When Will The Butler Bulldogs Get Some Respect?

Q. When does a two-time NCAA finalist stop being a Cinderella Team?

A. When they win it all and shut up the TV fools like Charles Barkley.

To his credit he did give them some props, after they beat the real Cinderella Team that the media wanted in the finals for ratings purposes. But before the game and at halftime, Barkley and some of his colleagues just had to keep harping about how VCU would eventually wear Butler down.

It didn't happen.

It hasn't happened in any tourney game in the last two years.

The only game they lost in the last two was the title game against Duke, only by a basket. That's not wearing anyone down and the entire nation watched that last shot from Hayward fly towards that basket, only to be a hair off the mark.

I can understand last year. It was a magical run. And like everyone else, I figured with Hayward leaving for the NBA, it probably wouldn't happen again. I knew the Bulldogs could send some teams home early in heartbreak, shock, and disillusionment. But that would probably be about it.

To their credit, they didn't listen to me. They have been believers in themselves more than anyone else. When they came back against a very good Florida team, I knew they were for real and have the makings of a potential champion. They are proving to the world that were more than just Hayward last year, they are a TEAM. Like one announcer said last night, Butler is good at playing bad. This means they can play badly and still beat you because they never quit, regardless of how they are playing.

Let me tell you (if you are a basketball fan who is not a UConn fan) why you should be for Butler Monday night:

1. They play the game, the way the game should be played.

They have been playing bigger, stronger, teams that are sometimes very physical. These teams have used their sizes and strength to intimidate the smaller Butler team. Basically they have played thugball, but they lost anyway.

Butler is patient and does not give up even when they are down. They pass the ball, spread the court, and do not allow pressure in the back court to get them rattled. If they make a mistake, they forget about it and keep playing on.

2. They put the student back in student athletes.

These guys are smart, all of them. If you meet one and speak to him, you get some damned intelligent conversation about basketball or anything else they are studying. You do not get jive ebonics, or all glory to God speeches.

93% of the current class of Butler freshmen have a 3.0 HS average or above. 50% has a 3.75 or higher.

The focus at this university is clearly on academics, not big money sports. They play in an old fieldhouse that was once the site of the Indiana championship games is years gone by, you may have seen it if you watched the movie Hoosiers. Their enrollment, including grad students, is around 4600.

Most of these guys will truly go pro in something other than basketball.

Forward Matt Howard (son of a postman) has a 3.88 in Financing. Ten of the players on the roster are from the state of Indiana. Shelvin Mack, a junior, is from Lexington Kentucky and may be the only player who has the skills to turn pro. (I bet UK wishes they would have given this kid a closer look, instead of the yo-yos that came and played the required one year, before going into the NBA.)

So unless you are committed to UConn for some reason or are a racist TV analyst, why would you not pull for Butler?

They do this right. They are building a solid program based on scholarship and athletics is a side act.

Brad Stevens gave up a great marketing job at Eli Lilly to pursue his dream of coaching basketball, starting out as a low paying assistant. They gave him a decent raise to stay last year when others were courting him after last year, but it's nothing like Calhoun, Calipari, and others make.

Stevens may eventually jump ship for more money. Who could blame him? If this thing with Tom Crean doesn't work out at IU, we may see Brad being hired as his replacement, down the road. He could make the big time and still stay in Indiana. But if you look at this realistically, he's making it big time right now.

Crean has NC Center Tyler Zeller's brother, Cody, coming in next year. He is also a 7-footer and there will be no excuses to not be competitive. no one expected miracles out of the Hoosiers after Mike Davis and Kelvin Sampson decimated the entire program. But if Crean cannot get the job done and improve this performance, maybe Stevens can. I can only imagine what Brad could do with a strong 7-footer on this Butler team right now.

Go Dawgs!!!

Another Blast From the Past

Souvenirs.

Over time, it's all we are left with to prove we were here or there, or we knew this person or another.

Today, I will go pick up a ceramic paw imprint of our little friend.



Enjoy.

Sydney Sunsett 1997-2011

Our hearts are saddened and she will be sorely missed.

Job Posting: President

Help Wanted: Contract About To Expire

Since the moment it was known Obama was the winner of the 2008 Presidential Election, there has been speculation of who could beat him in 2012. As we now find ourselves in early 2011, the punditry is saturated with rumors of who will or will not throw their hat in the ring on the GOP side.

