Thursday, May 31, 2018
The Democrats Prey On Civil Liberties
The Democrats prove anew their fraudulence by attacking the very civil liberties they claim to have defended in their determination to punish Donald Trump via Robert Mueller.
Tuesday, May 29, 2018
2018 Freedom 100 Indianapolis
Is it possible to have forty lead changes in a forty-lap race? Colton Herta and a pack of hungry drafters say Yes.
Monday, May 28, 2018
Indianapolis, Charlotte, And A Racing Renaissance
The 2018 Indianapolis 500 and World 600 capped a month of May that brought out a genuine sense that racing, a sport struggling for years, has begun a turnaround.
Indianapolis has seen a renaissance of the 500 the last several seasons, most notably in 2016 with the 100th running. The explosion in lead changes in the 500 in the 2012-17 period - the period of the Wheldon-12 racecar - began the renaissance, and the surge of darkhorse winners added immeasurably to the race's renaissance. It thus has truly reclaimed the title as Greatest Spectacle In Racing.
Indycar debuted a lower downforce body in 2018, and the loss of 300 pounds of downforce has been credited in some circles to an increase in passing - but in the 500 the loss of downforce was a manifest mistake with a weak drafting effect, cars running poorly in dirty air, and numerous spinouts. There was some very tense racing nonetheless, but clearly the 2012-17 package is far more raceable for superspeedways, and Indycar would be well advised to add downforce and thus drafting effect for the bigger ovals.
The 500 was the story of three teams - Ed Carpenter's self-owned #20, AJ Foyt's team with former 500 winner Antoine "Tony" Kanaan and rookie Matheus Leist, and of course Penske Racing. Carpenter stole Penske's thunder by grabbing the pole, but in the end it was Will Power grabbing the win after the upset bids of Oriol Servia and Stefan Wilson - adding a poignancy to the race is that Wilson is brother of Justin Wilson, killed at Pocono in 2015 - ran dry in the final five laps. Power led 59 laps to Carpenter's 65 but in the end Power had too much of a lead for Carpenter's bid. Kanaan was the big wildcard bidder, posting the fastest practice at least once and leading nineteen laps, but his bid was first frustrated by a cut tire near halfway, then as he'd clawed back into some contention the car spun out and hit the wall with thirteen to go. His rookie teammate Leist soldiered home 13th.
Those were the dominant angles of the 102nd 500, but of course there are others - Schmidt Peterson Motorsports had a solid if mind-boggling week as James Hinchcliffe somehow missed the 500, due in part to a forlorn qualifying effort by Pippa Mann, who also didn't make the race; the botched qualifying effort is the most bizarre since Jigger Sirois blew his chance to make the 1969 500.
Carpenter entered two cars, and Danica Patrick ran his second car - why anyone thought she warranted any ride remains perplexing, especially as she ended her racing career the same way she personified it - she wrecked.
Other notable contenders were Alexander Rossi - fourth in this 500 - Ryan Hunter-Reay - fifth - top race rookie Robert Wickens in another Schmidt Peterson car, Graham Rahal after leading twelve laps from 30th and finishing tenth, and Marco Andretti, finishing a respectable 12th in the Curb #98, still looking for his first win since 2011 and first since losing his ride with his dad's team.
With the 500's drama wrapped up, the racing focus switched to Charlotte and the Coca-Cola 600, and there seems a palpable sense of renewed love of racing in the sport, shown in a consensus of positive fan reaction on the postrace shows on satellite radio. While the 600 was hardly all that competitive - the 600 saw fewer lead changes (23, official and otherwise) than the All-Star Race and All-Star Open (38, official and otherwise) - and Kyle Busch, among the most hated drivers in recent NASCAR history, led 377 laps - there was surprising attention paid to intense racing outside the top five.
There seems to be several reasons for this positivity -
- the biggest angle may be that people's perspective changed when Kevin Harvick crashed, for the expected blitz to yet another Harvick win disintegrated and suddenly the race became radically different.
- the All-Star Race's competitiveness may have provided drivers an unconscious motivation to race harder.
- having seen such exciting racing in the All-Star Race, fans may have come into this 600 with a generally more sated attitude and greater sense of gratitude for the effort by drivers.
