What if Bush cancels the football season? - Hunter Thompson

[indigobusiness]

Don't You Dare Cancel Football
By Hunter S. Thompson
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"The football season has been cancelled this year. The White House just announced it." "No!" he shouted. "That's impossible! Football season will never be canceled in America -- not in an election year. There would be riots." "Exactly, "I replied. "Horrible riots every Sunday afternoon, in cities all over the country. Football fans will go crazy. I already feel the Fear. "It's true, but not because of our football season being canceled. No. We must have football. What would this country be without football in October?

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Where is Richard Nixon, now that we need him? He was crooked in every way and his hands were covered with blood -- but he was a rabid, high-rolling football fan with a sly taste for gin; and on some nights, he could be good company.


Ah, but we live in a new century now, and the president is not a football fan. The first real game of the season will be a huge event for most of us; but for young George Bush, it will mean nothing. He will feel no relief, no escape from the same sense of doom that fell on his father, only 12 years ago. The old man failed when he tried to get re-elected, and so will his son. They both peaked too soon, about six months before football season; and after that, they sank like punctured fish.

So the time has come to get busy on what we call "the summer book" in the business of gambling on presidential elections. And right now the London/Vegas numbers are about 51-49 percent for Bush, if only because he is the filthy-rich incumbent and the son of a global oil-industry magnate.
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http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=thompson/040727

Now if they cancelled Baseball...

[eaprez]

1. Then millions of women around the country would be elated....

...think of all the household chores that would get done!

[indigobusiness]

2. By whom?

The survivors of the revolution?

[HuckleB]

3. Man, Hunter sure doesn't have anything to say anymore, does he?

:eyes:

[indigobusiness]

4. Not much

But he keeps promising to take the gloves off.

I'm waiting.

[HuckleB]

5. Gloves? Waiting? It's well past time for him to retire.

Sometimes that's best. In his case, it comes 20 years too late, but what can you do?

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[Stuckinthebush]

8. Agreed...

But it is an article for ESPN.

[Cocoa]

6. Prince Bandar wouldn't allow it

he's a huge Cowboys fan.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

12. This has to be satire, folks

I think what he's saying is that canceling football season by presidential decree would cause bigger civil disturbances than canceling the November election.

What have been the biggest riots in the past few years? Protests over the stolen election? No way. They've all been associated with sporting events.

Thompson may be right. If Marx were writing today, he'd say, "Sports are the opiate of the masses."

[HuckleB]

13. Yes. It's satire.

It's bad satire, but it's satire.

And your "Marx quote" is quite correct, especially in regard to football.

[moobu2]

14. O/T --George W. Bush sucker-punches a rugby opponent at Yale

As long as we're re-examining the 1960s, looking for signs of character, trying to decide if a man who volunteered for combat and was decorated five times was more or less courageous than a guy who didn't even show up for his own medical exam... here's George W. Bush during his college days, hitting a fellow sportsman in the face.





The above photo, credited to the Yale yearbook (the caption is in the original), appeared in yesterday's Los Angeles Times, alongside a story on the appeal of "bad boys" in American politics. It's not in the Times' online version, and the rest of the country should see it, I think.

http://www.thismodernworld.com/weblog/mtarchives/week_2004_08_08.html#001687