Author: VD

A few years ago, while trying to convince my coach that we needed to adopt a different attacking philosophy, I broke down the MLS statistics and determined that shots on goal, not total number of shots or ball control, had the highest degree of correlation with winning. This tended to contradict the classic idea that having a strong center midfielder holding onto the ball and directing traffic was the best way to build a successful attack. In my experience, midfielders always want to hold onto the ball far too long, sacrificing the brief window of opportunity to create the quick one-on-one opportunity that is often possible at the beginning of a counterattack.

Also, too many strikers have a tendency to go for the far corners of the goal, putting it wide or putting it over in an attempt to avoid the keeper. The problem is that any miss eliminates the chance for rebound goals, which are a significant percentage of all goals scored. I saw a great example of how to do it properly the other day while watching Paris St. Germain playing Marseilles – at the start of the counterattack, the PSG midfielder immediately passed the ball through to a striker breaking past the defense just past the center of the field. The striker drilled a low hard shot at the center of the net, which the keeper managed to block as he came out to attack the ball. The rebound, however, went right to a second PSG striker trailing the action, who easily passed the ball into an empty net. Two chances are always better than one.

The top strikers seem to understand this. Henry of Arsenal, Inzaghi of Milan and van Nistleroy of Manchester United seldom blast away at the net, but are instead content to take hard, low shots that look more like passes and are usually directly on target. Not only do they tend to score more goals than most, they also create more scoring opportunities for their teammates. Why more players and coaches don’t grasp this concept, I don’t know.

I couldn’t convince my coach, which was no surprise. He thought the best way to attack was to dump the ball in the corner and cross it. Considering that our two starting strikers were both about 5’7″, this worked about as well as you would expect, which is to say, not at all. I don’t understand system-addicted coaches in any sport. If you have Randy Moss, THROW THE BALL. If you have Jamal Lewis, RUN IT. How is this a difficult concept? And is there anything more hapless than the Chicago Bulls try to run the triangle offense without Michael Jordan, Scottie Pippen or a decent three-point shooter? Well, maybe Rick Pitino trying to get a bunch of lazy NBA pros to play a Kentucky-style full-court press late in the season.

Apparently assuming that I have nothing better to do than to respond to every atheist who writes something about me somewhere, I heard from a gentleman who wondered why I hadn’t responded to a short critique that not only had not been sent to me, but concluded I was only claiming to be a libertarian and that my forthright Christian stance indicated I was truly an authoritarian. Which makes sense, as long as you assume that Christian = authoritarian and ignore all Western history as well as every political column I have ever written.

Of all the critiques I have read, I believe that one takes the cake for sheer asininity. It reminds me of those theologians who want to perform an exegesis on one particular verse in the Bible while ignoring the rest of the New Testament.

I have read every email I have received on the matter of godless morality. While I have found none of them to be in the least bit convincing, I have responded at length to the most detailed and thoughtful critiques I have received and in doing so have gone far beyond the norm for any syndicated columnist. If you still believe this equates to some sort of intellectual cowardice and that slinging petty insults suffices to demonstrate your highly and independently developed ethical system, then all I can say is please consider this an invitation to go read someone who won’t question your precious assumptions.

If there is an opposite of an Ideal Reader, you are mine. “There is not a God and you’re stupid if you think so” is unlikely to convince anyone over the age of ten. If I ever want to embarass atheists and their claims of inherent intellectual superiority, I’ll simply write a column quoting from many of the emails I received. Prior to my responses to the detailed critiques, someone complained that I was only responding to the ones that made atheists look bad; I assure you, those examples weren’t even in the bottom third.

This round is over. We’ll revisit it the next time I write on the subject.

Gloria Feldt, president of Planned Parenthood Federation of America, sent out an e-mail to some 80,000 abortion-rights advocates across the country to advertise the group’s effort to protect the Austin project. The e-mail references Danze by name, calls him an “out-of-control anti-choice fanatic” and accuses him of harassing local builders and threatening to blacklist them.

“As alarming as you and I find his blacklist strategy, anti-choice activists around the country consider Mr. Danze a hero and right now, they’re eagerly pursuing ways to bring his harassing tactics to more communities,” Feldt wrote in the e-mail. “We’ve got to let friends and foes alike know that, for every out-of-control anti-choice fanatic that crawls out of the woodwork, there are thousands of us ready, willing and able to defend the essential health services that Planned Parenthood clinics provide for women and families all across this country.”

Color me an out-of-control anti-choice fanatic too. Or, as I would put it, someone who is extreme about not killing children in any way for any reason. Got a problem with that, Oberleutnant Feldt? Essential health services – what a crock of propagandistic Newspeak. I have zero tolerance for the executioners of Planned Parenthood. If we were willing to carpet-bomb Dresden in the interest of preventing Germans from collecting taxes from the French, should we not at least be willing to speak out in protest against abortionettes murdering children? We need more men like Chris Danze.

