Fearless forecasts

It's mid-summer and time for the All Star Game in St. Louis as Major League Baseball will get ready to ramp it back up again following all the festivities.
The home run derby and the celebrity All-Star games are history and the game itself takes center stage with the American League seeking to continue its recent dominance against the senior circuit.
The Los Angeles Dodgers enjoy a nice cushion in the National League West with the San Francisco Giants and Colorado Rockies battling for the second spot and leading the wild card chase at the midway mark for 2009.
The host city for the All-Star Game, St. Louis leads Milwaukee by two and a half games with the Chicago Cubs and the surprising Houston Astros hanging around as well in the NL Central.
In the East, Philadelphia is rolling along with Florida, Atlanta and the New York Mets trying to mount a challenge against the defending World Series champions.
In the American League, the Boston Red Sox, led by stellar pitching, lead the New York Yankees by three games with the Tampa Bay Rays hanging around as well.
The Detroit Tigers, perhaps baseball's biggest disappointment in 2008, lead the AL Central by three and a half games over the Chicago White Sox and four games ahead of Minnesota.
In the AL West, the Los Angeles Angels actually have a battle on their hands this season as Texas is within a game and a half of the division lead after leading the West most of the first half of the season. And let's not forget the upstart Seattle Mariners, led by baseball's best hitter, Ichiro Suzuki, themselves only four games out.
All this being stated, here goes some fearless picks for the second half of Baseball 2009 and the ultimate pick of World Series competitors and eventual World Series champions.
Let's start with the American League...
The Boston Red Sox should hold off the Yankees and Rays and win the East... The Tigers will win the Central and the Angels once again will triumph in the West.
In the National League, the Phillies roll with the division title again while the Cubs overtake the Red Birds and win the Central... As before mentioned, the Dodgers simply have too large of a lead to blow it and will win the West.
Individually, look for Ichiro to win another American League batting title while Mark Teixiera (Yankees) wins the home run crown... the NL leaders will be Albert Pujols (who also is the MVP choice at this site) with 50+ home runs and 150+ RBI. It would be great to see Pujols win the triple crown as well.
That has not happened in the majors since 1967 when legendary Red Sox slugger Carl Yastrzemski accomplished the feat.
The NL MVP will be Pujols and in the AL look for Ichiro to get the honors. The Cy Young Award will go to Josh Beckett (Boston) in the AL and San Francisco's Tim Lincecum in the National League.
On to the post-season...
As mentioned, the division winners will be Boston, Detroit and the LA Angels in the American League with Tampa Bay getting the wild card spot.
The National League division winners will be Philadelphia, Chicago Cubs and LA Dodgers with the St. Louis Cardinals getting the wild card.
When all the dust settles in late October, look for the Phillies and Red Sox to go at it in the World Series and the Phillies repeating (YES repeating) as World Series champions.
In the meantime, let's grab a hot dog and some peanuts and enjoy the second half of the season.
You never really know what's gonna happen.

BREAKING NEW GROUND

As the Senate hearings begin for United States Supreme Court Justice nominee Sonia Sotomayor, it will be interesting to see whether or not the Senate Republicans will be hurling the stones at her in retaliation for the way Democratic Senators went after Samuel Alito and John Roberts, both Bush 43 nominations, a few years ago.
Being an optimist, I would hope not. But also being a realist, that would be asking for too much.
Political theatre they call it on Capitol Hill and it appears from all indications on the Sunday morning gabfests, that once again it will be the case for this judicial confirmation hearing.
Sotomayor is a Latina woman and there has been much said regarding her background and whether she is a racist or not. This blogger isn't buying into any of that.
Barack Obama showed good judgment in his selection of Sotomayor and in spite of the current Supreme Court's recent decision to overturn a ruling that Sotomayor was a part of with two other judges, she should sail through these Senate hearings.
So that being said, congrats are in order to Sonia Sotomayor as she seeks to become the first Latino woman justice of the United States Supreme Court.
The reason for the early congrats and optimism that Senators will get this done in a timely manner is the fact the Democratic party rules the Senate now with 60 votes, which means it is potentially filibuster-proof. The Republicans cannot block this nomination. And that is a good thing for the United States as a country.
The partisan bickering of the past when it comes to Supreme Court justices has been down right embarrassing in some cases.
The classic example was Justice Clarence Thomas in 1991.
Remember that one? George Bush, Sr. nominated him and the event in the Senate practically turned into a carnival as Anita Hill emerged to shoot down Thomas' nomination. No need for the sordid details on that one because it all worked out and Thomas got the job.
In 1987, the late Ronald Reagan saw his nominee go down in flames when Robert Bork was rejected as a Supreme Court nominee and of course George W. Bush also had to withdraw his nomination of Harriet Miers is 2005 because she was simply not qualified for the position.
The Supreme Court is serious business and not to be taken lightly. However, expect the right wing pundits and even some "neutral" political commentators to do the usual hatchet jobs regarding Sotomayor as things get going on this matter.
My prediction is for a swift approval and then Justice Souter can go and enjoy retirement.
We will wait and see if justice prevails.

