The NFL is Fixed - So Asante Samuel inadvertently makes contact with another players' helmet during a shoulder tackle and gets fined $40,000 while Andre Johnson only gets $25,000 for RIPPING OFF A DUDES HELMET AND PUNCHING HIM TWICE IN THE HEAD? I understand the caps lock is a bit leading, but check it, even in lowercase it's crazy. he got into a fistfight during the game, ripped off the other guys helmet, and successfully beat him about the face and head. Twenty-five K and no suspension? Crazy.

Well, maybe not that crazy. The NFL has a nationally-televised only-game-in-town to sell on its network this Thursday. And they couldn't have the lowly Texans going into this game without their best player, could they? I mean, who knows how quickly the game could be over without him? They needed to keep this whole "rage-fueled fistfight" incident low-key and under-penalized because, hey, the Texans need all the help they can get to make a date with the Eagles in Philly an attractive national matchup. And the NFL needs as many eyeballs on the screen to secure those fat ad revenue checks. Keep dancin' for that money, ho!

I've said it before: the NFL is fucking rigged. Gosh danget do I love the First Amendment.

What else did we learn? Tackling, Quentin Mikell is in Michael Lewis Territory, Bears Stretched Us Out, Give Cutler Credit, Come Back Asante, Moose Your Suit Looks Ridiculous, Fix Yo Field, and Blame the O-Line.


Tackling - The Birds defense played like butt(er scrapple). While it fits to point the finger at the secondary for Exhibits A and B, the majority of the problems on defense were with tackling. Devin Hester bubble screens for 39? Matt Forte up the gut for 61? You're poopin me, right?

Listen, I know Andy Reid. Big Red and I are like Britt Reid and Oxycontin (only I'm not smuggled in his asshole). Andy Reid chewed out the kids because they showed a lack of effort. Team awareness was, like, a 65. Solution? TACKLESCHOOL! When a good team loses like this one did on Sunday, it's time to get back to basics.

Quentin Mikell is in Michael Lewis Territory - Remember Michael Lewis? Neither do I. Quentin Mikell is well on his way to being sent to the barren wasteland of Candlestick park along with other zombie Eagles like Westbrook and Lewis. Missed tackles, poor coverage, slow pursuit of runaway runningbacks -- it doesn't look good for the lone veteran of an otherwise young team. The blame last year was placed squarely on the shoulders of then-rookie now-Redskin Macho Harris, but even then there were visible cracks in Mikell's armor. This year -- now playing alongside a much more capable Nate Allen -- it looks like we may need to draft another Safety early next year. Allen hasn't been perfect, but you can't point the finger at the rookie again this season.

Bears Stretched Us Out - I HATE the stretch play. HATE IT. Why? Because the Eagles are TURRIBLE as defending the thing. With the middle of the defense having exponentially improved through addition by subtraction (MINUS Bunkley PLUS Dixon), the Bears were smart to exploit the edges. While the Eagles certainly don't lack team speed, their featherweight coverage-only corners can't tackle. Kudos to Chicago for reaching into the Patriots 2004 beat-the-Eagles playbook.

Give Cutler Credit - As Eagles fans it's easy for us to say our defense didn't do this or our defense didn't do that, but what Cutler did speaks for itself. 247 yards, 4 touchdowns, and ZERO picks for a 146.2 rating. Yes, yes, our defense failed to do this/that, but Jay took advantage, and won them the game while putting up some gaudy numbers.

Come Back Asante -

Moose Your Suit Looks Ridiculous -

For real though, a tie...AND an ascot...AND a pocket square. All inside of a suit that looks like he plays for the Business Yankees. You win, Daryl "Silky" Johnston.

Fix Yo Field - Yada, yada, yada, here is a picture of 1 and a half hot Asian girls in mud! Let's hope we don't have a game in Chicago come playoff time.

Blame the O-Line - I think a large part of this loss has to be blamed on the offensive line. They were downright offensive!

...I'm sorry.

Anyway, when a unit receives as much praise as this group has over the past several weeks, it's important not to overlook them when it comes to passing blame. Sure, maybe Vick held the ball too long. Sure, maybe it was the receivers' fault for not getting open in time. Whatever it is one can say to defend our overachieving O-line, all you have to do is look at the tape to see how badly the Birds were losing the battle at the line of scrimmage. I'm guessing they felt overconfident coming off a great performance against the vaunted Giants line and underestimated a under-appreciated Bears group. They've got more than Peppers, apparently.

Next up is Houston on Thursday at home. Can't lose, won't lose (Harlem shake).

Go Birds!

My favorite part of this is Andre Johnson's attempted uppercut killshot at the end. Football fights are NEVER this good.

If only my fantasy league gave us bonus points for haymakers, I might've won this week. For those of you who have AJ in leagues, you may be out of luck next week. From the looks of it, there's a good chance he may be suspended - especially considering these two got in a fight during a Week 2 contest in 2009. Which is good, because after the way the secondary played this week, I'm pretty sure Johnson would go for 210 yards and 4 TDs.

[GIF via KSK / twoeightnine]

(Photoshopping courtesy of my sister Alicia Morgan of Last Left Turn B4 Hooterville.)

This is the visual I'm going with for the new cover of the American Zen Kindle edition (I wish it was a Fender Stratocaster, which is Mike's guitar, instead of a Gibson, but you take what you can get). I think it just about sums up the most important abstracts of the book. Alicia's looking for a better, more Zen-like font than the Presidential one I've been using. Then when she inserts the title into the .jpeg, I'll upload it. It'll make for a more professional-looking cover. After all, there are approximately 650,000 titles on Kindle alone, so one must make their work stand out in some way.

I also just reduced the price from $9.99 to $4.99 and sales are already picking up. So please give it a try. Once again, you can download a free 50 page sample to help you make up your mind as to whether or not to purchase it. I've also posted a review of it that's actually an expanded synopsis to further give you an idea of what it's about.

Custom logo’d jeans for MEN.

