NFL Predictions: Week Four

Okay, no more regular weak predictions; it’s time for some real week predictions.

Looking at some of my previous predictions, it might appear that I don’t really “get” football some weeks. However, I am one who “gets” new ideas and this week my idea is to pick against my better judgments. Admittedly, I don’t have enough natural courage to do what feels so wrong, so in order to make what I think are wrong predictions I had to down a couple of beers. I don’t even know if I want this to work.

Carolina at Chicago (-7.5)

Cam Newton should get his first real beating this game. This is Soldier Field, not some cushy home game in Carolina. More damning than that, The Kid Newton (copyright!) can no longer be underestimated and now defenses will be gunning for him, ala Michael Vick. Worst yet, Cam Newton doesn’t have a Lesean McCoy to help him out. On the other side of the field, the Bears have gotten smacked rather solidly by the Packers and the Saints—though those may very well be the two best teams in the NFL right now. Still, bears haven’t been wiped like this since those toilet paper commercials. Chicago has to be better than a 1-3 record; this is a game of dignity for them. Then again, as promised, I’ve been drinking. So I pick the Panthers to get within the margin.

Buffalo at Cincinnati (-2.5)

Are the Buffalo Bills real? I don’t know. It wasn’t too long ago the Broncos and the Bengals jumped out to something like 5-0 starts. Also, while beating the Patriots may count as a double-win in the AFC East, it was still only one game and the extra attention might be a heavier price than the benefits of the spotless record. Cincinnati is no better than Keanu’s team in “The Replacements” so this is the perfect game for Buffalo to lose and have respectable doubters—which is what’s necessary for a great team. And actually, Cincinnati may need to hire actual C-level actors in fill spots in their roster after the latest rounds of arrested Bengals. The team is nearly an endangered species at this point. Why the hell is a professional football player dealing pot? Is there really more money in that? Also, I predict Tony Dungy will jump off the Buffalo bandwagon with grace and speed not seen since the likes of Nastia Liukin. When was the last time anybody gave two snots about a Cincinnati-Buffalo game? More importantly, why is Cincinnati favored? This has the makings of disappointment. Bills.

Minnesota at Kansas City (+1.5)

Both teams lost to the Chargers and the Lions and any Madden ’12 team controlled by a kid over the age of 7. Literally, on the Monday evening news, there was a segment about how sports bar attendance is way down in the KC area. The whole city is just down like four flat tires. After the collapse of last season and the pure, uncut, throttling received by the Chiefs in the first two weeks, in KC there is less hope in winning than in an online slot machine. Even against San Diego, I think most people understood the Chargers were unusually ineffective—almost throwing the game, really. And speaking of throwing, Matt Cassel’s completion percentage is as inflated as Scott Pioli’s ego and just as expensive and helpful. The Vikings have been charitable, giving away their first three games. But I don’t expect anymore sympathy from them. Which, I guess, means I have to pick the Chiefs.

San Francisco at Philadelphia (no lines)

49ers, easy. No, wait. Eagles. No…49ers. Yes. 49ers. Wait. Wait. No. No. Wait. Yes. Yes! Eagles!

New England at oakland (+3.5)

Patriots got beat by the Browns last year and then devastated teams for the rest of the season. In fact, New England’s ability to bounce back from an, inevitably, embarrassing loss is plenty documented. Losing to the Bills after a 21-0 lead? It’s the worst tragedy in the New England area since that tanker spilled millions of gallons of hair gel along the coast—or so I assume happened a couple years back. And now the Patriots are playing against the Raiders? The oakland Raiders? I struggle to even capitalize the city, knowing it is neither a proper name nor a proper place. I don’t think there is a window in the entire range of drinking that can make me pick a proud Raiders team over an embarrassed Patriots team and still type coherently—or even remain conscious. I'm going to get damn close though. Whatever. Patriots.

New York (Jets) at Baltimore (-2.5)

Earlier this week NFL legend Joe “Sideburns” Namath mentioned how the New York Jets are kind of cocky—which is kind of like saying they’re from New York. Those not following football might need to know modern Jets like predicting Superbowl wins in the 1970s vein of Namath, but they haven’t had the decency to keep their promises. For whatever reason, Rex Ryan thought Ol’ Joe’s pointless comments were fighting words and basically told Namath to shut that withered old hole in his face before a pigskin is lodged in there. This basically reinforced the image I’ve had of the Jets for the last two years or so, that they are basically the punk teenagers of the AFC. They are arrogant, unaccomplished, hormonal and distracted by popular magazines and inappropriate shows on HBO. That said, I think they’ll play with a jalapeno this week and get the better half of Baltimore’s Joe Flacco. Lousy Jets. Think they're so great, just because they're actually doing something with their lives. I could have been a football player. Coach just wouldn't gimme a chance. I could've been great. I could've been anything. But now what...

Ah well. I'll get over it. Nothing wrong with a bunch of mistakes. Which the Jets know plenty about; which means they should win. So I'm taking the Ravens.

Say, ex-girlfriends like hearing about football predictions, right? Right? Guess there's only one way to find out.

