Michael Wilbon: Racist, Ignoramus, Fool

Yesterday news broke of a blockbuster trade in the NBA that would have sent Chris Paul to the Lakers, Pau Gasol to the Rockets and sent a few new rebuilding pieces to the NBA owned Hornets.  For some reason, that is still not 100% clear, NBA commissioner David Stern vetoed the trade.  The consensus among sports writers is the unprecedented move was terrible and wrong.  Some have even asked for him to be fired.  I was interested to see what some of my favorites commentators thought, so I tuned into Around the Horn and the PTI on ESPN.  I wanted to watch with an open mind, but as soon as I heard them start talking, I knew in my gut someone was going to use one of the most offensive terms I can think of.  I knew it would either be Bomani Jones or Michael Wilbon, and when Around the Horn ended without Jones using it, I just had a sick feeling that it was only a matter of time before Michael Wilbon’s ignorant ass uttered the phrase “plantation owners” to refer to the group of NBA owners.  Slavery was one of the, if not the, low point in our country’s history.  As a white person, I am ashamed of it and I think it is sad that my race would follow in the footsteps of so many other early cultures in enslaving another group of people.  That being said, I find it VERY offensive when I hear someone compare a group of whites to plantation owners, simply because they made an ill informed decision.  Not only is it just a stupid thing to say, but someone like Wilbon, who covers the NBA for a living, should be above saying something that is so untrue.  I have had this feeling for a while, but I believe Wilbon is a racist and should be fired for his ignorant comments.  When a white person makes any comment that is even remotely racist, they are immediately asked to step down from their post, especially at ESPN.  By comparing a group of white people to the most despicable group of whites in our country’s history, I believe saying something like that is just as bad as when someone who is not black drops a racial slur, such as the “N” word.  Just because the majority (remember Jay-Z owns part of the Nets now and Michael Jordan owns the Bobcats) of the NBA owners are white and the majority of the players are black, does not mean it is okay for someone in a public position, like Mr. Wilbon, to make such a stupid and ill informed comparison.  While whites are still the majority in the US, it does not make it okay for someone like Wilbon to say what he did.  Remember, this is the same man who said he would like to take a year off just to follow Adam Scott around the country so he can heckle his caddy because he said he wanted to shove his trophy up Tiger Woods’s black ass.  Hey Mike, Tiger’s ass IS black.  He didn’t say he wanted to shove it up there BECAUSE it is black.  There is a difference, and that difference is HUGE.  If you consider that to be a racist remark and think what you said is okay, you are truly out of touch with the current state of racial affairs in our country.  Even thirty minutes after your utterly ludicrous comments, I am still pissed and offended and I believe attention needs to be called to your ignorance.  To quote the great Ron Paul, “Racism is simply an ugly form of collectivism, the mindset that views humans strictly as members of groups rather than individuals. Racists believe that all individuals who share superficial physical characteristics are alike: as collectivists, racists think only in terms of groups. By encouraging Americans to adopt a group mentality, the advocates of so-called 'diversity' actually perpetuate racism. Their obsession with racial group identity is inherently racist.” Michael Wilbon, you sir, are a racist and I think you should take some time off (or just do us all a favor and resign) to get your head out of your ass.  

Above the Influence: The Propaganda Machine - An Interesting Look on Marijuana

In addition to supporting the full legalization of marijuana for responsible use among adults, I believe it is important to get rid of the negative stigma that is associated with smoking pot.  As a society, we  don’t look down on a man who chooses to have a few beers after work or woman who goes to the bar to celebrate with her friends on a Friday night.  We also do not deny these people jobs.  Why should puffing a joint with one’s friends be any different?  Many of us are getting to the age where we are starting to apply for jobs that put us in the “real world”.  Many of these jobs require us to take drug tests.  The common thought amongst many people is that these drug tests help keep the so called “hard drug” users out of the work place.  This is so far from the truth it is unbelievable.  What these drug tests really are, are another way our society tries to keep marijuana users down.  I have yet to meet someone whose work asked them to go in and take a drug test that day.  Most know when they are coming, have a general idea of when they are, or can even set them up at their own convenience within a week or so.  These policies effectively allow people to use hard drugs, if they choose to do so, as long as they stay away from THC.  Let’s take a look at these “hard drugs” that most drug tests look for and how long they take to clear out of your system:

·         Heroin – Considered one of the most dangerous drugs known to man – 24-48 hours

·         Cocaine – Again, very dangerous, addictive and accessible – 24-72 hours

·         Ecstasy – Once legal, but now considered an illegal party drug – 1-5 days

·         Methamphetamine – It’ll give you a nice pretty smile like Christian Bale in The Fighter, but even if you get the nice Heizenberg (a Breaking Bad reference never hurts) stuff – 1 day – a week

·         PCP – Don’t even know anyone who has done PCP, but even if you could find it and use it – 1-5 days

·         Marijuana – 3 weeks – 2 months

There you have it; even the most dangerous of drugs will most likely be out of your system within a week while weed will stay in your system for much longer.  The only other drug to take longer than a week to clear your system is Methaqualone, commonly known as Quaaludes.  Good luck trying to find those, though, because I’m pretty sure they’ve been off the market in the US for ten or more years.  Just make sure, if your travels take you to South Africa, and you feel the need to party hard, that you don’t have a drug test waiting for you upon your arrival back in the States.  