Holy shitballs. These are horrifying. I can't fathom any situation where NFL.com has sold a single pair of these monstrosities. You just know they have a whole warehouse full of classic, uncomfortable, stonewash straight-legged denim just waiting to have the Eagles logo emblazoned across the ass cheeks.

Ladies, if you’re considering buying these for your man, you might as well save yourself $74.99 and just give the lucky fella a swift punch to the dick. That pain will at least be temporary. These jeans will haunt him forever in the form of humiliating jokes from his buddies.

BONUS: 

NFL.com doesn't stop there.  There's a way that you too can walk all over the Cowboys this year!

Have an annoying and illogical Dallas Cowboy fan in your life? Search for their Christmas gift no longer! After losing to the Saints on Thanksgiving, the Cowboys are officially guaranteed of a non-winning season. They're at the cellar of the NFC East and have rolled over and been trampled by nearly 75% of their competition this year.

NFL.com is also selling team "rugs" as part of their Black Friday holiday sale. Now, let's not kid ourselves folks – I know a doormat when I see one. It only becomes confirmed when you stamp the Cowboys logo on it and proceed to use it for wiping dog doo doo off your sneakers. Could there be a more appropriate gift??

In all seriousness: This thing comes with a price tag of $79.99. Regardless of the team you choose or whether you’re using it as a legit area rug or gag gift - who in the hell is spending that kind of scratch on a rug doormat? There has to be something in life you actually need that you could spend that money on. Or how about charity? No? NFL doormat? Okay then.

Passive aggressive pot shots for all! How can you not love having a guy like this on your team? My favorite part is the smirk he gives each time he takes a shot. Despite the shootout loss, this post-game interview is full of WIN.

There's no fictional animal in the world scarier than flying sharks. No jackalopes. No centaurs. No warecows. Nothing. You're scared of us, humans, which is totally irrational since only ONE of you die from our attacks per year. And that's only because were nice and you guys taste bad. But if we could fly...oh boy. We'd be a whole lot scarier to you jerks than an STD or some dude on your flight wearing a turban. Anyway, check out the immeasurable awesomeness of this picture. It has many of the basic components of the absolutely ridiculous: sharks, explosions, chaos, sky diving, and highly skilled government agents. It's like a Jason Statham movie captured in one single picture.

Alright, so last week the Shark put together another winning campaign with a 9-7 effort. That brings us to 85-69-6 on the year. Without further ado, hit the jump for your Week 12 picks. Due to the Holiday and my immense amount of laziness, you're not getting commentary about each game. We've done this grouping format in the past, so you'll have to deal with it for a week. Enjoy your week off from me shitting on the Bengals, Jaguars and Chiefs.

Your Turkey Day Results via Our Twitter Picks:
LIONS (+6.5) over Patriots
COWBOYS (-3.5) over Saints
JETS (-9) over Bengals

Your 3 Team Parlay For Sunday:
Vikings (+1) over REDSKINS
TEXANS (-6.5) over Titans
SEAHAWKS (+2) over Chiefs

Teams Coming Off A Blowout Loss Tend To Cover The Following Week:
BRONCOS (-4) over Rams

The Games Only Degenerates Are Betting:
Panthers (+10) over BROWNS
Dolphins (+2.5) over RAIDERS

The Ones I Kinda Feel Good About, But Am Too Much of a Pansy To Bet:
FALCONS (-2) over Packers
Eagles (-3.5) over BEARS
COLTS (-3) over Chargers

Don't Get Cute, These Are Really Too Close to Call:
GIANTS (-7.5) over Jaguars
RAVENS(-7.5) over Buccaneers

Super Sneaky Pick Alert!
BILLS (+7) over Steelers

I Feel Bad For Fans of Either of These Teams:
49ers (-1) over CARDINALS

Good luck and enjoy the games everyone!

[pic via bit-tech.net]

Welcome to my first foray into Windows Movie-making. While Mrs. JP was puttering around on the internet tonight on the one laptop that actually gets online, I was puttering around on the Dell and discovered the Windows Movie Maker. After reading a few tutorials and experimenting with it, I shot this video of our cat Popeye and added some of my own subtitles. The results were kind of unexpected.

And yes, he's really like this every day of the week. See what I have to live with?

...but deviating from turkey and opting for baked ham is about as far as we stray from convention in our home come Thanksgiving. This was our spread before we done digged in and pigged out. You can see the baked ham with pineapple slices, Stove Top stuffing (with Bell's Seasoning, natch), butternut squash, sweet corn, real mashed potatoes, pitted black olives, Barb's cheesy potatoes on the far left and pork gravy in the foreground. We had a perfect Auslese white wine later topped off with a big bottle of Berkshire Steel Rail beer.

Pumpkin pie and Cool Whip, another concession to tradition, was accompanied by a small bottle of Veuvecliquot champagne we decided to get last night on hearing Tom DeLay got convicted on money laundering and conspiracy charges (Hey, I said we were liberal. The last bottle of champagne that I bought was October 30th, 2005, the day Scooter Libby got indicted. Today, we actually toasted the Travis County DA's office and Ronnie Earle with the champagne. Did I mention we were liberal?) So right now, we're feeling no fucking pain, folks. Ya only live once.

So, what did you guys have for Thanksgiving?

Well, for starters, despite the prostrate-before-Wall St-and-the-GOP Obama administration, I'm still grateful, for starters, that this deeply superficial asshole isn't still in office. His ghost-written, plagiarized turkey of a book ought to be a reminder as to why we should all be grateful for presidential term limits.

But, as with last year, I'm grateful that I can spend Thanksgiving with Mrs. JP and Popeye the sassy cat and Arlo Guthrie and "Alice's Restaurant" (I'm listening to it now on my CD mix, as I do at noon every Thanksgiving, a cool tradition I carried over from the last house). Have a happy, safe and grope-free Thanksgiving.

Sadly, even nerdy love dolls are subject to TSA patdowns.

