Watch this kid run...

I hear he has committed to Michigan. I suspect we'll be hearing the name McGuffie a lot over the next few years...

God Smites Supreme Court Chief Justice

Sorry, the Devil made me do it...

As I was saying...

Slate.com's Worst Sports Week Ever.

Jeezus H...

Okay, I'm having a really hard time with a lot of sports these days. I didn't see it, but Cory tells me that Al Troutwig went off on the sad state of sports on the Tour de France coverage the other morning. I'm right there with Al.

The Tour is particularly offensive. I, like many, jumped on the Tour de France bandwagon back in about 2000, when Lance Armstrong was going for his second of seven consecutive wins. It was tough watching last year without Lance leading the way, but I was still interested. This year, with the Operation Puerto scandal decimating the ranks of the peloton, the Tour had a rather sad pall cast over it. Then on Tuesday, Alexander Vinokourov fails a doping test and the entire Astana team (including top rider Andreas Kloden) withdraws from the race.

NOW, Michael Rasmussen, the maillot jaune and favorite to win the race,
has been dismissed and sent home. The Tour is in wreckage. The sport is in shambles. A lot of Americans, including me, are on the verge of writing cycling off completely. I used to be a fan of boxing. Boxing got so corrupt and ridiculous that I don't watch anymore. Cycling is moving that direction now. I am glad that Rabobank took a tough stand and sent their team leader home, but I REALLY wish that it hadn't been necessary.

This sucks. Seriously...

Everyone who thinks you can rely on a contract step forward. Whoa, not so fast, trial lawyers...

Some interesting dialogue has been going on recently about the Minouche Noel case and her dispute with her attorney, Sheldon Schlesinger, over his fees & costs from her med/mal case against the state. Schlesinger took on her case in the late 1980s, winning an $8.5 million judgment in 1999 against the state hospital where she was injured as a child. Seven years of lobbying later, after having to hire professional lobbyists, Schlesinger finally convinced the Florida legislature to pass a claims bill to pay the judgment. Governor Crist signed the bill back in May.

However, Schlesinger has now put a lien on the payment, saying he is owed an additional $500,000 or so in fees & costs under the contingency fee contract with Noel's parents. The legislature had capped Schlesinger's payment from the judgment at $1.07 million.

Most of the commentary on this case is predictable - "just another greedy trial lawyer trying to get rich on the back of a poor, injured girl." I don't buy it. Schlesinger worked on this case for nearly twenty years. He had a contract which the Noel family agreed to when the sought his services. Schlesinger is, by any measure, one of the most successful and sought-after trial lawyers in the U.S. I think he should be paid what the contingency-fee contract called for. That's the way it's supposed to work.

For some intersting takes on the issue, read Michael Mayo's column in the South-Florida Sun Sentinel, and a good comment about the case on Discourse.net.

Enjoy!

Florida's Fire Chiefs want PIP to stick around

The Buzz reports that the Florida Association of Fire Chiefs has issued a statement (.pdf document) urging Governor Crist to call the legislature back for a special session on PIP. Fire/EMS companies stand to lose millions in un-reimbursed EMS calls if PIP sunsets on October 1st, so it's not surprising that they want it to stay on the books.

As more and more folks in the health-care field wake up to the fact that the sunset of PIP will cost them money, you can bet that the drum beat for a special session will continue to get louder. It remains to be seen how the insurance industry plays their cards to oppose this growing call for a special session. Count on them starting a big public-relations push soon about how the death of PIP will lower insurance costs.

How the News Works

What's going on here?

I think we've entered the Florida panhandle of the Bizarro world. First I hear that a Jackson County Democrat is a strong candidate for state legislator, and now I hear that a Democrat is the top presidential fund-raiser in the panhandle.

Is it the Apocalypse?

*sigh* Sadness...

Michael Vick was just indicted for dog fighting.

This is depressing on a number of levels. I don't really know what to say about it.

Un-sucky movie of the day...

