bit timid and conservative when thrust into the Superbowl spotlight, and that tends to hold down scoring.  In the L Superbowls played so far, only VIII have seen total points of 60 or more.

I take Atlanta (-3), but I do so somewhat reluctantly, understanding that betting against the Patriots has not traditionally been a path to riches.  I eagerly take the under 59, however.  I will be genuinely surprised if these teams score 60 or more.

Copyright2017MichaelKubacki    

CONFERENCE CHAMPIONSHIPS 2017

Green Bay @ Atlanta (-5)

If you believe in the magical march of Aaron Rodgers to the NFL Championship, pay no attention to me.  But if the Yards/Pass metric has any validity, Atlanta should dominate this game.

The Falcons’ AYP is 8.1 and Green Bay’s is 6.1.  Atlanta’s defensive AYP is better as well.  Finally, Atlanta’s point differential is 8 ½ points per game; the Packers was 2 ½.

Take the Falcons and lay the 5.

Pittsburgh @ New England (-6)

The Patriots also dominate all the categories we care about.  Point differential is 12 points per game, while Pittsburgh’s is 4 ½.  The Pats have an AYP of 7.7; the Steelers are at 5.8.  The New England pass defense also appears slightly stronger than Pittsburgh’s.

Yes, six points is a lot to lay in a Conference Championship game.  Still, I’m laying it.

Copyright2017MichaelKubacki

DIVISION WEEKEND---2017

Seattle at Atlanta (-5)

This line opened at 3 ½ and now is 5.  I’m still taking Atlanta, which has the best AYP (8.1) in either Conference.  Seattle’s AYP is 6.2.  Atlanta also boasts a point differential of 8 ½ points, second only to New England.

Russell Wilson had a very nice game against the Lions, with 210 yards on 30 attempts, and no interceptions.  An important reason they won, however, was the sudden appearance of the Seahawks’ running game, which had been largely absent all season.  It was too much for the Lions.  Even so, the score was only 10-6 after three quarters, so the final tally of 26-6 is not as impressive as it looks.

Taking Atlanta means you don’t believe the Seahawks have the shut-down pass defense that made them famous.  They don’t.  Seattle’s defensive AYP this year was 5.7.  Seven of the twelve playoff teams had a better number, including Atlanta.

Houston at New England (-15 ½)

There is no way to handicap a line like this in the playoffs.  The Patriots have the highest AYP (7.7) in the AFC, and Houston has the lowest (4.1).  New England outscored its opponents by 12 points per game.  Houston was outscored by a field goal, on average, every time they took the field.

New England will win and there is no reason to believe the game will be close.  However, they may win by 10 after leading by 30, or they may win by 30 after leading by 30.

Pass.

Pittsburgh at Kansas City (-1)

The Steelers opened in Vegas as a 1-point favorite and now are a 1-point dog.  KC wins the AYP battle 6.1 to 5.8.  They also lead in defensive AYP 5.1 to 5.5.  Point differential is the same.  And the game is in KC.

KC should be favored by 4 or 5 points.  They are not because 1) there are way more Steelers fans than Chiefs fans, and 2) Le’Veon Bell reinvented the running back position in the Dolphins game.

Bell is a nice running back.  In fact, he was 5^th best in the NFL in 2016.  However, his 167 yards last week was more the result of Miami’s injured defensive line than Le’Veon’s unstoppable nature.  The evidence of that is the way he gained those yards, which the announcers tried to tell us was something new under the sun.

Hesitation before picking a hole and running through it is a luxury that runners rarely have, but if the offensive is totally dominating the line of scrimmage, it’s what a back should do.  O.J. Simpson did it.  Jim Brown did it.  When there is NO penetration by the defense into the offensive backfield, the smart thing to do is pause for a half-second to find the best path.

Le’Veon may have a decent game against KC, but the story of the Miami game was the Dolphin injuries.

Take KC.  Lay the point.

Green Bay at Dallas (-4 ½)

The Dallas AYP is 6.9.  Green Bay’s is 6.1.   Dallas’ point differential is 7; Green Bay’s is 2 ½.  Dallas has the better numbers.

On the other side, there is Aaron Rodgers vs. Dak (don’t call me “Dakota”) Prescott.  Rodgers had a wonderful game (331 yards, 40 atts, no ints) against a very good Giants defense.  Dak, however, had a genuinely great season, with a passer rating of 104.9 (vs. Rodgers’ 104.2).  He also has a running game that must be respected, while Green Bay does not.  But now, in the playoffs, he’s a rookie again, while Rodgers already owns some jewelry.

I think Dallas wins this game, but I feel little confidence in laying 4 ½ points on them.  I pass.

Copyright2017MichaelKubacki     

THE 2017 NFL PLAYOFFS---Revenge of the Truthers

The analytic process here remains the same.  I calculate a number we call Adjusted Yards per Pass (“AYP”) for each of the playoff teams.  Total yards gained through the air is first reduced by fifty yards for each interception, and then divided by the number of pass attempts.  This year, for example, Atlanta gained 4725 passing yards with 7 interceptions.  I subtract 350 (which is 7 x 50), from the 4725.  This yields 4375, which I then divide by Atlanta’s 537 attempts.  This yields an AYP of 8.1.

AYP is a measure of a team’s ability to throw the ball down the field, or more generally, to make a “big play.”  Historically, this is closely correlated with a team’s likelihood of both getting to the Superbowl and winning it.  Other factors that people think are correlated with winning a Superbowl are not.  The league’s best running attack almost never wins the championship.  Neither does the league’s best scoring defense.  There is nothing detrimental, in football terms, with either of these qualities, of course.  A great defense may carry you deep into the playoffs, for example.  It just doesn’t put the ring on your finger.  This is why MVPs tend to have names like Brady, Montana, Bradshaw and Manning.

Since the AYP is easy to calculate, I also figure the defensive AYP for playoff teams.  This would be the adjusted yards/pass for a team’s opponents over the course of the season.  I don’t believe it’s nearly as important as the offensive AYP, but it is suggestive of the quality of a pass defense.  A defense that records 25 interceptions over a season is probably better than a defense with 8.  I assume it is, in any case.

I also note point differential, prior meetings between teams, injuries, and other items.  Then I tell you who’s going to win.  And as you know, I’ve never been wrong.

The Pretenders---Pittsburgh, Houston, Oakland, Miami, Green Bay and Detroit.

Some of these are obvious.  There are three teams that have been outscored over the course of the season: Houston, Miami and Detroit.  Nobody is picking these guys to get very far.  Oakland’s AYP is 6.2, the second-best in the AFC, so they would normally merit at least some grudging respect in the tournament, but the injury to Mr. Carr, their quarterback, and their lack of a competent backup, renders them a non-factor.  They scored only 6 points in an important Week 17 game, and they are listed as dogs to the pitiful Oilers.  Woulda coulda shoulda.

