Random Thoughts #85

Well if Bernie can do it then why can’t I?

The president decided to take another page from the socialists playbook and promise every adult American $5,000 If the republicans win both the House and the Senate. Well if Bernie can promise medicare for all, free college, free healthcare, free childcare, free transportation and goodness knows what else, the Trump can offer free money! Some critics say that this is a bribe. Well isn’t the socialist pie-in-the-sky promises a bribe as well? Some say that it would cost over $1 trillion. Those people are taking this too seriously. The president gets carried away with his own rhetoric. Trump simply has no filter and his fans love it. Here is what he said:

“Because we’ve done so well, and because our country is making so much money, that—only I can make this promise to you, and here is my promise—if the Republicans win the House of Representatives and the United States Senate, both of them, because of our economic, tremendous economic success…I will issue a dividend to every adult citizen in the United States of America for $5,000.”

Put that down with: “Build a wall and make Mexico pay for It”, “Eliminate the national debt in Eight Years,” “tariffs bring in ‘hundreds of billions’ from foreign nations, “tariffs are a tax cut for the American people.” And “You know, we’ve cut drug prices by 1200, 1300, 1400, 1,500%. I don’t mean 50%. I mean 1400, 1,500%.”

BTW, isn’t a midterm convention just a bit weird?

What’s in a Name?

Donald Trump has a well-known penchant for changing names, but Joe Biden was no different. There’s no single official government-wide tally, but nine Army bases named for Confederate generals were renamed in 2023 (Trump later restored the original names), and the Department of Defense identified more than 1,100 assets for renaming or replacement, on top of various federal buildings and wildlife refuges. Mount McKinley became Denali — and, of course, Trump restored that name too.

The Georgia Department of Natural Resources — not Joe Biden, and certainly not Donald Trump — has officially renamed Stephen C. Foster State Park to Okefenokee State Park (Pogo would be proud). Foster, often called the “Father of American Music,” wrote “Oh! Susanna,” “My Old Kentucky Home,” and “Camptown Races.” He also wrote “Swanee River (Old Folks at Home),” which, like many of his songs, was featured in black-faced minstrel shows. Below is the first verse of the original lyrics — not the sanitized version most people know today.

(Old Folks at Home)

Written by Stephen C. Foster

Way down upon de Swanee Ribber,

Far, far away,

Dere’s wha my heart is turning ebber,

Dere’s wha de old folks stay.

All up and down de whole creation

Sadly 1 roam,

Still longing for de old plantation, And for de old folks at home.

Chorus

All de world am sad and dreary, Eb-rywhere I roam;

Oh, darkeys, how my heart grows weary,

Far from de old folks at home!

Now will Florida follow suit and rename its park too?

Bye Bye LSU?

The SEC has gone to court to seek authority to remove LSU from the conference over its intention to let athletes who’ve signed professional contracts return to college play. Hey, Ohio State Labron James has five years of eligibility left!

Tucker Carlson Loves El-Sayed

Tucker Carlson continues to show he’s lost it — and lost all credibility, at least to me. He has endorsed democratic socialist Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan’s Senate race, apparently because they share a hatred of Israel. Carlson said he would not vote for the Republican, Mike Rogers, “at gunpoint,” calling Rogers “a tool of Israel” and praising El-Sayed for “taking on AIPAC”. He went on to say that Rogers is “basically a tool of Israel and the intelligence agencies.” Then, while admitting El-Sayed is a “full-blown leftist,” Carlson said El-Sayed’s populist message was “literally Trumpian.” Well I guess that is because both are economic socialists.

No More Maple Leafs?

Canada has officially retaliated against the US by imposing $20 billion in tariffs in a tit-for-tat spat, prompting Trump to threaten cutting off all trade with the country. He specifically called out aircraft maker Bombardier (already the subject of an earlier dispute), declaring there would be “NO MORE SELLING BOMBARDIER IN THE UNITED STATES!” Trump then promptly banned Canadian dairy products, most alcoholic beverages and motorcycles. Trump also moved to shut Canadian products out of large, long-term US government contracts directing the General Services Administration to declare Canadian products ineligible for those contracts until Canada allows “full and fair reciprocity″ for American products.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said, “I don’t think you can be in a tit-for-tat with someone who’s 13 times larger than you are.” U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer, our trade representative who hates trade, seemed to contradict Bessent, saying the U.S. had little choice but to retaliate against Canada. “We’ve said enough, and so we’ve taken countermeasures. Our interest is in protecting American workers and protecting American supply chains.” Now I want to hear him explain how this is true given we are 13 times larger than they are.

Old (Redux)

Remember the post “How You Can Tell If You’re Getting Old”? Add prediction markets to the list. I don’t get it, but apparently you can bet on almost anything — the catch being you need to find someone willing to bet against you. Kalshi and Polymarket seem to be the market leaders, and I still don’t quite understand the appeal. For example, Kalshi banned disgraced former congressman George Santos and forced him to pay back his winnings after he pulled off what amounted to the dumb person’s version of insider trading. He bet on himself not to attend the State of the Union address, then conveniently skipped it. He won the bet but had to repay his $17,000 in “winnings” plus more than $80,000 in penalties to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, which regulates the market. Polymarket, meanwhile, lets users bet on questions like the color of a celebrity’s tie or as weighty as well as the eventual outcome of the conflict with Iranand is now worth more than $20 billion following  investments from Donald Trump’s son, Don Jr.

I’d bet there’s already a market on whether whoever sings the National Anthem at the Super Bowl will break Alicia Keys’ record of 2 minutes and 36 seconds.

The Escalation Trap

Robert Pape’s warning, and why it matters

In case you missed it, the war with Iran has taken an even more dangerous turn. It’s been apparent to me for a while that Iran was holding back. Holding back? What about the thousands of missiles fired at our Gulf allies, or the strikes on American bases and Gulf infrastructure? Yes, holding back — because until recently, Iran had confined its attacks to ships trying to cross the Strait of Hormuz rather than directly targeting U.S. Navy vessels. That has changed. Iran targeted a U.S. submarine attempting to enter the Strait of Hormuz and it fired missiles at a U.S. destroyer and an aircraft carrier. U.S. Central Command then retaliated striking three Iranian vessels.

Notably, the Iranian attack used ballistic missiles rather than drones. U.S. Central Command said the missiles were shot down and caused no damage. Unsurprisingly, Iran claimed the opposite — that the U.S. warships were damaged — and announced additional attacks against U.S.-linked shipping, raising even further the threat to naval forces and commercial traffic across the region.