I guess it was bound to happen. After previous summer-movie-blockbuster bombs like "Spiderman 3" and "Pirates of the Caribbean at World's End," we were bound to eventually go see a good movie. And so last night we saw "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix." And we saw that it was good.

I'm not a big Potter fan. I've not read any of the books. I've only seen a couple of the movies. But this one I liked. The story was fun and pulled me through, and the acting was commendable, particularly the woman who played Umbridge (*cough*bitch*cough*). And the wizard battle at the end was worth the wait. Most telling, perhaps, was the wife-to-be's reaction (who is a huge Potter fan, has read all the books and seen all the movies), who thought it was great. So there you go.

A Democrat state legislator in NW Florida? No way...

An interesting article in the St. Petersburg Times discusses the possibility of a Democrat actually being elected to a seat in the state legislature in a panhandle district. While most would say this is a fantasy, the candidate is Sheriff John "Johnny Mac" McDaniel, who has been sheriff of Jackson County for nearly thirty years.

A tough-talking, law and order Democrat? Yeah, I guess they do still exist...

The Dead Zone

And no, I'm not talking about the tv series...

The Houston Chronicle reports that the Gulf of Mexico "dead zone" off the coast of Louisiana, caused by nitrogen in the Mississippi River, will grow to more than 8,500 square miles, it's largest size in 22 years. Well, at least Louisiana doesn't have a lot of other problems to worry about right now...

As I discussed in a previous post, more corn for ethanol doesn't help this problem, as corn requires high-nitrogen fertilizer, which washes into the Mississippi.

Water, water everywhere, but not a drop for my lawn...

The Northwest Florida Water Management District issued a new report (.pdf format) yesterday on the drought conditions in this part of the state. As anyone who has seen my shaggy lawn recently can attest, we've had a lot of rain in recent days here in Pensacola. However, the district reports that we're still "about 16 inches below normal district wide." The majority of the district indicates severe drought conditions, with parts of the Florida-Georgia border region rated as "extreme drought." Although no mandatory water restrictions have been put in place, voluntary water restriction measures are being promoted by most of the water authorities in the area, including ECUA here in Pensacola.

So watch the water use, please...

Irony...

The "Code Monkey" video below has stopped playing correctly...

Any code monkeys out there care to lend a hand?

I thought not...

For the tech geeks out there...

Brought to my attention by my tech-geek buddy John C. in Austin, it's the Code Monkey.

Enjoy.

Ouch...

Here's a nice photo from the GOP presidential candidate forum hosted by the NAACP. Yes, you're seeing that correctly, only ONE (Tom Tancredo) of the nine GOP candidates showed up (by contrast, all of the Democrats came).

Phobia of the Day: paraskevidekatriaphobia

In keeping with my recent posts on fear of squirrels and fear of clowns, it seems appropriate today to address that age-old fear, paraskevidekatriaphobia.

Personally, I have no particular fear of Friday the 13th. I am, however, somewhat afraid of low-budget horror movies, but mostly because they bore me and are a waste of time.

I hope Jerry doesn't see a squirrel wearing a clown costume today. That'd suck.

Jeeezus H...

Arizona legislators admit they didn't know what they were voting on.

I guess I'm naive, but I would hope that a legislator would at least know what the bill is that he's voting on. These dopes in Arizona voted in favor of a bill outlawing the use of the names of dead servicemen on commercial products, and when questioned about it later had such wonderful explanations as:

"a senior moment"
"these things slip past us all the time"
"if I had been paying better attention, I would have voted no"

As stated in the article, "Rep. Kyrsten Sinema, D-Phoenix, conceded that she wasn't paying attention and was totally unaware of the contents of the bill on which she voted at least twice . . ."

BTW, Gov. Crist recently signed a similar bill into law in Florida. I wonder how many of our legislators in Tallahassee were asleep at the switch on this bill?

Rats from a sinking ship...

John McCain loses his campaign manager, deputy campaign manager, chief strategist, and political director all at once. Says "everything's great!"

