Sure looks like it could happen in 2008 if we keep getting more reports like this one:

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Miguel Tejada is under FBI scrutiny, officials said Thursday after opening a preliminary investigation into whether the former AL MVP lied when he told federal authorities he never took steroids or other performance-enhancing drugs.

Organized crime?  Drug importation, manufacture, and distribution?  Federal corruption?  Worry not, those things are as gone as polio here in the United States.  The only crime left for the FBI to spend its millions of man hours on is investigating steroid use, and possibly lying about steroid use, by millionaire athletes.

If only the state and local police were so efficient reducing non-steroid-related crime to zero.  As someone who thinks federalism is a good idea, and that states and municipalities can be good laboratories for democracy and problem solving, the realization that the Feds have somehow performed so much better in the area of crime prevention has me a little concerned.

When I saw this link via SI.com, I figured it had to be a joke or an Onion parody.  Even Myles Brand, dim as he may be [come on, he can't figure out how to create an 8 team football playoff, but only in the case of Division I schools?], couldn't have the NCAA looking into John Wooden having somehow violated the byzantine rules of athletic recruiting, right?

Turns out, it may be true.  From Bill Dwyer's column in the LA Times:

This is about a tempest in a teapot, a condition found frequently in the silly bureaucracy of the NCAA.

Just before the start of this college basketball season, UCLA received a letter of inquiry from the NCAA, seeking information about possible illegal contact between a recruit and a person representing the interests of the university.

The recruit was Kevin Love, now the Bruins' star freshman center.

The person representing the interests of the university was John Wooden.

The NCAA has not disclosed who made the complaint.

Love and his family visited Wooden during his recruiting trip. They had a nice chat, Wooden teased the Loves' young daughter, Emily, for being so quiet, and a nice time was had by all.

and

UCLA's investigation, under the guidance of compliance director Rich Herczog, clearly didn't need to be that severe. Matter of fact, it was easy. Wooden, as a paid consultant to the school, is permitted to meet with recruits.

But let's say he had no official status with UCLA, other than being its greatest living example of humanity. Then the NCAA could have agreed that he was a person illegally representing the interests of the school in the recruitment of Love and actually penalize the Bruins.

Think about this.

Even though we know better every time we read about big bowl money and the latest zillion-dollar TV network basketball tournament contract, does not the NCAA purport to exist for the betterment of the educational experience? What better educational opportunity anywhere than to meet and talk to John Wooden?

Another thing. If Wooden had the time, health and youth to do so, he would spend just as much time imparting his wisdom to a tuba player from Occidental as he would to a 6-foot-10 center. If Wooden talked to Love and didn't think UCLA would be a good fit, he would have told him not to come, to go somewhere else, to join a rock band. Whatever.

Wooden is 97 years old. He loves UCLA, but he is driven by only three things: family, truth and integrity. Bruins loyalty would be a distant fourth.

Even if Wooden hadn't been official and legal when he chatted with Kevin Love and his family, who cares? It's John Wooden, for Pete's sake. Is there nobody at the NCAA who can think and reason and insert logic into their 14,434-page rule book?

I'll take a stab at answering the two questions Dwyer poses in the last paragraph above.  The only people who care are the idiots who work for the NCAA, and there is plainly no one at the NCAA with an ounce of common sense.

So it looks like Roger Clemens was a steroid using cheater.  I've heard radio and television commentators indicate that rumors about Clemens' steroid use have swirled for years, so it was perhaps not surprising that his name came up in the report for MLB prepared by former Senator George Mitchell.

Clemens is now on track to both pursue a defamation lawsuit against the trainer who apparently told Mr. Mitchell's investigators that he injected Clemens with steroids, as well as testify before a Congressional committee sometime next month.

Hardly surprising that there are now news reports that Clemens is not so interested in being deposed by Congress' attorneys prior to his testimony, but apparently he is still willing to testify under oath at the hearing.  Confusing?  To me it is.  Anyway, here's the relevant stuff from an article at SI online:

NEW YORK (AP) -- Roger Clemens' lawyer wouldn't commit Sunday to having the pitcher give a deposition to congressional investigators, even as he said the seven-time Cy Young Award winner remains willing to testify in open session before a House committee investigating denials that he used performance-enhancing drugs.
  .....
"There has been absolutely no change in Roger's willingness and indeed desire to testify under oath before Congress in a public hearing at a date of the Oversight Committee's choosing,"  [Clemens' attorney Rusty] Hardin said in a statement. ....

