From northjersey.com:
Joe shaping up the Yanks
By Bob Klapisch

Friday, February 22, 2008

TAMPA, Fla. – The sweat was running off Derek Jeter's face in rivulets, and that wasn't the only evidence of another grueling workout. Jeter was breathing hard -- sucking wind, actually -- after the 10th and final 100-yard sprint that he'd run with Alex Rodriguez. If it was any consolation to the Yankee captain, A-Rod didn't look much better.

Just two weeks into camp, Joe Girardi has delivered an unmistakable message to the Yankees: winter vacation is over. It's a huge risk for a rookie manager, instituting a rigid conditioning program on a core of millionaire veterans. So far, however, Girardi's approval-rating in the clubhouse seems to be high.

"We all loved [Joe] Torre, but we're all disappointed at what happened last year. Something had to change," is how Mike Mussina put it. In this case, change means a strong emphasis on running, which has left the Yankee veterans sore, even the ones who thought they'd arrived in camp in shape.

On Tuesday, in addition to their normal baserunning drills, the players had to run eight foul pole-to-foul pole sprints. On Wednesday, there was a timed 300-yard shuttle -- a series of six 50-yard sprints -- that had to be completed in less than a minute. After a 90-second rest, everyone did it again. And on Thursday, the Yankees were pushing out multiple 100-yard dashes, followed by a 60-yard jog and 40-yard walk back to the starting line.

After the 10th sprint the Yankees were, literally, done. Jason Giambi said, "I'm 240 pounds, I was totally gassed." His teammates straggled back into the clubhouse after being on the field for nearly four hours. Although no one had a right to be shocked by the workload -- Girardi notified the players six weeks ago this would be a tough camp -- the Yankees never recalled being taxed like this by Joe Torre.

Girardi admitted, "it's a lot of work, especially because you're on your feet the whole time. But this is what you have to do if you want to be ready by opening day. I told the guys, 'the only time you'll ever feel really good is on Day One [of camp].' "

If this feels like shock therapy, it's because the Yankees hardly ran at all last spring. Torre and conditioning coach Marty Miller were so opposed to the heavy-conditioning philosophy, the players did little more than take batting practice, field ground balls, shower and head for the golf courses.

The results were catastrophic: by May 2, Chien-Ming Wang, Hideki Matsui, Mike Mussina and Phil Hughes all had suffered hamstring injuries. Bobby Abreu strained his oblique muscle, Andy Pettitte reported lower back pain and Johnny Damon had calf problems.

Not surprisingly, Miller was fired May 3.

Given that history, the sweat campaign isn't exactly a hard sell for Girardi. But it's more than simple exercise that's being pushed. Girardi's very stewardship is on the line; he needs acceptance from the core of veterans who once supported Torre, notably Jeter, Mussina, Giambi and Damon.

Despite his sub-par performance in 2007, it's the Stanford-educated Mussina who drives the clubhouse's intellectual engine. If he were to sour on Girardi, however subtly, it would negatively impact the manager's standing, particularly among reporters. Jeter, who was especially close to Torre, could undermine Girardi by not running as hard to first base.

Giambi and Damon could suddenly feel twinges in their backs, their hamstrings -- anything, anywhere. All they'd have to do is sit out a few days of wind sprints and the unspoken protest would be heard.

But none of that has happened, nor does it seem likely. Girardi is enjoying early success because he's been as communicative as he is disciplined. It might sound like a contradiction -- empathy from a 43-year-old man who wears a crew cut -- but the Yankees say Girardi is at least as interactive as Torre ever was, drawing heavily on his equity as a former teammate.

"He talks to you, he's in here [the clubhouse] asking how you're feeling," Damon said. "I mean, Joe is working us hard, but he's making sure he's not killing us. At least I hope he won't."

Mussina called Girardi, "more of a player in charge than a manager." Indeed, the new Joe is as fit as many of his players, and just to prove he's no sadist, has participated in many of the drills the Yankees find so exhausting.

Of course, a manager is ultimately judged on how he juggles his lineup and bullpen, not on his body-fat percentage. It remains to be seen how Girardi reacts to New York-pressure, to losing streaks, to an overly-zealous Hank Steinbrenner, and how he keeps his veterans happy.

One clubhouse insider wondered, for example, who Girardi will mercifully remove from the lineup the first time the Yankees are in the seventh inning of a blowout -- A-Rod or Jeter? Remember, it can't be both, since in the past the Bombers have had only one spare middle infielder.

Torre did it the democratic way, alternating early passes for his two superstars. But, as the insider said, "if Alex thinks Derek is getting special treatment, forget it." Crazy, isn't it, but those are the small battles Girardi will soon discover are his to wage.

For now, though, A-Rod is solidly backing Girardi, praising him for running "a track meet" every day at Legends Field, steering the Yankees toward "a National League-type camp." Rodriguez cited the emphasis not just on running, but on bunting and hitting-and-running, although the Yankees will likely score 900-plus runs without the flourishes.

But that's not really Girardi's point. His drills are meant to introduce the Yankees to a new philosophy, not to mention a new manager. It's all about the post-Torre era, which is Girardi's way of saying, get used to it.

Just two weeks into camp, Joe Girardi has delivered an unmistakable message to the Yankees: winter vacation is over. It's a huge risk for a rookie manager, instituting a rigid conditioning program on a core of millionaire veterans. So far, however, Girardi's approval-rating in the clubhouse seems to be high.

"We all loved [Joe] Torre, but we're all disappointed at what happened last year. Something had to change," is how Mike Mussina put it. In this case, change means a strong emphasis on running, which has left the Yankee veterans sore, even the ones who thought they'd arrived in camp in shape.

On Tuesday, in addition to their normal baserunning drills, the players had to run eight foul pole-to-foul pole sprints. On Wednesday, there was a timed 300-yard shuttle -- a series of six 50-yard sprints -- that had to be completed in less than a minute. After a 90-second rest, everyone did it again. And on Thursday, the Yankees were pushing out multiple 100-yard dashes, followed by a 60-yard jog and 40-yard walk back to the starting line.

After the 10th sprint the Yankees were, literally, done. Jason Giambi said, "I'm 240 pounds, I was totally gassed." His teammates straggled back into the clubhouse after being on the field for nearly four hours. Although no one had a right to be shocked by the workload -- Girardi notified the players six weeks ago this would be a tough camp -- the Yankees never recalled being taxed like this by Joe Torre.

Girardi admitted, "it's a lot of work, especially because you're on your feet the whole time. But this is what you have to do if you want to be ready by opening day. I told the guys, 'the only time you'll ever feel really good is on Day One [of camp].' "

If this feels like shock therapy, it's because the Yankees hardly ran at all last spring. Torre and conditioning coach Marty Miller were so opposed to the heavy-conditioning philosophy, the players did little more than take batting practice, field ground balls, shower and head for the golf courses.

The results were catastrophic: by May 2, Chien-Ming Wang, Hideki Matsui, Mike Mussina and Phil Hughes all had suffered hamstring injuries. Bobby Abreu strained his oblique muscle, Andy Pettitte reported lower back pain and Johnny Damon had calf problems.

Not surprisingly, Miller was fired May 3.

Given that history, the sweat campaign isn't exactly a hard sell for Girardi. But it's more than simple exercise that's being pushed. Girardi's very stewardship is on the line; he needs acceptance from the core of veterans who once supported Torre, notably Jeter, Mussina, Giambi and Damon.

Despite his sub-par performance in 2007, it's the Stanford-educated Mussina who drives the clubhouse's intellectual engine. If he were to sour on Girardi, however subtly, it would negatively impact the manager's standing, particularly among reporters. Jeter, who was especially close to Torre, could undermine Girardi by not running as hard to first base.

Giambi and Damon could suddenly feel twinges in their backs, their hamstrings -- anything, anywhere. All they'd have to do is sit out a few days of wind sprints and the unspoken protest would be heard.

But none of that has happened, nor does it seem likely. Girardi is enjoying early success because he's been as communicative as he is disciplined. It might sound like a contradiction -- empathy from a 43-year-old man who wears a crew cut -- but the Yankees say Girardi is at least as interactive as Torre ever was, drawing heavily on his equity as a former teammate.