Information Overload

After surfing the internet the past five days or so, I have discovered there are many differences in the way things are presented on the web when it comes to news stories.
The news media is also in on this as well as evidenced by watching the news coverage on the three major networks on television as well as the cable news networks.
We are in information overload these days people.
Take the news stories that have dominated the headlines the past couple of weeks.
We have the woman formerly known as the Governor of Alaska dominating things. Michael Jackson died and the coverage of his memorial service was overwhelming as ALL the major networks and cable news stations as well as millions of blog sites covered the events.
In mentioning this, Bill O' Reilly of Fox News Channel became a lightning rod for controversy (nothing new there) by doing a hatchet job on Jackson the day of his memorial in Los Angeles.
People are entitled to their own opinions, but have some class when one is still being mourned. This blogger likens that to desecration of a dead person.
So... in my opinion, Bill O' Reilly continues to be a jerk!
Other major stories had Republican Senator John Ensign (Nevada) and Republican Governor of South Carolina Mark Sanford behaving like a couple of would-be porn studs romping around with women in extra marital affairs and then either paying out "hush" money or else, in Sanford's case, trying to justify their actions with numerous press conferences.
Seems very strange to me that in these times we live, the basics in life, meaning sex and death, continue to dominate our fascination.
Is that a sad commentary on the state of humanity in our country or is it the media's fault for the bombardment of it on all of us?
Recently, this blog site has run photos of clowns and slutty looking women in the featured "photo of the day" regarding a certain house on C Street in Washington, D.C. because these people who hang out there and call themselves Christians are nothing but a bunch of hypocrites.
They like to talk the talk but they do not walk the walk as
they hide behind religion and mock the scriptures when they behave this way.
I am talking about Ensign and Sanford.
Ensign in particular, had Republican Senator Tom Coburn (Oklahoma) and former Republican Senator from Pennsylvania Rick Santorum looking out for him regarding his affair with a former staffer who is also married.
Ensign made statements regarding all of this a couple of weeks ago and then BAM... we find out after the smoke begins to clear away from Michael Jackson and the woman formerly known as the Alaska governor, that his mommy and daddy paid out nearly $100,000 to the family of the woman he was carrying on with.
Unbelievable!
Soap opera writers could not come up with shit this good.
The Senate ethics committee, if it has any stones at all, should do a thorough investigation of this matter.
These people are supposed to be "governing" for their constituents. What are they doing? Why is this happening?
Again, the media and bloggers alike jump on the other stories and "spin" our attention away from these things with constant updates from Alaska.
You betcha!
Point is if someone such as the woman formerly known as the Alaska governor or Ensign, Coburn, Sanford, etc. want to be in the jobs they hold (or held) then they have to set an example as well.
You cannot have it both ways.
Ensign insisted that former President Bill Clinton should have been impeached in 1998 following the Monica Lewinsky scandal. People backing the right wing movement will always point out that Clinton perjured himself and that is why the good senator called for such action.
Phooey!
Just like Newt Gingrich (another fine example of hypocrisy), Ensign called for the head of someone after himself carrying on with another woman just like the man he was coming down on for his affair at that time.
Bloggers left and right have been having a field day with these stories.
On the television coverage of these stories, CNN tends to remain somewhat neutral regarding its angle of the story. Fox News however, will lambaste the Democrats (like Clinton) when they falter. But they quickly change their tune for the Republicans (Ensign and Sanford) when they fall into trouble. Fox actually labeled Sanford as a Democrat when posting his title as governor on their newscast.
On the other side, MSNBC will fry the Republicans for their misdeeds while seeking excuses for the Democratic members when they screw up as they tend to be the anti-Fox news broadcast.
Lately however, it has been nothing but Republicans screwing (no pun intended) things up as the world turns.
It would be nice to see a different world politically speaking if our elected officials could clean up their act and stop the silliness and get some things done in Congress in this 111th session. After all, they are headed for recess in less than a month.
What will the political bloggers and news networks cover while they are gone?
I shudder to think about it.

