The Stig
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by The Stig on Sept 13, 2009 12:40:52 GMT -5
One John McEnroe never threatened to stuff a tennis ball down a lineswoman's f&*#ing throat. Serena Williams is a no class bully. No, Johnny Mac did a lot worse. He once called the umpire "an abortion." If this happened in the middle of the set, nobody would be talking about it. It was a simple point penalty, not a DQ. It just happened to come on match point. Foot faults generally tend to touch a nerve with players. Bad line calls are pretty routine, and now they can just challenge them. But foot faults are different for some reason. If the same line judge calls a few foot faults on a player, they tend to get an earful. A few years ago Hewitt went ballistic at a foot fault at the US Open and started screaming racist comments about the line judge. That doesn't forgive what Serena did. She shouldn't have done it, plain and simple. But it would be wrong to call her a classless bully for it.
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The Stig
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by The Stig on Sept 13, 2009 12:35:29 GMT -5
While I haven't heard anything about Holder (or my sarcasm detector hasn't kicked in), I do feel compelled to defend Serena here. I've never been a huge fan of hers, but both Williams sisters have always been classy competitors who are well-respected in the tennis world. Serena isn't everybody's favorite player, but I've never heard a negative word spoken about her sportsmanship. Yes, she went too far today and deserved the point penalty, but that's certainly not the norm for her. Um, she got a previous penalty in the same tourney for breaking a racket. Which is pretty common in women's tennis. Other women do it much more frequently than Serena, who isn't known for her temper.
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The Stig
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by The Stig on Sept 13, 2009 10:54:38 GMT -5
While I haven't heard anything about Holder (or my sarcasm detector hasn't kicked in), I do feel compelled to defend Serena here. I've never been a huge fan of hers, but both Williams sisters have always been classy competitors who are well-respected in the tennis world.
Serena isn't everybody's favorite player, but I've never heard a negative word spoken about her sportsmanship. Yes, she went too far today and deserved the point penalty, but that's certainly not the norm for her.
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The Stig
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by The Stig on Sept 12, 2009 22:18:01 GMT -5
Diplomacy was invented as a way to deal with countries that you don't like. Saying that we won't engage in diplomacy with countries we don't like is like saying we won't give counseling to suicidal people because that would give them attention, which is what they want.
I agree with theexorcist that 6 party talks are the best way to negotiate with North Korea. But North Korea isn't going to the 6 party talks. The only opening we have is bilateral talks, so that's what we've got to take.
Unfortunately, North Korea has basically all the bargaining power in this deal. They have nukes and even more importantly they have South Korea essentially held hostage. The situation on the Korean peninsula won't change in a good way until North Korea wants it to, and that's not happening anytime soon.
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The Stig
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by The Stig on Sept 12, 2009 8:56:01 GMT -5
When clicking on the link, I only get the GU seal and a blank page... anyone else? On edit: this page is not Firefox compatible... c'mon Georgetown! I'm running Firefox and it worked fine.
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The Stig
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by The Stig on Sept 10, 2009 6:03:33 GMT -5
Do you Really think the government does anything "better" than the private sector? Health care, for starters. The VA and Medicare are both much more efficient and effective than their private sector counterparts.
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The Stig
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by The Stig on Sept 9, 2009 20:26:09 GMT -5
After what happened at the Dome last year, any Gtown fans that attend should wear helmets and take umbrellas.
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The Stig
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
Posts: 2,844
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Post by The Stig on Sept 9, 2009 18:58:35 GMT -5
Some pretty remarkable details emerging in the Piquet crash case: www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/78446Renault admit that they discussed the idea of Piquet deliberately crashing, but said it was Piquet's own idea. Briatore also said that he was the victim of an extortion event by the Piquet family. Like a lot of F1 stories, this one just keeps getting stranger and stranger....