Season Record: 5-7

The Scopes Monkey Trial: Hatred Trumps Comedy...at first

Recently, the Foo Fighters—led by my supposed doppelganger, Dave Grohl—performed an impromptu, tongue-in-cheek (though not another man’s cheek) roadside concert for the most infamous protesters since the WWI-era National Woman’s Party: The Westboro Baptist Church. While the resulting footage received some clapping approval from fans of the alt-hip-rock band, it further demonstrated the conclusive discrepancy between the sides of cultural toleration and fundamentalists. Indeed, the very flippant, disinterested and somewhat annoyed attitude embodied by the Foo Fighters is why social liberals are doomed until the rise of the next generation. Precedent? Well…it starts back in 1925.

In the wake of “social Darwinism”—a notion Charles Darwin himself despised—the Tennessee state legislature passed a law banning the teaching of evolution in public schools. Afraid that the La-Z-Boy factory and birth place of Red Holt was not enough to draw tourists to Dayton, local business owners convinced 24-year-old science teacher John Scopes to let his lawyer friends charge him with teaching evolution. Scopes agreed and the ACLU got involved and immediately made a spectacle of the small town. This got the attention of three-time presidential candidate, and eight-time Spelling Bee winner, William Jennings Bryan. Bryan’s moral high-roading got the attention of famed agnostic lawyer Clarence Darrow. With as much inflated ego as any psuedo-reality TV show, all parties agreed the trial should be broadcast on national radio. And so we have the battle.

While the ultimate difference in the trial’s outcome was Scope’s confession, the pivotal difference in the public discourse, as much then as now, is that evolutionists saw/see the whole affair as an annoying display of willful ignorance, whereas the conservative right saw/see the trial as a trans-national holy war. The groups’ disparate enthusiasm of the trial as a whole shaped the outcome and how it is remembered today. The 1920s Christian fundamentalists in Tennessee were among the most outspoken against evolution being taught in public schools, going as far as to make this case a battle of two religions. Reverend John Roach Straton explicitly made the connection of evolution being a rival religion to Christianity, commenting, “[The question is] whether religion of the Bible shall be ruled out of the schools and the religion of evolution—with its ruinous results—shall be ruled into the schools by law.”

This holy war thought process turned the trial into an invasion by “this so-called science…with destructive forces which will destroy our civilization.” The fundamentalists felt they were under attack and at the brink of ruin. Many Tennessee natives wrote into their local papers for a call to proverbial, or literal, arms. The raw hatred toward this new science was a held as dogmatically important as the persecution of Christians over a thousand years earlier (fed to the lions, kicked out of England, etc.).

Rather than calling the Scopes Trial a war against ignorance and critiquing the Christian stranglehold on American politics, many intellectuals saw the trial as a joke with plenty set-up but with no real payoff. (Example: So the Pope walks into a bar...) Included in the group of occasionally smug intellectuals was W.E.B. Du Bois, who poked fun at Tennessee with his characteristic eloquence, calling it, “a great, ignorant, simple-minded land, curiously compounded of brutality, bigotry, religious faith and demagoguery.” The Butler Act, forbidding the teaching of evolution in public schools, was a state law and did not directly affect other Americans--including Du Bois, who was a writer in Chicago. His and others’ interest in the state law was then more of a philosophical problem or passing conversation topic soon trumped by the Bears drafting Red “Shovel Face” Grange. Though Du Bois felt America’s reputation was being damaged in the international political arena, most European countries, lost in their “Age of Anxiety,” had much more to worry about in the 1920s than one of America’s state’s legislation (i.e. food, etc.).

Bryan and others’ irascible terror followed that if children were taught evolution, they’d actually be taught that there is no God, as if God were Santa Clause. He, and others, concurred that evolution eliminated the miracles of the infallible, thousand year old Bible. What the point came down to was whether the Tennessee people had the right to choose “...the kind of education they want.” This proposal eerily resonated in a lot of congregations, who then wondered if religion was a less informed education. This would have forced people to decide if ignorance is bliss but the inspiration behind Dr. Zaius, Reverend John Norris, stepped forward and bluntly elaborated, “The Bible and Evolution do not agree because the Bible is a fact and Evolution is not a fact.”

Armchair scientists believed, and enough still do, that this means evolution is open to speculation and reasonable doubt. Similarly, gravity could be labeled a theory, as people can only see its effects, but not the actual process. This corruption of science reaches "Stephen Summers" lows in resurrected discussions of the Scopes Trial, or evolution in general, thanks to eighty years worth of scientific advances and the damning isolation of Kansas. Granted the idea of evolution was still relatively new and even unsettling to people in the 1920s. The notion that mankind has physically improved implied that we were still evolving and could benefit the race by dropping the imperfections out of the gene pool. This was the straw man eugenics paranoia—which did not actually create a race of “straw people.”

"If you're a dumb straw man, don't you want to come to Kansas with me?"

Many 1920s commentators believed society was collapsing because of the supposedly lost morals of society, largely due to capitalism, big cities, and science. Of course the largest cities (New York, Chicago, etc.) were the most modern and were censured by religious conservatives. In a “whatever” logic that remains today, some saw that evolution was being taught in these big city schools, and thus explained why these big cities had the highest crime rates. Obviously then Tennessee would fall to crime and weakened morals if they allowed God to be killed in their children’s classrooms. Then the ideological battle was less ideological and stood more as a territorial battle of corrupt big cities invading the lives of regular, kind, patriotic, small town folk. However, the big city “elitists” really wanted to invade Tennessee as much as modern “elitists” want to move to Topeka.

