'Learning to Fly' . . . Still

GM,

Watching a wretched Monday Night Football game (which turned out to be incredible after we started this post), the only thing worth mentioning is that Mike Tirico's winter hat has done the impossible--made him look even nerdier. (Here's a shot I just found of Tirico explaining to Jon Gruden how to sexually harass a coworker without losing your job.) It's a good thing the game is boring, though, because two events from this weekend clearly stood out as the most relevant. (My Christmas-Day unwrapping of towels and bedsheets wasn't one of them.)

I wonder what went through Urban Meyer's mind in the 25 hours and 9 minutes between his decision to step down as Florida coach and his decision to stick around after a leave of absence. What is it about having two national championships and living in Gainesville that breeds such indecisiveness?! Meyer's similarities to Florida basketball coach Billy Donovan are great. Both won two titles, of course, but both were also leaving teams that were loaded but would soon be bereft of all their talent. And if you don't think that was at all a factor, well, you're less cynical and jaded than I. But both men thought about it a little while, decided that coaching an average team was still better than almost every other job in the country, and ultimately made the right decision.

Meanwhile, the federal government is having a change of heart before our eyes--through no choice of its own. You may recall its post-9/11 commitment to making air travel safer.

More frustrating? Sure. More invasive? You bet. More bureaucratic? We can only assume. But on the first- or second-most significant Christian and American holiday, were we capable of stopping a bomb-carrying Islamic extremist named Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab from boarding a Detroit-bound plane in Amsterdam? Not even close. And news like this makes that fact even piss poorer:

In November, Abdulmutallab had been placed in a database of more than 500,000 names of people suspected of terrorist ties. But officials say there was not enough information about his terror activity that would have placed him on a watch list that could have kept him from flying.

What could that possibly mean? We knew enough to figure he might be a terrorist, but we didn't know enough to watch out for him at airports?! While that doesn't make sense, here's a suggestion that does: We give a firmer frisk to anyone with any of these in his name.

Remember what people told us after 9/11? "Sometimes you have to trade freedom for safety." We seemed pretty divided on whether or not that was a worth-while trade. What's for damn sure, though, is that we should all be willing to trade political correctness for both.

-JW

JW,

I suppose it's not an accident that the hyperlinked hat with which you illustrated Tirico's was a woman's. For the record, his actual hat wasn't nearly that feminine. And you left off the propeller on top.

With that settled, let's move on to Urban Meyer, a story that resolved too quickly for me to predict its resolution, dammit. Nevertheless, I'm happy to report that I saw Meyer's "return" (Did he even physically leave his office during that retirement?) coming a mile away. As I wrote in a Sunday email, "There is absolutely no need for coaching to be life-threateningly stressful if you've already won two national championships and will never under any circumstances be fired. Just care slightly less."

And speaking of caring less, how about a prediction for the Abdulmutallab story? It disappears. Vanishes. Quicker, even, than the Fort Hood story. The media knows that a continued examination of Abdulmutallab's motives, strategies, and actions can only hurt an administration that prefers to eliminate the word "terrorism" from our vocabulary. Literally. Just like Afghanistan is now Obama's war, Abdulmutallab is Obama's bored, privileged Islamofascist. We need to stop talking about him before the President gets hurt.

-GM

'Tis the Season. What?!

JW,

The NBA season has started. Who knew?! Looking around the league this morning, I was startled by some occurences, reassured by others, and pleased as Punch by yet more. Here's a brief overview.

1) As an entire generation of fans has come to expect, the Eastern Conference stinks. Of its five teams with a winning record, one of them, Miami, is a humble one game over. Of its five (different) teams with a per-game average of more than one hundred points, two, New York and Toronto, are verifiably terrible, and one, Boston, is so old they're still pissed off about Dred Scott. Conversely, the Western Conference has eight teams over .500, nine with a positive point differential (as opposed to the Eastern's pathetic five), and a whopping ten with a PPG of more than one hundred. At the top of the conferences, the Lakers look simply incredible, whereas the Celtics look relieved that yet another jump shot fell. I'll let you guess which playoffs I'm more excited about.

