The Houston Astros Are Morally Corrupt

In the off-season it became known that the Astros used electronic equipment to steal signs from the opposition, and then used either an electronic buzzer system or banging on a trash can to relay the info to the hitters, telling them what pitch was coming. It is not yet clear how much of this cheating was going on in 2018 and 2019, but it definitely was in 2017, when they won the World Series.

This breaks my heart, since the Astros have been an amazing success story which is quite inspiring. It simply ruins my ability to admire them at all. Jose Altuve used to be my favorite player, as was David Eckstein before him; but now I cannot admire him at all. The video of him grabbing his jersey and pleading with his teammates to not rip it off shows without a doubt in my mind that he had the buzzer system installed underneath his shirt. His teammate's lame excuse that he had an unfinished tattoo which he didn't want exposed doesn't ring true at all. And when asked about this whole mess at the start of spring training, Altuve refused to answer legitimate questions, so much so that the writers backed off and largely left the subject alone.

A lot of the problem here is the inadequate apologies from the Astros management and players. They are looking like fools and cheaters, which is what they are.

Commissioner Rob Manfred also has major egg on his face, in giving the Astros players immunity from punishment. Manfred underestimated how upset opposing players would be about this. Many opposing players, most notably Mike Trout, the game's best player, have spoken out about how there should be punishment for the Astros players who participated in this illegal scheme.

In defending his decision not to take away the Astros' 2017 championship trophy, Manfred put his foot in his mouth by saying the trophy is "just a piece of metal". This has raised a big stink among the players. They point out that this "piece of metal" is what they are all playing for, and a championship means a lot to them. Manfred doesn't seem to understand this, else he would not make such a stupid statement.

The anger of the other teams is so palpable that it is assumed that Astros hitters will be thrown at this year. Manfred will then have to deal with this ongoing crisis, a crisis which he created by his own bungling.

The Iowa Caucuses

The Iowa Caucuses were a complete disaster. After many Democratic candidates, along with thousands of their supporters, spent the better part of a year campaigning in Iowa, the Democratic Party could not even get its act together to count the votes in a timely manner.  No results were available until the the next day, and only three days later did 100% of the results become available. And even these are said to be questionable.  The Democrats blame a failed app, but that's no excuse--it should have been tested beforehand.

Even before this debacle, I was beginning to question the wisdom of the caucus system.  It is quite anti-democratic, in that it favors retirees and students, and discriminates against working people with families, who either have to work or perhaps hire a babysitter in order to invest the hours of time involved in attending a caucus.

You would think the Left would criticize this anti-democratic system as vociferously as it does the Electoral college.  Like the Electoral college, the caucuses can produce different results from delegates to raw vote totals.  This is fact actually happened in Iowa this year--Sanders won the popular vote, but Buttigieg narrowly won the delegate count. This is because the system rewards candidates whose votes are more broadly distributed geographically; here, Sanders piled up huge margins in college towns, thereby winning the "popular vote", but the Buttigieg votes were better distributed.

But the Left doesn't criticize the caucus system, because it allows a motivated group of supporters to dominate a district and dictate the delegates to be selected.  This is exactly what we McGovern supporters did in 1972 in Wichita, when we so dominated the Sedgwick County caucuses that we selected all four of the delegates from our Congressional district.

The caucus system should be discarded completely.  Some advocate for a national primary, but that is a bad idea also, because the candidate with the greatest name recognition would win every time.  What is needed is an initial primary in a small state, and then go on from there.

Yesterday's Democratic Debate

Last  night's debate between the remaining seven candidates was informative. All  the candidates stuck to their talking points and avoided getting derailed,  Biden did as he was expected to do, which is to come out swinging after his pathetic fourth-place showing in Iowa. However, his performance seemed to fall flat. Instead of coming across as aggressive, he simply came across as a pathetic loser. I'm afraid this is the beginning of the end for him.

All the other candidates did well, and Klobuchar continues to gain in stature.

Unlike the previous debate, in which the moderators repeatedly interrupted the candidates, the ABC moderators in this one let the candidates develop their thoughts and make their points. Kudos to George Stephanopoulos and the other moderators.