And so after 8 days of court proceedings and nine minutes of jury deliberation, Scopes was found guilty (fined some moneys) and not really vindicated until the 1960s, when social conservatives saw Communist Russia as the most convenient scapegoat for the problems of the world. This can bring us back to 2011, when once again a social battle is being fought and will only end like how all conflict ends: when one side discovers that the conflict is stupid. In fact, that’s how almost everyone has ever won a war: by being the last to figure out that the fight is dumb. And in this case, the Foo Fighters are not likely to win the battle against the Westboro Baptist Church until their music is on the Oldies’ station.

(POST–SCRIPT: I needed to include this late-addition, yet incredible, epilogue.)

The battles fought by Westboro Baptist Church may take a back seat to reality much sooner than I originally thought. And no, I don’t mean with the repeal of DADT or the feuds with Anonymous or Fox News. I mean the Westboro Baptist Church response to the Foo Fighters. The response is a mp3 parody of the Foo Fighters' “Keep it Clean,” called “Try Unclean.” This parody is an audacious, fulminating, stupefying paean/folk song. And best/worst of all…it joins a list, on the Westboro website, of dozens of similarly baffling pop song parodies.

Personally, I have no reservations spreading the message of the WBC when the message has been toned down from protesting soldiers’ funerals. I just hope this reaches history students a hundred years from now.

NFL Predictions: Week Three

So Michael Vick got injured while waiting in the pocket...that's unexpected. More importantly though, he injured his neck. This means the only logical way to salvage the NFL's shortage of star quarterbacks (because let's face it, Tarvaris Jackson is just not bringing it), and capture the unique opportunity presented, is to surgically graft Peyton Manning's head on Michael Vick's body. Or visa versa. Or both. And actually, Sam Bradford hurt his finger, and he has one of the best fingers in the NFL, so there more than enough reason for Roger Goodell to create some kind of super-quarterback after the failed Tom Brady-beta robot.

Just serious.

Detroit at Minnesota (+2.5)

I'm not a believer in the Lions yet. Matt Stafford is good, maybe better than good, but the Chiefs were too good at running the ball in the first half of last week's game for me to think Adrian Peterson won't collapse from exhaustion before he collapses from getting tackled in this game. Granted, Donovan McNabb has been absolutely nowhere these first few weeks, but I think it's a re-learning curve--hurt by the lockout--and not athleticism in question. I also have a feeling too many football fans will be waiting for Brett Favre to come out of retirement for the next 10 years with the same senseless anticipation of “Arrested Development” fans waiting for a movie. All else being even, Vegas generally puts the home team in the hole by three points, which would mean 50% of gamblers think the Lions are at least a touchdown better than the Vikings. Which they're not. Take the points, take the Vikings.

Jacksonville at Carolina (-3.5)

Cam Newton's numbers are a little inflated just by the nature of professional football nowadays. That's not to say he hasn't surpassed expectations; he certainly has. Though frankly, I think getting the Panthers to within a touchdown of besting the defending Superbowl champs is more impressive than the aerial numbers Newton has thrown around. Also, is it me or does his name sound like a candy bar? It's like his name is Chewy Caramel or something. I'm just saying, I haven't wanted to eat an NFL player this badly since Phat Porterhouse got bumped from the B-squad on the '93 Cowboys. Maybe I should just stop writing these predictions when I'm hungry. Food or no, I think Carolina gets their first win--and by more than three points. Panthers.

Houston at New Orleans (-3.5)

This week the Texans finally get to prove if they are serious this year. I can't help but wonder if they're reading the reports of Peyton Manning's neck surgery treatments with trembling fingers.He was supposed to be out for the season, they surely stammered, not just six weeks! The optimists contend, though, that the Texans will win the AFC South and finally strip the Colts of their annual playoff spanking. It'd be an honor, really. Meanwhile, the Saints have assumed they're an elite team for the last two years, regardless of how they actually play. For a first time this season, I'd like to the Saints actually get out too a good start rather than spotting teams 18 points with 3 quarters to go. All this spanking, quick starts and honor seems rather circuitous when I could have just said the Texans aren't serious. Saints.

Kansas City at San Diego (-13.5)

KC lost Tony Moeaki, Eric Berry, Jonathan Baldwin and now Jamal Charles. And lost 89-10 in a two-week span, against the Lions and the Bills no less. Just as bad, San Diego lost their season-opening game to K.C. last year, so don't expect them to overlook the Chiefs. Meanwhile the majority of the Kansas City sports talk show area has absolutely abandoned Scott Pioli and Todd Haley. Personally, I've also stopped giving Matt Cassel a free pass, as he seems to eager to throw that pass 4 yards on a 3rd and 10. Worse, nearly all of his throws more than 10 yards are horribly off-target. Even worse, when the Chiefs are decent for public viewing, Dwayne Bowe has proved himself some incompetent mixture of cowardice in the open field and inability along the sidelines. At this point, Kansas City might be better off trading Derrick Johnson for a sack of magic beans. Really the only thing working for the Chiefs in this case is the college-level spread given out, as I could see the Chargers going into the fourth quarter with a 35-7 lead and then just giving up and allowing two freak plays. Then again, this is a division rival and San Diego was never really with the Patriots last Sunday. Chargers by 15-plus.

