The Kind-Hearted Smart Aleck

While last night's Big East game between Louisville and Rutgers wasn't actually a conference title game, it played like one - for the winner of the game would in all likelihood represent the conference in a BCS game. Going into the game, neither team was ranked. This will be the start of a trend for such games this weekend, unfortunately. Tonight, we have more quality conference title games than we have all of tomorrow. How many games are being played tonight? Two. In the MAC title game, 21st ranked Northern Illinois will take on 17th ranked Kent State. In the Pac-12, we'll see 16th ranked UCLA face 8th ranked Stanford - yes, for the second time in two weeks. How lame is that? Especially if you're Stanford, having beaten the Bruins 35-17 just a week prior? That brings us to Saturday, where four more conference championships will be played - including: Conference USA: Central Florida vs. Tulsa (neither team is ranked) ACC: #16 Florida State vs. Georgia Tech (the ...

In conjunction with my not being too terribly intrigued by recent news stories and being sick, the main reason I haven't written much in the past couple days or so is when I haven't been thinking about chugging a full bottle of Ny-Quil, I've been proofreading and editing my seventh book - LOL at the GOP - Volume 2: 47% Awesome 100% of the Time  - and am now approximately 58.4% done with that. My thinking cap not being completely on during my illness has hampered me at times, but hopefully I'll be able to tough it out and get it all proofread and edited before too long here. ...to be continued...

Sheryl Nuxoll - Republican Idaho State Senator - just recently stated that the states, through the electoral college, can still refuse to election President Barack Obama to a second term in office, while giving the next four years to Republican nominee Mitt Romney. What is Nuxoll's reasoning? She said that the "states are going to have to stand up for our individual rights and for our collective rights," because Obama is "depriving us of our freedoms." Of course, she's wrong. As even the wacky right-wing conspiracy website World Net Daily noted, "Since this column was posted it has been discovered that the premise presented about the Electoral College and the Constitution is in error. According to the 12th Amendment, a two-thirds quorum is required in the House of Representatives, not the Electoral College." What I find both so appalling, yet hilarious, is the fact that Nuxoll is asking the states to take away the voters' rights - you kno...

On the front page of Monday's The Columbus Dispatch 's sports section read the words "Rivals Again?" in reference to the Cleveland Browns and Pittsburgh Steelers. I chuckled pretty hard at the sight of this headline. Why is this? You see, the Browns beat the Steelers on Sunday by the final score of 20-14. This is what prompted the headline. With the win on Sunday, the Browns improved to 4-22 (.154) against the Steelers since the 2000 season. Since that season, Pittsburgh has outscored Cleveland 619-347 (average of 23.8 - 13.3). That sounds like the renewing of a vicious rivalry right there!  To make matters worse, this fourth win by the Browns over the Steelers in their past 26 meetings was by a measly six points over a team that turned the ball over eight times (that's not a misprint) with their 3rd-string quarterback behind center. What's that I smell? I'm not sure, but it's definitely not the renewing of a rivalry.

Virginia Republican Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli recently spoke on WMAL radio with hosts Brian Wilson and Cheri Jacobus about voter fraud and how e-mails from listeners of theirs proved the state of Virginia and with that, the election, was stolen by one Barack Obama. Of course, no evidence was provided by the listeners. They just saw some strange things happen - like women, minorities, and young people vote. Who knew? Part of the discussion went as follows: Jacobus: "There needs to be a way for people to be able to report this stuff and have it looked into. I mean, just across the country, we're hearing so many stories. And people can talk about it, but nothing seems to be done. And, in fact in these states where voter ID is required to vote..." Wilson: "Photo ID." Jacobus: "Photo ID. Voter photo ID. Obama lost every one of those states. He can't win a state where photo ID is required. So clearly there's something going on out there and ...