2) At 2-26, the New Jersey Nets have the potential to be the worst team ever assembled. (Hell, they're already the worst; they're just searching for the worst record.) According to this handy ESPN chart, they're tied with the 97-98 Nuggets and a couple of pre-Cuban Mavericks teams for futility through twenty-eight games, and they're behind only the 70-71 Cavs for worst all-time. (No worries, though: the Cavs recovered in 71-72 with an impressive twenty-three wins!) A look at the Nets' starting five just made me go blind temporarily, but I'm pretty sure it was Josh Boone, Chris Douglas-Roberts, Brook Lopez, Devin Harris, and Courtney Lee. Yikes! You know things are bad when an entire fan base is anxiously awaiting the return from injury of Yi Jianlian--a thirty-eight percent shooter last year, by the way. In other news, Nets tickets are still available.

3) Despite Sports Illustrated's August claim that "no one in the West made as many direct hits in bringing in new players as the once-and-still contenders," the San Antonio Spurs may be getting a little too old for this. Sure, they're 15-10 and hanging on to the seventh seed, but their road record is a pitiful 3-6, and they've played fewer road games than any team in the league. Projecting their final record based on their performance thus far puts them at 44-38. Congratulations on missing the playoffs.

4) If we're going on the past few games alone, your 09-10 MVP is Zach Randolph. Since December 18th, he's averaged thirty-three points and nineteen rebounds. The Grizzlies are 3-0 during that stretch. Surely this is not the world.

-GM

GM,

1) Strangely enough, the Eastern and Western Conferences have been trading blows since 2003 when it comes to championships. Still, the generation you spoke of has every right to expect futility from the East. For a significant period of time, the Jason Kidd-led Nets and the Allen Iverson-led 76ers were the class of the conference, and Keith Van Horn contributed on every Atlantic Division team. In 2002-2003, there was only one 50-win team in the East--Detroit--and I do mean 50. The West had six teams with 50-plus wins that year. The next season, the 36-46 Celtics made the playoffs, and I'll pay for your Christmas ham if you can name me a player from that team besides Paul Pierce. (Hint: Antoine Walker was with the Mavericks that year; I checked.) Even when the Pistons and Heat won championships, we knew they were fraudulent, and Boston's 2008 title only came because an alumnus decided it was time to renew the dynasty.

2) What was Jay-Z thinking when he fired Lawrence Frank? I assume he's the key decision maker anyway. After losing Vince Carter and Richard Jefferson to free agency--from a team that stunk with them--the Nets were simply talentless. The fact that Frank had them shooting at the right basket almost every possession should have been enough to secure his job. By the way, I somehow managed to see the '97-'98 Nuggets twice in person! They won one of the games! But even they had players who could start for other teams. These Nets don't.

3) The Spurs' current road mark is no matter for concern. Those fossils could roll their wheelchairs into the playoffs and still annoy the piss out of any team that's too lazy to box out or play defense. Here's how old the Spurs are: Bruce Bowen played 80 games last year and shot 43 percent behind the arch (from that same spot in the corner, no doubt), and I saw him last night hosting NBA Fastbreak on ESPN2. These guys can still produce with one foot in the grave!

4) Congratulations to Memphis for trying so hard. I could see that team making a run with jumpshots and hustle, winning 44 games, and getting swept out of the first round of the playoffs for the fourth time in four franchise playoff appearances. In the pros, great effort doesn't win; stars do. This truism deserves its own post at a later date.

-JW

Brad Bench Brett? Bright, Bold, or Brainless?

GM,

If you watched Sunday night's game between the Panthers and Vikings, you know that Carolina owned the fourth quarter (20-0), that Matt Moore had the best game of his life (299 yards, 3 TDs, no INTs), that Steve Smith can still dominate a game despite his size deficiency (9 rec., 157 yards, TD), and that Adrian Peterson is very containable all of a sudden (12 rushes, 35 yards, TD). If you read anything after the game, you probably know that Brad Childress tried to bench Brett Favre and that Favre refused to leave the game. This didn't surprise me at all until I learned that Childress tried to take out his franchise, future-Hall-of-Fame, most-touchdown-passes-thrown, most-consecutive-games-started, can't-stay-retired-to-save-his-life, legendary, 2009 MVP candidate quarterback in the third quarter--when the Vikings were ahead 7-6!!!

I think we can safely say that Brett Favre enjoys the following:

- Accolades

- Locker-room comradery

- Fan adoration

- Money

- Winning

Those, however, are not why he came back. Brett Favre came back to playing football (drum roll)............... to play football. Not hold a clipboard and mentor the young guy. Not latch on to a team late in the season because he understands its offense. And certainly not to leave meaningful one-point games in the third quarter.