Season Record: 3-5 (C'mon baby, let's turn this around!)

Richard Nixon: Worse than Darth Vader?

Darth Vader, the iconic villain in the famed “Star Wars” franchise is the representation of evil, a stand-in for whatever military/political force (hey!) that needs demonizing by a seemingly over-matched rebellion. In many respects, though, Darth Vader while not likely winning the election in 2012, would have been able to take the high road against former, and actual, U.S. President Richard Milhous Nixon. That Vader and Nixon had the same hilariously disarming middle name is not a coincidence. Regardless…

Voice Work:

James Earl Jones (voice of Darth Vader) could transition from iron-fisted, mechano-man villain to the endlessly comforting Mufusa with damn near indistinguishable ease. Nixon, meanwhile, frequently panicked about the sound of his own voice and commonly referred to himself in third person as “RN.” I’ve never actually talked to anybody who referred to his or herself in third person, but I imagine it’d take about five seconds before I smack them—unless of course he or she were Chief Justice of the Supreme Court or Clint Eastwood.

Racism:

Darth Vader was the enemy of the Jedi but, to be fair, being a Jedi was a conscious decision. Moreover, the Jedi were a dangerous cult with fanatical followers. So Vader’s venom, while misplaced, was one of acceptable intolerance. Vader didn’t blindly massacre a civilian population, like Gungans—despite our pleas for such decisive action during "The Phantom Menace." No, Vader went after people that not only made an ideological choice, but whose choice was a direct result of intensified fighting capabilities. Nixon, though would not have dared to individually hunt down Green Berets. Instead, Nixon focused on bashing, imprisoning and financially handicapping foreigners, Asians and Jews. Nixon used the IRS to target Jewish contributors to the DNC, and when such criminal investigations proved insufficient for imprisonment, Nixon cried that the “IRS is full of Jews.” Foaming at the mouth by this point, Nixon would continue his perpetual, racist, diatribes with words I’m not sure are allowed on the Internet.

"Yes! Score one for ol' RN!"

Executive Power:

Darth Vader supported the Emperor’s restructuring of the Galactic Senate into a series of federated systems in Episode IV. Beyond that, Vader’s macro-politics are only hypotheticals deduced from his personal relations. As is, there is some weight to the theory that Nixon actually wanted to restructure the American political system in a similar fashion during his second term—right around when those “Washington Post Jews" started getting deep throated. More influentially, President/Tyrant Richard Nixon formed the White House Communications Office to allegedly give the American public information without the pesky filter of the press corps. In actuality, the Communications Office became the center of Nixon’s continuous campaign. From this point on, no decision was made in the White House without first considering the effects on re-election. This atmosphere of political paranoia, photo-op details and linguistic nuances was unprecedented at the time but has since become so ingrained with the American political system that fictional characters in this world can become prime-time heroes.

The Chief Historian:

Assuming Darth Vader exterminated the Jedi like a bunch of condors, there doesn’t seem to be any real reflection on history in the original Star War trilogy. Indeed, only a few characters actively recall a universe before “the dark times.” Strangely absently from Vader’s political stranglehold is the near obligatory re-painting of history. Stalin and Hitler personally rewrote history to suit their ambitious, fabricating motivations, precedents and justifications. Hell, even JFK was a psuedo-historian in the 1940s. None though, went so far as Nixon--a history major himself--who tried to fabricate historic/legal documents (memos and the like) to implicate the late-JFK to political disasters such as the Bay of Pigs fiasco. Now, that scenario already was connected to JFK but its origins date back to the Eisenhower administration (a.k.a. when Nixon was vice-president). Nixon’s relation to the Bay of Pigs was a complete non-issue until RN got greedy and tried to pin it all on, again, an assassinated president.

Sowing the Seeds of War:

Admittedly, the “Star Wars” prequel trilogy had numerous scenes dedicated to outlining the ridiculously circuitous route taken by Chancellor Palpatine to become the Emperor. The tariffs, colonization and free-trade arguments were boring to people barely listening and hilariously illogical to more conscious viewers. In either case, that the Chancellor single handedly started the Clone Wars to gain political supremacy was unabashedly evil. Anakin’s/Darth Vader’s motivation for joining the scheme in the fourth quarter ranged between even more boring to even more illogical. So at worst, Vader’s ambition for power is personal and ambiguous. Conversely, Nixon campaigned in 1968 on the promise of having a “secret plan” for ending the war in Vietnam. This promise was a flagrant lie but helped Nixon because Americans (and the South Vietnamese) would not accept a Johnson peace treaty when the possibility of something better was right around the corner.

Ending the War:

The Emperor drafted Vader and put him into the game in a turn around of about four seconds and effectively ended the war later that night. Nixon, though, would come into power and expand the war he inherited. When the story broke that Nixon had authorized the bombing of Vietnam’s neighbor, Cambodia, the President accused the journalists of weakening national security. This charge of endangering American lives is as baffling as it has proven to be repeatable. America was already bombing Cambodians, and the Cambodians kind of knew they were being bombed. Our "enemies" in war don’t get their information, such as a village massacre, from the Washington Post; they get their information from being in that massacred village.