The short answer? Yes. The long answer? Hell yes! Okay, so that's not the long answer. However, that may be the only thing keeping Texas A&M quarterback Johnny Manziel from being a shoo-in for the Heisman Trophy this year. You see, Manziel is a freshman and no freshman has ever won the Heisman Trophy before. There are some voters whom won't vote for a freshman because it's against their religion or something along those lines. In all honesty, I don't know what voters' reason(s) would be to not believe a freshman is worthy of the coveted award. Do they feel freshmen are undeserving, because if one has a great season, it's more due to beginner's luck than actual skill? Do they feel it's morally wrong to vote for a guy in his first year than another that has been with his team for between two and four years? Was an 11th Commandment added, which says, "Thou shalt not vote for a freshman for the Heisman Trophy"? Whatever the reason, hasn't...

It was another game and another loss for the Philadelphia Eagles on Monday night, which dropped them to 3-8 on the season. One could just look at the final score and say, "Well, at least it was close." But then I'd have to point out their opponent. It's not like the Eagles lost 30-22 to the 10-1 Houston Texans or the 10-1 Atlanta Falcons. No, they fell by that very score to the 2-8 (now 3-8) Carolina Panthers. The Eagles did what they've been doing all year - turned the ball over three times, didn't force any turnovers, and developed a case of Alzheimer's when playing defense. To the offensive coaches' credit, I thought they came in with a solid gameplan on that side of the ball. They found ways to ease the pressure off the beaten up offensive line, open some holes for Bryce Brown and the running game, as well as limit the hits rookie quarterback Nick Foles took. They did all they could to limit pressure on the rookie Foles. In a statistic that is ...

I can't count the number of times I've heard or read someone precede the word "historic" with the article "an." This isn't because I'm somehow deficient at math. I've simply lost track. I'd approximate that four out of five times I hear or read someone utter the two words "an historic," they sound extremely confident when doing so - like they've just wowed the world by thinking they've correctly preceded "historic" with "an," when in fact they're incorrect on the matter. I always find that to be humorous. It's one thing for a person to be wrong about a claim they make. It's quite another for them to be uber-confident about said claim and be wrong. It reminds me of a time back in grade school. Some classmates and I arrived to school early and were waiting for the doors to be opened. For whatever reason, I asked one of them, almost jokingly, what the capital of Nebraska was. For the record...

 Anti-feminist and former man, Suzanne Venker, just recently wrote an article for FoxNews.com , which is called "The war on men." What is this "war on men" the ex hairy-chested gentlewoman is talking about? It revolves around one Pew Research Center poll, which claims that while more women are wanting to get married, more men are not (37% of women, up from 28% in 1997 and 29% of men, down from 35% that same year). What is this femi-man's reason for this change among the two sexes regarding marriage? I'll let her explain it to you herself: "Women aren't women anymore." I honestly wasn't aware of a sex-change epidemic that was running rampant in this country until reading those four words. Is the woman I'm dating now a former man, like Ms./Mr. Venker? I may have to ask for her medical records in light of this breaking news story! Venker continued with this: "In a nutshell, women are angry. They're also defensive, thou...

The conference championships are now less than a week away in college football and soon thereafter, we'll officially know who will be playing in the national championship game. It's all but decided that unbeaten Notre Dame will take on the winner of the SEC Championship game between #2 Alabama and #3 Georgia. However, while it would be difficult for me to argue against Notre Dame deserving one of the two spots, I'm not entirely certain that the winner of the SEC title game is deserving of that second spot. Regardless of who wins the Alabama/Georgia game, and who gets rewarded that second spot in the BCS title game, I will clamor that a playoff would be more suitable to determine the national champion this year - of at least a four-team variety. Going into next week's games, there are five teams with one loss from major conferences whom could try to make legitimate arguments that their team belongs in the national title game alongside Notre Dame. Following next week...

