Connections

Fly-half Johnny Wilkinson became the top scorer in international rugby history this weekend with his first penalty goal for England in a 9-15 loss to Scotland at Murrayfield. Wilkinson has displayed somewhat diminished performance since guiding England to the Rugby World Cup in 2003.

The most recent Rugby World Cup, hosted in France, attracted well over 2.2 billion viewers worldwide. By contrast, this year’s Super Bowl attracted 97.5 million viewers. Much to the chagrin of the Federal Communications Commission, there was no halftime fiasco as with the Super Bowl XXXVIII halftime show.

The FCC has dutifully regulated the American airwaves for over 70 years. Established with the Communications Act of 1934, the FCC censors American broadcasts of all cursing, nudity and drug use (violence is fine). Many activists have objected to FCC censorship, arguing that it violates the First Amendment.

Some television channels remain unregulated, notably HBO and Showtime. Coincidentally, HBO has won more Emmys within the last decade than any other channel. Most recently, the acclaimed HBO drama The Wire went off the air after five seasons.

Grand Slam?

Wales are unbeaten in the Six Nations, and this weekend they face off against France. The only team capable at this point of at least sharing the crown with Wales, the French will be a very tough challenge for the Welsh pack, but I believe the home side will hold up strongly. Note that I said home side. Wales are playing France at home for this one, making their prospects even richer.

That being said, I’m not quite sold yet on Wales winning. I like the concept of putting James Hook in for Stephen Jones, but I’m not sure switching a winning formula is the way to go before the final match of a potentially historic season.

Scotland update:

The boys in blue will be playing Italy in the Loser’s Bowl, battling it out for the right to not be quite so embarrassed by this year’s outing. Keep hope alive, Aberdeenshire.

My Thoughts on Smoking Ban

I just picked up my local fishwrapper and read a particularly infuriating letter to the editor by Sharon Clark. Sharon writes that the city should ban smoking in “public restaurants” because “maybe smokers just might decide to quit smoking then.” This sentiment is the very root of everything that is wrong about American politics.

First thing’s first. There is no “public” restaurant. Sure, restaurants in the city may be accessible to anyone who wishes to eat in them, but they are not “public” in that they are private institutions. As businesses, they are entitled to make their own decisions regarding tobacco use on their own property. This is because the Constitution grants individuals and institutions the right to private property and affirms the ideal of limited government. If an individual doesn’t agree with what a property owner allows his customers to smoke, that individual should exercise his or her right to leave.

As for the “maybe smokers just might decide to quit smoking then” part of Sharon’s argument, it really isn’t any of Sharon’s business whether or not her fellow Elkhart citizens choose to quit smoking or not. Smoking is extremely harmful to one’s health, I cannot argue with that. What I can argue with is whether or not the government should take it upon itself to legislate healthy living. Certainly eating massive hamburgers and sitting around all day is a death wish as much as regular tobacco use is, but if an individual chooses to lead a slothful lifestyle, so be it. It isn’t the prerogative of the government to tell that individual to live differently.

Americans have become far too complacent with regards to these idiotic regulations and bans. Tobacco is a legal substance, and tobacco prohibition accomplishes absolutely nothing but making criminals out of law-abiding citizens. Sharon and her fellow cohorts should quit whining and get used to the idea that other people have the liberty to do as they please.

“The Wire” Creator Interviewed

Reason recently sat down with Ed Burns, creator of HBO’s “The Wire” for a very good interview. Here’s an excerpt that I really like.

“reason: We interviewed your co-producer David Simon just before The Wire’s fourth season. He said that though The Wire may be cynical about institutions, it treats its characters with a lot of affection. But the last two seasons seem to have gotten even more cynical. Many of the characters who show promise seem to either succumb to character flaws, or actually get punished for doing the right thing. Are viewers to take anything away from The Wire other than that our major institutions are failing, and there’s little reason for hope?

Burns: Well, I don’t think there’s much reason for hope if you keep doing the same thing over and over again, even though you know it’ll never work. Dietrich Bonhoeffer once said that if you get on the wrong train, running down the aisle in the opposite direction really doesn’t help. Basically that’s what we’ve done, we’ve gotten on entirely the wrong train, and we keep sprinting down the aisle in the other direction, trying to pretend that if we run fast enough, we can get it together and turn things around. We’re losing more than we’re winning, and there’s no reason for it.