I understand Mr. Hardin is apparently some big shot trial lawyer, so he's probably way smarter than I can ever hope to be.  But fortunately, I still have the common sense a good Hoosier upbringing invariably provides.  So I can figure out how easily this apparent problem that super-lawyer Rusty Hardin can't seem to solve.

Let's walk through it so that all the legal geniuses like Hardin can follow the logic:

1.  Clemens "remains willing to testify in open session before a House committee..."
2.  "Testify" in this case means that Clemens would be under oath.
3.  A deposition is essentially PRIVATE testimony, also under oath, but with more intense questioning.
4.  Clemens does not want to sit for a deposition.
5.  Then have Clemens publicly deposed before the House committee!

He's under oath either way.  And if Clemens is willing to testify, under oath, at a public hearing, then he should have no problem being deposed at that same time.  His answers should be the same, right?  No way an innocent guy like Clemens should have any concerns with giving full, accurate, honest answers to everyone's questions about his baseball career.  Simple!

Hopefully Clemens' legal team and/or the legal eagles with the House committee somehow stumble across my blog and figure out there's an easy way out of this mess that is staring them in the face.

With two children, ages almost 7 and almost 4, our family doesn't go to the movies often, and when we do, we're going to see family-friendly fare.  Our kids are familiar with most of the Disney, Pixar and Dreamworks material from the past 20 years, as well as a fair number of movies we have on DVD that have stood the test of time, like earlier Disney films and select titles such as The Princess Bride, Looney Tunes cartoons, Underdog and the Muppet Show.

Over the Christmas break from school, we went to see the Disney film "Enchanted."  If you are not familiar with the movie, here's the plot summary from imdb.com:

A classic Disney fairytale collides with modern-day New York City in a story about a fairytale princess who is sent to our world by an evil queen. Soon after her arrival, Princess Giselle begins to change her views on life and love after meeting a handsome lawyer. Can a storybook view of romance survive in the real world?

The theater was fairly full, but not ridiculously so, with many kids, as we expected.  We all enjoyed it immensely, and I'm sure when it comes out on video we'll pick up a copy to keep on hand.

My favorite part of the experience, as I told my lovely wife after the show when we all discussed what we thought were the best parts of the movie, was not really part of the film, but in a way, it had to have been exactly what the filmmakers at Disney wanted to achieve.

At the risk of spoiling the movie for anyone who has not seen it (sorry!), near the end of the film there is a kind of Snow White meets Cinderella plot device involving Princess Giselle.  She is under a spell, and only true love's kiss can save her.

Naturally, as Prince Edward, her betrothed, has followed her to New York and is on hand to save her, he kneels to kiss her.  Sadly, it has no effect.

Then the camera pans to the handsome lawyer, Robert, played by Patrick Dempsey (though he'll always be Ronald McDonald Miller to me!).  And while there was momentary silence throughout the theater, the emptiness was immediately filled by the voices of children urging Robert to "kiss her!"

Kids grow up fast.  And I know the time will come when they will be in the movie theater and a similar moment will arrive, but no one will speak out.  They'll all know what's going to happen next, and they may think to themselves, "Oh, yeah, now he needs to do X."

Who knows if the kids will even remember that part of seeing the movie.  All I can do is write about it, post it, and hope to save that memory for all of us.  And for right now, I'm glad that they are still young and innocent enough to be completely taken into the story on the screen, to the point where they feel the urgency and necessity to tell the "prince" he has to save the princess.

English is a wonderful language, and one of its more interesting aspects is the continual development of new usages and words from all over the world.  However, along with new usages and words that are a delight to learn, hear and use, there occasionally additions to the language that grate on my ear.  Bitter with the sweet and all that.

I was reminded of words that bug me when I was shopping at Borders bookstore this morning.  While browsing the children's section in search of new and interesting books for the kids, I overheard another customer speaking on his cell phone.  I know many people are easily annoyed by people in public who speak loudly on their cell phones, so that everyone in the area becomes part of the conversation.  For my own part, I've always been pretty good at tuning things out that I don't care about, so the loud cell phone yapping is not a huge issue for me.

But one of the first things the guy said (before I tuned him out) was that he had been to a "presser" for some issue or candidate.  For whatever reason, the word "presser" has become a new usage to refer to a press conference.  I've run across this usage on the internet mostly, and it annoys me almost as much to read it as it did to hear it.

It doesn't make sense, really.  There's nothing inherently offensive about using the word for this meaning.  It's probably just because I've come to associate it with politics and people whose lives largely revolve around politics that I've had such a visceral reaction to it.

For whatever reason, I just think that there's no good reason to discard the phrase "press conference" in favor of a shorter, single word like "presser."