An inspection of the vessels would presumably settle who’s telling the truth. If the Navy ships really were damaged, I’d expect word to get out eventually. But consider the alternative. Imagine Trump’s reaction if an aircraft carrier — which typically carries 5000 personnel or more — were damaged with loss of life. That would trigger a far larger response than anything we’ve seen so far.

My real problem with this war is figuring out who’s telling the truth. Neither side has much credibility. I believe very little of what the president says, given his bombastic claims and thin follow-through — the pattern that earned him the label “TACO” (Trump Always Chickens Out). He’s called the war “small potatoes,” a phrase democrats have seized on ahead of the general election. This is no small potatoes war: thousands of personnel deployed, billions of dollars spent, and the defense of Gulf allies at stake. But we’re used to this president misspeaking by now. He’s declared the war over more than once, yet it continues unabated, with the Iranian regime nowhere near collapse despite what Trump, Hegseth, Bessent, and the rest of the administration keep saying. Tellingly, I haven’t seen a single military commander echo that assessment, which makes me wonder what’s actually true.

On at least seven occasions, the president has threatened Iran with annihilation, and seven times he’s backed down. Most recently, he said he decided against a devastating strike on Iran’s energy infrastructure — while warning that the U.S. remains “locked and loaded” and prepared for “military terror not seen since World War II.” Iran doesn’t seem impressed. Senior IRGC General Mohsen Rezaei warned that further U.S. escalation would provoke retaliation against American forces across the Middle East, declaring: “Trump has said his hand is on the trigger. We will cut off his hand and his finger.”

So is Iran nearing collapse? We’ve conducted over 20,000 airstrikes. We’ve seriously degraded its military, killed its leaders, and battered its economy. Yet the regime is hanging on. I’ve read a wide range of scholarly opinion, and while I don’t dismiss any of it, I don’t fully believe it either. I read the Israeli press and Al Jazeera both, and it’s hard for either to be truly dispassionate on this subject.

One prominent version of the imminent-collapse theory comes from geopolitical analyst Barak Seener, writing for the Henry Jackson Society, who concludes that the regime in Tehran is “on the verge of collapse” as pressure mounts from every direction — sanctions, economic turmoil, and escalating military action.

Read the Henry Jackson Society report

But that report was published last year, and the regime is still standing. Iranians are certainly suffering, but Iran has long experience managing severe sanctions and is resource-rich and economically diversified. Other experts argue collapse isn’t imminent at all, and that Iran will simply outlast Trump’s presidency.

How you define collapse? One Iranian economist defines it as famine combined with the government’s inability to provide basic services. By that measure, Iran isn’t close to collapse. Yes inflation is high and goods are relatively scarce, straining households, but the state cushions the blow with cash transfers and subsidies — a monthly cash payment plus electronic coupons for essential goods. It’s an expensive way to survive, but it does avoid collapse. The U.S. has bombed bridges, tunnels, and parts of Iran’s natural gas and electricity infrastructure, leaving manufacturers facing two-day blackouts. As one expert put it: “Households reduce consumption, firms postpone investment and educated workers consider emigration. The economy continues to function, but at the cost of a shrinking middle class, lower capital formation, weaker public services and declining confidence in the future.” He concludes that without a stable environment, the Iranian economy will keep surviving but has little chance of genuine recovery.

The upshot: no collapse is imminent. So if sanctions aren’t working, bombing isn’t working, and blockades aren’t working, what comes next? I’ve argued before that no war has ever been won without boots on the ground — and an invasion of Iran would be an absolute disaster. No sane leader would attempt it. Right?

That’s where the University of Chicago’s Robert Pape offers a sobering counterpoint. Pape points to the mass of Marines and soldiers aboard ships and at American bases in the Gulf and puts the odds of the U.S. using land forces along Iran’s coast at roughly 70 percent — potentially seizing Kharg and other islands in the Strait. He calls this the “Escalation Trap” where coercion rarely succeeds without battlefield success. Strategies built on punishment, decapitation, or limited strikes tend to fail because they don’t actually deny the adversary its strategic objectives. When the promised gains don’t materialize, leaders escalate further, trying to close the gap between military action and political results.

Here’s an interview with Professor Pape:

Pape on why America has no way out of the escalation trap

In Pape’s words: “Every bomb, every revenge attack, and every response drives the next decision to move up the rungs of the escalation ladder.” He argues that recent developments point to “Stage Three” of his Escalation Trap theory — the point at which political pressure increasingly outweighs military restraint.

See also his Substack, Escalation Trap

Pape is no ivory-tower academic. He’s a leading scholar of airpower, military coercion, and strategic bombing. He has taught airpower strategy at the U.S. Air Force’s School of Advanced Airpower Studies and has advised the military and presidential administrations – I don’t know if he is advising Trump. He now points to the escalation extending beyond the Strait of Hormuz. The Houthis have launched missile and drone attacks against Saudi Arabia and threaten to open a second maritime front centered on the Bab el-Mandeb Strait. If sustained, he warns, simultaneous threats to both Hormuz and the Red Sea would put two of the world’s most important energy chokepoints at risk at once, ratcheting up pressure on Washington and its regional allies to act.

But act how?

Military conflict and global energy markets are becoming ever more entangled. Case in point: the recent Ukrainian strike on an Iranian ship carrying drones to Russia. Sectoral wars have a way of growing into larger ones, and that attack prompted Iran to warn Ukraine that it now falls within range of Iranian missiles — an ominous signal in its own right. The world is a dangerous place getting even more dangerous.

So who do you believe? I lean toward Professor Pape and until proven wrong he will be my guiding source of information.

The War of 1812: Memories of a High School History Lesson

I have pointed out before that my education in the segregated all-black Atlanta public schools was different than the history I was taught while at the University of Georgia. A case in point was that when I was in high school, I was in an honors homeroom full of really smart kids. We used to make fun of our history teacher behind her back because she “taught” simply by reading the textbook aloud verbatim. One day, someone asked her who won the War of 1812. She fumbled through the book until she found the right chapter, then began reading us from the book and said the war ended in a “checkmate.” Half the class struggled not to laugh. I remember that as we filed out of the room, one kid started reading the same passage aloud, mimicking her tone perfectly. We walked down the hall roaring, “Checkmate! Checkmate!”

What brought this memory back was a Wall Street Journal article, “Historic Homes: A Maryland Farm That Became a War of 1812 Battlefield.” (https://www.wsj.com/real-estate/luxury-homes/chestertown-maryland-farm-war-of-1812-0d3c2010).

