GP1

Now we are getting to the heart of the issue. Which is worse, a drunk Airman or a drunken Sailor? Kind of comes down to an old question. Is it worse to die in a plane crash or drown?

I posted this idea on the board over three years ago so it must be a good idea. I just got off the phone with a young man from Wake Forest calling about my season tickets for next year. I forgot to send in my renewal, but his call reminded me. Seats are being assigned at the end of this week so if you want the same seats, you need to get the check in by Friday. He asked me to make the envelop to his attention. Why? I asked..... Well, WF has set up a program where they pay their staff commission for ticket and Deacon Club renewals and new sign ups. They are one of the first schools in the country to try it and he said it is working great. Of course it is, give people incentive to work and they will work. The WF athletic director has won the national award for the best AD in the country two times in the past five years. This is the kind of creative thinking an AD should have. Stop doing what everyone else is doing, be creative and different. It works. Very simple. Renewal = 5% of sale. New customer = 10% of sale.

LeBron is a cash cow for NE Ohio. Without him, the Cavs are back to Brevin Knight, Shawn Kemp... and 4k people coming to downtown Cleveland on any given night. He's the difference between the downtown bars and hotels being packed for 45 - 50 nights per year, and them being at 20% occupancy. If LeBron departs, downtown Cleveland will be a ghost town ... once again. Turning around the Cavs took one guy. Turning around the Indians takes 12 guys. And the Indians are no where near close to having those 12 guys. The Indians are WAY closer to being the Pirates than the Yankees. Or the Twins for that matter. Go Zips. Fine, someone show me how much money he brings in and then prove to me that amount will go down to zero of he leaves. I know you are an engineer and it can be limiting at times, but this is a different kind of A + B = C. This LBJ argument you are making is 1+1=2. I look at it as C=10. There are a lot of ways to get to 10. 9+1, 8+2, 7+3, 6+4 or 5+5. The Cavs can win without LBJ. ITZ is right. If LBJ is their only chance at success, then they need to fold the team because nobody knows how to create a winning team. I don't think LBJ is going to leave, but if he does, that's life. The Lakers won after Shaq and the Cavs can win after LBJ. Someone just needs to find a way to gather a good team with a good coach and win. If Detroit can win, the Indians can win. If the Twins can win, the Indians can win. It is more important for Cleveland for the Indians to be good than the Cavs. I'll bring this around to the Zips since this is a Zips board. After 2004, all the hand wringers said, "What are we going to do without Charlie Frye? Woe to Zips fans." What happened in 2005? We won the league without Frye. The Cavs can win without LBJ, they just need to find a way to do it.

I'll bite. How much milk does that cow produce a year in total dollars and dollars in relation to the overall economy of NE Ohio? The Cavs play 41 home games (in a 20,000 seat arena) plus playoffs. Wouldn't they be better off f the Indians were good in lieu of the Cavs. The Indians play 80+ home games a year with 40,000 seat arena. I'm not buying that LeBron is a cash cow for NE Ohio. LeBron is a cash cow for himself though. Mayor Don is a joke and if this is the brain-child of his, the city is in bigger trouble than I had thought. This is just grasping at straws. I have absolutely nothing against LeBron. In fact, I almost feel embarassed for him for having to attend things like this. I wonder if Mayor Don's staff ran this by the LBJ marketing machine before they decided to have this day. Then again, a chance to sell a huge amount of his products during the off season probably isn't a bad marketing idea....Will UofA be smart enough to sell products on the same day or will it be restricted to LBJ stuff?

This is so pathetic, it is laughable.