This weekend, millions of American passengers will be flying all over the country for Thanksgiving in the midst of the TSA controversy over "enhanced patdowns" and X-ray screening. Last week alone, 170,000 passengers had been subjected to what many consider intrusive searches, possibly by homosexual TSA officials. The Transportation Security Administration is struggling to find a balance between safety in the skies and personal privacy, yet there are some measures you can take to prevent both an X-ray screening and a groping of your genitals. What are they?

10) Say in a pronounced lisp to a male inspector, "Say, sailor, you might want to get a second guy over here to help save time. There's a lot to cover."

9) "Say, that scanner's not gonna pick up my crabs, is it?"

8) "I think this might be a good time to warn you I'm seeing a sexologist for premature ejaculation."

7) Have a fake ID ready identifying you as Ted Haggard.

6) Spend 100 hours in a tanning booth the week before your flight and say you're Rep. John Boehner.

5) If you're a woman, apologize for smelling like Rosie O'Donnell.

4) Loudly announce to the TSA agent, "I'm just seeing someone off. This is the closest thing I've had to a sex life since the AIDS clinic."

3) Moan, breathe heavy and insist that the airport play "Bolero" over the PA system.

2) Claim that the Viagra and Oxycontin in your carry-on actually belongs to Rush Limbaugh and that you're his drug mule.

1) Mention that your biggest sexual fetish is latex and sadistic, minimum wage-earning losers in blue uniforms.

Green Man-Eating Monsters - The Eagles official site's splash page this week was right on point. Instead of focusing on Michael Vick like everyone else in the world, PhiladelphiaEagles.com managed to emphasize the defense's ability this year to generate turnovers. The Birds are now #1 in the league in turnover ratio at +20, having recovered 2 fumbles and intercepting Manning Eli 3 times Sunday night. Baby Peyton Manning was right: those big green monsters really are all about the flying brown pig.

What else did we learn? Eff the Terrorists, Jaaaaasoooooonnnnn..., Toughest Competition, Jason Peters and Todd Herremans Won the Game, Beating the Best, The Manningface Meter, Run Stoppers, and Da Bears are Turrible.


Eff the Terrorists - You wanna know how I spent my football Sunday?

U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A!

Jaaaaasoooooonnnnn... -There's a 350lb man with a stained kelly green Eagles sweatshirt who lays back in his recliner every Sunday with hoagie meat on his breath scratchily yelling "C'MON I COULD'VE MADE THAT CATCH!" This would be the only time that man was ever right.  This game could have and should have been a blowout, but due to the Eagles' continued problems scoring in the red zone, we were sweating deep into the fourth quarter.  Seriously though, Jason Avant, you've gotta make that catch.

Toughest Competition - Take a peek at the rest of the schedule. Chicago, Houston, Dallas, New York, and Minnesota. The Giants easily have the best defense of those teams and quite possibly showed the Birds their toughest test of the season. The Bears, while no slouch on D, are overrated and don't have the athletes the Giants possess. This was the best offense in the league against the best defense in the league, and we won.

Jason Peters and Todd Herremans Won the Game - Watch the 4th and 1 LeSean McCoy play again. ESPN was quick to give a bunch of credit to Mike Vick for not completely bobbling the ball and getting it to Shady in time, but the majority of the credit needs to be given to Jason Peters and Todd Herremans for the two tremendous blocks on the outside that allowed LeSean to break free. Sure, JP is a penalty machine and Herremans was chop-blocking the shit outta the G-men all game, but they came up when they needed to and won the game for the Birds.

Beating the Best - Did you know that the Eagles lead the league in wins over teams with winning records? I sure didn't until I saw this post from Bleeding Green Nation yesterday. The Eagles have 4 wins over winning teams, beating the Giants (6-4), Falcons (8-2), Colts (6-4), and Jaguars (6-4) this season. Probably should have beaten the Titans, too...but that's for another time. Next up -- the 7-3 Bears.

The Manningface Meter -

Run Stoppers -  Against the Eagles:

Thank you, Antonio Dixon.

Da Bears are Turrible - They are not nearly as good as their 7-3 record and I fully expect the Eagles to win this game. If Jay Cutler plays like Jay Cutler, I expect plenty of turnovers and an easy win for the Good Guys. The Bears have had a defensive resurgence this year, but they're still susceptible to the big play and lack the offensive firepower to scare many teams. Hester is a wildcard on special teams (and at WR with his speed) and Peppers is a great weapon on D, but, really, are any of you looking at this game as a possible loss? I'm overconfident, sure, but after beating Colts, Skins, and Giants in successive weeks, the Bears look ripe for a Vick-style asswhooping.

Go Birds.

A few thoughts on the ire I've stirred by accusing my fellow Americans of being cry babies. The response from so many people whose opinion I value (Don, Frank, Brian...) had me doubting how well I expressed myself in my previous post. 

Let me make this clear. I am not a proponent of full body scan screening. Neither do I oppose it. The best summary of my attitude comes from a Tanya, a commenter on Patrick Smith's Ask The Pilot column this week in Salon. She wrote...

I can't figure out whether we're having a collective adolescent moment, ("you can't do that to me!")--blended with Puritanical modesty -- or legitimate push-back. I mean, where were all these passionate defenders of civil rights when we started torturing other human beings? NOW they're upset?

Where, in your opinion, is a good place to put the line between safety, and privacy? What actually can help save lives? How do we factor in the very real desire to save lives, even if it means some sacrifice/inconvenience/ooginess?" (Ooginess? Search me, its her word, not mine.)

Like Tanya, what I find offensive about this debate over advanced imaging technology is the nagging sense that despite all the talk of constitutional rights and the right to privacy, there's something far more self-serving going on. Because she's right, if so many Americans were preoccupied by threats to the principals of our founding fathers, what about our role in the torture of terrorism suspects? And worse, where the heck were these civil rights advocates after 9-11 when the Bush administration's Attorney General John Ashcroft went about rounding up Arabs and Indians right here in the U.S. and throwing them into detention centers as material witnesses?  

