July 2007 – Page 3

Shorebird of the week 7-12-2007

On deck, Michael looks back to the dugout during a May game.
Michael Pierce is a catcher for the Shorebirds, this photo was taken prior to their July 7 game.

Catcher Michael Pierce gets the honors as my Shorebird of the Week. Michael’s shared time behind the plate this season with a former SotW, Victor Castillo, but this week it’s his turn to grace monoblogue.

A tough May and June had Michael’s average down to .219 after a decent start but lately Pierce has returned to the groove and pushed the average back up to .235 with a pretty decent .712 OPS mark (OPS stands for on base percentage + slugging percentage). Out of 32 hits this year, 13 are doubles and that really helps the slugging numbers. Hitting .235 won’t win him a batting title, but catchers usually don’t hit for high average anyway unless your name is Pudge Rodriguez. Nor was Michael selected as a hot prospect, instead he came to the Orioles as the 28th round selection in the 2006 draft out of Fresno Pacific University in his hometown.

In looking up his numbers, I noticed he had only a handful of at-bats last year in Aberdeen (just 2 hits in 22 at-bats) so in essence this is his first pro season and he’s done reasonably well for a guy most would dismiss as an “organization player”, one whose purpose is to fill out the low minor league rosters. But as long as he’s here and continues to get in the lineup his chance to move up in the Orioles chain still exists.

And I just like a guy who shares my name and my number from Little League days.

More Maryland budget grousing

I guess I’m on the list now. Senator Pipkin sent me another press release today, this time discussing the “fear and strong-arm tactics to force counties to support tax increases.” This stems from an e-mail Pipkin acquired written by Maryland Association of Counties lobbyist Dave Bliden. Pipkin also stated that,

“I thought I was beyond shock and outrage until I read about using volunteer firefighters to help beef up the propaganda campaign to get locals to rally behind the state tax increases. The e-mail lays out an arrogant and shameless blueprint for getting locals to back tax increases. As Bliden says, the next few weeks of gubernatorial visits to the counties ‘is a good opportunity to make a case, and, even more important to convince the Governor we (the counties) are there 100% to help him help us.’”

What interested me the most was the original e-mail with one of the addressees being Wicomico County Director of Finance Patricia Petersen. It was attached as part of the Pipkin press release and I’m replicating it warts and all.

Ladies and Gentlemen–

I just spoke to the County Executive Smith and Jan Gardner about a conversation I had with Josh White, the Governor’s Intergovernmental Relations Chief, about which we wanted to motivate a a (sic) response.

Josh is interested in coordinating a message for the Governor as he goes on roadtrips to the counties. He is looking for not just the property tax equivalents, but real vignettes of the county “doomsday” budgets… like closing libraries, reductions in deputies, larger class size, no support for volunteers (sic) firefighters. I suggested a goal of 10 examples for each county, if the proposed State “doomsday budget” comes to fruition..

The Gov could be visiting the counties during the next weeks, which presents an opportunity to deliver. And, with a good product, we could share with the other counties to get them motivated. Something for discussion at our July 13 meeting. Another good perspective would be having interested constituencies there to show their interest, e.g. the volunteer ff’ers.

This is a good opportunity to make a case and, even more important, to convince the Governor we are there 100% to help him help us.

Can you get your team motivated? We would be most willing to work with them.

Best wishes.

David

So the counties are trying to guard their own turf, which is understandable – particularly in Wicomico County where we’re under a revenue cap. In some ways, MACO is asking all participants to take a page out of Rick Pollitt’s “shadow budget”, detailing the cuts they’ll be forced to make if the state isn’t allowed to dig deeper into our pockets.

Much as the federal government shifts costs to each state as much as they possibly can to help with their budget, so too is Governor O’Malley attempting to push pricey programs onto the counties. While in many ways this is actually a good step, the abruptness of the shift is understandably making Maryland’s counties a little nervous. I suppose my issue with this attitude is that, judging by this e-mail, counties are more interested in protecting their turf than asking the tough questions, both of themselves and of Governor O’Malley.

For the Governor’s part, it seems like the cuts he’s making in the budget are set up to make the maximum splash but with a minimum of substance. For example, many of the state employees being “let go” are already gone, it’s a matter of not filling vacant positions. (These vacant positions were probably those of Ehrlich’s political appointees anyway, like my friend Maria.) It’s a bit reminiscent of the 1995 budget showdown, when federal employees furloughed by the impasse were portrayed as victims of the evil GOP. I’m just waiting for the cuts to be made and the sob stories to commence in the Sun and other sycophant media outlets. It’s obvious to me that with its call for publicizing counties’ own “doomsday budgets” the Bliden e-mail was the first step in setting up the victimhood mentality.