2/10/20 update.  As a postscript to this last point, at the Oscars last night the best picture winners were cut off in the middle of their comments.  The audience booed lustily, and the producers finally relented and let the winners finish their comments. In this era of short sound bites, it is refreshing to have some momentum developing for allowing people to express more complex thoughts and ideas.

Impeachment Winners and Losers

The Senate has acquitted President Trump, so here is my take on winners and lowers out of this whole process.

                                                               Winners

Adam Schiff.  The leader of the House managers conducted himself throughout with calmness, reason, and dignity, despite the constant name-calling from Trump and the right wing.

Mitt Romney.  He remained true to his conscience and voted for conviction on the abuse of power Article, the only Republican Senator to do so.  He became the first Senator ever to vote to convict a president of his own party in an impeachment proceeding.

Fiona Hill.  She distinguished herself in her testimony as a dedicated public servant, and answered all questions intelligently and persuasively.  The same could be said for several other of the House witnesses.

Doug Jones.  He is the Alabama Senator who won the seat when the Alabama Republican Party went brain-dead and nominated the sexual predator Roy Moore. His re-election was in doubt already, but  he showed great political courage in voting to convict even though it killed his re-election chances in red Alabama.

Joe Manchin.  Again, great political courage shown by West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin, who tried to get a compromise solution by proposing to censure Trump, but his proposal didn't go anywhere. In a state which went for Trump by 42%, the easy thing to do would have been to vote to acquit, but he voted to convict, denying Trump the "bipartisan acquittal" that he sought.

Nancy Pelosi.  She has conducted herself with class and dignity throughout this process.  Trump has denounced her as evil and corrupt, but she has had the dignity not to respond in kind, even though that would have been appropriate.

                                                              Losers

Donald Trump.  The House evidence clearly showed that he violated his oath of office in trying to shake down a foreign government for political favors.  But what really makes him a loser is his continuing insistence that he did nothing wrong, and his castigation of all who oppose him as "evil" and "corrupt".  The man has no class at all, no dignity whatsoever; he revealed himself to be a mean, vulgar, despicable human being.

The Republican Party.  It is really had to see how the Republican Party will survive the Trump era.  They have all (except for Mitt) sold their souls in support of a corrupt president, and surely these chickens will come home to roost.

Alan Dershowitz.  He is still one of America's best lawyers, even at age 81, but his arguments here bordered on the ridiculous. His position that only an actual crime is impeachable conduct is supported by no constitutional scholar, and is contrary to common sense and the background of the impeachment provision in our constitution.

Ken Starr.  Like Dershowitz, Starr made himself look ridiculous by making the opposite argument to what he advocated during the Clinton impeachment.  Starr was also ineffective in making his arguments to the Senate, unlike Dershowitz who was as persuasive as he could possibly have been in advancing an untenable position.

Jonathan Turley.  Turley purports to be a liberal Democrat, but when it comes to impeachment, he in anything but.  He was on the cable news channels daily during the Clinton impeachment, arguing in favor of it, but now he testified before the House committee against the Trump impeachment.  He wrote an opinion piece for The Wall Street Journal on 11/28/19, but, unfortunately for him, an alert reader called him out soundly with a stinging rebuke published a week later.

(added 2/17/20).  Susan Collins.  This Maine Senator, who likes to portray herself as a moderate, brought disgrace upon herself for voting to acquit Trump.  She said after the vote that she thought Trump had "learned his lesson"; however, Trump's actions since have made it clear he has not learned his lessen, and in fact is only getting worse.

The Equal Rights Amendment

Virginia recently ratified the ERA, which was first submitted to the states for ratification in March of 1972.  Virginia's vote meant that 38 states have now ratified it, giving the ERA the 3/4 vote of the 50 state legislatures which it needs for adoption.

However, the are two huge problems with this. First the deadline for ratification expired in 1982. And second, five states have rescinded their ratification.

