The NFL disses Britney, a Sammy Sosa comeback and sadly, Donald Trump goes silent

- Nepotism, retreads, publicity grabbing - the Miami Dolphins’ search for their next head coach has all this and more. After being dumped by former coach Nick “The Nomad” Saban, the ‘Fins first made themselves look like the world’s biggest doormat when owner Wayne Huizenga professed his respect and continued admiration for the man who had just screwed over his franchise by walking out on a team he had coached to two underachieving seasons, lying about his plans to leave and then telling his assistant coaches of the decision by a conference call instead of face to face. Now, Huizenga and his merry band of stooges are either making a terribly bad football decision or they are desperately grabbing for attention by interviewing recently fired University of Alabama head coach Mike Shula for their own vacancy. Amazing coincidence, interviewing the son of your franchise’s most successful coach ever, Don Shula - keeping in mind that Don is still a senior member of the Dolphins front office. Also, how pathetic do you look, with Saban deserting you to go coach at Alabama and you go and interview the guy he replaced, the one who accumulated a mediocre 26-23 record at UA? The best thing the Dolphins can do right now is scratch Mike Shula off their list, go back to searching among candidates who are actually qualified and viable, and try not to embarrass themselves further.

- Keeping your underwear on does have its benefits. If you don’t believe me, just as Britney Spears, whose antics (which include constantly being photographed without any underwear on while out in public), approached the NFL network about being in a commercial touting the network, but was told no thanks. The NFL’s pointed reply: "She's too much of a train-wreck. Besides we already have Paris Hilton." Ouch. Brit promised her remaining fans (didn’t know there were any) a career comeback earlier this month, but that dubious promise looks to be in trouble. Of course, it’s hard to have a comeback when your music absolutely sucked in the first place and your only “talent” was dressing and dancing like a skank to bubble gum, prepackaged pop music, but I digress. So NFL network would rather have Paris Hilton, a woman who has a sex tape coming out more often than the sun sets in the west, than you, Brit? That would be when you know that you’ve gone very, very wrong. By the way, it’s the right call by the NFL. Anyone who would have sex with and marry K-Dirt clearly is not someone you want doing commercials for you.

- Take heart, all of you (this would include everyone who is not an immediate member of the Clinton family - Bill, Chelsea, Roger, etc.) who live in mortal fear that Sen. Hank Clinton of New York will run for and win the Democratic presidential bid for the 2008 election. Hank will soon be facing her stiffest opposition in the form of Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., who filed paperwork earlier this week to form an exploratory committee for a presidential bid, a move which also enables him to set up the framework for a campaign and begin raising funds. I can't say for sure if Obama would make a good president, but I can say he would be a better choice than the reign of terror that Hank would bring to bear. She is far too angry, far to hostile and far too frightening to unleash on the world as our new leader. Obama would be a more rational, reasonable voice and someone that our country would have a better shot of getting behind than Hank. And while there are currently 751 men, women, children and probably a few farm animals who have declared their intent to run for the Democratic nomination, Obama and Clinton are the two who are most likely to be duking it out in the end. On behalf of all Americans who don’t wish to be governed by an angry, hostile woman bent on inflicting as much feminine vengeance on men as possible in order to even the score for her husband’s repeated, voluminous infidelity, Go Obama!

- Sad news from Donald Trump…..the billionaire and smackdown artist extraordinaire says he is done with his verbal feud with/demolition of Rosie O’Donnell. O’Fat hasn’t said a word in days about the issue, which is smart on her part because clearly she wasn’t going to win that battle and was getting blown up every time she tried. But I beg the Donald to reconsider, because his smack about her being fat, disgusting inside and out, a hack comedian, ugly and a failure that he would probably sue was some of the funniest (and truest) material I’ve heard in a long time. Even if Trump never builds another skyscraper or casino and never opens another luxurious golf course in his life, his linguistic deconstruction of O’Fat and anyone who rallied to her defense was hilarious and memorable. I’m openly wishing for someone, anyone, to take another run at this guy so he can have another chance to tear into them.

- Ride that cash cow, FOX network! FOX has already busted out with a DVD for the first two episodes of this season of the show 24, even though the episodes just aired a couple days ago. for $15, you can own four hours of TV history, as in the season premiere of one of the most overhyped, overrated shows in recent memory, and you can even get a bonus few minutes from the third episode. The only way I’m down for one of those DVDs is if FOX can promise to get rid of the damn multi-window split screens that made me lose interest in the show within minutes of tuning in. Oh, and if there’s some way to CGI the crappy acting and make it better, that would help too. Otherwise, count me out on this one, I think I’ll stick to paying $20-25 for full season DVD collections of good shows that I actually like.

- On the comeback trail……it’s Sammy Sosa, the corked-bat using, steroid popping (allegedly), non-English speaking-when-I’m-in-a-Congressional-hearing-and-it-benefits-me-to-pretend-not-to-understand-English former slugger is working out to make a return to MLB and has even signed a minor league contract with the Texas Rangers that includes an invitation to spring training. Sosa has been out of the game for a couple seasons now after declining numbers (in odd conjunction with the introduction of steroids testing) and bad health resulted in no one wanting him on their team. But he’s laid low, worked out and is coming back, ostensibly in the hopes of boosting his career stats to a level that would garner him induction into the Hall of Fame. Yeah, good luck with that, Sammy. You have 588 home runs, and if you think that breaking 600 will get you into the Hall, you’re begging. Mark McGwire has 563 and was a better player for longer than you, and he didn’t even get a third of what he needed, vote-wise, to get in. So I don’t care if you hit another 100 homers from here on out, you’re not getting in. When there’s debate about whether Bar-roid Bonds, he of the multiple Gold Gloves, the 40 HR, 40 SB season, the guy about to break Hank Aaron’s career home run record, will get into the HOF because of suspected ‘roid usage, then you’re not getting in either.