The Vikings had clinched the NFC North an hour earlier when Pittsburgh stunned Green Bay on the game's last play to take the Packers out of contention for the division crown. They no longer had to worry about that. But with New Orleans' loss Thursday, they were one more Saints loss away from getting home-field advantage throughout the playoffs. And if you think the difference between the No. 1 and No. 2 seed is big--and it is--consider that Minnesota is now just one loss away from losing its first-round bye to Philadelphia. In other words, that game was as big as a non-playoff game could get, and Childress wanted to rip the heart from his offense with the results hanging in the balance.

If he had gotten his way, we'd be talking about this much more, and Favre himself would be blaming Childress for a fourth-quarter beatdown. And Coach, Brett Favre's sh** list is not the best place to spend Christmas.

-JW

JW,

Well put, sir! While headlines like this one suggest that Favre is wrongly usurping Childress' authority, thoughtful fans understand that Minnesota would probably be better off if he were. Consider, for example, last night's Adrian Peterson line. Of Peterson's twelve carries, seven occurred on 1st and 10 and went for a total of twenty-five yards. His three receptions, on the other hand, went for seventy-three yards. Every Vikings game includes multiple comments about Peterson's open-field ability, but Childress is apparently going to be damned if he puts it to the test. Peterson is obviously a talented (though mildly overrated) guy. Why waste him on hopeless runs up the middle that my mother-in-law sees coming?

But forget Childress' predictability for a minute. Given that he characterized his in-game conversation with Favre by alluding to a literary technique popularized by James Joyce (not known for coaching), William Faulkner (not known for sober decision-making), and Virginia Woolf (not known for taking defeat reasonably), perhaps there are bigger issues here. How about the fact that a house built on Favre not screwing you will not long endure? The Vikings have proven--repeatedly, inexplicably--that when the game is on the line, a run is not on the menu. Only Indianapolis, New England, and New Orleans have more passing attempts in the red zone this season, and the Colts and Patriots barely dress running backs. If the last few weeks are any indication, Favre will end this season with a crucial interception--we're all waiting for it--and Childress will be sent packing. He'll deserve it, too. As John Travolta once said, he should have f-----g better known better.

-GM

Health Care Reform (My Ass, Still)

JW,

I'm watching a commercial right now for Education Connection, the online university database that matches deadbeats to their future diploma mill and advertises that fact with a po-faced white chick singing atonally. You asked me to talk a little more about tort reform. Here is my argument. The American medical malpractice system is a lottery for the slothful, the ill-bred, and the socially unacceptable. It's bankrupting the country, and it's doing so for the sake of people who can't read. And their lawyers.

Ingrained in the liberal imagination, though, is a different picture. Tiny Tim at the Christmas table, sobbing in his gravy because the doctors amputated the wrong leg. What liberals fail to imagine is the trailer-to-penthouse dream that has the Cletuses of the world praying for bad treatment. (It's either that or go back to college.) A lawyer friend of mine reports being asked to represent "victims" of such abuses as . . .

1) a medical receptionist losing files

2) a doctor refusing to prescribe antibiotics for a cold

3) a wait of more than three hours for a scheduled office visit

. . . and while these anecdotes prove nothing except that white people need to get their act together just as much as black people do, there's plenty of real evidence that the current system is broken.

Consider the following. While Tom Baker--the fellow you mentioned in your previous post--has lots of numbers at his disposal, he neglects to mention that medical liability premiums have gone up an estimated 2,000% since 1975. (My source? The same actuarial firm from which Baker got his numbers!) Furthermore,

"At 12 percent per year, the growth rate in medical malpractice premiums since 1975 is four times the rate of inflation and twice the rate of inflation in the cost of health care. Million-dollar verdicts are now the norm in jury trials: 52% of all awards exceed $1 million, while the average award now weighs in at $4.7 million."

Tackling health care "reform" without addressing the costs that doctors' insurance premiums add to the system is a fool's errand--it's nakedly, pitifully political--and I'm ashamed of the country for even thinking about it.

Convinced?

-GM

GM,

I am convinced. And this issue reminds me of an all-too-similar traveshamockery in this country--the reference check.

According to a Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) survey, 63 percent of employers have refused to provide references for former employees because they feared a lawsuit. See, if Manager A believes that a former employee is dishonest or lazy, he may be able to help Manager B from another company by conveying that belief in the form of a bad reference. These descriptions are so inherently subjective -- and potentially damanging -- that Manager A could be held liable in a civil suit.

