Tiger Stadium is set for demolition in a few months. No one expected that venerable baseball icon to fall apart so quickly after such a great run. But, here we are.
What a fantastic season for the Tigers. And what an incredible fall. Forgive the cliche, because it's very fitting: This is a year that Tiger fans won't soon forget.
I'll remember Justin Verlander's expression of disbelief after he threw away the ball to allow the Cards to go ahead. And I'll never forget the look on Brandon Inge's face as he swung and missed to end it all.
I'll remember that the baseball "experts" are complete morons.
I'll remember the pandemonium at Comerica Park after Magglio Ordonez smacked that walk-off. And I'll remember the look on Derek Jeter's face after we dispatched the woeful Yankees.
And I'll remember the last time I saw a game at Tiger Stadium back in 1999. That was the old stadium's last year. But the young kittens over at shiny new Comerica Park will be back.
So, while we're keeping both eyes on the 2006 ball, it's still helpful to point our mind's eye toward the bright future -- the end of George W. Bush's presidency. Here's the most exciting good news for national politics that I've seen in a long time.
Labels: Politics
Much has been made of last year's Palestinian election. For the first time, the elections for the Palestinian Parliament -- part of a Palestinian "government" which has no land, little legitimacy, and no military -- elected someone from outside the mainstream Fatah party. Instead, as you'll recall, Hamas won a majority. This meant that Hamas would elect the new Palestinian Prime Minister and the cabinet. This was a problem because Hamas, a social movement organization which provides all sorts of public services for the Palestinian people but also launches despicable and unacceptable suicide bombing missions into Israel, is officially labeled a terrorist organization by the US.
Hamas' election win led to a new moratorium on any official contact between US and Israeli officials and the Palestinian government. The election (along with the capture of a single Israeli soldier in Gaza) was used as an excuse for Israel's continued military embargo and bombardment of the Gaza Strip -- a brutal campaign which killed 7 Palestinians just today. The crippling blockade of Gaza -- supported by the US -- has led to food and medicine shortages in Gaza. The embargo seems to be having the effect that Israel and the US intended -- it's causing a Palestinian civil war.
Hamas has maintained, more or less, a one-sided ceasefire with Israel (even though the Israeli army has kidnapped Hamas legislators and has been bombing Gaza almost daily). But Hamas' their steadfast refusal to even entertain the notion of recognizing Israel has meant that Israel can maintain the moral high ground -- "we'll come to the peace negotiations as soon as Hamas stops talking about pushing us into the sea," the Israeli government can claim.
Until today.
Today, the Israelis brought their own version of Hamas into the government. The Yisrael Beiteinu Party advocates ethnic cleansing, or "transfer," as the politically correct euphemism goes in Israel. Now, the Israeli Deputy Prime Minister advocates pushing the Palestinians into the desert.
After annexing most of the West Bank, Yisrael Beiteinu would transfer millions of Israeli citizens of Arab descent out of Israeli territory. What's worse, Yisrael Beiteinu got the Israeli cabinet to agree on new "emergency powers" for the Israeli Prime Minister, taking Israel one big step closer to fascism.
This makes a terrible situation even worse. Not only has the State of Israel never been asked to recognize the existence of a Palestinian nation, but the State of Israel has also never been asked to kick right-wing extremists like Avigdor Lieberman (the leader of Yisrael Beiteinu) out of politics. Yisrael Beiteinu is a lot like Hamas, except now they'll actually have even more of a say over one of the most powerful armies in the history of the world -- the Israeli Defense Forces. This is unacceptable.
Of course, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has done even worse things than appointing a rabid ethnic cleansing proponent into high political office. This summer, he authorized the horrific, disproportionate bombing of the entire nation of Lebanon. Using cluster bombs and chemical phosphorous weapons, the Israeli army under Olmert's direction committed a major and inhuman blunder over the summer, and the fallout of that stupid failure has led to the current bleak state of affairs. Olmert, rather than taking steps to atone for his country's controversial history by making a lasting peace agreement with the Palestinians, has instead invited a frothing right-wing extremist to join the ruling coalition. What a shame.
There is no military solution to this conflict. The world needs to demand that Israel immediately expel the Yisrael Beiteinu Party from its cabinet, and they need to demand that Israel recognize a Palestinian state.
As long as the US and the rest of the world remains silent on Israeli transgressions, the continuing brutal beat-down of the Palestinians won't help anybody -- certainly not the people of Israel.
Labels: Middle East
And, true to form, recently Arnold has used all the benefits of incumbency to help promote this clean image. He had Tony Blair come visit to talk about the environment. Then, with an extravagant PR showcase, the Governator teamed up with the Democrats (the same people he used to call "girly") to sign a landmark, bi-partisian law designed to dramatically cut greenhouse gas emissions in California. Good news, for sure, right?
Wrong. Arnold is already going back on his word.
