Go Giants!

[Lord Jim]

Hmm...I seem to recall that the Rangers have Cliff Lee pitching in the first game!

Go, Rangers!

Oh goodie! A Rangers fan....

And I was afraid I wouldn't have anyone here to taunt...

[Lord Jim]

I do know of course, that the Giants will ultimately emerge victorious, because they are, as I said back when they were playing the tomahawk choppers... A Team Of Destiny....

But exactly how many games it will take them to defeat the Former Washington Senators...(Stolen from Washington and moved to Texas in the middle of the night by one of the most vile figures in the history of professional sports, Robert Short)

I wont be able to predict until after the first game...

[Joe Guy]

Congratulations, LJ!

You are now not only the CSB Snopester-dude, who embarrasses the New England Trio with their own posts, you are the people's punctilious prognosticator of pennants.

In other news, I think I'm going to need blood pressure pills to get me through the World Series.

[Guinevere]

Please Joe do not paint my beloved New England in the same light as "the trio." Neither New England or I (who also lives there) deserve that.

[Joe Guy]

Please Joe do not paint my beloved New England in the same light as "the trio." Neither New England or I (who also lives there) deserve that.

I can't help it if the New England Trio (NET) lives in New England.

And I don't believe that the NET in any way represent New England.

They just live there.

[Lord Jim]

I don't believe that the NET in any way represent New England.

They just live there.

Or under the nearest bridge...



I think "Troll Trio" is probably more appropriate than "New England Trio"....

[Jarlaxle]

Hmm...I seem to recall that the Rangers have Cliff Lee pitching in the first game!

Go, Rangers!

Oh goodie! A Rangers fan....

And I was afraid I wouldn't have anyone here to taunt...

Hardly a Rangers fan...I just want the team that bounced the Yankees to win.

[Lord Jim]

and Danny DeVito notwithstanding,

Digression:
I've always thought the character "Louie De Palma" that Devito played brilliantly on Taxi , was the single most vile, reprehensible, doesn't-have-a-single-redeeming-quality character in the history of situation comedy...(the only one who would even come close would be Frank Burns from MASH)

But the Frank Reynolds character he plays in "It's Always Sunny..." makes Louie De Palma look like Bing Crosby in The Bells Of St. Mary.....

[Big RR]

A question to baseball fans--the trophies (NL championship and MVP) were presented in the locker room area reserved for press conferences--isn't it usually presented on the field? I did here some Philly fans booing the Giants on the field after the game (then again, these are probably the same people who booed Santa all those years ago at the EAgles game), but did they really move the presentation off the field because of those jerks?

[oldr_n_wsr]

Congrats to the Giants and the Rangers. They beat both teams I was rooting against. Good luck to whomever you want to see win the World Series but it really doesn't matter to me. And with Cablevision and Fox still fighting about how much money one will pay the other and still blacking out the telecasts on FOX 5, I don't think I'll be seeing the games.

Oh, and "Always Sunny..." is a great show.

[Sue U]

The Giants played well, the Phils couldn't keep it together; congrats to the new NL champs.

"Next year."

[oldr_n_wsr]

The Giants played well, the Phils couldn't keep it together; congrats to the new NL champs.

"Next year."

I'm sure they (the Phillies) will be better than my Mets.

[Lord Jim]

The Giants played well, the Phils couldn't keep it together; congrats to the new NL champs.

I have to say Sue, that's very gracious of you....

You're a much more polite, magnanimous, and dignified loser than I would have been.....

A quality which will serve you well on election night....

[Andrew D]

Lord Jim, you have predicted that the Democrats will retain control of the Senate. So:

--> For the past two years, the recalcitrant Republican minority in the Senate has been blocking (or watering down) Democratic policy initiatives; and

--> For the next two years, the recalcitrant Republican minority in the Senate will be able to block (or water down) Democratic policity initiatives.

I'm not seeing a big difference in legislative outcomes here ....

[Lord Jim]

I'm not seeing a big difference in legislative outcomes here ....