The presence of Green Bay and Pittsburgh on the “obvious loser” list may be a bit of a surprise for some, especially since they have (combined) won their last 13 regular-season games.  They also each feature a QB in possession of Superbowl jewelry.  The AYP for these teams is the story, however.  Pittsburgh’s is 5.8 and Green Bay’s is 6.1, and these numbers put them each no better than 5^th-best in the AFC and NFC respectively.  Their defensive AYPs also put them near the bottom of the playoff-team defensive AYP list.  Finally, Green Bay has outscored its opponents by only 2 ½ points and Pittsburgh’s point differential is just 4 ½.  Neither of these teams has made a habit of crushing their opposition, and that is NOT a good sign.

(A side note: as Bill James first demonstrated, the hallmark of a good team is its record in lop-sided games, not close ones.  In baseball, a team’s record in one-run games is often cited as a measure of quality, but in fact, one-run games are usually decided in a single lucky moment.  Thus, teams with a great record in one-run games in one year usually revert to the mean in the following year.  James pointed out, however, that a team with a great record in games decided by 4 runs usually gets to the playoffs, and will probably get to the playoffs the following year as well.  Since James did this research, it has been done in other sports, and the results are largely the same.  Good teams may or may not squeak past other good teams; what they usually do, however, is crush the weaklings.)

Could Get Lucky---KC, Seattle, NYG.

These teams are in this category for different reasons.  KC makes the list because they have the second-best numbers in the AFC, even though they are far behind New England.  KC’s 6.1 AYP qualifies as the third best in the AFC, and their 5.1 defensive AYP is the best in the tournament.  Also, assuming they will have to play the Patriots, they get to wait until the 3^rd week of the playoffs to do so.  I’m not looking for 2017 to be the year Andy Reid finally breaks through, but if the obvious favorites stumble, KC is well positioned.

Seattle has the third-best AYP in the NFC and the third-best defensive AYP.  Also, of the teams that have to play in the wild-card round, the Seahawks appear to have at least a plausible path to glory.  They’re still Seattle, for one thing, and their secondary gives them a chance against pass-heavy teams like Detroit (an easy match-up) and Atlanta, their certain 2^nd round opponent (assuming the win over the Lions).  Then they would have to (probably) beat both Dallas and New England, of course, so maybe “Could Get Lucky” seems a bit of a stretch.  Still….

As for the Giants, they have the worst AYP in the NFC (though they do have the best defensive AYP).  In addition, they have only outscored their opponents by 1.5 points per game.  If science is my grail, this un-scary 11 – 5 wild card team is worthy of very little respect.  Why then, would I give them at least half a chance to surprise?

There is one reason I put them on the Could Get Lucky list.  It’s because they have gotten lucky before.  I wrote them off completely in both 2008 and 2012, and they won the Superbowl both times.  In 2008, you may recall that Eli was the guy who took the trophy away from the 18 – 0 Patriots.  That was a year the Giants went 10 – 6.

The Contenders---New England, Dallas, Atlanta.

New England’s numbers dominate the AFC playoff list.  They outscored their foes by 12 points per game; the next best (KC) was 5 points.  The Patriots’ AYP is 7.7; second place is KC with 6.1.  Their defensive AYP is 5.3, which is merely on par with all the others, but certainly not worse.  They have won seven games in a row, all by at least a touchdown, and the last time they had a close game was their loss to Seattle, 31-24, on November 13.  And, of course, they don’t have to leave New England until they head off to the Superbowl.

The highest AYP in the league, however, is 8.1 and it does not belong to the Patriots, but to the Falcons, who outscored opponents by 8.5 points per game.  In the past, I have described Matt Ryan as a “mutt,” and for good reason.  His history is that of coming up small in the biggest spots, and this year may prove no different.  Ryan has never come close to putting up the kind of passing numbers he did this year, however.  Second only to Drew Brees in total yards, Ryan achieved a league-leading 117.1 QB rating (Brady was 2^nd at 112.2).  Ryan’s 38/7 TD/INT ratio also jumps off the stat page, though Rodgers’ 40/7 and Brady’s 28/2 cannot, under current federal regulations, be described as “chopped liver.”  Is it possible Matt Ryan has finally figured it all out?  Is it possible the team around him (e.g., Devonta Freeman as an emerging star all-purpose back), is good enough to challenge for the top prize?  Is it possible that the defense, though not great, is adequate?  Yep.  It is possible.

Then there’s the stinkin Cowboys, and while they come in second to the Falcons in the NFC, they are by far the best of the rest.  Point differential is 7.  AYP is 6.9 (behind Atlanta but way ahead of Seattle’s 3^rd-best 6.2).  Then there is the best running game in the playoffs, featuring Ezekiel Elliott.  THE GREATEST OFFENSIVE LINE IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD, however, is somewhat beat up at the moment, and they were more than a little over-rated even when everybody was healthy.  Also, the next time a rookie quarterback wins the Superbowl, he will be the first rookie quarterback to do so.  (Listening, Dak?)

Still, if you’re looking for somebody to tell you the stinkin Cowboys have no shot, you’ll have to look elsewhere.

WILDCARD GAMES

Oakland @ Houston (-3 ½)

Oakland is starting a QB who has never started an NFL game.  Houston has tapped Osweiler who, while he has played 15 games this year, brings in a personal AYP of 4.2, with 15 TD passes, 16 INTs and a QB rating of 72.2.  You don’t usually see NFL passer ratings that low because guys who put up numbers like that don’t get to play anymore.  But he’s the best the Texans have to offer.

This could be an ugly game, and I would take Houston if I had to choose, just because they are at home.  I pass.

Consider the total, however, which is 36.5.  The Texans only averaged about 20 points/game when they were reasonably healthy, and it may not be possible for Oakland to score at all.  I go UNDER the 36.5

Detroit @ Seattle (-8)

Stafford has not played well since he hurt his finger a few weeks ago, and Detroit has lost their last three games.  In addition, while the Seattle pass defense ain’t what it used to be, Detroit is just the sort of pass-dependent squad the Seahawks are capable of devouring.  What bothers me is laying 8 points with the suddenly-anemic Seattle offense.  I will be amazed if the Lions win this, but it may turn out to be a low-scoring game with Detroit staying close throughout.  Pass.

Miami @ Pittsburgh (-10)

Miami beat Pittsburgh 30 – 15 on October 26 in Miami.  Roethlisberger got banged around some and did not play the entire game.  Also, this was before the Steelers somehow found their qi and won the last seven games of the season.

Still….  This does not appear to be the sort of Dolphins team that, every six years or so, gets lucky enough to qualify as the loser of a wildcard game before slithering back into the python-infested muck of the Everglades for another half a decade of obscurity and 5 – 11 seasons.  One looks at the 2016-17 Fish, checklist in hand, and one’s pencil begins to dance across the page.  Defensive line?  Check.  Secondary?  Check.  Offensive line?  Yeah, sort-of.  Running game? Check.  Quarterback?  Well, there are worse QBs who have won the Superbowl, and at least this one is not named Chad.