My teacher never got around to telling us who won, but she did tell us the war was caused by the British pulling American sailors off their ships and forcing them into the Royal Navy and that many of those sailors were black. That part is historical fact. What she left out was that the impressment crisis was only one of the reasons leading to America’s declaration of war under President Madison. There were issues of trade stemming from Britain’s war with Napoleon and the British arming Native American resistance to American expansion, leading to the Battle of Tippecanoe in 1811. 

When war was declared the Americans almost immediately tried to invade and annex Canada (an early version of an idea that’s come up again in recent years), seemingly forgetting how badly that had gone during the Revolutionary War. U.S. Secretary of War William Eustis predicted, “We can take the Canadas without soldiers; we have only to send officers into the province, and the people… will rally round our standard.” He was wrong. British forces and their Shawnee allies, led by Tecumseh, routed the Americans, drove them back across the border into Michigan, and forced the surrender of Detroit.

Most people know the next chapter: Fort McHenry in Baltimore withstood 25 hours of bombardment by the British Navy, and the next morning the fort’s defenders raised an enormous American flag, inspiring Francis Scott Key to write the poem that became “The Star-Spangled Banner.” After that failed assault on Baltimore, the British sued for an armistice and the Treaty of Ghent was signed in 1814, restoring the prewar status quo. Under its terms, the British abandoned their support for a Native American buffer state in northwest Indiana and agreed to end the impressment of U.S. sailors. Ironically, the Battle of New Orleans was fought after the treaty had already been signed, since word hadn’t yet reached the country. That battle made Andrew Jackson’s reputation and is also notable because he recruited enslaved men to fight by promising them freedom, then reneged on the promise afterward and returned them to slavery, prompting one of them to say later that he should have shot Jackson on the spot if he’d known.

But back to the sailors. At the time of the war, roughly 15 percent of U.S. Navy’s sailors were black. They served in an American navy that was small and inexperienced, with only 18 seaworthy ships in 1812. Some were free men while others were enslaved who had been granted their freedom in exchange for enlisting. Life at sea was harsh everywhere, and navies around the world weren’t particular about who filled their ranks. In particular, the British Royal Navy, facing a severe manpower shortage, resorted to impressment, stopping American merchant ships and forcibly seizing sailors it claimed were Royal Navy deserters, carrying off thousands of U.S. citizens in the process. In 1807, the incident nearly boiled over into war when the frigate HMS Leopard fired on the USS Chesapeake and seized four sailors, three of them American citizens and two, William Ware and Daniel Martin, were black. Among black sailors taken by impressment, some willingly joined the British navy to escape slavery, or, if already free, to seek a better life. During the war, over 1,000 black sailors, were captured by British forces and held as prisoners of war.

Somehow the history professors forgot to mention the impressment of the black sailors – until I brought it up in class. But my high school history teacher did get the black sailor part right. Yet my most indelible memory of that class was her saying the war ended in a “checkmate”.

Forrest Trump? Wade. Nike.

More evidence that the president is trying to convince us he’s lost it

Exhibit one: the president now says he wants New Mexico to change its name to “New America.” I kid you not — here’s what he posted on Truth Social, without further comment.

New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham couldn’t resist needling the president back, saying, “While the White House wastes time coloring on maps, Nuevo México is busy doing the work.”

I’m honestly surprised he didn’t threaten to cut off trade with New Mexico unless it changed its name.

Speaking of names: Google Maps and Apple Maps now show “Lake America” for U.S. customers only, while MapQuest still uses “Lake Ontario” and the “Gulf of Mexico.” Meanwhile, only 14 percent of Americans approve of the name changes — which will likely be reversed by the next democrat president.

Exhibit two: last week’s hiring numbers came out surprisingly strong. Keep in mind these figures are almost always revised downward later, sometimes significantly. Still, the president jumped at the chance to push for lower rates, tweeting, “Great jobs number just announced, breaking all estimates (except mine!) by double and triple.” Then: “LOWER THE RATE OR I’LL STOP TRADING WITH COUNTRIES WITH WHICH WE HAVE A DEFICIT.”

Wait — when job numbers were weak, the president demanded the Fed lower rates. Now that job numbers are strong, he still wants a cut, only this time with a new threat attached: cut rates or he’ll cut off trade. That’s a strange new chapter in Trump-o-nomics: tying trade policy to monetary policy. He also posted, “Lower the interest rates because the U.S.A. is a much stronger credit than it was just a short time ago! A STRONG COUNTRY MEANS A LOWER INTEREST RATE — IT’S A BETTER CREDIT… Very simple!”

And he majored in economics at Penn.

No doubt his supporters will offer some translation to make sense of all this (Bessent, where are you?). But with all the tariff rants, naming rants and interest rate rants, to the rest of us, he’s sounding more and more like Forrest Trump.

In Response to Wade

It’s football time in Tennessee, and I could not care less — I’d rather watch baseball. I hate the new league configurations and miss the old regional conferences. Is Tennessee really now in the old Big 12 with Oklahoma, Texas, Texas A&M, Missouri, and Arkansas? This new pod system means Tennessee rarely plays Georgia anymore, when the two used to meet every year. That may be good for Tennessee, but is it good for football?

The Big “10” for some reason, added Rutgers — an embarrassment, mostly there to grab eyeballs in the New York–New Jersey market. The league should expel Rutgers, especially after its loss to UMass, arguably the worst team in college football. And isn’t Tennessee thrilled it didn’t hire Greg Schiano as head coach? Speaking of coaches, Josh Heupel should get on a GLP-1 plan — it’s hard to believe he was a Heisman finalist at Oklahoma. He is morphing into the Pillsbury Doughboy.

Back to regional matchups: I’m sure the sports world is salivating over Maryland playing USC in basketball, but I don’t care. Yet I would not have missed Maryland vs. UNC. Chasing the big bucks has robbed sports of any meaning. UCLA vs. Northwestern — only as a preseason game, not a Big “10” conference game. The conferences should go back to being regional instead of national. Stanford, Cal, and SMU have no business in the Atlantic Coast Conference. Rutgers, Maryland, USC, UCLA, Oregon, and Washington in the Big Ten? Ridiculous — except for the money.

S&P 100 Drops Nike

Nike has fallen out of favor with consumers, the market, and now the S&P 100. Its stock has lost over $230 billion in market capitalization over the past 12 years and now trades around $38 a share. It is being delisted along Honeywell Aerospace, Simon Property Group (shopping malls), and Colgate-Palmolive. Replacing them: Dell Technologies, Palo Alto Networks, Arista Networks, and Sandisk.

