Click on title to link to the Associated Press's pre-season Top 25 College Football team ratings.
Well, another season has come around. I usually have plenty to say about the college football scene but I am taking a page from the late gonzo "sportswriter' Hunter S. Thompson playbook. Thompson's premise was that once you have "run the board' on one football season (or any sporting event)you can basically live off the fat of the land thereafter. In the word processor/Internet blog age all you have to do is call up a previous year's work and slip it in. I do so here. Except to note that unless something strange happens (always entirely possible in college football, especially the very competitive SEC)Florida with ace quarterback Tebow should repeat. If they falter, then my real favorite Texas out of the Big 12 should prevail.
Below is the commentary from 2008. Thanks for the tip, Hunter.
"Commentary
This running commentary was started on August 29, 2008 and will continue until January 2009. Each week I am making my comments on the previous week and making my selections for the upcoming week in the comment section. Of course, using the power of the Marxist scientific method (or maybe dumb luck) to enlighten one and all on this earth shaking struggle.
Well, folks now is the lead-up to the first real weekend of college football and time once again for this unrepentant Marxist to use his materialist concept of history to predict the trends of the season. But let us back up for a moment to last year’s (yes, I know ancient history but with blog history available, such as it is in this case, it can be pulled up in an instant) zany season and this forecaster’s ill-advised choices. One knows things are not right when upstart Appalachian State takes Michigan in the first week. It went downhill from there. The next couple of paragraphs taken from a review of Hunter Thompson’s Hey, Rube and a postscript tell the tale when the deal went down.
A run through the ups and downs of Thompson's previous seasons' (2000-2003) gambling wins and loses, however, does not date well. Hell, I can barely remember last week's bets. But the real problem is that, as in politics, we listen to different drummers. I am a long time fan of `pristine and pure' big time college football and would not sully my hands to bet on the NFL so his whining about the San Francisco 49'ers or the Denver Broncos is so much hot air. However, I will take Ohio State and 3 points against LSU in the 2007 college championship game. That's the ticket. I miss Hunter and his wild and wacky writing that made me laugh many a time when I was down and needed a boost but not here. Enough said.
Postscript: May 15, 2008. Needless to say there is a strong difference between my uncanny powers of political prognosis and the rather mundane ability to pick college football champions. Obviously, only a fool would have bet on the Buckeyes of Ohio State against a real SEC team like those Cajun boys from LSU. Right?
...Obviously, at the end of this year’s football season I will have to make better use of the delete key. But all of that is so much hot air and ancient history. Today we start as fresh as new born babes. That, after all is the beauty of this kind of madness. Here goes.
A Democratic convention with a historic black candidate for a nominee. Ho hum. A Republican convention coming up with the same old same old. Yawn. Today, or at least the time it takes me to write up this commentary, all that ‘real’ news is so much hot air. Why? This weekend marks the first serious collegiate football Saturday and the time to make my predictions about who will win this year’s coveted national championship (Jesus, I better stick to politics, this line sounds like something out of the late legendary sportswriter Grantland Rice. Somebody please stop me if I start writing about the 'mythical' national championship). I admit that I got waylaid last year when LSU seemingly came out of nowhere at the end to deliver Ohio State its second consecutive national championship lost. But that was last year. This year is as fresh as the driven snow.
On the first weekend of September it would be pointless (and foolhardy, as well) to name the winner. One of the virtues of following the Top 25 in the college football ratings is that, more so than in professional sports, the most precise calculations can blow up in your face. Witness last year’s unlikely defeat of Michigan by Appalachian State. So with that precaution in mind here is my Top Four which reflects the strength of the top conferences in the scheme of things. Pac-10- Southern California (no-brainer out West). Big 10-Ohio State (here I finally like them so they probably will tank out on me). Big 12- Oklahoma (although I like that quarterback McCoy from Texas, if he ever stops throwing interceptions) and the home conference of last year’s national champion’s, the SEC- Georgia who came on like gang busters at the end of last season (no, no repeat for LSU. Yes, I like Florida's Heisman Trophy Tebow but is the team around him strong enough?). For all you Clemson(ACC) and/or West Virginia fans (Big East). Get real-again!