Celebrities in Crisfield?

I’m just going to take a little time and do some idle speculation here. As we all know, in just 7 short months (yes it’s that close) the party-affiliated voters of Maryland will be picking their Presidential candidates. One would think that a good way to meet interested voters and those who are more interested in being political volunteers than most here in Maryland would be to make an appearance down in Crisfield at the Tawes Crab and Clam Bake next Wednesday (the 18th.)

I did a little bit of checking over the last couple days only to find that most of the Presidential candidates only post their schedules a week in advance, so they just have this week’s schedule up. I did see that Mitt Romney is slated to be in Colorado that day and John Edwards begins his “one America” tour or whatever he calls it in West Virginia. But part of that was a pledge not to visit states with early primaries, thus that would freeze out Maryland.

So it’s up in the air at best whether we’ll be blessed with an appearance from any national officeseeker. It’s likely that we won’t but one never knows – after all, since many of the candidates reside in Congress and the Senate they’re not all that far from Crisfield to pop in and check things out. On the Democrat side that covers Biden, Clinton, Dodd, Kucinich, and Obama; for the GOP hopefuls the list goes Brownback, Hunter, McCain, Paul, and Tancredo. Congress is in session next Wednesday though so it’ll most likely be many of Maryland’s lesser lights who attend. Of those candidates who aren’t in Congress, many of them are spending their summers in Iowa and New Hampshire.

However, another intriguing sidelight about Congress being in session is that there might be a free opportunity for the three hopefuls running for Wayne Gilchrest’s seat to meet and greet voters without the incumbent being able to compete. It’s been well-documented both locally and on the regional front that Andy Harris made a deep cut into the cash advantage Congressman Gilchrest enjoys. I’m quite sure Harris will be in Crisfield, and it’s a fairly safe bet that Democrats Frank Kratovil and Chris Robinson will be partaking in Crisfield’s finest seafood that day as well. (By the way, I did get the Harris press release but I saw others had posted it before I would’ve had the chance to. I even got a call from the Harris folks asking me if I got it.)

Another guy who should show up down at Somers Cove is State Senator E.J. Pipkin. No, I don’t think he’s running for anything this time but it gives me a segue to another press release I received from his office concerning state spending. Calling Governor O’Malley’s budgetary sleight-of-hand “fiscal magic at its clumsiest”, State Senator Pipkin also said:

“For the Governor to suggest that $153 million in cuts, of which some will be replaced by federal dollars, some are simply not filling vacant positions, and still more is from the savings of shutting down the House of Corrections, is nothing more than window dressing.”

“I am pleased to see that the Governor is willing to make these types of efficiencies,” said Pipkin. “But there is much more work to do, and not a lot of time to do it.”

“I hope everyone in Annapolis is not going to point to these cuts and say ‘This is the best we can do, now we need to raise your taxes!’” added Pipkin. “As the Governor’s own spokesperson said ‘these are the first cuts, they certainly may not be the last’.”

Governor O’Malley’s meager cuts represent only ½ of 1% of the states total $30 billion budget and only 10% of the looming $1.5 billion deficit.

“Who’s kidding whom?” asked Pipkin. “I have suggested putting a lid on spending increases as an effective way to fix the budget shortfall, and that would save $955 million.”

Sen. Pipkin’s plan is a combination of holding the states spending growth to 2.5% for 2008, reallocation of a portion of the teacher’s pension and retirement back to the Counties where it is incurred, and legalizing video lottery terminals. The plan could net the state as much as $1.9 billion in combined savings and revenue for the 2008 fiscal year.

“This combination of belt-tightening, reallocation of fiscal responsibilities, and realizing revenue from slots, would allow the state to get its fiscal house back in order,” said Pipkin, “and would not dig even deeper into the pockets of the hard working families of Maryland.”

Aside from the tax on the poor (slot machines) Pipkin has some good ideas, probably from the same batch Senator Stoltzfus attempted to get through during the last regular General Assembly session.

(By the way, who’s kidding who about slots? In all honesty, both the Maryland Lottery and the proposed slots act as a tax on the poor. Because no one wants to raise their income tax rates, the state provides the allure of “easy money” which works best on those who may not have a lot to spare, mostly poor, working-class, and elderly. I’ll bet they don’t sell a whole lot of lottery tickets in Ocean Pines.)

The looming special session is another reason for politicians to show up in Crisfield, an opportunity to interact with voters and soft-sell some of the hard decisions that will have to be made. Whether it’s through spending cuts or (much, much more likely) higher taxes and more legal gambling, the structural deficit will be addressed this fall.