- Dave Moody noted on Sirius Radio a subtle shift by the FOX telecast in its broadcast focus; long has been the complaint that TV ignores racing in the back and doesn't scan the field to better promote all the racers, and the focus on the leader certainly seemed noticeably lower this time around.
- the racing outside the top five - and some of the racing within it - featured a plethora of darkhorses and productive finishes as a result. Alex Bowman in particular showed a very respectable effort a week - finishing a solid ninth - after criticism of his racing during All-Star weekend. Ricky Stenhouse - tenth at the end - also showed noticeable improvement with veteran Matt Kenseth replacing Trevor Bayne as a Roush teammate. Veterans Jamie McMurray - the target of some running social media abuse of late - and Kurt Busch, both largely lost in the shuffle of the season, salvaged top-ten finishes. Bubba Wallace clawed from the back of the field - result of a post-qualifying change and resultant penalty - and ran in the top-15 for awhile, then passed several cars late to salvage 16th. Michael McDowell had a respectable night as well salvaging 18th.
- Chevrolet has taken it on the chin all season, but this time around put four cars in the top nine, including Jimmie Johnson, who reached his fifth top-ten finish of a season where he and the entire Hendrick fleet have been outclassed by the SHR Fords and the Toyotas. Certainly this 600 was a race of progress for the Chevrolets after so poor a beginning of the season.
Hovering over the 600 of course is the success of the All-Star Race restrictor plate-draft duct package, and monitoring the scuttlebutt the consensus seems to be the package will be used at Indianapolis in September, with one curious sub-rumor being that New Hampshire will also use this package come July. Certainly there is no credible reason not to begin integrating this package into NASCAR's varied fendered classes at the most propitious possible moment.
It all added up to a racing weekend where a genuine sense of renewed love of the sport can be felt, in a sport where positivity isn't so easy to detect.
Wednesday, May 23, 2018
2018 Mass Pirates at Carolina Cobras
A shocker out of Carolina as the Mass Pirates face a heartbreaker in a spectacular affair combining for 137 points.
Sunday, May 20, 2018
Harvick Keeps Powering In Spirited All-Star Race
NASCAR's 2018 All Star Race became a test bed for the restrictor plate-draft duct package and the test proved worth it in a spirited affair with numerous upset bids.
The Winston Cup Monster Energy All Star Open and Feature
The new package, first run in the Lillys Brickyard 250 last season, was anticipated to where the lone practice session before the race was monitored more intently than most practices. As one might expect the drivers spent lengthy time feeling out the cars, and as they got comfortable they became more spirited, to where late in the session there was a roughly 20-car sidedraft.
Takeaways from the most anticipated All Star Race in years -
Scoring showed 38 lead changes, nineteen official and nineteen additional between the Open and the Feature. Even with that passing the leader proved harder than hoped, but clearly this was not caused by this package, given the drivers now have a genuine drafting effect to work with. Handling proved more important than perhaps anticipated, especially fresh tires - all of which teams will address down the road. Historically the draft has mattered at Charlotte and Atlanta but not to quite the effect as at Daytona and Talladega; it nonetheless has been an aid to passing.
For several lengthy periods the leader was free because his pursuers spent too much time racing for second. Kevin Harvick had posted the strongest trap speeds down the backstretch in Friday's qualifying session and it showed in the race at the end the way he was eating his chasers up entering Three. It showed anew how much stronger Harvick is compared to everyone else.
In the Open Alex Bowman and Daniel Suarez grabbed the first two segments and thus transferred to the Feature but it was AJ Allmendinger who stormed to win the race and then followed that up by flying through the Feature field. His very promising night ended when he whacked the wall pretty hard, thus denying the All Star Race a darkhorse winner even though he salvaged a respectable eighth at the end.
Allmendinger was one of several wildcards whose promising night didn't end as well as hoped. In the Open Bubba Wallace led seven laps and was clawing for the win; the last-lap three-wide near-shunt wound up killing his night down to a disappointing 11th.