I promise to do better updating the weekly commentary. Hell, all there is as an alternative is this misbegotten presidential campaign so I should have plenty of time on my hands."
Showing posts with label collectivism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label collectivism. Show all posts
Saturday, August 29, 2009
Monday, October 16, 2006
SOFT-CORE SELL OF A STALINIST HENCHMAN
BOOK REVIEW
KHRUSHCHEV, ROY MEDVEDEV, ANCHOR PRESS, NEW YORK, 1983
At one time in the seemingly distant pass the name Roy Medvedev was associated very closely with the left-wing elements of the opposition movements into the former Soviet Union at the time of Khrushchev’s leadership. One would hardly know from reading this biography that the two were, at least formally, political opponents. Mr. Medvedev has produced a biography that beyond acting as catalogue of Mr. Khrushchev’s travels and activities as leader of the former Soviet Union is little more than a soft-core sell of an old Stalinist henchman. This tact on the part of the author may be due to the fact that book was published in 1983 when the Soviet Union was in the early process of going to hell in a hand basket and so the Khrushchev period appeared, in retrospect, to be a Golden Age of Stalinism-without Stalin. Nevertheless if one is looking for a more profound analysis of a key personality of the immediate post-Stalin period one will have to look elsewhere.
That said, Mr. Medvedev cannot be faulted for his general factual presentation. He dutifully, if superficially, goes through Mr. Khrushchev’s rise to the top layer of the Stalin entourage, the struggle for power after Stalin’s death in 1953, the monumental revelations of the crimes of Stalin at the 20th and later the 22nd Russian Communist Party Congresses, the various domestic crises particularly the continuing problems in agriculture that years later would contribute to the downfall of the Soviet Union, the international disputes within the world Communist movement, the at times very heated struggle with the West during various episodes of the Cold War and his eventual downfall from power in 1964.
The reviewer grew up in America at the time of the rise and fall of the Khrushchev regime and it was useful to be reminded of those events, their importance in the history of that period and as a refreshing of my memory of my reaction to the events at the time. For those who have forgotten or do not know of the key events such as the attempts at nuclear disarmament, the crisis in Berlin and the Cuban Missile Crisis this book provide a competent review of those events.
The stumbling block to any further credit to Mr. Medvedev’s book is his rather fawning attitude over Mr. Khrushchev’s achievements in the post-Stalin period. Yes, Mr. Khrushchev performed an important, if not adequate, service to the international communist movement by his revelations of Stalin’s crimes. But any leftist critic of Stalinism has the right to ask- Mr. Khrushchev what were you doing at the time of all these acknowledged crimes while a henchman of Mr. Stalin? It is not enough to argue that there was little one could do. The history and fate of the Left Opposition in the Russian Communist Party and that of other oppositionists in the wastes of Russia testify to other routes for those who considered themselves Bolsheviks. No, this gloss-over will not do.
Mr. Khrushchev, Mr. Medvedev and I shared one thing in common. At one time we all stood for the defense of the Soviet Union against attack by world imperialism and internal counterrevolution. Beyond that we part ways. I note that all through this paean to the intrepid Mr. Khrushchev there is very little sense that in the Khrushchev era, despite some obvious thawing of the internal political environment, that workers and farmers councils could have been a more appropriate way out of the impasse of Soviet society than just playing musical chairs with the top levels of the Soviet bureaucracy. The gap between that Leninist understanding of the road to socialism and Mr. Khrushchev’ s top-down operation certainly did its part to weaken the Soviet Union and cause its ultimate collapse. Stalinism certainly represented the political expropriation of the working class, the labor camps, the judicial murders, the bureaucratic perks and all of that. However, in the final analysis the Stalin regime also meant the practice of "socialism in one country" which placed natural limits on the internal developments of the Soviet Union. Stalin liked it that way. Nothing in the book indicated that Khrushchev saw the world any differently.
