John Calipari & Other Fun Stuff

Not saying anything will come of it because if no one talks, it will be like the Reggie Bush situation where nothing can really be done. But anyone who thinks this Eric Bledsoe investigation isn't bad for UK has their head in the sand. I won't even worry about the extra benefits part of the story, but who can really believe that Bledsoe could get a 1.9 in his first three years of high school and suddenly get good enough grades as a senior to raise it to the magical 2.5 needed for college eligibility? That would have to be almost all As as a senior. I've seen this guy interview. This is as shady as they come. I know I will hear all the excuses that have become routine for UK fans. "The NCAA has a vendetta against UK" which we know must be true since the NCAA hates teams that gets ratings and sell tournament tickets. "How was Calipari supposed to know Bledsoe might be cheating at school". Trust me. I've said it before, college coaches are well aware of their recruits are doing academically. That's why you hear of schools backing off recruits because of fear they won't get eligible. And Calipari has a history of players miraculously gaining eligibility after signing with him. We have the Derrick Rose situation where he got eligible with a bad SAT score which caused Memphis to vacate a Final Four. But Calipari had a history of taking players with shaky transcripts at Memphis. Actually, he's had a history of taking players at UMass with shaky transcripts going back to Lou Roe and Dontae Bright. John Calipari just has the worst luck in the world. All these mental midget basketball players conning him into letting them in college. How can it keep happening to a guy?

But let's ask the real question. How stupid was the athletic department at UK? Once again, as noted before by me, it may not have been the smartest thing to hire Calipari when they knew he was already under investigation at Memphis. UK hits the gray area on compliance so often that it's the only school whose compliance officer's name I'm familiar with. How stupid are they to not do their own investigation on Bledsoe? Which it seems unlikely to have occurred. UK gave a statement saying the NCAA cleared Bledsoe to play. Guess what? At one point they cleared Derrick Rose to play. That didn't work out too well. The NCAA clearinghouse clears thousands of players every year, but if new information comes to light, that can be vacated. After seeing your new coach have a second Final Four vacated due to academic fraud in high school, don't you think it might be a good idea to make sure everything is okay yourself? It was commonly believed by many coaches that Bledsoe wouldn't get eligible. Add that red flag to his incredible jump in academic production and you have to believe there was a problem. And guess what? There is a problem. Based on the Derrick Rose precedent, it doesn't matter if the NCAA thinks UK was unaware of the problem (and with the reputations involved here, that's a big if). If they retroactively declare Bledsoe ineligible, the whole season could be vacated. I'm sure if that happens, UK fans will still insist that Calipari has never been mentioned in NCAA sanctions. Just like at UMass and Memphis.

Recently, the world lost Dennis Hopper and Gary Coleman. Not in that order. I'd heard rumors a couple of months ago that Hopper was in bad shape. Coleman was a mess. Not hard to be surprised at him going although he didn't seem to have the big ass drug problems as his costars. But pretty sad commentary that a porn star laments the tragic lack of a childhood that Coleman had.

I don't watch beauty contests very often. Actually, outside of the ones at Hooters where I know some of the entries, I don't at all. Why should I? I have the internet. I can look at all the scantily clad hotties I like. All I get in a beauty contest is whether they can walk in heels. Much better when they fall on their ass. So I didn't pay much attention when the latest Miss USA was crowned. In fact, I didn't even know it was going on until I heard some inane chatter about the winner being the first Arab to win it. Still didn't care. Contest was always full of mindless political correctness. But then photos surfaced of her winning a pole dancing contest at strip joint (although clothed). Now I'm intrigued. And she's probably dead if she goes to Iran. I'm just wondering how soon that will get added as part of the talent competition.

Speaking of dirty dancing, a video emerged of Billy Ray Cyrus' retarded child doing a dirty dance at a movie wrap party. While sixteen. I'm sure Hannah Montana fans will be thrilled. Well, the ones who wear trench coats and take pictures at the park might like it. I've always assumed that was a large part of her fan base. To be honest, I never thought she was very cute so I don't understand the "wait until she's 18" crowd. Have to wonder about those who do find her attractive. She seems to be the obsession of a gay dude in his 40s. Not sure how to figure that out. She might want to start learning showtunes.

These are the crime stories I love. Two men were feuding about parking. Parking? WTF? I'm too lazy to carry on an actual feud over that. But these guys did. Until one shot the other with an arrow. I like that the victim had to actually see an arrow before realizing he was shot. But not as much as I like the mugshot. It says he is 41. Looks older than Uncle Jesse.

Maybe I should take a trip to Europe.

