It's A Game....

I have changed the name of the university in this blog, because I don't think the school should be the focus here. To my knowledge, it's a great university that produces alumni who do good things in the world.
And, I don't think that knowing, from the start, what school I'm talking about will help me make my point. On the contrary, I think that in order to get my point across, and to have you reflect on what I am saying, I should leave the name of the university out of it for a moment.
We are going to call the school State Fact University.
State Fact University has a sports team that is very successful. In the history of this sport, there have been a few "dynasties", and State Fact University can now, rightly and proudly, add their name to that small list of dynasties--they join that short list of programs who have won tournament after tournament and national championship after national championship. SFU have alumni who have gone on to the professional level in this sport, adding an additional layer of luster to the accomplishments of this sport at this university.The players are, for the most part, good sports--I say this with some degree of experience; I have seen some really dirty players in this sport, and I have seen some real hotdogs--players who strut up and down the court and force fans to pay attention to them. Ugh. This team does not have players like that.
Alumni should be rightly proud of this team; no other university in the history of this sport has won more consecutive matches.
In fact, this year, I would make the case that the National Championship should just be given to SFU, and the rest of the universities should then play for runner-up. They're that good.
And yet....
And yet...It's just a game, and these are young women who are playing so that they can go to college. College is so expensive these days, and these women want a good education from a good school so that they can have a better chance at life. They have amazing skills in this sport, and they're choosing to use these skills in exchange for a quality education.
I am in awe of them and their skills.
And yet....
And yet...it's just a game. We have to keep that in mind; it's a game, it's played many places, many levels, and has a LOT of fans.
But it's a game.
And yet the coach of the SFU team seems to have lost sight of this. This coach has a very successful program and good women who play on the team. This coaches' team has won more games in a row than any other in the history of the sport. Nobody comes close to the bragging rights that this team has; the coach knows the game and knows how to play and WIN. No doubt, ever. I admire that; I find it amazing.
But it's a game.
It's a game, and this coach has a mindset that I just don't understand. This year, this team is undefeated. This team has beat their opponents by an AVERAGE of 30 points. I can't imagine that any game has been in doubt, given the success of this team and their mindset to win. For the past few seasons, the story has been the same; this team dominates the game...Every. Year. Sure, there have been close games; games when your starters need to play every minute in order to avoid a loss. But those are few and far between. And, the average win is by 30 points. Here's what I don't understand--this coach of this SFU team plays only about 6 players on average (there can be 5 players on the field of play at one time). The rest of the team sit on the bench for a lot of the match.
Now, if I was a coach (and I in no way can match the intelligence for the game that this coach has), and my team was consistently beating opponents by a large margin, I would play my subs. A LOT. In fact, my team would have a pretty level playing time average; it's just the right and fair thing to do when you're playing a game. Why run up a score, just because you can? Because, by not freely substituting, that's what this coach is doing.
The last straw for me came last night; it's the reason I am writing--otherwise my head would explode. I was watching SFU play in a tournament game. The score very early on was 35-11. The final score was 100-44. One of the SFU players scored 40 points, and was 10 of 10 from 3-point range. Instead of being impressed, I was angry. What coach, leading by over 20 points, would encourage any player to keep shooting 3's, let alone so many over a period of what was going to be a blowout anyway? What coach would keep a player in long enough to score almost as many points as the entire other team??? What kind of person does that?  How is this "sporting"? How is this anything but cruel to your opponent?
And...It's a game!
It's not sporting to do this, old chap. It leads to people really disliking you, and leads to alumni and fans having to defend you. Over a game, for crying out loud.
Knock it off, coach. You have some pretty talented players. You know that. Play them. Play them all. Your winning record is not in danger, and you could make some young women feel pretty happy.
Or, keep doing what you're doing. Eventually, your bench players will find out that there ARE other programs in the country; programs where they can shine. Or just play the game they obviously love.
It's a game, coach. Let them play.

Freedom of the Press, Always

"Freedom of the Press

The right, guaranteed by the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, to gather, publish, and distribute information and ideas without government restriction; this right encompasses freedom from prior restraints on publication and freedom from Censorship.
The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution reads, in part, "Congress shall make no law… abridging the Freedom of Speech, or of the press." The courts have long struggled to determine whether the Framers of the Constitution intended to differentiate press freedom from speech freedom. Most have concluded that freedom of the press derives from freedom of speech."