But coming back to the present, I'm no legal scholar but the constitution never granted us the right to fly. We make a choice to travel by air. We purchase airline tickets in full knowledge of the restrictions that go along with it. These days that includes paying for checked luggage, squeezing into cramped seats and agreeing to levels of security deemed - rightly or wrongly - necessary for public safety.

In Patrick's column, he concludes he also has ambiguous feelings about airport security from the user perspective. Whether its "resistance against TSA" as Patrick calls it, or Tanya's "push-back" (or my less than sensitive characterization of whining) there are larger questions. Patrick writes that the heart of the matter isn't the pat downs.

"It distracts us from asking important questions about the agency's approach to security overall."

Yes. Right you are, Patrick. Let me beg John Pistole, the TSA chief to be the leader here. Don't cave on the small stuff and leave the larger issues unaddressed. It is not possible, not logical, not sensible, not safe to approach security with the idea that we are all potential terrorists until the hourly workers at the check point prove otherwise. 

Effective counter-terrorism starts at the top. Or as Richard Bloom, the Embry Riddle Aeronautical University professor explained to me last month and expanded on even more eloquently in a New York Times blog post last year; security is multi layer process; heavily reliant on intelligence gathering and analysis of how our transportation systems work, analyzing global trends and risks and keeping an eye on the rest of the world and our role in it. But of course, Mr. Pistole, you already know this. In our heart of hearts, we do too. 

The most thought-provoking thing the TSA chief said lately, however, is that "security is a shared responsibility" and he doesn't mean shared among government agencies. He's talking about all of us.

So can we please, Please, PLEASE, put the kabosh on our national inclinations to demonize the government, hunker down into the rightness of our position and paint the controversy as an irreconcilable us-versus-them conflict? If we could only.....we'd have so much to be thankful for.

Check out this video from the Eagles' locker room immediately following their 27-17 victory over the New York Giants. In the video DeSean Jackson addresses the team, says that "two-five" (LeSean McCoy) won them the gave, but in the end gives ultimate credit to the linemen. Their reward? Dinner anywhere on him.

One of the players in the background yells "We wanna go to LA." I'm sure DJacc wouldn't mind. [Warning: video loudly auto-plays so if you're reading this in a feed...you've probably already noticed]

Hell, so are all the boys of The Immortals. That's right, even though I hadn't gotten any confirmation from Amazon, yet, I decided to check on the status of my Kindle upload of American Zen and it appears that it's already on sale.

Now, if you have any of the following:

Kindle
Kindle DX
Kindle (2nd Generation)
Kindle (1st Generation)
Kindle for PC
Kindle for Mac
Kindle for iPad
Kindle for iPhone
Kindle for Android
Kindle for BlackBerry

you can purchase my novel American Zen (ASIN: B004D9FUZ4) on Amazon. To help speed things along, here's the catalog page that'll take you straight to it. All except 1st Generation Kindles have text-to-speech in case you want to listen to it in your car.

To be honest with you all, I have no idea what it looks like since I can't afford a Kindle, yet, so if they screwed up the formatting and it looks amateurish, I apologize in advance.

For those of you who don't know about my novel, I'll give it to you in a nutshell:

Liberal investigative political journalist Mike Flannigan (the very same guy who occasionally posts here when his editor in chief Ari lets him out of his cage) is quite possibly the only political reporter not writing about Barack Obama's victory in November 2008. That's because about two years ago today, Mike got a cryptic email from his childhood friend, the keyboardist Jo Jo Vandermeer. One thing leads to another and eventually Mike reunites with his old rock'n'roll band The Immortals from 1978. The men, now middle-aged, eventually realize how cruel life had been to them since the band broke up when their front man Dave Carmichael signed himself and not the group to a recording contract. One nationally televised and Youtubed scandal, some jail time, a graveyard brawl and several soul-defining musical performances later, Mike and his old band realize the limits and cost of love and friendship and what each one will risk in that pursuit.

I tend to look at American Zen not as a $10 purchase but an investment because it may teach one a lesson or two about life, love and death. So if you have a Kindle or are planning on getting or receiving one for the holidays, please give my novel a looksee. It may prove to be the best 626 kilobytes you'll ever download.

I just uploaded it on Kindle and it'll take about 24 hours for it to become available on Amazon. So, if you have a Kindle (they start out at $130 for wifi only) and appreciate rock'n'roll novels told from a liberal/progressive perspective, you might want to give it a try. I've set a standard price of $9.99, which is far less than individuals have donated to P'ville through Paypal. I think it's high time I started earning my own money instead of having it given to me and not really giving something back. I should have a URL by tomorrow to direct you to, so stayed tuned.

Forgive the whipsaw, but I'm right back to annoyed and this time it is by the if-you-touch-my-junk protester who has become the American air traveler's new spokesmodel. I've written twice about the uproar over airport security and advanced imaging technology. First I criticized the ExpressJet pilot who refused to submit to the full body scan at at Memphis International Airport, then I semi-apologized a week or so later when it appeared that his not-gonna-take-it-anymore approach had the effect of prompting his fellow pilots to take a more unified and responsible position. They've written the chief of Homeland Security to review 21st century airport security. 

Negroni predicts the full-body scanners now in use at 65 airports around the country that allow TSA workers to detect what's underneath travelers' clothes are on their way out. And their rapid rise and fall present a high resolution picture of an American character flaw. Forget the fuzzy genitalia, what the full body scan is revealing is Americans as a bunch of cry-babies.

Here in America, one of the richest and most technologically advanced countries in the world, where education is free and speech protected, where the rule of law more or less acts as a balancing force between the haves and the have-nots, why oh why do we bitch-and-moan about everything? 

Nowhere is this more clear than in aviation. Last month, I was on AirTran's last flight of the evening from Atlanta to New York, when the crew detected a smell in the cabin it could not locate or identify. The airline made the decision to return to the gate, put the eighty-some passengers up in a hotel and fly us out in the morning. Hey, that's not good news for anyone. It meant I would miss my church's annual Scottish Sunday service complete with bagpipes, but as they say, things happen. 

