Capitalism

This week Sam Keller complained about not getting paid to play football, but former Sooner QB J.C. Watts has taken his single digit ACT score* and turned it into a six figure lobbying job for the Bowl Champsionship Series. What a country!

Watts career has gone from Sooner QB to CFL player to Oklahoma Corporation Commissioner to US Congressman to Lobbyist. Watts has earned $620k over the past five years lobbying on behalf of the BCS.

Not bad work, if you can get it. On the other hand, the efforts didn't seem to go so well last week in hearings. All the lobbying in the world doesn't help if you have Texas and it's electoral votes on the other side.

*I can't find a reference for this, but vividly remember in my teem years hearing Switzer say that JC made a 0 on his ACT. National average was around 17 at the time.

If Al Gore were a Longhorn

Gentlemen Bears win postseason game

The Baylor Bears won their first postseason game since 1950 on Wednesday night, when they defeated the Georgetown Hoyas. To give you a sense of how long 1950 ago was, the federal budget deficit for 1950 was $3.1 billion, and total expenditures were $42.5 billion.

$42.5 billion can’t even get you a good bailout anymore.


Congrats to the Bears.

AIG Pays for Courtney Paris Guarantee

by LandThieves Women's Basketball correspondent Jenna Plumlee
Norman (LTP) – Earlier this month, Courtney Paris received national attention for a guarantee that the Lady Sooners would win the Women’s national championship. Last week, however, the Sooners were bounced out of the Big 12 tourney in the semi-finals.

Today, during AIG CEO Edward Liddy’s testimony before Congress, Liddy stated that the Sooners loss to the Texas A&M in the Big 12 tourney constituted a “technical default” on Paris’ guarantee to the Sooner nation. As a result, the troubled insurance giant has paid the University of Oklahoma approximately $64,000.

Paris was unaware she purchased an insurance policy regarding the guarantee, prompting further calls into oversight of the operations of AIG.

LandThieves Washington, DC bureau chief JC Watts may have contributed to this report.

Is Obama the New Blake?

Upon his hire at the University of Oklahoma, John Blake was a youthful, energetic African-American pioneer, the first African American head coach at Oklahoma. Many hailed his hiring as the right man for the job to turn around a great organization that had recently fallen upon hard times. A quote in this 1996 article says, “We can’t go down any further” If only he had been correct.

Hindsight tells us that while Blake was a masterful recruiter and that players liked him, he was ill suited for the job as a head coach and the end result was not desirable. After the 0-4 start of 1996, the fans turned on him. Sound familiar?
Sure, Obama’s skinnier, and the MSM are behind him 100%, and he has better command of the English language, but it remains to be seen if Obama is any good at being a President.

I know my 401(k) is now a 0.401(k), and I know the “change” that has come so far is that government just got a whole lot bigger. Will Obama turn things around? I dunno. I know that if you’re going to turn it around, you have to make sure you stop at 180 degrees and not do a 360.

For the sake of our country, I'm rooting for Obama to be a better President than Blake was a head coach. But me cheering on Blake didn't help any in 1996-98.

Obama fixes College Football

We read earlier this week that Obama has proposed an eight team playoff to determine the national champion. Since the idea was long on brevity and short on details, Joe Huff commissioned LandThieves political correspondent Julius Ceasar Watts to get the details from President elect Obama:


JCW: You mentioned in earlier speeches that you were in favor of reparations for Blacks. How do you see that playing out in your plan to change college football?


BO: the Historically Black Universities have been long denied a chance to compete on the highest levels of college sport. At the end of the regular season, the champions of the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference and the Southwest Athletic Conference will play for one of the eight slots in the playoffs.


JCW: President-elect Obama, you have indicated that America is in need of redistribution, and that this would be "chump change" to the college football elite. Do you also see that translating into your playoff?


BO: I certainly do. Many schools don't have the same opportunities to advance as the elite. As a result, I've formulated a 5 point plan to level the playing field.

• Coaches that work long hours game planning and recruiting, come up with innovative ideas and climb the ladder of success will be allowed the opportunity to share their earnings with coaches that lack imagination and motivation to succeed. It's just unfair to expect all coaches to have the same level of work ethic.
• At the end of the season, teams that have experienced successful seasons will have their skill position players redistributed to other schools that are less fortunate.
• Players that have been gifted with exceptional speed and quickness will be required to wear weighted ankle bracelets, so that their brethren who weren't born with the same muscle twitch fibers can complete on the same playing field.
• Players possessing remarkable strength will be required to tie one had behind their back, so that their physical advantage won't impair the progress of an individual who's hasn't worked as hard in the weight room.
• The Big 10 network will be the only sports channel on the basic cable and dish packages. the MTN will be available to premium subscribers, and ESPN, ABC and CBS will only be available to federal workers and their families at no charge.

JCW: That seems a little concerning to me. By levelling the playing field like that, you're going to disincent achievement, and end up with an inferior product.

BO: My election was a mandate for change. This change to a level playing field may not be welcome to some. But make no mistake, it is change. Sacrifices must be made for the greater good. No one should have to watch Iowa State play Colorado in their present state.