My Spectator Sport

I get worked up over politics like most people do over a Super Bowl with their home team in it, or their favorite franchise in the NBA Finals. As admitted earlier, politics IS my spectator sport. I have a home team, and I get madder about a perceived referee problem than I do over a loss. If I lose fair and square I’m disgusted, but when I feel the refs blew the game for me, or the other team played too dirty, then I get simply outraged.

So I fear losing, but I fear losing more when it’s not because I lost fair and square, it’s when someone didn’t play within the ‘established rules’ or used some bias or bozo ref against me. I can understand why people are so outraged against PRESIDENT George W. Bush. They feel that’s exactly what happened. I think that’s why tempers are so hot.

Analogy: The finals are narrowing down. It looks like this year’s Super Bowl is going to be a re-match between the Dallas Cowboys and the Washington Redskins (don’t tell me if that combo isn’t possible, just flow with me here).

Last year, the game was won by a single point on a play that ran as time expired. The Cowboys’ quarterback threw a pass to the end zone (is that the right term? I’m a hockey fan but hockey seemed too obscure for a general analogy) and the Redskins claim the receiver (who had just been drafted from the Gators) did not get both feet down in bounds (that’s the rule, right?) To make matters worse, not fifteen seconds before the ball was snapped on that final play, an NBC (who had the rights to the game) color commentator claimed that with only two seconds left and almost exactly half the field to cross, the Cowboys couldn’t win, the game was going to the Redskins.

The refs watched the replay, taking their time as a tense crowd began to throw beer and pizza at each other, as people around the nation paced and screamed in front of the TVs where they could see the replays themselves and all held opinions that backed their favorite teams.

Finally, the refs called in favor of keeping the touchdown. The Cowboys won. The tape was analyzed, digitized, zoomed, altered, tested, distributed, debunked, framed in gold, and flushed down several toilets. In every instance, it sure looked like toes BARELY bent blades of green grass before scraping across white chalk. But still, the outrage continued.

Adding fuel to the fire for this year, the Cowboys have had a spectacular season. They’re undefeated despite several close games, a few scandalous stories, and a few interesting player trades. One most incredible story is that the Cowboys’ quarterback was doing a charity event for local school children when the fire alarm went off at the school. Some nut had blown up the bathroom, killing a few children and a janitor. Administrators from the local school Principle to the national Secretary of Education pointed fingers and blamed each other because apparently the bomber had left a bomb-scare message at the office that went without action. This was supposed to be impossible, but it turns out through several funding mishaps, the secretaries were so under-staffed that the only one on duty (instead of three) had been sitting on her coffee for five hours and needed to go to the bathroom – so the bomber got an answering machine. This didn’t daunt the quarterback who charged into the flames, rescued five children and a badly burned teacher, and was still able to start the season without injuries.

The only real benefit was that the Cowboys’ popularity around the nation soared for some time so they sold out every stadium the visited, though by the playoffs, public opinion had drained right back into the trenches it always occupied.

Now, hot to prove that they were beaten by a technicality, the Redskins are on the warpath. Dismayed that none of THEIR players was lucky enough to be in the right place at the right time to save children and public workers, they’ve gone on a smear campaign to discredit as many of the Cowboys’ players as possible. The Cowboys, on the other hand, have launched salvoes right back, touting their higher points-per-game average, better completed pass record, better points-against total, and higher ticket sales. Whether this was due to playing in larger markets against weaker teams with a quarterback who is “in the zone” (everything seems to go right at the same time or wrong at the same time, right?) or because they are really superior is what’s on the line.

Whoops, almost put up my next post as a tirade developed from this one. Bad blogger. Bad blogger. Upcoming: my personal demon-army, bias media that portrays itself as unbias.