This Blog is Back!

The FJP returns from summer vacation to greet its reader(s?) with some cool summer fun stuff.

Here’s an idea to revamp the now-disgraced NBA Playoffs: Blaise Pascal was a French mathmagician who devised a way to determine odds…of things…such as what would the odds of a basketball team coming back to win a best-of-seven series after dropping the first. His formula considers the possible outcomes of the remaining games as. However, it also has to count the outcomes of games that would not necessarily be played…like in a sweep. Well, why not make them play the extra games after the series has been locked up. More games, more chippy performances and shoddy refereeing, more fights in payback games, more bitter conference rivalries could make the regular season mean something, and slowing down a team’s momentum will make the playoffs less predictable.

I got to thinking about this while reading Against the Gods by Peter Bernstein. In explaining Pascal’s above theorem, the Frenchmen himself said of people who do not allow a series to be completed, “it is absolutely equal and immaterial to them both whether they let the match take its natural course.”

The Daily Puppy: Online journal of cute puppies.

Cost of Living Wizard: Restless? Feel like packing it up and hopping the next funky flight to sunny Pittsburgh; leaving your one-stoplight town in the dust? But what about a job and my comfortably modest post-college standard of living? See how expensive where you live and work is to where you could move to. Making 40k a year in Manhattan? You could have same apartment and drinking schedule in Utica for $15,000! Are you kidding me, I bet you have to wear a suit to work in the city. You could be stoned and working behind the counter of the gas station next to Turning Stone and make 15k.

Football’s coming back: On a lighter note, with talk of fantasy drafts and training camp in the air, oh how can you wait to hear the first “Who Let the Dogs Out” chant when the Falcons go on the road… with Joey Harrington gutting it out.

But while we’re on the subject, let's go to the undergraduate world of football where the FJP Sports Editor had an idea on how to fix my beloved Syracuse Orange. Step one: fire Greg Robinson and replace him with Dick MacPherson’s son (check on existence/availability). And secondly, use helmet stickers as a recruiting ploy. Now I think this is right up the Cuse’s alley. How many fake traditions has Syracuse tried to start in the last 5 years, this shouldnt be any different? The FJP gives its express support for this idea provided that the stickers be of actual oranges. Enough tip-toeing around this one, if the team is going to be the Orange, the community needs to go all the way and become the OJ-drinking capital of the Northeast

Run away Yi!

For his own safety, I think Yi Jianlian should sign a contract with the Milwaukee Bucks post haste. The Chinese seem to have made it abundantly clear that they do not appreciate people F-ing with their money.


On another NBA Summer League note, I am anxiously awaiting Tommy Heinsohn's first comments on Brandon Wallace (signed a 2 year deal yesterday, say goodbye to Allan Ray and his weak eye sockets). No video on him yet, but here's a bio.

On this Independence Day, the FJP Reminds You to Live Free or Die

Maciavellian Mofo:
Patrick Leahy, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee appeared on Meet the Press yesterday. At topic was the stonewalling by the White House and Justice Department regarding emails about firings of US Attorney’s. But the broader issue is the Bush Administration’s flagrant flouting of their accountability and a lack of effort to even appear transparent. The most recent case involves VP Dick Cheney’s assertion that he is not subject to a presidential order to turn over records to the national archives because he is not a member of the executive branch. Cheney believes that his role as the President of the Senate makes him a hybrid between an executive and a legislator.

Cheney has been one of the most secretive politicians in history. Since his early and continued refused to name members of his energy policy task force, Cheney has made it his mission to subvert the transparency that is so critical to the success of democracy. Patrick Leahy’s comments from Sunday suggest that at least one man has had enough, and wants to ensure that future executives do not presume they have the right Cheney’s dangerous precedent sets.

In case you missed MTP, the previous weeks episode can be viewed on MSNBC’s website.

Also, check out this blistering editorial from Sunday's NYTimes.

Senatus Populusque Americanus
An interesting article in the NYTimes yesterday details the startling comparisons between America and the Roman Empire. This quote aptly sums it “parallels between Rome’s imperial predicament and what he sees as ours: the problems of a vast, multiethnic nation with a messianic view of itself and an often simplistic view of the rest of the world, stretched too thin beyond its borders and facing mounting challenges within them.”

Mitt Romney caught riding dirty
Part of the primary process involves vetting candidates’ histories and revealing some of the more embarrassing and supposedly character revealing episodes. For the love of god, please read the description of the incident.