Thus, the ERA has not been adopted, and will not be. The wisdom of this amendment is seriously open to question. It seems like a make work project for clever lawyers, as many issues could be presented as unconstitutional discrimination against women, should the ERA become law.

The ERA feeds into the national obsession with "rights". In no other country of the world is there such an obsession with rights as in the United States. We are consumed with the concept of rights, rather than with the nobler concepts of duty, honor, integrity, and personal character.

The Decline and Fall of Susan Collins

Maine Republican Senator Susan Collins now has the highest disapproval rating of any Senator in their home state. Fifty-two per cent of Maine voters now disapprove of her job performance, compared with only 27% three years ago.

Collins in the past has tried to portray herself a a moderate Republican, in the tradition of past independent-minded Maine Republican Senators like Margaret Chase Smith, Bill Cohen, and Olympia Snowe. But now, she has completely gone over to the dark side, voting with her fellow Republicans on all but one of the eleven Democratic amendments to the impeachment rules. She refuses to allow subpoenas to secure the testimony of relevant witnesses, showing that she is no better than hacks like Lindsey Graham and Mitch McConnell. The only amendment she voted for was an innocuous procedural proposal to allow Senators more time to respond to motions.

The demise of the moderate Susan Collins foreshadows the demise of the Republican party itself, which surely cannot last as a viable major party in the wake of its sychophantic support of the disastrous Trump presidency.

Here are the Republican Senators who are the most unpopular in their home states: Collins (52% disapproval), McConnell (50%), Joni Ernst (42%), Lisa Murkowski (41%), Cory Gardner, Martha McSally, and Deb Fischer (40%). Of these, Collins, McConnell, Gardner, and McSally are up for re-election in 2020 and are considered vulnerable, along with Thom Tillis and David Perdue.

The Decline of Alan Dershowitz

Alan Dershowitz has joined the Trump impeachment team to argue the constitutional issue. He has taken the position that, even if the allegations are true, they don't meet the constitutional standard for an impeachable offense.

Dershowitz is claiming that to impeach a president, Congress needs to allege a crime. The news media has come up with a clip from 1998 when he said the exact opposite during the Clinton impeachment! The other day Dershowitz attempted to explain this, but not very successfully.

I cannot escape the impression that Dershowitz is in serious decline. He seems to be turning into a caricature of himself, just as Howard Cosell did in his later years. The arrogance and condescending tone of Dershowitz is becoming more and more pronounced. We saw these traits a bit in a TV interview years ago, when he said that he often had to "talk down" to judges, because many judges were unable to grasp the legal arguments he was making. Small wonder, then, that now the judiciary is starting to complain about his condescending attitude.

I saw him on three different Sunday morning shows this past Sunday. In all three he said the same thing, refusing to express an opinion on whether Trump pressured a foreign country to help him in his upcoming campaign, because to Dershowitz this is immaterial. His argument is that the constitutional standard for impeachment is higher than this.

In all three appearances he referred to former Supreme Court justice Benjamin Curtis, who served as Johnson's chief counsel during the Andrew Johnson impeachment, arguing that criminal conduct must be present. In all three he mentioned that Curtis dissented in the Dred Scott case, as if that has anything at all to do with impeachment.

Dershowitz is making a losing argument, and surely he knows this. It is almost like he is trying to see how much nonsense he can get away with. He seemed to be practicing his arguments before the TV cameras, to see how ridiculous he had to sound before people started laughing at him.

The fact that the Trump team is using Dershowitz, a criminal defense attorney, to make the constitutional argument, rather than a constitutional law expert, shows just how weak his argument is. They can't use Jonathan Turley, their constitutional law expert before the House Judiciary Committee, because even Turley admits that asking a foreign government to help in a political campaign would be an impeachable abuse of power. Turley simply doesn't think the allegation has been sufficiently proven.

Howard Cosell, in his later years, burned all his bridges behind him, alienating all of his former friends, and spending his last days holed up in his New York apartment as a recluse. Nobody except his immediate family visited him. I see Dershowitz heading down the same path, filled with the same kind of egomaniacal fantasy of his own greatness as Cosell was.

Sorry, Alan, your time has come and gone.