Ahead of me in the line for the hotel vouchers was a woman who told me she would spend the night with a friend in town, but she was getting the voucher "because I'm entitled." Well yes, she was. Entitled. That's the name of this particular American trait that's got me grumpy. 

Last March when a Virgin America flight from Los Angeles to New York was diverted to Hartford's Bradley International due to weather, passengers were stuck on airplane on the ground for four hours before being bussed to New York. I heard about it on the radio the next morning when outraged passengers were threatening to file lawsuits. ABC News described the ordeal as "hellish". The story goes on to say that passengers went for more than two hours without food or water. Hellish? Nine years of war in Afghanistan, cholera in Haiti, human rights abuses in Myanmar and China and this diversion is news? Only in a country where going two hours without food is considered "hellish". 

The passenger bill of rights crowd and their pandering supporters in congress feed on this feeling of entitlement, the sense that nothing can go wrong and our every move has to be as comfortable and connected as if we were sitting in our pajamas in cozy living rooms even while we move in this incredibly complex system called commercial aviation.  

The notion that every step along the way will proceed without interruption or inconvenience is not happening and its unrealistic to expect that it will. Airlines, politicians, and air travelers are equally responsible for creating and buying into the fiction. The rants of some of my fellow bloggers have reached a fever pitch. One commenter likened airport security in America to "jack booted fascism". Say what? 

Up against hyperbole like this, what can the TSA chief John Pistole say? His entirely reasonable comment, "Security is a shared responsibility" has not registered.  No surprise there, how can anything be heard over the din of American boo-hooing.

Now we are in the throes of the latest passenger revolt, hysteria over the full body scanner and a call to boycott the procedure as we enter the busiest holiday week of the year. The worries range from radiation exposure and lack of privacy, to the discomfort of the alternative; receiving a full body pat down by a TSA officer.

The inconveniences associated with flying post 9-11 aren't designed just to piss travelers off. The pilots who make a flight diversion, the airline that decides to deal immediately with that unusual smell in the cabin, the security process that checks to see what passengers may be packing on their person, these decisions have history. And I guarantee you, let anyone in aviation fail to do their job correctly resulting in a terrorist act or air disaster and there will be plenty of tears and wailing too.

I could enter the fray again and say in all caps, SUCK IT UP FELLOW AMERICANS. Or I could tune out the whining. I'm the mother of four, trust me, I've tuned out plenty. But there's a greater harm in letting the frenzy continue unabated. Richard Bloom, an aviation security expert and a professor at Embry Riddle Aeronautical University in Prescott, Arizona explained it to me when I was visiting the campus last month. 

"Maybe something has happened to American national character," he suggested. "Too many people expect a risk-free life. If they don't have one, even if there is an unsuccessful terrorist attack for example, its really successful because people get bent out of shape. They want to fire their politicians and blame people." 

I've had a number of conversations about security with Richard and I'm usually impressed by the precision with which he sees the issues. I agree with him when he says that the X-ray belts and shoe removals, even the full body scanner must be the smallest part; the last-step in a long process that is much more focused and reliant on gathering intelligence, analyzing global trends, keeping an ear open to what other countries have to say and an eye on how they view Americans. 

And that's what's so worrisome. The picture of Americans emerging from the full-body scan, is an image of a people prone to complain and easily upset. Or as Richard sees it, "A very lucrative target for terrorists from a psychological point of view." 

Feast your beady lil eyes on the handiwork of Jocelyn Carrington.  You may remember her from such previous TheWizWit masterpieces as: Black Roy Halladay and Ice Gold Samuel Dalembert .  She was kind enough to whip us up an official portrait of The Shark himself.  Before yall flood the ole inbox with requests, we're in the early stages of mass-producing those buttons.  Like tens of thousands worth.  You can wear them to work, school, the supermarket, during sexy-time, dinner...literally anytime.  If Max Jean Gilles can sling mousepads for $21 a pop, you'll buy buttons from us right?  Right???

The Shark managed to recover from a disastrous Week 9 and turn in a positive performance of 8-6 for last week.  That brings the yearly total to 76-62-6 with seven weeks to go.

Strap in and pull out your rent money; this is where we pay for your loved ones' Christmas gifts.

DOLPHINS (-1) over Bears
Well we got this one wrong on Twitter last night. Don't fret - with bye weeks over, there are even more games to bet on.

Raiders (+7.5) over STEELERS
We have entered bizzaro world. Considering it's Week 11, who would've thought the Raider franchise would instill enough confidence in football fans to bet on them? The Raiders won last year's meeting as 14.5 point underdogs and the Steelers are suffering from injuries to some key players. I think the Steelers will win the game, but giving more than a touchdown is just too much.

Texans (+7) over JETS
The Texans have screwed me over quite a bit this year. Considering I haven't had a good read on Houston at all this year, I'll understand if you don't believe this time. But I do believe they'll keep things close against the Jets. New York isn't really over-powering anyone right now. The last time they beat a team by more than 7, you have to go back to Week 5. Houston still has the offense to make this interesting, and they are in an absolute must-win situation.

Ravens (-10) over PANTHERS
The Panthers are just God awful and no one can really feel good betting on them. They're starting Brian St. Pierre this week. Nobody even knows who that guy is. Their best two running backs are injured and their coach can't wait to be fired. Just take the Ravens and assume they'll take out some of their aggression on Carolina after losing on a last second play in Week 10.

Redskins (+7) over TITANS
Holy shit, what wasn't crammed up the Redskins' collective buttholes last week? It will be a long time before an Eagle fan has that much fun watching a regular season game. But for this week, I like the Redskins to keep the game respectable. They absolutely have to show some pride and come out aggressive against the Titans. McNabb should be able to rebound and have a solid game against a very suspect Tennessee pass defense. It's entirely possible the Titans aren't even going to take the Redskins seriously. Not doing so may very well bite them in the ass.  Lots of butt-talk this week.  Maybe I'll keep it up.

