Take this Stadium and shove it

It's March 1st, which means my least favorite two months of the year are completed.  It's dark, cold, often snowy or wet, and there isn't even the holidays to break up the monotony of January and February.  Mind you, on March 1st it's still dark, cold and wet, but there's more hope in the air.

Here in Cleveland, Jimmy Haslam, owner of the Cleveland Browns, is pushing for a new Stadium.  One with a retractable roof.  

Football stadiums are expensive.  The most recent stadiums have been around $2 billion- but SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles has over a $5 billion price tag.   That's over $5,000,000,000.00  And while that is in California instead of Ohio, a new stadium is going to be pricey.

Now, if Haslam, who is supposedly worth about 4.8 billion wants to pay for it himself, more power to him.  But I haven't heard that.  And Haslam is busy purchasing a stake in the NBA's Milwaukee Bucks.  He has priorities.

So he will likely 'ask' the city of Cleveland to foot the bill.  Now, Cleveland has already lost one NFL team because the owner wanted a new stadium.  So the people of Cleveland will get flashbacks that if the city doesn't pony up, the team will leave.

But First Energy Stadium is only 24 years old (aren't sports stadiums and fields supposed to last for decades?), and the NFL only has 8-9 home games a year.  Cleveland can find a lot of better uses to spend more billions of dollars to help the city.

This is a horrible idea- and if Haslam wants to flee, I'll be glad to hold the door open for him.  

The Potential and the Problem

 Nikki Haley announced that she is running for President.

I really like Nikki Haley- more than any candidate since at least Mitt Romney, and possibly longer than that.

(Note:  The fact that I liked Mitt Romney tells you that (a)  I am Conservative by nature and (b) I am a political dork.  I plead guilty to both charges)

On paper, I think Nikki Haley could make a great President, for the following reasons:

1)  She was a popular two term governor in South Carolina.  As a general rule, governors make for a better training for the Presidency than time in Congress.  Governors have to actually manage the state, and have to deal with the state legislature that often is working against their goals.  

2)  She took the position of UN Ambassador in 2017, and held the position for two years.  So she has both governing experience and foreign policy experience.

3)  In 2015, she signed a bill to remove the Confederate flag from the Capitol grounds.  Which shows she is willing to take on her own party.

4)  She is a woman and a person of color (her parents are Sikh immigrants).  It would be good for both the GOP if she was the nominee- and it would be good for the country if, in a 2 party system, both parties showed they were open to being led by anyone, regardless of gender or background

In addition, people who have worked with her vouch that she is very smart and very hardworking.  Add everything up, and she can potentially be the next President- and that would be a good thing.

Here's my concern:  I fear she is running to win the 2004 Presidential election instead of the 2024 Presidential election.  Her first campaign events were highlighted by her supporting term limits, support from the Freedom Caucus, and wanting  "mandatory mental competency tests", for politicians over the age of 75.  While I understand the appeal (attacks both Biden and Trump), is a little too cute.

One of the biggest problems the GOP has is that they no longer know what they stand for.  In 1980, Reagan ran on a few core principles (low taxes, a stronger military to stand up to the Soviet Union, a smaller government footprint), won, and those principles drove the country.  But that was over 40 years ago.  Trump's appeal to the GOP was, in part, because he wasn't trying to be warmed-over Reagan.  Unfortuantely, Trump's appeal was a combination of a cult of personality and a constant barrage of attacks on the other party.  There was no principle except for "I should win, and they should lose".  That's not healthy.

If I can offer Nikki Haley some advice, it would be this; pick the principles and main ideas that will guide your policies because you believe it is best for the country to deal with the issues of 2024.  Don't worry about 'winning', either in the GOP Primary or the election. Because right now, I have no idea what those core principles are- so it's a blank canvass for someone to fill in.  

It might as well be you.

Various thoughts - 2023/02/14

A collection of random thoughts this week:

* Happy Valentine's Day.  If you are in a happy romantic relationship, give your partner a hug.  If not, find a friend and give them a hug.  To be fair...

* Congratulations to the Kansas City Chiefs for winning the Super Bowl.  They weren't my favorite team, but I have friends from Kansas City who are thrilled.

* Speaking of Kansas City, Feb 7th was the anniversay of the day I lost one of my closest friends.  Barbara Jo, I still miss you, your energy, your intelligence, your attitude towards life.

* Condolences to the Eagles, who lost a close game.  In the past 100 days, Philadelphia was runner-up in the finals of three different sports.  That's brutal- and I say this as a fan of the Cubs, Cavaliers, Guardians, and Buffalo Bills.

* I think we need clearer defintions of "Left", "Liberal", "Right", and "Conservative".  We tend us the first pair and second pair interchangably, and I think that is misleading.  In baseball, it's hard to tell the players without a scorecard.  In politics, it's hard to use labels without understanding what they mean.

* Fun link of the week:  Roll for Sandwich.  A man uses dice rolls to create his lunch.  Given my history with dice rolls, I would be terrified to try this for myself.  He makes some fascinating combinations.  

* Thank you all for reading.

The State of the Blog

I'm trying to write weekly on this blog- partly to keep writing, partly because it was a New Year's Resolution, partly because a friend and I both agreed to encourage each other to write more, partly... well, I've had this blog for over a dozen years.  I should use it.

But I'm not sure what this blog is about, exactly.  I don't write much about myself.  My philosophy is that anything I post should be expected to go out to the entire world- and I don't want or desire my entire life to be an open book.  

So I usually post about lighter things- music, sports, etc.  I used to post about politics, but I don't anymore.  Politics used to be about two differing philosophies about how to balance between the good of the individual and the good of the larger group.  Now it's more like a sports rivalry- I want my team to win but it's imperative that the other team loses.  