I have said it before. I will say it again. Calling a feminist a feminazi is an insult to National Socialism.

From Jason Steorts at National Review: Among the more colorful figures hawking their wares at American universities is self-styled “ecofeminist” Carol J. Adams, known principally for her 1999 book The Sexual Politics of Meat: A Feminist-Vegetarian Critical Theory. Adams traverses the campus speaking circuit and presents a slideshow that, according to her website, addresses “the animalizing of women in contemporary cultural images and the sexualizing of animals used for food.”

Yes, this is the sort of intellectual that university officials like to bring in to speak to students. The woman actually makes her living by talking about the sexual politics of meat. Forget postmodern, this is post-parody. I wonder if she’s ever been to the University of Tennessee?

DB writes: My question to you is would you mind providing a list of your favorite books or whatever book/books you are currently reading? I think it would be a great addition to your blog for all of your fans/readers out here in America. I know that I would thoroughly enjoy it. I saw where you recommended some books to a specific reader on your blog site and was hoping that you could possibly expand it. I actually had another question for you in regards to your opinion of the “The Sopranos.” I know you wrote sort of a mini-review of “The Matrix” awhile ago at your blog and was curious to know what you thought of the New Jersey crime family.

I’m currently reading William Gibson’s Virtual Light, while Space Bunny is reading George Eliot’s Middlemarch. Yes, gentlemen, she’s hot, blonde and reads quality literature to boot. My ten favorite authors right now are:

Neal Stephenson – Cryptonomicon is so far the best book of my generation; can’t wait to read Quicksilver

Umberto Eco – the dottore, the maestro. His semiotics stuff is always interesting too.

Herman Hesse – It’s not as deep as it pretends, but it’s still great stuff.

Arturo Perez Reverte – Mystery or thriller? Who cares.

JRR Tolkein – I like most fantasy. This is the original and best.

Douglas Adams – It’s all good, but Dirk Gently is tops.

PG Wodehouse – It’s always the same book. I always like it. Read for the style, not the plot.

George RR Martin – Fantasy as history. Sandkings is a great short story too.

Tanith Lee – the best pure writer out there.

Sharon K. Penman – good historical literary candy.

I have absolutely no opinion of The Sopranos, since I’ve never seen it. I’m not as completely TV-illiterate as I once was, but I am still more than a little out of it where the TV scene is concerned. I rather like Dead Like Me and Scrubs, but I really haven’t gone out of my way to see a show since Willow got interested in that dreadful what’s-her-name on Buffy and Charisma Carpenter cut her hair on Angel. In any case, I tend to find Hollywood’s incessant interest in all things Our Thing to be somewhat baffling.

The College Republicans have laid out a timeline of events. I really do need to have a conversation with Ms Vaughan, as there are some fairly significant dichotomies between what she’s reported to have said and what the facts appear to be.

This statement made me laugh: [Maxine Thompson] states that “I have no reason to lie about receiving a call from Ron Laffitte that Friday, and I do not appreciate you suggesting otherwise.”

Um, sure you do, Dean Thompson. And I bet you don’t. I’m sure Bill Clinton didn’t appreciate people suggesting that he had indeed had sex with that woman either. I notice that she doesn’t actually repeat her assertion that she did receive a call from Mr. Laffitte that evening.

AS asks: I’d like to get your opinion as to why college campuses are such bastions of leftism. The University of Tennessee is just one of countless examples of the political leanings in the academic world. This bias, of course, is nothing new. William F. Buckley showed the world in the 1950s what campus politics were like, and atheism was in vogue for 150 yeas before that. What causes this left political leaning?

I think there’s a few factors. First, those who wind up in academia are usually not the sort of people who know in undergrad what sort of career they’re going to pursue, nor are they ready to handle the responsibility of a full-time job upon graduation. So, instead of working, they avoid the harsh realities of the real world by attending various stages of graduate school and they continue obtaining degrees until they are pretty much unemployable as anything but a professor. This isn’t true of all graduate students, of course, but it fits the profile of the majority.

Second, the sort of people attracted to academia are abstract thinkers. There’s nothing wrong with that – I’m an abstract thinker myself – but in the absence of real-world experience or a serious dedication to supporting your theories with hard evidence, it’s pretty easy for the abstract thinker to divorce himself from objective reality. This is why you still have many economics professors who are avowed Marxists despite the fact that no one has taken the labor theory of value – which only happens to be the entire base and justification for the Marxist system – seriously for over 25 years. A normal person would conclude that the whole system has to be junked since the base is disproven and the model hasn’t worked anywhere in more than 100 years; the left-wing academic will continue to insist that it just hasn’t been applied properly, an argument they can cling to for eternity considering that Marx was incredibly vague about things.

“And then, for reasons that I won’t bother to explain, the State will magically disappear, poof, and everyone will have 70 virgins!” Right, Karl, whatever, now go take a bath.

Finally, in case you haven’t noticed, many professors are still emotional teenagers. They live around 18-23 year olds, they interact with them all the time, and they like to consider themselves much younger than their real age. PJ O’Rourke has a hilarious send up of this in one of his books. As with most emotion-based thinkers, strange arguments based on mythical fairness and what Thomas Sowell calls universal justice tend to appeal to them in the same way it appeals to little kids. The truth is that life isn’t fair, and the most cursory reading of history will show that it never has been fair in any society anywhere. When faced with this reality, the adult shrugs his shoulders and deals with it. The child gets very upset and expects Mommy to do something about it. Substitute government for Mommy and you will get a much better handle on how the academic Left thinks. This is why you cannot expect or hope for any degree of consistency from a leftist academic; it just doesn’t exist.

The deeper truth is that, as Dennis Prager points out, “Wisdom begins with fear of God.” Few in academia have either.

I sent the following questions to Ms Edee Vaughan, the faculty advisor of the UT Issues Committee. Her answers should be very interesting, for reasons I shall divulge soon.

1. How were the emails sent by Mr. Rubinstein, Mr. Comstock and others reported to the Office of Student Conduct on November 14? Who did you contact at the OSC when you reported them?

2. How were the emails “misconstrued”? What is the proper way to construe the comments about shooting ragheads in the face, torturing Mr. Khalsa and the professed liberal bent of the Issues Committee?

3. Which students were “sentenced” to sensitivity training at the ICmeeting on November 17? What was the disciplinary procedure involved in the sentencing, and what, precisely, is sensitivity training?

4. What students were at the IC meeting on November 17? Was Justin Rubinstein at the meeting?

5. Were you at the IC meeting on Monday, November 17?

Here’s one of the actual emails from the now-famous University of Tennessee Issues Committee, not the most infamous one, but the one that I thought was most perfectly illustrative of the mind, such as it is, of the campus left. It was CC’d to the entire committee, which goes to show how smugly assured these jokers happen to be. The literary quality of an email should never be judged as harshly something that is written for public scrutiny, of course, but I nevertheless find some of the word choices to be so bizarre as to suggest semi-literacy. Somewhere, an English teacher is weeping. Rock on, comrade.

Subject: RE: Issues in the Beacon

Date: Thu, 13 Nov 2003 16:49:09 -0500

fortunately someone brought a beacon to work today, so i got to see our GLORIOUS front page coverage of carlson. i was disappointed to see that the issues committee wasn’t mentioned anywhere in the article, but nevertheless it was great coverage. apparently the guy who wrote the article is aware of his mistake and he has apologized for not mentioning the small detail of HOW tucker came to the university unfortunately my thirst to see the issues committee’s name in print was satisfied on page five.

like most of you, i spent much of my day drafting a letter to the editor in response to the piece. however, i probably spent more time thinking about what a little brat this guy is and what i would do to him given the chance–torture that would put the spanish inquisition to shame, etc–but ultimately i don’t think it would do any good. he simply isn’t worth any more of our time. i think it goes without saying that we shouldn’t be talking to him as much about what goes on within the committee. as he mentioned, he did apply to the committee and he was rejected (largely due to his closed-mindedness and attitude). during the interview he did ask questions about our budget and its source, which we revealed to him because it’s public information that he wouldn’t have to search hard for. however, it’s obvious that he acquired this info (and other info) about us purely for his own interests in bashing us. as witnessed in his past bashings of campus committees, responses to his opines only warranted further insane and unfounded bashings. the WCC found that out the hard way.

i think we can learn from their situation and instead not reply to the absolute bullshit that this guy writes. to paraphrase, i make no allusions as to what this email is. this is not an attempt to change a single rejected applicant/op-ed writer’s mind. this is a desperate plea to tell you that i think we’re doing a fucking incredible job as a committee.

rock

–[name withheld to protect the asinine]

From a College Republican at UT:

Edee Vaughan, the faculty advisor for the IC, [University of Tennessee Issues Committee] has lied to both the news media and administration about corrective actions that she took in the wake of those emails. Vaughan claims that she reported the emails to the Office of Student Conduct as soon as she read them (the day after they were emailed), and that in the next IC meeting (three days later) she took the entire committee to task for its inappropriate responses, and “sentenced” the offenders to sensitivity training.

We have found a student on the committee who is willing to swear that these are ALL lies — that the sole purpose of the meeting was to discuss how to respond to the negative publicity, and that NO rebuke or reprimand of any kind was given to the authors of those emails. There was NOTHING said about sensitivity training — just a reminder that they should be careful to avoid expressing those kinds of sentiments via email, because something might be “misconstrued.”

Yes, misconstrued. I seem to have heard that somewhere before…. It sounds as if the spin operation was already in effect by the time I spoke with the student head of the IC.