Here is a big question I have. Are there that many people out there who have the kind of cash necessary AND willing to donate it at the higher price?....For a parking spot next to the stadium, when in reality, most places to park at UofA for less money really aren't that far from the stadium? Before I owned my own business, I worked for big companies and believe it or not had really good positions. Before we made a business decision that we were certain would upset a customer, we would make a "risk analysis plan". The purpose of the plan was to explore all possible outcomes of a decision to see if making the existing customer base upset was really worth the risk. At times it was......at times it wasn't, but we at least put some thought into it. How this went down was so stupid it makes me think they spent zero time weighing the pros and cons. Let's face it, if the team is bad again next year, attendance will drop off dramatically. Even if some of those spots open up at a much lower price, many of you (and there really aren't that many of you all together) are upset to the point you will not get a Lot 9 sport OR you realize you are having just as much fun in your new, less expensive lot as you were in Lot 9. The lot will sit empty and they my as well allow the Sun Grill and The Odd Corner to be rebuilt there. It's funny to think about how things could go full circle. I always thought the parking questions were silly when we played at the RB. Let's face it, there was no real difference in parking location from one lot to the next...just different levels of crappy. The Bid Dialer is a different story and there should have been some consideration for long term fans. I take that back. Mack did have consideration for long term fans, TW has consideration for his next job. This situation has been poorly, poorly, poorly, poorly conceived and executed.

I've been writing on this board for years about this very topic and it looks like I'm right again. I took a minute to look at the best team in the Big Ten in the past 5 years, which is tOSU. 21 of the 95 players from the roster (23%) I picked up were from south of the Mason Dixon Line or California. Many more are from out of state but mostly rust belt kids. When a tOSU coach goes to a player and says, "Come to tOSU and you can play for a national championship". He is not telling a lie. tOSU gets the best out of state talent of any school in the midwest, they play a cake walk of an ooc schedule, they play in a talentless conference and they are a media darling so they get voted high in the polls regardless. Every year, they stand a good shot at going undefeated and if things fall in the right direction, they could win the national championship game. Next year is going to be a long year for tOSU haters. I'm glad I don't live around their obnoxious fan.

Like all economics, not everything is easy to explain. What is certain though is spending a portion of your taxes for a bureaucrat to manage what you should be able to decide for yourself what to do is not efficient. The problem we have today is politicians have taken to calling all government spending a "stimulus". Bailing out a bank is not a stimulus. Making government employee unions happy by not cutting employees is not stimulus. Building a bridge is more like a stimulus, but since one in three American bridges are in disrepair, I would call it a necessity. If Obama wanted to project himself as being a responsible adult, he would portray road and bridge building as "good government" or "responsible government". Not a stimulus. Americans want badly for our government officials to behave in an adult manner. If one actally did, that person would be loved by all. Wider roads are a stimulus. Rail systems from the suburbs to the city are not stimulum...they are welfare programs designed to create more people sucking at the breast of government because every mass transit system, with the exception of NYC, loses money evey year.

Libertarian economist? I think I'll pass. "If all the economists were laid end to end, they'd never reach a conclusion." -- George Bernard Shaw Ill go with the masters... Keynes and Hayek Mankiw is not a Libertarian. Read his blog. You are assuming economists can be laid end to end. If any of you are uncertain about who Keynes and Hayek, here is a rap song that will help you understand the difference between the two. Lastly, you may like masters, but I'll take King Adam Smith above all else. Milton Friedman second.

This link takes you to Greg Mankiw's blog. Many of you may have used his Economics text books in college. The video from yesterday explains why we are so screwed, but it does it in a funny way. Lasts less than three minutes and explains the world economy during that time.

Beer, guns and football. Sounds like my kind of day.

