Crumpled Notebook

Why John Mayer is my hero

Seriously, this guy is awesome. I mean, who cares about his relationship with Jennifer Anniston and how/why they broke up or if he cheated. But this video here just says it all. When it’s over, it’s over. Why waste anyone’s time. Truer words never spoken…haha!

John Mayer Video

Regardless of your political beliefs, you cannot tell me the speech below is not inspiring, or at least this part of it (1:06 in video): “We are the ones we’ve been waiting for…We are the change that we seek.” Sure, it’s not original, or a new concept, but regardless of who says it, but it could be the most true thing I’ve heard spoken during this election season.

Anyway, this isn’t about the election. I voted for Obama, but I’d be perfectly happy with Clinton, McCain or Obama.

For the record, I re-did this post 3 times in the last 20 minutes. First it seemed too anti-american for most of your all’s taste. Next, I got too political. But, that said, if you’d like to know what’s really going through my head on those 2 fronts, email me .

Bobby Knight, the all-time winningest Men’s Division I coach, resigned today with 902 wins and only 371 losses. He’s currently at Texas Tech.
Not sure why, or if there is a reason, other than what is listed in this article here. I hope not.

If you read here, you know I am a fan of Bobby Knight. Always have been, at least since his time at Indiana, and will probably always be.

Anyway, it’s a sad day for NCAA Basketball, but wow, what a wonderful career this man had.

So, a week or so ago, I made up my mind about who to vote for since it was becoming ever more apparent that my first choice, John Edwards (whom I also supported in the last primary election), wasn’t quiet going to make it. This week, I started questioning the “why” of why I made my decision. Went back to my, “I don’t know” thing. What I really wanted was for John Edwards to make an endorsement of either Hillary of Obama so I didn’t have to make a decision myself. I don’t think that is going to happen. At any rate, after going back and for and back and forth and back and forth, etc… I think I have decided, although I plan to just turn in my mail ballot on Tuesday so I have a few more days to sit with it. Right now, I’m feeling good about it.

I’ll tell you who I (plan to) support after Tuesday. What I do feel good about is that 3 of the 5 (4 major) candidates left, I think I would be okay with. At least more okay than I am now. But, I’d rather be a little more than “just okay” with our next president. For the record, I would be “okay” with Hillary, Obama, or McCain. Huckabee just scares me (although I think he’s falling to the wayside), and after doing some research today, Romney scares me even more.

This has bugged me for a while, and since I’ve been inspired to write more lately, I’m going to say it publicly.

Doesn’t Congress and Senator George Mitchell have anything better to do than worry about baseball? As one friend says, “it’s ridiculous that they’re even involved.”

I don’t think I’m the only person who feels this way either.

I guess maybe I could be wrong. I guess maybe I was always taught that our government, our congress, legislators, and President’s job was to look out for the welfare of the country. You know, things like, a thriving economy, peace with other countries, taking care of those who need help, making sure every child has a proper education, and making sure Americans get proper health care, just to name some more obvious ones.

But it seems, at least lately, Senator Mitchell has made baseball his only agenda. Yes, baseball players using and abusing steroids is not good for baseball, but come on, in the grand scheme of things, where does that rank on the priorities of our country? Is there any presidential candidate running on the platform that MLB needs to crackdown on steroid use in baseball? Is that on the list of questions of issues that are important to the people who live in the country? The answer is NO.

So I ask, why are you, Senator Mitchell, wasting my tax dollars on something that I, and most Americans, already know? Shouldn’t MLB be allowed to govern itself? Since using steroids illegally is a crime, shouldn’t law enforcement just be cracking down? I’m just saying, it would be like my city council coming in and investigating our high school sports teams here are drinking too much gatorade, or practicing in the off-season, or even using steroids. That doesn’t happen. If a coach, school official, or police officer suspects that, they’ll do something about it. Not our city council or mayor or anything like that. And if they did, I would still say it was ridiculous.

Sure, maybe MLB should have done a better job of monitoring it. Maybe the coaches and trainers and team mates should have taken some responsibility. Why aren’t you investigating Bud Selig for not doing his job if you care that much? If you have to go in an investigate the coaches and players under him, should that say that he hasn’t been doing his job and should just be fired? My opinion is that he never cared until the government started caring. Why would he? You have records being broken…something that gave baseball it’s first breath of life in I don’t know how many years. And all of that happening under baseball commissioner Bud Selig. Now he’s playing “hard” and cracking down. He should be. He should have been all along because there of course is steroid use in baseball. There still is. And there was even before Congress decided to make it its mission to strip any record-breaking baseball player of their credibility, whether it’s true or not.

Maybe the Babe never used steroids. Maybe he did. Maybe there was something else he used. The fact is, people have been cheating in baseball, and probably every other sport, since the inception of the game. It doesn’t make it right, but it also doesn’t make it a matter of national security either. If Barry Bonds or Roger Clemens took steroids, and you busted them for it, is that going to help my future children have a good education? Is that going to ensure that when they retire, they have social security there (or when I retire for that matter)? Is that going to help ensure my mom gets the medication she needs just so she can get out of bed and get up and move around? Is that going to help find a cure for cancer or Parkinson’s disease? This that going to make sure that we don’t go into another recession during the Bush administration? This that going to bring peace in the middle east and our troops home safely? Reduce crime rate? Get drugs off the streets? Boost our economy?

No. It’s not. You, Senator Mitchell, and anyone else in Congress who helped with this witch hunt, should be ashamed of yourself for wasting not only tax payers dollars, but more importantly, your time. That time that we elected you to be looking our for “our” best interest and the best interest of our country, not the best interest of America’s Pastime.