COWBOYS (-7) over Lions
I might be foolish to jump on the Cowboys betting bandwagon, but the team just seems more inspired now that Wade Phillips is gone. Neither of the Cowboys wins have come at home, so I'd imagine they'd want to treat their fans to a convincing victory. The Lions tend to keep things close, but I like Dallas' offense against the Detroit defense.

VIKINGS (+3) over Packers
Sneaky pick alert! At face value, the Vikings have the following working against themselves: they're not better than the Packers, they hate their coach, they just lost to the Bears, and Brett Favre loves to throw interceptions. Even with all that, we're going the other way. It's finally obvious this will be Favre's last season. He's already played Green Bay several times, but you're kidding yourself if you think Favre won't be playing with some added passion to go out a winner against his former team. Here are some stats to consider also: Vikings are 7-2-1 against the spread (ATS) in their last 10 home games. The underdog in this matchup is 17-6 ATS in the last 23 meetings. I'm fully expecting Minnesota to win this game outright and prolong their season for one more week.

Bills (+6) over BENGALS
If you haven't noticed by now, I think the Bengals are a bunch of wretched shits.  They're consistently overvalued week in and week out, and it pisses me off.  I wonder how long it will be before the Bengals realize they need to get rid of Carson Palmer and blow the whole thing up.  Anyway, take the Bills.  They suck too, but they aren't quite as bad as their 1-8 record indicates.

Browns (+1.5) over JAGUARS
Like the Bengals, I have a great deal of unnecessary hatred for the Jaguars. I don't even remember why anymore, but I'll continue that trend. Besides, Peyton Hillis is the shit and has a fan page nick-naming him "The Great White Buffalo".

Cardinals (+8) over CHIEFS
The Chiefs haven't played well in their last two games. Eight points is just too much to give away. Jamaal Charles is going to have a big fantasy week, but I just don't see them pulling away to the point where Arizona won't be able to hang around.

Seahawks (+12) over SAINTS
Let's be honest, the Saints haven't played well enough this year to be giving anyone 12 points. I just don't have any faith in them. Over the last couple years, the Saints have had difficulty covering double-digit spreads, and I expect that to continue.

Falcons (-3) over RAMS
Let me caution you - I would not be surprised if the Rams pulled the upset here. The Falcons are a good team and they're certainly better than the up-and-coming Rams. Temper your expectations though - the Rams play very well at home, have covered the spread in 7 of 9 games this year, and covered the spread in 5 of the last 8 games against Atlanta. You should probably just stay away altogether.

49ERS (-3) over Buccaneers
I'm smitten by the Niners in this matchup. Tampa Bay does not travel well to the West coast. They've always been that way. The 49ers are energized with Troy Smith quarterbacking the team and have seemingly picked up their game when playing opponents with superior records.

Colts (+4) over PATRIOTS
You have to like Peyton Manning getting points. The Colts have won the last two and historically have done an excellent job at covering the spread against Tom Brady led Patriot teams.  I'm actually looking for an outright win from Indy in this spot.

EAGLES (-3) over Giants
I'm kind of shocked this line is only 3. I fully expected the line to be doubled when the spread was released. Everyone watching Monday night's game was left in complete amazement of the Eagles offense. When Vick is on the field, the Eagles operate at an extreme level of precision and confidence. The Giants' offense is good and will certainly test the Eagle defense, but it may not matter considering their sieve of an offensive line. This is the most important game of the season thus far with first place in the NFC East on the line.  I just can't see the Eagles losing. The only thing that scares me is the fact the Giants defense has knocked 5 different QB's out of games. Five injured QB's in nine games!  That's nuckin futs. Vick has less than a 50% chance of making it out of this game healthy if those trends continue. Let's pretend that's not a possibility. Instead, let's be blissfully ignorant as we laugh and cheer at the inevitable Manningface of Confusion and Dopiness. Eagles win 30-23.

CHARGERS (-10) over Broncos
Ten points is a lot to give to a team that won by 20 the previous week. While I personally wouldn't bother betting this game, I'm still going to side with the Chargers. As I've said before, the Chargers are a different team at home. They're also getting back one of their big play receivers in Malcolm Floyd. If that's not enough, the line just looks a little funky to me. I have a feeling Vegas thinks the Chargers will win in a blow out and, therefore, offering the Broncos at an attractive 10 points.

Good luck and enjoy the games!

Calm down -- no need to freak out. These are just phony concept unis for the 2012 season when our friends at the formerly-sweatshop-labor-employing sportswear juggernaut Nike replace Reebok as the NFL's official uniform supplier. But wow, what a difference.

You've seen these uniforms on the Oregon Ducks and a handful of other NCAA football teams this season, and for the most part they've looked pretty cool. But the hideous interpretations of the Jaguars and the Steelers makes you want to shield your eyes with one hand and stab their designer in the throat with the other. That's not to say there aren't some good-looking changes, though. I think the Colts, Raiders, Panthers, Cardinals, Titans, Rams, and especially the Jets have to be happy here.

The Eagles version....meh. Don't particularly love or hate these.  They're kinda vanilla, especially when you consider what Nike did to the Patriots.  AMERICA!


h/t to Shutdown Corner and [shudder] The Bleacher Report

(By American Zen's Mike Flannigan, on loan from Ari.)

Two years ago, we were counting the nanoseconds.

Two years ago, we were looking for legal and even extralegal ways to get Bush out of the White House before January 20th and to get Obama in there sooner. The Democrats had widened their congressional majority and were going to lead us to the Promised Land and Mordor was finally plugged up. We couldn't have been any more slap-happier than if we'd found out Paul Wellstone had come back from the dead.

Fast forward to the present day. Sarah Palin's new reality show was a ratings coup in spite of us signing hundreds of thousands of petitions. Like Palin, George W. Bush got a literary agent to get him $7,000,000 for a ghost-written book. First day sales were almost 250,000.

To top things off, we enjoyed the spectacle of seeing George W. Bush, Condi Rice and Dick Cheney in Dallas this week wielding not the pickaxes they ought to be swinging at a rock pile while doing hard labor at an East Texas federal prison chain gang but golden shovels during the groundbreaking ceremony for Dubya's Presidential Lib'ary, a massive half a billion dollar complex for a guy who insulted erudition his whole life.