Standings report: All-Star break

I’m sorry to say that I find the home run derby pretty lame. It’s much more fun for me to be a prognosticator for the traditional second half of the season.

I’m going to do a very fast standings report on one team I follow as they are also at their league’s midseason break. Matching my Tigers in first place are my Toledo Mud Hens as they try for a third straight International League Governors’ Cup title. They already have another title this season as “the Roost” was recently picked as being the best seats in the minor leagues by ESPN.

As they stand at the moment, it’s a rerun of 2005 as the Mud Hens have surged to the IL’s top record at the break (52-39). Despite losing yesterday, they maintained a 3 game lead over Indianapolis in their effort to win another IL West crown. And the remainder of July is relatively kind schedule-wise to the Hens as they play mostly IL South foes with the exception of the mediocre Pawtucket Red Sox, who are 5th in the IL East. Their next division game isn’t until August 4th against instate rival Columbus.

Now it’s time to move up a level. As I’ve done for the last two seasons, I’ll go through each American League team in order highlighting their strength of schedule.

1. Boston (53-34). Leads AL East by 10 games over Toronto and New York.

Strength of schedule: 297 games under .500, easiest in the American League.

Key stretch: If all goes well, they may clinch around September 15, when the hated Yankees come to Fenway Park. Other than that, they have a nice homestand coming out of the All-Star break against three teams who are all under .500 – Toronto, Kansas City, and Chicago.

Prediction: They will win the AL East but probably not until after the Yankee series.

2. DETROIT (52-34). Leads AL Central by 1 game over Cleveland (2 in loss column.)

Strength of schedule: 50 games under .500, 3rd easiest.

Key stretch: They salvaged a winning homestand (7-5) coming into the All-Star break by sweeping Boston, but they’ll pay for it now as they play 18 of their next 21 games on the road, featuring trips to Seattle/Minnesota and Chicago/Los Angeles/Oakland. Of that group, only Chicago is under the break-even mark.

Prediction: Hard to say. They’re fairly likely to make the playoffs, but whether it will be as AL Central champion or wild-card is up in the air. Last year’s bullpen strength isn’t there this season due to injuries and defections.

3. Los Angeles (53-35). Leads AL West by 2.5 games over Seattle.

Strength of schedule: 104 games over .500, 7th easiest.

Key stretch: Around Labor Day weekend they enjoy a long homestand featuring Texas and contenders Oakland and Cleveland.

Prediction: They’ll fight with Seattle the rest of the way, playing the Mariners 10 times (6 in Seattle.) I think they’ll hold off the Mariners and go into the playoffs as they are now, the #3 seed.

4. Cleveland (52-36). 2nd in AL Central, 7 games ahead of Minnesota and leading wild card by 1.5 games over Seattle.

Strength of schedule: 1 game under .500, 4th easiest.

Key stretch: From September 17-27, they play contenders Detroit (home), Oakland (home), and Seattle (away) before finishing at Kansas City. One game in Seattle is the last remaining makeup of the snowed-out series back in April.

Prediction: I think they’re strong enough to either win the AL Central or emerge as the wild card.

5. Seattle (49-36). 2nd in AL West, 6.5 games ahead of Oakland.

Strength of schedule: 124 games over .500, 8th easiest.

Key stretch: From late August into September they have an eastern trip to Cleveland (for one makeup game), Toronto, New York, and Detroit. Because of that makeup they don’t get a day off at either end, just one between New York and Detroit.

Prediction: The Mariners probably don’t have quite enough to overtake the Angels or Indians. They’ll be a team that sits home while some NL team with a worse record plays on.

6. Minnesota (45-43). 3rd in AL Central, 5 games up on Chicago.

Strength of schedule: 353 games over .500, 12th easiest.

Key stretch: Right off the All-Star break they host contenders Oakland, Detroit, and Los Angeles. They’ll likely need about a 7-2 or 8-1 homestand to jumpstart their season.

Prediction: The schedule is probably too tough to make a late charge like they did last season. While they did make up 11 games over two good teams from this time last season I can’t see both Detroit and Cleveland collapsing like Detroit and Chicago did in 2006.

7. Oakland (44-44). 3rd in AL West, 6 games ahead of Texas.

Strength of schedule: 307 games over .500, 11th easiest.

Key stretch: They play a batch of teams who are currently under breakeven toward the end of August. That has to be the point where they make a move because the Athletics have the most difficult September schedule in the league.

Prediction: I don’t think they have the horses this year, I see them winning maybe 85 games at most.

8. Toronto (43-44). 2nd in AL East in a virtual tie with New York.

Strength of schedule: 26 games over .500, 6th easiest.