A Case for Honesty:

A man wiser than myself once said the most important quality for any relationship is trust. Accepting this aphorism, Darth Vader really isn’t that unlikable. Kind of a brutal, leader, yes. But he never went behind people’s backs, tarnished somebody’s reputation or hampered their livelihood—again, except for choking more people than Jack Bauer. Nixon, as historian Lewis Gould has noted, could have gleaned information about the fractious Democrats with a casual reading of his day's newspaper. But accepting common (and correct) knowledge would not satisfy Nixon’s obsession with conspiracies and “reassurance that he was always one step ahead of his unscrupulous enemies.”

Most flatly, Nixon did not trust Americans to make the “right” choice in the voting booth. Through his actions, Nixon, the one man, thought he understood people and the world more than every other president, judge, lawmaker and voting citizen the nation had ever seen, combined.

President Nixon may have been aptly, albeit flippantly, punished in his one-part comical and two-part villainous depictions in American culture from “All in the Family” to “Frost/Nixon,” but Nixon’s legacy has inspired copycats, now aware of their predecessor’s undoing (i.e. getting caught). Ultimately, voters accept that “the ends justify the means” even if the ends are as ill defined as the means are undetermined, so long as the voter had elected the politician in question.

It's just too hard for people to admit when they bet on the wrong horse; preferring to instead blame third parties and any number of unforeseen x-factors. We'd die before admitting our follies. And so ultimately we tend to see the person, not the actions, and that’s just an [expletive deleted].

NFL Predictions: Week Two

It's strange to think about how much money somebody could make by betting against me. Then again, I suppose Las Vegas has done pretty well without my contributions. I read somewhere, perhaps in one of the better bathroom stalls I've ever been in, that professional sports writers correctly pick the winners of a game 47% of the time--which is about twice as often as they write interesting articles (take that, Jason Cole!)

Anyways, the answer is simple: writers like picking the upsets; it's something to brag about. But upsets aren't a sure bet, and they're really not even a good, safe or smart bet. And I work with the point spreads because I'm a bad ass. Anyhow, did you see me totally call the Raven's D and Darren Sproles' numbers last week? Genius work.

Chicago at New Orleans (-6.5)

The Bears are coming off an impressive win against Atlanta and the Saints are coming off a frustrating season opening lost. This is the first home game for the Saints and they had an extra three days to prepare. Given that the Saints' last two losses were in Green Bay and Seattle, I wonder if maybe they just don't like playing outside. Unrelated, it’s strange to think a kid could have watched the last three years of NFL football and not know who John Madden is. On the other hand, they likely wouldn’t know who Dennis Miller is, so there’s that. What? The game? The spread seems like a bit much, but New Orleans has to be better than 0-2. The Saints cover.

Baltimore at Tennessee (+5.5)

I don't really understand how Titans QB Matt Hasselbeck is in national commercials and has endorsement deals. Does he have another career I don't know about? Was he on "Celebrity Apprentice"? Wait a minute, was he in "The Expendables" with Steven Austin? Whatever. The Titans may have the fastest man in the NFL in Chris Johnson but that just means he'll run into defenders that much faster at the line of scrimmage. Seriously, 24 yards against Jacksonville?I'm pretty sure Peggy Olson would get that much--and score at least once. Ravens.

Philadelphia at Atlanta (+1.5)

Personally, I don't understand people who think Michael Vick should still be in jail. I mean, he's still getting chased, tackled and otherwise mangled by 250-lb men every week. Isn't that kind of a punishment? Michael Vick will probably be tired and busted up by the end of the season but this is only Week Two. Also, I'm getting an Chris Chandler-vibe from Matt Ryan--which makes more sense if you don't remember who that is. Ryan might be good but I don't see why he's not on a straight path to Whatever, USA. Here's hoping Andy Reid can achieve the unlikely and keep himself more pulled together than Chris Farley in the last minute of an SNL skit. Eagles.

San Diego at New England (-6.5)

I'll wait for this to change to a 10-point spread before thinking of the Chargers. Tom Brady threw for over 500 yards last week. They purposefully let Miami drive the ball to the one-foot line and stopped them on downs so that the Pats could set up the longest touchdown from scrimmage ever/possible. This is the New England home opener. On the other hand, Brady threw his first regular season interception since last October, so he might be slipping. With the Indianapolis Mannings boycotting football, the Patriots will be in the Superbowl. And I still wouldn't root for them unless they were playing against the entire cast from "Glee." Patriots by eleventy-hundred billion points.

Season record: 1-3

JFK vs. Nixon: A Showdown of Evil

Funny thing about history: it’s never really as over as you think. In fact, the often spewed phrase, “the right side of history…” is a reference to a fantasy; a fallacy for the simple. The right side of history changes. The right side of history is more debatable than the more intellectually aggressive like to admit. One such case might be a reexamination of the comparison that has existed in American politico-history since 1960. This, though, is an argument—not a discussion. Simply put, President John F. Kennedy was more evil than his commonly vilified counterpart, and later President, Richard M. Nixon.

Professional Politicians:

Both men were chiseled products of a media era from a young age to be politicians and nothing else. Obviously we can’t all be James Franco and academically dabble in a thousand creative fields that are marginally improved by quantifiable education, but most people change their professions, their dreams or at least their interests more than either of these former presidents. JFK and RMN were the beginning of professional politics and the life of perpetual campaigning.

