- Umm, that might not be necessary, Turkey. Your newly
elected Dictator For Life, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, seems to believe that it’s in
your hands to decide whether to continue pursuing membership in the European
Union, but that plucky little referendum you plan on holding may not have a
point, not if the EU continues to take a hard stance on your authoritarian
nation providing clearer signals on whether it intends to meet EU criteria on
human rights and the rule of law. See, the EU is funny about welcoming in
despotic leaders who rig votes that allow them to extend their reign of terror
over their country, all in the midst of a jaw-dropping and never-ending
campaign of trampling the human rights of your people. So while Turkey pretends
it’s the one deciding how this ends, the truth is that it needs to step its
game up to get the union to welcome it to the ranks. Sure, Erdogan did what
despots do, go on television and do an interview in which he boldly accused the
EU of not being "sincere or honest" and of making Turkey wait at its
gates. “Turkey will choose the next path of a Brexit-like referendum," the
dictator proclaimed. Right, except for the small matter of the United Kingdom
actually being in the EU and deciding to leave, as opposed to you acting like a
jilted junior cheerleader who throws a fit if the right guy doesn’t ask her to
prom and says she’s not even going to the dance. See, Turkey has been going
through EU membership negotiations since 2005, but little progress has been
made, mostly (or entirely) because of the despotically contemptible way Erdogan
runs his country…….
- This is why you typically don’t allow star pitchers to
dictate their own medical treatment. The New York Mets have tried that approach
twice within the past week and both times, it hasn’t ended well. First, starter
Steven Matz decided to square off with the team because he disagreed with its
stance on his elbow injury and now, power-pitching Noah Syndergaard is out
indefinitely after he was finally forced into having that pesky MRI, the one he
didn’t want to have prior to his last start even though the team insisted on
it, a start that ended with him exiting the mound against the Washington
Nationals in the bottom of the second inning, grabbing his right side after
throwing a pitch to Bryce Harper. Even after Syndergaard missed his previous
start due to biceps and shoulder discomfort and was scheduled for an MRI on
Friday, he decided to throw a bullpen session as a means of proving he was
fine…which he clearly wasn’t. When he finally did have the MRI, it showed the
pitcher suffered a partial tear of his right lat muscle and according to the
team, he will be placed on the 10-day disabled list. Why the team would allow a
star player, one in whom they have a lot invested, dictate to them whether he
would undergo a simple medical test because he appeared to be seriously
injured. "We didn't get into that," general manager Sandy Alderson
said. "I didn't think that was necessary at that particular time, so I
think he understands now that there's something going on that needs to be
examined.'' Something else that needs to be examined is whether it’s medically
possible for Alderson and the front office to grow a pair and take a firmer
stance on making injured players undergo testing rather than allowing a
headstrong professional athlete to tell them whether or not he’s good to make
his next scheduled start………
- What is it with jails and water lately? First, federal
lawsuits by two inmates who accused a Missouri prison of not providing proper
water or plumbing to their cells and now, Milwaukee prosecutors are accusing
the county sheriff's office continued using water deprivation as a form of
punishment at its jail even after an inmate had died of dehydration. It’s one
thing for convicted (or accused) criminals of claiming that their jailors
aren't properly hydrating them, but it’s quite another for the district
attorney's office to present jail logs to jurors showing two inmates were
disciplined by having water to their cells shut off in the weeks after another
inmate died of dehydration. Terrill Thomas is the inmate who died April 24,
2016, according to prosecutors, after he was deprived of water for seven days
because he had flooded a cell. That would seem to be a drastic overreaction by
deputies, not to mention violating that pesky constitutional entry against
cruel and unusual punishment. Prosecutors taking on correctional facilities
doesn’t happen often enough, but prosecutors are conducting an inquest for a
jury to determine whether criminal charges against jail staff are warranted.
That means squaring off against Sheriff David Clarke, who runs the jail and
whose response to questions about Thomas’ death has been a) to decline comment
and b) try to shift the focus back to Thomas’ criminal record, which has no
actual bearing on whether or not he was treated humanely while behind bars……
- It’s nice to know people’s true motives. For example, you
might think that the family of (the wildly overrated) late musician Prince
suing to block the release a new EP of unreleased recordings called
‘Deliverance’ that dated from around 10 years ago was merely a case of loved
ones defending the name and image of the man they held near and dear to their
hearts. Shockingly, this appears to be less of the love and more of the “looking
to make money and build our own brand off the name of our deceased loved one,”
as in the family allegedly wants the recordings so they can use them in a
planned reality TV show. Yes, Prince hasn’t even been dead two years and his
family is already trying to move on by turning his fame into their big break
with a show that will reportedly tell the tale that no one gives a damn about
except them, i.e. how their lives have changed since Prince died. Of course,
one obvious change is that it’s much harder to gravy train on his career when
he’s deceased, but there are plenty of royalties from his vast catalog and
various products and projects for which they can grant permission, but it’s
still not as easy as it was during his life. The family did win the initial
skirmish over the recordings as a court has since ordered George Ian Boxill, a
producer involved in the release, to hand the recordings over to them. Boxill is
still contesting the result because clearly, everyone wants their piece of the
monetary pie that someone else made from scratch, baked and skillfully prepared…….
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