Upon winning the coin toss for overtime in a college football game, I have never witnessed a team choosing to go on offense first. Every single time I've seen such a game, the team who won the coin toss has elected to go on defense first. The reason for this is it gives them the last chance in the first overtime and through that, provides them with the necessary information on what they will need to do on their possession in order to either win the game or move it to a second overtime. If the opposing team scores a field goal on their possession, the team who elected to go on defense first will then know they'll need a field goal to send the game to a second overtime or a touchdown to win in the first overtime.  I understand that, but think I would go about things differently if I were a college coach. It depends on location. If my team were playing at home, I would elect to go on defense first. I'd trust that the crowd would add extra pressure on the opponent on their f...

I hate doing this, but after watching some college football today, felt the need to inform a couple announcers about the rules of college football. On two separate occasions today, I heard announcers state the following after a flag was thrown: "It appears as if we have a face mask on the way and it's the 15-yard variety!"  It wasn't always this way, but all face-mask penalties are now 15 yards. All touchdowns are worth 6 points. All field goals are worth 3 points. All college football announcers should read up on the rules of the game before calling any games. That or they'd be welcome to call me for some pointers. I'll only charge $1,500.00 per second. I can be reached at the number 1-800-YEAHDUH. Call away!

There were six conference games this weekend to close out the regular season. With Nebraska's 13-7 victory over Iowa on Friday afternoon, the Huskers clinched the Legends division and will face Wisconsin in the Big Ten title game next week. The Badgers fell to Penn State today by the final score of 24-21 in overtime, which dropped them to 4-4 in conference and 7-5 overall. Both Purdue and Michigan State became bowl eligible with wins today - the Boilermakers defeated Indiana 56-35 to improve to 3-5 in conference and 6-6 overall and Michigan State beat Minnesota on the road 26-10 to also improve to 3-5 in Big Ten play and 6-6 overall. Northwestern pounded Illinois 50-14 to send the Illini home for the holidays winless in conference play. Lastly, Ohio State finished their season unbeaten by defeating rival Michigan by the score of 26-21. Due to both Ohio State and Penn State being ineligible to play in bowl games due to their NCAA violations, the Big Ten has just seven bowl eligibl...

Down 24-14 midway in the 3rd quarter, the Houston Texans received an early Christmas present from the refs. Tailback Justin Forsett was tackled after a 7-yard gain, but then got up and extended that for a club-record 81-yard touchdown run. The refs didn't blow their whistles and even though Stevie Wonder was rumored to having seen Forsett's elbow and knee touching the ground, the refs called it a touchdown. Having seen quite clearly that Forsett was down, Detroit Lions head coach Jim Schwartz angrily threw out his challenge flag. Since every touchdown is reviewed upstairs, this was not necessary. In fact, due to a ridiculous rule, Schwartz's throwing of the challenge flag resulted in the play not being reviewed by rule and the team getting penalized 15 yards. This all resulted in the Texans closing the gap to 24-21 and with it, the entire complexion of the game. The Lions had trouble getting focused both offensively and defensively, and before they knew it, Houston had ...

With the holiday this week and the fact I'm currently proofreading and editing another manuscript of mine, I haven't been quite as active with this blog in recent days. Hopefully, shortly after the holiday, I'll have the book finished and ready to go for release, and I can get back to being more active on this site. In the meantime, I wish everyone a very happy and safe holiday weekend! Don't do anything Charlie Sheen would do!

I don't think I'm alone in saying I'm growing tired of the SEC in college football. It seems that most every year, the conference appears to get over-hyped in the pre-season, yet finds a way to get a team to the national championship - winning the past six. Last year was the worst-case scenario, as the national championship game was between two SEC teams that had already played in the regular season. LSU won the regular-season match-up, the SEC Championship, and then was paired with a team they had already beaten, who didn't even qualify for the conference title game in Alabama. As seems to be typical, the loser of the first game won the rematch, and Alabama did just that en route to being crowned champs one again. Before last Saturday, it appeared as if no SEC team would find its name listed in the BCS title game. With Kansas State ranked #1, Oregon #2, and Notre Dame #3, two of the three teams would need to fall for an SEC team to have a legitimate chance of winni...

