whitesoxmurph

-McCartney and his now EX Heather (Paul gave me the guitar pick he was using at the rehearsal I was at) -Buddy Guy (At his club) -David Lee Roth and the Van Halen brothers. (In Roth's kitchen, they were making chili) -Jimmy Buffet (On the set of the movie we were working on) -Meatloaf (Played softball with him a few times)

I can't wait for the Reality show show with OJ entitled..."How to explain to your kids you beheaded their Mother".

I finally figured out why the Cubs are protesting on May 274th. That's the day they will be mathematically eliminated from the playoffs.

The North Korean "tactical" situation forces the United States and the rest world into a different "strategic" view and/or response to the nuke threat posed by them. Please, please keep in mind that the capital of South Korea (Seoul) is within North Korean artillery range and hundreds of thousands people could be killed in a conventional attack by the North on the South, in just the first few hours. Now granted that even conventionally the U.S. and South Korea could clean the North's clock in a few days, but are you willing to gamble with the lives of millions of South Koreans to achieve that result? There is also the real possibilty that the North, if provoked could fire off a Nuclear artilley shell or missile at Seoul, which could kill millions. (The last time I was in Korea while in the Navy was in 1980 and I believe the population of Seoul at the time was 5-6 million, it may be double that now.) The only real way to reduce or eliminate the threat from North Korea is a massive tactical nuclear strike and I don't think anyone wants that. As for the threat from Korea to the U. S. I wouldn't be to worried for now re: that, the U S Navy a very good job of tracking state of the art Soviet "Boomers" and they are all over the North Koreans. The greater danger is the North selling nukes to terrorists or smuggling a nuke in a container ship and setting it off in Los Angeles harbor. It's a grand world.

From time to time, just to satisfy the twisted sadistic side of my personality, I visit northsidebaseball.com. It's great reading all the Cub fans whining about this and that, but this morning is priceless. They are all ripping apart Mark Grace for his Sosa article, refusing to acknowledge that there "Sammy" was juicing. One guy even ripped Grace's talent. ( Most hits in the 90's, good clutch hitter) I have always liked Grace even though he wore that hideous blue uniform, thankfully he left the Northside in time to win a Title with Arizona.

Saturday and Sunday for me (unless I'm working weekends). There are quite a few Sox fans in SOCAL, you just have to know where to look. I actually play on a softball team in LA and half the guys are from Chicago. If you live in the LA area let me know and I'll fill you in on any "Chicago" get togethers.

The elements of the US Military that would be used in the 2 strike variants I listed are uneffected by the current situation in Iraq and Afg. The Subs and/or ships that would launch the Cruise Missiles strikes have little or no tactical job in the current war on terror, other than some ships inspecting and boarding vessels in the Persian Gulf. The Subs have no job other than surveillance and any Special Ops. that might pop up. The total time to launch these missiles is less than an hour most likely. As for the second variant, the planes involved for the most part are not invovled in Iraq or Afg. The Stealths are not needed and the fighter protection is readily available. It is mainly the Ground Forces (ie: the Marines and the Army) that are stretched pretty thin, but they will have nothing to do with this operation. On the second point I agree with NSS72 in that Istael has much more to lose in Iran develops nukes, but they also have a very real concern over being attacked by evreyone and their Arabic brother if they do strike themselves. I think that the Israeli Gov. will little to no trouble convincing the Bush Admin. to take out the Iranian nukes, and then they can wash their hands of the act. The third point is one that I hear over and over. You are falling into a trap in thinking that the same tactical solution can be used in two very different situations. I agree that both countries and their leaders are dangerous madmen, who have or are going to have nukes. That is where the similarities end. I have been to South Korea, while in the U S Navy and the city of Seoul, with millions of people is within range of North Korean artillery. If we do a tactical strike on North Korea hundreds of thousands of South Korean civilians could be killed in an artillery in response. North Korea could also hit Seoul with a nuke and that would be horrendous. Up to a million people could die in that attack. That is a price that nobody can afford to pay. We would have to make sure that we wiped out all of North Korea's nuke programs and sites while also hitting and wiping out any targets that could hit the South. This is also impossible to do with conventional weapons and I don't think anyone wants to cross the nuclear threshold. Just as the United States had to use different tactics in WWII in regards to Japan and Germany, we now can not think of the threats posed by Iran and North Korea from the same tactical stand-point. The problem in the same (madmen with nukes) the solutions are not.

