H2O Man
H2O Man's Journal"The Ring"
Two days ago, an unidentified person left a bag with ten old The Ring magazines outside of my door. The magazines date from 1035 to 1963. Most are from the 1950s.
I enjoyed (re-)reading predictions by "experts" about the then-upcoming fight between heavyweight champion Charles "Sonny" Liston and a young challenger named Cassius Clay. Only two -- Jersey Joe Walcott and Marty Marshall -- gave Clay any chance. Most were sure "The Bear" would flatten Clay in one round!
Walcott, of course, was the former champion who was the referee in the Ali vs Liston rematch; Marshall was the first man to defeat Liston, in the first of their three fights.
I'm having fun going backwards in time.The quality of writing was overall far superior to today's.
Boxing! 10-12
At Las Vegas (HBO PPV): Timothy Bradley Jr. vs. Juan Manuel Marquez, 12 rounds, for Bradley's WBO welterweight title.
This is an interesting bout; while it shouldn't be PPV (or should be at a low price), I'm looking forward to it.
Bradley is younger, and naturally bigger. While not a big power-puncher, he is able to set a pace few can keep up with. However, he can be hurt .....and was actually almost knocked out in his last fight.
Marquez is 40, and has been through many tough fights. He is coming off his career high -- flattening Manny Pacquiao -- and is looking to win a title in yet another weight class.
I think it is likely that at some point, perhaps in the 5th or 6th round, Marquez will catch Bradley coming forward, attempting to bang on the inside. If Marquez hurts him, he will take him out. If not, Bradley wins by decision in a bloody fight.
Is anyone else watching the card? Who do you pick to win?
Managerial Conservatives vs Tea Party
"He felt at the moment like a tight-rope artist might feel if suddenly, in the middle of the performance, the manager of the Music Hall were to rush out of the proper managerial seclusion and begin to shake the rope."
-- Joseph Conrad; The Secret Agent
The splintering of the republican party is interesting to watch. It is, of course, causing damage to very real human beings, which comes as no surprise: for the essence of the republican party is corporate inhumanity to mankind. The cog-in-the-machine unconscious nature is found not only in the shutting down of federal government operations, or even the willingness of congressional republicans to sacrifice their aides' insurance -- it's highlighted by the willingness of those aides to continue to work for masters who have so little regard for their well-being.
The malignancy known as the "tea party" is taking a course that many of us "old-timers" on DU predicted. It's not a great mystery. There have been examples of similar dynamics in and at the edges of the Democratic Party in the past. This is definitely not to say that the groups involved are "just alike" -- in fact, they tend to be polar opposites. Rather, it has to do with two sub-groups that, for any of a variety of reasons, become aligned.
The two groups in the Democratic Party are the progressives on the left, and the combination of liberal-to-moderate folks. The example that might best illustrate the group dynamics would be the Civil Rights Movement. Until 1960, a significant number of the southern black registered voters were republicans. Martin Luther King, Sr., is but one example. This was largely because of the Dixiecrats, or southern democrats who strongly opposed integration.
In the years 1960 to '64, more black people placed their hopes on the national Democratic Party. The Kennedy family had appealed to them, when during the 1960 contest between JFK and Nixon, the Kennedy brothers attempted to help Martin Luther King, Jr., when he was in a southern jail. President Kennedy didn't follow through with his infamous "with a stroke of a pen" campaign pledge, but he and Attorney General Robert Kennedy did make some attempts to support the movement.
By '64, the Civil Rights Movement had grown to include numerous people who were not entirely invested with King's non-violent program. The college students in organizations such as SNCC were expecting more immediate change in the system. When the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party attempted to seat their delegates at the 1964 convention, they were following the law and party rules. More, they pledged to support LBJ and the party's plank. However, more than 80% of the regular state delegates had said they planned to vote for Goldwater, the republican candidate.
LBJ wanted a "perfect" convention. Along with other party bosses, he had a host of liberals attempt to convince the MFDP to settle for seats, but no votes; then, eventually, two voting delegates, with the promise of full recognition in 1968's convention. The MFDP refused.
Thus, in that era, the LBJ folks were known as the liberals who attempted to manage the party, and the MFDP and SNCC as the radicals. The managerial liberals offered future gains for current compromise; the radicals were less compromising, and wanted results "now." And, by 1968, the divide between the managerial liberals and the radicals -- which included a strong student anti-war movement -- had begun to separate, often fully, from the Democratic Party.
After the 2008 presidential election, a small grass roots movement, almost entirely white, had begun. It was known in some areas as the "tea party." At first, it included people who were unhappy with both major political parties. But some of the managerial conservatives in the republican party sought to buy it, so that they could control it. And indeed, they did just that. With the new-found funding, the tea party was being managed in a way that it became an entirely anti-Obama phenomenon. It was programmed to disrupt town hall meetings, and a commercial image was created to increase the paranoia and hatred of the white, largely middle class public.And it definitely helped republicans in the 2010 congressional elections.
By 2012, however, the tea party was able to win primary contests, and placing bat-shit crazy obstructionists in numerous congressional races. Some won, and some suffered humiliating defeats. That combination of victories and defeats, along with the failure of the managerial conservatives to put a true, radical tea party clown on the presidential ticket, was the lightening that struck life into the republican party's Frankenstein monster.(All Ted Cruz needs is a couple bolts on his forehead.)
Today, of course, we see that monster is out-of-control. The republican managerial squad is unable to control it. And we hear them on the news shows expressing concerns that the radicals are doing long-term -- meaning 2016 -- harm to their party. The only real question is if the managerial conservative bosses, especially those who operate behind the scenes, will allow Cruz the opportunity to self-destruct, or if they will feel the need to cut his legs out from under him.
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