The rough draft for my seventh book - LOL at the GOP - Volume 2: 47% Awesome 100% of the Time  - is finished. Now's time to proofread and edit the darn thing. Hopefully I can get that finished and the book released by early December sometime. Details to come...

The Philadelphia Eagles continued their lovely string of defeats, falling 31-6 to in-division rival Washington today - their sixth consecutive loss, dropping them to 3-7 on the season. Today marked the first game started by Eagles' rookie quarterback Nick Foles. It's just about impossible to fairly grade an NFL quarterback based on one start, so I won't be too critical of the guy. However, Foles did anything but dazzle with his play, completing just 21 of 46 pass attempts (45.7%) for 204 yards (4.4 per attempt), and 2 interceptions for a quarterback rating of 40.5. He also ran the ball once for no gain and was sacked four times for a loss of 27 yards. He completed passes to six different receivers. However, he only completed seven of his passes to actual wide receivers and only two of those went to either DeSean Jackson or Jeremy Maclin. Being down for most of the game, Philly had to ditch the running game fairly early. It had been fairly ineffective up to that point anyw...

More information has been released regarding his recent call to donors, where he stated that the reason President Obama won was because of his gifts to minorities, women, and young people. In addition to that, Romney provided his insights on the Republican primary process and how it should be changed in the future: "...[the GOP should] agree that we're gonna do, you know, I don't know, eight debates, and we're gonna, we're gonna do one a month, and we're gonna pick stations that are reasonable, it's not all gonna be done by CNN and NBC, alright, I mean we're gonna try and guide this process that it's designed to showcase the best of our people as opposed to showcasing liberals beating the heck out of us." Here we go again - blaming the "liberal" media for defeat! Considering Republican candidates have won five of the past nine presidential elections, I have a difficult time believing that claim. The "liberal" media must ...

There were six Big Ten games this weekend - three good and three not so good. We'll start with the not so good. Penn State ended Indiana's run at going bowling at season's end with a 45-22 win against the Hoosiers, dropping them to 4-7 on the season. The same thing happened with Iowa, as they were trounced in Ann Arbor by Michigan, 42-17, to fall to 4-7. Nebraska dominated the now 6-5 Golden Gophers of Minnesota by the final score of 38-14. In the three decent games, Purdue defeated Illinois 20-17 to improve to 5-6 and keep their bowl hopes alive. Northwestern and Michigan State were back and forth for sixty minutes, before the Wildcats were able to prevail in East Lansing by the final of 23-20. Lastly, it took overtime, but Ohio State found a way to remain unbeaten with a 21-14 overtime win against Wisconsin in Madison. With one week left to go in the Big Ten regular season, it's official that 7-4 Wisconsin (4-3 in-conference) will represent the Leaders division in t...

I really had to laugh upon reading an article this morning. Shortly after the election last week, one Cope Reynolds - owner of the gun store Southwest Shooting Authority in Pinetop, Arizona - posted the following message no his site, in a newspaper ad, and on a sign at the front of the store: "To Whom it May Concern: I thought you all might be interested in this. We will try to demonstrate once again that the bottom line for our business is principle, not money. Yes, it has been damaging at times but our values are intact. Effective immediately, if you voted for Obama, your money is no good here. You have proven beyond a doubt that you are not responsible enough to own a firearm. We have just put a sign up on the front door to save you the trouble of walking all the way in here... I took this ad out in our local paper. It will come out in the White Mountain Independent tomorrow, 9 November Sincerely, Cope Reynolds" First off, how in the world is this Cope Rey...

Setting: Sunday school (9th-12th grade) at the church of Holy Hell! Jesus Rocks! Pastor Malarkey: "When this nation was down, Ronald Reagan flew up to the heavens, and spoke with Jesus. He tried convincing our lord and savior to grant him special powers. After the two talked things over for 79 minutes over some strawberry daiquiris and buffalo wings, Jesus granted the president those special powers. These special powers included being able to: Heal the sick, feed the hungry, talk very well, fly, and all sorts of other things. He was even given  a magical wand, which could transform into a tank, cap gun or clown to destroy or frighten dragons, especially the ones in Florida. This helped him save this great country and in essence, the world. So you see kids, Ronald Reagan was a lot like Jesus. Please tell your parents to vote Republican next Tuesday. The end." Jake: "Wow! That's amazing! That really happened?" Malarkey: "I cross my heart." ...