A Presidential Precedent:

From the beginning, JFK set the stakes and deserves proper blame for the world Nixon would come to inherit. This isn’t about the specific problems, but rather the image of the White House JFK created for himself, and by proximity Nixon. JFK was the first president to order the IRS to investigate personal enemies and political opponents. JFK understood the world of politics and how a financial investigation can lead to a political score. One, the person being audited or interrogated has to spend money, time and energy on the actual investigation. Two, the investigation MIGHT bring up some financial discrepancies that would not have otherwise been caught. Thirdly, and most damning, JFK could then refer to his opponents’ “problems with the IRS” as a way of painting them guilty of, if nothing else, not being president. Admittedly, Nixon would later abuse his listed enemies, but this was post-Kennedy's administration—if not explicitly because of Kennedy. Also, JFK used secret audio recording…so there’s that morally shaky precedent, too.

Phony Thinker vs. Independent Thinker:

One of Kennedy’s crowning achievements in his fabled 1000 Days in Office, was the (temporary) restoration of a seemingly qualified executive cabinet. While Kennedy didn’t go so far as to hire or acknowledge political rivals, he did employ a team of Washington outsiders who seemed so unaccustomed to the potential glitz and glamour of D.C. that old Johnny Boy had no real rivals for the cameras. Naively trusting of his team, Kennedy let each department have near sovereignty, so long as they occasionally popped into the West Wing for roll call. Conversely, Nixon—a Washington player for the better part of two decades—assembled a small team of deeply collaborative experts. At times this team might have been made of just Kissinger and Nixon, but, hey, committees don’t breed efficiency.

The Masochist vs. The Prop Master:

As mentioned before, Nixon treated his wife Pat like a prop, only arguably less dispensable than Henry Kissinger. However, the Kennedy's, with all of their quasi-royalty, were playing the same sad game, and maybe better than the Nixon's. A TIME magazine reporter asked JFK if they could speak to the First Lady, to which the President said, “My wife? What do you want to talk to her for?” Apparently, Mr. Kennedy was flabbergasted that Jackie could have any political relevance herself, much less have an opinion on anything. Amazingly, it was actually Jackie that could talk about history and culture to Charles de Gaulle and other world leaders who chalked up John F. Kennedy as a pretty boy meat head.

The Womanizer vs. The Loner:

Beyond that, JFK’s sex-capades would simply make Charlie Sheen look gay; whereas Nixon’s first love, as cold as it sounds, was the embrace of a political victory. This comparison may immediately side some of my readers with Kennedy; readers making sex-cuses, perhaps envisioning some Mad Men/West Wing crossover series, but this is a decidedly anti-cheating point. Perhaps Nixon would have jumped into the sack with Ali MacGraw had there been a political advantage (and chance in hell), but as it stands in revealed history, Nixon was nothing short of a solid, albeit distant, family man.

Silver Spoon vs. Bootstraps:

In 1940, Kennedy’s college thesis (“Why England Slept”) was published and became a best seller, thrusting him into the realm of America’s young academics and—in theory—becoming a model for future presidents to be intellectually engaged. That Kennedy’s essay was a defense of England’s de facto policy of pre-WWII appeasement, that Kennedy’s father was the American ambassador to England at the time, and that Kennedy’s father bought thousands upon thousands of copies of the book are relatively absent points in the minds of modern readers. Continuing, JFK’s wartime heroism “documented” by Reader’s Digest was ridiculously exaggerated, to the point of mythology, and JFK’s Pulitzer Prize-winning book, “Profiles in Courage,” was as written by John F. Kennedy as this blog post. His whole legacy stands in vibrant contrast to Nixon, who was a self-made lawyer, drafted into the Navy, rose to lieutenant commander, left the service after the war, partook in teaching/acting hobbies and eventually ran for Congress using his poker winnings.

Invasion vs. Diplomacy:

JFK led the Bay of Pigs fiasco. JFK put additional troops/advisors in Vietnam with the primary objection of being fired upon—to rev up that American, wartime, proto-patriotism that carries a shelf-life of about six months (or if in the Middle East, six days). It was JFK who overthrew the anti-Communist government of South Vietnam and authorized the assassination of President Ngo Dinh Diem and his brother, because they weren’t anti-Communist enough for possibly the most enthusiastic war mongers who have ever seen the inside of the Oval Office. But thanks to depictions of RMN in "Futurama," and worse shows, Nixon is incorrectly known as a violent instigator. Nixon was the first president since Truman to say, “hey, maybe China is a legitimate country.” More than that, Nixon was the one who traveled to communist China and communist Russia to warm-up relations during the Cold War. Furthermore, the Vietnam War’s, somewhat synthetic, resolution only occurred under Nixon’s administration--something neither Johnson nor Kennedy could muster.

Indifference vs. A Difference:

Domestically, JFK’s policies can largely only be hypothesized as not every problem can be assassinated away over the weekend. Frankly, there is barely any evidence Kennedy cared about or envisioned anything on the scale of Theodore Roosevelt, FDR, Truman or LBJ. Simply, Kennedy didn’t have the courage to expend any political capital during his presidency and its relative infancy. Meanwhile Nixon managed to address and positively affect issues concerning Native Americans, welfare reform, space travel, creation of the EPA and federal affirmative action. The last of which earned him the support and praise of Sammy Davis, Jr.—a former Rat Pack member alongside Peter Lawford (who was the brother-in-law of...

...wait for it...