Meanwhile, the Democrats have to move out of their committee chairman offices like shamed and vilified foreclosed homeowners and Obama just dragged his tail back from a humiliating defeat in Asia in which the 19 other G20 countries basically told him to go fuck himself. "We're going to move into the global economy with or without you," they said.

Fox "News", despite being run by a jiggling partisan pig named Roger Ailes, someone the very sight of whom makes one think of apple sauce and mint jelly, is still atop the ratings heap and Keith Olbermann just came off a humiliating suspension because he committed the unpardonable sin of his few modest campaign contributions making all of MSNBC look partisan.

And even Jon Stewart is sounding a bit sketchy these days with his false moral equivalences.

Frodo fucked up. He lost the ring and Mordor has just blown its top, largely thanks to a brain-starved faction of the voting and non-voting public who thought that bitch-slapping the Democrats and voting in Republican lunatics like Michelle Bachmann, Steve King, Tom Tancredo, Alan West and Rand Paul was somehow better than what the Democrats had given them these past 4 years.

Once again, with feeling: How the fuck did we let this happen? How did something so right turn into complete and utter dog shit?

Well, the Democrats have to assume some blame. Granted, the average American knows their current American Idol contestants' names or the roster of their favorite football team better than that of their elected officials or the President's Cabinet. So, while they should've known this, they should've done a better job enumerating and articulating their successes. Health and banking reform, even in its weakest state, was still reform that wouldn't have even been considered if the Republicans were still in power.

Thanks to Obama, women now have more parity in terms of pay and advancement than they ever would've had under the Republicans. The Obama administration is winding things down in Iraq, are scoring victories over the Taliban and is repairing the foreign relations damage done under eight years of Bush. Tax cuts had been extended to both poor and middle class. The stimulus under Obama created over 2,000,000 jobs.

But when the American public asked in the months leading up to the midterms, "What have you done for us, lately?" the Democrats were as tongue-tied about what they'd done as the Republicans were about what they planned to do apart from extending the Bush tax cuts, repealing what little health care reform the Democrats gave us and blindly opposing whatever Obama wants.

Looking at how the wicked and stupid are succeeding on every front, it reduces to absurdity the old adage we may still try to teach our kids that crime doesn't pay. Not only does crime pay but it's further enriched by brain-dead literary agents and TV producers and pays dividends with stock options and has a kick-ass pension.

Then we build half a billion dollar monuments to that evil.

America, I've never been more ashamed to be one of your citizens as I am now.

Seriously, I've seen a lot of baseball cards and this has to be one of the most bad-ass ones around (as is this one). Mickey is layin' the wood to some crappy catcher (who I think is on the Mets but I can't quite tell) obviously scoring a game-winning run. He probably slept with multiple girls following this game, and then combed his mullet slowly as he looked over his conquest. As we all know, Mickey Morandini rocks.

Oh, and he's also back in the organization now as the manager of the Class-A Williamsport Crosscutters. But really, I just wanted a reason to show that awesome card.

Enjoy your Friday.

The NY Post’s Paul Schwartz has posted an uber-sarcastic little number entitled "Eagles Can't Be Beat, So Why Should Giants Try".  You can read it in full here.

Here are some highlights:

All will not be lost for the Giants after they lose Sunday night in Philadelphia. Sure, they won’t be in first place anymore, but they will be only one game behind the awesome Eagles and heck, a wild card playoff berth still represents progress after last season’s meltdown.

*****

Eli Manning is a competitive sort, but even he will admit that his abilities pale when compared with the wondrous Vick, who directed an attack that piled up a team-record 592 total yards.

*****

The Giants certainly will try to win this game and Coughlin will not tolerate any of his players surreptitiously sidling up to Vick for a quick autograph, although he probably won’t mind if Vick gives Justin Tuck or Osi Umenyiora a sweaty wristband, as long as they don’t brag about it to their teammates.

Schwartz’s post consists of 926 sarcastically-soaked words, but the point behind the article is to beat you over the head with the fact the Eagles are the darling of the NFL after their domination of Washington. I don't necessarily disagree with that, but I’m sure Schwartz was just fine with all the high praise the Giants received from the five consecutive, convincing wins prior to last week’s letdown against the Cowboys. The whole thing would’ve been a little more effective if he decided to put a smattering of insight into the matchup instead of drowning the whole piece cynicism.

No matter - it's going to be awfully embarrassing when Mike Vick is dicking the entire Giant defense en-route to sole possession of first place in the NFC East.

Go Birds.

Juan Uribe. If Ryan Madson is anything like us fans (which right off bat, I'll admit, is unlikely) he probably falls to sleep at night having nightmares about Mr. Uribe. I mean, if I gave up a go-ahead home run to a player that effectively ended my team's season it would probably stick with me for awhile. Fucking Juan Uribe.

Honestly, though, Ryan Madson had quite a year. His end of the year statistics, a 2.55 ERA, 1.04 WHIP, 10.87 K/9, do a pretty good job of telling his story for 2010 - he was pretty damn dominating. Once he returned from his broken foot...

(Ok, side bar. I really think an "idiot injury" clause should be automatically written into every contract in professional sports. I know the union's would never allow this, but honestly, if you're an athlete and you almost blow a game and then in anger kick a chair and break your foot - you deserve to lose some cash. Not your career, just some cash. This clause of course will inevitably help the Steelers recoup some dough when Big Ben has his scrotum torn off by some angry college chick he tries to rape bone in a random bathroom stall in Chicago. Or Miami. Or Harrisburg.)

...he was practically un-hittable. His ERAs in August and September were 0.98 and 1.26 respectively. In October, his only run allowed was the solo shot to F'in Juan Uribe. Hell, from July 31 through October 23, Madson gave up only five earned run. Five. That's beyond impressive. Plus, his year was also Saber-approved, with a 2.61 FIP and .308 BABIP, meaning he wasn't lucky...just good.