So what caused Nike to lose so much value? Back when the company stood by Colin Kaepernick, I told a friend Nike would suffer for it. He said I was wrong — that it would grow instead. We bet a dollar. He was right. I was wrong. Nike’s sales surged. The Kaepernick ad, part of the “Just Do It” campaign, ultimately proved to be a win for the company — its marketing leaned into an edgy, anti-establishment, counterculture image. Nike released a controversial shoe featuring the Betsy Ross flag and pulled it after Kaepernick said it was offensive. That year, Nike’s sales rose 7% to more than $39 billion, and its stock climbed 12%. Then-CEO Mark Parker said the Kaepernick campaign drove “record engagement with the brand” — a key goal as the company built out its direct-to-consumer business.

So what changed? Is it that Nike’s stars, Michael Jordan and Tiger Woods, are no longer relevant? Has Kaepernick simply become boring and passe? Nike, once the leader in running shoes, was slow to innovate and fell behind Hoka and On — even Asics, Puma, and Adidas moved faster falling out of favor in $7.4 billion U.S. running shoe market. But I think the biggest factor was complacency — the same trap that catches industry leaders who get too comfortable and fail to adapt to shifting tastes. Kodak and IBM come to mind.

By the way, Tennessee switched from Nike to Adidas.

I wonder if it’s too late to get my dollar back.

Pack the Court. Bowling. Kharg vs. Larak. Tariff Refunds.

Pack the court please!

Democrats won’t let go of the court-packing idea. Hakeem Jeffries says democrats will “push for dramatic reform of the Supreme Court” because its “conservative, right-wing majority” is “a subsidiary of the MAGA Republican Party.” That’s nonsense, but it’s not new. Trump has won some and lost some in this Court. Back in 2021, Senate and House democrats introduced legislation to expand the Court from nine justices to 13, to “guarantee” short term liberal victories. In 2023, members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus called for adding four seats. And this past term, the Court’s Louisiana v. Callais decision ending racial gerrymandering renewed calls from the left to expand the bench. Just recently the republicans in the House voted on a proposal to amend the Constitution to fix the Court at nine Justices. Since passing an amendment takes a two-thirds majority it failed, 212-206, with all but a one Democrat, Don Davis of North Carolina voting against. Of course, the republicans knew it would fail but wanted to make a statement. This was a useless exercise and a waste of the country’s time. Why don’t the republicans quit being so dumb (the stupid party) and really be proactive? They want a constitutional amendment to fix the number of justices at nine. Why? I have a better idea that doesn’t require amending the constitution.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: the moment democrats hold the presidency and both chambers of Congress, they will try to conduct all sorts of mischief including packing the Court. So why should republicans wait? They hold the majority now — a majority the midterms could put at risk, with democrats having a real shot at flipping the Senate and the House. Trump should take a page from the democrats’ own playbook and send four nominations to the Senate right now. The Senate could expedite the confirmations and get them all done before November. 

Trump loves to shake things up, so do it!

Let’s go bowling

The White House’s Harry S. Truman bowling alley is getting a glow-up. A $230,000 contract has been awarded for lighting work on the two-lane alley, plus a companion $8,800 contract for escort services — not that kind of escort service, but the kind that walks outside workers through secure areas so they can do the lighting. This is the same bowling alley Obama tried to renovate, until republicans had such a fit that the GSA pulled the contract. House republicans went so far as to adopt an amendment barring funds for the renovation. I’m waiting for the democratic outcry now, and I’m confident this time the republicans will stay quiet.

Er, Mr. President, that was not Kharg Island

The president must have been pulling our collective leg when he posted an AI-generated video of an attack on Kharg Island, captioned “Kharg Island being blown to smithereens!!! President DJT.” Hamid Bovard, chief executive of the National Iranian Oil Company, called the post “laughable,” noting that Kharg Island was operating as normal. Critics pounced. One wrote that “Trump is fighting a war in VR while our troops are going without, our bases are being destroyed, and our munitions are depleting — pure buffoonery.” Another warned that “Trump is getting ready to do something crazy — which is why the generals and admirals are leaking to the Washington Post. They’re freaking out because it’s obvious Trump and his team are about to make them do something nutty.” Trump is probably laughing it off. But the U.S. did strike two Iranian missile launchers on Larak Island, a strategically located island in the narrowest part of the strait. My question is this: with more than 20,000 airstrikes on record, why hadn’t those launchers been hit before now?

So what did you do with your tariff refund?

I noted earlier that companies keeping their tariff refunds would enjoy windfall profits — the cost of the tariffs had already been passed on to consumers, whatever the president says, so the refunds are pure gravy. And sure enough, some companies are doing exactly that. The government is refunding a total of $168 billion collected from 330,000 importers.

Walmart received $2.9 billion. Target got $994 million. Apple, $2.2 billion. Ford, $1.3 billion. Home Depot, $730 million. Nike, $684 million. Amazon, $640 million. Meanwhile, the average U.S. household paid roughly $1,700 more in 2025 and 2026 because of the tariffs. The real question is whether consumers see any of that money back. Walmart and Tractor Supply (where I buy my dog food) are using their refunds to fund price cuts, but that’s not the same as a direct refund to the people who overpaid. Other companies aren’t cutting prices at all. Smaller businesses, which say they never had the pricing power to pass tariff costs on to customers in the first place, are using their refunds simply to cover the costs they already absorbed.

The administration’s media intimidation is getting downright silly

Presidents do love to lean on the media. Nixon kept an enemies list and tried to strip a television station of its license. Biden tried to manage coverage of questions about his fitness for office. Trump has continued the tradition with gusto: he has sued CNN, the Des Moines Register, the Pulitzer Prize Board, the New York Times, and the Wall Street Journal, and walked away with a $15 million settlement from ABC and $16 million from Paramount. He has also sicced the FCC on adversaries including Media Matters and threatened broadcasters’ licenses if they don’t operate “in the public interest.”

He went after the reporter who broke the story of the Air Force One mishap in which Trump boarded the plane and ended up being carted off in a cargo container. Now he’s demanding NBC discipline Kristen Welker for reporting that his endorsements have had “mixed results” on GOP candidates. They have but Trump erupted anyway: “How can anyone be allowed to say this, working for freely given Public Airwaves? Because of this purposeful inaccuracy, she will be reported to the FCC for rebuke or punishment.” He added that his endorsement is “without question, the strongest Endorsement in the History of Politics. If it were not, I would be the first to admit it,” and accused “Radical Left News” of going out of their way to “harass, demean, and libel anything TRUMP,” calling on FCC Chairman Brendan Carr to “take this threat to our country very seriously.”

Didn’t Trump endorse Andy Ogles?

Mudd. No More “Allies.” Xenotransplantation. More Bessent. Money and Campaigns.