Do a little search on this blog and you'll find my ridicule of British police for routinely arresting old people for fighting back against teenage thugs instead of arresting those teenage thugs. Now they've really gone stupid. They're breaking into people's houses to show them that it can be done. Next they'll murder a few people to show that can happen too. Seriously, is this the best use of police force? To wander around looking for houses with unlocked windows to leave them a bag with their own possessions in it? Why not take a dump on the carpet to warn them about the perils of vandalism?

Just in time for Memorial Day. Richard Blumenthal is running for Senator in Connecticut. Apparently the NY Times and Washington Post have outed him as a bit of a liar about his Vietnam War record. Namely that he would mention his time in Vietnam even he was in the Marine Reserves and never went over there. I do like that the initial focus of his campaign was to defend the deferments. I guess they don't want any connection to accusations that George Bush faced, but Bush never claimed to have actually been there. Blumenthal says he misspoke, and often said he never actually served in Vietnam. But does anyone believe this is the first case of him doing this? He's allowed the impression that he had served in Vietnam get to the point that numerous newspaper articles have included that in his bio. He's a well known media whore so the likelihood that he didn't know about those articles is crap, and the fact that he didn't make any attempt to correct them is good indication he was happy with that deception. While a lot of vets are unhappy about it, I'm guessing won't matter for most voters in Connecticut (as it would in say Alabama), but it should. Especially when the best he can do is an emailed apology to a newspaper. I think this should be a big story. I've watched my brother leave his family for three overseas tours of duty where people are losing life and limb. I would never respect anyone who tried to pass off his sacrifices as their own. And for Vietnam vets, it's an even worse case. Not only did they have people shooting at them, but unlike vets of wars before and since, they had a noncommittal homefront with a lot of outright hostility from a large segment. I guess it's a sign of progress though. It took ten years for a welcome home parade for Vietnam vets who were often stereotyped as murderers and psychopaths. Now instead of actual vets downplaying their service, you have others trying to use it to advance their political career.

But people are all the time lying or exaggerating for political advancement. And here is a new one. Some guy running in the Democratic primary was accused of faking his bisexuality by his opponent (an ugly straight woman). I was surprised to see it wasn't in some place like San Francisco but in Philadelphia. I guess it really is the city of brotherly love. But this is what you should expect with identity politics. I'm not sure which should be more offensive to gay people. That someone might claim to engage in part time buggery because he thinks it'll get him the gay vote. Or that some 70 year old witch has decided she can decide someone else's sexuality for him. Well, the witch won. I guess the wannabe gay guy should have put out an ad showing himself kissing a bunch of guys at a gay bar.

But it's not just politics that now has a gay litmus test. It's softball. Well, a men's league. We know straights don't play women's softball. A team from a San Francisco gay softball league was DQed from the Gay Softball World Series for not being gay enough. Same situation. Guys may be pretending to like sausage while having a girlfriend. To find out, event organizers interrogated team members about their sexual preference. Guess that's better than making them get on their knees to provide a certain service to prove it. I guess in this league, you need to bring your personal sextapes with you.

How cute. Some company decided that regular vibrators use too much energy so they came up with one the is eco-friendly. It has a hand crank. Like those emergency flashlights. I hope the women are quick. Those flashlights don't last long at all. Oh, and how cute. It was originally designed for women living in the Third World who don't have access to electricity. I'm sure vibrators are high on their list of priorities. But never fear. Cave dwellers can be resourceful. A German university found a 30,000 year old dildo in a cave. It was all broken, but they put it back together (who got that fun task). Even better, it combines the hand cranked sex toy and flashlight together because it was also used to start fires. Although probably not at the same time.

It is Memorial Day weekend, and I've always been curious about what kind of programming movie channels and such would carry. Scanning through the listings, I see that AMC, Fox Movie Channel and even Encore were doing the usual with films dedicated to war movies. Turner Classic Movies did a Clint Eastwood marathon which could have been okay since it was also his birthday. However, I think they could have picked some pictures with more of a soldier theme. As much as I like the Dollar Trilogy, only The Good, The Bad and The Ugly had any soldiers in it. Which left Where Eagles Dare and Kelly's Heroes (two of my favorite WWII movies) to also fit for Memorial Day. No Heartbreak Ridge? Of course they may not have had access to all his movies since they started the day with The First Traveling Saleslady which may have been his first real credit but doesn't seem to be much of a part for him. But then you have the Independence Film Channel. They decided to show war movies too. Most of which focused on Russian or French soldiers and women in occupied Europe. Uh-huh. I guess they weren't aware that Memorial Day is an American specific holiday. But that wasn't too surprising. Yet, it wasn't a movie channel that was most disappointing. It was the History Channel. They did a Pawn Stars marathon. Now I like Pawn Stars. But you would think that of all the TV channels to have something planned around Memorial Day, it would be the History Channel.