What was most exciting about Madson career year, however, is his increase in K/9 rate. After posting a career high rate in 2009 of 9.08, Madson jumped all the way up to 10.80. That is dominating stuff. While it's hard to directly attribute that jump to anything in particular, it's possible that Madson's increased use of the cutter helped. Madson only threw his fastball last year 52.2% of time, the lowest since his rookie season in 2004 (which during, perhaps coincidentally, he had the lowest ERA of his career) . He threw the cutter 18.1% of the time, over a 4% increase from the year before. He also bumped up his changeup usage (which has always been his best pitch) to 28.7% of the time. As he got more comfortable with the cutter (it became a positive value pitch this year, as opposed to last year when it was negative) his use of it gave the hitter another quality pitch to worry about. No longer being able to simply sit on a fastball, or hit a mistake cutter, the National League had no chance. Madson rode his dominating changeup to what probably would have been a 100 K season if he had been health all year.

Unfortunately, this might be Madson's final year as a Phillie. He's under contract for 2011, his final year of the $12M/3-year extension signed in 2009, and then will hit free agency at just 31 years old. With teams always looking for dominate relievers, Madson will be a hot commodity next off-season. I mean, if Brandon Lyon can get $5M a year, you have to think that Madson will get at least $7-8M. Will that be from the Phillies? Probably only if he's the closer (which is a post for another day).

So, anyway, don't worry about that right now. Madson will be an incredibly important part of the Phillies bullpen next year, especially with Brad Lidge's health always in question. Let's just hope he stays away from chairs this off-season.

Next up, Carlos Ruiz.

That is Justin Bieber. He's annoying, Canadian, a Yankee fan, and a pedophile’s dream. He’s also been given an honorary personalized jersey by the Flyers. That’s all well and good, but come on - #1 is Bernie Parent's number. How they gonna slap BIEBER over one of the greatest goalies of all time? No respect I tell ya. No respect.

Check out Broad Street Hockey for more.

[pic via Ike Richman]

Trent 900 engine being removed from Qantas A380
photo courtesy ATSB

I know its only us Americans who are poised to celebrate a day of thanksgiving later this month, but may I suggest that the 466 people on Qantas Flight 32 - whatever nationality they are - express their gratitude to the Almighty for the bullets they dodged two weeks ago? 

The coulda-woulda-shouldas of this near-calamity are so great that the happy landing is getting the kind of scrutiny usually reserved for disasters. That's because this is the mother of all close-calls. Not only were an extraordinarily large number of people in jeopardy in the uncontained failure of the airplane's Rolls Royce Trent 900 engine, but the concern with the A380 since its days on the drawing board has always been the potential for record-breaking loss of life in the event of a crash.  Consider this; an A380 on order for Air Austral will carry 840 passengers.

But back to the present, the process of stripping down the Qantas A380 that made an emergency return to Singapore's Changi airport on November 4, has made significant progress as you can see in this photo from the Australian Transportation Safety Board.  The board is reporting that the massive number 2 engine was removed from the wing and is being progressively dismantled at an engine shop in Singapore. But that's not all. 

"A number of wing and body fairing panels have been removed from the aircraft to facilitate the examination of the underlying structure and systems affected by the engine failure," the board announced on Wednesday.

Now here we are, barely beyond 3 years past the first passenger flight of the A380 and the question being asked is whether the damage wrought by the spinning-out-of-control number 2 engine is so great that Qantas will have to write off the $300 million plane. There's a huge emotional cost to the term "hull loss". Nobody wants that less than Airbus, which spent roughly $14 billion developing the  A380 and has firm orders to build 234 of them. 

But the list of items that went wrong on the airplane is making lots of folks queasy, and I'm not talking about the passengers here. Airline executives and financiers, along with Rolls Royce and Airbus engineers have been sleeping fitfully for the past 14 days.

I call your attention to the blog Plane Talking.  Blogger Ben Sandilands has scooped everyone with the publication of a PowerPoint presentation by Thomas Montagne, the technical services manager of Airbus. Complete with dramatic photos and graphics, the presentation confirms some of damage to the airplane from shedding pieces of the engine. (Ben adds interesting commentary about the wisdom of engine manufacturer-supplied maintenance, and questions whether there is an inherent conflict of interest when engine suppliers also provide engine service.)  

The graphic illustration of the damage to the airplane adds weight to the speculation of folks who have been basing their opinions on passenger videos, news clips and publicly available images of the airplane. My guess is that Ben's blog stats are going to go stratospheric from the clicks of armchair investigators and aviation enthusiasts.  

In the meantime, the Australian newspaper Herald Sun published a list of airplane failures including the loss of one of two hydraulic systems, the loss of control of the left outboard engine, fuel leaks in the left wing tanks and loss of fire control in that same area. The article also suggests that fuel from a tail tank could not be transferred forward. Whether this caused the pilots to moderate how much fuel they dumped from the wings, or if they even had control over the wing tanks isn't known. 

A Boeing 747 pilot explained the problem to me recently by saying, "The big deal is if the tail tank won't transfer, you have a CG problem. You have to keep fuel in the most-forward fuel tank," he explained, to balance the aft weight. Clearly the men in the cockpit of Qantas Flight 32 were in a dilemma; land heavy and risk not being able to stop the plane in time, or land tail heavy and risk tank rupture and subsequent fire. Where's the good choice there?

Dealing with the weight distribution was far from their only problem. My 747-flying friend added, "multiple failures get confusing very fast. You have one or two components fail which cause other components to fail. You've got these messages coming up. If you get a couple of those multiple messages its hard to sort out what the real problem is among a blizzard." 

Captain Richard de Crespigny, first officer Matt Hicks and Mark Johnson are to be hailed for finding their way through the storm of malfunctions and bringing that airplane to a safe landing in Singapore. Now its the investigators who find themselves with a blizzard of information. They can be thankful for that. More information should be better than less.  If they are conscientious, if they sort it out, and make the right decisions about what needs to be fixed on the engine and on the airplane, air travelers will have something else to be thankful for.