The quality of our lives has vastly increased over the past 200, 100, 25 years.  The quality of our politicians have gone downhill, and I've grown to cynical and apathetic to change them.  Or even argue about them anymore.

I'd rather find out about the technologies and advancements that will affect all of us.  Or learn a new skill.  Or hear a great puzzle that makes you think.  Or get a recommendation for something to watch, read, or listen.

Speaking of which- I've fallen in love with a comedic game show from the UK called Taskmaster.  It's fits my sense of humor exactly, and I highly recommend it.  I'm putting the first episode of series 5 on, but really- any of the seasons are fantastic, and just about everything is on Youtube.  Give it a shot if you have time:

Sports Thought from a casual sports fan...

 Are NBA franchises getting smarter- and NFL franchises getting stupider?

Let me explain.

The history of the NBA is that there have always been at least a quarter of the NBA franchises that made foolish, short-sighted moves that crippled their franchises.  It wasn't enough to not be one of those franchises; you had to do a better job taking advantages of those franchises than anyone else.

The perfect example:  In 1976, the New Orleans Jazz wanted to sign Gail Goodrich.  Now in his prime Goodrich was an excellent NBA player.  But in 1976 he was 32 years old and on the downside of his career.  To sign him, the Jazz relenquished their rights to Moses Malone.  And, because of the NBA compensation laws at the time, the Jazz owed the Los Angeles Lakers their 1979 first round pick- who turned out to be Magic Johnson.

The NBA is littered with examples like that- teams making bad decisions that hurt them in the long run.  Portland picking an injured Sam Bowie over Michael Jordan.  The Knicks passing up a chance to get Julius Erving.  The Cleveland Cavaliers traded so many 1st round draft picks the NBA had to step in and create The Stepien Rule to prevent an owner from sabotaging his team too badly.

But right now... most of the NBA franchises are in decent shape.  The teams with poor records have young players and are stockpiling draft picks.  The teams that have traded their draft picks are either contenders or recent contenders.  There are still one or two franchises that make some questionable moves (Minnesota Timberwolves, anyone?).  But they are the exceptions.  Maybe with all of the money going around, the owners of the NBA are getting smarter.

But that doesn't seem to be applying to the NFL.  The NFL seems to be growing in franchises that are making foolish moves that are not good in the short term and horrific in the long term.  The obsession with getting a quarterback has led them to making stupid reckless trades.  It's one thing to go all in, try to win the Super Bowl, and then suffer the long term consequences; I'm sure fans of the Los Angeles Rams accept the poor year and lack of a draft pick in exchage for the Super Bowl Victory.  But what's the point of going all in and not even making the playoffs?

Most of the moves I see in the NBA, even if I don't agree with them, I understand them.  That's not so true with the NFL.

Well, this sucks...

My plans at the start of the week:  "I'll go visit my parents, and practice the guitar, and work out, and see about cleaning up the tool room, and..."

Reality:  I don't think so.

I've got COVID.  

Lovely.

It's my second time catching it.  I've gotten the vaccines and two boosters, so I'm not worried about long-term issues.  Thanks to modern science, for all practical purposes COVID isn't any worse for me than the flu.  

But it's still annoying.  And has knocked me on my ass for the past couple of days.

A couple brief thoughts:

* One of the main symptoms of this strain of COVID is a sore throat.  I hate having a sore throat, because it keeps waking me up all night.  I can sleep fine- for an hour at a time.  

* Honestly, the speed at the development of the COVID vaccine was impressive to the point of being scary.  The potential for the mRNA to solve not only viruses, but genetic disorders and even cancer... 

* Well... I needed something to write about this week

Dungeons and Dragons and Licenses and Players and...

For those who play Tabletop Roleplaying Games (TTRPG), the past couple of weeks have been as exciting as watching a dragon flying in to destroy your village.

The quick and dirty explanation; Dungeons & Dragons (run by the company Wizards of the Coast; owned by Hasbro) is the most well known TTRPG, and is often the first version of the TTRPG that people learn to play.  For many years it has had an Open-Game License (OGL); anyone could produce content using the Dungeons & Dragons system and sell it without worrying about being stopped by Wizards of the Coast.

This worked for years; people would play Dungeons & Dragons, and there was such a wide variety of worlds created under the system that it became the go-to system.  Even if Wizards of the Coast didn't make money from every piece of content, just about every player of TTRPG would eventually buy products from Wizards of the Coast.

But Hasbro and Wizards of the Coast felt that Dungeons & Dragons was "Under-Monetized", and wanted to increase the revenue stream.  They plan on releasing a new version of Dungeons & Dragons called One D&D... and part of the changes included changes to the OGL.  

The changes to the OGL would require third-party content providers to pay Hasbro (including 20% from Kickstarter campaigns) and give Hasbro rights over content created by third party.  This would, in effect, damage (if not kill) all third party content providers going forward.

And the fans of Dungeons & Dragons revolted.

People dropped subscriptions to D&D Beyond, the official website of Dungeons & Dragons.  They had a petition protesting the changes signed by over 60,000 people.  The players and GMs who actually run the games shouted very loudly.  

Wizards of the Coast has been backtracking, and it sounds like they changes won't be happening.  People are still angry (One of my groups is already changing systems).

This was a foolish move by Hasbro and Wizards of the Coast; I understand the desire to make more profit, but the OGL created a brand for Dungeons & Dragons that made it the behemoth of the TTRPG market.  You don't see the kids on Stranger Things playing 7th Sea, or Call of Cthulu, or Champions.

The problem with goodwill is that, once it's lost, it's very difficult to regain.  I think Wizards of the Coast is finding that out in real time.

In the meantime, let me tell you about my character...