Tag: September 11th
Gruden and Bush – uncanny similarities
You know, I could talk up and down about he Presidential Debate last night (“You forgot Poland!” ) but I digress. That’s what all the other political blogs are for…. Soemone came off like a politician and someone came off hapless… That’s all I am saying.
However with Los Buccaneeros de Tampa Bay falling assunder — looking at going 0-4 for the first time since 1996 — I couldn’t help but start thinkign about Gruden and Bush last night. I mean, the debate put El Presidente on my mind and of course any Tampa Bay resident is going to put the Bucs on their mind at one point or another.
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Bush came into power and was blessed with the state of the economy and state of the federal budget which the previous administration helped along. He was handed a world that wasn’t embroidered with peace but if he acted decisively and quickly – he could have dealt with a lingering foreign problem… September 11th happened (which was tragic) and people started to blindly follow him through the days that followed.
Jon Gruden came into power with The Buccaneers blessed with the Buccaneer roster anda shrewdly managed salary cap that the previous head coach helped along greatly during his tenure. He was handed a team that was dominant but couldn’t win the whole she bang, but if he acted decisively and quickly – he could turn the team into not just a one time Super Bowl champion but a dynasty. The Bucs were coming off a first round loss to the Philadelphia Eagles (again) which featured an inept offense (which was tragic) and people started to blindly follow Gruden (after he was hired) because he seemed to be the answer to things.
- Bush went to War with terror. Patriotism went through the roof and the man could seemingly do no wrong.
Gruden brought the Bucs to the Super Bowl and won. Team frevor went through the roof and Gruden could seemingly do no wrong.
- Bush went off on a tangent and wanted to attack Iraq, and verbally sparred with his allies when they wouldn’t agree with his plans.
Gruden went off on a tangent and started to attack his free agency carelessly, and verbally sparred with his General Manager when he (Rich McKay) wouldn’t agree with hsi plans.
- Bush continued to do as he pleased and sold Iraq on false pretenses…
Gruden continued to do as he pleased and cut John Lynch on porrous pretenses
- Bush surrounds himself with sychophants in his administration in order to continue with his carekess plans without opposition
Gruden surrounded himself with a sychophant (Bruce Allen) in the organization to continue with his careless plans without opposition.
- Bush’s cronnies made bad tactical decisions (Fallujah, Hallburton, etc)
Gruden’s cronny has made bad tactical decisions (signing Darrell Russell, Signing Charlie Garner, etc)
- Bush doesn’t think of the Future with the national debt, tax cuts and costly defict spending.
Gruden diesn’t think of the Future with his shunning of rookies, trading draft picks and costly/careless signings.
- Bush will not fess up to his mistakes
Gruden will not fess up to his mistakes
Maybe it’s just me, but this is how I see it. The similarities stop at the fact Bush can be kicked out of office in November and Gruden is contractually signed for a long time to come….
9-11
The morning of 9-11-01 I was sorta groggy — I had been nursing several Smirnoff Ice’s the night before and writing out several pages of a story that just shot the shit — it was my first real great creative writing attempt in a while and I had the notion to continue writing on September 11th just for the sake of trying to accomplish something with written words.
I was woken up at sometime after 9 — maybe it was after 10 — by my mom who had a written message saying that the World Trade Center had been bombed and that there was a car bomb at the Pentagon. At first hearing this, I didn’t think of how bad it was — the US was overdue when it came to an attack on us with the discontent sentiment from certain parties around the globe. It was after my mom said that one of the towers were gone that I started to view how bad things were.
| I got up, grudgingly and put on CNN to see what was going on and witnessed the most surreal image of my life — the south tower of the World Trade Center stood a smoking stick in the sky and the north tower was gone — clouds of rubble surrounded the south tower. |  |
I got on-line, going back and forth with the TV and the computer – I started talking to friends and the few who were on-line and in the know (my friend, Matt Rogish) shared a sentiment with me of the anger, outrage and hurt — “This is war! This is war!” I know I alerted several to what happened while on here — that’s right, broke the news of 9-11 to people who were on the west coast or were closed-minded enough not to realize there was a world beyond them (that’s a story in itself I will bitch about in the future).