(Beginning in 2002, state law in Florida provided that the starting quarterback for the Miami Dolphins could only be named Chad.  The statute was passed by Democrats bitter over the “hanging chads” that they believed had denied Al Gore the presidency in 2000.   In 2014, Governor Rick Scott, a Republican, finally signed a bill repealing this law and permitting Ryan Tannehill to start for the Fish.)

I’m not predicting the Dolphins will win the Superbowl, and I’m not even predicting they will beat the Steelers.  I am saying that the Dolphins now have a real football team that belongs in the playoffs.  It is also a team that beat these Pittsburghers two months ago and now is getting ten points.

I know Pittsburgh is a real playoff team, and I know they’ve won 7 in a row or 23 in a row or 126 games in a row, or whatever the hell it is, and I also know there are some meaningful injuries to various Dolphins, including Tannehill.  Nevertheless, I’m taking the points.

New York Giants @ Green Bay (-5 ½)

Trivia question: What two things do these guys all have in common---

Bart Starr, Joe Namath, Len Dawson, John Unitas, Roger Staubach, Bob Griese, Terry Bradshaw, Ken Stabler, Jim Plunkett, Joe Montana, Joe Thiesmann, Jim McMahon, Phil Simms, Doug Williams, Jeff Hostetler, Mark Rypien, Troy Aikman, Brett Favre, John Elway, Kurt Warner, Trent Dilfer, Tom Brady, Brad Johnson, Ben Roethlisberger, Peyton Manning, Drew Brees, Aaron Rodgers, Joe Flacco and Russell Wilson?

Answer: They are 1) Superbowl-winning quarterbacks, and 2) the best quarterbacks in their families.

Earlier, I mentioned 2008, when Eli Manning took his 10 – 6 Giants to the dance and beat the undefeated New England Patriots.  In 2012, Eli did it again, this time with a 9 – 7 squad against the 15 – 3 Pats.  New England had a well-known quarterback in both these games.  You may even have heard of him.  Tom Brady has won four of the six Superbowls he has started.  The only two he lost were to Eli.

My point is: it’s apparently very hard to get ANY respect in the NFL if you are not the best quarterback in your family, even if you are the only guy to beat Tom Brady in a Superbowl, and you’ve done it twice!!!!!!

Ah, but this is Lambeau, you say.  This is the freakin frozen tundra!  And Aaron Rodgers is playing for the Packers and he promised they would win their last six games and then they won their last six games!  I mean, Holy Prognostication, Batman!!!!

Well if that’s what you think, then return with me to yesteryear, little grasshopper.  In particular, to 2008 and 2012.  Brady and the Pats were not the only team Eli beat in those years.  The path to the Superbowl is always a jagged and uneven journey, fraught with hippogriffs and tsunamis and even tundras.

On January 20, 2008, the Giants donned warm sweaters for their trip to Lambeau Field and the NFC Championship Game, because the temperature that day was absolute zero and all molecular and atomic movement had ceased two hours before kickoff.  Nevertheless, the despised Eli Manning felled the legendary Brett Favre (maybe you’ve heard of him too), in a thrilling 23 – 20 overtime victory.

A fluke, you say?  Let’s climb into the Wayback Machine once again and visit the frozen frickin tundra on January 15, 2012.  This time, we watch the Divisional Playoff as Eli and his helpers (they were 9 – 7, remember), demolish the 15 – 1 Green Bay Packers by a 37 – 20 tally.  The temperature that day was not recorded officially because all mercury in the state of Wisconsin had frozen solid a couple days before Christmas, but the paper reported that one of the Packers fans in attendance had described the weather that day as “a bit chilly.”  Oh, and the GB QB?  That was a guy named Aaron Rodgers.

I’m taking the Giants in this game, in case you haven’t guessed.  I love the 5 ½ points I’m getting, but I will be disappointed if the NY Giants don’t win outright.

There’s even a 911 truther angle to this game, as was explained to me by the guy who delivers Pepsi products at my Target.  The Giants, see, well, they’re from New York so that’s an obvious 911 team, and then there’s the Patriots, and they’re called the Patriots so that’s patriotic, and plus they’re from Boston where most of the terrorists took off from on 911.

That’s why, five years after 911, in 2008, the New York Giants beat the Patriots (who are actually sort-of the terrorists).  And then five years later, on the tenth anniversary of 911 (in 2012), the New Yorkers did it again against the same damn Patriot/Terrorists.

All of this sets us up for the Superbowl this year, which will be the 15^th anniversary of 911 (in a way).  It has to be the Giants and it has to be the Patriots in the Superbowl this year.  And Eli gets another ring.

Works for me, though I suggest you not stare too deeply into the calendar work that gets you celebrating the fifth anniversary of 9-11-01 in February of 2008.  Equating the Patriots with al-Qaeda, with Belichick as Osama bin Laden---well, I suspect that does get a few nods from the gallery.

Copyright2017MichaelKubacki

SOME OBSERVATIONS ON THE ORLANDO MURDERS

    On occasions like this, I turn to leftwing news sources to see what the official line is.  Not surprisingly, this event was basically an anti-gay hate crime made possible because our gun laws (damn the NRA!) are too loose.  This song was on all their lips well before noon.  It started with some local Florida Democrats, then Obama pounded it home, and then it was reinforced by every Democratic politician that CNN and MSNBC could find.  I looked at a few leftie newspapers on Monday morning, and they all took the same tack.

    As Mark Steyn (Monday’s Limbaugh sub) pointed out, all the European papers had “ISIS” in their headlines.  In the US, ISIS tended to show up somewhere in paragraph 6.

******

    As I and 10,000 other people have pointed out, ALL mass shootings in America occur in gun-free zones.  This is simply the latest.  They will continue to happen until gun-free zones are outlawed across the country. 

******

    An event like makes it much more likely that Donald Trump will be your 45^th President.

Copyright2016MichaelKubacki

  

THE USES OF THE JEWS

I’ve mentioned Benny before in these pages.  He is the maintenance man at the store where I work, and he’s the sort of guy who can fix anything.  Plumbing, electric, ceilings, floors, refrigeration, heating and cooling---you name it.  In addition to his job, he has a side business buying cars, restoring and reselling them.  He could probably fix your pacemaker if you gave him the instruction manual, a sharp knife, and an anatomy book.

The other day, I mentioned to him that I had taken my mother-in-law to the National Jewish Museum down at Fifth and Market in Philadelphia, and that we had enjoyed the trip.  He told me he had been there about a year ago with his daughters (who are eight- and ten-years old), and he agreed the place was well put together and said he was glad they had gone.

(Picturing Benny at the National Jewish Museum is itself amusing.  He is built like a fireplug, with a pointy, satanic beard.  Both arms are covered with tattoos that appear to encase his arms in dark, heavy chains.  He also has several piercings in his eyebrows and a five-inch-long, Frankenstein-type bolt that goes through the back of his neck.  At a glance, he appears to be a one-man Puerto Rican biker gang from hell, and imagining him strolling through the NJM, where the typical visitors are a 65-ish Jewish couple from the Main Line, made me smile.