We have even seen the name Hillary Clinton circulated as a possible Democratic primary challenger, because Obama is such a massive failure on almost every front a President must lead on. He is even losing his base support, the radical cast members who were behind his thrust into the spotlight and eventually the White House have found that he is useless to their grossly disfigured causes.

Big government statism is once again demonstrating that the government is corrupt, incompetent, ineffective, and does not meet the needs of the people it was designed to serve. With so many people disillusioned with this current government for one reason or another, it stands to reason that the GOP is ripe for a pretty solid return to power next year. But, it is not guaranteed.

The thing that can and will hurt the GOP the most in the next election cycle is the GOP.

Every week, we see a new poll conducted as to who Republicans will support to be the party's nominee for President next year. Every poll seems to have a different result, based on who is behind it. But the most interesting thing worth noting in all of these surveys is the candidates themselves. Only one that I am aware of has even announced a candidacy, and that is Herman Cain.

For this reason, the polls are speculative and mean absolutely nothing at this point in time. Every time one of the candidates win, it's never by a majority and is seldom by a large margin.

Some of the polling taking place are straw polls put on by conservative organizations. None of them are conclusive and are probably designed solely for fundraising purposes.

There are many polls put out by the usual polling organizations who make their living off of polling. Since we know that Obama's poll numbers are in the low 40% range in some polls and a little bit higher in others, it only stands to reason that the organizations are tired of surveying the president's job approval.

Some of the early polling taking place right now is likely being engineered by the pro-Obama lobby (which includes the complicit media that supports him) for the specific purpose of creating a false picture. They want people to believe the GOP is seriously divided on who they want to be President, despite the lack of a declared field.

Most people won't factor these things in when forming an opinion, the average stiff may not be quick to realize the games played by political hacks behind the scenes. I doubt any of this crosses a lot of people's minds these days, and that includes many Republicans.

Right now, conservatives want a clear cut choice that mirrors that of Reagan. There's nothing wrong with this, of course, as he was a pretty good choice to replace Jimmy Carter, another massive failure on many fronts. But we must understand that Reagan wasn't made, he just happened. He was not a mold of anyone else, he was himself. He was spontaneous and he was what we needed at the time.

When we consider that Obama is so incompetent, that makes this selection even more pressing. Frankly, it worries me when I see people trying to find the next Reagan because Obama is so closely compared to Carter. These things do not always make for good and wise choices. The man or woman who must replace Obama will not be a Reagan, He/she will be themselves and hopefully, he/she will be what is needed.

Undesirable qualities include, but are not limited to the following:

We do not need a sloganeer. Obama was just that and look what we have now. Values or not, we cannot have someone who merely comes up with catch phrases that sound good in a sound bite, or look good on a poster.

We do not need someone who can merely describe the problems we face, all of us can do that. There is nothing special in having this quality, anyone with half a brain can see what is happening. People have either become enlightened to what is really going on, or they have dug themselves in deeper to the delusion.

We do not need someone who can shout down the opposition by using the first two methodologies that I have described. Louder does not make right. Just look at the people in the Wisconsin rallies. They were loud and boisterous and dead wrong.

Desirable qualities include but are not limited to the following:

We do need someone that can discuss solutions to the problems, We need someone who can effectively articulate these solutions and defend them when they are attacked in the multitudes of ways they will be demonized, when brought forth for discussion. And they need to be implemented.

We need someone who has the ability to stand for principle, not polls. Polls come and go, principles remain steady when they are based in truth.

We need someone who will cut spending, waste, and the debt and not just talk about it. It cannot be cut all at once. We didn't get into this overnight, we won't get out of it overnight. But we must seriously reverse the trend. I will not mind staying at the same tax rate for awhile, if spending will be cut to pay down this massive debt we have incurred.

We need someone who has a worldview that begins here at home. We need to stop worrying about what others think of us and do the best job we can for each other here at home. And what's left over, we can share with others.

We will need to vet and debate throughout the primary process. But ultimately our goal should be more than just defeating Obama, more than just winning an election. Just because a candidate can win doesn't mean he/she can lead and implement practical solutions. Let's not settle for the lesser of the two evils this time, let's give this some serious thought while there is time.

Obama's Media: A Slobbering Love Affair Continues

Remember this display of illogical reasoning by Candy Crowley? Remember how ignorant she showed herself to be on national TV?



