Converse - "All Summer" - Music Video

I don't know if it is because it is the end of the summer and we are now in the fall season, but when I heard this song on the radio, I found that I really enjoyed it. Maybe but it has a very catchy melody. The video is also great. Converse is a great new band. Enjoy!

On the K side of history

As ESPN repeatedly reminded us today, this was the 38th anniversary of a travesty that occurred during the 1972 Beijing Summer Olympic Games, when after several extremely egregious referee decisions, the Soviet Union's men's basketball team was given a victory over the US team, the rightful victors. The US team refused to accept the silver medals during the awards ceremony and this moment of ignominy has festered in our collective memory ever since, sort of like Roger Clemens's insistent and almost laughable claims that he did not take performance-enhancing drugs. Perhaps more bemusing is the reaction of Mike Krzyzewsk, the US team coach to comments made  by the coach of the Russian team. It is one more clear example of why sports figures and history and current events do not mix. It seems that Coach K has an amnesiac sense of history compelling him to resort to righteous indifference as he prepares his apostles to take down an enemy that only exists in our memory.

The team that the US faced was Russia, not the Soviet Union, which ceased to exist in 1991. No player on either team was alive in 1972 so there is no is no direct connection to that fateful event. There really is no reason to view the game as incentive for US revenge. Had Coach K bothered to learn about his opponents he would  have realized that the coach for the other team has dual American-Israeli citizenship and is not Russian as Coach K so derisively dismissed him. Coach K commits the sin of "assumption of guilt by association." David Blatt coaches the Russian team so clearly he must be Russian. This book cover intimacy with history and current events is disturbing in someone who occupies such a prominent place in the American landscape.

The only history Coach K seems to be interested in is the kind that he can rewrite. Perhaps someone should remind him of another shameful event that took place on a basketball court in 1993 and involved one of his players--Christian Slater.

Pandy Andy

Andy complaining to the line judge.

It's that time of the year again....summer hits the final stretch, kids reluctantly return to school, baseball approaches the post-season, and Andy Roddick is eliminated from a grand slam tournament in an early round. I have never been a big fan of Roddick but last night's performance reminded me that this guy is nothing more than a big serve, a lot of hot air and no class. After being called for a foot fault Roddick proceeded to argue with the line judge and to throw sarcastic comments  her way and directed other mean-spirited comments about her to the chair umpire, who is also to blame for not chastising the obnoxious runt or giving him a warning. Instead, he had the line judge removed from the court. In other words, he took the easy way out. He was afraid to draw the ire of the blustery, infantile Roddick and punished the line judge for simply doing her job. How sad.

More disturbing is the the fact that Roddick's poor attitude seems to be representative of a growing trend at the US Open: US tennis stars throw tantrums over a call that went against them, and then are bounced from the tournament. Last year, it was Serena Williams putting on a shameless display of crassness and low education when she threatened a line judge for threatening a line judge. Last year, the chair  umpire and the tournament director maintained the foot fault against Serena Williams, which resulted in her loss to the classy Kim Clijsters. It is too bad that yesterday, the chair umpire didn't have the conviction or integrity to issue a warning to a pampered tennis player who happened to win the US Open so many years ago. Very sad.

Caroline Wozniacki

But there is hope for those of us who enjoy tennis. Caroline Wozniacki, the young Danish tennis star, has been graceful and gracious and her ever present smile and good cheer give me hope that the future of tennis will see a renaissance of good attitudes and class.

As the summer approaches its conclusion, I can't help but wonder (and hope) that the same thing will happen with Andy Roddick's  tennis career.

Information Overload

I first took the idea about information overload seriously when I read an article by Nicholas Carr in The Atlantic magazine in which he wonders out loud if we are being 'googled to death.' He argues that because of the instant retrieval of information that google provides, we are losing the ability to concentrate over long periods of time.

A recent article featured on the NPR website, Digital Overload: Your Brain on Gadgets, reveals that scientists are rapidly discovering that prolonged exposure to the high volume of information available at our fingertips can impact the way we perceive our world and our sent of time. Several reports state, for example, that the average computer user visits 40 websites a day. Technology journalist Matthew Richtel refers to the phenomenon of retrieving information from so many technological sources (Internet, e-mail, twitter, laptop computers, iPhones, iPads) as "information juggling." All this juggling is making it much easier for us to become distracted.