It was once again a showdown between Harvick and the Toyotas and the Toyotas wound up either shooting themselves via a big melee involving Martin Truex and Kyle Busch or couldn't quite get past Harvick, as was the case for Daniel Suarez en route to a frustrating second.
It was yet another lousy night for the Roush Fords - Matt Kenseth and Ricky Stenhouse swept the front row then were never heard from again after Stenhouse led the opening five laps. The Ford fleet outside of Harvick curiously was also uneven - Joey Logano ran stout but crashed with Kyle Larson late and still finished third; Brad Keselowski was quiet all night and eliminated in the big wreck with Kurt Busch - his second crash of the night - and Clint Bowyer, who self-servingly whined the racing was like an Xfinity race. Ryan Blaney also had a rough night.
Though not in contention, the Chevrolets overall showed for the first time since Daytona some actual fight, especially Jimmie Johnson. Though it was the tail-end of the top ten, five Chevys nonetheless finished in the top ten - far and away better than what the Chevrolets have run pretty much all season.
But the big story was and is the restrictor plate-draft duct package and its effectiveness, to where Harvick on PRN offered an endorsement of it. "How do we merge this package and the superspeedway package to be the same, because I think we can." Even more interesting is that there now seems to be advocacy toward integrating this package this season rather than wait to 2019. Certainly the bottom line is this package is far and away better than what the sport has had for many years. Difficulty passing the leader is no longer something the teams can't solve, and this race also showed while Harvick is well above everyone else it's no longer the canyon of a gap it had been earlier this season.
So the sport now has genuine reason to anticipate better racing and also that a number of teams will eventually ascend to challenge Harvick and others.
The Winston Cup Monster Energy All Star Open and Feature
The new package, first run in the Lillys Brickyard 250 last season, was anticipated to where the lone practice session before the race was monitored more intently than most practices. As one might expect the drivers spent lengthy time feeling out the cars, and as they got comfortable they became more spirited, to where late in the session there was a roughly 20-car sidedraft.
Takeaways from the most anticipated All Star Race in years -
Scoring showed 38 lead changes, nineteen official and nineteen additional between the Open and the Feature. Even with that passing the leader proved harder than hoped, but clearly this was not caused by this package, given the drivers now have a genuine drafting effect to work with. Handling proved more important than perhaps anticipated, especially fresh tires - all of which teams will address down the road. Historically the draft has mattered at Charlotte and Atlanta but not to quite the effect as at Daytona and Talladega; it nonetheless has been an aid to passing.
For several lengthy periods the leader was free because his pursuers spent too much time racing for second. Kevin Harvick had posted the strongest trap speeds down the backstretch in Friday's qualifying session and it showed in the race at the end the way he was eating his chasers up entering Three. It showed anew how much stronger Harvick is compared to everyone else.
In the Open Alex Bowman and Daniel Suarez grabbed the first two segments and thus transferred to the Feature but it was AJ Allmendinger who stormed to win the race and then followed that up by flying through the Feature field. His very promising night ended when he whacked the wall pretty hard, thus denying the All Star Race a darkhorse winner even though he salvaged a respectable eighth at the end.
Allmendinger was one of several wildcards whose promising night didn't end as well as hoped. In the Open Bubba Wallace led seven laps and was clawing for the win; the last-lap three-wide near-shunt wound up killing his night down to a disappointing 11th.
It was once again a showdown between Harvick and the Toyotas and the Toyotas wound up either shooting themselves via a big melee involving Martin Truex and Kyle Busch or couldn't quite get past Harvick, as was the case for Daniel Suarez en route to a frustrating second.
It was yet another lousy night for the Roush Fords - Matt Kenseth and Ricky Stenhouse swept the front row then were never heard from again after Stenhouse led the opening five laps. The Ford fleet outside of Harvick curiously was also uneven - Joey Logano ran stout but crashed with Kyle Larson late and still finished third; Brad Keselowski was quiet all night and eliminated in the big wreck with Kurt Busch - his second crash of the night - and Clint Bowyer, who self-servingly whined the racing was like an Xfinity race. Ryan Blaney also had a rough night.
Though not in contention, the Chevrolets overall showed for the first time since Daytona some actual fight, especially Jimmie Johnson. Though it was the tail-end of the top ten, five Chevys nonetheless finished in the top ten - far and away better than what the Chevrolets have run pretty much all season.