The United States will attack Iran by the end of 06 unless there is a significant and verifiable change in their position regarding the development of their nukes or unless someone takes out that nut case running their country. Israel will be a silent partner in this, not wanting to provoke retaliation from any of its "neighbors". Europe will will sit this one out with the possible exception of the British, who will at the very least state their support for our actions ( The French of course will be shocked). The UN will do nothing more than launch many investigations leading nowhere. If the Security Council votes China and Russia are likely vetoes. The attack itself will a tactical strike, most likely in one of two variations. 1- A Sub and/or Ship launched TLAM-C strike(Tomahawk Cruise Missile, conventional land attack variant with high explosive warhead). This Attack Variation has a a fair chance at disabling the Iranians. It will set them back a few years most likely. This Variant exposes no American Military personnel to any danger. It is also likely in this scenario that a second strike would take place weeks or months after the initial one. The NRO would monitor the facilities that were hit and we would hit them again, when the Iranian scientists come back to retrieve anything of use that survived the attack. 2- A Sub and/or Ship launched TLAM-C (see above) and TLAM-D (Tomahawk Cruise Missile conventional land attack with bomblets) followed by Stealth Fighters and Bombers. The TLAM-Cs would take out any Iranian anti-aircraft sites around the target areas and along with the TLAM-Ds would also hit every Iranian Air Force base in the country. The Cs would hit Planes, Hangers, Barracks and Bunkers while the Ds would hit the runways and any taxi-ways long enough for a plane to take off on. The Stealths would go in and hit the sites themselves with whatever conventional munitions are deemed ness. (Bunker Busters etc..) We of course would have an AWACS plane monitoring the situation from just the other side of the border, with the ability to vector fighters (F-15, F16 etc..) should any Iranian planes get off the ground and happen to get to close to one of our Stealths. This Variant has a much greater possibilty of setting the Iranians back a decade or more and this plan could be followed up with a second Cruise Missile attack, as in the First Variant. The problem with this plan is of course that a Plane could get shot down and the Pilot killed or captured. IMO

Bushmills.

I was listening the morning that Bill Handel of KFI was talking about those deaths, it was pretty damn funny. At one point they even had their traffic reporter do a Arabic dialect , pretending he was flying over the stampede. Sick, but funnier than hell.

Also we have to remember that Thome's body will take less punishment as a DH as opposed to being a full time 1B. I think the chances of Thome having a injury riddled season are much less than Big Franks. It seemed that in the last few years everytime Frank ran he hurt himself. He was one of my favorites and I hope he has a good season in Oakland, gets # 500, retires and goes into the H.O.F. wearing a Sox uniform. That being said the Sox are a better offensive team this year than last.

Come on LCR, I have it on good authority that Ahmadinejad's quote about Israel was just mis-translated. What he really said was... " Mister Bush would you please send your cruise missiles to destroy our nuclear facility, Thank You".

Just remember... "Vote early and vote often"

By listening to the Dems I guess I missed that part of the U S Constitution that states that the Supreme court must be divided evenly and that an outgoing Justice must be replaced with a Justice of the same politcal beliefs. I guess I better pull out my copy and read it again... Oh wait a minute I seem to recall that Justice Ginsburg (Left leaning counsel for the ACLU) replaced Justice White (Right of center for sure), that can't be right can it?

Are we sure this guy isn't French?

Great post Ron. I can't tell you how much fun I had at that game and to be able to share that with my son and one of my oldest friends was awesome. During the game I recieved a call from my sister and niece in Tinley Park saying that they had just seen Cooper on the "Sox Fan Cam" my sister said she was wondering if I was at the game and then Cooper was there on TV. I wish I could have stayed longer, but as you said I had to get Coop home. I doubt if I'll be able to find tickets for the Series, but if I do I'm going. I think of my Grandfather, who worked for the Sox in the 60's and 70's and I know he must be Smiling watching this going on from up above, probably taking a long pull on a cold Pabst. Go Sox.