The image is false, by the way.  I’m sure Benny is street-wise, but he’s a pussycat.  Since he has daughters, I once asked him how many times he had seen “Frozen,” the Disney movie.  “Double-digits,” he said, rolling his eyes.  “I know every fucking song by heart.”)

“So my daughters came home from school last year, and it must have been around Puerto Rican Day or something, and they start telling me about how poor the Puerto Ricans were in the 50’s and 60’s and how they had to leave the island, and how hard it was to find work, and then the Anglos were discriminating against them, and so on and so on and so on.  And you know, I just hate that shit they feed them in school.  I hate that victim shit.  We’re not victims.  I’m not a goddamn victim!  We have a house, we have cars and computers and a flat-screen and there’s food on the table.

“So I took them down to the Jewish Museum, and we walked through the whole place and read all the exhibits, and a few times, I made sure to tell them, ‘Now look at this.  You think Puerto Ricans had it tough?  Well, look what those bastards did to the Jews!!’

 “And that’s the last I heard of that crap about how pitiful the Puerto Ricans are.  Great museum.  Very useful.”

Copyright2016MichaelKubacki

HILLARY? REALLY?

I don’t remember the last time Pennsylvania’s presidential primaries mattered.  They are held so late in the primary season that the races are almost always decided by the time we get to vote.  This year, however, on April 26, Hillary and Bernie and Donald and Ted and John were all over the place.

Here’s what surprised me: the number of apparently normal, even somewhat informed friends and acquaintances who were voting for Hillary as if it were the most natural thing in the world.  Of all the unexpected things that have happened this election season, this is the most puzzling.  The Trump phenomenon is a strange one, to be sure, and I didn’t see it coming, but I have come to understand it.  The matter-of-fact acceptance of Hillary as someone one might vote for, however, remains a mystery.

Now, let’s be clear.  I understand liberals.  I know how they think.  I am surrounded by liberals and I always have been.  I live in Philadelphia, where there has not been a Republican mayor in my lifetime.  I do not know a single person who lives here and is registered Republican.  So when people I know vote for Al Gore or John Kerry or Obama, or our various left-wing Congressmen and City Councilmen and Mayors, it doesn’t surprise me in the least.  I get it.

But Hillary?  Doesn’t she belong in a completely different category?  Is there NO level of depravity and corruption that will make a liberal Democrat pause and think, “Well, wait a minute.  I know she’s the anointed one this cycle and I know she’s a liberal and a Democrat, but I don’t have to vote for her, do I?  I mean, why can’t I vote for O.J. this time?  That way, I wouldn’t feel so dirty.”

If these Hillary voters were kids who don’t know anything, that would be understandable, I guess.  But the kids are voting for Bernie.  The Hillary voters I’m talking about, the ones I know, are older.  They’re my age.  Hillary voters in general are over fifty.  And that’s what I can’t fathom.  The people voting for Hillary are people who know the Clintons.  They’re old enough to remember the Clinton presidency, and Hillary’s role in it, and the Senate election, and the election campaign of 2008, and the Secretary of State years.

And yet, somehow it doesn’t matter.  Really?  It doesn’t matter that they trashed the White House ($20,000 in damages), before they handed it over to the Bushes?  It doesn’t matter that they rented out the Lincoln Bedroom?  It doesn’t matter that they sold presidential pardons?  It doesn’t matter that Bill pardoned Puerto Rican terrorists in order to curry favor for Hillary with New York Puerto Ricans for her Senate campaign?  It doesn’t matter that they stole the freaking White House china when they left office and later had to give it back??

And I’ve barely touched the surface here.  There’s the Rose Law Firm records that were subpoenaed but which she couldn’t find even though they were in her bedroom for two years.  And her miraculous $100K profit on cattle futures.  And the execution of Ricky Ray Rector in Arkansas in 1992.  And the Rwandan genocide that Bill could have stopped with a phone call, but couldn’t be bothered.

I mean, why not vote for one of the million liberals, good Democrats all, who DON’T run a money-laundering operation that spends only 10% of its budget on actual charitable work.  Hey, you tin-pot psychotic dictators---do you want the private cell phone number of the US Secretary of State?  Do you want her to come to your broken-down hellhole of a country and legitimize you, treat you like David Cameron?  Well, all you have to do is book her husband for a million bucks or so in speeches.  Sweep off the tarmac.  Here she comes.

There’s so much of it, and it never ends.  There apparently has never been a time in her life when she was not crooked.  In 1974, even before anybody knew her name, she was fired for dishonesty from her job as an intern on the Watergate Committee.  Yes, that Watergate Committee.  And to the Democratic geezers and baby-boomers voting for her, none of this matters?

If nothing else, how can anyone vote for a person who, at Andrews Air Force Base on September 14, 2012, while standing over the bodies of four Americans murdered at Benghazi, lied to their grieving relatives by blaming the murders on an internet video, a ridiculous story she knew to be false?  How can Democrats vote for a woman who would do such a thing?

Copyright2016MichaelKubacki

BATHROOMS

    The reaction of most people to the transgender bathroom wars (North Carolina, Target, etc.), is “Why?”  After all, it’s not like this was a problem.  Nobody ever told a transgender person to get out of a particular public bathroom, did they?  Because if there had been such a case, we would all know the name of the poor beleaguered soul who had been embarrassed and humiliated by us Christian, Bible-thumping haters when all he or she had ever wanted to do was take a leak.  It would be Rosa (or Roosevelt) Parks all over again.  So why, suddenly, and for no apparent reason, are places like Charlotte passing laws making it a violation of law to question anybody, of any sex, with any sort of sexual organ or organs or secondary sexual characteristics, about their choice of a public restroom?  Why can’t a store manager ask a guy with a full beard, tattoos up both arms, a well-earned reputation as a child molester, and a boner in his pants why he is going into the little-girls’ room?

    There was no need for these laws.  There is no epidemic of anti-transgender bathroom discrimination, is there?  In fact, it hasn’t happened even once.  So why did the radical left start this war?

    The only purpose was to excite a reaction from the state legislature in North Carolina, which promptly restored the status quo by annulling Charlotte’s ordinance.  Recognizing that the subject matter did not need to be addressed in the first place, and that all Charlotte was doing was to encourage frivolous lawsuits, the state shut down the entire issue.

    And this is exactly what the radicals in Charlotte wanted---a war.  Charlotte could now wail that it had been trying to prevent the scourge of anti-transgender discrimination that was sweeping the nation, and to protect the (four? five?) transgender people in Charlotte from the degradation of being questioned about which bathroom they were using, even though they had never been questioned about it before.  It doesn’t matter that there was no underlying problem.  Once the state reacted, the activists could accuse them of bigotry.