Key stretch: 8 games to start the second half at division rivals Boston and New York. It’ll set the tone for the season and probably determine if Toronto is a buyer or seller at the trading deadline.

Prediction: Another disappointing campaign for Canada’s team. They’re not likely to finish out of third this season like they did in 2006.

9. New York (42-43). 3rd in AL East, 5 games clear of Baltimore.

Strength of schedule: 168 games under .500, 2nd easiest.

Key stretch: They do not play a team with a winning record the rest of July. That’s the good news; the bad news is their ancient pitching staff will have to deal with 19 full games plus the completion of a suspended game in Baltimore in 18 straight days after the All-Star break.

Prediction: The Boss ain’t gonna be happy this season. It’s not that the Yankees don’t have talent, but even if they win at a 2/3 pace the rest of the way, they finish 93-69. Cleveland, who’s fourth overall right now, is on track to win 96 games. So the Yankees need two good teams to falter and play well to make yet another playoff trip.

10. Chicago (39-47). 4th in AL Central, 2 games ahead of Kansas City.

Strength of schedule: 515 games over .500, toughest in baseball.

Key stretch: Are you kidding? They play in the AL Central. How about 32 games against Detroit (14), Cleveland (12), and Minnesota (6)?

Prediction: While the Sox have played better of late, they just might be sellers at the trading deadline. The killer schedule and hole they’ve dug for themselves show just how baseball is – the 2005 World Series clubs (White Sox and Houston) are a combined 77-97 this season. I’m seeing a team lucky to win 75 games this year but retrenching in 2008.

11. Baltimore (38-49). 4th in AL East, 4 games ahead of Tampa Bay.

Strength of schedule: 9 games over .500, 5th easiest.

Key stretch: Learning how to win against weak teams like Tampa Bay and Texas, who they face a combined 19 times.

Prediction: Happy crowds on four weekends the rest of the year as the Orioles play punching bag to the Red Sox and Yankees. Since on those weekends Boston and New York fans outnumber and outshout the hometown faithful, on balance the attendees will be pleased.

12. Kansas City (38-50). 5th in AL Central.

Strength of schedule: 224 games over .500, 10th easiest.

Key stretch: Except for a makeup game at Baltimore, their last 19 games are against AL Central foes. Just like last season in Detroit, the Royals can really play a spoilers’ role.

Prediction: No 100-loss season this year. It may be 63-99, but the Royals are showing some signs of becoming a respectable team.

13. Texas (38-50). 4th in AL West.

Strength of schedule: 214 games over .500, 9th easiest.

Key stretch: They can also play spoiler at seasons’ end, hosting Los Angeles and closing at Seattle.

Prediction: Look for a firesale come the end of the month.

14. Tampa Bay (34-53). 5th in AL East.

Strength of schedule: 366 games over .500, 13th easiest.

Key stretch: You’re a raw rookie, coming up to the bigs for the first time with a team rapidly closing in on 100 losses yet again. You look at the schedule and see your first big league roadtrip is a nice cross-country (and back) jaunt to Boston, Seattle, and Los Angeles. Welcome to the big leagues, kid.

Prediction: Like a clock that’s stopped, someday the conventional wisdom that Tampa Bay is loaded with young talent and is a team on the rise will pan out if they just keep repeating it. You would think a team that annually drafts toward the top would get a team full of good players – after all, they’ve now drafted that way 10 or 11 times! But until then, at least someone holds Baltimore up in the standings.

And for those of you who are National League fans, never fear. I also figured out the strength of schedule for each NL squad. In standings order:

San Diego (49-38), 67 games under .500 collectively, 10th easiest.
Milwaukee (49-39), 343 games under .500 total, 2nd easiest.
New York (48-39), 241 games below .500, 4th easiest.
Los Angeles (49-40), 158 games under .500 combined, 6th easiest.
Atlanta (47-42), 288 games under .500 total, 3rd easiest.
Arizona (47-43), 124 games over .500 collectively, toughest.
Chicago (44-43), 395 games below .500, easiest.
Colorado (44-44), 94 games above .500, 15th easiest (second toughest).
Philadelphia (44-44), 58 games under .500 total, 11th easiest.
Florida (42-47), 238 games below .500 combined, 5th easiest.
St. Louis (40-45), 102 games under .500 aggregate, 7th easiest.
Pittsburgh (40-48), 92 games under .500 total, 8th easiest.
San Francisco (38-48), 82 games above .500 combined, 14th easiest.
Houston (39-50), 10 games ahead of .500, 12th easiest.
Cincinnati (36-52), 59 games over .500, 13th easiest.
Washington (36-52), 69 games below .500, 9th easiest.