"He talks to you, he's in here [the clubhouse] asking how you're feeling," Damon said. "I mean, Joe is working us hard, but he's making sure he's not killing us. At least I hope he won't."

Mussina called Girardi, "more of a player in charge than a manager." Indeed, the new Joe is as fit as many of his players, and just to prove he's no sadist, has participated in many of the drills the Yankees find so exhausting.

Of course, a manager is ultimately judged on how he juggles his lineup and bullpen, not on his body-fat percentage. It remains to be seen how Girardi reacts to New York-pressure, to losing streaks, to an overly-zealous Hank Steinbrenner, and how he keeps his veterans happy.

One clubhouse insider wondered, for example, who Girardi will mercifully remove from the lineup the first time the Yankees are in the seventh inning of a blowout -- A-Rod or Jeter? Remember, it can't be both, since in the past the Bombers have had only one spare middle infielder.

Torre did it the democratic way, alternating early passes for his two superstars. But, as the insider said, "if Alex thinks Derek is getting special treatment, forget it." Crazy, isn't it, but those are the small battles Girardi will soon discover are his to wage.

For now, though, A-Rod is solidly backing Girardi, praising him for running "a track meet" every day at Legends Field, steering the Yankees toward "a National League-type camp." Rodriguez cited the emphasis not just on running, but on bunting and hitting-and-running, although the Yankees will likely score 900-plus runs without the flourishes.

But that's not really Girardi's point. His drills are meant to introduce the Yankees to a new philosophy, not to mention a new manager. It's all about the post-Torre era, which is Girardi's way of saying, get used to it

Bobby Kennedy and Why Obama Unnerves Me
By Roger L. Simon

February 23, 2008

Two or three days before Robert Kennedy was assassinated in the early morning hours of June 5, 1968- its hard to remember now - I attended a rally for RFK in East Los Angeles. The audience was almost entirely Mexican or Mexican-American - there were very few of us gringos. The crowd was wildly enthusiastic, to put it mildly. Cries of "Viva! Viva!" rang out everywhere. It felt as if I was at a rally in Central America and Kennedy was not running for President. He was running for "caudillo." I am sure if it were put to a vote of those present, they would have installed him as "maximum leader" for life in a landslide.

I was a supporter of Bobby Kennedy's in those days, but I was unnerved. And it's not just because I knew that his record was checkered, to say the least. A cult of personality was developing and I was beginning to feel nauseated by it. I am having the same feeling about Obama. Every time I hear "Si se puede!" I get queasy. I didn't when I heard it years ago at Cesar Chavez farmworker rallies, when it had a specific reference, but I do here. It's as if rhetoric has been stolen in a form - almost deliberately - devoid of content. "Yes, we can - what?" Nobody knows.

Another way to look at this is as an issue of the separation of church and state--for me one of the most important values of our society. Support of Obama has become a religion. And now it threatens to take over the state. It's not separated. And like most religions, it can mean different things to different people. Christ said "Render unto Caesar what is Caesar's" for a very good reason. I'm not a Christian but I thank him for that. Those words made democracy possible. I don't want fainting spells at political rallies, anymore than I want cries of "Viva!" I want concerned voters. I'm worried.

From The Times Online:
Obama: is America ready
for this dangerous leftwinger?
Listen to the rhetoric of Barack Obama ...
Gerard Baker

February 22, 2008

For most ordinary Americans, those not encumbered with an expensive education or infected by prolonged exposure to cosmopolitan heterodoxy, patriotism is a consequence of birth.

Their chests swell with pride every time they hear the national anthem at sporting events. They fill up with understandable emotion whenever they see a report on television about the tragic heroics of some soldier or Marine who gave his life in Iraq or Afghanistan.

Foreigners don't have to like America - and they've certainly exercised that freedom in the past few years. But most Americans can distinguish between the transience of policy failure and the permanence of the national ideal.

And surely even critics of the US could scarcely deny that there have been real causes for American pride in the past 25 years: the fall of the Berlin Wall; the victory in the first Gulf War in 1991; the nation's unity in grief and resolve after September 11. Heck, I suspect most Americans got a small buzz of patriotic pride this week when they heard that one of their multimillion-dollar missiles had shot a dead but dangerous satellite travelling at 17,000 miles per hour out of the sky so that it fell harmlessly to Earth.

But not, apparently, Michelle Obama, wife of the man who is now the putative Democratic candidate for US president, and at this point favourite to succeed to that job. In what might be the most revealing statement made by any political figure so far in this campaign season, Mrs Obama caused a stir this week. She said that the success of her husband Barack's campaign had marked the first time in her adult life that she had felt pride in her country.

This, even by the astonishingly self-absorbed standards of politicians and their families, is a remarkably narrow view of what makes a country great. And though she later half-heartedly tried to retract the remark it was a statement pregnant with meaning for the presidential election campaign.

Now, to be fair to Mrs Obama, she would surely have a point if she had said that it was a source of incomparable pride to her and all African-Americans that in a country with a long and baleful history of racial discrimination, one of their own was within serious range of becoming president. All but the most irredeemably racist Americans would surely agree with that.

But that was not what she said. She said this was the only time in her adult life that she had felt pride in America.

It was instructive for two reasons. First, it reinforced the growing sense of unease that even some Obama supporters have felt about the increasingly messianic nature of the candidate's campaign. There's always been a Second Coming quality about Mr Obama's rhetoric. The claim that his electoral successes in places like Nebraska and Wisconsin might transcend all that America has achieved in its history can only add to that worry.

Secondly, and more importantly, I suspect it reveals much about what the Obama family really thinks about the kind of nation that America is. Mrs Obama is surely not alone in thinking not very much about what America has been or done in the past quarter century or more. In fact, it is a trope of the left wing of the Democratic party that America has been a pretty wretched sort of place.

There is a caste of left-wing Americans who wish essentially and in all honesty that their country was much more like France. They wish it had much higher levels of taxation and government intervention, that it had much higher levels of welfare, that it did not have such a “militaristic” approach to foreign policy. Above all, that its national goals were dictated, not by the dreadful halfwits who inhabit godforsaken places like Kansas and Mississippi, but by the counsels of the United Nations.

Though Mr Obama has done a good job, as all recent serious Democrats have done, of emphasising his belief in American virtues, his record and his programme suggest he is firmly in line with this wing of his party.

This, I think, not his inexperience in public office, is the principal threat to Mr Obama's campaign. His increasingly desperate opponent, Hillary Clinton, keeps hammering away that his message is all talk and no substance - and she was joined this week by Mr Obama's likely Republican opponent in the November general election, John McCain.

But if you listen to Mr Obama's speeches, it is not the lack of substance but the quality of it that ought to worry Americans. His victory speech after his latest primary win in Wisconsin this week was a case in point.

There was no shortage of proposals. He plans large increases in government spending on health and education. He wants to tax the rich more to pay for it. He is against companies using the opportunities of free markets to restructure their operations in the US. He is vehemently protectionist. He continues to insist, despite the growing evidence that this left-wing nostrum would be lunacy, that the US must pull its troops out of Iraq with the utmost dispatch.

While he speaks of the need for Americans to move beyond partisanship (“We are not blue states or red states, but the United States” is a campaign meme), when you cut through the verbiage there is nothing to suggest he believes anything that is seriously at odds with the far Left of his party. If you think about it for a second, it's not really an accident that he has been endorsed by the likes of Ted Kennedy and Jesse Jackson.

Though he talks with great eloquence about the future, he sounds for all the world like one of the long line of Democrats from George McGovern to Walter Mondale to Michael Dukakis, who became history by espousing policies and striking a rhetorical pose that was well out of the mainstream of American politics.

America is certainly moving left in the post-George Bush era. The long period of conservative ascendancy is clearly over, buried by a Republican Party of recent years that has preached intolerance and practised incompetence. That a new era in American politics is beginning is not in doubt. But are Americans really ready to leap all the way across in one go to embrace a European-style Left?