First: A seriously proud moment

Time magazine has released its listing of the top schools in America. California’s Harvey Mudd College where my niece Dr. Harriet Black Nembhard is president, is ranked third. Stanford is first and MIT second. This is one of the proudest moments of my life. I truly regret that my brother, the late Dr. Charles Black and my parents are not here to share this moment.https://time.com/article/2026/08/25/americas-best-colleges-2027/

 

Allies no more

With Donald Trump, there’s no such thing as an “ally” anymore. Call them “strategic partners” instead.

Xenotransplantation

Xenotransplantation: transplanting cells, tissue, or whole organs from one species into another.

Science fiction keeps becoming science fact. Take Octavia Butler’s Xenogenesis Trilogy — Butler is one of my favorite sci-fi authors, though I can only handle her in small doses. In Dawn, nuclear war has wrecked Earth, and the survivors are rescued by the Oankali, an alien race with three sexes: male, female, and Ooloi. The Ooloi splice their mates’ genes together and generate a hybrid Oankali-human offspring.

Now real life is catching up. The medical journal STAT reports that eGenesis, the biotech firm behind genetically engineered pig kidneys, says two of its first patients have since gone on to receive human organs — successfully. The whole point of pig kidneys is a numbers problem: there aren’t enough human organs, and people die waiting. The worry was that a temporary pig kidney might trigger antibodies that would sabotage a later human transplant. So far, it hasn’t. Xenotransplantation, anyone?

The story reminded me of something said by the late Lewis Grizzard who was the sports editor for Georgia’s campus paper the Red and Black while I was a student there. Grizzard had a series of heart problems and once related that he once got a heart valve from a pig named Jerome and afterwards teared up every time he drove past a bar-b-q joint.

Bessent in the spotlight

Treasury Secretary Bessent is chasing the president for airtime these days, and he’s clearly loving it — a faceless bond trader turned voice of the economy. He is charged with overseeing the so-called “Economic D-Day” that is supposed to sever economic ties with countries continuing to do business with Iran (China anyone?). He was the subject of some ridicule when he referred to the Strait of Hormuz as the “Strait of Vermouth”. He was acting head of the IRS and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. He’s also taken heat for trying to strong-arm the bond market. At the G20 he insisted we can grow our way out of the national debt. We can’t. And he keeps parroting the economically illiterate line that “non-market-based economies pushing out a never-ending stream of cheap exports is not sustainable.”

Not sustainable for whom? As Don Boudreaux wrote in a letter to the Washington Post: if non-market economies sell goods below cost, that’s a problem for them, not for us. We pay less; they eat the loss. Selling below cost is what’s unsustainable — for the exporter. Boudreaux calls it a wealth transfer straight into American pockets, with the damage landing on foreigners, not Americans. A real “America First” crowd should be cheering cut-rate exports, not jeering them.

Bessent almost certainly knows better. He’s just too busy enjoying the spotlight to let the truth get in the way. After Trump, does he run for office back home in South Carolina?

Money and politics

The media wants you to believe money buys elections. Republicans slammed Trump for dropping $800,000 to push political novice Darline Graham Nordone past veteran Ralph Norman in the South Carolina Senate race. Trump has now announced he’ll aim his $400 million war chest at select GOP midterm races.

But the evidence keeps telling us that money doesn’t always triumph. In Michigan, a Trump-backed candidate lost the primary to a rival who had suspended his own campaign the month before. In Florida, democratic socialist Angie Nixon was outspent 16 to 1 and won anyway. Ken Paxton was outspent by John Cornyn in Texas. Julia Letlow beat Bill Cassidy in Louisiana. Mike Collins beat Buddy Carter in Georgia. Bernie Sanders outspent Joe Biden. Jaime Harrison outraised Lindsey Graham $57 million to $28 million — and lost. Now James Talarico is outspending Ken Paxton nearly 200 to 1 in Texas, $31.6 million to $9.3 million. Money talks. Whether it wins is another story. 

The Republican Socialists of America

A close friend is on the left. He can’t bring himself to read my blog, which is apparent since he texted me: “Good afternoon. I was amused at Trump’s announcement that the U.S. government is taking a controlling interest in a Venezuelan oil company, while his fellow Republicans said ‘Amen’ through their silence. By definition, that’s socialism. I look forward to your blog attacking the Republican Socialists of America!” My response was that if he actually deigned to read my blog, he would know that I have already done that many times. A dear friend of forty years who is a prototypical socialist: a downwardly mobile college-educated trust-fund baby — has ended our friendship, saying I’ve become a “tool of right-wing propaganda.” And she knows I got fired from writing a weekly column in Knoxville’s conservative paper because I was not 100 percent MAGA 100 percent of the time!

Who, me?

Listen once again all, I’ll say it again: Trump is a neosocialist and I abhor his economic socialism. His followers go wherever he leads with essentially zero pushback. Virtually all elected republicans (and democrats, for that matter) are unprincipled and will say and do whatever it takes to get elected and reelected. Republicans have watched what happens to colleagues who veer off the MAGA path — Bill Cassidy, Thom Tillis, Tom Massie, Marjorie Taylor Greene, John Cornyn, five Indiana state senators, and Georgia’s Brad Raffensperger come to mind. So to protect their own political futures while Trump is in office, they rubber-stamp whatever he favors with little if any resistance.

That’s why they’ve stayed largely silent while Trump embraces economic socialism — something they would fight tooth and nail if a democrat president tried the same thing. Our Tim Burchett and Martha Blackburn would be having apoplectic fits if Obama had tried to pull this off, Now? Silence. Maybe they figure they can reverse his actions once he’s gone. But unwinding this kind of policy is never as easy as it sounds. A future president is unlikely to be a Ronald Reagan or Margaret Thatcher willing to relinquish the government’s newfound leverage over corporate America.

The U.S. government has already purchased shares in more than two dozen American corporations, concentrated mainly in high tech and natural resources. In several — like U.S. Steel and Intel — it holds veto power over corporate decisions. The Venezuela deal is something else entirely. The U.S. will hold a 35 percent stake in North American Blue Energy Partners, the second-largest private oil producer in Venezuela, along with veto power over the company’s board appointments. The arrangement also includes a 100-year lease on Venezuelan oil fields.

This is the same president who once said of Venezuelan oil “It’s the dirtiest, worst oil anywhere in the world” announced the deal on “Truth” Social saying that this is

“THE BIGGEST OIL DEAL IN WORLD HISTORY!” 

