navigationRoger Robinson: Why I Still Love Racing at Age 82
Dana Gioia, renowned poet, literary critic and chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts, delivers the 116th Commencement address to Stanford University’s Class of 2007 at Stanford Stadium. …here
John Boehner, Ohio Republican, was Speaker of the House from 2011-2015, then resigning from Congress in disgust.
Fun excerpt from his memoir:
“At one point in the mid-1990s, I got fed up and decided to yank their chains anyway. I was on the Agriculture Committee and we were getting ready to put together the 1996 farm bill. I walked into my office while this was going on and found a sugar lobbyist hanging around, trying to stay close to the action. I felt like being a smart-ass so I made some wisecrack about the sugar industry raping the taxpayers. Without another word, I walked into my private office and shut the door.
I had no real plan to go after the sugar people. I was just screwing with the guy. My phone did not stop ringing for the next five weeks. The guy must have walked straight out of my office to the nearest phone booth (or maybe he had a cell phone even then—these guys were loaded) and called his office and announced: “Boehner, Ohio 8th—Code Red.”
I had no idea how many people in my district were connected to the sugar industry. People were calling all day, telling me they made pumps or plugs or boxes or some other such part used in sugar production and I was threatening their job. Mayors called to tell me about employers their towns depended on who would be hurt by a sugar downturn. It was the most organized effort I had ever seen.
And that’s why you don’t fuck with sugar.”
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Currently a shill for pot. Dope for the dopes.
Lots of fun news since Friday.
I asked my secret source if the new coaching protocols included the football coach. “That’s my understanding,” he replied, I think, with a smirk. Within 24 hours the team was hammered by Utah. 48 hours after that it was announced the coach is leaving for Miami at almost double the pay, 8 million a year. At 4 or 8 million per, you think a football coach can’t and won’t say anything to his minions he damn well pleases?
Isn’t it coaching malpractice if a coach doesn’t know what’s going on with the physical and mental well-being of his/her charges? A full athletic scholarship at UO is worth $50,000. If there’s something wrong, the athlete not performing to expectations, the coach needs to know why.
Malcolm Gladwell writes:
I think we’d all be better off if, when it came to reviewing prospective students, colleges were more interested in whether someone participated in sports. And a lot less interested in how well they performed. And for those students who don’t do sports at all, it would be nice if the cross-country coach went around campus knocking on people’s dorm rooms and saying: “A couple hundred of us are going out for a run later. Do you want to join us?” ….More.
Check out our latest Q&A with Pat Melgarus, biographer of the famous (best?) track coach Joe I. Vigil, December OTC Newsletter… here
Ku Stevens, Nevada prep cross country champion, is the sole runner on his team. Read. …Wants to run for Oregon University.