From Opinion Journal:
Try a Little Tenderness
By Peggy Noonan

February 22, 2008

Barack Obama's biggest draw is not his eloquence. When you watch an Obama speech, you lean forward and listen and think, That's good. He's compelling, I like the way he speaks. And afterward all the commentators call him "impossibly eloquent" and say "he gave me thrills and chills." But, in fact, when you go on the Internet and get a transcript of the speech and print it out and read it--that is, when you remove Mr. Obama from the words and take them on their own--you see the speech wasn't all that interesting, and was in fact high-class boilerplate. (This was not true of John F. Kennedy's speeches, for instance, which could be read seriously as part of the literature of modern American politics, or Martin Luther King's work, which was powerful absent his voice.)

Mr. Obama is magnetic, interacts with the audience, leads a refrain: "Yes, we can." It's good, and compared with Hillary Clinton and John McCain, neither of whom seems really to enjoy giving speeches, it comes across as better than it is. But is it eloquence? No. Eloquence is deep thought expressed in clear words. With Mr. Obama the deep thought part is missing. What is present are sentiments.

Our country can be greater, it holds unachieved promise, our leaders have not led us well. "We struggle with our doubts, our fears, our cynicism." Fair enough and true enough, but he doesn't dig down to explain how to become a greater nation, what specific path to take--more power to the state, for instance, or more power to the individual. He doesn't unpack his thoughts, as they say. He asserts and keeps on walking.

So his draw is not literal eloquence but a reputation for eloquence that may, in time, become the real thing.

But his big draw is this. In a country that has throughout most of our lifetimes been tormented by, buffeted by, the question of race, a country that has endured real pain and paid in blood and treasure to work its way through and out of the mess, that for all that struggle we yielded this: a brilliant and accomplished young black man with a consensus temperament, a thoughtful and peaceful person who wishes to lead. That is his draw: "We made that." "It ended well."

People would love to be able to support that guy.

His job, in a way, is to let them, in part by not being just another operative, plaything or grievance-monger of the left-liberal establishment and left-liberal thinking. By standing, in fact, for real change.

Right now Mr. Obama is in an awkward moment. Each day he tries to nail down his party's leftist base, and take it from Mrs. Clinton. At the same time his victories have led the country as a whole to start seeing him as the probable Democratic nominee. They're looking at him in a new way, and wondering: Is he standard, old time and party line, or is he something new? Is he just a turning of the page, or is he the beginning of a new and helpful chapter?

Mr. Obama did not really have a good week, in spite of winning a primary and a caucus, and both resoundingly. I don't refer to charges that he'd plagiarized words from a Deval Patrick speech. He borrowed an argument that was in itself obvious--words matter--and used words in the public sphere. In any case Mrs. Clinton has lifted so many phrases and approaches from Mr. Obama, and other candidates, that her accusation was like the neighborhood kleptomaniac running through the street crying, "Thief! Thief!"

His problem was, is, his wife's words, not his, the speech in which she said that for the first time in her adult life she is proud of her country, because Obama is winning. She later repeated it, then tried to explain it, saying of course she loves her country. But damage was done. Why? Because her statement focused attention on what I suspect are some basic and elementary questions that were starting to bubble out there anyway.

* * *

Here are a few of them.

Are the Obamas, at bottom, snobs? Do they understand America? Are they of it? Did anyone at their Ivy League universities school them in why one should love America? Do they confuse patriotism with nationalism, or nativism? Are they more inspired by abstractions like "international justice" than by old visions of America as the city on a hill, which is how John Winthrop saw it, and Ronald Reagan and JFK spoke of it?

Have they been, throughout their adulthood, so pampered and praised--so raised in the liberal cocoon--that they are essentially unaware of what and how normal Americans think? And are they, in this, like those cosseted yuppies, the Clintons?

Why is all this actually not a distraction but a real issue? Because Americans have common sense and are bottom line. They think like this. If the president and his first lady are not loyal first to America and its interests, who will be? The president of France? But it's his job to love France, and protect its interests. If America's leaders don't love America tenderly, who will?

And there is a context. So many Americans right now fear they are losing their country, that the old America is slipping away and being replaced by something worse, something formless and hollowed out. They can see we are giving up our sovereignty, that our leaders will not control our borders, that we don't teach the young the old-fashioned love of America, that the government has taken to itself such power, and made things so complex, and at the end of the day when they count up sales tax, property tax, state tax, federal tax they are paying a lot of money to lose the place they loved.

And if you feel you're losing America, you really don't want a couple in the White House whose rope of affection to the country seems lightly held, casual, provisional. America is backing Barack at the moment, so America is good. When it becomes angry with President Barack, will that mean America is bad?

* * *

Michelle Obama seems keenly aware of her struggles, of what it took to rise so high as a black woman in a white country. Fair enough. But I have wondered if it is hard for young African-Americans of her generation, having been drilled in America's sad racial history, having been told about it every day of their lives, to fully apprehend the struggles of others. I wonder if she knows that some people look at her and think "Man, she got it all." Intelligent, strong, tall, beautiful, Princeton, Harvard, black at a time when America was trying to make up for its sins and be helpful, and from a working-class family with two functioning parents who made sure she got to school.

That's the great divide in modern America, whether or not you had a functioning family, and she apparently came from the privileged part of that divide. A lot of white working-class Americans didn't come up with those things. Some of them were raised by a TV and a microwave and love our country anyway, every day.

Does Mrs. Obama know this? I don't know. If she does, love and gratitude for the place that tries to give everyone an equal shot would seem to be in order.

From The American Spectator:
If It Feels Good, Say It
By George Neumayr

If you have heard one Barack Obama speech, you have heard them all. In a way, his words are as limited as his legislative accomplishments, which explains his now-famous cribbing off Deval Patrick and JFK speechwriter Ted Sorensen, among others.

The only variation in his speeches comes from the slight rearrangement of cliches, while the quality of thought in them never rises up the level of an episode of Oprah. That she launched his campaign is altogether fitting.

In the Oprah age of fantasy and instant happiness, feel-good babble about this or that problem, usually determined not by reality but by political exigency, is all that is needed to captivate crowds. If it feels good, just say it, and if anyone scrutinizes your promises too closely, accuse them of "fear" and cynicism.

"The fierce urgency of now": To what momentous injustice does that Obama line, borrowed from Martin Luther King Jr., refer? It is not clear and apparently it doesn't matter. Who cares what it means? It feels good.

The right words and principles, you see, aren't as important as the right feelings -- a defense to which the Obama campaign resorted after Michelle Obama's declaration of sudden pride in America. Her brazen words were defended by the campaign and sympathetic media commentators on the grounds that they conveyed a vibe of justified feeling from a black woman. Anyone who says otherwise is "parsing." The Obamas won't take responsibility for the words lifted from others or even their own.

"Hope is making a comeback," she burbled fatuously. But what she calls hope, sober historians would call raw demagoguery, which is a sign not of a society's renewal but of its accelerating decadence.

Obama's faux-radicalism and idealism, carefully stirred into a safe brew of truisms, is catnip for a decadent elite that would rather feel good than be good and complains amidst prosperity of the need for dramatic change. But how urgent could their "revolution" possibly be if it was hatched down at a Starbucks?

Perhaps Karl Marx wrote Das Kapital in between sips of a Latte, but the Obama craze is ridiculous, evidence not of revolutionary idealism but of a prosperous democracy's slide toward dilettantism. Were the country truly in a bind, it would never take a chance on a rookie senator whose only real accomplishment is revising and extending his remarks.

The fakeness of it all reminds me of Robert Redford's The Candidate, in which an attractive but vapid pol says upon winning: "What do we do now?"


THE BLANKNESS OF Kirk Watson -- the Texas legislator who, under barking questions from Chris Matthews on Tuesday night, couldn't come up with a single accomplishment by Obama in the Senate -- captures the hollowness of Obama's movement.

Obama appeals to an increasingly childish class of adults who crave an emotion-based politics and don't particularly care about the details of the package in which it comes. There is a "Kids for Obama" section on his web page but it is not clear where it ends and the rest begins.

