Rod For Illinois!

There is comedy, there’s high comedy, and then there is this: Rod for Illinois. What’s great is that it isn’t a porno site. So it’s totally safe to open at work (unless, of course, you work for that clown Judy Barr Topeka).

Take that Cubbies… Sox TV ratings were higher than the Cubs this year. That may sound logical, but trust me, in the city of Chicago that’s a huge upset.

On both WGN and WCIU, the Sox's ratings for the season rose 21% over last year, to a 5.1, while the Cubs' fell 22% to a 4.5. One rating point equals 34,550 area households.

The Sox scored a 3.1 rating on Comcast SportsNet, up 19% from the previous season. The Cubs slipped 25% to a 2.9.

Ummm, Juan, what’s going on man?

Sadly, it seems like our favorite White Sox, Juan Uribe, is in a bit of trouble down in the DR (RD if you speak Spanish). Apparently he and a bodyguard were arrested for shooting two men (one of which was an Italian sailor, which makes this story even more bizarre).

Uribe’s denying any involvement according to ESPN.com, even going as far to say that they know that he plays in the majors and just want his money:

"I'm completely innocent," Uribe told ESPNdeportes.com. "They're trying to extort me because they know I play in the major leagues. They sent word to me that if I give them 1,000,000 pesos [about 33,000 U.S. dollars], all of this will go away."

Personally, we think the Dugout’s take on the entire situation might be the closest thing to the truth… it’s a Jeep Thing… Word Up, Thome.

But no matter, we hope that justice is served. So if Uribe is innocent, hopefully he can move on with his life and play winter ball down in the Dominican. If he is guilty, then may due process take place (or whatever they call it in the DR).

Uribe had a down year for the Sox hitting only .235 and making some boneheaded mistakes. But he’s a hellova defensive player… and who can forget his magic in Game Four of the 2005 World Series?

(This is when we show the YouTube clip of Uribe’s great plays, but of course MLB, being MLB, yanked all those off youtube because you know, promotion is a bad thing after all. If it worked for the Blackhawks… eh?)

And you thought Deadspin wasn’t intellectual enough? Well Will Leitch, aka the editor of Deadspin, wrote an op-ed in today’s New York Times. It’s about the St. Louie Cards, but hey, it made the back page. So word up Thome to him.

We’ve been a little disappointed with the Guardian the last few weeks… nothing really to note that we’ve noticed. But this is an interesting and at times chilling photo essay.

Finally, here’s an op-ed piece from today’s Washington Post on the detainee legislation that Bush signed into law yesterday. While we have full faith in the checks and balances in our system (in other words, that the Supreme Court will rule that this law is unconstitutional), it’s still extremely worrisome that Congress has pretty much failed to do it’s job for almost five years now.

We’ve touched on this before, about the break down in Congress to stem the power that the President is grabbing, which is a historical first. Congress usually acts tough with Presidents that attempt to increase their power at the expensive of Congress (well, maybe not FDR). Why this is happening is the big question, and we could probably go on and on attempting to find some reason somewhere of why this is happening (money?). But right now, we’re more at a loss for the failure of Congress. At some point they have to step up to Bush and his tendency to take on more and more power (which btw, isn’t unique to Bush, pretty much every president has attempted to expand their power within the government).

Hopefully Congress will eventually begin to reel the power that they’ve given Bush. But until that day, Congress is just as much to blame, if not more so, as Bush. They’ve allowed him to do what he has pleased and get us into this mess that we’re in.

Oh well right? Who knows. Whatever… nevermind.