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The Stig
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by The Stig on Sept 7, 2009 18:39:00 GMT -5
Although many of us disagree on the way these goals should be achieved, I think we can all agree these are good goals, right? By making these statements, Obama is not suggesting children should support overly large subsidies for alternative energy, huge curbs on carbon emissions, or single payer health care. He's identifying goals 99% of Americans agree on and allowing teachers and schoolchildren to engage in a debate on how best to achieve them. Doubtlessly some will agree with the President, but many others will not. I said these were oblique political statements. His agenda is to develop new sources of renewable energy to the exclusion of allowing us to use those sources that we now have (coal, nuclear, oil, gas). His agenda is also to push a cap and trade measure that is in the congress now and by referring to protecting the environment he is obliquely fostering cap and trade because this is the environmental issue to be in the news. The reference to making America more fair and more free is an oblique reference to the point he often made overseas that the U.S. has made many mistakes in the past; and it's an oblique statement that he considers America to be not fair and not free. Keep in mind I gave him an A for content despite what I think were oblique political statements. Did I use the word oblique enough? I get where you're coming from, but remember the audience here. I doubt too many schoolkids listening to this speech understand subtle oblique political statements.
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The Stig
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by The Stig on Sept 4, 2009 21:38:49 GMT -5
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The Stig
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
Posts: 2,844
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Post by The Stig on Sept 3, 2009 18:06:59 GMT -5
Reading through the NCAA press release, it sounds like this was simply a major lack of oversight by the athletic office. For example, this quote from the release: "The committee found the university lacked internal controls or systems to monitor the program or detect whether abuses took place. The committee also found the university failed to provide training for the baseball work-study supervisors and student-athletes regarding the accurate completion and review of timecards."
I'm not that well versed with how our AD works, but it wouldn't surprise me if this was simply a result of a lack of resources.
It also annoys me that one of the members of the NCAA committee that worked on this case was the former AD at Miami, a school that isn't known for being squeaky clean.
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The Stig
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by The Stig on Sept 2, 2009 17:09:46 GMT -5
I guess I share DeGioia's views for now. It's unfortunate that this happened, but it looks like our people responded appropriately.
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The Stig
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by The Stig on Aug 31, 2009 18:04:59 GMT -5
It's entirely possible that Piquet is using the issue to get back at Renault. Like I said before, he was very bitter about the way the team treated him. Another thing to remember is that Renault's boss Flavio Briatore has always had a very contentious relationship with FIA President Max Mosley. Mosley is retiring at the end of this year. Is he just capitalizing on his last chance to go after Briatore? It's possible. Both those issues you raised are indeed things to consider. Like I said, something like this has never happened before. Here's the best video I could find of the crash: www.fastfever.com/?vid=403
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The Stig
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by The Stig on Aug 30, 2009 18:07:16 GMT -5
And in the race, Fisichella finished a strong 2nd behind Kimi Raikkonen, who took Ferrari's first victory of the season.
But the most interesting piece of news this weekend didn't have anything to do with the race at Spa, or even this season. The news tidbit that caught everybody's attention was a bizarre headline that the Renault team are under investigation for allegedly ordering one of their drivers to deliberately crash in a (successful) attempt to help his teammate win last year's Singapore Grand Prix.
The incident in question occurred on Lap 14 of the race. Renault's Fernando Alonso had just made a surprisingly early pitstop, and his teammate Nelson Piquet Jr. promptly spun on his own and crashed, bringing out a full-course caution. Under the full-course caution rules, the pack bunched up, so when everybody else made their pitstops Alonso (who had already stopped) took the lead, which he held until the end.
At the time, F1 fans and pundits joked that Piquet (who is an awful driver) must have spun intentionally to help Alonso win, but nobody took it seriously. For starters, it would require Piquet to do something right, which he was never capable of doing.