...John F. Kennedy.)

Dammit! I thought he was going to say Joey Bishop!

Over-hyper Martyr vs. Unacknowledged Loyalist:

Have you ever covered for a friend’s mistake? Why would you do such a thing? The answer is obvious to anybody with friends, including Richard Nixon. He himself did nothing provably illegal until he lied about his knowledge regarding the Watergate break-in while under oath. Really, it’s the same crime (perjury) committed by Martha Stewart, Bill Clinton, Lil’ Kim and countless others. But the crime’s inherent humanity separates it from the more heinous of crimes, such as murder and indecent exposure (the two most common accusations leveled at Kennedy). Really, that even murmurs existed about Kennedy’s face being carved into Mount Rushmore is ludicrous when so little can be deduced from his legacy. Historically, he is only fractionally closer to that Rushmore pantheon than the likes of James Garfield and Zachary Taylor—both moderate, mid-level celebrities who became president, talked a big game and then went and died like JaMarcus Russell’s career.

Beginning to understand how JFK is more evil than Richard Nixon? Understanding history means understanding some ambiguity. It also means looking at evidence twice and adapting to new evidence. Really, it just means that while I didn’t lie at any point in this, or any, post, I did not state the historic truth as I understand it.

Nixon was the worse president, and even the worst president, and I’ll tell you why next time.

NFL Predictions: Week One

This weekend is going to be a global anniversary remembered with millions of dry eyes thanks to a decade passing by, the death of Osama bin Laden, the resurrection of Captain America and a new, exhausting and somewhat manufactured financial crisis that directly affected more lives than the 9-11 attacks.

As I had years ago, I will be making some NFL game day predictions over this season. The first prediction is that every game will note the tenth anniversary of the 9-11 attacks. Maybe that prediction doesn't count. So lets get to it.

New Orleans at Green Bay (-4.5)

It seems nuts, I know, to pick the defending World Champion Packers to lose in their home opener and season kick-off, but hey, I want to get a jump on the analysts who always give too much credit to last year. The extended lockout over the off-season didn't hurt all the teams evenly, and the Saints maybe least of all. Drew Brees organized most of the team into unofficial practices and the head office made some strong personnel moves (watch Darrell Sproles if you can). Granted, the Packers didn't go around this off-season acting like they won the most important Superbowl of all-time--like the Saints had one year back--but a repeat is too much to expect in the NFL. Even if the Saints lose, it'll be less than four points. And Drew Brees will be elected to the highest political office he wants after retiring, perhaps re-naming his city "Drew Orleans." (Nice, right?) Saints.

Pittsburgh at Baltimore (-1.5)

Joe Flacco was my pick to have a break out season last year but instead he stayed defiantly inconsistent. Like "The Wire," you have to watch a lot of Flacco to see the greatness that only might be there. Moreover, I'm not a gambler who considers each loss one step closer to inevitable winnings. Still, Superbowl losers tend to suffer a worse hangover than Kiefer Sutherland; and that might be my only consolation after finding out Big Ben is just one of those high school jocks I was promised wouldn't amount to anything. He had a Superbowl ring by the age of 23; I just want a microwave that'll cook my pizza rolls evenly. The Baltimore defense should eat people this season. Ravens.

Buffalo at Kansas City (-5.5)

I will generally have Chief predictions on this site, being lodged in K.C. and all. Everything else is just random. Which is kind of how the Chiefs play. Todd Haley's idealism of "the right 52" was shot to hell when WR Jonathan Baldwin started taking swings at his teammates. The Chiefs ended last year 2-5 while playing in the AFC West (which is basically co-ed flag football anymore). Cassel still can't throw a ball quicker than I can get another beer, and he's just not a "playmaker." I think the offense scored thirty points during the entire preseason entirely by accident. And now the Chiefs have a season opener against....Buffalo? Really? Oh, okay. Chiefs cover the spread.

Dallas at New York (Jets) (-3.5)

During Donovan McNabb's tenure in Philadelphia, the team consistently made the playoffs and just as consistently lost on the cusp of going to Disney and meeting the President. I'm just saying that "a team's time" never just comes. The Cowboys' self-destruction last year was more fun than 16 Afro Ninjas put together and rather than tap the YouTube market, Jerry Jones has said he is glad the spotlight is out of Dallas this year. Yeah, I'm sure you hate the spotlight, Jerry. Just as I'm sure he won't have the entire Dallas Cowboys football team buried with him if he keels over before they win a Superbowl. The man wants to hoist up a Superbowl trophy but doesn't want to go about the normal route of just writing the best heist movie of all-time, casting 15 or 16 A to C-list actors, running onto the movie set and switching out the real trophy with a gift shop souvenir. Let the Cowboys stay down, for I have no beef with New York. This spread is a joke; Jets by a lot.

Earliest Superbowl Prediction? Patriots and Eagles, which would just be a great QB battle.

SEVEN SAMURAI vs. THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN: The Variety of Classics

It was a time of extremes; it was a time of international turmoil. These two separate and equally bland descriptions of a society are can be used about every other ten years in American history—and, to a less specific sense, world history. Every example is just another tally in the victory column for people arguing history does not repeat itself so much as it acts as a swinging pendulum, exerting too little energy in one direction that it can not sustain itself in a circle and must swing back with equal vigor and passion. While this is a weary statement on unimaginative scholars, it is also justification for the timeless appeal of two plot-similar, yet thematically-contrasting, films: “Seven Samurai” and “The Magnificent Seven”.