Obama presents his campaign as one of high principle and great courage, but in reality it simply sparks off liberalism's low and perennial appeal to man's appetites and emotions. This is what makes "progressive" liberalism so easy to sell in a modern democracy: it straightforwardly caters to fallen human nature, "challenging" people to take a low road Original Sin takes them down anyways.

Conservatism, on the other hand, is a tricky sell (which is why it is so quickly compromised), as it asks people to follow reason despite wayward emotions -- a message fallen humans don't care to hear until a crisis hits which brings them back to reality.

For many years the Clintons played these demagogic games too, casting corruption as change and failed liberalism as progress. "Yesterday is gone, yesterday is gone," they enlisted Fleetwood Mac to screech.

And it is. Obama has surpassed their sophistry, scooping up yuppies who jumped off Hillary's train as they saw it begin to derail. While the Clintons couldn't stop "thinking about tomorrow," Obama was busy stealing away their supporters with his similarly sham "fierce urgency of now."


George Neumayr is editor of Catholic World Report and press critic for California Political Review.

From The New York Daily News:
New photographic evidence
could prove damaging to Roger Clemens
BY TERI THOMPSON, MICHAEL O'KEEFFE,
CHRISTIAN RED and NATHANIEL VINTON

Friday, February 22nd 2008, 4:00 AM

As the congressional committee that spent nine weeks considering Roger Clemens' attack on the Mitchell Report now quietly mulls referring the entire matter to the Justice Department, federal investigators seasoned in the anti-doping game are ready to hit the ground running.

Their leads could include new photographic evidence that has emerged to potentially undermine Clemens' sworn testimony that he did not attend a 1998 party at the home of his then-teammate Jose Canseco - a party that figured both in the Mitchell Report and the Feb.13 public hearing in Washington.

The photo is owned by a young man who attended the party when he was 11 years old and took photos of his baseball heroes, including Clemens. Richard Emery, one of the lawyers for Clemens accuser Brian McNamee, was aware that such evidence had been circulating this week.

"We have reason to believe it's reliable evidence," Emery told the Daily News on Thursday. "We believe there's photographic evidence that shows Clemens was at a party he says he wasn't at."

The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform does not necessarily have to make a formal request for the attorney general to initiate an investigation, although the committee may do so next week. Sources close to the case have told The News they expect the committee to refer the entire matter to the Justice Department rather than just refer Clemens.

That kind of referral would satisfy two groups that were vocal critics of the committee's inquest: Those who thought a failure to investigate Clemens' challenges to former Sen. George Mitchell's report on performance-enhancing drugs in baseball, next to the federal indictment issued against Barry Bonds, signified a racist double-standard; and those who thought Congress had no business investigating baseball's drug problem to begin with.

"We haven't heard anything one way or the other," Rusty Hardin, one of Clemens' lawyers, replied when asked yesterday if he considered a criminal referral to be imminent.

A Justice Department investigation could lead Clemens into the kind of lengthy, expensive and serious criminal investigation that Bonds has undergone, opening the door to the government to examine the pitcher's claims with much broader investigative power than the committee's attorneys used.

Jeff Novitzky and Matthew Parrella, the IRS special agent and assistant United States Attorney, respectively, who have spent five years leading the government's prosecution of the Bay Area Laboratory Cooperative (BALCO), already are looking into the challenges Clemens made against McNamee, their pivotal cooperating witness.

Beyond the photograph, the BALCO busters would presumably look at the blood-stained medical refuse that McNamee saved for seven years, as well as the abscess on Clemens' buttocks and radically contradictory testimony that emerged from the last month's hearings and depositions.

Novitzky and Parrella are known to be looking into at least one gym in the Houston area that may have distributed performance-enhancing drugs to ballplayers. On Sunday, The News revealed that 1-on-1 Elite Personal Fitness, a gym in Pasadena, Tex., owned by a distant relative of Andy Pettitte named Kelly Blair, had supplied human growth hormone to Pettitte's father, who then shared it with the Yankee pitcher in 2004.

Blair's gym existed outside of any of the sources of performance-enhancing drugs that were identified in the Mitchell Report. Following The News' report, photographs of professional athletes associated from the Blair were removed from the gym's Web site.

McNamee, a former trainer for Clemens, began cooperating with the BALCO busters almost a year ago. His proffer agreement with Novitzky and Parrella - who had linked him to illegal drug deals, and could hold a prison term over his head - required that he cooperate with investigators and Sen. Mitchell. But it also obligated the two federal agents to follow the leads he gave them, at the very least to verify the accuracy of McNamee's claims.

The case, which could last for years, might result in a United States attorney presenting a case to a grand jury and potentially seeking a federal indictment. No U.S. attorney's office is more likely to adopt the Clemens-McNamee dispute than the Northern District of California, the office that has handled most of the government's recent prosecution of sports doping.

From Real Clear Politics:
Obama the Messiah of Generation Narcissism
Kathleen Parker

WASHINGTON -- Much has been made of the religious tenor of Barack Obama's presidential campaign.

Reports of women weeping and swooning -- even of an audience applauding when The One cleared his proboscis (blew his nose for you mortals) -- have become frequent events in the heavenly realm of Obi-Wan Obama.

His rhetoric, meanwhile, drips with hints of resurrection, redemption and second comings. "We are the ones we've been waiting for," he said on Super Tuesday night. And his people were glad.

Actually, they were hysterical, the word that best describes what surrounds this young savior and that may be more apt than we imagine. The word is derived from the Greek hystera, or womb. The ancient Greeks considered hysteria a psychoneurosis peculiar to women caused by disturbances of the uterus.

Well, you don't see any men fainting in Obi's presence.

Barack Obama has many appealing qualities, not least his own reluctance to be swaddled in purple. Nothing quite says, "I'm only human" like whipping out a hankie and blowing one's nose in front of 17,000 admirers. The audience's applause was reportedly awkward, as if the crowd was both approving of anything their savior did, but a little disappointed at this rather ungodly behavior.

So what is the source of this infatuation with Obama? How to explain the hysteria? The religious fervor? The devotion? The weeping and fainting and utter euphoria surrounding a candidate who had the audacity to run for leader of the free world on a platform of mere hope?

If anthropologists made predictions the way meteorologists do, they might have anticipated Obama's astronomical rise to supernova status in 2008 of the Common Era. Consider the cultural coordinates, and Obama's intersection with history becomes almost inevitable.

To play weatherman for a moment, he is a perfect storm of the culture of narcissism, the cult of celebrity, and a secular society in which fathers (both the holy and the secular) have been increasingly marginalized from the lives of a generation of young Americans.

All of these trends have been gaining momentum the past few decades. Social critic Christopher Lasch named the culture of narcissism a generation ago and cited addiction to celebrity as one of the disease's symptoms -- all tied to the decline of the family.

That culture has merely become more exaggerated as spiritual alienation and fatherlessness have collided with technology (YouTube, Facebook, MySpace, etc.) that enables the self-absorption of the narcissistic personality.

Grown-ups with decades under their double chins may have a variety of reasons for supporting Obama, but the youth who pack convention halls and stadiums as if for a rock concert constitute a tipping point of another order.

One of Obama's TV ads, set to rock 'n' roll, has a Woodstock feel to it. Text alternating with crowd scenes reads: "We Can Change The World" and "We Can Save The Planet."

Those are some kind of campaign promises. The kind no mortal could possibly keep, but never mind. Obi-Wan Obama is about hope -- and hope, he'll tell you, knows no limits.

It is thus no surprise that the young are enamored of Obama. He's a rock star. A telegenic, ultra-bright redeemer fluent in the planetary language of a cosmic generation. The force is with him.

But underpinning that popularity is something that transcends mere policy or politics. It is hunger, and that hunger is clearly spiritual. Human beings seem to have a yearning for the transcendent -- hence thousands of years of religion -- but we have lately shied away from traditional approaches and old gods.