Surprisingly the Nats have a pretty tame schedule. So I’ll go out on a limb and do a quick breakdown.

16. Washington (36-52). 5th in NL East.

Key game: September 23 vs. Philadelphia. It’s scheduled to be their final game in RFK Stadium.

Prediction: They’ve actually played .500 ball since a dreadful start to the season (9-25 on May 9th.) So the Nats have a decent shot at winning 70 this year. It’s a start.

********************

This was fun to write. I actually did more research into it but decided that doing all the numbers was a little too dry so I played baseball expert tonight. We’ll see how I do come September.

The next standings report will be more conventional and occur at the end of the month.

A 50 year plan moves forward

If you read monoblogue during the first half of the year, you’ll certainly know that I spent several posts talking about what I call my 50 year plan – so-called because it’s going to take at least the next two generations to implement some of the sweeping changes I seek. Hopefully I’ll be around to see them!

At this juncture I’m going to take my thoughts on the direction our country should go down two paths. One of these paths will be posted on monoblogue for all to see and the other will hopefully find a wider audience sometime in the near-term future.

Starting later this week, I’m going to use most of these pet issues I care about to compare and contrast the Republican presidential candidates and see which ones I think are best suited to run the country. And as an added bonus, I’ll rate the Democrats and minor party ones as well, insofar as I can with some of the limited information available to me from some of the lesser lights.

From the sixteen chapters I originally devoted to the 50 year plan, I’ve whittled them down to 12 issues that I’m going to grade the candidates on. After looking at the issues and rereading the posts, I’ve decided that some are related enough to be combined. I also graded the twelve in order of importance, so what I’ll do is begin the process with the twelfth most important and proceed, probably on a semi-weekly basis, to number one. I’m shooting for this to run on Tuesdays and Fridays starting this coming Friday. I’m also exploring other ways to interact with various campaigns.

I’ll need to work offline as I can for the second path. One goal I had in doing the 50 year plan was to promote discussion. And while that’s occurred in most cases, it’s a case of the limited scope of my readership retarding the progress I seek. In the back of my mind, though, the posts were intended as a sort of outline for a longer form of writing.

All told, my posts dealing with the 50 year plan ran about 22,000 words. In book form, that’s somewhere between 70 and 90 pages. And while a lot of assertions I made were factual, I also wrote this in a Maryland-centric way and I think I need to do further research and study into some of the subjects I delved into. It’s probably not going to change my views on them any, but buttressing my arguments with a more diverse set of facts, figures, and research can only make the argument stronger.

To achieve this I have a goal of, in the next year or so, enlarging the 50 year plan into a book format. If it can get published, great – if not, it’s still helpful for doing monoblogue. I figure, why can’t I write a best-seller? After all, many greats in political writing and thought started out with just an idea and made it into a lucrative career. May as well dream big, huh?

In the interim, I’m still planning on being helpful in enlightening the voting public into the choices that we’ll be faced with here in February and November, 2008. Being into politics as I am, this will be a fun process. Seeing that the Shorebirds season is now over 60% complete, soon it’s going to be “back to school” and Labor Day (the traditional start of political season) is not all that far away. It’s going to be a LONG season since we have the early primary, but it’s also quite possibly a watershed election in American history. My goal is an informed electorate, so stay with monoblogue as we learn together.

Shorebird of the Future

A May pick for Shorebird of the Week, Pedro Beato got a much larger honor recently. He’ll be pitching on a major league stage as he’s been selected to the World Team playing the All-Star Futures Game today (4 p.m. on ESPN). The site of the Futures game is AT&T Park in San Francisco, where Tuesday’s major league All-Star Game will be held.

Four other SAL foes have also been selected to participate in this contest. The U.S. Team includes Chris Coghlin of Greensboro, farm club of the Florida Marlins, and Adrian Cardenas of Lakewood, representing the Phillies organization. Cardenas may not be a BlueClaw long, he’s currently on their Reserve List. It’s most likely he’ll be in for a promotion upon his return.

Joining Beato on the World Team is Fautino De Los Santos of Kannapolis (property of the Chicago White Sox) and James Van Ostrand of Lexington, who’s a Houston Astros prospect.

In case you’re wondering about seeing these other SAL players in person, for the U.S. Team representatives you’re out of luck. Coghlin’s Greensboro squad made their annual trip into Perdue Stadium back in May, while Cardenas’s BlueClaws wrap up their final trip here tomorrow evening. On the other hand, both De Los Santos and the Kannapolis Intimidators (July 30-August 2) and Van Ostrand’s Lexington Legends (August 17-20) are still on the Perdue docket this season.