SOME OF THE BOOKS REVIEWED HERE MAY NOT BE READILY AVAILABLE AT LOCAL LIBRARIES OR BOOKSTORES. CHECK AMAZON.COM FOR AVAILABILITY THERE, BOTH NEW AND USED. YOU CAN ALSO GOOGLE THE MARXIST INTERNET ARCHIVES.
KHRUSHCHEV, ROY MEDVEDEV, ANCHOR PRESS, NEW YORK, 1983
At one time in the seemingly distant pass the name Roy Medvedev was associated very closely with the left-wing elements of the opposition movements into the former Soviet Union at the time of Khrushchev’s leadership. One would hardly know from reading this biography that the two were, at least formally, political opponents. Mr. Medvedev has produced a biography that beyond acting as catalogue of Mr. Khrushchev’s travels and activities as leader of the former Soviet Union is little more than a soft-core sell of an old Stalinist henchman. This tact on the part of the author may be due to the fact that book was published in 1983 when the Soviet Union was in the early process of going to hell in a hand basket and so the Khrushchev period appeared, in retrospect, to be a Golden Age of Stalinism-without Stalin. Nevertheless if one is looking for a more profound analysis of a key personality of the immediate post-Stalin period one will have to look elsewhere.
That said, Mr. Medvedev cannot be faulted for his general factual presentation. He dutifully, if superficially, goes through Mr. Khrushchev’s rise to the top layer of the Stalin entourage, the struggle for power after Stalin’s death in 1953, the monumental revelations of the crimes of Stalin at the 20th and later the 22nd Russian Communist Party Congresses, the various domestic crises particularly the continuing problems in agriculture that years later would contribute to the downfall of the Soviet Union, the international disputes within the world Communist movement, the at times very heated struggle with the West during various episodes of the Cold War and his eventual downfall from power in 1964.
The reviewer grew up in America at the time of the rise and fall of the Khrushchev regime and it was useful to be reminded of those events, their importance in the history of that period and as a refreshing of my memory of my reaction to the events at the time. For those who have forgotten or do not know of the key events such as the attempts at nuclear disarmament, the crisis in Berlin and the Cuban Missile Crisis this book provide a competent review of those events.
The stumbling block to any further credit to Mr. Medvedev’s book is his rather fawning attitude over Mr. Khrushchev’s achievements in the post-Stalin period. Yes, Mr. Khrushchev performed an important, if not adequate, service to the international communist movement by his revelations of Stalin’s crimes. But any leftist critic of Stalinism has the right to ask- Mr. Khrushchev what were you doing at the time of all these acknowledged crimes while a henchman of Mr. Stalin? It is not enough to argue that there was little one could do. The history and fate of the Left Opposition in the Russian Communist Party and that of other oppositionists in the wastes of Russia testify to other routes for those who considered themselves Bolsheviks. No, this gloss-over will not do.
Mr. Khrushchev, Mr. Medvedev and I shared one thing in common. At one time we all stood for the defense of the Soviet Union against attack by world imperialism and internal counterrevolution. Beyond that we part ways. I note that all through this paean to the intrepid Mr. Khrushchev there is very little sense that in the Khrushchev era, despite some obvious thawing of the internal political environment, that workers and farmers councils could have been a more appropriate way out of the impasse of Soviet society than just playing musical chairs with the top levels of the Soviet bureaucracy. The gap between that Leninist understanding of the road to socialism and Mr. Khrushchev’ s top-down operation certainly did its part to weaken the Soviet Union and cause its ultimate collapse. Stalinism certainly represented the political expropriation of the working class, the labor camps, the judicial murders, the bureaucratic perks and all of that. However, in the final analysis the Stalin regime also meant the practice of "socialism in one country" which placed natural limits on the internal developments of the Soviet Union. Stalin liked it that way. Nothing in the book indicated that Khrushchev saw the world any differently.
SOME OF THE BOOKS REVIEWED HERE MAY NOT BE READILY AVAILABLE AT LOCAL LIBRARIES OR BOOKSTORES. CHECK AMAZON.COM FOR AVAILABILITY THERE, BOTH NEW AND USED. YOU CAN ALSO GOOGLE THE MARXIST INTERNET ARCHIVES.
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