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Yesterday, the RP joined his friend — and Louisville’s most popular radio host — Terry Meiners on Terry’s afternoon drivetime program (WHAS 700 AM) to discuss his impossible journey through the World Series of Poker. Click here to listen to their funny and fascinating conversation The Politics of Hoops
Despite a lack of true post players, the USA Olympic team looks primed for another gold medal run in London. [ESPN] Picture Dirk in a jersey that doesn’t say Dallas. As painful as it is, you might want to prepare yourself. The big man claims he’s “too old” for a team that’s rebuilding. [CBS] Krzyzewski has always been hesitant to pull the trigger on transfers – but when he does, they’re good. Is Rodney Hood the next Blue Devil success story? [Yahoo] Whether you support it, think it’s too strict, or not strict enough, only one thing is for certain: nothing is for certain when it comes to the future of basketball’s “one-and-done” rule. [ESPN] A College of Charleston senior will be lacing them up for the home team in this summer’s Olympic games. [CBS] Politics of Fashion
Wedding dresses by…Jessica Simpson? You heard that right. [NYDN] Cinderella may have lost her glass slipper, but Christian Louboutin is the prince who found it. Check it out: [SHEfinds] The battle of the retailers continues: brick-and-mortar retailers combat the online shopping craze. [Racked] Beach time is here! Prepare yourself with these beach bags and summer essentials: [Fashionista]
An exhilarating roller coaster ride encompassing 40 hours of mind-thumping boredom. A liberal former politician succeeding by playing with an über-conservative game plan. A victory of steadfast patience, the absence of which has been my defining character flaw. The long distance coaching of one of my better friends, whom I’ve only met twice in person. A game legendary for its macho bravado that’s dominated by pasty-faced math geeks. And the most striking contrast of all: I’ve lived a life of painstaking diligence — some might say monomaniacal zeal — toward building a career centered around moral values; and one of my life’s highlights — indeed one of its most truly spiritual moments — came playing a card game that I’d hardly practiced and that’s banned in my home state because of its purportedly immoral implications. ===
Months earlier, when we learned the schedule of my youngest daughter‘s summer in Israel program, my wife, who had a trip planned already to Mexico, suggested that after I dropped Abby off at JFK airport, I should make it a long weekend playing poker in Vegas. She knew how much I loved no limit Texas hold ’em — a game that both rewarded my high school math skills and stoked my innate competitive fires — and that I so rarely got chance to play since online poker was made illegal. Read the rest of… Contributing RP Jeff Smith researches the amazing but untapped (and capitalist) potential in prisons in his audition for the TED speaking program. If you are unfamiliar with TED, click here. They select a winner based on reader feedback, so PLEASE go here and vote!
An exhilarating roller coaster ride encompassing 40 hours of mind-thumping boredom. A liberal former politician succeeding by playing with an über-conservative game plan. A victory of steadfast patience, the absence of which has been my defining character flaw. The long distance coaching of one of my better friends, whom I’ve only met twice in person. A game legendary for its macho bravado that’s dominated by pasty-faced math geeks. And the most striking contrast of all: I’ve lived a life of painstaking diligence — some might say monomaniacal zeal — toward building a career centered around moral values; and one of my life’s highlights — indeed one of its most truly spiritual moments — came playing a card game that I’d hardly practiced and that’s banned in my home state because of its purportedly immoral implications. ===
Months earlier, when we learned the schedule of my youngest daughter‘s summer in Israel program, my wife, who had a trip planned already to Mexico, suggested that after I dropped Abby off at JFK airport, I should make it a long weekend playing poker in Vegas. She knew how much I loved no limit Texas hold ’em — a game that both rewarded my high school math skills and stoked my innate competitive fires — and that I so rarely got chance to play since online poker was made illegal. Read the rest of…
I said, yes. And I really do think you can divide the two major political parties into a patriarchal and matriarchal divide in how they approach problems and appeal to voters. Republicans are, as described above, the party more inclined to have a convention speaker accuse the competition of being “Girly men.” It’s crude, dated, and ham handed but also fills a need we all have for a strong sure father-figure. Ronald Reagan mastered this role in a way that Schwarzenegger only caricatured. By contrast, we Democrats are viewed as the more nurturing, compassionate, and patient party who “feels your pain” as Bill Clinton famously said. A banal statement that became famous because it so well symbolized a key difference between Clinton and his opponent; Democrats from Republicans. A conservative will tell you to quit whining and fix a personal problem yourself. A liberal will go on a long walk with you to help you talk through it. Both approaches have their excesses and extremes. But both parties, in my opinion, do have this primitive distinction between them at their core. Of course, the gender characterizations I make are outmoded and crude. But then again, that’s a very liberal thing to say.
Even assuming that at least some of the conservative sentiment is the desire to find comfort in defeat, and that some liberals are engaging in the intellectual version of being graceful winners, there is some core of truth here: upholding the mandate on commerce clause grounds would have linked the power to regulate a market with the power to compel participation in it. Justice Ginsburg’s concession that the power’s only limitation is practicality and political modesty is much less dangerous in a concurrence than a majority opinion.
Read the rest of…
Out of the field of 4260 in the World Series of Poker’s $1000 no limit hold’em tournament, there were 95 of us left. And I was the shortest stack of all. Only 16,000 chips. And the big blind was coming to me the next hand — that meant I’d have to post 6000 chips from my dwindling stack. I was toast. Despite my imminent elimination, despite the extraordinary fatigue of the late/early hour and having spent over 20 mind-numbing hours watching grown men (and a few women) play cards, I was beaming. Not only was I checking off my longtime bucket list moment of playing in the World Series of Poker; not only had I fulfilled the goal I set of playing to Day 2; not only had I passed my revised goal of making a little money; not only had I cracked the top 100 players left; I felt the unique zen of playing a perfect game — for me, of course — I had not make a single stupid decision; I hadn’t lost my cool and gone on “tilt”; I hadn’t lost my attention and failed to assess the circumstances correctly; I had done my best. And now, as the Poker Gods had demanded, it was time to go home. I looked down at my two cards and smiled. A Jack and a five. Known among in poker parlance as “Jackson Five,” it’s a pretty lousy starting hand. 99% of the time, I would have folded. But I had no choice — if I folded now, I’d have such a small stack that I’d be leaving soon anyway. I went all-in. The player on the button called. He turned over an eight and a four. Read the rest of… To kick off the weekend, RP Jason Atkinson offers his latest cinematic adventures, this time from a trip to Yakutat, Alaska: |
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