    From the French Revolution to the Soviet Union, from Mao’s China to the faculty lounge at Harvard, the people who want the state to rule every aspect of our lives hate two institutions that have been foremost in human hearts and minds since we all emerged from the caves.  Marriage and religion are the two things that drive totalitarians mad because they are the only things that prevent most people from having a primary loyalty to the state.  One of Stalin’s biggest disappointments was his inability to break the emotional bond of marriage that made spouses cherish each other more than they loved the Soviet Union.  And while churches were destroyed and clerics murdered, the Soviets were unable to obliterate their subjects’ love for God.

    In Obama’s America, this battle continues.  The assault on religious freedom (explicitly protected by the 1^st Amendment) is relentless, with Obama repeatedly characterizing the Constitutional right as merely a “freedom to worship” while demanding that his federal government define the actual mission of religious institutions like Notre Dame University and the Little Sisters of the Poor.  And as for the marriage that humans have recognized for millennia, it has now been transformed, warped, its original purpose disguised behind an array of feel-good justifications including a state-mandated recognition of love, self-esteem and self-actualization.  For ten thousand years, marriage provided safety for women and children, and allowed families to flourish.  That original meaning is still there, somewhere, but since the Supreme Court’s decision in Obergefell, it is buried under rainbow flags and waves of narcissism.  I gotta be me, you know---that’s the real purpose of marriage, according to Justice Kennedy.  Our children will now be somewhat confused about the meaning of marriage, and its purpose; our children’s children will have no idea what it once meant.  Obama has succeeded in a way Stalin could only dream of.

    So for the radicals, the Charlotte bathroom law is necessary, even though it addresses no existing problem, because it starts a fight over the two beasts the Left forever dreams of slaying.  Issues like this (and LGBT issues in general), are twofers.  They provide a path to attack both religious freedom and the family.  For those that dream of an all-powerful state, they are irresistible.  It’s an opportunity to make their case that all our traditional beliefs about sex and gender and family are hateful and discriminatory.

    And where do our hateful ideas come from?  Where do we get the idea that people with penises are men, and that they are different from women?  And who told us that men and women should marry each other and have children and raise those children?  These most fundamental notions of the sexes and marriage and family come from the Old Testament, the New Testament, the Quran, and other religious traditions from around the world, all of which are in basic agreement on these points.  That is why, once these scriptures are thoroughly discredited, they will have to be suppressed.

Copyright2016MichaelKubacki   

HARRIET TUBMAN

Many, many Black History Months ago, when my son Tex was in third grade, Harriet Tubman was the subject of a “module,” (or whatever they call them) in his history class.  It was a lengthy module.  He was required to study the adventures of Ms. Tubman and construct a time-line of her life.  Tex is not a complainer, but wife and self could not help but notice he was not enjoying the module.  I can’t say exactly what it was that annoyed him about the project because he is not the sort to discuss these occasional disturbances to his fundamental sang-froid, but suffice it to say that Sandy and I were careful not to use the words “Harriet” or “Tubman” or “Harriet Tubman” around him for quite a while.  A few days ago, when I mentioned the Tubman-for-Jackson currency swap in a phone conversation, icicles began forming on the telephone I was holding.  I had tried to make a little joke about Harriet Tubman.  But apparently, it’s still too soon.

So we have strong feelings about Harriet Tubman in our family.  Personally, I like her.  She’s mostly known for helping slaves to escape the South via the Underground Railroad, and God bless her for it, but there were many people who did that perilous work and she was far from the most prominent.  Much more impressive, I think, was her work as a spy for the Union during the Civil War.

The job was not less dangerous than helping slaves to freedom, and she was apparently extraordinarily good at it.  Her sources, of course, were blacks living in the Confederacy who knew, through their work for their masters, what the plans were, where troops and supplies were being moved, and so on.  Though they would be reluctant to risk their lives sharing that information with a white spy who had snuck across enemy lines from the North, they trusted Harriet Tubman.  Not only was she black, but they knew who she was and what she had done.  To most white southerners, she was just some anonymous colored woman, so she was usually able to pass unnoticed by the authorities.  Some have argued she was the most valuable intelligence asset the North had during the war.

 

In addition, she was a devout Christian woman her whole life and she always carried a gun.  I mean, what’s not to like?

And Andrew Jackson?  Well, he won the Battle of New Orleans in the War of 1812, so he was a genuine war hero, and he was a popular legislator in the House and the Senate, and he became the seventh president, and he owned hundreds of slaves and he founded the Democratic Party (the party of slavery).  So he’s a mixed bag at best.  I hate it when people in the past are judged by modern standards, so let’s not do that, but does he really deserve to be on the twenty?  I mean, forget about Harriet Tubman for a minute.  I can think of half a dozen old dead white guys I’d rather see on that bill.  Why not John Adams?  Why not Thomas Paine?

Let’s be clear.  The decision to replace Andrew Jackson with Harriet Tubman is solely based in political correctness.  For the Obama Administration, this is about getting rid of an ODWG and putting a righteous sister on some money.  In fact, however, they chose the correct ODWG and the correct sister.  I assume it was an accident, actually.  I assume it was done because Obama’s crew doesn’t know much about history.  If they did, they would never have picked an armed, Republican, devout Christian to replace the founder of the Democratic Party.  But in spite of themselves, they got it right.

The problem, however, is not this Tubman-for-Jackson switcheroo.  It’s that Obama wants to get all the ODWGs off the money and replace them with representatives of modern victim groups.  Jackson, however, is the low-hanging fruit of the ODWGs; there will be some serious bitching (at least from me), if they try to remove any of the others.

Washington and Lincoln?  No way.  Jefferson?  Well, Jefferson certainly has his detractors, but his founding father cred is untouchable.  He did write the Declaration of Independence, after all, and more than doubled the size of the country with the Louisiana Purchase.  Then there’s Alexander Hamilton, who started the mint and the national bank and wrote most of the Federalist Papers and now stars in his own hip-hop musical on Broadway.  And Ben Franklin?  Nobody will take old Ben off the hundred.  I mean, it wouldn’t be a Benjamin any more.  Even the lefties like him because they think he was an atheist.

All of which brings us to Ulysses S. Grant.  And let’s face it.  He was not a founding father, he was born way too late to fight the Revolutionary War, and he had no role in building the fledgling republic.  Nevertheless, the $50 bill is the coolest-looking currency we have.  Grant looks like a general, a winner, and a tough SOB.  Grant, with his steely eyes and a half-smile pushing through that bushy beard, is just about the manliest man we have on our money.  He looks like he just kicked Robert E. Lee’s butt halfway to Appomattox Courthouse.  I always use fifties when I’m buying my flame-throwers, Tennessee whiskey, chain saws and other manly stuff.

 

I’d hate to see him replaced by Margaret Sanger.

Copyright2016MichaelKubacki  

WHY TRUMP?

Consider the following:

·        The Department of Justice refuses to seek statutory minimum sentences in criminal drug cases though it is required to by law.

·        The Little Sisters of the Poor are forced by the government to pay for abortions.