A Female or a Hispanic Male. The one thing that they will have in common is that they will not be widely published. The Bush Administration will look for the most conservative person it can find that does not have a long paper trail of conservative decisions, papers, books or articles. A sad historic note, that in todays political world we do pick the most legally qualified people, but those that have the least possibility of being fillibustered. Advise and Consent is dead. This is not a right or a left thing, both sides are to blame.

The Sox are always going to hit a great deal of homeruns, the Cell is a long ball park. This year we are playing "smarter" ball. Small/Smart ball has to do with a number of things: Good baserunning, speed, good defense, situational hitting, to name a few. I said early in the season that the Lee - Pods deal was good and could very well be the key to a good season and even with Lees HR totals I still think we are a much better team w/o him. Lee was not a good outfielder, every once in a great while he would make a great diving catch of a ball that 85% of the other outfielders in the game would have made a routine play on. He was one of the worst baserunners in the game, I can recall numerous times seeing him getting thrown out at a base that he shouldn't have gone for anyway. He would also never change his swing, never trying to hit to the right side w/ a runner on. I also don't think his second half will compare to his first, teams are going to start pitching around him a bit and he will start chasing. Also remember that money saved from dealing him also landed us AJ, who has handled the staff well and is the kind of player I love.

Walter No Neck Williams Coco Crisp Shoeless Joe Jackson King Kong Korab Dizzy Dean The Fridge

Spam in the Can Baby. At least those idiots didn't take anyone out on the ground.

My son (Cooper 7 yrs old) and I were on Amtrak going down to the game on Sunday when it hit. We didn't feel anything because we were on the move, but they did stop the train a few times to make sure the tracks were okay, even though the quake was pretty far away. I have been through two big quakes the Whiitier narrows quake and the Northridge quake. The Whittier quake was kind of a rolling quake you could actually hear the aftershocks coming, I lived in Pasadena at the time and was about 17 miles from the epi-center. The Northridge quake was worse by far it was a real shaker, I lived about 8 miles from the epi-center of that one and everything came off the walls and out of the cabinets. I rolled over and covered my wife (ex-wife now) till it was over. Come to think of it, that was the most action I'd had in quite a few months. My favorite story from the Northridge quake, was the poor guy that right after the earthquake jumped into his pickup to check on his Mother, who lived a couple of miles away. He came to an intersection on Balboa Blvd. that was flooded due to broken water mains and stalled out. What he didn't know was that the gas mains had broken as well and when he tried to restart his truck the spark from the ignition set off the gas. He escaped but his truck and a nearby trailer park went up in flames. Just not his day.

Good one Nuke, but the biggest Clinton joke is Hillary trying to paint herself as a Moderate prior to 2008. Howard Dean is a decoy (noisemaker variety) yelling, jumping up and down and generally looking like a Left wing wacko, much to the glee of Hillary.

...and I am being sworn in as the King of Chicago on Friday, by the ghost of Mike Royko, on a boat in the Chicago River. Coronation Party at Billy Goats following.

5 bucks, unless of course I was a Lesbian. Sue Bird. White Sox World Series win over 100k.

A couple of little tidbits on Psycho. First of all in the shower scene, the most famous scene in the movie, was interesting for two reasons. #1 they killed off the female lead, a star, early in the movie, this was rare. #2 When Norman comes in to kill her you never actually see the knife stabbing her. You see him stabbing and then you see blood running down the drain as she is screaming. There is also a classic shot of Martin Balsam (I think) coming into the house going up the stairs and then Norman dressed as dear old Mom comes out and stabs him. It is a great seamless shot without a cut , following him as he enters and goes upstairs, then after the stabbing Balsam flails his arms as he falls down the stairs, he actually was stationary, and they used a special effect to make seem as if he was falling.