I have no idea if this has become an "accepted" usage at the Oxford English Dictionary.  My understanding is that new words and usages are submitted all the time for consideration, and every year, a list of new words or usages is announced.  In any event, this usage didn't seem to come up in an internet search of dictionaries.

Nothing I can do to stop new words that bother me.  But that's another wonderful aspect of the English language - I can simply ignore silly words that I don't think should be included, and use words that may be considered more archaic but are [ed. - Fixed!] still recognized as part of the language.

From the UK Guardian online comes news of another death.  From the story:

Philip Agee, a former CIA agent who became a bitter critic of Washington's Cuba policy, has died aged 72, Cuban state media reported today.

Agee quit the CIA in 1969 after 12 years in which he mainly worked in Latin America. He was later denounced as a traitor by George Bush Sr and was threatened with death by his former colleagues.

I sometimes thought George H.W. Bush's experience as head of the CIA was one of the points most strongly in his favor as a presidential candidate at a time when the Soviet Union was still in existence.  Given the apparent CIA shenanigans of the past 10-15 years, I'm not so sure how Mr. Bush's CIA experience is a net plus.  Perhaps things went significantly downhill in the performance of the Agency after the debacles of the Carter years and the Church Commission.

In any event, I suppose if nothing else the story of Agee's death in exile could be seen as yet another example that, despite the fervid imaginations of Hollywood movie makers and others who are sure that the CIA and various secret government agencies are all knowing and unstoppable in their capacity to inflict evil throughout the world, the reality is a lot less exciting.  A rogue agent can betray the CIA, leading the horrific results for the Agency and various agents, and undermine our national security, and rather than being liquidated quickly and cleanly by the omniscient CIA, he lives freely in exile for nearly 40 years before dying on an island in the Caribbean.  Jack Bauer would never let that happen.

While I do not own any guns, I am not philosophically opposed to them.  I've fired rifles at targets, and I can imagine that real target shooting, or something like skeet or trap shooting, could be kind of fun to do on occasion.

So with that minimal background, I was curious about Professor Glenn Reynolds' link to an article on anti-gun sentiment in the NFL and NBA.  Here's the setup:

Last year, Washington Redskins safety Sean Taylor got out of bed upon hearing intruders entering his home. The house was situated in a wealthy, gated community on the outskirts of Miami. It was the middle of the night. To protect himself, his girlfriend, and their young child, Taylor grabbed a machete he kept nearby and crept to his bedroom door.

So Taylor, in fear, and concerned for the safety of his family, armed himself with a large knife used to hack away at jungle foliage. The intruder shot and killed him.

Many have asked why Taylor felt it necessary to have a machete nearby, but it's probably worth asking (as his friends and peers in professional sports certainly are), "What if it had been a gun?" Certainly, the outcome may have been different.

Unfortunately, officials in the NFL and the NBA increasingly take a paternalistic attitude toward their athletes. For years, the NFL and the NBA have attempted to distance players from firearms. Some would argue these policies are aimed at a culture that celebrates the criminal use of violent weapons, but the effect is pretty clear: The leagues would rather their players put themselves at risk than protect themselves with guns.

I wind up reacting to this article like I do to a lot of things posted on the Reason website - intellectually, it's kind of compelling and interesting to see where they're going.  In this case, the idea that safety training, including proper handling and use of firearms, for professional athletes who may have unsavory connections in their background or exposure to unbalanced fans makes a certain amount of common sense.

But when I try to imagine a reality where professional sports teams somehow trying to sell the public on the idea that they are encouraging or aiding professional athletes in learning how to properly defend themselves, which may mean using firearms for their protection, I just don't see it.  It would probably be an easier sell for professional sports leagues and teams to somehow provide "official" security for players that would somehow be more professionally trained and responsible than would be the athletes themselves.  But even that has disturbing connotations if athletes become seen as being surrounded by armed goons, creating even more distance between themselves and their fan base.

And I suppose one elephant in the room that the Reason article does not address is steroids and other drug use.  My guess is that there is an increasingly common perception of professional athletes as being users and abusers of steroids and other drugs.  And one of the problems often mentioned with steroids is the user's rage issues.  So until the league's can somehow get a handle on the players' use of steroids and drugs that would impair their decision making ability, it's probably not a good idea to float the idea of promoting more firearm ownership on the part of professional athletes.

Lower property and income taxes?  Check.  Lower cost of housing?  Check.  Visited by the Chicago Cubs for at least 3 games each season?  Check.

I told my lovely wife when we moved to her native state of New Jersey 5 years ago that I did not want to go through the hassles of relocation again.  Since telling her that, the elected yahoos and bureaucratic dim bulbs in this state have done nearly everything in their power to get me to rethink my position.