Things progressed and I had a sick sense of anxiousness — waiting for the next leg of this attack, and it didn”t come, thank God.
9-11 was a morning that shook me to the core and let me witness the best in Americans shortly after the attack occurred )the days and weeks that followed). Now? Two years later — I feel betrayed by my government and by those who exploit not only the terrible tragedy that was 9-11 but exploit patriotism and our fear of another 9-11 to get their own will pushed on the masses.
Make no mistake, I am for strong national security, I am for a lot of things that prevent another 9-11 style attack… But I am also very much against things like the Patriot Act which were just sitting on a shelf, waiting for a national tragedy in order to get passed through congress. I am also very much against the Office of Homeland Security, as I have stated in the past. This is a job for the Defense Department, and streamlining national defense to get the red ink and the bullshit that CAUSED 9-11 in the first place, cleared up, should take precedence over starting wars for oil or going on an offensive mission to seek out terrorism. You can only start going strong on offense after you have a strong defense. 9-11 proved our defense is shaky – at best. (thank you, Tony Dungy, for teaching this important lesson to me)
Do I fear another attack in the future? Yes. I’m not living in terror, but I will say that war is coming and it will be unlike anything the world has seen before…
Sniper Stuff
The Sniper case finally broke late last night. If you have been living under a rock the past month you would not be aware of Sniper attacks that have been going on in Maryland and North Virginia — 10 (?) killed, several wounded – and the fact they had no leads on who was doing this or how to catch the guy.
What really irks me about this – forget them finally catching the guy for a moment – is the guy called the task force that was investigating these attacks. He called several times at that. And what happened? They hung up on him. They disregarded him. They brushed off the calls.
And five more people got shot and died because they were that ignorant not to take his calls seriously.
It’s screw ups like this that got thousands killed on September 11th… You know,” intelligence” not taking possible scenario’s seriously enough to acknowledge the threats…
Crazy, just too frigging crazy.
The Knife
This is probably my last entry for the time being. I’ve got to get some sleep tonight and I need to / want to talk to some people before I leave tomorrow and I would be more likely to stick around talking to them than tap-tappity-tap-tap the keyboard and write out a journal entry on this web site.
I published contact/feedback information for Sony Music on the Fab 4 Lyrics section of the site. If you’re pissed that they are pulling this shit (threatening over lyrics being published on the web) — TELL THEM. Make sure you tell them it’s in regards to Beatlelyrics.com
I got a haircut today and lets just say the guy who appears in the Stonegauge logo above does not look much like me right now. For those of you who saw my picture in the St. Pete Times from the 1st article about the situation that arose with Beatlelyrics.com – I can say that my long locks in that photo are gone as well.
I spent most of the morning pinning about politics…. I really continue to despise George W. Bush and feel half of what I’ve gone through is helped along because of his administration is so pro-corporate… I also feel the US is guilty of Terrorism with their threat on Iraq… Sure Iraq poses a threat with biological weapons or other stuff — but SO DO WE! So does GREAT BRITAIN, so do other countries that are our allies but we aren’t going to bomb them and invade. We aren’t about to oust the government in Saudi Arabia even though they support terrorism. Hell, we sponsor terror by allowing Saudi Arabia to remain our ally and continue to have unrestricted access to the US. How many of September 11th’s hijackers were from SA? Where is Osama Bin Laden from? It’s bullshit.
I want Bush out of office so bad…. I look and ask are we better off than we were 2 years ago and I gag at the thought… Economics are skewerd, corporations rule, the environment means little to Dubya and some of our freedoms are being taken away by the Attorney General who is a far-right-wing thinker. Why don’t they just burn the Bill of Rights, declare the Bush family the first monarchy of dictatorship and throw all liberals (like myself) in jail who might question the President. How many times have I heard that I am in the wrong for questioning the president because we are at war? Should I be intimidated like that? No sir…. ESPECIALLY seeing the president’s Administration is doing objectionable stuff.
Oh well, just about 13 hours before I need to be up and ready to go… 🙁 I’ll hopefully get to leave you another comment in this journal soon….