Joe Bush: "Do you see that building over there, little Joey?" Joey Bush: "Yeah..." Joe: "I built that." Joey: "Really? All by yourself?" Joe: "That's right!" Joey: "How long ago was that?" Joe: "Well, your great-grandpa is the one that started it, so it's been around for a while now." Joey: "...and you built that?" Joe: "You betcha. ...and someday, when you're my age, you'll get to tell people the same thing - that you built that." Joey: "Wow. I'm gonna build a lot of things, aren't I, dad?" Joe: "You bet you are! You already have!" Joey: "I have? Like what, dad?" Joe: "That backpack you wear every day to school - you built that!" Joey: "Really?" Joe: "Yeah - you put it on your back and made it work, right?" Joey: "That's right!" Joe: ...

Another right-wing conspiracy theory is circulating the web and airwaves. For some strange reason, the jobless claims increasing this week is part of some grand conspiracy. You see, if those claims were reported from the government prior to the election, Mitt Romney would have won - erasing a 3.5 million vote deficit in the popular vote and 126 vote difference in the electoral college. It was all about the Obama Administration "cooking the books," as the saying goes. Okay, I'm going to try and use as small of words as possible, speak incredibly slowly, and perhaps even draw some pictures so that these conspiracy theorists can better understand the situation. Okay, here I go. Wish me luck... Remember what happened just before the election? There was some really yucky weather in the top right part of the country (look at a map....no, your other right...there you go...). This storm was called a hurricane. It did very bad things to states like New Jersey, New York, an...

I've read and heard about some pretty crazy conspiracy theories centering around President Barack Obama. The one I just read about may be the craziest. Alright, so perhaps it places second behind the theory that Obama was born from a man. On October 11th of this year, the Republican caucus, led by majority leader Chip Rogers, held a closed-door meeting at the Georgia state Capitol. At one point during the four-hour meeting, local conservative activist Field Searcy made the following comments regarding President Obama and liberal organizations: "They do that [use mind-control techniques] by a process known as the Delphi technique. The Delphi technique was developed by the Rand Corporation during the Cold War as a mind-control technique. It's also known as 'consensive process.' But basically the goal of the Delphi technique is to lead a targeted group of people to a pre-determined outcome while keeping the illusion of being open to public input." Yes, 39% ...

Some people (mainly Casper-like white people living in gated communities) wonder why African-Americans rarely ever vote Republican. Both Al Gore and John Kerry won around 90% of the black vote in the 2000 and 2004 elections. Barack Obama won 95% in 2008 and 93% in 2012. What gives? It's situations like the one I'm about to share with you. Well after the election results became final, Maine Republican Party Chairman Charlie Webster publicly announced that there may have been some voter fraud in the state. Why did he suspect this? I'll allow him to tell you himself. Webster said, "In some parts of rural Maine, there were dozens, dozens of black people who came in and voted on Election Day." He continued with this: "Everybody has a right to vote, but nobody in [these] towns knows anyone who's black. How did that happen? I don't know. We're going to find out." For the record, President Obama beat Mitt Romney by well over 100,000 votes state...

Mitt Romney is at it again! During a May private meeting with donors in Boca Raton, Republican nominee Mitt Romney told his wealthy audience that it wasn't his job to worry about the 47% whom didn't pay federal income taxes. They were moochers, solely dependent upon the government and wouldn't vote for him anyway. As it was a private meeting, Mr. Romney was unaware that it was being recorded and that it would circulate the internet and airwaves more than lesbians scream when they see Justin Bieber. This resulted in his approval numbers falling harder than Dane Cook does for himself. Romney then attempted to suggest that he didn't really mean what he said during that private meeting and he would represent 100% of the people. Following the beat-down Romney suffered on election day, he decided to suggest to fund-raisers and donors that Obama only beat him because of how generous he was with his gift-giving to certain key demographics - namely blacks, Latinos and young ad...