At my direction, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and Secretary of War Pete Hegseth, working closely with Highly Respected Interim President of Venezuela, Delcy Rodriguez, and, through a partnership with private business, have secured majority U.S. control of more than 65 BILLION BARRELS of proven Oil Reserves in Venezuela, no cost to the American Taxpayer. This Historic Transaction MORE THAN DOUBLES American Oil Reserves, greatly increases our Oil Supply, and will substantially lower Gas Prices for all Americans, long into the future, while helping to continue to set Venezuela on a course toward Tremendous Success and Great Prosperity. This Transaction will greatly strengthen the already growing relationship between Venezuela and the United States! Thank you for your attention to this groundbreaking matter. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN! President DONALD J. TRUMP”

North American Blue Energy Partners will be run by Alejandro Betancourt, a somewhat shady Venezuelan businessman close to Delcy Rodríguez — Maduro’s former vice president, whom Trump elevated to the presidency. Betancourt is a controversial figure who has faced money-laundering accusations from multiple countries over the past decade. Trump’s own assessment: “This is a proven operator… I’m not nominating anyone for sainthood here. What I am telling you is that this is a person that, in the past, has been helpful to the United States government.” Is this just more of Trump’s crony capitalism?

What could possibly go wrong with the American nationalization of Venezuelan oil?

The official U.S. investor is the Pentagon’s Office of Strategic Capital, which will structure the investment through penny warrants — gaining an equity stake without spending taxpayer cash. What legal authority permits the Defense Department to invest in a foreign entity is unclear. But when has Trump ever worried about legal authority? His philosophy has always been “Do it until the courts make me stop.”

What is clear is that the deal throws the hope for Venezuelan democracy under the bus because it strengthens the strong arm socialists in power. The Trump administration has apparently decided it can fight socialism in Venezuela by cutting a socialist deal with Venezuela’s socialists. In reality, Trump shows little interest in restoring democracy there.

Following the announcement, Chevron — the only major oil company still active in the country — announced a $7 billion investment to more than double its production. Trump has been pressing other companies to follow suit, but most remain hesitant, citing the need for security guarantees and sweeping reforms to Venezuela’s legal and commercial framework before committing serious capital. Some have spent months negotiating with Venezuelan officials just to gain access to a limited number of fields. Why doesn’t Trump simply demand that Venezuela clear the path for U.S. companies? At this point, he and Rubio seem to be functioning as de facto heads of state. Perhaps if Trump pushed Rodríguez to reimburse ExxonMobil and ConocoPhillips the billions they have sought in restitution since Hugo Chávez nationalized their assets in 2007, they might take the plunge.

Venezuela’s oil deposits lie beneath the Orinoco Belt, where extraction is difficult and costly. The crude requires heavy processing before it’s usable, and Venezuela no longer has the local expertise or infrastructure to extract it, let alone refine it. Bringing the industry back up to speed will take years and billions in investment — an enormous risk for anyone operating there, especially given that Venezuela has already nationalized the industry twice before. What happens if companies invest, develop the resource, and it gets nationalized again? Trump will be long gone by then. What would a future president do — invade?

Unsurprisingly, pro-democracy Venezuelans are disheartened by Trump’s foray into socialism. One critic said the deal “flies in the face of economic freedom and the principle of voluntary exchange that made the United States prosperous.” Another, Ricardo Hausmann, a former Venezuelan official who teaches at Harvard’s Kennedy School, called the deal “shameful” and told Rubio that “it will come to haunt you.” “You opted to use US power, not to free Venezuelans, but to go to bed with our oppressors.” 

Even the Communist Party of Venezuela denounced the arrangement as an opaque handover of a major share of the nation’s wealth. Meanwhile, Democratic Socialist of America’s Angie Nixon who is the democrat’s candidate for Senate in Florida accused President Trump of pushing communism in the deal. She said “You just had a gentleman on who was talking about how he has taken over Venezuela. That sounds like communism to me. They’re taking over their oil reserves and wanting to sell them off. That is the epitome of what communism is and I am totally not okay with that at all.”

So now the communists don’t like communism?

Other democrats piled on. Maryland Senator Chris Van Hollen: “Let’s be clear: this isn’t a win.” Virginia Senator Tim Kaine accused the president of using Maduro’s ouster as cover to seize control of Venezuelan oil. Florida’s Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz said that the deal needs to be halted: “Trump and Marco Rubio have intentionally left everything opaque … Trump did remove Maduro so he could get control over Venezuela’s oil and line his billionaire buddies’ pockets. That’s what this is all about.”

I’m still waiting on the broader Republican reaction — though Ted Cruz has at least called for free elections.

So will all of this neosocialist policy continue last once Trump leaves office? That is guaranteed and will come with even more socialism if economic illiterate JD Vance succeeds him – which I seriously doubt. In the meantime, I am waiting to see whether Trump moves to seize control of the AI buildout and force government stakes in those companies.

You read it here first.

On the other hand. Trump & Mamdani. AFT vs ICE. Haitians deported.

Ode to the one hand backhand

In his guest post Wade lamented that status of college football and said that he might watch the US Open instead. Well, the Open is now happening with the New York Times observing that the one handed backhand is now virtually obsolete. “The one-hander was once common. Now, though, it’s going extinct. The Open features only two men and two women in the top 50 who still use it. So far, this is the first year since 1877 in which no one-handers have made it to the semifinals of a Grand Slam. “Players are getting stronger and whacking the hell out of the ball,” said Ava Wallace, who covers tennis for The Athletic. “You need two hands!””

Because of two arthritic knees and total shoulder replacement I retired my tennis racket 15 years ago. But being ahead of my time – I guess – when I played I featured a two-handed backhand. I do know the game is now a power game that features shorter rallies. I ask myself: is the game better and is it more fun to watch? The Times writer waxed rhapsodic about Roger Federer’s game saying it was gorgeous to watch, especially as he danced across the base line to prepare the shot. Federer retired in 2022. I wonder if today’s game is as “gorgeous to watch”?

Trump and Mamdani are buds

Mamdani and Trump are soul brothers? Both love having the government in control. Trump did say when they met in the White House that Mamdani was “a nice guy.” Mamdani called the meeting “productive.” Of course, both the far left and the far right lost their collective minds that they would even talk to each other. But why not? Both are economic socialists. Both want to fix prices. Trump says he is going to allow 300,000 tons of Argentine beef into the country setting the price at 25 percent below market. Not to be outdone Mamdani says that he will freeze rents and set his city-run grocery stores to sell stuff at 30 percent below market.

Mamdani is being sued by both landlords over rents and by immigrant and minority grocers over the government-run grocery stores. In the case of groceries, the irony is that the left has kept Walmart out because they argue that Walmart’s discounts would drive small businesses out of business. So now it is okay for the socialist government to do the same? I am sure that this has been brought to Mamdani’s attention. And I am equally sure that he doesn’t care so long as the grocers are driven out of business by socialism rather than by capitalism.

