Poker attitudes

People often talk about the antics of poker players on TV, some hate them, some love them. I think that these celebrations or whatever the player does are good for the game. All sports events are about storylines, they are about drama, they are about good Vs evil on some level. When you root for your sports team, they are the good guys, the opponent, whoever they are, are the bad guys, some you hate more then others.

Poker is different, we don't have a 'home team' playing for us, our rooting interest is based upon the person. And then if we like that person, we tend to root for them to win. The other side of this is players we don't like, we root to lose, which is why when our hero faces our enemy, it makes it all the better.

Phil Hellmuth, has for better or worse, embraced the role of the villain, and this has clearly been a very profitable thing for him. His whining and crying at the poker table make him a clear target for scorn and insults, and that is what makes him a household name. He is most likely not one of the true elites of the game anymore, but he knows how to play tournaments well and knows how to market himself excellently.

Mike Matusow was first brought into our lives as a villain himself. He was famously insulting and mocking soon-to-be World Champion Greg Raymer, before he ended up being crippled in a big hand with Raymer later in the tournament and then busted out. Matusow has since then had an image rehab done and is now the 'jolly insult artist' in part because his targets are either friends who tolerate it, or they are in fact, Hellmuth, who lives to be insulted and made to look the bad guy. Because of Matusow's endless trash talk and antics, he's a well known player.

In 2005 when Joe Hachem went on to win the World Series Main Event, Matusow was at the final table. Everyone knew Matusow was a big name and a big time player, so folks knew to expect him to be a force at the table, due to some horrible luck and some bad plays he managed to get knocked out first, it was a pretty stunning turn of events.

Now in 2006, Allen Cunningham, who is in poker circles seen as one of the best in the world, was at the final table, but the media as a whole really didn't seem to know who he was. One writer, ESPN's Bill Simmons, even went so far as to say that 'nobody anyone knows' was at the final table. Cunningham most likely is a far better player then Matusow, but because he's quiet, keeps to himself, and just plays the game, he's basically an unknown.

Personalities are what sell the game, when John Smith and Allen Jones go all in and turn over AK Vs 77, the only reason you care about the outcome is what you have learned about the two men and if you like one or the other. You need to have a hook, a reason to care, or you wouldn't watch. Last year's World Champion, Jamie Gold, was hated by so many many people for his endless table talk, people who didn't know the outcome most likely kept watching hoping he'd lose. Sometimes evil beats good, just the nature of the world.

But where this stuff is bad for poker is that it effects people, and makes them think this kind of action should be tolerated in poker rooms. I see it all the time when people are playing for a couple hundred bucks. Chairs are tipped over, insults are launched, people get up and walk from the table howling in disgust over what just happened. Others take minutes to make a fold everyone at the table knows they are going to make, they just have to 'think' about it like they do on TV.

So I guess what I'd really say about all this is, please save the stuff you see on TV, until you yourself are on TV, until then just play the game.

Creationism: Best Issue Ever!

On the list of 'issues that are fantastic for the right wing' Creationism in all it's many forms is the clear cut winner. Global Warming made a strong run at the title, and even now might be the more popular issue, but the fact is that if not dealt with, it may cause problems to people, problems that will become noticeable and force the deniers to start spinning "Well we're not causing this" kinds of horse-hockey. People may at some point be forced to take note.

Which is where Creationism, and the newly spawned "Intelligent Design" come in. This is the best stuff ever! You get to pander to people's biggoted natured, you get to lie to them in a way that is very pleasing to them, and then you get to lose, which leaves them bitter and angry at the evil forces of 'liberalism' that defeated them, and the best part is, they can never win! They will always be stuck at square 1, railing against an enemy that will always be the winner.

Losing is vital, losing builds anger, losing makes a person do more to try to win. And losing while being insulted and degraded just makes you want to try harder.

Here is the cycle of the typical excellent loss for the ID'ers.

Step 1: Get a bunch of people elected to a school board.

Step 2: Pass ID agenda, talk about the 'controversal theory of evolution' which brutally misuses two words in that sentence, it is 'controversal' because people who don't understand the science fight against it, making it a 'controversy' and 'theory' is not a theory in the sense of the word in common useage, it's what science calls everything. Nobody attacks the 'theory of gravity' for being a 'theory'

Step 3: The ACLU and the evil egghead liberal scientists come into the mix, things go to the courts, ID gets thrown out for being religion trying to sneak it's way into the classroom. The late night talk shows make fun of the state in question who's bringing us back to the scopes trial.

Step 4: The people of the town vote out the people who brought this all about, and are thankful to be 'back to normal'

Thusly defeated, shamed, disgraced and angry, the Creationists return back to their homes for the next round, they get more friends, work more phone lines, do what they can until they can in a few years, sneak more of their own onto another school board and continue the good fight against the Godless Liberals who seek to poison the minds of our children with their sick lies about man being related to apes. Some day they will have final victory, some day they will finally get ID into the classroom, until then they will work tirelessly for Republicans in the fight against the Godless, evil, Anti-America Democrats.