Many media pundits and talking heads like to talk about how divided we are as a nation. They tend to classify the divisions as: Liberal vs. conservative, Republican vs. Democrat, red vs. blue, urban vs. rural, but I see the division in a different manner and feel it's become more evident every four years - that's old vs. new. When looking at the exit polls from last week's election, with what demographics did Republican candidate Mitt Romney succeed? The old and the white - men, in particular, along with evangelicals. Where did President Obama succeed? With young voters, minorities, and women.  The country is becoming more diverse by the year, not only with regard to race, but also with regard to people in power - women and minorities now standing alongside white males with growing numbers. Each and every new generation of voters appears to be more liberal than the last, largely due to social issues - gay rights, in particular. Women and minorities are voting in larg...

Before I delve into this any, I want to make it very clear that I'm not trying to make light of either tragedy. Lives were lost and families were shattered during both horrific events. However, based on living through both and being a keen observer to the political world throughout these past 11 years, I can't help but be struck by some amazing similarities and differences I've noticed between the two. The question always seems to be - "Do you remember where you were on 9/11?" Most people seem to remember where they were when word came that the Twin Towers had been struck in an apparent act of terrorism. A decade from now, will that same question be asked regarding Benghazi? "Where were you when the Benghazi attacks occurred?" While it'd be impossible for me to see into the future and provide an accurate report on the matter, I'm pretty confident that it's not going to happen. I only ask this because of the drastically different demeanor am...

There have been some Republican members of Congress whom have wanted to redefine rape, which would further their cause of attempting to strip rights away from women. Let me redefine rape for them. Rape (verb - pronounced rehp): What Mitt Romney, Paul Ryan, Todd Akin, Richard Mourdock, and the Republican Party suffered on election day - November 6th of 2012 - courtesy of American voters. http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2011/01/31/gop-abortion-bill-redefines-rape.html

I am currently in the midst of placing the final touches on my seventh book. It's my second book in the LOL at the GOP  series. I still need to proofread, edit, add footnotes, and a few other things. As I'll be heading out of town for Thanksgiving next week, I hope I'll be able to finalize the project the following week and receive the proof copy the first full week of December. I'll be sure to keep readers updated. ...to be continued...

I've criticized New York Jets' back-up quarterback Tim Tebow more than Tebow has prayed to Jesus, but even I will defend the quarterback in light of what I read in an ESPN.com article today. As reported by Jane McManus and Rich Cimini, a report was released which showed that 12 players on the New York Jets have stated that Tim Tebow isn't a good player. As one defensive starter told the Daily News, "He's terrible." Another player, said that outside of starting quarterback Mark Sanchez, "There's no other viable option." In addition to this, a Jets official told the newspaper the following regarding the team's passing game: "I've seen better receiving corps in college than we have on our team." Yes, when a team is struggling, as the 3-6 New York Jets are, some things are going to be said. However, even in that scenario, there's really no need to exacerbate tensions in the locker room by calling players out as being a...

We're just one week removed from the election, where President Barack Obama won 332 electoral votes compared to just 206 for Republican challenger Mitt Romney. However, this hasn't stopped some Republicans from seeming to suggest that even though their nominee was soundly defeated, his policies won. As Missouri Republican Senator Roy Blunt just recently stated: "I think, frankly, this is a great opportunity for the president to step forward, he's just been reelected, he doesn't have to run for office again, and come up with a plan that can actually pass. And I think that means, don't do the across the board cuts, come up with a way to have really targeted cuts and look at ways to increase revenue by one growing the economy, and two, maybe look at the tax code, just like Governor Romney suggested, you look at tax code and increase revenue without increasing taxes." Yes, because when America voted Barack Obama to be president for the next four years, w...