- News flash: the IRS gets angry when you don’t pay your taxes. Shocking, I know. But apparently that memo never got to former Major League pitcher Rollie Fingers, who was popped by the feds for $1.4 million in unpaid taxes. The Hall of Fame hurler was trying to evade his taxes the way his pitches used to evade the bats of MLB hitters, but he has gone the way of MC Hammer and Wesley Snipes, both of whom were clipped by the IRS for the same crime. Fortunately for Fingers, his $1.4 million is significantly less than the $12 million Snipes is on the hook for, but I’m guessing that Rollie doesn’t exactly have $1.4 million in change under his couch cushions. So for all of you athletes, entertainers and wealthy citizens out there (yes, you included, naked guy Richard Hatch, still trying to gravy train off of your Survivor win), pay your taxes. You can murder people and get away with it (O.J., allegedly), you can drink and drive and get about a dozen second chances, you can even start a war with no real reason or plan (yes, you W.) and not be held accountable, but if you try to skip out on paying your taxes, the feds will find you and they will bring you down.
- Good news. We’ve found out where all of the thin women in America have gone. If you’ve been living in the same country I’ve been in, then you undoubtedly see way too many overweight women (men and children too) and not nearly enough people on the healthy side of the obesity line. Well, apparently many of those thin individuals are in New York, where the city’s transit system is experiencing problems because thin women on crash diets keep fainting or feeling weak on the subways and trains. Five women were treated for such problems in December alone, and such incidents are causing regular delays for travelers. A MTA emergency medical technician summed it up by saying, “You have women trying to get their bodies tight for summer and they won't eat.” Isn't there a healthy balance of some sort, where they could eat, say one or two small meals a day and exercise? And wouldn’t that plan translate to the rest of our country so we wouldn’t have to be bombarded with sights of obscenely fat people and have to put up with them spilling over the confines of their own airplane or stadium seats and into your seating area? You’re telling me there’s nothing we can do about this?
- Things were going so well for the Cincinnati Bengals in the 2006 season. They’d been putting together a solid, consistent effort since training camp, with one player after another stepping up and getting it done. A season that included the league’s toughest schedule still found them in great position at the year’s final weeks came near. But the team fell apart at the end, and the year ended with a stunning disappointment. And no, I’m not talking about the missed field goal and subsequent overtime loss to the Steelers that kept the Bengals out of the playoffs, nor the botched extra point that kept them from tying a game in Denver the previous week. No, I’m referring to the fact that the team had its eighth player arrested more than a month ago, and had several weeks left in the season to reach double digits in arrests for the year, yet they failed. They could have put that record out of reach to the point where it would never even be challenged, yet they couldn’t get it done. Call it a lack of focus, or an infusion of discipline and self-control at the worst possible time, but either way, it’s a staggering blow. For a team that had one guy (Chris Henry) arrested four separate times during the season, a final month with zero arrests is unconscionable. Oh yeah, they also crapped out on the field and should have made the playoffs too.
- How could you not love a job where, no matter how poorly you performed, you just couldn’t get fired? The Seinfeld episode where George tries to get fired from the New York Yankees so he can take a job as scouting director for the Mets summed it up best. George told off the owner, destroyed historic Yankee memorabilia, “streaked” in a flesh-colored body suit during a game, but none of it could get him fired. Ultimately, he tied the Yanks’ most recent World Series trophy to a rope, tethered it to his car and dragged the trophy around the parking lot, destroying the trophy while yelling denigrating remarks about the Yankees into a bull horn. Still, he can't get himself fired…..well, Detroit Lions general manager Matt Millen must be a big Seinfeld fan and a fan of that episode in particular. Millen is a colossal failure, with the team sporting a 24-72 record in his six seasons at the helm (and average of 4-12), finishing last in their division in four of the six seasons. At one point, he drafted wide receivers with the team’s first round draft pick in three consecutive years even though the team had glaring needs at every other position on the roster. Now, one of those receivers isn't even in the NFL, another was inactive for almost the entire season and only one remains with the team, and even he has yet to make a Pro Bowl. Fans have twice staged walkouts during games to protest his reign as GM and “Fire Millen” has been the Lions’ fan mantra for the past three or four years. Yet owner Williams Clay Ford announced that Millen will be back for the 2007-08 season, following a spectacularly bad 3-13 campaign this season. I’m starting to wonder if there’s something, anything, that Millen could do to get fired. Maybe if he lit Ford Field on fire and shot up with heroin on national TV………..even that might not work.
- All of your education problems are solved, South Africa, so you can move on to other, more pressing matters. The Oprah Winfrey Academy for Girls has opened in a small town south of Johannesburg, and Winfrey promises it will be a place for girls from disadvantaged backgrounds to better themselves and hopefully change their country for the better. On a serious note, it’s a good thing to help people, especially those most in need, but when did it become passé to help people in your own country? Can no one adopt an American baby or build a charter school for American kids from disadvantaged backgrounds? And at the dedication ceremony, did Oprah have all the kids stand up and then yell to them, “And you get a school! And you get a school! And you, and you, and you, and you, you all get a school!” Hopefully this works out better for the kids than it did for the audience members she gave cars to, who then had to pay a hefty sales tax and other fees for their “free” cars. Otherwise, they can look forward to pay-to-play sports and having to buy their own textbooks and desks.
- I sincerely wish Pat Robertson would just shut up. It’s people like Pat who give a bad rap to faith and religion in general. They make others who call themselves Christians or people of faith look like whack jobs by association simply because they can't keep their mouths shut or prevent idiotic things from flying out of their pie holes. This time, Robertson says God has told him that a terrorist attack on the U.S. in 2007 will result in massive killing. Rest assured though, that God didn’t specifically tell Robertson that it will be a nuclear attack, although that’s what the good reverend suspects. Nothing like inciting fear of a nuclear attack and claiming God told you about it……….did God also tell you when and where it would happen, or how to prevent it? Call me nutty, Pat, but the God I know doesn’t inform us of nuclear attacks through divine messages. And if you have some magic premonition power through the Lord himself, can we also look forward to you predicting the winner of next year’s World Series or the winning Powerball numbers for the next drawing? Keep these things to yourself, Pat, so that people don’t have as many negative stereotypes and misconceptions about Christianity than they already do.
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