Hopefully Beato does well for his inning or two of work – but of course I’m rooting for the U.S. Team to win!

Update: Beato pitched in the game, giving up a bloop single and striking out a batter to close out the 6th inning. Those were the only two batters Pedro faced as World Team manager Juan Marichal was trying to get pitchers into the World Team’s 7-2 victory.

Getting my summer back

Today I managed to relieve a large burden off my back, something that took me many hours of study and reading to accomplish. I spent quite a few evenings when I’d have preferred to be blogging or watching baseball with my LEED Version 2.2 Reference Guide. However, this morning I passed my exam and am now a LEED AP.

For those of you who don’t know all the initials involved, it stands for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design Accredited Professional. Thus my title at work becomes Michael Swartz, AIA, LEED AP. Having secured my reciprocal registration in Maryland over the spring, I’m entitled to both designations. (Technically I was already a full AIA Chesapeake Bay member because of my still-active Ohio registration, but now I can practice legally here.)

Frequent readers of monoblogue may scratch their head and wonder why I got into the green building field when I’m pretty far from the environmentalist wacko frame of thinking. Furthermore I don’t subscribe to the portion of the green buildings movement that believes designing sustainable buildings will combat global warming because I don’t think mankind (particularly American mankind) has that much to do with creating it.

On the other hand I do agree with the USGBC insofar as stating that energy efficiency is prudent practice and reusing existing sites and/or infrastructure on balance is a good thing. It can’t always be the case but when possible I like to see reuse of old buildings or sites with infrastructure already in place. But the real reason was, after working on a building that was seeking a LEED-style certification for state tax credits, I was asked to pursue the LEED AP designation thus I did so. After studying all of this, I can safely conclude that it sure would’ve helped me in that earlier case!

I do have one quibble with this movement, even though becoming a LEED AP gives me and my company a leg up on securing the work. Several pieces of legislation at the federal level mandate that new federal buildings achieve LEED Silver certification. And while it’s an admirable goal, I simply don’t believe in this being a hard and fast rule because I can just see the long arm of the federal government withholding certain amounts of money from states which don’t adopt similar regulations. It’s happened a lot in the realm of highway safety (like the .08 BAL controversy) and anytime the federal government gets a hammer on the states they tend to use it.

But I’m quite relieved today nonetheless because now I can spend my evenings doing other more interesting things that I’ve missed out on the last couple months. This was the second attempt for me at this exam, and the first time I missed the cutoff by one point. So I redoubled my efforts and it paid off – I passed this time by 21 points.

What this means in the near term is tonight I’m off to the Shorebirds game and I’ll be in a good mood. My work is slowing down back to relative normalcy so I can get into some items I’ve been meaning to start for monoblogue concerning my 50 Year Plan. Woohoo!

Not sure where it all came from…but I’ll take it.

It was a pretty good day here at monoblogue, nice readership spike. Yeah, I’ll give Joe some of the credit but he only provided 20% of the referrals, and normally he’s 10-15% on a regular basis.

But I’m not going to change to a radio review website, so I need some other stuff to bring you all back. And that’s what I’ll be working on next week since my heavy workload is coming to an end and it’ll be back to a more normal 7 to 5 day for me.

I did want to make another point about John Robinson though. On Monday he got into the whole Jack “the Dripper” Kevorkian (aka the “Doctor of Death”) controversy. My contention with the philosophy Kevorkian holds is that it cheapens life to a great extent. While having a living will is not a bad thing, and assisted suicide for the terminally ill sounds like the humanitarian way to go, bear in mind that many of Kevorkian’s victims may not have been terminally ill.

Regardless, my point is that euthanasia can be seen as the mirror image of abortion on the other end of a lifespan. Instead of killing for the convenience of the mother, you’re killing for the convenience of the offspring. But the victim is just as dead.

And while this is sort of an anecdotal story, a recent incident in Kansas makes me wonder just how desensitized society has become to death thanks to abortion and euthanasia. As Wichita Police Chief Norman Williams notes, “This (incident) is just appalling. I could continue shopping and not render aid and then take time out to take a picture? That’s crazy. What happened to our respect for life?”

So what did happen to our respect for life?

Robinson off the radio soon?

From what I’ve been told the possibility is there. Regardless of the status of his contract with WICO, I’m sure the station could buy him out at any time should they feel it’s warranted. I seem to recall that the ratings book ended about the last of June so results will be forthcoming.