Just in the past few weeks, we've been treated to:  (1) having the death penalty removed from the books, despite wide popular support for retaining it; (2) being told that our votes in the presidential campaigns won't matter because the state's elected officials have decided in their infinite wisdom that they know better than the Founding Fathers and New Jersey's electoral college votes will go to whatever candidate wins the national popular vote (I'm so glad that my already worthless presidential vote will now officially become subservient to the wishes of those in California, New York, Illinois, Texas, Pennsylvania, Ohio and Florida); and (3) an official apology from the State of New Jersey for slavery, undoubtedly setting up the taxpayers who were never asked about an apology to make massive payments in reparations for slavery that ended over 100 years before they were born.

Makes me wonder if there are any Lakota Indians anwhere in Mercer County so that perhaps they can declare a separate, tax free country here in Lawrenceville so that we can somehow abandon New Jersey but still not have to move.

Sports Illustrated has a page on its website called Extra Mustard, for even lighter fare than the nuts and bolts of game reports.  There was a blurb in today's entries with a picture of Texas Tech men's basketball coach Bob Knight with the following caption:

Bobby Knight topped himself yesterday. He brought his grandson into his postgame press conference and  then unleashed the BS curse right in front of the tyke.

Wearily, I clicked through the provided link to the YouTube video to see the latest "outrage" for myself.  Having been raised watching Indiana University basketball during Knight's heyday in the 70s, and then enjoying watching his Hoosier teams play during the 80s and early 90s, I've also been through the countless episodes of shameless behavior, both basketball related and otherwise.

But after watching the YouTube clip, I found myself wondering how the caption from Sports Illustrated could have been written.  Maybe I missed it during the approximately 4 minute segment, but if Knight uttered a BS during the press conference, it was done with no real emphasis and certainly was not part of any angry tirade directed at the media.

I know Knight is not perfect.  But it's this kind of sensationalized reporting from the media that has always put me much more firmly on Knight's side than the media's when it comes to any story of Knight's excesses.  What I got out of the video was that Knight did in fact have his grandson with him, and the grandson, despite being very young (I would guess maybe 2) was very well behaved during the segments shown.  Did Knight swear during the press conference?  Maybe, but again, if he did, I missed it, and it certainly wouldn't have been the worst thing in his grandson's life if it was said in passing in response to a question during the press conference.

Good luck on number 900 and beyond, Coach.  I wish things in Bloomington had not turned out the way they did and that you were able to continue your success with the Hoosiers.

The headline at ESPN.com caught my eye:

Cubs will add 70 'bullpen box seats' at Wrigley

From the story:

The Chicago Cubs have received permission to add 70 "bullpen box seats" along the third base line and install additional digital signage at Wrigley Field.

First, as we Cubs fans have now hit the century mark for incompetence, futility and losing, I suppose we shouldn't be surprised that the team sees the offseason not as an opportunity to pull out all the stops to acquire a dominating pitcher such as Johann Santana, but rather as the proper time to focus on important issues like increasing the revenue stream, because the biggest problem the Cubs have faced lo these 100 years since they last won a World Series title is lack of money and fan support.

Second, I realized with horror that these new "bullpen box seats" will be down the third base line.  Anything of significance ever happen during a Cubs game down the third base line?  I seem to remember something happening in 2003...

That's right, the Cubs have in fact found a way to get Steve Bartman CLOSER to the action on the field.

If I believed Lou Piniella actually cared about winning a championship with the Cubs, I'd be worried this coming season will see him stroke out.

Jonah Goldberg of National Review Online posted an excerpt from this online news story about the Lakota Indians withdrawing from various treaties with the U.S.  The relevant bits:

WASHINGTON (AFP) — The Lakota Indians, who gave the world legendary warriors Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse, have withdrawn from treaties with the United States, leaders said Wednesday.

"We are no longer citizens of the United States of America and all those who live in the five-state area that encompasses our country are free to join us," long-time Indian rights activist Russell Means told a handful of reporters and a delegation from the Bolivian embassy, gathered in a church in a run-down neighborhood of Washington for a news conference.

and

Lakota country includes parts of the states of Nebraska, South Dakota, North Dakota, Montana and Wyoming.

The new country would issue its own passports and driving licences, and living there would be tax-free -- provided residents renounce their US citizenship, Means said.

I'll leave it to the smarter lawyers like the guys from law review, as well as the folks who actually took the course in Native American Law in school, to debate the likelihood of the Lakota Country somehow becoming a truly free and independent country.