The AFT versus Target

I have long said that teachers’ unions should be decertified. Further evidence is the American Federation of Teachers asking its members to strike Target at the beginning of the school season. Target is headquartered in Minneapolis which was the “target” of concerted ICE enforcement. AFT’s president Randi Weingarten wants the company boycotted not because Target supported Immigration and Customs Enforcement, but because the company has stayed “silent” rather than condemning ICE. 

Target seems to not be able to stay out of the spotlight. Remember when the right called for a boycott because of a display in the stores prominently featuring trans clothing for kids? Then there was the boycott by the left accusing the company of abandoning DEI. Now its ICE. I don’t know of any other retailer that has gotten as whipsawed as Target. How does Walmart manage to stay out of the spotlight?

I would like to see a poll on whether AFT members condone what their leadership is doing and spending their dues on advocacy. But there is no doubt that the leadership of the Tennessee Federation of Teachers is on board with their national leadership and refers to Trump’s “anti-immigration campaign of terror.” https://tn.aft.org

Deportations continue

Speaking of which, over 300,000 Haitians are slated to be deported after having their “temporary” protected status revoked. Tom Homan, Trump’s border czar, recently defended the action in light of the recent violence in Port-au-Prince that left at least 47 people dead and many others wounded in a raid by a gang in a neighborhood near the city. Homan said “I don’t know the conditions in Haiti. I’ve never been in Haiti. But we’re just enforcing the law and we’re doing it in a way that the American people voted for.”

What I want to know is how are the deportations being conducted? Do the Haitians self deport? If they don’t, does the government deport them instead? Last week, 160 were deported and flown into the northern Haitian city of Cap-Haitien because the main international airport in Port-au-Prince is considered too dangerous. Did anyone tell Homan this? The deportees were given $65 and immigration officials said “Those who cannot reach their homes today, we will host them in secure spaces and the next day the process will continue until all migrants return home as they should.” Query: Do they even have a home to go to?

Currently, the administration plans to deport around 10,000 annually which then will take 30 years to deport them all (if they stay alive all that time). If they deport 160 at a time, then that’s around 63 flights per year. But the children born here are US citizens. They cannot be deported. Ohio’s governor – a republican – wants them to stay despite Trump’s accusation that they were eating pets in Springfield. Trump said: “In Springfield, they’re eating the dogs. The people that came in, they’re eating the cats, they’re eating, they’re eating the pets of the people that live there.” 

I guess he must have been saying that they eat cats and dogs in Haiti? That reminds me of the story that when the Vietnamese came to this country they were astounded that pigeons were walking around freely. Back home one of their favorite dishes was squab so they started taking rocks, hitting the pigeons on the head and taking them home to eat them. As someone observed “They did not leave a tern unstoned.”

Warning: The following may make your head explode

Trump: The Greatest President of All Time?

I am the greatest! Donald Trump is clearly thinking about his legacy. He has been attaching his name to an extraordinary range of things in Washington: a huge new arch, a stone marker at the White House helipad site that he chose himself and said would last a million years, his name and face on limited-edition passports and national park passes, and a commemorative $1 coin set to be released soon.

The list keeps growing. There’s the Donald J. Trump United States Institute of Peace, a class of Navy battleships bearing his name, and his signature on new U.S. paper currency. There are also the Donald J. Trump/JFK Center for the Performing Arts and an effort to rename a Ford-class aircraft carrier after himself rather than Doris Miller. Earlier this year Trump sought to have Washington’s Dulles International Airport and New York’s Penn Station renamed after him. Banners bearing his picture now hang on most federal buildings in D.C. There’s TrumpRx, Trump savings accounts, Trump gold cards, and the Donald J Trump International Airport (Palm Beach). He even asked the owners of the Washington Redskins (er, Commanders) to name their new stadium after him.

The obvious question is how many of these names will survive once he leaves office — especially the ones a future president could simply change.

The president had already made his feelings about his predecessors clear with the “Presidential Walk of Fame” that he installed at the White House (whitehouse.gov/walk-of-fame).

And now comes the latest bit of chest-thumping: a post on “Truth” Social in which the president declared himself the greatest president in history. I kid you not (see the post).

The Original “Greatest”

Calling yourself “the greatest” inevitably calls to mind Muhammad Ali, who proclaimed: “I am the greatest! I’m the greatest thing that ever lived. I don’t have a mark on my face, and I upset Sonny Liston, and I just turned twenty-two years old. I must be the greatest.”

So was Ali really the greatest heavyweight of all time? My dad would have said Joe Louis. But looking at the boxing rankings, one expert observed that “the heavyweight division is comfortably the biggest — quite literally, but also figuratively — and most exciting in the sport,” since anything can happen in a single moment. Below is that expert’s ranking of the ten greatest heavyweights (givemesport.com/boxing):

Ranking factors included:

• Overall record
• Titles
• Ability in the ring
• Level of opponent

Ali was first:

1. Muhammad Ali
2. Joe Louis
3. Larry Holmes
4. Rocky Marciano
5. George Foreman
6. Joe Frazier
7. Lennox Lewis
8. Jack Dempsey
9. Wladimir Klitschko
10. Mike Tyson

Personally, I would have found room for Jack Johnson and Evander Holyfield somewhere (a top twelve?). But of the lists I checked, all of them had Ali first and Joe Louis second.

Where Presidential Historians Rank Trump

What about presidential rankings? I would guess that most of the people compiling them are not Trump admirers and even in responding to a scientific survey, biases come through. Almost every historical presidential survey had always placed James Buchanan dead last. One of my best friends has a remarkably amazing nine-year-old son who says Buchanan deserves that spot. In his words: “Buchanan didn’t try hard enough to stop the Civil War. His biggest accomplishment was just stopping a small battle. He could have done more.” A noted presidential scholar essentially said the same thing, citing Buchanan’s “failure to address the escalating tensions over slavery, which ultimately led to the Civil War,” and pointing to his handling of the Dred Scott decision and the Kansas-Nebraska Act as having “aggravated sectional divisions and undermined the Union.”