Thus, in post-Judeo-Christian America, the sports club is the new church. Global warming is the new religion. Vegetarianism is the new sacrament. Hooking up, the new prayer. Talk therapy, the new witnessing. Tattooing and piercing, the new sacred symbols and rituals.

And apparently, Barack Obama is the new messiah.

Here's how a 20-year-old woman in Seattle described that Obama feeling: "When he was talking about hope, it actually almost made me cry. Like it really made sense, like, for the first, like, whoa ... "

This New Age glossolalia may be more sonorous than the guttural emanations from the revival tent, but the emotion is the same. It's all religion by any other name.

Whatever the Church of Obama promises, we should not mistake this movement for a renaissance of reason. It is more like, well, like whoa.

kparker@kparker.com

From The News & Observer:
Slump takes down magazine
Changes in the recording industry prove fatal
for roots-music chronicle No Depression
By David Menconi, Staff Writer

This week's announcement that No Depression magazine was shutting down took most of its fans by surprise. The bi-monthly magazine, which helped define as well as popularize alternative-country music, will end a 13-year run with its May/June issue.

"I feel gobsmacked," says Raleigh's Phyllis Gordon, a subscriber for nearly a decade and one of No Depression's many Triangle readers. "This is really a shock. It's like finding out your best friend has moved to China."

All sorts of metaphors have been flying around since Tuesday's announcement. The publishers cite declining record-company advertising revenue as the primary reason for the shutdown. But the magazine's folding is also a sign of the changing habits of music buyers, especially younger ones.

"It's like one of my favorite bands is calling it quits, only this time I'm sort of in the band," says Rick Cornell, one of several local writers who regularly contributes to No Depression. (Full disclosure: I am another.)

No Depression began in Seattle in 1995, named for the Carter Family song "No Depression in Heaven" (covered in 1990 by the pioneering alternative-country band Uncle Tupelo) and an early online music discussion group. The magazine frequently covered North Carolina acts, starting with its first issue.

I did a short feature on the Raleigh band Whiskeytown for that first issue, after spending a memorable evening trying to interview frontman Ryan Adams at the Berkeley Café. The interview ended prematurely when a drunk calling himself "Kenneth From Nashville" began making threats and the police showed up, triggering an all-night standoff -- the first and last time I've ever had an interview cut short by third-party psychosis.

No Depression co-editor Peter Blackstock thought this was so amusing that he printed the interview and back story under the headline, "A short interview's journey into hell." Over the next few years, 6 String Drag, Jolene, the Backsliders, Flat Duo Jets and Jim Lauderdale were among the North Carolina acts to score full-length features in No Depression, gaining nationwide exposure at a time when that was hard to come by. Even in the Internet age, getting a feature in the magazine remains a coup.

"When I first talked to the Avett Brothers about managing them, the game plan I presented had getting a story in No Depression as a main goal," says Dolph Ramseur, manager of the Concord-based band. "That was a big point for us. No Depression always felt like a punk-rock fanzine, but covering roots music. This is terrible news, really sad."

From Willie to Wilco

No Depression always had influence beyond its modest circulation of about 30,000 copies.

"It's been like the Bible for that style of music," says longtime subscriber Molly Flynn of Raleigh. "It's hard to imagine it gone."

The magazine began as an attempt to find common ground between classic old-school country and young upstarts. So it covered Nickel Creek as well as Ralph Stanley, Willie Nelson as well as Wilco -- plus choice historical obscurities, such as the long-forgotten R&B singer Little Miss Cornshucks.

In the process, No Depression became a brand. When the soundtrack to 2000's "O Brother, Where Art Thou?" unexpectedly sold 7 million copies and won an album-of-the-year Grammy Award, the mainstreaming of No Depression's alternative country was at hand.

"Things get taken for granted as time goes by, and I don't think people remember what a void No Depression stepped into in 1995," says Fred Mills, managing editor of the competing music magazine Harp. "What stands out to me is that they were able to very deftly draw a direct line from Johnny Cash to the Replacements. And this all happened pre-MySpace, long before blogs and all that."

Untimely move

In 2000, No Depression's connection to North Carolina became more direct when Blackstock moved to Durham (co-editor Grant Alden now lives in Kentucky, while co-publisher/co-owner Kyla Fairchild is still in Seattle). Blackstock returned to the Seattle area a few years later before coming back and buying a house in Mebane last fall -- which makes the timing of the magazine's shutdown about as unfortunate as it could possibly be.

But as outlined in the "publishers' note" released Tuesday, the principals don't have much choice. While increasing paper and postal costs are factors, the single biggest reason is the decline of the U.S. record industry.

Album sales in America have declined 36 percent this decade, from a high of 785 million in 2000 to 500 million last year, according to Nielsen SoundScan. As a result, record labels have drastically cut their print-advertising budgets.

No Depression's advertising revenue has declined even faster than U.S. album sales -- down 36 percent in two years -- and the pace is picking up, pushing the magazine's page counts lower. At 80 pages, the March/April issue is just half the length of the same issue in 2004.

"It became apparent at the start of this year that things had changed," Blackstock says. "When we only had enough advertising for 80 pages in March/April, which is always one of our biggest issues, we knew we had a serious problem that would not balance out if we kept going into the future."

As a small business, No Depression doesn't have the deep pockets to hang on and hope for a turnaround. Reading the writing on the wall, Blackstock and his partners opted to shut down rather than risk going into debt or bankruptcy. No Depression's Web site will continue at nodepression.net, although not on the same scale as the magazine.

Of course, No Depression's demise is indicative of larger trends beyond the magazine, record and advertising industries. Shifting consumer interests also enter into the equation, especially those of younger adults.

"The 12-to-34 demographic gets their music on iTunes, their videos on YouTube, their friends on Facebook," says Karen Albritton, president of the Raleigh marketing firm Capstrat. "Do we really expect them to get their entertainment news in print? Advertisers chase trends, and right now the trend is online."

That leaves niche publications of all kinds struggling to survive. No Depression probably won't be the last such magazine to go down.

"The ad-revenue thing is very troublesome for all of us," says Harp's Mills. "All the things [No Depression] pointed out about print media, that's all true and it's the canary in the coal mine. Everybody has to adapt to electronic media more rapidly, because we see a lot of advertising shifting. Any magazine not in a position to do that ... Well, they're in trouble."

david.menconi@newsobserver.com or blogs.newsobserver.com/beat
or (919) 829-4759.

News & Observer music critic David Menconi has had a byline in 73 out of 74 issues of No Depression magazine. He is listed as a "contributing editor" on its masthead, but receives no compensation beyond freelance fees for stories published in the magazine.

JULIE JACOBSON / AP

New York Yankees manager Joe Girardi watches batting practice
during spring training baseball workouts Wednesday, Feb. 20, 2008 in Tampa.
Wednesday was the first day of workouts for position player

From MiamiHerald.com:
Yankee's Girardi no average Joe
BY MIKE PHILLIPS

About $200 million worth of payroll and some of the biggest names not just in baseball, but in all of sports jogged onto Legends Field on Wednesday morning as the Yankees took the field for their first full workout of the spring.

But there was only one message from the crowd of more than 300 that showed up to watch their beloved Yankees.

''Hey Joe,'' came the first voice.

''Way to go Joe,'' came another.

''Good luck, Joe! Go get 'em,'' another said.

Joe Girardi, looking trim enough to get behind the plate in the opener, jogged among his players, his grey hair glistening in the sun under his Yankees cap.

His gait was just like the man himself, steady and unpretentious. No one seemed to care that Girardi had made one of the greatest leaps in baseball history, somehow going from the poor-market Marlins who wallow among apathy in South Florida to the greatest stage in the game.

''He's a perfect fit here,'' Yankees first baseman Jason Giambi said. ``He played here. He coached here and he knows the Yankees. Joe is Joe. He knows players, and he knows how to handle veteran guys because he was a veteran player here, and even though he managed a young team in Florida, he'll be even better with veteran guys here. He's straight and he's to the point. There's not going to be any confusion with Joe.''