·        Hundreds of self-proclaimed “sanctuary cities,” which refuse to enforce federal immigration laws, are ignored by Obama, the DOJ and ICE, and face no repercussions.

·        Members of the New Black Panther Party, in uniform and brandishing nightsticks, intimidate white voters on Election Day in 2008.  The DOJ, though it knows the individuals and has photos of the crime, refuses to prosecute.

·        Secretly, and without warrants, the Administration gathers phone records of staff at the Associated Press.

·        The Obama Administration, through the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, arranges for thousands of guns to be sold to Mexican drug criminals, resulting in the violent deaths of hundreds of innocent Mexican nationals and at least one US border agent, then refuses to comply with Congressional subpoenas seeking information about the project.  The US prosecutes no one for the illegal gun sales or the subsequent murders.

·        Christian and conservative groups applying for 501(c) (4) status are harassed for years by IRS agents, who then resist Congressional scrutiny of their actions.  No one is prosecuted.

·        After Obamacare is passed, hundreds of executive “waivers” (with no basis in the statute), are issued to unions, friends of the Administration and Democratic campaign contributors so that the most burdensome provisions fall only on groups Obama does not like or which have no insider status with his Administration.

·        Amnesty is unilaterally granted, by executive order, to large numbers of illegal immigrants, ignoring current law.

·        “Operation Choke Point” is set in motion, where various government agencies, without any statutory authority, force banks to choke off access to financial services for businesses the Administration disapproves of, like those who sell ammunition or make payday loans.

·        Following a military coup in Egypt, the Administration continues to provide aid to the Egyptian government even though it is prohibited from doing so.

·        Four Americans overseas are intentionally killed in counterterrorism operations without any judicial process.

·        The Administration unilaterally changes long-established bankruptcy law by giving unsecured creditors superior status to secured creditors in the Chrysler bankruptcy.

·        Following the receipt of large campaign contributions for Obama from executives at Solyndra, the Administration awards $535 million in federal grants to the company, which then goes under.

·        Obama, by edict and without any statutory authority to do so, delays the employer mandate under Obamacare.

·        A sitting U.S. Senator (Menendez) of the President’s own party, who expresses disapproval of Obama’s “legacy” deal with Iran, is immediately indicted by the DOJ on complicated corruption charges that will occupy the Senator’s time and attention for years.

·        The Administration takes TARP money (which legally can be used only to rescue financial institutions), and uses it to bail out GM, then appoints a “czar” to run GM for months without any authority to do so.

If you are among the millions who read this blog regularly, you know I am not a Trump fan.  Though I concede he possesses a peculiar genius that has put him atop the Republican field, he remains a crude, dishonest person who is not only ignorant of things a President needs to know (e.g., history, economics, the Constitution), but also does not care that he is ignorant.  (He also is reputed to be a worse golf cheat than even Bill Clinton, though this was previously believed to be scientifically impossible.)  Finally, his policy positions, to the extent one can figure out what they are, are those of an Eastern blue-state liberal Republican, and I won’t vote for Eastern blue-state liberal Republicans anymore.  Mitt Romney was my last.

But while I don’t like Trump very much, the support for him is easy to understand, and the dismissal of Trump’s supporters as yahoos is insulting.  It’s an attempt to belittle Trump himself, I suppose, but it’s not merely unkind, it is foolish. While it is true there are white supremacists and xenophobes among his voters, the vast majority of them are rational, sensible people who support him for rational, sensible reasons.  Most know exactly the sort of person he is, and they may like him about as much as I do, but they are choosing to vote for him because they are frightened by what has happened in America over the last eight years.  Trump is an inevitable response to the (partial) list of Obama’s illegal acts that began this article, and to the unfortunate conclusion that law in America is coming to be used merely as a tool to enforce leftist social policies, and not as a bulwark of freedom and equal protection for individuals. As the rule of law frays and begins to break down, the rise of a candidate like Trump becomes a certainty.

The phenomenon happens everywhere, and is easier to see in places where the process is much further along, where civil society has completely failed.  In a place like Libya or Iraq or Syria, for example, when all semblance of law and government devolves into looting and score-settling and civil war, what happens?  What happens with the decent folks in quiet villages when everything and everybody is suddenly at the mercy of roaming armies and criminals and soldiers of fortune?  What happens to the people who have been raising families and growing crops and running cafes and pouring concrete, and who now find themselves helpless against the armed and violent forces all around them?

They look for tough guys to protect them.

People in such a place will get together and form a militia, consisting of farmers and shop-keepers and young guys who don’t have anything better to do, and they will set up a checkpoint at the edge of town in order to keep the bad guys out.  The message to outsiders is far from complicated:  “You can’t steal these chickens.  You can’t rape these women.  You can’t kidnap these children.” Where there is fear, decent people turn to the “strongman.”  In Libya, that may mean some local, friendly guys with automatic weapons.  In America right now, it means voting for Trump.  The motivation is exactly the same. 

And there is no one else on the Republican side who fits the role.  The party has held the House and Senate throughout most of the Obama Administration, and despite campaign vows to fight back against Obama’s autocratic rule, his spending and his disdain for the law, virtually nothing has been done.  Historically, the House has often reined in a President of the other party by refusing to appropriate funds for his initiatives (it’s how the Democrats shut down the Vietnam War, for example), but this Congress refuses to exercise its traditional “power of the purse.”  The Republicans in charge of Congress will not even stop the government from funding the dismemberment of babies. The people voting for Trump are not only frightened by the current government, they are disgusted with the standard-brand Republican Party (McConnell, McCain, Ryan, Boehner, et al.), that has betrayed them.

Voting for Trump is a perfectly rational response to both the current government and the current Republican Party.  While I do not agree that Trump is the solution to the problem, and I don’t believe he will do what he says he will, I understand the impulse to embrace him.  The options for those who want to save and rebuild the American republic are very limited.

Copyright2016MichaelKubacki

MORE OF THE TRUMP MENACE---The Voting Begins

I last commented on the Republican race for the presidential nomination on November 8, and even though the voting has begun, and even though a few of the weaker candidates have thrown in the towel, nothing in the fundamental dynamics of the race has changed.  There has been plenty of noise but the signal remains the same.

From the moment Trump entered the race, there has been one issue---immigration.  Trump has demanded that the laws be enforced, that a border fence be built, and that any plans for a path-to-whatever for illegals already here be dropped.    Every other Republican candidate, with the exception of Ted Cruz, has a long record of supporting open borders and amnesty for illegals.  Those in leadership positions in the Republican Congress and in local offices (the “Republican establishment”) also support Obama’s policies and even want to loosen border controls further.  Many elected Republicans, and most of the current candidates, have taken campaign contributions from groups and individuals that seek what is called “comprehensive immigration reform.”  These donors include the US Chamber of Commerce, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, Warren Buffett, and many others.

