Some sports news of interest (to me at least) last night. The Dallas Mavericks for example got lucky and escaped with a win against the Oklahoma City Thunder, 110-108 in OT. It's good that the Mavs have the toughness and savvy to mount 4th quarter comebacks and to win close games. But what are they doing being in the position they were in, down 12 in the 4th to a team missing its biggest star, Kevin Durant? Do the Mavs have what it takes to advance at all in the NBA playoffs down the road? The crystal ball on that one remains cloudy.
Meanwhile, the Detroit Pistons shocked everyone by winning last night at Orlando, 93-85--without Allen Iverson playing at all. (he's off getting his back examined.) They looked like their old selves. Questions remain, of course. Can Iverson be content coming off the bench?
And the Detroit Red Wings, with Chris Osgood starring in goal, played solidly and beat the LA Kings, 2-1. It was an important night for Osgood--he'd been given 12 days off from playing in order to get himself right, given how much he'd struggled. It obviously helped.
In other news, I have no problem with this, and I don't think other conservatives and libertarians should either:
"Supporters of programs to provide legal marijuana to patients with painful medical conditions are celebrating Attorney General Eric Holder’s statement this week that the Drug Enforcement Administration would end its raids on state-approved marijuana dispensaries."
It's time to at least begin to scale back the war on drugs. And persons should have the liberty to use a drug like this in a way that is clearly beneficial to them, and not harmful.
Meanwhile, gosh--is anyone surprised that, as secretary of state, Hillary Clinton is, er, changing positions from where she used to be as a senator? In this case, the issue is Israel:
"In a swift about face from her views as New York's senator, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is now hammering Israel over its treatment of Palestinians in Gaza.... "I'm a very strong supporter of Israel," Clinton said back in February 2000. On Thursday, as Secretary of State she had yet another about face in the form of angry messages demanding Israel speed up aid to Gaza. Jewish leaders are furious. "I am very surprised, frankly, at this statement from the United States government and from the secretary of state," said Mortimer Zuckerman, publisher of the New York Daily News and member of the NYC Jewish Community Relations Council."
Get used to it, folks--Mrs. Clinton has proven over the years that she will say anything and throw anyone, long-time supporter or no, under the bus.
Mark Steyn makes a very good point today concerning "superhero" Obama...and the language he uses:
"Do you ever go back to the first issue of this comic book and try to figure out what the plot’s all about? Wasn’t it something to do with subprime mortgages and two strange creatures called Fannie and Freddie? And then it became something to do with saving banks, wasn’t that it? And somewhere along the way the Big Three auto makers got involved? And now it’s about everything. Obama is going to do everything. So he needs to be able to spend everything. Only we don’t call it “spending” anymore. Everything government “spends” is now deemed an “investment.” Government will “invest” in “more efficient cars,” it will “invest” in daycare, it will “invest” in a new Federal Regulatory Agency of Fancy Drapes and Window Treatments. It will “invest” in an impact study group that will study the impact of recalling every edition of Webster’s and pasting in it a little Post-It note on the page defining “spend” saying “obsolete — see ‘invest.’ ”
The Clinton administration did this too, back in the 1990s--when it came to the issue of tax cuts, the Clintons got everyone to agree that they had to be "paid for"--as if letting Americans keep more of their own money equaled government spending. We mustn't let Obama get away with this particular bit of language-twisting.