In this country, we have guaranteed the right for freedom of the press. There is to be no government censorship, and there is no government "state-run news agency" (although Mike Pence did try this in Indiana while governor). While there have been times, I'm sure, that those in power would rather that the press be shut down, freedom of the press has been "sacred" in this country. Yes, the press does sometimes get it wrong (I have been misquoted before), but since the beginning of our democracy, we have had confidence that the real, impartial news will be delivered to us every day by educated journalists who seek the truth. We counted on it, for how else were we going to know what our leaders, at every level, were doing? We couldn't all be at City Hall, at the Capitol Building, at the White House every minute of every day. But some journalists could, and we counted on their words, photos, and recordings. We digested all of that, and came to our own understandings of the world. 
When I was in grade school, we were given newspapers, and taught the difference between the facts in print ("The mayor visited a local school today, and gave a speech in which she said.....") and the opinions ("The mayor looked terrific today."). We were later taught what an original source was, and we understood that sometimes, a source could not safely be identified, but it was the right of the journalist to not disclose that source. In my lifetime, the biggest example of this was the person called "Deepthroat" in the Watergate story; but even with this anonymous source, the facts had to be verified before the story could be printed...true, trusted journalism.
And then came the internet, and then came social media.
Truth and impartiality, true unbiased facts--all are harder to find these days. You have to really know, and understand, that a blog post is not real news--it's an opinion piece, sometimes bolstered by fact. I do try, when writing my blog, to provide links to facts to prove my point, but sometimes "professional bloggers" don't. I try to avoid sharing things on social media that just aren't true, or are a distraction from the truth, but a lot of people don't to that. And, I've found that if we trust the person, we trust what they are sharing, no matter how ridiculous or absurd the "true story" is.
Amazingly, the news, and news sources, for each of us has become "slanted", and now we have a president that has used this for the worst possible purposes. His Chief Strategist came directly into the White House from an internet "news source" provider (Breitbart) that publishes lies, states them as facts, and then reports those "facts" to others. And, most tragically, these lies are regurgitated by "journalists" on a "news network" that people have come to trust for actual news. The "journalists" on this "news network" have not taken the time to verify the "facts" coming from Breitbart--they have done no original fact-checking, but have reported opinion as facts. We know this because there is just no way any fact-checking could be done, as quickly as the news story is re-reported. 
At this point, let me be clear. You can watch all the Fox news you want, but if you rely on that station for all your news, you are not getting true, unbiased, factual news all the time. I suggest you also take the time to read an AP Story once in a while, or an article or two from the New York Times (if for no other reason than to discover the US is not the only country in the world--an important thing to remember). And, if you want to see, for yourself, what your national leaders are up to, turn on C-Span. 
This is a long way to say:  
YOU SHOULD BE FRIGHTENED. YOU SHOULD BE FRIGHTENED ABOUT WHAT IS HAPPENING, RIGHT NOW, IN OUR COUNTRY.
In the past 24 hours, the President of the United States has used a speech to accuse the most trust-worthy, reliable news providers of being "fake" and "dishonest". And, he has said we should no longer trust the anonymous sources that real journalists have to sometimes rely on (see above). If you disagree with absolutely everything I have said so far about Breitbart and Fox, you should at least agree with me on this:  the survival of our democracy depends on "two sides to every story" and "the truth will set us free" and "trust but verify". 
The President of the United States does not believe this. His Chief Strategist is going to do everything in his power to destroy the free press in this country.
Hyperbole? No. Actual fact? Yes.
Yesterday, two things happened. The New York Times, CNN, the Los Angeles Times, Politico, and Buzzfeed were all denied access to the Press Secretary. 
Then, late last night, this news broke:  (from the Washington Post):

"The Trump administration has enlisted senior members of the intelligence community and Congress in efforts to counter news stories about Trump associates’ ties to Russia, a politically charged issue that has been under investigation by the FBI as well as lawmakers now defending the White House.

Acting at the behest of the White House, the officials made calls to news organizations last week in attempts to challenge stories about alleged contacts between members of President Trump’s campaign team and Russian intelligence operatives, U.S. officials said.

The calls were orchestrated by the White House after unsuccessful attempts by the administration to get senior FBI officials to speak with news organizations and dispute the accuracy of stories on the alleged contacts with Russia...

The effort also involved senior lawmakers with access to classified intelligence about Russia, including Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) and Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), the chairmen of the Senate and House intelligence committees. A spokesman for Nunes said that he had already begun speaking to reporters to challenge the story and that, “at the request of a White House communications aide, Chairman Nunes then spoke to an additional reporter and delivered the same message.”

Unlike the others, Nunes spoke on the record and was subsequently quoted in the Wall Street Journal.

In an interview, Burr acknowledged that he “had conversations about” Russia-related news reports with the White House and engaged with news organizations to dispute articles by the New York Times and CNN that alleged “repeated” or “constant” contact between Trump campaign members and Russian intelligence operatives."

Simply put? The White House is trying to control the news, and the truth, in this country, and have been able to enlist the help of members of Congress in reporting lies to the American people. 
So, where do we go from here? Back to reality television, our favorite sports teams, and believing that all of this is just politics? 
Or do we try to fight back? And how? We can't wait until 2018...our democracy will be gone by then.
Help me. Help us. Resist.