Trump’s support comes from Republican voters (a majority of them) who want the border enforced, and want American laws respected.  They feel betrayed by elected Republicans who have promised these things but then broke their promises and allowed millions of illegals into the country.  Some of these immigrants are dangerous criminals.  Some bring disease.  Some bring cultural values (e.g., the inferiority of women and a boys-will-be-boys view of rape) that ordinary folks in San Antonio or Des Moines or Albany find appalling.  Yet there is little effort, even when these immigrants are identified, to expel them.

This issue (and the fact that Trump is not an elected Republican owned by the open-borders money guys), is the reason Trump is leading in the polls.  It is the only reason.  He is a vulgar, inarticulate man with little credibility and no apparent understanding of the Constitution, the role of law in the American republic, the history of our foreign policy or macro-economics, but when he says he will build a fence and enforce the laws, Republican voters believe him because he is the only candidate (except for Cruz), who has not yet lied to them about this issue.

The Republican Party could have taken Trump down at any time simply by taking his (one) issue away and embracing border enforcement, wholeheartedly and without prevarication.  A flat-out, unambiguous statement of a change in policy would do it.  No more “paths” to whatever, no more “dreamers,” no more lies about a fence, no more sanctuary cities, and no more driver’s licenses for M-13 gang members.  Bring back Newt Gingrich for a day and make it a new Contract With America. And that would be the end of the Trump candidacy.

At this point, however, it is clear the Republican Party either cannot or will not abandon amnesty.  This means its only option is to find an open-borders Republican candidate who can beat Trump.

First, of course, there was Jeb(!).  Though he is still nominally in the race, even the good old boys have figured out he is not going to get the job done.  

Then, a couple weeks ago, the party decided they could take down Trump with, believe it or not, Donald Trump.  Feelers went out, overtures---hey, maybe we can work with this guy, maybe once we bring him into the fold and tell him he doesn’t have to spend his own money, maybe he’ll make a deal with us.  He makes deals, right?  He just wants to “win.”  So if he wins and he’s our boy, well, then we can finesse this whole fence problem.

It’s a plausible theory, or at least one can understand why the amnesty forces and donors within the Republican Party would find it tempting.  Trump is a guy who praised Hillary as a great public servant, thought Obamacare was just fine, and was pro-choice about five minutes ago, so he looks very much like someone who doesn’t have any core beliefs but will say just about anything if it will enable him to “win,” (whatever “win” means at any given moment in his strangely un-nuanced mind).

And that plan is still in play, at least on the back burner.  The problem with it is that he is so mercurial that he cannot easily be trusted.  One day, the people of Iowa are wonderful; the next day they are idiots.  One day Megyn Kelly is a brilliant journalist and commentator; the next, she is menstruating all over him.  If he is elected on a platform in which the major plank is building a security fence on America’s southern border, what are the odds he would actually do it?  Personally, I have no idea.  So how can you make a deal with the guy?

Now that Jeb(!) is toast and the co-opt-Trump scenario is at best a desperation back-up scheme, the new champion for the pro-amnesty Republicans is Rubio.  His last-minute surge in Iowa makes him a player, and he has always had some attractive qualities.  He’s young and cute and articulate and Cuban.  (Some of his mannerisms and gestures are reminiscent of JFK, and there is speculation that Rubio has studied film of Kennedy and does this on purpose.)

Rubio is attractive to the good old boys, of course, because of his participation in the “Gang of Eight,” the Senate group of four Democrats and four Republicans who drafted an immigration bill and almost pushed it through.  The problem is that Rubio’s role was so large and so notorious and so dishonest that too many Republicans remember what he did, even though it was a few years ago and Rubio has since recanted his support for amnesty.

Rubio appeared on the national political scene as a tea-party Republican running for the Senate in 2010 against Charlie Crist, former Governor of Florida.  Illegal immigration was a BIG issue in that race, with Crist arguing for a “path to citizenship” and Rubio vigorously denouncing him and demanding the laws be enforced.  Though Rubio was a virtual unknown at the time, he pulled away from Crist in the race largely on the basis of the immigration issue.  It was only two years after this election that Marco Rubio changed his tune and supported amnesty in the Senate.

Candidates like Christie and Kasich and Fiorina all have amnesty skeletons in their closets, but you have to dig for them.  Every serious Republican, however, remembers Rubio’s betrayal on this issue, and those who may have forgotten will be reminded by Cruz and Trump.  With immigration the major issue in the 2016 presidential campaign, Marco Rubio would have to explicitly acknowledge his perfidy, apologize for his error, and pledge to take a hard line on border enforcement and swear he will never support any sort of amnesty in the future.  He hasn’t done that, of course.  No politician ever wants to make that sort of mea culpa, even if he’s caught in the sack with an altar boy.  Instead, Rubio claims he has changed his views.  Sort of.  But it’s just not good enough in the 2016 campaign for the Republican nomination.  Speculating in a theoretical way, Rubio might actually be the best candidate for the general election, and he might be able to beat whatever geriatric white person the Democrats throw out there, but Rubio will not be the Republican candidate no matter how much money Mark Zuckerberg drops on him.

And all of this leaves us where we were when I last addressed these issues in November.  The only way to stop Donald Trump is for the Republican good old boys and donors to give in on the amnesty issue and allow our laws to be enforced.  And they won’t do it.  They won’t do it even though they are convinced Trump would lose the general election.   (On that point, I’m not so sure).  The Republican establishment, in other words, would rather Hillary or Bernie or Joe be elected President than give up on their quest for open borders and amnesty for illegals.

Copyright2016MichaelKubacki   

THE SUPERB OWL --- 2016

If you have been paying attention to the last few postings, you know where I come down on this one.  And remember, I’m the guy who told you Phil would see his shadow, Trump would finish third in Iowa, and Bernie would beat Hillary (actually, I still might be right about that one).

I’ve said from the start that Denver doesn’t belong here, and I’m not going to change my tune now just because the Broncos squeaked past the Steelers and the Patriots (in Denver both times, of course).  Carolina, by contrast, crushed two very dangerous opponents, Seattle and Arizona.  Average yards/pass here favors the Panthers 6.0 to 4.6.  The Panthers outscored their foes by more than ten points per game; the Broncos by only three.

The 5 ½ point spread is large, and there certainly haven’t been a lot of blowouts in the Superb Owl lately, but this could be one of those games.  Take Carolina and lay the points.  Also, for those of you who care about such things, Carolina has outscored its two playoff opponents by a combined score of 55 – 7 in the first half.  They tend to come out of the gate like a freight train and then coast a bit.  For games like this, Vegas posts a total not just for the entire game, but also for the first half, and in this case that number is 22 ½.  I like the OVER for the first half. 

Trust me.  But don’t forget the groundhog.

Copyright2016MichaelKubacki  

IOWA, GROUNDHOGS, ETC.

The Iowa caucuses are tonight. Based on recent polls, Trump should edge Ted Cruz, with Rubio a close-up third.  Considering the campaign thus far, however, about the only thing we can realistically expect is a surprise.

That still leaves us with the question: what kind of surprise?  Will Trump actually win big or will he disappoint?