One thing that wouldn't surprise me, though, would be to find that in the coming months and years, if this issue continues to linger, people will start trying to claim citizenship in Lakota Country in order to avoid paying U.S. income taxes in much the same way as the geniuses who keep trying to tell us the entire income tax is unenforceable so you don't have to pay taxes.

While it may be a very interesting socio-political experiment if the Lakota were somehow able to become a separate, tax-free nation, my guess is they still have a very long hill to climb in order to get there.

If anyone really believes that the proposed "apology" resolution being floated in the New Jersey general assembly will not be used at some point to help pave the way for reparations to all African American citizens, please contact me immediately to discuss a bridge I'm looking to sell.

From this morning's story posted on the Fox News web site:

TRENTON, N.J. —  New Jersey could become the first Northern state to apologize for slavery under a measure due for a legislative committee hearing this week.

"This is not too much to ask of the state of New Jersey," said Assemblyman William Payne, sponsor of the proposal. "All that is being requested of New Jersey is to say three simple words: 'We are sorry.'"

And:

Payne's measure is set for a hearing Thursday by the Assembly Appropriations Committee. It hasn't received Senate consideration. The legislative session expires Tuesday.

Huh.  The Appropriations Committee.  Go figure.  Wonder why the yahoos who oversee all the profligate waste of taxpayer funds are the ones who are considering this resolution.

No way this could possibly lead to consideration of reparations.  No, never.

As the great Lloyd Bridges said, "Looks like I picked the wrong week to stop sniffing glue."

From a "breaking" news story posted online this morning:

SINGAPORE (AP) - Maria Sharapova said Saturday she believed women's tennis is taking the necessary measures to remain clean amid allegations of match- fixing and illegal betting in the men's game.

"The women's game is very clean," the fifth-ranked player said one day before an exhibition match with her sixth-ranked Russian compatriot, Anna Chakvetadze.

Sharapova, 20, said WTA Tour chief executive and chairman Larry Scott "is doing all the things possible, from having meetings throughout the year to encouraging players to be safe and smart about their choices.

"Unfortunately we have to be realistic about the fact that some of these things do go on ... but at the end of the day I believe that women's tennis is doing a great job of being clean," Sharapova said.

Ok, so the chief executive of the women's professional tennis tour is "doing all things possible" to make sure the sport is clean.  That must mean state of the art, random, and frequent drug testing, rigorous background checks on players, their coaches and entourages, perhaps even working with international police agencies to further investigations into possible improprieties in the world of professional sport.

Oh, wait, never mind, he's found a better way.  He's having meetings (presumably with players) and encouraging said players to make good decisions.  Well, then, he's pretty much covered the waterfront!

I suppose we have to at least give Mr. Scott credit for having Ms. Sharapova make these comments to the press.  If your tour's position is essentially to do nothing and hope that there are no problems, you may has well send it via a tall, blonde, gorgeous player for all those people who aren't listening to what she's saying, but instead are mesmerized by her beauty.  Well played, Mr. Scott.

Some smart blogger should make available "Contempt Citations" for ordinary citizens to issue to deserving elected, judicial and bureaucratic figures.  If I were a government official or employee, nothing would give me a bigger smile than having a nice clean contempt citation from Congress to frame and hang on my bathroom wall.  From the linked story:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Senate Judiciary Committee voted on Thursday to hold two men who have been top aides to President George W. Bush in contempt for refusing to comply with subpoenas in its probe of the firing of federal prosecutors.

On a largely party-line vote, the Democratic-led panel sent contempt of Congress citations against White House Chief of Staff Josh Bolten and former Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove to the full Senate for consideration.

I see on Michelle Malkin's blog that the Democrats in New Jersey are apparently working to eliminate the death penalty in this state.  The news report from the Courier Post that Ms. Malkin links to provides in part as follows:

The Legislature moved New Jersey closer Monday to becoming the first state to pass a law repealing the death penalty since it was nationally reinstated in 1976.

The state Senate passed the measure 21-16, and the Assembly Public Law and Safety Committee advanced the bill by a 5-1 vote to the full Assembly. The Assembly will take up the bill Thursday, positioning New Jersey to replace capital punishment with life in prison without parole by early next year.

Of course, more surprising to me was the revelation that New Jersey still actually HAS the death penalty on the books.

My guess is no criminal who truly deserves it is ever going to be executed in New Jersey anyway, so I'm not going to get too worked up about this nominal change in law.  When the busybodies in the State House figure out a way to outlaw living in Camden, Jersey City and Newark because residing in such locations is effectively a death sentence, then things may get interesting.