But I’ve come not to bury John Robinson, or to overly praise him for that matter, except where I feel it’s due. I’m just going to give an objective look at where I feel his program is and maybe where improvements can be made. I’ve caught all but a handful of John’s broadcast days as a regular listener; further, I have witnessed the show in operation on one occasion as a “co-host” (April 13th) plus I’m one of his more frequent “serial callers”. The Robinson on the Radio show made its debut March 12 so this review comes at the end of his 17th week on the air, or about 80 shows in.

What intrigued me about his show was the idea of a local afternoon radio program. WICO was making a push for more of a local presence and not just airing syndicated programming all the time (except for Bill Reddish’s morning drive show). So they hired John to do a one hour stint in the afternoon. John had no previous radio experience but pestered the brass at WICO long enough to convince them to take a chance on the unproven talent. And he’s got a helluva lead-in show as he follows Rush Limbaugh. Thus, the opportunity for success seemed pretty good despite the lack of experience – it’s not like John’s totally unknown in Salisbury since he’s an established businessman.

John’s show generally runs with one of three formats: either a guest for the hour, a guest during the first half-hour, or no guest at all. The shows that generally work the best are ones where he has a guest. But the caveat to that is when he runs through the prewritten questions and goes off script, the show bogs down most of the time. I was disappointed when I found out (via his own blog) about the prewritten questions because to me it implies a lack of preparation. I had my own list of talking points when I was on as a “co-host” but I really looked at that as backup material and looked to John to carry the conversation. After all, people generally listen to the host of the show and the job of a good one is to have a interesting conversation with the guest – it just so happens there’s a microphone between the two. I know John Robinson and Bill Reddish can’t be compared in terms of radio experience, but when I do the morning show with Bill it’s just like a conversation between two friends bullshitting about politics because Bill’s handled his share of interviewees, 99.9% of them professionally.

It does help John to have Captain Jim there during the show. I noticed that at the start Captain Jim wasn’t as much a part of the program as he is now, so it’s almost become a dual effort. But please John, lose the “warm, cuddly, lovable” platitudes…oh man, I feel sorry for poor Captain Jim when you gush like that. It was funny shtick for a couple days, now it’s old.

I have to say that one thing I like about John is that he’s fairly animated. You would never confuse him with a droll NPR host. The two are close cousins politically but in terms of style they don’t come anywhere near each other. John just has to be real careful about going out on tangents though because he’ll go from one subject to the next abruptly and never get back to the one he started on. It’s particularly annoying when he does it with a guest. John’s show can get very scatterbrained and because I’m the ADHD type, I can relate to that trait. It doesn’t mean I care for it a great deal though.

The other real problem I have with the program is that it’s still not run all that professionally. He’s not always prepared as he’ll leave his computer at home, or doesn’t think to check the phone lines or give out the phone number and he’s quite undisciplined when it comes to airing his commercial spots. I suppose I’m used to the Limbaugh format as far as commercial timing and number of spots goes, but I’m sure there’s been a couple irate sponsors who got their commercials skipped during John’s show. Now I’m not a huge fan of commercials but those are the people who in essence write his paycheck. So he should give them a bit more respect and rein himself in to get all of the spots done.

And then there’s the minor quibble about him promising more bumper music but not delivering. Nope, I don’t care much for Vanilla Ice, sorry. There’s much better ’80’s and early ’90’s stuff I can think of for good bumper music.

Now there are some good things about the show too. Obviously there’s things I like or I would’ve quit listening long ago!

I like how he has Jimmy Sweet on weekly to discuss the Shorebirds. Yes, I’m a baseball fan and as regular readers know each Thursday during the season is Shorebird of the Week day. It might help the program if he could get some freebies like Shorebird tickets to give away, I’m surprised he doesn’t do that already. (Ok, he’s done it once or twice with his own seats when he knew he wouldn’t be there.) I’m guessing that may be out though simply because another company’s radio station airs the Shorebirds games. But maybe the Orioles?

On the whole though John does manage to secure (or maybe “beg for” is a better term) a good variety of guests on the show. Yeah, I’m not wild about home mortgages or poetry but others might not care for Jimmy Sweet either. And while I’d like to see John Robinson and Joe Albero getting along better, to me it’s good that Joe’s not as much of a feature on the show anymore. I’m stepping no further into that pitched battle, so enough said.

To be frank I’m not certain that many of the changes I’d suggest will be implemented. In my gut I think this radio experiment may be coming to an end for various reasons – ratings most important, but I sort of wonder if Delmarva Broadcasting wouldn’t be looking for a young host to do a full afternoon drive-time talk show from 3 to 6. With John doing this as a sideline (and claiming it’s costing him thousands in business) maybe ratings that aren’t stellar will make the decision for him.