There was more than confusion in Florida, where Girardi performed a small miracle, taking a team that was supposed to lose more than 100 games and turning them into a playoff contender in his first year as a manager in 2006. His reward? He became the first Manager of the Year Award winner to get fired. His problems with Marlins owner Jeffrey Loria and general manager Larry Beinfest were well-documented, and are now far behind Girardi.

''I'd prefer not to go into that,'' Girardi said Wednesday as he sat his huge office. ``You know, I've always been thankful for the opportunity. Obviously, you learn from situations, and I'm thankful for that. It helped shape me as a person. I'm extremely grateful to be back on the field. It's where I want to be.

``You learn a lot, and you learn a lot more about yourself when you go through difficult times.''

NO PROBLEMS

The Yankees don't foresee any problems.

''I know Joe, and he knows how I run business from his days here,'' Yankees general manager Brian Cashman said. ``The one thing about Joe is he is not going to complicate things. You can dress it up with the pinstripes and what people's salaries might be; dress it up with 50,000 people in the stadium, but at the end of the day it's still the simple game of baseball. And that's a great thing Joe will bring to the table.''

Girardi foresees no problems with his new bosses or the ravenous New York media.

''It's just a matter of spending more time [with reporters],'' Girardi said. Girardi is to the point with the media. He is the same way with his players.

''They're still people,'' Girardi said of his high-priced Yankees. ``Of course, you manage differently, because every person is different. There are some team things you do and there are expectations, but personalities are different and you adjust to that. . . . It's a family, and you've got to figure out how to get the best out of your family. Joe Torre taught me that a team is a family.''

Girardi is a players' manager, according to Yankees pitcher Andy Pettitte, who was Girardi's former battery mate.

''He was a tough, scrappy player who worked hard, and he manages the same way,'' he said. ``But he's honest and to the point. You know what you get with Joe. There's no grey area. You are going to work hard. Look at him. He's in great shape, and he's going to work us hard and expect the best.''

SAME MESSAGE

That's Girardi's mantra: ''Expect the best.'' He says it all the time. Girardi spoke to his team Wednesday and delivered the same message he had once before.

''I told them I expect to win the World Series,'' Girardi said. ``And I told the Marlins the same thing.''

The Yankees expect nothing less.

''He's going to manage the same way,'' Yankees catcher Jorge Posada said. ``He's still going to push guys. Just because we are older than the Marlins doesn't mean he doesn't need to push us. He's going to do the things he knows to do to push us to get the best out of us.''

The Marlins believe that.

''Joe is Joe. You know where you stand with him,'' Marlins catcher Matt Treanor said.

``He'll fit in perfect there. He played there, and he won there.

``He knows how to handle veteran players, and he has a ridiculously talented team.''

Girardi knows nothing less than winning the World Series will be accepted with the Yankees, who have won 26 titles, and punctuated the idea by changing his number from 25 to 27 to represent the next World Series championship.

''Joe is straight and narrow, and everybody knows where he is going and what he is thinking, so there shouldn't be any problems,'' Treanor said.

``Joe is there to win. There's a reason he's wearing No. 27.''

The harsh spotlight might not burn Girardi.

''The pressure comes from here,'' he said, pointing to his heart. ``I put more pressure on myself than anyone else.

``That's the way it is. You do your best.''

Fidel Castro: The Teflon Tyrant Resigns

By Humberto Fontova
FrontPageMagazine.com
Wednesday, February 20, 2008

Last September, Fidel Castro vowed to stay in power until President George W. Bush leaves the White House. Even with his failing health, one would have been hard-pressed to bet against the dictator who outlasted nine U.S. presidents and his great sponsor in the Soviet Union. Castro’s retirement yesterday, in favor of his brother Raul, confirms that he will not be able to keep his word. But to understand his legacy, and its implications for Cuba’s future, one must go back to a promise that Castro made at the dawn of his one-man rule nearly half a century ago.

Upon entering Havana on January 7, 1959, Cuba's new leader Fidel Castro broadcast that promise into a phalanx of microphones. "Cuban mothers let me assure you that I will solve all Cuba's problems without spilling a drop of blood." As the jubilant crowd erupted with joy, Castro continued. "Cuban mothers let me assure you that because of me you will never have to cry."

The following day, just below San Juan Hill in eastern Cuba, a bulldozer rumbled to a start, clanked into position, and started pushing dirt into a huge pit with blood pooling at the bottom from the still -twitching bodies of more than a hundred men and boys who'd been machine-gunned without trial on the Castro brothers' orders. Their wives and mothers wept hysterically from a nearby road.

On that very day, the U.K. Observer ran the following headline: "Mr Castro's bearded, youthful figure has become a symbol of Latin America's rejection of brutality and lying. Every sign is that he will reject personal rule and violence."

These two events perfectly symbolize the Fidel Castro phenomenon, even half a century later: Fidel Castro oppresses and kills while issuing a smokescreen of lies not merely devious but downright psycopathic. The worldwide media abandons all pretense as "investigators" or "watchdogs" and adopts a role, not merely as sycophants, but as advertising agency.

By the time of his delirious, deafening, foot-stomping receptions at Harvard Law School and the National Press Club (most of whose members oppose capital punishment) three months later in April 1959, "Mr. Castro's" firing squads had slaughtered 1,168 men - and boys, some as young as 15.

By the time Norman Mailer (another opponent of capital punishment) was hailing Fidel Castro as "the greatest hero to appear in the Americas!" his hero's firing squads had piled up 4,000 corpses and one of 18 Cubans was a political prisoner, an incarceration rate that surpassed Stalin's.

By 1975, when George McGovern (another opponent of capital punishment) was calling him a "very shy and sensitive, a man I regard as a friend," the bullet-riddled bodies of over 10,000 Cubans lay in unmarked graves, and Cuba still held the most political prisoner as a percentage of population on earth, surpassing Nazi Germany's prewar rate by several multiples.

He brought the world closest of anyone to nuclear Armageddon by pleading, begging, and finally trying to trick Nikita Khrushchev into launching a surprise nuclear strike on the U.S. Yet he was nominated for a Nobel Peace Price by Norwegian parliamentarians.

He jailed and tortured at a rate higher than Stalin. Yet Cuba sits on the UN's Human Rights Committee.

His legal code mandates 18 months in prison for anyone overheard cracking a joke about him. Yet Jack Nicholson and Chevy Chase sing his praises.

He abolished habeas corpus while his chief hangman, Che Guevara, declared that “judicial evidence is an archaic bourgeois detail. We execute from Revolutionary Conviction.” A month later Harvard Law School invited him to address them and erupted in cheers and tumultuous ovations after his every third sentence.

He drove out a higher percentage of Jews from Cuba than Czar Nicholas drove from Russia and Hafez Assad drove from Syria. Yet Shoah Foundation founder Stephen Spielberg considered his dinner with Fidel Castro "the eight most important hours of my life."

He overthrew a black Cuban head of state and replaced his government with one where only nine percent of the ruling Stalinist party is black and where the prison population is 80- 90 percent black. He jailed the longest suffering black political prisoner of modern history. (Eusebio Penalver who suffered longer in Castro's dungeon's than Nelson Mandela suffered in South Africa's.) He sentenced other blacks (Dr Elias Biscet, Jorge Antunez) to 20 year sentences essentially for quoting Martin Luther King Jr. in a public square. Yet he's a hero to the Congressional Black Caucus and receives passionate bear hugs from Charlie Rangel.

He twice tried to destroy New York, once with nuclear missiles, the following month by planning to set off 500 kilos of TNT in Macy's, Gimbel's, Bloomingdale's, and Grand Central Terminal on the year's busiest shopping day. Yet Newsweek magazine hailed him as "The Hottest Ticket in Manhattan!" and Time as "The Toast of Manhattan!" referring to the social swirl that engulfed him on a visit to New York in 1995 from the city's best and brightest, including David Rockefeller, Robert McNamara, Dwayne Andreas, Mort Zuckerman, Mike Wallace, Peter Jennings, Tina Brown, Bernard Shaw, and Barbara Walters. According to the U.S.-Cuba Trade and Economic Council, on that visit, Castro received 250 dinner invitations from Manhattan celebrities and power-brokers.