To promote the public interest of not hiring horrible people, 32 states have given employers qualitative privilege, which is essentially leeway that helps them avoid civil litigation. This theoretically allows employers to give an opinion about a former employee as long as it's not given with malice or recklessness... and that's where the subjectivity and inconsistency of the courts come in:

1. Berg v. Consolidated Freightways, Inc.: William Berg Jr. sued and was awarded $40,600 from his former employer because it forced him to resign amidst an investigation of theft. Let's go over that again. The company believed the guy was stealing, so it told him to quit or be fired, and the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania decided that action was enough to impair his reputation--and pay for it. This is known as "defamation by conduct."

2. Tacket v. Delco Remy Division of General Motors Corporation: Thomas Tacket sued GM after a coworker painted "Tacket Tacket What a Racket" on the wall at its plant in Anderson, Indiana. He was originally awarded $100,000 for psychological damages because the company failed to remove the defamatory statement. This is known as "defamation by neglect." Fortunately a higher court overturned it on appeal.

3. Lewis v. Equitable Life Assurance Co. Soc. of U.S.: Four employees were fired for "gross insubordination." Sounds pretty bad, right. Well, the Minnesota Supreme Court determined they were victims of "compelled self publication," meaning that they had to reveal the reason for their termination to potential employers. Then the court determined that the whole "gross insubordination" thing was unsubstantiated and made the company pay up! Nobody from HR or anywhere else ever said a word!!!

Now, here's where the real parellel is between medical malpractice suits and reference defamation suits: the fear far outweighs the actual threat. Yet the fear is legitimate--especially for doctors--because one bad ruling could cripple the whole business. Unfortunately, there is no insurance to cover companies for reference defamation. This is the world we live in.

-JW

Health Care Reform (My Ass)

JW,

I came to a point of resignation about the health care bill some weeks ago. (I'd point you to it, but the hyperlink system can't handle a document that size.) Sadly, the groundswell of conservative and populist opposition that might have toppled it peaked too early and couldn't be sustained. The success of the bill depends upon conservative Democrats, and they seem to feel that they've done enough by shaping it into what it is.

Which is a monstrosity. As MSNBC reported on Friday afternoon (a story-killing maneuver called Taking Out the Trash by political operatives), the bill being considered by both legislative bodies will cause health care spending to "grow somewhat more rapidly than if Congress does nothing." Their source isn't a Conservative think tank, mind you, but the Department of Health and Human Services. Obama promises to "root out the waste, fraud, and abuse in our Medicare program" to help pay for the new entitlement, but anyone who believes that Congress will allow a cut in services should probably worry about raising the ol' IQ a bit before Obama's death panels get cranking.

Despite all, I might be able to swallow this debacle of a bill as a run-of-the-mill political loss if it weren't for one thing. As Atul Gawande writes in a fascinating article in The New Yorker this week, the bill currently under consideration has a number of pilot programs that very well could provide models for huge savings down the line. The one idea left out? Tort reform.

That's right, America. Go f--k yourselves. Love, Democrats.

-GM

GM,

I once knew a girl, the extent of whose physical beauty was surpassed only by that of her liberal agenda. Tragic really, and she's not even alone in that regard--among women I know! While trying to convince me that we should socialize health care, she told me about a summer in Ireland in which she was given the free care she needed when she got sick. And by "sick," she meant pregnant. And by "care," she meant abortion.

Just kidding.

Let's talk about your last point--tort reform. Former NBA star and New Jersey democratic senator Bill Bradley wrote an op-ed piece in the New York Times in late August, suggesting that tort reform should be included in the health care bill as a way to unite Republicans and Democrats on the issue. After all, frivolous medical malpractice lawsuits have terrible effects:

1. Doctors have to pay lawyers to defend them and insurance companies to cover them should they lose. This increases the cost of health care because doctors have to pass the costs along to the customer.

2. The cases themselves are costly to the American taxpayers. Experts must often be brought in and compensated for their time, as must juries and judges, who could probably be presiding over something more important.

3. Rather than pursuing practices for the right reasons (like wanting to fight certain medical conditions or having an interest in a particular field), doctors are now avoiding certain types of practices--even certain states in some instances--because the fear of being sued is so great.

But then there was this response from Tom Baker, a professor at Penn's law school who wrote The Medical Malpractice Myth, a book that claims that medical malpractice claims don't significantly add to the cost of health care. In his Times interview with Anne Underwood, Baker accuses people like you, GM, of trying to obstruct change in the system by using tort reform as a red herring. As a rare request for a two-parter, what is your rebuttal?

-JW