A Sarah-Free Zone

After all Sarah Palin, all the time on the news channels recently, this blog site is pleased to announce we are now going SARAH PALIN FREE!
That's right, no more on Sarah Palin at this site. There are many other choices of blog sites to find out more on the woman formerly known as the Governor of Alaska.
Just a quick shout out to Twitter for starters in this hodge podge of items today...
Twitter is a good way to sources of news items on the net as well as real-time comments regarding those current news events. If you haven't checked out Twitter yet, do so at your earliest convenience. You won't be disappointed once you are accustomed to it.
OK... now on to other things sans Palin.
# The Chicago Cubs deal is being finalized and the Cubs will finally have new owners once everything is made legal.
# Speaking of the Cubs, only one member of the team, pitcher Ted Lilly, made the All-Star team this year.
# Who would have thought Los Angeles Dodgers' slugger Manny Ramirez would be struggling so much this year. Of course he did miss 50 games due to a suspension as a result of violating a banned substance uses rule.
# The Dodgers really are the only team in Major League Baseball with a comfortable margin while leading their division.
# NFL training camp is just three weeks away!
# Is Albert Pujols of the St. Louis Cardinals having a monster season or what?
# Hard to believe the Cleveland Indians are struggling so much this season.
# Hard to believe Boston Red Sox slugger David Ortiz is struggling so badly this season.
#Does anyone believe aging NBA veterans Ron Artest and Rasheed Wallace (both hot-tempered head cases as well) have enough left in their game to make the Lakers or Celtics any better?
# Oh, wait a minute, the Lakers just won the NBA championship a couple of weeks ago. Ron Artest on the same court with Kobe Bryant and Phil Jackson coaching... sounds like Phil is trying to re-create Jordan and Rodman from the Bulls' 1990's glory days.
# NFL training camp is just three weeks away!
# Will the Chicago Cubs and White Sox turn their seasons around?
Switching gears...
# How many people are expected to be at the memorial for Michael Jackson at the Staples Center in Los Angeles? My guess is that it will be more than attended the Lakers' championship rally two weeks ago.
# Hard to believe it was 25 years ago this summer that the Jackson's launched the "Victory Tour" across the world. Remember that?
# What's happening with South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford? How about Nevada Senator John Ensign? They have been blown off the news pages lately.
# Why isn't the state of California, with all of its economic turmoil, having a recall vote on Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger like they did to former Governor Grey Davis six years ago? Davis probably looks like a political genius now compared to Ah-Nold!
# NFL training camp is just three weeks away!
# Congratulations are in order to Minnesota Senator Al Franken as the 111th Congress reconvenes in the nation's capitol.
# Health-care reform... will it have a pulse now with 60 Democratic votes in the Senate?
# How many people are aware that veteran actor Karl Malden (Streets of San Francisco) died last week?
# How many people are aware that controversial former Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara died? It happened today (July 6) and McNamara (with JFK and Lyndon B. Johnson) was S.O.D. when Vietnam was escalating and actually later in retirement, admitted that Vietnam was a huge mistake for the United States of America.
# Would former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld (under Bush 43) ever admit the same regarding Iraq and the current situation still going on over there? Here's a hint: Don't hold your breath.
One last thought...
Had John McCain been elected President of the United States last fall, would Sarah Palin have resigned as Vice-President last weekend?
Think about it... and remember ...
NFL training camp is just three weeks away!

Sarah Palin Flashback: 'Whining' About Media Coverage 'Bothers Me' (VIDEO)

Sarah Palin Flashback: 'Whining' About Media Coverage 'Bothers Me' (VIDEO)

Posted using ShareThis

This is an interesting take on the story of Sarah Palin announcing her resignation as Alaska governor and in part blaming the media for one of the reasons for her decision.
This whole thing is really starting to turn into a Hollywood-type soap opera of sorts. Remember all the media attention with people such as Paris Hilton? This is starting to look and sound like the same thing with Palin.
Does anyone really take her seriously as a possible future Presidential candidate after this episode?
I will say it yet again ... Sarah, if you can't take the heat, get out of the kitchen.

Paul Begala: Sarah Palin Turns Pro

Paul Begala: Sarah Palin Turns Pro

Posted using ShareThis

Another typical slow news weekend?

There is an old saying in the media that if someone wants to slip "under the radar" then go forward on a Friday with a story.
Ususally, news events that take place late Thursday or on Friday escape mass public scrutiny. If something happens on a Saturday, forget it until Monday in all likelihood. And if a big event takes place between then and Monday, the most recent event takes center stage.
Ahhh, you gotta love the 24-hour news cycle in the modern day media.
We have seen Alaska governor Sarah Palin announce her resignation on Friday, JULY 3rd (great timing) and you can bet your bottom dollar if you are viewing this blog on Sunday (July 5) morning, ALL the talking heads on the Sunday morning gabfests are talking about Sarah Palin and her sudden resignation as Alaska governor effective the end of July.
Palin, it has been said, has been the victim of a "media blitzkrieg" against her. That is the underlying reason for her leaving her position.
Hey, I already blogged about her sensitivity on recent issues by suggesting if you can't take the heat, then get out of the kitchen.
Apparently, she is doing just that. If you really believe that.
Get over yourself Sarah Palin.
The world of politics does not revolve around you. There have been rumors swirling about since Friday's announcement by Palin that she might be facing future indictment charges, maybe she is pregnant again, perhaps she is leaving to make a serious run for President in 2012 or maybe she is leaving to take on a new talk show (on Fox you think) in the future.
Who knows?
According to Alaska blogger and frequent Huffington Post contributor Shannyn Moore (pictured in upper right), the serious charges claim might have some merit to it. Moore has been covering Palin since she first campaigned for governor of Alaska.
So she knows Palin and her idiosyncracies. In a telephone interview on MSNBC's Hardball, she said Palin seemed nervous.
Perhaps she is nervous because she is hiding something?
For more information on the phone interview with Shannyn Moore on Hardball, click on the Immoral Minority blogsite in "Jim's Shared Items" on this page.
Ms. Moore and the people at The Immoral Minority deserve a lot of credit for their work on this still developing story from the great frontier.
You betcha and stay tuned.