But the big story was and is the restrictor plate-draft duct package and its effectiveness, to where Harvick on PRN offered an endorsement of it. "How do we merge this package and the superspeedway package to be the same, because I think we can." Even more interesting is that there now seems to be advocacy toward integrating this package this season rather than wait to 2019. Certainly the bottom line is this package is far and away better than what the sport has had for many years. Difficulty passing the leader is no longer something the teams can't solve, and this race also showed while Harvick is well above everyone else it's no longer the canyon of a gap it had been earlier this season.
So the sport now has genuine reason to anticipate better racing and also that a number of teams will eventually ascend to challenge Harvick and others.
Saturday, May 19, 2018
Continued Hypocrisy On Russia And ICE
By now it is manifest that the investigation of Donald Trump is about the Obama Administration engaged in an illegal persecution prosecution that drew investigation away from Hillary Clinton and Obama criminality. Such hypocrisy is in keeping with the Democratic Party and its support of enemy forces, such as with its attack on the Immigration-Customs Enforcement agency, a body that has found among other things that some 80% of illegals arrested have criminal records.
Thursday, May 17, 2018
The Continuing Lie That Is Black Lives Matter
The Black Lives Matter movement is a vengeful fit of bigotry pretending to be about justice - shown in the group's dishonesty about crime and its antisemitism.
The Real Point Of The Investigation Of Trump
The FBI's investigation of Trump is not a criminal investigation - because no crime was ever committed. It is a counterintelligence investigation at the behest of then-President Obama. Basically the rules were changed to try and deny the defendant right to defend himself, even though literally no evidence exists that Trump or his people in any way aided Soviet espionage.
Wednesday, May 16, 2018
The Fraud Of "Me Too"
First this post from January 18:
Now the fraud of "Me Too" continues as Eric Schneiderman exposes yet further the fraudulence of leftism in general and the Democratic Party and its cultural control in particular.
The entertainment industry's non-reform after the exposure of rapist Harvey Weinstein continued with the idiotic Golden Globe ass-kissing. The fraud continues as the "Me Too" movement pushes not accountability but feminist entitlement in a hookup culture. It also extends to Public Radio as it enabled sexual molester Garrison Keillor while Harvey Weinstein's moral relativism gets examined.
Now the fraud of "Me Too" continues as Eric Schneiderman exposes yet further the fraudulence of leftism in general and the Democratic Party and its cultural control in particular.
The Savages Of Gaza
Hamas launched a "protest" attack in Gaza looking to sacrifice lives to score propaganda points against Israel. And as usual some are falling for it.
Tuesday, May 15, 2018
The Perversion That Is The Democratic Party
Racial and sexual perversion has overwhelmingly been a Democratic Party failing from Harvey Weinstein to Joe Biden et al to Eric Schneiderman of late. This piece looks at reasons why, yet oddly seems to ignore the roles that entitlement and moral relativism play in left-wing hate - liberals want to bully and boss around people and mold people into doing what they're told, and they dress it up as "it's good for you."
NASCAR's State Of Confusion
NASCAR enters Charlotte's two weeks of racing with yet more confusion as to where the sanctioning body is going. First came a Reuters story that the France family was looking to sell its ownership stake, or at least part of it, to an outside buyer - the story got a sharper angle when a name of a potential buyer was mentioned in Comcast, the entertainment giant - in keeping with Liberty Media's purchase of the F1 sanctioning body. Another angle comes with word that team owners are increasingly unhappy with NASCAR even as the sanctioning body and team owners have striven to work together more in recent years. Such news comes amid ratings for the sanctioning body continuing to labor.
Andrew Murstein of Richard Petty Motorsports in the Sports Business Daily piece advocates going to more night races and going to some mid-week races, ignoring the failure of night racing in Winston Cup and the fact that late start times for Sunday races have helped drive fans away.
This comes as the 2018 season has seen some genuine improvement in the racing, with a wild and compelling Daytona 500, a strikingly spirited Phoenix 300, and a wild finish at Kansas.
Kansas had several spirited bouts up front.