The author Alain de Botton decries our addiction to all things technological when he writes, "To sit still and think, without succumbing to an anxious reach for a machine, has become almost impossible." He is right. I remember years ago when I was at the lake I saw a couple sit t down at a picnic table across from each other and pull out their laptop computers. They did not speak to each other or notice the beautiful sunset. How sad.

But de Botton has a suggestion: Our minds, no less than our bodies, require periods of fasting.

Simply put we need to disconnect.

From August 6, 1945 to November 2010

For me August 6th has always had a special meaning for me. One, because it is Bolivia's day of independence (1825) and two, because it marks the day that the Enola Gay dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima becoming one of the most horrific man-made catastrophes inflicted upon humankind. I still remember John Hersey's vivid "Hiroshima" for my ninth-grade English class and how struck I was by the encounters and people he came across.

For many people, the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima epitomized America's cognitive dissonance: on one side the country holds high regard for human life and freedom; but on the other side it does not hesitate to resort to violence to achieve its political goals. Similarly, the US condemned the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 but vehemently defends its actions on that fateful day of August 6, 1945. For others, it represents the ultimate act of terrorism (the 145,000 people killed by the attack dwarfs the 3,000 victims who lost their lives in the September 11, 2001 World Trade Center attacks. I doubt the debate will subside anytime soon.

There is, however, an  opportunity to take a step toward healing the pain that has spanned across generations, barely masked by the quiet and elegant dignity of the Japanese. Five Nobel Laureates are calling on President Barack Obama to join the delegation that will visit Japan in November to renew calls for a world without nuclear weapons. Former leader of the Soviet Union, Mikhail Gorbachev, Lech Walesa, of Poland, former South African President Frederik Willem de Klerk, East Timorese President Jose Ramos-Horta and former Costa Rican President Oscar Arias Sanchez wrote a letter to President Obama asking him to join them in Japan in November in an act of solidarity with that country. So far he has not made any comment or commitment. The decision is not an easy one, but then again the decision to drop the bomb was not easy either. Funny how that works out, isn't it?

It seems that it is easier to go to war than to arrive at peace. That is the true tragedy.

The Shrill of it All

Watching ESPNs 360 this evening I was astounded by the ignorant and downright buffoonish words coming out of the mouth of US Lacrosse President and CEO Steve Stenersen. The show focused on the disturbingly more frequent head injuries to female lacrosse players. When asked by the interviewer if the association would consider having female lacrosse players wear helmets like the men do, Stenerson scoffed and vehemently argued against the use of helmets, claiming that they did not protect against concussions and other head injuries. I asked myself, what is this guy smoking? According to Stenersen, having the women wear the helmets would allow them to become more aggressive and physical, like the men. Apparently, to this guy he is more interested in the aesthetics of the game than the safety of its players. I would argue that he is more interested in the market value of having spectators and television audiences view the visages of the female athletes unencumbered by the burden of a helmet. This would not be the first time marketers stressed the athletes' femininity over their athletic prowess: in 1999 marketers asked the US Women's National Soccer team to remove their wedding rings to convey the illusion of their accessibility to the male audience.

A 2010 study by the Centre for NeuroSkills revealed that more female lacrosse players suffered head injuries (30%) than their male counterparts (18%). It is time for them to wear helmets.I wanted to get a quote from Mr. Stenersen, but I was told he was unavailable. He was arguing that you don't need a parachute to go skydiving.

A sad anniversary

Yesterday marked the 80th anniversary of one of the most despicable displays of public support for lynching. NPR did a nice feature on this and I thought I would share it with you. On August 7, 1930, an angry crowd of white townspeople stormed a jail and removed Thomas Shipp and Abram Smith from their cells. They had been accused, but not convicted of murdering a white man and raping his wife. The photograph of the lynching, taken by Lawrence Beitler, has become one of the most iconic illustrations of that era and came to inspire the civil rights movement. The picture captures the same power, emotion, sadness as the famous Dorothea Lange photo "Migrant Mother" which came to represent the anxiety and desperation of the Great Depression.

Check out NPR's Strange Fruit: Anniversary of a Lynching  to read more about this moment in our history. While you are at it, listen to Billie Holliday's classic Strange Fruit.

In 1993 Sting recorded his version of this song, but it does not top the original.