In the early 1950s, Japanese director Akira Kurosawa was researching about samurais for some movie he didn’t quite have a plot for yet. This took a bit more work than modern investigations for two reasons. One: no Internet. Two: the popular book “Bushido” had been released about 50 years earlier and was most people’s sole understanding of ancient Japan and samurais. “Bushido,” (‘way of the warrior’), though, had the historical accuracy and insipid moralizing of an Oliver Stone movie. In fact, “Bushido” was written in Philadelphia by a Japanese immigrant—who wrote the book in English, as it was only intended to prove Japan had a history of honor comparable to Western ideas of chivalry. Later it was translated to Japanese, positive allusions to Christianity and all. The text was then used by the Japanese government, on the eve of WWII, to teach its population about state loyalty and self-sacrifice. This is all a long ways to go to say Kurosawa didn’t care so much to continue this idolization of robotic samurai (not to be confused with the samurai robots in “RoboCop 3”).

Wait...was "Robocop 3" a commentary on the automotive industry?

Kurosawa discovered samurai, at points in their relatively brief history, defended farmers in exchange for food and a bed. All of a sudden Kurosawa had heroes that were physically dirty and starving, yet had skills, dignity and mobility. Seeking to unite the Japanese population of the 1950s under a new history of camaraderie, Kurosawa made a dynamic film with frames packed like sardine cans and a narrative about samurai finding meaning in their life, farmers finding faith in strangers and everybody finding strength in themselves. The fluidity of a social ladder also inspired respect among the characters, albeit after originally inspiring mockery and scorn. The character Kikuchiyo acts as a samurai though from a peasant upbringing and Katsushirō, a young warrior from an aristocrat family, befriends (and befriends-with-benefits!) a local village girl.

About five years later, American John Sturges, got the idea that cowboys are kind of like America’s samurais—including the drinking and bar-fights—and so lifted the story, almost character-for-character, yet trims about an hour of run time. Reportedly, Kurosawa was a big fan of “The Magnificent Seven,” which doesn’t make entire sense, as he became distressed when another of his famous samurai films, “Yojimbo” was remade in Italy four years later under the name, “A Fistful of Dollars.” Perhaps Kurosawa was just less giving to the Italians’ Western, as he sued them—delaying the release of the Clint Eastwood vehicle in America for three years. Eventually Kurosawa settled for 15% of the film’s international gross (making him absolutely rich). Surprisingly, Kurosawa later admitted he lifted the “Yojimbo” story from an American movie called “The Glass Key,”—which stole its story from a 1920s novel called “Red Harvest,” which was, most incredibly of all, a Western.

“The Magnificent Seven,” unlike its inspiration, does little to blur the differences of the American gunfighters and the Mexican peasants they are protecting from Mexican bandits. Because the protecting forces are foreigners, this becomes less about acceptance and more about global responsibility. Yes, in both films, several of the underpaid mercenaries (or bodyguards) die nobly, but they are also fighting for their own sense of self-worth. They are fighting because it’s all they know, and they just want to know how good they are. Fortunately, this is a time before fame, so the characters are not seeking greatness so much as they are seeking self-discovery.

Conversely, Steven McQueen was very much seeking stardom and so is always playing with his hat, gun, hands or “gun.” This become distracting when juxtaposed with the stoic, even kingly, Yul Brynner. As for the socio-political grounds, "The Magnificent Seven" was made more as a modest reflection on international intervention in general, as America was 7 years out of Korea and still 4 years away from any real Vietnam conflict.

The quiet and personal motivations (pride, duty, revenge, glory, wealth, survival, etc.) for the characters in both films do wonders with the scope. They give the audience--if not whole-hearted sympathy--at least some understanding to the characters as people; for people are rarely motivated as one mind, but rather our cooperation with one another is generally just coincidental--an occasional by-product of self-preservation. The heroes in both movies don't bother rationalizing their selfishness and masking it as generosity; it is the villains who try to convince others (and the audience) that their actions are for a great, collective, good.

The motives place the stories in a historic time that feels real because the sentiments (time of social extremes, time of international conflict, masking selfishness, etc.) are so often regurgitated—in society, not films. Fortunately, these sentiments do drift away every ten years or so, making them twice as specific as any film that solely pushes the oh-so-controversial ideologies of “fighting evil” or “being true to oneself.” Furthermore, as the motives for the heroes are personal and not ideological, the films are not pitted in a temporally alienating setting or have socially alienating themes (i.e. “The Alamo”—wherein John Wayne fights for libertarianism).

These are a pair of films that people know as classics because their stories have been parodied or paid tribute by Pixar ("A Bug's Life"), and less respectable organizations. Unfortunately, such indifferent acceptance teaches the present and future filmmakers and audiences nothing. Modern films, and other mediums of art/entertainment, are scrutinized and dissected—in an impossible ambition to be the first to correctly label a classic as such, whereas “classics” are just regarded as obviously great.

When everybody seems to gain something from bashing Hollywood, however intangible, it’s relevant to note worthy remakes. Worthy in that they continue the discussion of society and ourselves; and worthy in that they provide brief entertainment for, and even escape from, society and ourselves.