THE DAILY BLADE: Pitch Perfect
That hoary homily, "It doesn't matter whether you win or lose, it's how you play the game," came vividly to life Wednesday night after a bad call by umpire Jim Joyce cost Detroit Tigers pitcher Armando Galarraga a perfect game. The umpire admitted his mistakewhen he saw replays on TV after the game and personally apologized to Galarraga, while the pitcher and Tigers fans all took the historic mistake with uncommon grace and equanimity. Writes Washington Post columnist Thomas Boswell:
[W]hen Galarraga made his way to home plate before Thursday afternoon's game to present his team's lineup card to Joyce, the umpire's reception was just as clear-cut.
The fans in Detroit cheered, and baseball and sport had one of its most inspiring and least expected moments. …
When that admission and the courage to make it was acknowledged with cheers Thursday afternoon, Joyce's face stayed firm, but the tears of gratitude rolled at the Tigers' magnanimity. After the ump wiped his eyes, Galarraga gave him a slap on the back, and Joyce smacked him back, dugout gestures of respect, unmistakable. …
[O]bservers shook their heads that a thing that was so sad and screwed up late Wednesday night could, simply by good will and compassion, be turned into something sparklingly fresh, unexpectedly strong and best-of-baseball by Thursday afternoon.
Before Wednesday night’s game, there were only 20 perfect games in major league history. But even rarer is the caliber of sportsmanship Galarraga demonstrated. He literally improved upon perfection.
Public Sector Job Growth May Be Worse Than Data Suggests
The Labor Department’s monthly employment report showed that of the 431,000 jobs added in May, 411,000 could be attributed to headcounters hired by the federal Census Bureau. Though the 41,000 jobs created by the private sector was “far short of expectations of 150,000 to 180,000 jobs” and the number of Americans out of work for 27 or more weeks “remained at its highest rate since the Labor Department began collecting such data in the 1940s,” The New York Times managed to find a silver lining:
[T]he census jobs will put money into the pockets of the nation’s hard-pressed working and lower-middle class. As these workers have little economic margin for error, they will spend these dollars quickly.
“You could not have planned that temporary hiring to come at a more critical time,” said Heather Boushey, chief economist for Center for American Progress, a liberal research group. “That money will be spent immediately.”
The only problem is, the 411,000 jobs created by the Census Bureau doesn’t mean 411,000 people earned money they otherwise would not have. It’s just the same person who has gotten hired, fired and rehired 411,000 times – with each rehiring “counting” as a new job.
We Fight Them Over There So We Don’t Have To Fight Them Over Here?: Part VIX and Part X (A Two-Fer)
Ohioans Hor Akl and his wife, Amera Akl, both 37 years old, were arrested on charges that they conspired to provide material support to Hezbollah, which has launched numerous attacks on Israel from Lebanon and is considered a terrorist organization by the U.S. government, reports The Associated Press:
[A]n FBI informant provided them with $200,000 in cash, which they were preparing to hide in a vehicle that was to be shipped to Lebanon, prosecutors said.
The Akls planned to conceal up to $500,000 so the money could be given to Hezbollah on behalf of anonymous donors in the United States, a court complaint said. …
The Akls expected to receive a fee or commission for arranging the transfer of funds, prosecutors said.
The Akls are being represented by a public defender. If convicted on the conspiracy charge, they could each be sentenced to as much as 15 years in prison and a $500,000 fine.
Meanwhile, Barry Bujol Jr., 29, was charged in Houston with attempting to deliver material support to al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), the group behind the attempted Christmas Day bombing of a Detroit-bound passenger plane, reports Reuters:
According to court documents unsealed Thursday, the FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force began investigating Bujol in 2008 and determined he had communicated via e-mail with Anwar al-Awlaki, a militant Muslim cleric wanted by U.S. authorities. …
An FBI informant whom Bujol believed to be an AQAP operative said Bujol repeatedly expressed a desire to travel overseas to fight in violent jihad for al Qaeda in Yemen, according to the court documents.
The informant provided Bujol with a false identification card and the [money, GPS devices and cellphone chips] Bujol allegedly agreed to carry to AQAP operatives in an unidentified Middle Eastern country, the court documents said.
If convicted of attempting to deliver material support to a terrorist group and aggravated identity theft, Bujol can be sentenced to as much as 20 years behind bars.
Barack's Bullsh*t Bingo
TammyBruce.com posted this handy dandy Barack's Bullsh*t Bingo card so that we can all play at home every time President Barack Hussein Obama gives a speech or holds a press conference (given his track record, the next one should occur on or about April 1, 2011). For bingo tokens The Stiletto suggests using Obama coins.
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