It also had a huge melee late in the race.
Kevin Harvick had to run down Martin Truex to win the race.
Word of a possible sale of at least partial ownership to an outside entity has brought out the usual bitterness from some long-time fans with the usual nonsensical calls for "bring back stock bodies" etc. - never mind stock bodies proved unusable long ago. Solutions are well known and should not need belaboring and the bitterness by some fans continues to reek of spurned lover syndrome.
As for the on-track competition, with the coming All-Star Race the restrictor plate-draft duct package will get its first race on an intermediate oval after last year's successful Lillys Xfinity 250 at Indianapolis. Given that the draft historically has mattered a great deal on intermediates like Charlotte and Atlanta one can feel this package will open up passing. The likely winners will be Fords, whose program is simply that much better than everyone else's, especially the Stewart-Haas Fords, though Penske's bunch is still good.
JGR and Truex are still stout, but it's obvious Truex's team misses the #77 car, as their muscle simply isn't there now.
Chevrolet has become irrelevant, period. More and more the prospect that Chevrolet will not be in any contention the rest of the season is becoming real, and shows how the favoritism of Chevy to Hendrick's team is now costing them - having done nothing to bolster their other teams, Chevrolet is now not just also-rans but junk as such. Chevy needs to reassign some of their engineers to other teams and get all of their teams working directly together a la the Pontiacs two decades past.
A humorous byproduct is the failure of the young gun drivers, who have simply been out of contention from the start of the season. True, Chase Elliott has led laps and fought for top fives but nowhere has shown the maturity or intelligence that indicates he's learning how to win. His young Hendrick teammates right now look lost at the Cup level; they look like actual rookies, and weak ones at that. The old NASCAR saw that it will take five years to see if the kids actually can become competent racers seems to have come back to the sport - talk about throwback.
Elliott's idiotic tantrum at Ricky Stenhouse after the race shows what's wrong with the young guns - Stenhouse swerved Elliott high in Four and afterward Elliott drilled him, then complained about Stenhouse racing him too hard, a contemptible opinion for which Elliott was deservedly ripped by Larry McReynolds. Stenhouse for his part does deserve criticism for chopping off Elliott instead of holding his line better.
The flameout of the young guns has now cost one of them his race team as Trevor Bayne is now going down as the first spectacular drafting bust of NASCAR in recent memory. One struggles to see him ever getting another Cup chance.
******
An unexpected angle came with the Supreme Court's overruling of government bans on sports betting, opening up the potential that sports bodies will see direct gambling by fans on contests, players, etc. Concern about competition integrity is legitimate, but as pointed out on Sirius XM radiocasts it is bookies themselves who expose cheating scandals and thus ensure competitions are legitimate. The potential revenue sanctioning bodies may achieve has been the big temptation involved, and NASCAR may be the sport best suited to legalized gambling.
For the sport to benefit most, teams and tracks need to see genuine benefit. Betting should also shy away from NASCAR's misbegotten playoff idea - instead betting should be about winning races, laps led, and hard charger awards - performance, in short, not contrived title formats.
So we thus await the All-Star affair and whether NASCAR can begin getting things in better order for going forward.
"A budget cap is one aspect of the wider topic of the competitive framework of the sport, which has been an imoretant topic of late in Team Owner Council meetings and RTA discussions."
Andrew Murstein of Richard Petty Motorsports in the Sports Business Daily piece advocates going to more night races and going to some mid-week races, ignoring the failure of night racing in Winston Cup and the fact that late start times for Sunday races have helped drive fans away.
This comes as the 2018 season has seen some genuine improvement in the racing, with a wild and compelling Daytona 500, a strikingly spirited Phoenix 300, and a wild finish at Kansas.
Kansas had several spirited bouts up front.
It also had a huge melee late in the race.
Kevin Harvick had to run down Martin Truex to win the race.
Word of a possible sale of at least partial ownership to an outside entity has brought out the usual bitterness from some long-time fans with the usual nonsensical calls for "bring back stock bodies" etc. - never mind stock bodies proved unusable long ago. Solutions are well known and should not need belaboring and the bitterness by some fans continues to reek of spurned lover syndrome.