                I believe Above the Influence is a terrible organization that spreads propaganda that leads to many people in the general public to be misinformed about marijuana and marijuana users.  We have all seen their ads on television, in magazines, on bus stops and in public schools.  I believe many of these ads to be lies or truths that are stretched very far in order to scare people from using drugs.  I understand that parents do not want their children to use drugs because, among many other reasons, they hinder the development of a growing brain.  Why not be honest about THC rather than trying to scare them out of doing them?  Does having a child make a person instantly forget what it is like to be young?  Kids may not have brains that are fully developed yet, but they are not stupid.  If you fill their heads with lies to scare them, they may believe them for the time, but then they get a little older and realize that buying weed isn’t going to fund terrorism or that the guy they buy it from isn’t going to offer them a syringe filled with heroin, what would make them think that anything else that they have learned about drugs is not a lie as well?  While the commercial for marijuana funding terrorism was pretty extreme and only on the air for a short time after 9/11, it still sticks with people to this day.  I will focus on a more recent commercial from Above the Influence that I have seen on the air in the last year.  It is the one where a couple of teenagers smoke a joint and the next thing they know they are standing next to a junk yard.  One of the boys is persuaded by his friends to jump the fence and try to outrun the junkyard dog.  This is one of the most absurd commercials I have ever seen.  You find me one person who smokes a blunt and then says, “You know what I want to do right now? I want to jump a fence and then run as fast as I possibly can for an extended distance.”  I dare you too.  Another lie that Above the Influence is trying to spread is that marijuana causes cancer.  On their website, they state that, “Marijuana smoke contains 50%-70% more carcinogenic hydrocarbons than tobacco smoke.”  If this statistic is true, why has there never been a single instance of cancer being caused by smoking only marijuana?  After thinking about this, I decided to write them a letter and pretend to be a high school kid who has some questions about smoking weed.  I attached my letter below, and I am interested to see if they will write me back.  Trey Parker said it best, through Randy Marsh, at the end of the Future Self ‘n’ Me episode of South Park, “pot makes you feel fine with being bored, and it’s when you’re bored that you should be out learning some new skill, or discovering some new science or being creative.”  But then again, South Park is full of fart jokes so they probably don’t know what they’re talking about.  The lies seem to be working and that’s why the war on drugs is working and less and less kids are using marijuana…right?  Maybe if parents were honest and upfront with their kids, rather than treating them like they are stupid and trying to scare them, more people would wait until they were older to try pot, if they even try it at all. 

Below is the letter I sent to Above the Influence.  I tried to sound young and naive so hopefully they will respond. 

Hi, my name is Mike and I am 16 years old. I have heard many different things about marijuana ranging from what I hear from older friends who have tried it, to the things I have seen in your commercials on TV.  This led me to your site because I figured it would be a good source of information.  I read over the article and most of seems pretty over the top. When trying to use Wikipedia as a source in English class, my teacher told me it is not reliable because it is not sourced. I noticed your site does have a few sources but all of them link to government websites rather than independent studies. Would you be able to provide me a few more sources that back up the information that you provide? In particular, I find the part about marijuana containing "50%-70% carcinogenic hydrocarbons than tobacco smoke," to be puzzling.  When I clicked on the link that is provided after this sentence, nowhere in the entire article does it mention marijuana causing cancer. I was under the impression that tobacco smoke does not contain many carcinogens, but it was all of the chemicals that are added by the tobacco companies that cause cancer.  Anything you could tell me to help clear this up would be appreciated.  Thanks.

Thought provoking, ain't it?...

