Why I want an apology from Andre Agassi, birthday wishes for "Sesame Street" and reporting your own drunk driving

- I’d like an apology from Andre Agassi. No, I don’t have a problem with him writing an autobiography in which he admits to hating the sport that made him a famous millionaire (tennis), tanking matches during his career or going on a yearlong crystal meth bender in the midst of said career. I don’t even have a beef with those actions in and of themselves; my issue comes with the response to Agassi’s autobiography. In short, people are acting like morons and falling all over themselves in the rush to say incredibly moronic things in the wake of Agassi’s revelations. First it was former women’s tennis champion Martina Navratilova trying to liken Agassi to noted cheaters like Roid-ger Clemens. Never mind that Clemens and his ilk used performance-enhancing drugs that made them better on the field and in the weight room and Agassi used a performance-hindering drug like meth that only helps you if your chosen profession requires less teeth, living in a mobile home and wearing wife-beaters all day long. Sure, Agassi got out of a failed drug test by lying to ATP officials in a letter, claiming the positive test was an accident that occurred because he took a sip from a cup of Coke laced with meth that belonged to his personal assistant. But that’s on ATP officials and not Agassi, because no way should that lame, transparent excuse fly. But M. Navratilova’s comments were just the tip of the idiocy iceberg and she’s now being joined by former No. 1-ranked Marat Safin, who believes that Andre Agassi should give his tennis titles back and return much of the prize money he won based on his revelations. Safin, who plans to retire this month, said in an interview Tuesday that Agassi should "give his titles, his money and his Grand Slam titles" back. "I'm not defending the ATP, but what he said put it in a delicate position," Safin said. "The ATP allowed him to win a lot of tournaments, a lot of money. It kept his secret. Why does he need to be so cruel with it?" No Marat, what the ATP did in accepting his lame-o excuse put the ATP in an awkward position. Its choice to allow him to continue to play doesn’t mean he owes them a damn thing; capitalizing on someone else’s mistake doesn’t mean you owe them an apology. Why should he give his titles and money back? If other players weren’t good enough to defeat a meth addict on the court, then how is that the meth addict’s problem? "If he is as fair play as he says he is, he has to go to the end," Safin said. "You know, the ATP has a bank account and he can give the money back if he wants.” No, he can’t. If he gave the money back, he would be caving in the brain-dead, foot-in-mouth idiots like you who are assigning blame to the wrong place in a very ugly situation. So I would like an apology for Andre Agassi for writing this book, thereby inciting these insipid and asinine comments from people who are clearly much better off when they stick to hitting a fuzzy yellow ball with a graphite-handled racket over a net and leave the commentary to those of us more qualified for it………

- This is a day late, but a very happy 40th birthday to Sesame Street, which has now spent four decades teaching kids of all ages valuable lessons about life, the world they live in and the personalities of crabby green puppets living in trash cans with pet worms. The show marked its big day with a visit from First Lady Michelle Obama and used the occasion to kick off a two-year, environmental program called "My World is Green and Growing” (ironically, also one of the rejected subtitles for the autobiographies of both Warren Buffett and Willie Nelson, albeit for different reasons). But despite its enviro-centric title, don’t expect the program to delve into big-picture issues. "Global warming and deforestation—those are really adult concepts, and it's just too scary for children," said Rosemarie Truglio, vice president of research and education at Sesame Workshop, the New York City-based nonprofit that produces Sesame Street. "The place we're coming from is, 'Let's love and care for the Earth, because it's so beautiful, and we appreciate its awe and wonder, and we're going to respect it.'" Apparently the hope is that kids will learn to love, respect and cherish nature and thus grow up to become a bunch of tree-hugging hippies…..I think. I’ve actually learned something already, namely that the curriculum for Sesame Street changes every two years. The switch to focusing on the environment could not be a wiser choice, because moving on from focusing on a pointless, useless subject like literacy – the focus for the past two years – is a fantastic idea. It’s also a much better focus than healthy eating, which was the topic of choice prior to literacy and turned the Cookie Monster into a neutered, bastardized version of himself, chowing down on fruits and vegetables instead of chocolate chip and macadamia nut treats. By comparison, teaching kids about concepts such as habitats, hibernation, and migration is a fantastic idea. In the end, I suppose the most important thing to do is congratulate Sesame Street on a fantastic first 40 years and wish the show many successful years ahead. Happy birthday, Big Bird, Bert and Ernie, Oscar the Grouch, Cookie Monster, Snuffleupagus, the Count and everyone else on Sesame Street…………

- I have no problem admitting that this next story absolutely confounds me. It’s taken me a while to get to this, but don’t believe for one second that the delay is any indication of a lack of enthusiasm on my part for the tale I’m about to tell. Journey with me to Wisconsin on Halloween night, where all manner of frightening creatures were out on the streets. There were ghosts, goblins, slutty nurses/librarians/police officers/ballerinas/demons, pro athletes and oh yeah, drunken lushes with blood-alcohol levels of 0.17 who were phoning 911 to report themselves. The last entry on that list would be Mary Stray, a 61-year-old woman who had a beer or nine and got behind the wheel rocking a BAC more than twice the legal limit. And what’s not cool about someone’s grandma getting liquored up and swerving around the streets on Halloween night, when there were probably more than a few kids and their families out and about? But it wasn’t her erratic driving that did Stray in: it was her cell phone. See, she may have been too drunk to drive legally, but bizarrely she was sober and coherent enough to dial 911 and in slurred speech, inform the operator that she had spotted a drunk driver on the road: herself. Here’s how things unfolded, on account of the actual transcript from the call after Stray stated that she had seen a drunk driver:

Dispatch: You behind them?