I’m predicting he disappoints.  Over the past few months we have all learned a lot about the unexpected political currents driving this race, and I have been as amazed as anyone.  The one thing I still can’t believe, however, is that Donald Trump, in an Iowa contest against Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, Mike Huckabee and Rick Santorum, will take the evangelical Christian vote.  This bloc is a critical part of the Iowan Republican electorate, and it’s hard to see them, en masse, ignoring Trump’s divorces, his boasting about adulterous relationships, and his life-long (until recently) pro-abortion views.

Prediction:  Trump finishes third, behind both Cruz and Rubio, though I express no opinion on which one of the two actually wins.

On the Democratic side, Hillary is 0 -1 against socialists in the Iowa caucuses, and after tonight, she will be 0 – 2.  One thing you need to win Iowa is enthusiastic supporters who are willing to spend hours in a fire hall or a church basement on a mid-winter night in order to vote for their candidate.  Today is the day we learn just how un-enthusiastic Hillary’s minions truly are.

And as long as I’m predicting things, Phil will see his shadow tomorrow morning and we will have six more weeks of winter.

And finally, the Carolina Panthers will win and cover on February 7.

Not that you asked.

Copyright2016MichaelKubacki          

2016 MFL PLAYOFFS---The Conference Championships

New England (-3) @ Denver

Going into last week’s game against KC, the questions we all had about the Patriots concerned their health.  Was Edelman really recovered?  Could Gronkowski play?  Did Brady have any lingering effects from the Miami game?  If New England had finally returned to something approaching full strength, they would probably find a way to beat K.C., but how many working organs did they really have?

We have our answer.  New England is just fine.  With Brady and Gronkowski and Amendola and Edelman all running and jumping and playing football, the Pats are (at this moment), the best football team in the AFC.

As for Denver, I said at the start of the tournament that they did not deserve to be in it, and I saw nothing in the Pittsburgh game to change my mind.  Manning played OK (no interceptions!), but did nothing to suggest he is the Peyton of old.  Roethlisberger actually had slightly better numbers.  Denver won because of their defense, which is still very good, and because Pittsburgh’s coach Mike Tomlin is as savvy about in-game decisions as a box of rocks.  Tomlin is one of those coaches (and he is far from the only one), who never think about game situations in advance and who, faced with a critical decision (punt? call a time out? kick a field goal?), with the clock ticking, simply chooses the first option that pops into his head.

New England’s AYP for the year is 6.8; Denver’s is 4.6.  New England outscored its opponents by more than ten points per game; Denver outscored its opponents by 3 ½.  It is true that Denver’s pass defense is superior, but overall the game lines up as a mere speed bump on New England’s path to yet another Superbowl.  Lay the points.

(Technology note: every time I use the word “superbowl,” my spell-checker tries to correct it to “superb owl.”)

Arizona @ Carolina (-3)

I pretty much told you where I was going on this one in previous posts.  Arizona’s AYP for the season was 7.5, the highest in football.  Carolina’s was 6.0.  Arizona’s point differential was 13.7 per game, which was three points better than the second-best team (Carolina).  I must take the three points here and bet Arizona.

Having said all that, however, you would have to be a fool not to notice what Carolina did to Seattle because it is precisely what a Superbowl champ is supposed to do.  Seattle is a good team.  They were the guys “nobody wanted to play.”  The Panthers, however, forced the Seahawks to disrobe, hoisted the Seattle pantaloons up the stadium flagpole, said bad things about the Seattle players’ mothers, smacked their bottoms with wooden paddles and then, just when they were about to sodomize them, got bored and decided to run out the clock instead.  It is true that Carolina took its foot off the gas pedal once the score was 31 – 0, but it’s hard to blame them for losing interest when the game is basically over with ten minutes left in the first half.  Despite the Seattle “comeback,” they were never really in danger of winning the game.

(By the way….  If you are losing 31 – 0 in the second half, and you score a touchdown, do you calmly line up to kick an extra point, or do you go for two on the theory that you need to try for every point you can possibly get?  Just sayin’.)

And in the other game?  Well, one has to be concerned about the deer-in-the-headlights look of Carson Palmer throughout much of the contest, and Arizona’s inability to dispatch an inferior Packers team until after sixty minutes had elapsed.

A sane man can be forgiven for thinking Carolina, playing in Carolina, is correctly favored in this game, and that they will roll over the Cardinals.  Well, who are you going to believe---my numbers or your lying eyes?

Copyright2016MichaelKubacki   

MLK DAY--An Alternate View

I was thirteen years old when the 1964 Civil Rights Act was passed, and I remember Selma, and Birmingham, and the killing of Chaney, Goodman and Schwerner, and the march on Washington, and the “I Have a Dream” speech, and all the rest.  There was a wonderful period, that seemed to last about five minutes, when everyone in America agreed that equality under the law was a grand idea and that, finally, everyone could share in the equal protection of our laws.  Then, on April 4, 1968, Martin Luther King was murdered and his legacy and ideals were instantly co-opted and stolen by the race hustlers, welfare activists, reparation-seekers, black nationalists and Marxists who control it to this day.  Martin Luther King Day became a federal holiday in 1986.  I am one of the millions who hate MLK Day because it has never had anything to do with Martin Luther King.

And it’s getting worse, of course.

In 1994, Congress made MLK Day a “National Day of Service.”  Typical.  Only the left would think we need an official federal declaration of when to do a good deed.  This peculiar “day of service” business actually began in Philadelphia, where this year is the “21^st Annual Greater Philadelphia Martin Luther King Day of Service.”

I know this because of a press release issued on January 6 by globalcitizen365.org, (a name almost certainly coined by George Orwell), which informs us that this year’s co-chairs are the mayor, the fire and police commissioners, big shots from every major corporation in town (Comcast, Target, Wal-Mart, etc.) and, of course, the Superintendent of Schools.  “There will be projects at hundreds of schools in Philadelphia and throughout the region.  Volunteers will beautify dozens of Philadelphia Parks and Recreation facilities.”

Well, good for them.  But don’t you have to wonder a bit about these “volunteers”?  If every preening nabob in the city, and your boss, and your boss’s boss, and the CEO of your company are all urging you to “volunteer,” at what point does it stop being your idea and start being more of an I’d-better-get-my-ass-down-to-the-homeless-shelter-and-start-painting kind of thing?

Well, stop wondering.  The gloves come off a couple paragraphs later and the answer is revealed: “Participants will include students of all ages from public, private and parochial schools….” (emphasis mine).  And there we are.  Those 6-, 7-, and 8-year-olds don’t want to spend their day off from school playing games or watching TV, do they?  No.  They all want to be “volunteers,” you see.  Their desire to spend the day scraping subway-station walls has nothing to do with the fact that their teachers and principals and parents and pastors are all telling them “It’s the right thing to do, Johnny.  And you want to do the right thing, don’t you?”

And thus does MLK Day become a celebration of involuntary servitude.  Martin would have been so proud.

Copyright2016MichaelKubacki