His firing squads murdered pregnant women, his coast guard machine-gunned mothers with their children for trying to escape on rafts, and his regime made Cuban women into the most suicidal in the world, tripling their pre-Revolution suicide rate. Yet Barbara Walters hails "the great health he has brought to Cuba," Andrea Mitchell, referred to him as "an absolutely fascinating figure!" and Diane Sawyer was so overcome in his presence that she rushed up, broke into that toothy smile of hers, wrapped her arms around Castro and smooched him warmly on the cheek.

Over the years a varied assortment of foreign fans and well wishers have showered Castro with accolades.

• "Cuba's Elvis!" -Dan Rather.
  
• "Castro is the most honest and courageous politician I've ever met! Viva Fidel!" - Jesse Jackson.
  
• "If you believe in freedom, justice and equality you have no choice but to support Fidel Castro!" - Harry Belafonte.
  
• "Castro is a genius and Cuba is a Paradise!" - Jack Nicholson.
  
• "One helluva guy!" - Ted Turner.

Sadly, lunacy on the subject of Fidel Castro is hardly confined to the lunatic fringe.

• "Castro has done good things for Cuba." - Colin Powell.
  
• "Castro threw out an SOB and liberated Cuba's poor." - The late Stephen Ambrose, America's best selling historian.
• 
  
• The conservative and respected London Times, owned by Rupert Murdoch even editorialized about Castro's "achievements."

Among historical figures Fidel Castro was, hands down, the most effective liar of modern times. His effectiveness was greatly aided by a fawning worldwide media dazzled by his status as the world's pre-eminent symbol of anti-Americanism. With such cachet much could be forgiven, overlooked, ignored or simply falsified. If what we constantly heard and read about Fidel Castro and the Cuban Revolution in the mainstream media and college textbooks was merely in error it might be less obnoxious. Instead the media/academia clichés usually upend the truth. We get the precise opposite of the truth. Ignorance (usually willful) of conditions in pre-Castro Cuba, of Fidel Castro's background, of U.S.-Cuba relations pre-1960 all contribute to the cliché-ridden Castro legend. With Fidel Castro's burial as a backdrop and the media wallowing in a Castro-cliché orgy let's examine them one at a time, in no particular order of importance.

Cliché no. 1: A plucky Castro succeeded in defying a relentlessly hostile U.S. that worked ceaselessly to topple him.

The Facts: “We ended up getting exactly what we'd wanted all along," wrote Nikita Khrushchev about the Missile Crisis Resolution.

"Security for Fidel Castro's regime and American missiles removed from Turkey. Until today the U.S. has complied with her promise not to interfere with Castro and not to allow anyone else to interfere with Castro [italics mine]. After Kennedy's death, his successor Lyndon Johnson assured us that he would keep the promise not to invade Cuba."

Henry Kissinger, as Gerald Ford's secretary of state, renewed the pledge.
After the Missile Crisis "resolution," Castro's "defiance" of the U.S. took the form of the U.S. Coast Guard and even the British navy (when some intrepid exile freedom fighters moved their operation to the Bahamas) shielding him from exile attacks. Far from "defying" a superpower, Castro hid behind the skirts of two superpowers, plus the British Empire.

Cliché no. 2 : Pre-Castro Cuba was a veritable U.S. colony, greedily exploited by U.S. corporations and by her most notorious gangsters who maintained the hapless island as a sordid casino and bordello. Castro rectified this shameful condition.

The Facts: In 1958, only 7 percent of invested capital in Cuba was American, and less than one-third of Cuba’s sugar output (its main crop) was by U.S. companies. Cuba had a grand total of three gambling Casino's at the time. (Gulfport Mississippi has triple that number today.) Exactly one Havana hotel was mob-owned (compare this to Las Vegas and ask yourselves who demands that Nevada suffer Stalinism to rectify its shameful condition.)

In 1958, Cuba had approximately 10,000 prostitutes. Today an estimated 150,000 ply their trade on the desperate island, many as young as 14.

And to cap it all off: in 1950 more Cubans (out of a population of six million) vacationed in the U.S., than Americans (out of 200 million) vacationed in Cuba. At that time, Cubans didn't come to the U.S. in any great numbers to settle. In fact as a percentage of population, Cuba took in more immigrants (primarily from Europe) in the early 20th century than did the U.S. In the 1950's, when Cubans were perfectly free to emigrate with all their property and U.S. visas were issued for the asking, fewer Cubans lived in the U.S. than Americans lived in Cuba.

Cliché no 3: Fidel Castro overthrew the "U.S. backed" Batista whose patrons and puppeteers went instantly ballistic at his ousting. No sooner had Castro entered Havana than the U.S. started pounding its big stick while waving nary a carrot. This pushed an affronted and innocent Fidel Castro into the arms of mother Russia. The poor man had no choice against such relentless bellicosity and bullying, characterized by the vindictive and ineffective embargo.

The Facts: Former U.S. Ambassador to Cuba, Earl T. Smith, during Congressional testimony in 1960, declared flatly: "We put Castro in power." He referred to the U.S. State Department and CIA's role in aiding, both morally and materially, the Castro rebels, to their pulling the rug out from under Batista with an arms embargo, and finally to the U.S. order that Batista vacate Cuba. Ambassador Smith knew something about these events because he personally delivered the messages to Batista, who was then denied exile in the U.S.

"Me and my staff were all Fidelistas," boasted Robert Reynolds, the CIA's "Caribbean Desk's specialist on the Cuban Revolution" from 1957-1960. The U.S. gave Castro's regime its official benediction more rapidly than it had recognized Batista's in 1952, and lavished it with $200 million in subsidies.

In August 1959, the liberal U.S. ambassador to Cuba, Philip Bonsal, alerted Castro to a conspiracy against his regime by Cubans. Thanks in part to Ambassador Bonsal's solicitude for a regime then insulting his nation as "a vulture preying on humanity" and poised to steal $2 billion from U.S. stockholders, the anti-Castro plot was foiled, hundreds of the plotters imprisoned or executed, and the regime that three years later came closest to vaporizing many of America's biggest cities (including Bonsal's home) with nuclear missiles, survived.

In 1958, at the very time the U.S. State Dept. and CIA were helping his movement, Castro had written in confidence to a colleague, "War with the U.S. is my true destiny." Castro had sent armed guerrillas to attempt the violent overthrow of four sovereign Latin American countries, confiscated $2 billion in U.S. property, invited in thousands of Soviet military and police agents, kidnapped 50 U.S. citizens from Guantanamo Bay, and jailed and executed several Americans before we lifted a finger against him.

Cliché no. 4. "The Cuban embargo doesn't work. It never succeeded in toppling Castro or even in moderating Castro's policies. It allows the regime to blame "the bully to the north" for its economic failures and thus rally the Cuban people to its side. It's long past time to do away with it."

The Facts: Spanish pollsters conducted a clandestine poll in Cuba last year and found that less than a third of Cubans blame the U.S. "blockade" for their economic plight. The U.S. embargo was reactive not pro-active and came only after Castro stole 5,911 businesses worth $2 billion from U.S. stockholders. This was (and remains) the biggest such heist in history Castro boasted that he'd never repay a penny of what he stole ( the only promise he's ever kept.)

If the embargo "failed" it is simply, because for over 30 years no "embargo" has been in place.

In 1974, Henry Kissinger allowed all foreign subsidiaries of U.S. companies to trade with Cuba. Since most U.S. brand products are available (cheaper) from Mexico, Cuba's tourist and "dollar stores" have long been well-stocked with U.S. products.

But even that avenue is now moot. In the last three years, U.S. companies have done more than $1 billion dollars worth of direct business with Cuba. Currently, the U.S is Cuba's biggest food supplier and fourth biggest import partner. Since 2000, Cuba has been able to buy practically anything it wants from the U.S. -- but only for cash.