But what about Trump? Is he the greatest president of all time in the opinion of those who study the presidency? There are two surveys of presidential scholars that rank the presidents. There is the C Span 2021 survey in which nearly 100 historians and biographers rated the former US presidents. The 2021 Presidential Historians Survey, which was released after Donald Trump’s first term in the White House, measured 10 quantities of presidential leadership: public persuasion, crisis leadership, economic management, moral authority, international relations, administrative skills, relations with Congress, vision, pursued equal justice for all, and performance within the context of his times. Biden was omitted because he had not finished his term. Trump was ranked 41^st. You can see all the results here:

https://www.c-span.org/presidentsurvey2021/?page=overall

What about if Biden were included? Where would he rank and where would Trump rank? A 2024 survey by professors Brandon Rottinghaus (University of Houston) and Justin S. Vaughn (Coastal Carolina University) reported the results of a survey of 154 presidential historians to score every president on a 0-to-100 scale. Lincoln finished first, at 93.87, with FDR second and Washington third. But Buchanan lost his familiar spot at the bottom — because Donald Trump took it, with a score of just 10.92 (read the full report). 

Most people I know (me included) would strongly disagree with the experts who put Obama #7, Clinton #12, Biden #14, Reagan #16 and Carter #22. But again most historians lean to the left. This poll shows that their bias even if it claims to be “scientific.” I would have put Biden last – move over James Buchanan – because in my opinion he is the least consequential of all presidents. I would have switched Reagan and Obama and then put Carter ahead of Obama. But I am not a presidential scholar. Due to personal dislike, I would have lowered Teddy Rosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, and Andrew Jackson. Regardless. there is no way Trump is last. He certainly makes the top 10 as one of the most consequential presidents of all time. Putting him last is an indication of bias and not dispassionate analysis.

A Final Thought

I’m not here to render a verdict — rankings like these depend heavily on who is doing the surveying and who is responding – although this one does try to survey the universe of presidential scholars. I make no judgments. I know it all depends on who writes the history. I have told of my rebelling (no pun intended) against the history being taught to me while at the University of Georgia that was light years different from the history I had been taught in high school and by my parents. I don’t know if southern history books still teach the “lost cause” but I reject that as a means to excuse slavery.

So will Trump end up being the consensus (amongst presidential historians) the worst president in history? Probably. Regardless, but there is no debate, however, that both those who idolize him and those who despise him will rank him as being one of the top 50 presidents of all time. But the greatest?

Note: Here is a guest post by a frustrated (former) college football fan

Guest Opinion: I’m Out

As the college football season opens this weekend, I’ve come to realize that I’m out. Maybe it all started five years ago when the business enterprise that is the UT Athletic Department insisted that I give up my premium parking and seats. Under the guise of renovation for an improved gameday experience, UT offered me the privilege of inferior seats at four times the price. “This is necessary to remain competitive.” I paraphrase but that’s essentially what Danny White’s letter said. Bull. It was about squeezing more dollars out of the sixteen inches where my butt used to sit and the nine feet where my automobile parked. And ever since I’ve watched UT play good teams from the comfort of my own sofa. The view is better and its air conditioned. I have attended a few games against lesser opponents but only out of the generosity of friends and I usually leave before half-time.

But this year is different. I’m only vaguely aware that the Vols are opening against the mighty Furman Paladins. I don’t know the name of our quarterback, much less the name of any other player on the team. I don’t know the name of any assistant coach. I don’t know what channel the game is on or kickoff time. I’m honestly more interested in Baylor/Auburn and Clemson/LSU, but I don’t know the names of any of their players either.

I should explain that I have been an avid college football fan since childhood. I enjoyed the college game far more than NFL football because it felt different, more pure than the professional game. I admit that I have known, everyone should have known, that D1 college players have been professionals for a long time with scholarships, health benefits, side jobs that required no work, sinecures for parents and assistant coaching jobs for high school coaches. And $100 handshakes and bundles of cash in Chik-Fil-A bags. But I was self-delusional and chose to believe that despite the shenanigans, those were our guys out there, playing for kith and kin, giving their all for Tennessee and bleeding orange.

No more. Players are now truly mercenary, performing for the highest bidder and leaving at the end of each season for a better opportunity. In the era of NIL, the transfer portal, NIL collectives and agents run amok, college football is now overtly transactional with a year-end game of high-stakes musical chairs. Those aren’t our guys on the field any more. They’re not the same guys we had last year. And last year’s guys weren’t the same guys we had the year before. It’s much worse than the NFL where players have contracts and agents have a rule book.

That’s my perception of the state of college football and it will never go back to the way it was. So I propose we be clear-eyed and allow the college game to evolve to create the most entertaining product possible. 

A few ideas:

Why are there more than one hundred teams when only the top teams are competitive? The top thirty teams should break away from the NCAA altogether. SEC and BIG10, are you listening? The game would be more competitive and the television rights would be more valuable. I can already see the advertisements for the BIG10/SEC Ticket offering exclusive access to all games for only $480. As a bonus, an expanded playoff with seeding earned on the field would eliminate all debate and generate new revenue.

In rebuttal to last week’s headlines and knee-jerk rulemaking, allow players to go back and forth between the NFL and the BIG10/SEC. They’re all professionals who should be allowed to play for the team that offers the best opportunity? As an aside, I’m confident the new rule will soon be tested in court.

The BIG10/SEC would seek exemptions from Congress that, like the NFL, allow teams to lock in players with enforceable contracts thereby ending the annual revolving door. In addition to the current benefits, players will gain access to retirement plans,  accounting and tax services. But going to class is optional. If a player wants an education, great, it’s free. But most won’t want to invest their spare time studying and we should quit pretending that modern student athletes actually attend class like regular students. Salary cap and smaller rosters? Of course. Endorsements? Sure thing. Five years to play four? No need for that. Diego Pavia can continue to play for the Commodores into his forties, at which time, he should have a plenty of money saved to retire.

Leave the rest of college football and all other sports, except men’s basketball, under the purview of the NCAA where the current rules remain. The BIG10/SEC would draft older, seasoned players of a minimum age from the NCAA where all high school recruiting would occur. The draft event would be televised, also generating new revenue. 

If you really want to make it fun, add a European Football element whereby the worst teams in the BIG10/SEC would be demoted and the best NCAA teams would receive a promotion. Goodbye Kentucky, hello Utah! Wouldn’t that make for interesting end of season games?

But won’t that make the BIG10/SEC just like a minor league for the NFL? Yup. It won’t be the game of our youth, but those who want the illusion of purity can still watch Tulane take on Duke and see some athletes who may actually attend class.

My titular premise remains, with a qualifier; as a fan, I’m out. I’ll continue to watch college football with detachment. But I won’t root against the bad guys in Gainesville and Tuscaloosa. I won’t even hope a house falls on wicked Lane Kiffin, and he deserves a healthy dose of antipathy! And I won’t root passionately for my home team because I just don’t care much anymore. Now I’m off to watch Kiffin’s home opener against Clemson or maybe US Open Tennis.

Wade