This past Monday, Arnold traveled to New York to make yet another big show of his "clean" record on the environment. He attended party fundraisers and rang the bell at the stock exchange. He also surprised everyone by announceing a sweeping new Executive Order (which he signed Tuesday after returning to California) that breaks his promises and makes drastic changes to the greenhouse emissions law he supposedly signed in good faith.
Assembly Speaker Fabian Núñez suddenly (and belatedly) realized that Arnold shouldn't be trusted, when he lamented: "You can't rewrite a law through executive order.... This is totally inconsistent with the intent of the law and with the way that it is written." Arnold's new order, which he claims "clarifies" the greenhouse law, changes a crucial aspect of how the law is enforced. In negotiations, Arnold had to give up on his proposal that the Executive Branch would have final say. He went along with the Democratic proposal instead, but now he's used the Executive Order to get what he couldn't get in negotiations. Even worse, Arnold's despicable actions significantly weaken the law -- his idea is to use some kind of emissions trading system with other states rather than just flat out reduce greenhouse emissions like the bill originally intended.
This fiasco is just the latest in Arnold's broken promises on the environment. ThinkProgress documents how Arnold claims to want to reduce California's addiction to oil, but he's refusing to support Prop 87. Rather than take the obvious step of supporting 87 -- which would make oil companies pay their fair share in research for new sources of energy -- Arnold is instead going all out to protect the sweet deal oil companies (a special interest if there ever was one) currently have in California.
Just like he did on education, Schwarzenegger is breaking his promises. Those mistaken enough to trust Arnold -- including Núñez and a few bizarre newspaper editorial boards -- need to remember that just because he's running for reelection doesn't mean that we're looking at a new Arnold.
Labels: Politics
Fifty-five families living in Isla Vista, the beachside community neighboring UC Santa Barbara, are victims of a mass eviction at the hands of a greedy real estate developer. All 55 of the familes were served eviction notices last month. These mostly low-income, Spanish-speaking families lived in the Cedarwood Apartments - a development recently acquired by a real estate developer (with a tragically ironic name), Conquest Student Housing. Conquest plans to significantly raise rents and replace the evicted families with UCSB students.
The story of the Cedarwood families shows how Proposition 90 would make a terrible situation even worse. Prop 90 - or as we at Courage Campaign call it, "Leave No Real Estate Developer Behind" - would give even more power to developers like Conquest to do whatever they please, ignoring both common decency and legal restrictions.
Prop 90 would allow real estate developers like Conquest to sue local governments when regulations -- in the form of environmental protections, community planning, or affordable housing requirements - caused the company any additional cost. This sweeping, radical change would give real estate developers a veto over any restriction on their already extensive power. It's crucial to vote No on 90.
Much like Howie Rich (the billionaire developer putting up money for the Prop 90 campaign), the owners of Conquest Student Housing have done their best to remain anonymous and invisible. They've used technicalities in the law (like setting up shadow companies and speaking only through attorneys) to hide their identities. Determined to speak directly to the people responsible for the mass evictions, a group of 11 Cedarwood family members and community activists went to the LA headquarters of Conquest a few weeks ago. When the group finally saw someone who appeared to be an owner of Conquest, police surrounded them and allowed the owner to drive away before he could be identified.
The struggle against Conquest continues. Cedarwood families and community activist groups including Santa Barbara PUEBLO have taken their case to the Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors, but the Supervisors have said that they lack the legal authority to step in. Student activists at UCSB have held fundraisers to help support the evicted families, and just yesterday, student activists occupied a UCSB administrative building, demanding that the University take action. So far, UC administrators have not made any statement of how they can support the Cedarwood families.
Proposition 90 would give real estate developers like Conquest even more power. They're already able to ignore discrimination laws - California law prohibits discriminatory evictions of families with children - and Prop 90 would allow Conquest to ignore environmental and zoning laws as well. Vote No.
Labels: Politics
Republicans like Arnold want to give red meat to their base of right-wing voters who believe that immigration is the source of most problems in America today including the perennial election-year problems of voter fraud, terrorism, pedophilia, violent crime, and speaking Spanish in public. The Republican elected officials at the Tustin meeting yesterday were there to echo and intensify right-wing scapegoating of immigrants on behalf of Arnold. Newport Beach Assemblyman Chuck DeVore and his Republican allies came down from Sacramento to hold this rally dressed up as a "hearing," complete with invited "experts." The "testimony" came from Republican allies like members of the vigilante Minutemen and owners of large businesses who spoke about their personal crusades to help keep immigrants out of America. Other "experts" including Costa Mesa Mayor Allan Monsoor spoke of the dire threats that immigrants pose to the very fabric of our lives. I think I heard the term "sex offender" trotted out at least 2 dozen times. It's clear that the Republicans are doing all they can to shift the blame for their failures while in government over to the old, tried-and-true scapegoat -- immigrants.