I mean, if you go into West Baltimore, or East Baltimore, or any of these cities in the ghettos and you pick up a stone and you throw it, you’re probably going to hit a nonprofit. They’re all over the place. They aren’t working, because again we’re all on the same, wrong train. The nonprofits are fragmented. The whole thing is fragmented. It just doesn’t work.

So no. I don’t think we’re being cynical. I think we’re being factual. We’ve been fighting the drug war for 30 years. Thirty years of failure. But there’s some reason that we persist in this. What is it? We never explore why that is. But you just can’t spend this much money and get these few results and continue on like this. Someone has to start wondering what the f*** is going on.”

Rugby Video of the Week

I figured it would be nice to introduce Concord to God’s Game, and the best way to do that seems to be through the magic of internet video.

So here we are. Since I couldn’t find any videos of the Scotland-England game (read below), I’ve gone with Frederic Michalak’s first Super 14 try. Enjoy.

Quality try. Great pressure by the forwards and plenty of credit goes to Michalak for the finish. I have to wonder, however, if it’s the slightest bit cheap for a South African rugby team to bring a French player onboard. After all, this won’t help their domestic pool of players in the slightest. In fact, if this becomes a trend we may well see a diminished quality of play amongst southern hemisphere nations.

Murrayfield Magic Once Again

I was planning to focus today’s post on the Ron Paul dropout (and my subsequent disillusionment), but instead I’ve decided to spend my time on more important things. Scotland stunned the world yesterday at Murrayfield, defeating heavily favored England by two penalty goals. Though they still don’t have a chance in the RBS Six Nations, they made a statement that will propel them to the IRB World Cup in 2011.

First, quick facts.

- Johnny Wilkinson’s first penalty goal made him the highest scorer in test history.

- Graeme Morrison made his debut at centre, replacing Andy Henderson (read on for my thoughts)

- Wilkinson missed a chance to tie the match with one minute left to go before the half.

- Near the end of the match, with England still in the game, coach Brian Ashton made the bold (read: bad) decision to send on newcomer Charlie Hodgson to replace Wilkinson.

Though I remain excited for my Scotsmen, I also remain worried about the state of northern hemisphere rugby. Matches like these won’t cut it if the IRB adopts the Schellenbosch laws world-wide. Even if that decision isn’t made, the Six Nations simply aren’t preparing themselves for the SANZAR speed and versatility. I’ll take my Tana Umaga over Johnny Wilkinson any day, and so would Brian Ashton.

On to the bearers of the purple heather. I applaud Frank Hadden immensely for what he did today. Ever since Scotland A beat the Irish, there have been rumors that perhaps the future should start just a little earlier, and Hadden picked up on them. Solid perfomances from the aforementioned Morrison and others only bolstered the claim that Scotland should start on its path to the World Cup sooner, rather than run out a miserable Six Nations with its current stock. For the first time since last year’s defeat in France, I find myself cautiously optimistic about Scotland rugby. Now, if only the deplorable domestic situation could be fixed.

Friday Funnies

For a number of reasons, John. First and foremost, you plan to spend $550 million on defense in just four years. You know nothing about economics and have no background as a fiscal conservative. You are Bush. If you want to win this campaign as a Republican, you have to promise the American people something they haven’t seen before. Spending and tax cuts, for starters. No more troop deaths in foreign countries would also be good. You just aren’t up to the task, John.

Not that I can blame you. After all, nobody wants to “flip-flop” in the twilight of their career, during their final, last-ditch run for office. This is a time to go down with the ship, to be the maverick senator who couldn’t care less what anyone else thought. Maybe someday history will look back on you fondly, but don’t hold your breath. Your message wasn’t fresh enough, you weren’t bold enough. You weren’t and still aren’t good enough to be president.

first post

Welcome, folks. The final trimester is upon us. Just to update you, Barack Obama looks likely to win the election and Bill Buckley recently died. The GOP candidate is an economically liberal foreign policy neo-con eerily reminiscent of the recently departed Mr. Bush and Scotland is winless at the Six Nations.

Read the CATO Institute’s evaluation of the World Health Organization’s ranking of health care systems.

Bye ’til next time.