Shorebird of the week 7-5-2007

Tim Bascom is the first 2007 Orioles' draft pick to play for the Shorebirds, and a first non-action photo I use for my feature.

I’m going to take this opportunity to first of all give my kudos to the Shorebirds management for again making players available prior to the games. In this case, it gave me an opportunity to get a good photo of my latest Shorebird of the Week, Tim Bascom.

I knew I had to get a picture of Tim and pick him as a Shorebird of the Week once I found out the opportunity was there. After all, it’s not every pitcher who blows away the opposition in his pro debut like Tim did. On June 25 up in Lakewood, Tim faced 15 batters in five innings, allowing nary a hit and fanning nine. It was a shame he got a no-decision for his effort.

He got a sixth no-hit inning in Sunday night before Lake County batter Matt McBride finally got to him with a single. It wasn’t as easy in that start, but Tim battled through five innings again against the Captains, allowing three hits and one run, striking out five and walking two. So for his brief pro career, Bascom is sporting a nifty 0.90 ERA and a dominating 0.50 WHIP. Granted, it’s just 10 innings and the struggles are sure to come, but Tim’s been impressive in his debut with the Shorebirds.

The Orioles picked Tim in the fourth round out of the University of Central Florida. What I suspect will become of the 22 year old Floridian is that he’ll likely pitch not much more than 5 innings a start (probably on a pretty sharp pitch count), and he’ll have about 12 more starts this season. That will give him about 70 pro innings on top of his workload from UCF this spring. Particularly in Florida, their college season begins in February so the innings will take a toll on Tim a little more quickly than most at this level. Then next year he’ll likely be placed into the regular routine for Orioles farmhand pitchers, albeit (with any sort of success in Delmarva) it’ll probably be in a Frederick or even Bowie uniform. Though he was picked in the fourth round, Bascom was actually the second name called by the Orioles, who lost their second and third round picks when they signed free agents over the winter.

So enjoy watching this kid while he lasts here on the Eastern Shore. I’m sure Andy MacPhail and the rest of the O’s brass are watching him closely too.

And a happy Independence Day to all!

I’m not going to sit at the computer long, but I wanted to take a few moments and wish my readers a Fourth of July festooned with family, friends, fireworks, and fun! Here’s an AP story detailing how others will spend the Fourth of July holiday, including our soldiers in Iraq.

The most interesting part of the article to me was how many new citizens choose today to swear their citizenship to our nation. These LEGAL immigrants who went about things the right way generally turn out to be an asset to the country and do assimilate into our culture.

And a good number of those people serve or did serve in our armed forces. Today’s a day we should thank them too. Okay, we should thank them every day but an extra thought or prayer today never hurts.

On a personal note, I’ll get to enjoy the company of friends today at their place and it looks like my heretofore heavy work schedule is going to ease a little bit now. This means I can get back to regular posting. I think I’ve managed to place something up each day lately but now I can get back to more political issues and other items I do as a mid-summer tradition, like my rundown of baseball’s second half.

So enjoy the blessings of our nation today. While it’s not perfect, remember the Founding Fathers only strove to form a “more perfect Union.” The rest is up to us.

Late edit: Another AP story about our soldiers overseas celebrating the Fourth. In some places it’s already the Fifth now so they’re done with the partying and it’s back to work.

Shorebirds no-hit – again! (with video)

For the second time in 10 days, Delmarva’s bats were silenced by the pitching staff of the Lake County Captains. This time it was a 3-0 whitewash in front of a large crowd drawn by the post-game fireworks. And for the home crowd, those would be the only fireworks seen from anyone connected with the Delmarva side.

Lake County hurlers Hector Rondon and Neil Wagner combined to mystify the Shorebird bats, Rondon (6-4) tossing six no-hit innings and Wagner the final three frames for his 10th save. Brandon Snyder’s popup was the final out and set off a celebration of Captains in the middle of the diamond.

And it just so happened I had my camera. Now it has a sort of limited video capability (only 320 x 240) so it’s not the best quality video ever shot, but it’s a bit of history. So here’s the video I uploaded of the final out and celebration. (It’s about a minute and 45 seconds all told, takes a bit to download.) I managed to keep off-color comments to a minimum.

I know this is the first no-hitter I’ve personally witnessed, and I’m certain it’s rare (if ever) that a particular team has no-hit another team twice in the same season, let alone in a span of less than 10 days. And I congratulate Rondon and Wagner on their fine effort. Fortunately we’re through with playing the Captains until the tail end of August so maybe their better pitchers will be called up by then.

Update 11:32 p.m. – Here’s a wrapup and game summary, along with the box score from the Minor League Baseball website.