ZipsWin! is a good example of someone who has spent 25+ year supporting the program and is getting crapped on by the Athletic Department. Over the years he has gone from a GA ticket guy, to a GA/parking pass guy, to a GA/parking pass guy with Z-Fund donations, to Reserved Seats/Expensive parking pass guy with even higher levels of Z-Fund donations and so on. He is what you want your alumni to be as they progress from young adulthood to old age (OK, not that old). Along the way, he as been forced to sit in some of the worst facilities in the country, drove up and down Rt8 in horrible weather to watch BB games and tailgated in a field next to a crappy little airport. He was nice enough to call it a courtesy call, I call it a go "f" yourself call. ZW! is a reasonable guy along with CK and others on the board. Had UofA approached him in any other way other than a "f" yourself way, hard feelings could have been avoided (see my plan previously). There are probably only around 25-50 calls UofA would have needed to make to avoid a problem...let's face it, that about sums up the die hard fans....we're not talking tens of thousands here. They might have even been able to increase donations had they handled it differently. I don't know who made the calls, but there are so few, TW could have made some of the calls himself. My guess is he was out searching for other landmines to step in. There is a right way to present bad news and a wrong way to present bad news. This was handled wrong.

Or any of his time.... The guy is an absolute do nothing.

Bingo!!!!! Changing the parking situation is an easy resume line for people working in the Athletic Department. That's why things get done. I've never thought parking was a big deal. This is not a big deal. In fact, I think people obsess too much about it on this board. With that said, I'm not much of a fan of our AD and this is an example of how things poorly get handled. I think he is lazy and a "ready, fire, aim" guy....Just like I said about him last year during the Reno episode. I think I have this guy pegged pretty good as a short term employee of UofA....we can only hope. Our last three ADs were Thomas, Mack and TW. I guess two out of three ain't bad.

Lot 34 is where the real party is at, that's for sure. You're a history guy, right? Did the Russians stop at Czechoslovakia? Did the Germans stop after they bombed Pearl Harbor?

It isn't an either/or question when it comes to road money games or parking increases. I understand the need to make money and I encourage them making as much money as possible. How they executed this plan is wrong. Let's say CK contributes $2,000 per year to the Z-Fund and they want $10,000 for people to park there. He is a loyal fan and owns a web page that could cause a stir (and it did...this thread is already on page 2 with page 1 including a stripper). Why not go to him and offer the same spot for $3,000? Still less than the 10K, but much more than he currently pays. The ball is in his court to accept it or walk away. If he accepts it, the Z-Fund increased a donors giving 50% and CK has made a choice he can live with. If he walks away, it was his decision to make after a fair offer and the Z-Fund can sell the spot at a higher price and save face. The appearance is much better as it is a win/win for everyone.

Ahem -- There were stripper poles. See you at the game. If I don't make it, please tell Destiny I said hello.

No stripper poles, no strippers, no baby pools full of oil, no mud pit etc. Doesn't sound like much of a party to me. Seriously, I'm all for them making some money. There is a right way and a wrong way to handle this. It would seem to me that a wrong way to handle it would be to alienate a guy who owns the ONLY fan board about the Zips. There are enough people working at UofA who know who the regulars are to make a better decision. My guess is some of you might have even shelled out a little more to park there, but not up to what they are asking. Asking you for a little more money would put the decision to leave or stay in your court. Things like this could have been handled more quietly. For example, my brother has Pens season tickets on the glass. There are a couple of nice ladies who sit a couple rows behind who never miss a game and have had season tickets since the first season the Pens ever played. There were so few season ticket holders, the players used to deliver the tickets to their homes and fan appreciation day was a post season kegger at a park outside of Pittsburgh where the players showed up and got as drunk as the fans. These ladies are not wealthy, but the Pens helped them out so they could continue to have the same quality seats they have had for 40+ years. Do you want that story in the paper or one where these ladies are sitting in peanut heaven. For a guy who is supposed to be a PR genius, TW sure is a dumb-ass.

The main tenets of the LP are the Constitution and Bill of Rights. These documents create a framework for government and restrictions on the government against personal liberty. People can see abortion anyway they want, but the government should not intrude on the personal liberty of anyone, including a woman (even thought this country has been going downhill since we let ladies out of the kitchen and into the voting booth). The discussion of abortion is no different than a discussion of the Civil Rights act in 2010. More important issues are unemployment, national debt, government burden on small businesses. Those are the issues facing America today.

