Posse Incitatus

Happy Thanksgiving

This year, the Posse is grateful for many things, but foremost (as always) there are the Three Fs: Faith, Family and Freedom.

The past few years have been far from ideal, but through it all, we have been incredibly blessed.  The country may yet go to hell in a handbasket under President Messiah, but even then, it is important to note that we are not afraid of what most of the world has had to cope with for most of human history: military coups, civil war, refugee camps.

We will journey a modest hundred miles or so and gather with our family to share news, enjoy one another's company, partake of the national turkey feast, and watch the Lions lose.

For all of this, we are very thankful.

Blowout weekend

Well, that was unpleasant.  My beloved Spartans went from Big Ten contenders to background on the Penn State highlight reel.  Ugh.  I really didn't expect MSU to win, I just expected them to show up.

Still, 9-3 is a good season, particularly for a program that is being rebuilt.  And MSU wasn't alone in being blasted off the field.

Texas Tech got crushed, as did North Carolina and (least surprising of all) the Skunk Bears.  Must have been something in the water.

The end of the quest

This Saturday will see the completion of MSU's regular football season.  Whether or not the Spartans defeat the Nit'ny Lions, it has already been a successful campaign.  Bowls beckon and all indicators are showing that after only two seasons, Coach Mark Dantonio has changed the culture and restored discipline and respect for MSU football.

The opposite is true down the road in Ann Arbor, where it has been snowing since early September.  Time will tell whether RichRod is able to perform the miracles that his exorbitant pay and this season's record-shatteringly awful game play now demand.

For the record, I thought MSU would go 9-3, a prediction that may have seemed wildly optimistic in August but now is the worst we can do.  Depending on how the running game shapes up, we can do even better next year.

It is a good time to be a Spartan.

The radical left wastes no time

In the comments to our post congratulating the Democrats, Troll-in-training Nurglitch made the following allegedy sarcasting prediction:

What are we going to do with it? Well, personally I'm looking forward to robbing you of all your hard-earned money, stealing your drive and initiative to create wealth, force abortions on women, take guns away in preparation for hauling conservatives off to forced labour camps, and enjoy my mandatory gay marriage to socialized bankers!

A lot of campaign rhetoric tends to get overheated, and I certainly hope many of my darker predictions are not realized.  However, the gay militancy thing seems to be already in full swing.

What is interesting is that these attacks only started after the recent election.  One cause may have been the rejection of homosexual 'marriages' by California voters.  Apparently this was a rebuff that the tolerant couldn't tolerate.

I can't help but think that Obama's election also was a factor - in embolding radical leftists to think they could get away with what in any other context would be a hate crime.

What would be the public reaction if, say, a group of loud evangelical Christians infiltrated a gay support group meeting with similar tactics?  Or, dare I suggest it, if a bunch of Christians infiltrated a mosque during Friday prayers?

Not only would arrests have taken place on the spot, but the media would go into wall-to-wall coverage about the 'Christianist' threat.

Since he brought it up, I don't think the Dems will force women to have abortions.  I do, however, expect them to compel doctors to learn and perform the procedure as a condition of licensure, hospitals will have to support it, and insurers will have to pay for it.

That's one of the great selling points for "universal" (read: government) health care for Democrats - it does an end run around the massive public opposition to taxpayer-funded abortion.  You see, if all procedures are funded by the government, and since (to the Dems) abortion is the most important of all civil rights, it absolutely will be a feature of the new regime.

It's going to be an interesting couple of years.

We're 9-2

I was meaning to post about the Purdue game on Saturday, but it's taken this long for my hands to thaw out.  I got seats in the East Upper Deck and the 30mph winds were something fierce.

It wasn't a pretty win, but a win it was.  The Spartans now have a legitimate chance at a share of the title - and a national ranking at the end of the year.

Who would have thought that Mark Dantonio would accomplish so much so quickly?

We may well lose at Penn State, which would be unfortunate, but I won't lose much sleep over it.  Given that our QB still can't hit half his passes, I think we're doing amazingly well.

Can't wait until next year.

Veterans Day 2008

Traditionally, the Posse’s Veterans Day posts have been a simple “thank you” to our military veterans. This year, as in years past, we repeat that message:

Thank you.

Today is the 90^th anniversary of the Armistice that ended the Great War, now known as World War I.

For Americans, World War I is truly a forgotten war. The films are fuzzy, the personalities quaint and the issues unclear. But serious students of history know that the years 1914 through 1918 cut like a chasm through the fabric of world history.

The confidence, faith and prosperity of the early 20^th Century were destroyed in four years of mud, barbed wire, bullets and poison gas.

If knowledge of the past is the key to the future, knowing about World War I is essential to understanding the world today. The roots of the Cold War, the Arab-Israeli conflict – all of these struggles debut during World War I.

There are a lot of documentaries out there that purport to tell the story, but the best I’ve yet seen is this one. Unlike the more modern versions, it does not dub explosions and other sound effects. Rather it uses music to underscore the original silent films.

Its perspective – it was made during the 1960s – is also different. This documentary was as removed from the war as Vietnam is removed from us today, which is to say still very much in the public consciousness.

The days to come

Long-time readers of the Posse know that I am not particularly happy with the president-elect. I think he is incredibly unqualified for the job, and I have little confidence in his judgment. I’m also not very excited about the crowd of people he’s going to install in various posts around Washington – particularly in the event of a vacancy on the Supreme Court.

But I am encouraged that, perhaps, we can put the question of race behind us. Yes, the coming months will be full of ‘firsts,’ – the First Sneeze by an African-American President, the First Stubbed Toe on the Oval Office Carpet by an African-American President, and so on.