As for the on-track competition, with the coming All-Star Race the restrictor plate-draft duct package will get its first race on an intermediate oval after last year's successful Lillys Xfinity 250 at Indianapolis. Given that the draft historically has mattered a great deal on intermediates like Charlotte and Atlanta one can feel this package will open up passing. The likely winners will be Fords, whose program is simply that much better than everyone else's, especially the Stewart-Haas Fords, though Penske's bunch is still good.
JGR and Truex are still stout, but it's obvious Truex's team misses the #77 car, as their muscle simply isn't there now.
Chevrolet has become irrelevant, period. More and more the prospect that Chevrolet will not be in any contention the rest of the season is becoming real, and shows how the favoritism of Chevy to Hendrick's team is now costing them - having done nothing to bolster their other teams, Chevrolet is now not just also-rans but junk as such. Chevy needs to reassign some of their engineers to other teams and get all of their teams working directly together a la the Pontiacs two decades past.
A humorous byproduct is the failure of the young gun drivers, who have simply been out of contention from the start of the season. True, Chase Elliott has led laps and fought for top fives but nowhere has shown the maturity or intelligence that indicates he's learning how to win. His young Hendrick teammates right now look lost at the Cup level; they look like actual rookies, and weak ones at that. The old NASCAR saw that it will take five years to see if the kids actually can become competent racers seems to have come back to the sport - talk about throwback.
Elliott's idiotic tantrum at Ricky Stenhouse after the race shows what's wrong with the young guns - Stenhouse swerved Elliott high in Four and afterward Elliott drilled him, then complained about Stenhouse racing him too hard, a contemptible opinion for which Elliott was deservedly ripped by Larry McReynolds. Stenhouse for his part does deserve criticism for chopping off Elliott instead of holding his line better.
The flameout of the young guns has now cost one of them his race team as Trevor Bayne is now going down as the first spectacular drafting bust of NASCAR in recent memory. One struggles to see him ever getting another Cup chance.
******
An unexpected angle came with the Supreme Court's overruling of government bans on sports betting, opening up the potential that sports bodies will see direct gambling by fans on contests, players, etc. Concern about competition integrity is legitimate, but as pointed out on Sirius XM radiocasts it is bookies themselves who expose cheating scandals and thus ensure competitions are legitimate. The potential revenue sanctioning bodies may achieve has been the big temptation involved, and NASCAR may be the sport best suited to legalized gambling.
For the sport to benefit most, teams and tracks need to see genuine benefit. Betting should also shy away from NASCAR's misbegotten playoff idea - instead betting should be about winning races, laps led, and hard charger awards - performance, in short, not contrived title formats.
So we thus await the All-Star affair and whether NASCAR can begin getting things in better order for going forward.
Monday, May 14, 2018
The Fraud Of Palestinian 'Refugees'
By treating "Palestinian" "refugees" as something they've never been, the world - and especially the uncurious media - enabled a multi-generational humanitarian swindle.
Sunday, May 13, 2018
2018 Maine Mammoths vs Massachusetts Pirates
Arena football is as exciting and competitive as anything and the first-year Massachusetts Pirates squared off in Week 6 with the Maine Mammoths in a wild affair where two-score leads were twice erased, a unique scoring rule was utilized to pivotal effect by the Mammoths, and the game went to a wild overtime.
Thursday, May 10, 2018
Another Feminist Perv Goes Down
New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman fancied himself a leader of the "resistance" to Donald Trump and a supporter of feminist causes - including abortion. And like all such, he got exposed as a serial rapist.
Of course he wasn't just a feminist perv, he (being a liberal) was a crook.
Abortion is, first and formost, an easy way out for men who do not wish to take responsibility for their sexually libertine lifestyle. This is why first-wave feminists opposed it.
Of course he wasn't just a feminist perv, he (being a liberal) was a crook.
Sunday, May 06, 2018
Mueller Transcript Showcases His Fraudulence
Robert Mueller lost big when a judge in Virginia ruled he overstepped badly in prosecuting Paul Manafort as part of his attack-Trump vendetta.
The full transcript.
The full transcript.
Wednesday, May 02, 2018
Tuesday, May 01, 2018
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