My dad was a small town doctor and came from a really poor background. One of those guys who earned every penny he had. My mother came from an almost equally poor background in West Virginia. Sort of like the author's parents. He was WWII generation and was 49 when I was born (youngest of six), so I heard it all growing up because he was past the point of talking to a child like a child. I only remember being treated like an adult. Among one of my favorites was his advice about hemorrhoids, but this took place after I was an adult. "If you don't want hemorrhoids, don't sit on the toilet all God damn day. People from the Middle East never get hemorrhoids because if they squat over the hole in their backyard too long, a lizard will come along and bite them on the ass."

Want to laugh? Go out and buy a book called Shi*t My Dad Says. It could have been written by me or one of my siblings. My father was a lot like his in that he was a very caring parent who didn't give a crap what anyone thought of him and never sugar coated very much. My wife is away for the weekend with friends so I'm sitting around the house in my underwear with my dog reading this book. I laughed out loud so many times it started to make my dog nervous. Go get the book!

It's because the majority of journalists are leftists and they don't want to focus on the real issues facing the country.

Besides, Republicans constantly bring up the Constitution, Bill of Rights, Boston Tea Party, and other issues more than 200 years old. So saying that the Civil Rights Act of 1964 doesn't matter defies logic. My goodness, where to start? Do you understand there is a difference between the Constitution/Bill of Rights/Amendments and the Boston Tea Party? Just to be clear, the Boston Tea Party was a episode of revolt by the colonists. The Constitution and Bill of Rights establish the legal framework for the country. The laws we establish today are required to be in compliance with the Constitution and Bill of Rights. They are as important today as they were 200+ years ago. The problem is, citizens either don't know or don't understand the Constitution and Bill of Rights. Dave's post is a perfect example of probably the majority in this country who really don't understand the framework of our government. The Republicans and Democrats use lawyers and the courts to manipulate the Consitution and Bill of Rights. Their use of the Equal Protection Clause in the 14th Amendment is a perfect example of how they manipulate the Constitution. Republicans used the 14th Amendment in the 2000 election to solidify their case. The Democrats use is to make up protections for freak fringe groups instead of making certain all groups are treated equally. The Libertarian Party is the only party that discusses equal protection as everyone being equal. If the media wants to try to run people with different ideas out of political races (they will fail in Kentucky), then we are going to be stuck with more of the same. What we have now isn't working and a change is needed. Obama isn't change, he is an acceleration of the ongoing disaster. Republicans and Democrats are more than willing to participate in the disaster as well. We are all screwed unless Libertarian thinking can catch hold.

I agree. He could play defense the rest of the way and win. A huge mistake Republicans make is playing the game the left wants to play. Democrats have been smart in dealing with Republicans in past two years. What they do is float out an idea they would never act upon and then sit back while Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh and the Sarah Palins of the world run around and spout off insanely about the idea. Let's face it, only one of those three graduated from anything more than high school. The Republicans need to focus on issues that matter to people today and when they are asked about an issue from 40 years ago, they should say it does not matter in 2010 and spin the questions to issues facing Americans today. Getting back to the Libertarian/Republican issue. I wish some of you would actually read up on the Libertarian Party. The LP is not an extreme version of Republicanism. Extreme Republicanism is Creationism, anti-abortion, prayer in schools, endless war in the middle east (although that seems to be the Obama policy as well), etc. The extreme base of the Republican party has actually lost its mind and is focused on issues that really don't help American today. The LP is about individuals having as much decision power over their own life as possible without government interference. The LP is about states deciding their future and not the federal government. LP is about you deciding your own future on your own. It is pro choice, it is anit-war in the middle east, it is about bringing troops home from places such as Germany (let the Huns defend themselves for crying out lout) and Japan...all of these ideas fall within the Democratic Party. Granted, there are probably more issues siding with Republicans, but you get the point.

So click on "disagree" like I did and move on. (BTW I did not need to refer to the bible to make my decision) But I agree if it is to show restraint.