McCain is the Republican candidate most closely tied to President Bush on OIF, which is more and more the wrong place to be.

Bong Hits 4 Jesus - The Game

I missed 2.

Any requests? Sorry, I'm not licensed to play that one...

Florida Today reports that music licensing companies (ASCAP, BMI, etc.) are "stepping up" enforcement of copyright laws by going after coffee houses, bars, restaurants, etc. where musicians play covers of copyrighted songs. So, if you own a bar or coffee house and want to have your local guitar hero come and warble a few Jimmy Buffett tunes to entertain your customers, be ready to shell out the bucks first.

They report that a bar even received a bill from the licensing company that owns Hank Williams, Jr.'s "Are you ready for some football?" jingle, because it played Monday Night Football on t.v. sets in the bar. Instead of paying, the bar owner just turned down the volume when the opening song came on.

Gotta love the "free market" sometimes...

Dear Smokers: You are the scum of the earth...

Joe Jackson lights up.

Yow.

I can't wait to have kids...

From One Good Thing, this nice story:

For hands-down humiliation, however, I haven't yet been able to top my neighbor's misery, when his three year old daughter interrupted his poker game by running naked into the room and screaming with a joyous voice of discovery, "DADDY! DID YOU KNOW? I COME WITH MY OWN POCKET! AND IT CAN HOLD A PEN! LOOK!"

And while he was knocking his chair over to get across the room to put a stop to her performance, she showed all his friends where the pocket was and how well you could put in and take out all kinds of things.

This is a man who's going to show up at his daughter's high school graduation drunk and shirtless, with her name painted across his chest and gut, randomly shouting "WOOO!!!" during her valedictory speech and making devil horns with his upraised hands. And she will have totally earned it.

Hott4Hill

Special PIP-tastic session?

The Buzz reports that

Gov. Charlie Crist is "very close" to calling a special session to address the Oct. 1 disappearance of the state's no-fault automobile insurance coverage.

It's easy to see who's ox will be gored by the sunsetting of PIP. Looking at the (unbelievably weak, home-made, amateur looking) Save PIP website, the list of supporters includes the Florida Medial Association, Independent Healthcare Providers, Florida Chiropractic Association, Florida Orthopedic Society, Florida Consumer Action Network, National Center for Policy Analysis, and the Palm Beach Medical Society. (I mean, really, with all that money that is the BEST they could do with their website?).

Sciurophobia

Jerry apparently doesn't like squirrels. Therefore, Jerry is a girly-man. Personally, I find squirrels to be among the least offensive of the order of rodentia.

Oddly enough, though, when I entered "evil squirrels" into Google I found that there are many people who share Jerry's aversion to squirrels. Here are some websites that you sciurophobes might want to check out (and believe me, this doesn't even scratch the surface):

The Bushy Tailed Rat

Proof that Squirrels are Evil and Mischievous

Evil Squirrel Bastards

The Evil Squirrel Conspiracy

Evil Squirrel Attacks 3 Innocent People

Enjoy.

*yawn*

Reading about Prez Bush commuting Scooter Libby's prison sentence leaves me with a profound sense of apathy. I just don't care. I TRY to care; I feel like I SHOULD care; but I don't. My own indifference is actually more interesting to me than the story itself ("Narcissus, table for one..."). I think it's a combination of things: Libby being an obviously expendable underling (the loyal solider falling on his sword to atone for the sins of his commanders), my total lack of surprise that Bush decided to keep him out of jail (the only surprise is that it is not (yet) a full pardon), and my disappointment that Patrick Fitzgerald did not prosecute any of the more culpable players (*cough*DickArmitage*cough*). I find the whole thing depressing, and it stokes my rising cynicism about this administration.

Nixon lives.

Anybody know anything about html?

'Cause I don't. I found this 3-column blog template, but what I want to do is to WIDEN the whole page, so I don't have these 1.25-inch-wide borders on either side of the page. I don't have a clue how to do that. Anybody? Bueller?