[This post was originally published on The Living Room Tumblr.]
Mail-in election? Ha! I spent two hours last night researching the candidates, then dropped off my ballot today – Election Day. I refuse to go along with this newfangled mail-in, multi-day election claptrap. Elections are held on one day, Tuesday, like God intended. Why, in my day, sonny, we walked to the polling place, uphill both ways, and used lever voting machines! Now get off my lawn!
Good news everyone! The Pac-12 media rights deal is done, and the conference looks to have hit the jackpot! Expected to be officially announced soon, the deal will reportedly bring in over $225 million annually for the next 12 years, for a total of approximately… THREE BILLION DOLLARS!!!
That’s a major upgrade from the current deal, worth only $45 million a year. It also blows past the $170 million threshold that would have seen USC and UCLA receive an extra $2 million cut, as part of the agreement to get them to sign on to equal revenue sharing. Anyway, here are the details as we know them now:
The deal is great for all member schools, but particularly so for the smaller revenue schools like WSU and Oregon State (and insanely good for new member Utah, although they won’t get full revenue sharing for a few years).
So what’s next for Scott and the conference? Well, according to Jon Wilner, who has been following the media deal issue closely, it’s even more expansion, but not the kind that adds more teams. No, instead it would be expansion of the Pac-12 media brand internationally along the Pacific Rim. Not necessarily a huge revenue generator, but a big deal for exposure, especially in the Olympic sports and academically for the various schools.
NOTE: Given the subject matter of this post, I feel compelled to make clear this post in no way reflects the views, opinions, or positions of Brendan.
A friend of mine posted a link to this note on the idea of jury nullification.
Which got me thinking. The idea of a inalienable right to trial by jury came out of the Crown’s capricious application of the law against treason. That is, the point of juries is to nullify capricious or unethical state action. A judge can do a better and more efficient job of finding fact within the confines of the law. The point of juries then, is that you don’t trust judges not to act in collusion with the state.
Thus the question becomes, absent the positive power, right, dare I say responsibility, of nullification on behalf of juries, what is the point of having them? The ethical conscience of a community might not always be what we would like, indeed there are egregious cases of it being completely bereft of such, but none the less, the point of a jury is to reflect the conscience of the community in the court room as a check on the power of the state. And given the above, isn’t it rather unethical, if not blatantly contrary to the point of the Constitution, not to tell juries they indeed possess this power?
Mail-in election? Ha! I spent two hours last night researching the candidates, then dropped off my ballot today — Election Day — at the nearest Voter Service Center.
I refuse to go along with this newfangled mail-in, multi-day election nonsense. Elections are held on ONE day, always a Tuesday, as God intended when He invented democracy. Why, in my day, sonny, we walked to the polling place, uphill both ways, and used lever voting machines! Now get off my lawn! 😉
[This post was originally published on The Living Room Tumblr.]
Obama going to Ground Zero Thursday. Can he invite Bush? That’d be really great. Unity!
[This post was originally published on The Living Room Tumblr.]
Remarkable, awful Tuscaloosa damage footage, courtesy of The Daily’s aerial drone (!).
A thought just popped into my head. Obama is going to Ground Zero on Thursday. He should invite George W. Bush to join him. I’m serious. Can you imagine what an amazing American moment that would be? A transcendent moment of unity and celebration: the two presidents together, marking their joint victory over terror and evil. What’s the downside? Obama lives up to his post-partisan, unifying promise, and looks incredibly magnanimous and presidential. Bush gets his chance to bask in the success he so desperately wanted. Everybody wins, most of all America. Make this happen, White House.
P.S. Speaking of Bush, this morning as I listened to my 9/11 anthem, I was particularly moved (again) by the line from his underrated November 2001 speech to the U.N. General Assembly:
The terrorists are violating the tenets of every religion, including the one they invoke. … They encourage murder and suicide in the name of a great faith that forbids both. They dare to ask God’s blessing as they set out to kill innocent men, women and children. But the God of Isaac and Ismail would never answer such a prayer. And a murderer is not a martyr, he is just a murderer.
Bush had some really good speeches in that post-9/11 period, and he delivered them well. He really rose to that occasion, and whatever my issues with the later years of his presidency, I’ll always be grateful to him for that.
[This post was originally published on The Living Room Tumblr.]
We’re still here. You’re not. Go figure.
[This post was originally published on The Living Room Tumblr.]
Things I’ve learned, or re-learned, in the last 12 hours:
