FOOTBALL'S WAR OF ATTRITION HAS MADE SPORT THE UNWATCHABLE

With each passing week of the football season, it feels like we're constantly hearing about players facing devastating, season-ending injuries. Just last night, during the Monday Night NFL matchup between the Ravens and Buccaneers, five players had to leave the field due to injury—some of them won't return for the rest of the season. It's reached the point where this kind of scenario happens in almost every game, and it's made me lose any desire to follow or support American football, whether it's at the high school, college, or professional level.

The surge in severe injuries has stripped the game of its integrity, transforming it into little more than a brutal war of attrition. Each week, teams are forced to rely more and more on second- and third-string players, especially as the seasons stretch longer and longer. Yes, other contact sports contend with injuries, but none on the same scale as football. The sport has become a modern-day gladiator arena, echoing the brutal competitions of ancient Rome.  

THE FIRST ROAR

It was sometime during the summer of 1964; I don't remember the exact date. The hometown St. Louis Cardinals were in the middle of one of the most fantastic pennant drives in baseball history. However, as a six-year-old kid, I was oblivious to this fact when I attended my first major league ball game. I barely knew the difference between a ball and a strike when my father took me and my older brothers to watch the Redbirds take on the New York Mets at OLD, OLD Busch Stadium (formerly known as Sportsman's Park).

This venue was where I first heard the ROAR. It happened while we were sitting in our general admission seats on the upper deck. The game at the time meant little to me as I was fixated mostly on the spectacle of seeing the largest mass of humanity I had ever seen gathered before my young eyes.

Then suddenly, cork...ROOOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAARRRRR!!!!!!

Tens of thousands of people were standing and cheering loudly. The sound reminded me of the noise my toy walkie-talkie made when the volume on its static was turned all the way up. I looked at my Dad with a mix of surprise and puzzlement. He knew I didn't know what the hell was going on and told me, "The Cardinals just got a hit."

Over the years since that first game, I have become quite an avid, and I'd like to think, a knowledgeable fan of the Cardinals and the sport, in general. Now, I've heard that roar in the following years during many exciting and memorable moments at differing venues. However, none of those instances have equaled how the sensation felt when I experienced it for the first time.

   

 

ALBERT PUJOLS SHOULD RETURN TO ST. LOUIS

The Cardinals really ought to consider allowing Albert Pujols to finish his superstar career where it began...in St. Louis. Yes, there really isn't a clear-cut role on the team for him other than as a backup, pinch-hitting type player.The Los Angeles Angels surprised the baseball world earlier this week by unceremoniously releasing the 41-year-old veteran. For those not aware, Pujols signed a multi-million-dollar contract with the Angels nearly ten years ago after putting up legendary numbers during the first part of his career in St. Louis. However, he never really caught on in Los Angeles. 2021 has been especially laborious for him. If he does decide to wear the 'birds on the bat' again, Pujols can end his career playing for a team that has a real shot at winning a championship. And Cardinals fans get to say goodbye to one of the true legends of their historic franchise. There is precedent for aging superstars returning to their original homes, by the way. The Hall of Fame careers of Willie Mays and Hank Aaron ended in just such a fashion.

THE WHITEWASHING OF LIZ CHENEY

What is with this preoccupation from the so-called ‘liberal’ media with Liz Cheney? Lately it seems, cable news channels MSNBC and CNN are lavishing endless hours of coverage to the rift between Cheney, a Republican congresswoman from Wyoming and daughter to former Vice President Dick Cheney, and the current GOP House leadership that’s loyal to Donald Trump.

Cheney had the audacity to vote for the former president’s impeachment due to his role in instigating the U.S. Capitol insurrection earlier this year. In retaliation, Trumpian House leaders seek to strip Cheney of her powerful committee assignments.

As a result of all this insider politics, Liz Cheney has been elevated as the new courageous hero for the ‘resistance’ by becoming the emblem for the GOP they falsely assert it once was, fact-based and rational. While Liz Cheney appears willing to sacrifice her House career by calling out Trump’s lies, lest we forget, she continues to support her father’s lies that led to untold amounts of death, bloodshed, and torture in the disastrous Iraq War. Liz Cheney is about as right wing as they come. She’s a warmonger who’s never met a war or bloated defense budget she didn’t love as she’s to the right of Trump on foreign policy. She’s vigorously opposed both COVID-19 relief acts calling the first one “a real tragedy”, and has attacked even the mildest responses to gun violence as an assault on the Second Amendment.

Amnesia seems to have gripped much of the mainstream liberal media these days as pundits continue to revise the legacy of the Bush-Cheney crowd, including the former vice president’s daughter, in a sympathetic, yet erroneous, recollection. Frankly, I won’t lose any sleep if Liz Cheney loses her clout in Congress.

MEDICARE ELIGIBILITY

JOE BIDEN: MY EARLY VIEW ON HIS FUTURE PRESIDENCY

In 73 days, Donald Trump will officially lose power and Joe Biden will be sworn in as our 46th president. And he will be a vast improvement on many levels. He will bring, at long last, at scientific, compassionate approach to battling the Coronavirus pandemic effectively. I believe he will be successful. Beyond that, however, my hopes for Biden getting much else accomplished remain somewhat subdued. Like President Obama, he will have to deal with an obstructive Mitch McConnell-led U.S Senate. Biden will likely be hamstrung in getting even the smallest possible incremental reform passed. Moreover, the new president-elect has signaled that he may not make pushing for any progressive reforms a priority. Pundits say Biden may appoint anti-labor, austerity-minded Republicans like former Ohio Governor John Kasich to his cabinet. Meantime, many party insiders close to Biden are warning progressives should back off from promoting issues, such as Medicare for All. They say they will be harmful to any future electoral success. 

I believe this approach would be a mistake. Medicare for All is hugely popular as recent polls indicate it has more than 70 percent support among all Americans. In a recent piece published in Common Dreams, New York progressive Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez points out that all the congressional Democrats who lost their re-election bids in Tuesday’s elections were centrists who did not support Medicare for All. While the candidates supporting it, she maintains, won. Sadly, during the campaign, Biden has categorically stated that he is opposed to Medicare for All, but did indicate he supports a revised ACA plan with a public option. I hope, at least, he remains steadfast to that promise.

ANCESTRY FINDINGS UNCOVER ONLY THE TIP OF THE ICEBERG

Until not long ago, I knew very little about my family’s roots. I was armed with only scant knowledge in which I could only trace both my paternal and maternal ancestry to approximately a hundred years ago.

However, during the past few years, I’ve gained an amazing new awareness of it thanks to genealogical research conducted by my brother, and to a lesser extent myself, on Ancestry.com. This research has laid bare a family history that, in some instances, can be traced backed to the Early Middle Ages. 

It revealed that the ancestral Wells line is intertwined intimately with English history, perhaps dating as far back as William the Conqueror. Another paternal line indicates that I could be a direct descendant of English King Edward III. Research on more ‘recent’ findings shows that I have paternal ancestors who were English Puritans that immigrated to New England during the time of the Pilgrims. Later generations lived there while the American Revolution unfolded and one ancestor, it appears, was the father to a Declaration of Independence signer named Oliver Wolcott.

Findings also show more recently that my paternal grandmother’s father, Thomas Jefferson Wiley, had fought in the Civil War as a Union infantryman for a Minnesota volunteer regiment.

While not as far-reaching, this fresh research greatly broadened my knowledge on my maternal roots as well. My family was already aware that my mother, whose maiden name was Kelley, was descended from Irish Catholic stock. However, we could only trace that lineage back to my great-grandfather, John Joseph Kelley, who immigrated from Ireland to the United States sometime during the late 19^th Century. This new inquiry enabled us to learn to my great-grandfather’s surname was ‘Kelly’ before immigration officials anglicized it upon his entry to this country in 1888. The findings also enabled us to trace his lineage, as well as his wife, Bridget Fitzgerald, back several more generations.

Research on my maternal ancestry also revealed, a heretofore, unknown link to Swiss German ancestors who settled in Idaho around 1883 and to Quaker ancestors who originally settled in Pennsylvania during the 1700s and later moved to North Carolina, Ohio, and Indiana in subsequent generations.

My sixth great-grandfather, the Reverend Thomas Beals, is one ancestor in this line who was particularly noteworthy. He was a Quaker missionary preacher who’s credited with being the first to bring that religion to the wilderness in what was to become Ohio. (It existed then as the Northwest Territory.) This link provides an interesting account on how Beals was arrested and later released after working out a peace agreement with Native Americans.

All in all, these findings have been an epiphany. Yet, I must recognize that they paint somewhat of a rosy account of my roots and do not come even close revealing the complete picture. The vast majority of my roots remains hidden and will probably remain so for eternity. These findings are based on written accounts, which become more difficult to come by as one delves further into the past. Many of my ancestors were illiterate and have no record whatsoever of their existence. As is the case with all of humanity, I suspect I don’t have to time travel very far to find direct ancestors who cannot be traced.