None of these "experts" had the numbers on just how many of the millions of immigrant workers who cook meals, clean hotel rooms, design cars, care for children, work the fields, teach college students, build our homes, and otherwise make the American community and economy go - none of the experts could say how many of these people were criminals, terrorists, or pathological voter frauds. But they didn't need numbers - the crowd of about 50 people there in Tustin (many of whom wore Minutemen t-shirts) believe readily that immigrants are the problem. The thing is, these elected officials holding a "hearing" should have been there to help calm racist backlash against immigrants.
Look, it's very reasonable that middle-class voters feel squeezed right now. After 6 years of President Bush's economy, tax breaks have gone to the wealthy, wages for middle class Americans have gone down, and the cost of living has gone up. Jobs have been outsourced overseas, and our investment in education has stagnated as the cost of war has eaten up the budget. The first instinct of many of these middle-class voters is to try to find someone to blame. Immigrants, today as in the past, are often the first people in the line of fire. Responsible public officials will try to soothe this racialized animosity while crafting effective public policy to ease the stress on the middle class. Republicans, it seems, choose the more divisive and hateful route - they stoke the flames of hate, refuse to cut taxes for the middle class, and continue down the path of war rather than make investments in America's future.
And just to show that I'm not making this up - here are some quick facts showing how immigrants really don't deserve the stereotypical image that the Republicans paint of them. The "Task Force" yesterday could have brought in real experts to show that in fact, immigrants (undocumented and documented) have a negligible effect on the wages of native-born citizens. Immigrants, according to economists everywhere, give a huge boost to the economy by providing much-needed hard work (all while they often accept terribly low wages). Immigrants (undocumented and documented) pay more in taxes than they need in the form of government services like public education for their children. On the issue of crime, it's obvious that race plays a part in the scapegoating of Latinos as causing crime. This is one of the oldest and most durable forms of racism - "they look different so they're dangerous." In fact, according to many studies including one by John Hagan and Alberto Palloni (1999), "these misperceptions [linking immigration and crime] are perpetuated by government reports of growing numbers of Hispanic immigrants in U.S. prisons. However, Hispanic immigrants are... more vulnerable to restrictive treatment in the criminal justice system, especially at the pre-trial stage. When these differences are [taken into account]... it is estimated that the involvement of Hispanic immigrants in crime is less than that of citizens. These results cast doubt on the hypothesis that immigration causes crime...." Terrorism - somehow, Republicans have linked September 11 to the issue of immigration, as though every person who has come to America to work and raise their family might belong to a sleeper cell. Well, the biggest terrorists in American history were either native born (Timothy McVeigh) or here legally (Mohammed Atta). There's no evidence to support the claim that terrorists are more likely to come across the border than they are to have grown up right here. And on the silly issue of voter fraud, again, there's no evidence to show that Republicans are losing elections due to the influx of fraudulent, immigrant votes.
The bottom line is that we can all agree, Republicans and the rest of us, that Illegal Immigration isn't good. But the solution isn't more ineffective and expensive fences or draconian police efforts or discrimination on the job site. The solution is a realistic and humane immigration policy. We need a path to citizenship for the people already here without documents, and we need a realistic immigration policy that doesn't criminalize people who come here to work hard for their families. We need real leaders who respect newcomers to America - not Republicans who rely on knee-jerk racism to scapegoat entire groups of people as criminals and terrorists.From The Courage Campaign
Thanks to the good people over at PowerPAC.org for sending me to cover this event.
Labels: Politics
I like what Ian said to me on the phone yesterday. "I can think of a dozen reasons why the Tigers beat the Yankees. I just don't understand why we WHUPPED the Yankees."
The 2006 Tigers are the greatest story in Major League Baseball in a long time. After losing over 100 games just two years ago, suddenly the Tigers have beaten the prettiest of the pretty boys in three straight games. Our pitching, led by veteran asshole Kenny Rogers and rookie of the year Justin Verlander, silenced a lineup complete with some of the loudest bats in baseball history. Manager Jim Leyland is universally loved as a sharp-tounged, weathered, chain-smoking baseball genius, and he has turned this team around.
For most of the year, the Tigers had the best win-loss record in all of baseball. The young pitchers slumped down the stretch, though, and in September the Tigers fell out of first place. Bummer. But the roller coaster picked back up this week as the Tigers stormed into the postseason like the 2004 Detroit Pistons.
Two years ago the scrappy, no-name Pistons fought their way through the NBA Playoffs only to meet the league's finest -- Kobe Bryant, Shaq, and the Los Angeles Superstar Lakers. Everyone, and I mean everyone said "well, it's nice that the Pistons are here, but these four games are just a formality, a coronation for the Lakers." Five games later, the Pistons shocked the world.
The Tigers, limping into the playoffs, met the Yankees where everyone, and I mean everyone said "well, it's been a great story for the Tigers this year, but these are the Yankees. They have the best lineup we've seen in a generation. Maybe next year, Detroit!" Four games later, the Tigers are on the way to the ALCS.
Detroit sports. Major underdog. No-name players in a breakout season. Hardworking. And against the league's most cherished franchise and most hyped superstars, we blow them out. That's how we do.
In short, eff you Derek Jeter. WOO!