Ignorance is bliss

"The rest of the show was kind of predictable and I nearly wretched at having Al Gore’s propaganda piece shoved down my throat all night, not only by winning Best Documentary but also Best Song AND another segment just dedicated to letting Gore talk about global warming! Look, the best scientists that money can buy today can barely even tell us if it’s going to rain tomorrow, don’t give me this line of crap about how they can somehow magically predict climate changes for the next hundred years, because they can’t. "

--Scott Keith, some guy you shouldn't know.

Now I may not know a lot about the science of Global Warming, but I can say that this is truly an apples and oranges comparison.

Imagine you had a bunch of friends who went to the dog track every day, and they watched the dogs race, and they bet on the dogs. They won slightly more then they lost, but they were not exactly world beaters, but hey, they had fun with it.

Now let's say they, and countless others, noticed something odd, that over the course of the year, the dogs were going faster then they had the year before, and the year before that. That they started putting their data together and were baffled by it, but they kept at it, and well after years more of research, they had in fact come to the inescapable fact that the dogs were running faster. They called this "Greyhound Speeding" and brought their info to people.

To which somebody replied.

"Look, you idiots can't even tell me who's going to win in the 6th race, and now you expect me to believe that you know for a fact that a dog 100 years from now will run faster then a dog now? You CAN'T know that."

Closes the case doesn't it?

True Yankee

When listening to people talk sports, they will often talk about how somebody has to 'earn' their place on a new team. The New York Yankees of the last few years haven't won a World Series, which is nearly the end of the world for any Yankees fan. As a result, almost all of the players brought in to the team since that time are seen as not being 'True' Yankees. A-Rod being the clearest example.

The problem for the GOP is that currently none of their three big stars (McCain, Rudy, Romney) are "True Yankees". McCain will forever be remembered for running to the left of Bush in 2000. Rudy is pro choice, pro gay rights, lived with his mistress while getting a messy divorce from his wife. And Romney is the most craven political creature possible, state shopping as best he could till he managed to win the meaningless Massachusetts govenorship (the Mass State Congress is nearly pure democrats, when a republican is in the Gov's office, they just override his vetos and do as they please.)

The thing is, the high bar of True Yankee that Bush set is one that will be nearly impossible for any of the major three to meet. There are a few lower teir canidates like Brownback who have the ability to make the case, but nobody's looking at them at all.

And this is the problem for the GOP, the majority of Americans don't like Bush, so they don't want more of the same in the next election, to not be crushed in the upcoming election, the GOP must go with somebody who is at the very least on the surface, more moderate then Bush.

But to win the nomination, one must pander to the 30%, those who support President Bush and all his amazingly unpopular decisions, like being anti-stem cell research, being in favor of having the government get invovled in a family's decision to end life support for someone who is in a 'persistant vegitative state', and of course, the whole failure in Iraq and the potental for a new and greater failure in Iran.

This is the albatross around the neck of the Republican Party that Bush has become, those who wish to take his place can not both be "True Yankees" to the home team, and still be tolerated by the public at large. McCain has already said he'd work to overturn Roe V Wade. He's doing everything he can to placate the fans, but he'll never be a "True Yankee".

This leaves the 30% in a true pickle, they want to support their team, but they now feel their team has betrayed them, will they stay home, or will they decide to support another team? Time will tell.

Our side is to smart

I think the real problem with the politics of this nation is that one party truly seeks to inform and educate people. That they want to bring the truth to light and show everyone what's really happening.

The other side just wants you to believe what you believe, to pander to your fears, your hatred, your ignorance of the world.

The problem with this is that one side becomes about winning and losing, while the other side is about doing right by people. One side is like a sports franchise that has fans while the other side is a movement of people trying to effect the world in a positive way.

The Republican Party is morally bankrupt. The "Small Government, balanced budget" party is now the party that invades your bedroom to make sure your partner isn't someone that's the same sex as you. They invade your doctor's office to make sure you're not having an abortion. They invade your death bed and demand you be kept alive by machines. They run up huge debts and don't even attempt to balance the budget. Yet their followers remain. What issues they run on or what stance they take is meaningless. I've heard many people claim to be 'truly liberatian' and thusly, to be relevent to American politics, they vote Republican.

How any liberatian can ever see themselves in the GOP camp is beyond me, the only issue they have any ground on over Democrats is on guns, and the Dems have long given up on gun control as a national issue. On all other issues of personal freedom the Democrats are light years better then the Republicans.

Yet this hardly effects their angry base. There are many conservatives who are intelligent and do care about issues, but this is not about them. This is about the angry horde, the 30% of America who will just vote for whoever has an "R" before their name. It is like rooting for a Red Sox or a Colt. The person is meaningless, the team they play for has your loyality.

