Sportsfans: How Do You Feel About ESPN?

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Anti-Meles Protest

-Four Stars out of Five-

On November 15, 2005, protestors assembled for a march down Constitution Avenue to protest the rule of Meles Zenawi in Ethiopia. Quite frankly, I don’t know anything about Mr. Meles’s government, but what I can say is that American protestors could learn a lot from African immigrants.

First off, like anyone who has followed events in Ukraine or Georgia, they know that protests need a color, or colors. In fact, the green, yellow and red three-striped flag of Ethiopia is perfect. Color, color, color. Want to protest in DC, people, pick a color scheme, and make some flags. Got it?

Next thing they have: melody. Their protest chants don’t have that annoying, nursery rhyme boredom of American protestors. (Next time I hear, “Hey, hey, ho, ho, [insert person] has got to go,” or the even worse, “One, two, three, four, we don’t need your stinking war.”) MELODY, really, protestors, you need to throw out the ‘Nam era leadership and find some new blood…maybe a choreographer?

And the whistles are a nice touch. And the clapping! Great stuff.

Also, nothing gets people excited by bringing out Ol’ Glory. Yes, that’s right, Lefties, the red, white and blue can work for you!

Chants, with reply chants! I love it.

Anyway, I usually tune out the protestors, but these guys are good. A truly entertaining protest, recommended for all.

Tropic of Cancer

Today there was a used book sale in the lobby of my office building to support charity. There were slim pickings, but I did find a book that I've been wanting to read for some time, Henry Miller's Tropic of Cancer. The reason, interestingly enough, had very little to do with the book and mostly revolved around a dissenting opinion in a Pennsylvania Supreme Court obscenity case about the book, Commonweatlh v. Robin, in 1966. The majority opinion failed to find the book obscene within the meaning in First Amendment jurisprudence. Justice Musmanno, didn't like the book, but if I were the publisher of it, I'd put this on the jacket:

The decision of the Majority of the Court in this case has dealt a staggering blow to the forces of morality, decency and human dignity in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. If, by this decision, a thousand rattlesnakes had been let loose, they could not do as much damage to the well-being of the people of this state as the unleashing of all the scorpions and vermin of immorality swarming out of that volume of degeneracy called the "Tropic of Cancer." Policemen, hunters, constables and foresters could easily and quickly kill a thousand rattlesnakes but the lice, lizards, maggots and gangrenous roaches scurrying out from beneath the covers of the "Tropic of Cancer" will enter into the playground, the study desks, the cloistered confines of children and immature minds to eat away moral resistance and wreak damage and harm which may blight countless lives for years and decades to come.

That's just the introductory paragraph, it only gets better. The opinion can be found at 421 Pa. 70 (Pa. 1966).

On va a la France

Bonjour, Madames and Messeiurs,
I've been on the shores of these united 50 for a shade long, so I'm going to Paris. Haven't been since '99, and I was a bit of a wide-eyed traveling neophyte in those days, so I'm hoping that 5 nights in the City of Light this time will let me figure out if I'm a Left Banker or Right one.

Direct flight from Dulles to Charles de Gaulle on Air France for under $500 bucks is something of a steal, with our fuel prices being what they are these days. I've been to Amsterdam and to London in the period between Thanksgiving and Christmas, and I have to say me experience then was that this is a great time to visit the Old World.

I've even pulled out my "Invitation" from college French class to try to brush up a bit on my French, we'll see.

Tips and suggestions are welcome...