- So do you still think benching Hope Solo was a good idea, Greg Ryan? The soon-to-be-former coach of the U.S. women’s soccer team found out Monday that his contract will not be renewed when his contract expires at the end of this year, ending a 45-1-9 run as the head of the national team. That might seem like a great record and with the 53-match unbeaten streak that Ryan and his team had working to begin his tenure, you would wonder why he was being dumped….until you realize that he benched the goalie who was between the pipes for almost all of that streak in the biggest game of Ryan’s tenure, the World Cup semifinal against Brazil earlier this year. The 4-0 loss that came when Ryan put Solo on the bench in favor of aging veteran Brianna Scurry drew a lot of attention, more attention than women’s soccer usually gets in a decade, actually, mostly because after the game, Solo had her now-famous rant where she blew up Ryan for sitting her, saying there was no doubt in her mind that it was the wrong decision, that she would have made the saves on the goals Scurry allowed and that Ryan needed to stop living in the past. As harsh as the reaction was for Solo from most directions (not me, I applauded her), I guess U.S. Soccer agrees with her, even if it would never say so publicly. Thing is, they don’t have to say so, because their decision to fire Ryan says it for them. Why else would you fire a coach with only one loss if it wasn’t for the horrifically bad lineup decision he made in that loss, a decision that may have cost his team the match? Congrats on having your comments validated, Hope, and I hope (pun intended) that you get along better with whoever the next coach is.
- This next riot story is brought to you with a bit of regret, because although I love riots, especially ones involving the burning of law enforcement vehicles, this story also has a tragic slant to it. It comes to us from Rawathpora, India, where a local schoolteacher was shot and killed by an army patrol team after a simple dispute outside of the school where he taught. Abdul Rashid Mir was fatally shot by a soldier Saturday and the people of his village didn’t take too kindly to the incident. Hundreds of them took to the streets and they did so with bad intentions. The riot led to the burning and destruction of several police vehicles and the injuring of some 30 police officers, which I would have to qualify as a full-scale riot. I salute the villagers in Rawathpora for their enthusiasm and outrage, taking action against those who so senselessly killed one of their own in such brutal fashion. And no, they shouldn’t have waited for the legal system to address the matter, because that just wasn’t going to happen. No way does anyone in a position of authority take the side of those villagers and they knew it, so they rioted. Now, their cause will get some attention and maybe there will be some sort of investigation or scrutiny beyond the cursory glance from authorities it would have received otherwise. Well done riot and a great cause, two thumbs up to the villagers of Rawathpora.
- No f’ing way. That’s what I kept repeating to myself after hearing that the vapid, annoying waif Heidi Montag, she of the tired MTV reality series The Hills, is releasing an album. Predictably, it’s a heavily produced, sugary-sweet pop album, a la Hilary Duff or Britney Spears. What someone needs to do is to tell Montag, Paris Hilton and anyone else like them that being famous or quasi-famous doesn’t mean that you should be able to indulge your long-harbored ambitions to pursue a music career. Every kid wants to be a famous musician at some point, but most of us should never get the chance because we don’t have the talent and Montag is one of those without the talent. Let’s put it this way: if you wouldn’t have been given a recording contract if you were living in Topeka, Kan. and making $25,000 a year in some average job instead of living in L.A. and either rich and famous or married to someone rich and famous, then you shouldn’t get to make an album simply because you are rich and have the financing to make it happen. Having the money to do something doesn’t mean it’s a good idea for you to do. Montag, who premiered her piece-of-crap single on the exact right place, the radio show of teeth-bleaching, tip-frosting, man-blouse wearing, effeminate loser Ryan Suck-crest, sounds like a 13-year-old girl singing into her hairbrush in her bedroom mirror, and not a talented 13-year-old. Plus, she’s got her tool of a boyfriend, Spencer, as her manager, and if this guy is as big an idiot and ass hat as he appears, this should end verrrrrry well for both of them. I find it hard to believe that he’s not as stupid as he comes off, so let’s just go ahead and assume that this whole musical career for Montag is just some sick practical joke and that it will be over soon when this album sells all of four copies.
- What is it with dumb criminals with the last name Simpson writing books are crimes they (allegedly) committed? Former gang member Colton Simpson has been sentenced to 126 years in prison in a Riverside, Calif. court after being convicted for a jewelry heist eerily similar to one he described in his memoirs. Simpson, no relation to double-murdered (allegedly) and memorabilia thief/burglar O.J. Simpson but making a weirdly similar mistake to the Juice (yes, you’re still the worst guy ever, Juice), declined to speak at his sentencing hearing. Hey Colton, the optimal time to keep your mouth shut was actually back before you wrote your memoirs and sketched out the details of a jewelry heist you committed but had never been prosecuted for. That’s when you should have kept quiet, because if you’d kept your words to yourself back then, you wouldn’t be set to spend the rest of your life plus about 75 additional years behind bars. As a former gang member you probably aren’t the smartest guy around, but even you should have been able to figure out that publishing a book with intricate details of a crime you thought you got away with was a bad idea.
- Thanks for nothing, government of Myanmar. The county’s ruling military junta has oh-so-magnanimously lifted the ban on public gatherings of more than five people and removed the 9 p.m. to 5 a.m. curfew for his citizens, this on the heels of an equally hollow gesture in restoring partial public Internet access. These three actions have been described as “cosmetic” by the White House and although it pains me to say this when it comes to anything coming from the White House these days, I agree. They’re empty gestures from a government that clearly feels it has broken the resistance movement and has a firm grasp on the control of its nation. The soldiers who had been patrolling the streets of Yangon have been removed, some of the activists who were detained or arrested during the riots and protest marches when this whole upheaval began have been released and Gen. Than Shwe and his administration are clearly feeling pretty good about themselves. I, for one, hope that they’re dead wrong and that the pro-democracy forces are simply waiting for the right time to strike again. Maybe it’s time for the country’s Buddhist monks to step up again and start somethin’……
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