I was just browsing the comments on a story about the new movie, The Gambler, that Leonardo DiCaprio just agreed to make with Martin Scorsese.  Although I was initially excited to hear that the pair would be working together for a fifth time, after reading about how they totally cut the original writer out of the process and did not even ask for permission to remake a script that he wrote as an autobiography.  The article is very long, but in a nutshell, James Toback turned his life story into a movie script and sold it to Paramount Pictures.  That means he no longer technically owns the script, but nevertheless, it is his life story and it would have been the right thing to do to at least give him the heads up that they planned to remake it. Not what I would expect from my favorite director and one of my favorite actors. It does, however, bring to mind a particularly funny scene from Seinfeld, when Kramer sells his life story to Mr. Peterman so that he may use them in his autobiography.  Enough of the background though.  I was so intrigued, that after I finished the article, I decided to read the comments.  It was there that I stumbled upon this quote from author Robert Heinleim's book, Friday. I found it to be very interesting, as it put such an interesting idea into words so well. Got me thinking, so I figured I'd share since I have not updated this in a while. Maybe someone will find it as interesting as I did.

“I want to mention one of the obvious symptoms [of a sick culture]: Violence. Muggings. Sniping. Arson. Bombing. Terrorism of any sort. Riots of course–but I suspect that little incidents of violence, pecking away at people day after day, damage a culture even more than riots that flare up and then die down. I guess that’s all for now. Oh, conscription and slavery and arbitrary compulsion of all sorts and imprisonment without bail and without speedy trial–but those things are obvious; all the histories list them.”

“Friday, I think you have missed the most alarming symptom of all.”

“I have? Are you going to tell me? Or am I going to have to grope around in the dark for it?”

“Mmm. This once I shall tell you. But go back and search for it. Examine it. Sick cultures show a complex of symptoms such as you have named… but a dying culture invariable exhibits personal rudness. Bad manners. Lack of consideration for others in minor matters. A loss of politeness, of gentle manners, is more significant than is a riot.”

“Really?”

“Pfui. I should have forced you to dig it out yourself; then you would know it. This symptom is especially serious in that an individual displaying it never thinks of it as a sign of ill health but as proof of his/her strength. Look for it. Study it. It is too late to save this culture - this worldwide culture...”

Thank you, Gary

Although I have a lot of early sports memories, the ones that stick out the most in my head are those that took place in Cole Field House.  The legendary building was home to such stars as future first overall pick Joe Smith, the late Len Bias, John Lucas, Len Elmore, and for the first few years of their careers, the 2002 Maryland National Championship team.  My earliest memory of the building was when I was six or seven years old and me and my dad went to go see a Keith Booth led Maryland team dominate whoever it was we played that night.  Every time he would dunk the ball or hit a big shot the whole crowd would yell, "BOOOOOOOOOOOOTH."  It was these early memories of Gary Williams led Terps teams that made Maryland college basketball my favorite sport growing up, a honor that it still holds to this day.  Although I do not attend UMD, I still live and breathe Maryland basketball.  I don't think any of that would have been possible without Gary Williams being at the helm of the program for as long as I have been alive.  In 1989 Williams took over a struggling program that was still getting over the tragic loss of former player and number 2 overall pick Len Bias just three years prior.  A year after taking over in College Park, his team was hit with violations dating back to the years of his predecessor, Bob Wade, that barred the Terps from playing in the post season in 1991 and 1992, kept them off of live TV, and lost them scholarships.  Even with these restrictions, Gary tried furiously to rebuild the program, which he led to a surprise Sweet 16 birth in 1994.  This would start a streak of NCAA Tournament bids that would last for the majority of my childhood.  The Terps made the Big Dance every season from then until 2005.  For a true fan of all sports from the DC-metro area, this was a welcome contrast to pretty much all of our other mediocre (at best) teams.  Although, at the time, this streak was the longest in the ACC, Gary did it without a single McDonald's All-American.  During this magnificent streak, I started to get to go to the Maryland/Duke game every other year, and I can honestly say that it was (and still is) one of the most fun days of the year, especially when we would pull out a win.  Through his coaching and leadership, Williams managed to overshadow the historic North Carolina/Duke rivalry, culminating in their match up in the 2001 Final Four; a game which, to this day, I still believe Maryland should have won if it were not for that douche bag official calling off the foul when Lonny Baxter was at the free throw line, and instead saying the foul was on Baxter, thus fouling him out of the game.  Nevertheless, the Terps returned their star players the next year and Gary led them to the 2002 National Championship.  Nearly nine years later, I can still vividly picture Drew Nicholas driving down the baseline and hitting the jumper that sealed the game.  To this day, I still consider that one of the happiest days of my life.  Gary Williams achieved all of this without many highly recruited players, and instead with players he liked and knew he could develop.  Outside of a minority few, he recruited guys that he knew fit his flex offense and would be there for four years.  He retired on Thursday as the 5th in wins among active coaches and 3rd all time in the ACC.  The fact that he is not in the Hall of Fame is a sham to me that will hopefully be rectified soon.  I also hope that the university rectifies whatever roadblocks the motion to name the court after him seems to have hit.  I just wanted to write all of this to show my support and to give my thanks to one of the greatest college basketball coaches of our generation, if not of all time.  There are so many reasons why I love Gary Williams. Whether it was his fiery demeanor on the court, his patented fist pump as he walked out of the tunnel, or him coming out to speak half-heartedly (at the insistence of the biggest cunt in the universe, former AD, Debbie Yow) to the crowd about being more well behaved after someone threw a bottle that hit Carlos Boozer's mom in the back of the head, Gary is and always will be the man.  Thank you, Gary Williams.  You have contributed to so many great moments of my youth and you will be greatly missed.