I thought I covered that in the previous lesson:

There are two schools of thought on what will happen next, and being an eternal optimist, I'm hoping for the former....

The first possibility, is something similar to what happened after the Dems lost their majority in 1994....

A liberal Democratic President, "getting it", and understanding that he had to move to the center if he wanted to be re-elected, and working with a Republican Congress, (equally well motivated) producing some of the best legislation this country had seen in a generation; The Welfare Reform Act and The Crime Bill....

Today that would mean a stimulus strategy that emphasizes the resuscitation of small business, and an energy policy that actually produces energy.... [ETA: by "producing energy", I mean in amounts sufficient to have a meaningful impact on our energy needs in the living memory of those who are at least "toddler" age today...)

The other possibility of course, is absolute gridlock; Obama and his folks may decide that the best political strategy would be to let the country go completely to hell, refuse to compromise at all, and hope they can blame the misery on the Republican Congress...

In my view, not only would that be terrible for the country; it would be really bad politics...

If he adopts that approach, I believe he will find himself sitting in a heated chair on the East Side of The Capitol at noon Jan., 20th 2013 watching Mitt Romney sworn into The Presidency....

[Andrew D]

"Lesson"? Hardly.

In the 1994 election, the Democrats lost both houses of Congress. By your own prediction, in this election, the Democrats will lose only one of the houses of Congress. And in the 104th Congress (the one seated by the 1994 election), the filibuster was not used nearly as much as in the 111th Congress.

Thus, your so-called "lesson" fails political pedagogy 101 on two counts: (1) It conflates (a) losing majorities in both houses with (b) losing a majority in one house while retaining a majority in the other. (2) It treats a preceding Senate (that of the 103rd Congress) which was not filibuster-crazy as equivalent to a preceding Senate (that of the 111th Congress) which has been the most filibuster-crazy in all of American history.

Not much of "lesson," really.

If the recalcitrant Republican minority in the next Senate actually works with the Democrats, then your so-called "lesson" might well, though purely by accident, align with (despite having failed to explain) the events. Of course, if the recalcitrant Republican minority in the current Senate had had some policy objectives other than making the Democrats look bad, and the well being of ordinary Americans be damned, we would already be better off than we are now.

But where is the evidence that the Senate Republicans will be at all inclined to work with the Democrats to get us out of the mess we're in, rather than remaining content to continue doing what they have been doing -- perpetuating that mess just so that they can blame it on the Democrats? I see none.

So I put the question again: For the past two years, the recalcitrant Republican minority in the Senate has been blocking (or watering down) Democratic policy initiatives. And for the next two years, the recalcitrant Republican minority in the Senate will be able to block (or water down) Democratic policity initiatives. Republican Senators have been filibustering for purely partisan purposes. There is no reason -- unless you adduce evidence supporting one -- to believe that Republican Senators will not continue filibustering for purely partisan purposes. Where's the big difference?

[Sue U]

The Giants played well, the Phils couldn't keep it together; congrats to the new NL champs.

I have to say Sue, that's very gracious of you....

You're a much more polite, magnanimous, and dignified loser than I would have been.....

Of course I would prefer that "my" team win (Philadelphia has a tremendous self-esteem problem), but mostly what I like is seeing the beauty of well-played baseball. This was a good series with some very close games; it was good fun despite the ultimate loss (honestly, seeing Ryan Howard watch that last pitch go by was just heartbreaking).

Lord Jim, you have predicted that the Democrats will retain control of the Senate. So:

Hey, Andrew, this is a baseball thread! You trying to start a rhubarb?

[oldr_n_wsr]

Still no Cablevision vs FOX settlement, so no World Series for me. (at least not on TV).

[Big RR]

Can't you just hook up a set of rabbit ears; or a wire coat hanger, and get channel 5? You're pretty close to the transmitter and not a lot of mountains/hills in between.

[Guinevere]

I don't think that works any more in the digital age. No great loss -- baseball on the radio is a wonderful thing.

Go Rangers!!