Which is great. I’m seeing in the news how many liberals who were once hoping our armies would be defeated are now once again proud Americans. Uh, welcome back. I intend to remain a proud American. I anticipate I will criticize the new president quite a bit in the coming years, but I can’t imagine making common cause with the enemies of our nation, as too many Democrats have done.

Anyhow, my advice to disgruntled GOP readers is to find something else to do. MSU football has never been more exciting and for those who go in for hoops (like Sithkitten), Tom Izzo looks to have a great Spartan team lined up for this year.

I also hope to get to the range more often and start gun-blogging once again. Yes, I’m aware that president-elect isn’t a big friend of gun rights. Well, he tried to hide it during the primary and the general for a reason. It seems to me that the Dems have figured out that gun control is a big loser of an issue. I honestly don’t think they will stir that hornets’ nest, but if they do, I’ll be one of the first to sting.

Congratulations, Democrats

You won it all.  So what are you going to do with it?

Election Day

Well, at last the campaign is over.  God preserve the right.

The madness of Drew Sharp

That was a close call. Wisconsin showed up ready to play and we showed up ready to look at more pictures of the scoreboard from last week.

I couldn’t catch the game live, so I watched it on tape. Thankfully, I had been told we won, otherwise I might have died of heart failure or apoplexy.

Oh well, a win is a win.

Meanwhile, this column by Drew Sharp helps explain why newspaper readership continues to decline.

He starts strong enough, and for a moment, it seems like he’s going to focus on the transformation of Brett Swenson from erratic and unreliable to Mr. Perfect.

Then he goes off the rails.

But don’t confuse resilience with excellence.

They’re probably the worst 8-2 team in the country.

That sounds contradictory, but it’s nonetheless indicative of the overall pathetic quality of Big Ten football this season. The conference has eroded into a mélange of mistake-riddled mishaps. And this contest was no different.

It’s not the Spartans’ fault that the league stinks worse than usual. They’re only responsible for the challenge directly before them. They’re making just enough plays to rise to a slightly higher plane of mediocrity.

What. The. Hell.

I know Michigan’s meltdown has its fans in various stages of mental illness, but this is the most advanced case I’ve seen this year.

There are a lot things I could say in response to this, but I think the most measured (and work-friendly) would be to point out that if he doesn’t like the Big Ten, he may want to consider relocating – or finding a different job.

My father, who worked in newspapers all his life, gave me great advice when I was in college working on term papers. I was sparring with a professor and my grades were low as a result. “Write to your audience,” he said. “In this case, it’s a professor, so give him what he wants.”

I’ve followed his advice ever since.

Who is Sharp’s audience? It can’t be State fans, since he tears into them just a few paragraphs later:

It’s called the Michigan hangover.

The Spartans usually succumb to that affliction the week following a victory over their primary nemesis. It’s why praise comes grudgingly and with reservations. They cannot handle even the slightest whiff of prosperity here. They make T-shirts here celebrating victories over 2-6 opponents, and then wonder why their program is often recognized with a snicker.

Hmm, the only team I see getting laughed at on Sports Center is the one that lost at home to Toledo.

Back to my question: Is his audience Michigan fans? If that’s the case, who are they really ripping on when they trash the Big Ten as terrible? I mean, they may be “pathetic” but they’ve handled Michigan. What does that make the Wolverines? Ultra-pathetic?

Michigan is (as its supporters love to point out) the winningest program in college football history.  From this follows two propositions: 

1.  They should lose gracefully because it is so rare.  They should be like a billionaire who misplaces a nickel - no big thing.  Instead they tear the furniture up looking for it.  Very undignified.

2.  The same tradition that they take so much pride in means that other teams will truly relish beating them.  If I go one-on-one against my 11-year old, I won't have much to brag about if I win.  But if I go one-on-one against Magic Johnson, beating him is something to really enjoy. 

So when Spartan fans celebrate a Michigan victory, Skunk Bear fans should appreciate the esteem in which we hold them.

Sharp, on the other hand, is basically saying that beating Michigan is now meaningless, it’s just another school with a losing record, and beating the Wolverines in Ann Arbor has the same significance in college football history and tradition as pounding Indiana or Purdue.

(Speaking of Purdue, does anyone doubt that if Michigan had held on, Sharp would be crowing about how the program had “turned a corner,” or “fought with their backs to the wall?” Yes, the Skunk Bear faithful would be besides themselves with the “important step” Michigan had taken in beating a 2-6 team.)

It may end up being that way, but I don’t think we are there yet.

Look at men’s basketball. Michigan is no longer a rival with MSU. Spartan fans don’t make t-shirts when Michigan is crushed on the court because it’s just a given that they suck. The Spartan faithful have their sights set on other teams, teams with stronger traditions and better reputations – that’s why we only play Michigan once. If we lose, we shrug, and focus on the tournament.

Is this what Sharp wants?

As I said, it isn’t clear who his audience is. What is clear is that he’s in a snit, and felt the need to share it with the rest of us. Given the surplus of journalism graduates in the state, I’d say that’s a poor career move.

State played a terrible game, but it won. That’s the important part – we found a way to win. Time was, when Michigan would play a dreary, mistake-filled game against a sub-par opponent but managed to scrape through, the sportswriters would be falling over themselves with praise for how even on a bad day, Michigan “found a way to win.”

I sincerely hope that Coach Dantonio hammers the team this week for its poor performance. I hope Javon Ringer gets plenty of fluids and gets over that flu bug.