This is the problem for Democrats. I can honestly say I don't know anyone who's a blindly loyal democrat. I might be living in a vacuum, but I've dealt with a great many people who will vote for whoever the GOP puts before them, while those who do vote Democrat do so because they care about the issues, and the Democrats happen to represent that the best.

It is saddening to know that after 6 years of Bush's rule, we still have so many people supporting him, what could ever change their minds? I doubt anything, they are truly unreachable, and will just support 'the home team' for as long as they live.

Good Old Rush

I was listening to a clip of good old Rush, I.E. Pigboy on bartcop's website. Bart was generally tearing him apart as well anyone should when listening to Rush, but I heard something in Rush's endless rambling that Bart didn't bring up and it struck me as being really galling, I know a liberal being offended by Pigboy's radio show, shocking isn't it?

He went off on one of those fantastic false comparisons where you compare the number of people murdered in American City X (In this case he used Philly) then compare it to Iraq, and wow! Iraq's no worse then American City X! The Press are a bunch of whiny defeatists who want to see us lose this war! The liberals long to live in an Islamic Dictatorship run by Osama Bin Laden! Clearly that's how the world works.

After making his false claims about Philly = Iraq, he then pouts over the fact that 3100 Americans have been killed in Iraq over 4 years, and that this is really a small small number of dead over such a giant period of time, really, Philly is just as bad, yet the Media does NOTHING but whine about all the dead kids in Iraq, not one word about all the violence riddling the streets of Philly.

Now of course I could waste a great many words refuting that stupidly illogical line of reasoning, but I won't, what I want to ask to Rush is, how many American troops in Iraq need to be killed for it to be worth writing about, and how fast does it have to happen? Do we need 200 in a week for you to accept it as being newsworthy? Is 10,000 dead enough no matter how long it takes, or do we have to reach that milestone within 2 years from now? When will the amount of America troops killed in Iraq reach the threshold you need to accept that this is in some small way, relevant to the world at large and thus, the press shall be allowed to spill some ink in covering it? How high must we pile the dead before you will grant your blessing for them to be spoken about?

Deal or No Deal

I have been told by more then 1 person that we are fighting the Iraq war due to the amazingly flawless reasoning of "we're fighting them over there so we don't have to fight them here." and that the Iraq war allows me (Cause they know me so well) to have "Peace of Mind" knowing that terrorist will in fact not be blowing me up today or tomorrow.

Can you imagine that being the reason we have sent all these people to Iraq, to be shot at, wounded, or killed? For us in America to have "Peace of Mind"? What kind of a sick nation would we have to be to be so morbid as to declare our military to be expendable, their deaths merely a means by which to protect us from harm.

The "Peace of Mind" war is one that can *never* end. Since the moment we leave Iraq, we will lose our "Peace of Mind". I can't imagine what life is like for these people, did they feel instantly 'safer' once we invaded Iraq? Were they living in fear from 9/11 until the invasion of Iraq? Or did it take more for them to finally feel safe? Did killing Saddam's children make them safe? Or was it capturing Saddam? If that wasn't enough was it hanging him? How much more can we do to make them, or anyone else, feel safe?

Can anyone imagine this being the justification or reason for this war? Can anyone think that honestly any President could have gotten in front of the American people and said the following.

"My fellow Americans, we have been attacked by Terrorists, these people have caused great damage and loss of life to our nation. To deal with this threat we shall engage in a cursory attack at their leadership in it's home nation. After having done so, we will invade Iraq, mostly because it is a middle eastern nation with an easy to defeat military. After we have crushed Iraq's puny military, our troops will then police the nation. The people of Iraq will most likely rise up in rebellion against them. Osama Bin Laden, who we will have failed to capture or kill, will find Iraq's rebellion against our troops to be a chance to strike at us, and will do his best to send his terrorist legions into Iraq. There his supporters and the native Iraq population who hates us, will work as best they can to murder our troops. By allowing Bin Laden and the Iraqi people to stay focused on murdering only those Americans sent over to Iraq, we will keep America safe. You may ask when can the troops leave? Clearly the answer is never, they must fight and die in Iraq so that we in America can remain safe and free from deadly terrorist attacks like those we suffered on 9-11. We will end up with tens of thousands of wounded troops, thousands of dead troops, and so many others who will suffer from endless mental disorders inflicted on them by the horrors of war, but this is a needed, and vital mission to keep America safe.

Thank you, and God Bless."

This is what they are telling us. This is the sad, pitiful reality we have to face. That the doomed, mindpoisoned 30% of this nation live in such fear, such dread of boogeymen and hobgoblins, that we must, MUST send endless waves of young men and women to Iraq to die, just so they can feel better.

Ugh.