That's the precisely the kind of idiocy we have come to expect from the slobbering, drooling media types who continue to hail the Emperor with no clothes. Her only saving grace was nobody watches CNN anymore. So she was free to look like a fool and no one really knew. It's kind of like the old saying, "if a tree fell in the woods and nobody was around, did that tree make a sound?"

Here's a moment where someone was around it's a moment that we probably won't hear Candy address in any of her shows because she is a poor excuse for a journalist.

The very people who were supposed to like us because Obama is President do not seem to be very pleased with his likeness, take a look at a shot of Obama getting stomped in effigy.

Muslims around the world were supposed to love us, after that Cairo speech. And radical racist thugs like the Nation of Islam and Black Panthers were supposed to love their country, now that a black man was in office. Farrakhan even called them the "Chosen One".

Even though Obama's Justice Department got charges dropped against two thugs who broke federal law by intimidating voters at a polling place in Philly, it appears that this honeymoon is also over:



You the faithful few who make this a regular stop know that we spent a great amount of time and effort to warn the American public on this and other blogs. But alas, some did not listen.

We were racists for even suggesting that Barack Hussein Obama was a liar, who would say anything to get elected. We were paranoid when we made the claim that he was inexperienced and incompetent. But to quote Obama's one time spiritual adviser, "the chickens have come home to roost".

Muslims abroad and radical racists have finally awakened to these cold hard realities. When will the American mainstream media finally get it?

I don't expect it anytime too soon. They just refuse to ask the tough questions that they were somehow inclined to ask, when George Bush was President.

Charles BS Barkley: The Mouth Of The South

You can't call it a fluke anymore. But even yet, the national media still calls the Butler Bulldogs a Cinderella team. Even though they are 9-1 in tourney games over the last two years, they are still the underdogs. Even though they are in back to back Final Fours, they just can't get the respect in some circles.

Barkley is one of those blathering idiots who cannot grasp this concept and he never ceases to show his ignorance, when he is hired to do commentary on basketball shows. Why they hire this guy to talk is puzzling, because he never played the game the way it should be played..... or he would have won something in his long career.

Maybe if he hadn't been given over to drinking in bars, running his mouth and getting into fights with the local patrons the nights before games, he could have won a championship. Maybe if he knew how to be a team player like Michael Jordan, making others around him better, he might have had a ring to show his kids and grandkids. No...Barkley made his teammates mediocre.

He hasn't changed much either, He makes his TV team sound mediocre too.

One only needed to hear him this past weekend on the halftime shows and it would become blatantly obvious he does not like teams like Butler. He likes thugball better because it does not require thinking or strategy, just some size...swinging some elbows....something that got him many of his points in his career.

I suspect there is a racist element to it, Butler does have some white guys on the team who can play good team ball. But more than this, it may be the culture of academics that guys like Barkley are not familiar with. Every player on Butler (whether black or white), must have a 3.0 average to get into the school.This means they must be intelligent, as well as good ball players. When Barkley played, D's got it.

When you see a Butler basketball player interviewed, you hear intelligent kids answering questions with humility. You do not hear arrogant trash talk in ebonics. You do not hear reckless and brainless comments like we heard from Barkley for many years, as a player and now as a pseudo-commentator.

So to Mr. Charles B.S. Barkley, I have a quote for you to ponder in the midst of your idiocy:

"It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to open one's mouth and remove all doubt."--Abraham Lincoln

I am sure he doesn't care what I think, but he really does make a better quiet fool, than a vocal one. I know he is better suited for the pro game than the college game. Because there, the arrogant thug culture is openly promoted and worshiped. There, brandishing weapons in the locker room is considered just horsing around.

But sideshows aside, even the teams that win rings in the NBA are the ones that have team players that keep their mouths shut and play. As the old Nike ad once said, they "just do it"... like Hakeem Olajawon (two rings) used to do. They don't need to talk to hear their own voices, they just play and they win. Then, they go home and do not troll the bars looking for fights, afterward.

When they retire, they do something productive and/or they enjoy the money they made over the years. They do not need to take jobs on TV just to makes further fools of themselves, than they did when they played.

Geraldine Ferraro 1935-2011

"Though we were one-time political opponents, I am happy to say Gerry and I became friends in time — a friendship marked by respect and affection. I admired Gerry in many ways, not the least of which was the dignified and principled manner she blazed new trails for women in politics." — Former President George H.W. Bush.