Fast forward to a couple weeks ago, and Renault fire Piquet after he continues to suck this year. Piquet immediately puts a multi-page rant against the Renault team up on his website blaming them for all his problems. Singapore is not mentioned, but this weekend the FIA quietly confirmed that they are investigating last year's race. This is the first time I can recall the FIA ever investigating a race from a previous season. It doesn't take a genius to figure out that Piquet, now angry at Renault and not silenced by his contract, may have said something to them about what happened at Singapore last year.
If Renault are found guilty of ordering Piquet to crash, they will likely face a very heavy penalty, which could cause the Renault company to pull out of F1.
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The Stig
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by The Stig on Aug 29, 2009 14:38:09 GMT -5
..... and just when you thought things were as strange as they could be this season, things get even stranger. The Force India team, owned by Indian billionaire Vijay Mallya, is the smallest in F1, and has the smallest budget. One of their drivers is Italian Giancarlo Fisichella, who is widely seen as washed-up. His highest grid position this season before today was 13th, but today he stunned the F1 world by qualifying his car on pole position for tomorrow's race. Even more shocking, it wasn't down to luck at all - Fisichella in the Force India was legitimately the fastest guy on the track.
Now Fisichella, who everybody thought would be out of F1 next year, is being mentioned as a possible Ferrari driver for the next race (which just happens to be in Italy), replacing the underperforming Badoer.
Once again, if you wrote a script for this F1 season, people would laugh at you!
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The Stig
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by The Stig on Aug 29, 2009 10:15:02 GMT -5
Not only do we have to rent for every game, we also get screwed by the place we're renting from. The Verizon Center is the only arena in town that can accommodate GU basketball. We need them more than they need us, so we basically have to accept whatever terms they dictate to us. Most other schools that that rent out bigger arenas for games have other options, so they can negotiate better deals. Seton Hall is a prime example. Although I'm not privy to the details, I'm willing to bet that the terms of our deal with the Verizon Center are nowhere near as bad as they could be, given that Ted Leonsis owns a large part of Washington Sports and Entertainment, which runs Verizon. Ah, I wasn't aware that Ted owned a chunk of the VC now. I remember that when Seton Hall signed their deal with the Prudential Center, some people here familiar with our deal said that Seton Hall got a much better deal than we did.
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The Stig
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by The Stig on Aug 27, 2009 22:41:32 GMT -5
Not only do we have to rent for every game, we also get screwed by the place we're renting from. The Verizon Center is the only arena in town that can accommodate GU basketball. We need them more than they need us, so we basically have to accept whatever terms they dictate to us. Most other schools that that rent out bigger arenas for games have other options, so they can negotiate better deals. Seton Hall is a prime example.
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The Stig
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by The Stig on Aug 26, 2009 16:24:06 GMT -5
What's a Hoya? It's not fruit!
Congrats to all the incoming Hoyas and their families!
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The Stig
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by The Stig on Aug 25, 2009 20:18:42 GMT -5
Wikus is an outstanding character. Very well acted, and I think a lot closer to what a normal person's reaction would be to an extraordinary series of events than some "hero" type (i.e. personable and somewhat courageous, but more than occasionally an a-hole and more often than not, extremely stupid). I agree 100%. He really is a great character, precisely because he's so uninteresting at the start. It took me a while to realize that the film was actually about him. It was really impressive how they managed to make him the "hero" of the movie without being melodramatic.
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The Stig
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by The Stig on Aug 25, 2009 20:04:27 GMT -5
Peter Jackson is producer for both. Other than that, I am not sure of any other connection. (I say producer for "both," even though there is a good chance there may never be a Halo movie. The project is not cancelled, but it remains on hold and could never happen; Jackson is still attached to it though, if I'm not mistaken). According to Wikipedia: "Originally, Neill Blomkamp was contacted by Peter Jackson to direct Halo, a film based on the video game series of the same name. When this project did not turn out due to internal disagreements between Fox, Universal and Microsoft, Jackson and those involved felt obligated to give Blomkamp financial support and a chance to direct another film, and it was decided that the short film Alive in Joburg could be expanded into a feature instead." en.wikipedia.org/wiki/District_9
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