Mary Strey: No, I am them.

Dispatch: You am them?

Mary Strey: Yes, I am them.

Dispatch: Okay, so you want to call and report you're driving drunk?

Mary Strey: Yes.

Dispatch: Are you still driving right now? You want to stop driving before you get in an accident?

Mary Strey: Yes, I will stop.

Dispatch: You want to stop right now?

Mary Strey: Yes, I will stop right now.

If you haven’t heard the audio from the call, you need to track it down. The incredulousness in the operator’s voice as he processes the fact that a drunk driver is calling to report herself is hilarious. But big ups to this guy for keeping his head enough to mirror back Stray’s butchered grammar, “You am them?” Oh, and I love how the operator posed the suggestive question implying that maybe Stray should consider pulling over before she caused an accident. After the call, police were able to track her down and administer a field sobriety test. Officers say Mary Strey had slurred speech, was stumbling, and swaying back and forth. Her blood alcohol level was 0.17 and she received a one-way ticket to the drunk tank. No word on whether the judge in her case will give her leniency for having the common decency to stop drunk driving…..by reporting herself………

- No one is more on the side of the working man, the everyman, than I am. Any time that workers anywhere in the world want to strike, picket and rebel against The Man, I will support them. Few things piss me off more than The Man holding down, walking all over or outright abusing the little guy. Today, my support goes out to workers at the Palace Hotel in San Francisco who began a three-day strike Tuesday as contract negotiations with hotel management remained stalled. It was an impressive sight as some 350 workers, members of Unite Here Local 2, began picketing in front of the hotel at about 4 a.m. While I probably would have signed up for a later-starting picketing stint, I appreciate the effort. The union is battling with hotel management to protect workers’ health and retirement benefits, which management is looking to reduce. The cuts were highlighted in hotel management's most recent contract proposal to the union and the reaction was swift and severe. The strike, expected to last until Friday morning, follows a three-day strike by workers at the Grand Hyatt last week. For a city that relies as heavily on tourism as San Francisco, having workers at two of its better hotels go on strike independently of one another with in a one-week period is an attention-grabber. The strikes have gotten the attention of city hall, with Mayor Gavin Newsom stepping in to assist with the contract talks. The Unite Here Local 2 union is currently negotiating separately with hotels including the Hyatt, Hilton, Marriott, Starwood and Intercontinental on behalf of the most blue-collar workers you’ll find in any hotel anywhere: room cleaners, cooks, food servers, bellmen, bartenders and dishwashers. These are people who don’t deserve to be dicked over by management or to have their benefits ripped or reduced just to boost the bottom line. Fight the good fight and stay strong, Palace Hotel employees, I’ve got your back………

- Way to call an anonymous whistleblower with the courage to speak out a liar, International Energy Agency. The IEA is vehemently denying allegations from a whistleblower that world oil reserves have been exaggerated to avoid panic buying in the oil market. Maybe it’s just the conspiracy-theory lover in me, but I’m inclined to hear this anonymous whistleblower out. This person claims that many within the agency believe the body's prediction for oil supplies "is much higher than can be justified." In other words, they are lying about how much oil is available so that people who aren’t smart or forward-thinking enough to begin adapting to alternative fuel sources don’t lose their minds to look to buy up every barrel of oil they can find. These claims stand in direction to the IEA’s annual outlook, which the agency released Tuesday. In that report, the IEA reiterated its prediction that oil supplies would rise to 105 million barrels by 2030 under current government policy. "We're the ones that are out there warning that the oil and gas is running out in the most authoritative manner. But we don't see it happening as quickly as some of the peak oil theorists," Richard Jones, deputy executive director of the IEA, lied, er, said. "Generally, we're viewed as more pessimistic than we should be by the (oil) industry.” Sure you are, Rich. So why am I more inclined to believe your anonymous whistleblower when he or she says that: “Many inside the organization believe that maintaining oil supplies at even 90 million to 95 million barrels a day would be impossible, but there are fears that panic could spread on the financial markets if the figures were brought down further.” A second senior source, also anonymous, seemed to back up those sentiment with this gem, that it was "imperative not to anger the Americans" who were said to play an influential role in encouraging the body to underplay potential supply shortfalls. “We have already entered the 'peak oil' zone. I think that the situation is really bad." Those who support the peak oil theory insist that the world is rapidly running out of oil and multiple measures must be taken immediately to avert utter disaster. As for the IEA outlook, it outlines potential results of two scenarios: The "Reference Scenario" assumes government policy remains the same, while the "450 Scenario" projects what may happen if governments take action on climate change. The 450 moniker is a reference to the long-term concentration of 450 parts per million of CO2-equivalent needed to limit to 50 percent the probability of a global average temperature rise of two degrees Celsius. The “Reference Scenario,” under which global temperatures could rise by up to six degrees Celsius, predicts a 40-percent increase in demand for fuel between now and 2030. The nations expected to drive this increase are fuel-suckers like China and India, along with the Middle East. The dilemma for the world is how to boost production and consumption of renewable energy sources so that demand for oil doesn’t actually rise from 85 million barrels per day to 105 million barrels per day by 2030. If that nightmare scenario unfolds, crude oil could cost as much as $115 per barrel by 2030, up from an average around $60 a barrel this year. One thing everyone seems to agree on is that world leaders hold the key to our energy crisis and that they must find a way to address the Earth’s growing climate-change issues to fix things. Color me cynical, but I’m not holding out a lot of hope for that…………