That was Mr. Bush's statement, now here is mine:

I stood on the opposite side from her on many political issues of the day. But there was no question that Geraldine Ferraro was always a lady, who deserved the respect she had earned--both as a trailblazer for women and as a person.

In the heat of political discourse, she took on the argument... and not the person who stood on the opposite side of it. She was very openly critical of the opposition's stances and policies, but I cannot recall her ever demonizing anyone she disagreed with personally.... like many we see on the Left today.

She was classy, dignified, and certainly very principled in her beliefs. Unlike many today, she did not waiver for the sake of party unity. If she felt it was wrong, it was still wrong--even if her party openly waffled on any given subject.

Four years younger than my mother, Ms. Ferraro was a tough lady from the same generation who had to overcome many of the same sets of circumstances. I didn't know Ferraro personally, but I had the utmost respect for her and what she accomplished in her lifetime.

I pray that her family can find solace and peace in this time of grief. She will certainly be missed by everyone whose lives she touched, but I also know it is THEY who will miss her the most. We will all have some sorrow and sympathy, but THEY who will be saddened the most. Ours will pass more quickly, theirs may last a lifetime.

May she rest in peace.

Another Blast From the Past

A little song about the Man Of Steel:



Enjoy.

Friday Funnies

Once again, this one comes from the PYY Mailbag:

Working people frequently ask retired people what
they do to make their days interesting.
Well, for example, the other day, Bev my wife and I
went into town and visited a shop.

When we came out, there was a cop writing out a parking ticket.

We went up to him and I said, 'Come on, man,
how about giving a senior citizen a break?'
He ignored us and continued writing the ticket.
I called him an a--hole . He glared at me and started
writing another ticket for having worn-out tires.

So Bev called him a s--t head.  He finished the
second ticket and put it on the windshield with the first.
Then he started writing more tickets.
This went on for about 20 minutes.
The more we abused him, the more tickets he wrote.

Just then our bus arrived, and we got on it
and went home.

Calling John Galt...

Here is some food for thought on your Thursday.

I have always tried to teach my children that there is no greater freedom on this earth than to be self-reliant. This means being you must be one that you can count on the most. You, and you alone, are the one who can control your destiny the best---not your parents, not the government.

If you have ever read Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged, you well know the character named John Galt. And if you are intuitive, reflective, someone who reads deeper than the second dimension, you will also know that he is not just a character in a book. He is a symbol of self-sufficiency, creativity, and innovation who needs no one but his own drive, will, and intellect to survive in a cold and demanding world.

To know him in his real form, is to inherit some of his remarkable characteristics. This guy understands him:



He is not the only one, there are many others who know John Galt and have allowed him to inspire them to develop their own inner strengths, free from undue interference and corrupted influences:



Coming next month will be the premier of Atlas Shrugged: Part One. Don't look for John Galt in this part. Look for why we need him.



Some theaters may refuse to show this. Some may be turned off at the fact that Ayn Rand was an atheist. others will call it racist because it goes against everything our President stands for. I say we should ignore both critiques, and take the value of the substance from the material and use to to make ourselves better.

This is not about religion, for God wants people to work their way out of turmoil, finding their own solutions, if possible. Still... I firmly believe that He is not beyond helping us, when we cannot. But we must make every effort we can make, first.

This is not about race either. Had Hillary or Howard Dean been in the White House right now, we would be asking the same questions about a failed ideology. Race matters nothing in this. Race has been made a scapegoat for many who cannot find their own way, but I am telling you all right here and now that I know black men and women who have worked very hard to make themselves self-reliant, and can buy/sell all of us, several times over.

Tell Herman Cain and Robert Johnson that a black man cannot make it in America, and they will laugh you out of the room.

This is not about either of those things, this is about us. It's about we, the people. It's about whether we throw in the towel and allow the forces that want to DICTATE to the people, to prevail and implement their will over us.... or it's about finding individuals, who want to LEAD the people out of dependency and into the real freedom I described in the first paragraph.

The proper question that should be asked is not, "who is John Galt?" It's "where the hell is he?"

I suggest we all start calling our local theaters to ask when they plan to show this movie, and make sure we attend one of its showings. It will be demonized by those who have a vested interest in the failure of the principles it contains, but you can be an individual and freely make up your own mind, after you see all three parts of the trilogy.

Don't let them decide for you. Be unafraid, be willing to challenge yourself. Be John Galt.

Are you John Galt? If so, where are you and what are you going to do about this?