The Giving Pledge - One Reason Why America is the Greatest Country on Earth

Over the past few years I have heard more and more about how people are unhappy with the economic situation in our country. Since the stock market crash of 08 the issue has been raised even more about how there is a huge divide between our nation’s richest citizens and our most poor. I have always thought this is a load of crap because I believe that capitalism is the greatest invention in the history of the world. I am of the opinion that capitalism in the United States creates competition and gives motivation to our citizens to constantly come up with new ideas and inventions that make our country, as well as the world, a better place. Yet, for some reason, there are still critics out there who want to "spread the wealth around". These critics either believe that a.)wealth should be spread around between every citizen no matter how hard they work (also called socialism) or b.)the more popular choice, that anyone making a certain amount of money (over $250,000 in our current taxation system) should pay a much higher tax rate than those making less. The latter implies that our government is better equipped to spend one's money than the so called "rich" people. In my opinion, this is a bunch of malarkey. I'll save my "how the government wastes our money" speech for another time, but I'll just say that I think our government wastes a RIDICULOUS amount of money on programs that either don't work or don't help the people they were put in place to support. If we were to all live in a utopic society, things might be different. Maybe there would be no poor people, no people in need, and no one who is disabled and in need of government support, however we do not live in such a society.  I believe that the vast majority of people who believe in these higher taxes and that spreading around the wealth is for the good of the country seem to have a distorted view that the "rich" are evil people out there to squash the little guy. Whether this outlook comes from jealousy or somewhere else, I am not in the position to comment. I do know that while there is a large gap between the top 1% and the bottom 5% of our nation's wealth, this is to be expected in a society where the people are free to either work their asses off or sit around and do nothing.

This brings me to my main point of writing this: today, while I was looking up Mark Zuckerberg on Wikipedia, I came across something called The Giving Pledge. The Giving Pledge is a group, started by Bill Gates and Warren Buffett (The two richest people in the United States) that pledged to give half of their wealth away over time. Since it’s list was made public in 2010, 57 of our countries billionaires have joined and pledged to give away half of their wealth, totaling over $150 BILLION dollars. For some reason, this unprecedented act of charity has gone unreported in the mainstream news. This act alone shows me, as I hope it will show at least one person who reads this, that a country that allows its citizens to control their own wealth is a country that will flourish more than a country that tries to keep a tight grip on it's citizens money and spend it how the government sees fit.  If one were to look at some of the world's other richest people, who do not live in the US, I think you would see a vastly different trend. I don't have time to go into every crazy foreigner, but I will look at two who have stuck out to me personally. The first is Russian investor Roman Abramovich. Abramovich is the 9th richest person in Russia. From what I can find he does not give much to charity to help his fellow countrymen.  He does however employ a 40 man security team, own a fleet of three of the world largest private yachts (he had a 4th but he gave it away to a friend, if you want to consider that charity) which collectively totaled around $2 billion to build, three helicopters, a 767 commercial jet, and a collection of homes around the world, the most expensive costing about $230 million. The second is Mukesh Ambani, an Indian businessman and the ninth richest man in the world. His greed can be summed up simply through reading about his home, named Antilia. Antilia is the largest home in the world. It is as tall as a 60 story building, cost between $1-2 billion and only houses him, his wife, his three children and his mother. I think this proves that while, our country may not be perfect, it is better than any other system that has been set up around the world. There are always going to be very wealthy people, at least the Americans have a great sense of morality and giving. 

This country started from a group of people who just wanted to govern themselves and be free of governmental control over the basic things in their lives. After a century it grew into a country with budding businessmen, including John D. Rockefeller the founder of the Standard Oil Company (now the world’s largest company ExxonMobile) and the countries first billionaire. Mr. Rockefeller, on top of being one of the smartest businessmen our country has ever seen, also founded the modern philanthropy system which led to the many breakthroughs in education, science and medicine. If we continue to allow our citizens to work freely from governmental regulations, we will continue to flourish in the decades and centuries to come, if not, well greater dynasties than the US have fallen throughout the world's history...