Winston Zeddemore
Twenty four year old University of Missouri senior Micheal Sam is undeniably an NFL prospect whose expected to be a forth round draft pick by all accounts. He played All American and was named an SEC defensive player of the year. However this is not enough to generate the amount of coverage he is now receiving. Sam has drawn international attention simply by publicly admitting he is gay. Simply? Apparently he also happens to be the first NFL player prospect to do this in history, making his potential playing career forever bearing an asterisk of controversy. Because no matter what his achievements are on the playing field, it will always be accompanied by this footnote. So why would he subject himself to this scrutiny? Michael Gardiner
It’s hard not to be excited about the performance of the Russian Police choir at the Olympic opening ceremony of the winter games at Sochi. They sang Daft Punk’s pop hit (We stay up all night to)”Get Lucky.” Russian military choral singing is distinctive and invokes imagery of the revolution, and the Great Patriotic War against the Nazis. And there is something totally amiable and winning in their sharing of our Western culture and putting their own Russian stamp on it. It was so surprising, it made many of us laugh.And if you haven’t seen it yet, check it out. You will probably laugh. But it’snot derisive laughter. It’s more like surprise and “I can’t believe what I am hearing and seeing.” But it’s wonderful. It’s a little incongruous, but somehow, a complete success. Well, our military bands do the same and it is a little bit surprising to see military band members rocking out, and they do. We have some wonderful performers in our military service bands, even in our local National Guard and Reserve units. So I laughed ,but warmly. And, now when I play Axis and Allies with my son, and it’s the Russian turn, and I am rolling the dice to smash the Nazi invaders, and I am singing in my best Russian military chorus voice, I have the perfect set of lyrics forl the thloh of thedice yeys? I say “Cheers.”Maybe in Russian they would toast, phonetically, Zaschaste’-ye! To happiness! That is what the Russian Police Choir’s rendition of Get Lucky sounded like, happiness. And that is definitely part of the Olympics, the universal joy we take in human performance. Speaking of happiness, Ken Block supporters have to be happy that in a facebook posting, 2010 GOP gubernatorial candidate John Robitaille has not endorsed Mayor Allen Fung. Instead, JR left the issue “Block or Fung” open. Now the bad news, Ken Block and attorney and Allen Fung are going to have to and prove themselves before the anointing thumb is lifted skyward and presses approval into their forehead. Mike Liberty
Okay, quick peak behind the 990wbob curtain here. Somehow, on the heels of my pro Olympics rant a couple weeks back, I drew the "cover the whole gay angle at Sochi" straw when this week's assignments were being given out. And at first I was excited. This is a story with deep social impact that everybody's talking about. Add to that the fact that I love to pick a Libertarian battle and get up on my soapbox for a few hundred words and I had the makings of an easy post. But then I started really thinking about how I felt and what I wanted to say and I've gotta' be honest, I still don't know what to make of this one. Please don't misunderstand, I am an ardent supporter of the full spectrum of gay rights. The bill signed into law last summer (is that how it even works in Russia?) is offensive on its face and an affront to the concept of Liberty. To even frame this as a "gay rights" issue devalues the very person-hood of the human beings caught in the middle of this mess. These are, after all, people with the same natural rights to live and love that all of us expect and demand. Now, this is probably a great place for a little clarification and back story. The aforementioned law behind all this doesn't ban homosexuality outright or anything like that. What it does is ban "homosexual propaganda" and make it illegal to “spread information about non-traditional sexual behavior” to people under age 18. To put it into American Constitutional parlance, what we're talking about here is an issue of free speech. I'm not trying to diminish the stakes, just framing them properly. RA Bartlett
The 2014 Olympic Games have started in Sochi, Russia, and there has been more negative ink (Well, pixels) on the subject, than not. It's not like it was off to a great start--Russia has been the target of complaints over human rights (in particular, regarding incarceration and homosexuals) and there's a wide belief the flat-out bribed the Olympic Committee. A few months back, there was a different "Boycott Coke" movement, regarding Coco Cola's sponsorship of the games. Many world leaders refused to attend, and President Obama's proxy delegation included a selection of three gay athletes. Not off to a great start, but it seems things have gone downhill. Alerts of terrorist attacks, surveillance of visiting dignitaries, journalists, or just spectators, reports of inhumane disposal of stray dogs, and to top it all off, the hotels housing visitors have been sub par. As in, the power and plumbing have not been working. It has gotten to the point where very, very few foreign spectators have come to the games. It has reached a point of, shall we say, a PR disaster. Professor David Clyde Lately it seems the vogue thing in life to do is, blame the guns. It's easy enough, they don't talk back and can't think for themselves. Wait a minute, that's the exact reason we shouldn't blame guns, for school shootings or any other act of terror done by a person, not in the right frame of mind. |
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