What the Castro regime craves (along with the U.S. agricultural lobby and Cuba’s long queue of stiffed creditors) is U.S. sales to Cuba on credit and guaranteed by the U.S. Export-Import Bank (i.e., U.S. taxpayers.) Cuba has defaulted on such credits whenever offered, most recently from France’s own Ex-Im bank, COFACE. Cuba’s external debt, primarily to Russia, Venezuela and Europe, approaches $40 billion and her credit rating according to Dun & Bradstreet is below Somalia's. Via Congressional lobbying, stilted mainstream media stories and UN votes, all of the above parties ( for obvious reasons) urge the U.S. taxpayer to come to their rescue. They refer to this as “lifting the Cuban embargo.”

The U.S. taxpayer is among the few in the world not screwed and tattooed by Castro. As such the so-called embargo has been a resounding success.

Cliché no. 5. Cuba was a wretched place before Castro. The Castro regime's minuses in political liberties are more than offset by its plusses in heath care, literacy, nourishment, etc. The London Times described pre-Castro Cuba as "an impoverished Caribbean island." The New York Times termed Cuba's economy in 1958 as "Near-Feudal."

The Facts: A UNESCO report on Cuba circa 1957 stated: "One feature of the Cuban social structure is a large middle class.The U.S. Department of Commerce Guide for Businesses from 1956 stated: “Cuba is not an underdeveloped country." In 1958, that "impoverished Caribbean island" had a higher per capita income than Austria and Japan and Cuban industrial workers had the 8th highest wages in the world. Cuba also had the hemisphere’s lowest inflation rate and her peso was always equal in value with the U.S. dollar.

Cuba also had more doctors and dentists per capita than Britain and lower infant mortality than France and Germany the 13th lowest in the world, in fact. Today, Cuba's infant mortality rate despite the hemisphere's highest abortion rate which skews this figure downward is 34th from the top. So, relative to the rest of the world, Cuba's health care has worsened under Castro and a nation with a formerly massive influx of European immigrants needs machine guns, water cannons and Tiger sharks to keep it's people from fleeing. In 1958, 80 percent of Cubans were literate and Cuba spent the most per capita on public education of any nation in Latin America. In 1958, Cubans had the third highest protein consumption in Latin America, more Televisions per capita than any European nation and more autos per capita than Japan and half of Europe.

Since 1962, a Cuban's government-mandated food rations are lower than those mandated for Cuban slaves by the Spanish King in 1842. The average salary is $10 a month and oxcarts are envied as a mode of transportation in Cuba's countryside. The only people on earth with fewer cell phones per capita than Cubans live in Papua, New Guinea.

All of this after the Soviets lavished Castro with the equivalent of six Marshall Plans, and pumped not into a war-ravaged continent of 300 million but into an island of 6.5 million who formerly enjoyed everything mentioned above.

Regarding Cuba's “near-feudal countryside" as the New York Times described it: According to the Geneva-based International Labor Organization, the average daily wage for an agricultural worker in Cuba in the 1950's was higher than in France, Belgium, Denmark, or West Germany. Also, far from huge latifundia dominating the agricultural landscape, the average Cuban farm in 1958 was actually smaller than the average farm in the U.S .

Cliché no. 5. The Bay of Pigs was a “fiasco” because Cubans in Cuba overwhelmingly supported the Castro regime and were not motivated to fight it as they had the Batista regime.

The Facts: Initially, thinking the moment of liberation had arrived, entire battalions of Castro’s militia surrendered en masse to the invaders. Only when it became obvious that the invaders had been abandoned and no U.S. military support would be forthcoming did the ring close. Even then, one U.S. jet flying over the beachhead on a reconnaissance mission briefly halted most of the firing from Castro’s forces. After the battle, Fidel Castro himself fumed at the poor fighting spirit of his troops.

More facts: A ferocious anti-communist guerrilla war raged in the Cuban countryside from 1960 to 1966 that involved t10 times the number of rebels who ever fought against Batista. Raul Castro himself admitted that his troops, militia, and Soviet advisers were up against 179 different "bands of bandits" as he labeled the freedom-fighters. Tens of thousands of troops, scores of Soviet advisors, and squadrons of Soviet tanks, helicopters, and flame-throwers finally extinguished the lonely Cuban freedom-fight Everyplace else on earth the liberal media/academia axis refers to such a thing as "an insurgency," and is proof that “the people” oppose their rulers.

"Fool me once," they say. "Shame on me. Fool me twice, shame on you." Once in exile, the Cuban refugees pouring out of Cuba adopted the desperate role of Dorothy's dog Toto, tugging the curtain open and urging the world to avert their gaze from the smoke and mirrors and please, please! pay attention to that man behind it.

Results have been -- to put it delicately -- "mixed." Even in death the mainstream media remains in awe of The Great and Powerful Fidel. Castro's primary detractors lacked the proper cachet. Few ethnic groups have ever hit these shores carrying more unfashionable baggage. Not that they carried much. Most landed with the clothes on their backs, their every possession stolen by Castro. Then these people compounded the curse tenfold by bounding into the middle class in one generation and by becoming the most solidly Republican ethnic bloc in U.S. history. From 71 to 82 percent of Cuban-Americans vote Republican. So the usual taboos regarding the discussion of ethnic groups vanish when discussing Americans of Cuban heritage. Georgetown professor and Democratic presidential adviser, Norman Birnbaum referred to them as "Those truly reprehensible Miami Cubans." During the Elian Gonzalez circus Bryant Gumbel referred to Cuban demonstrators as "disgusting" and The New Republic and Nation writer Alexander Cockburn recommended "nuking" Miami's Little Havana.

Yet, no hysterics erupted from the usual quarters. None of the brouhaha that hounded John Rocker, Jimmy the Greek, and Mel Gibson ensued. All Professional sniffers and snouters in matters regarding "ethnic sensitivity" remained deafeningly mum.

So, what now for Cuba? Fidel's successor, Raul, was the one who gave the "FUEGO!" order for the massacre mentioned at the beginning of this article. "Meet the new boss," wrote Pete Townsend, "same as the old boss."

You get the picture. Given the temper of the times, and given his lackluster personality, Raul is unlikely to gather the same media plaudits as his brother. But he's already being described as "pragmatic," "efficient," "a skillful manager," "more open," etc. by the mainstream media.

And, based on their track record, why wouldn't you believe them?

---

Humberto Fontova is the author of Exposing the Real Che Guevara and the Useful Idiots Who Idolize Him. Visit www.hfontova.com

Does Balkanization Beckon Anew?
by Patrick J. Buchanan

When the Great War comes, said old Bismarck, it will come out of “some damn fool thing in the Balkans.”

On June 28, 1914, Gavrilo Princip shot the archduke and heir to the Austrian throne Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo, setting in motion the train of events that led to the First World War.

In the spring of 1999, the United States bombed Serbia for 78 days to force its army out of that nation’s cradle province of Kosovo. The Serbs were fighting Albanian separatists of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA). And we had no more right to bomb Belgrade than the Royal Navy would have had to bombard New York in our Civil War.

We bombed Serbia, we were told, to stop the genocide in Kosovo. But there was no genocide. This was propaganda. The United Nations’ final casualty count of Serbs and Albanians in Slobodan Milosevic’s war did not add up to 1 percent of the dead in Mr. Lincoln’s war.

Albanians did flee in the tens of thousands during the war. But since that war’s end, the Serbs of Kosovo have seen their churches and monasteries smashed and vandalized and have been ethnically cleansed in the scores of thousands from their ancestral province. In the exodus they have lost everything. The remaining Serb population of 120,000 is largely confined to enclaves guarded by NATO troops.

“At a Serb monastery in Pec,” writes the Washington Post, “Italian troops protect the holy site, which is surrounded by a massive new wall to shield elderly nuns from stone-throwing and other abuse by passing ethnic Albanians.”

On Sunday, Kosovo declared independence and was recognized by the European Union and President Bush. But this is not the end of the story. It is only the preface to a new history of the Balkans, a region that has known too much history.

By intervening in a civil war to aid the secession of an ancient province, to create a new nation that has never before existed and, to erect it along ethnic, religious and tribal lines, we have established a dangerous precedent. Muslim and Albanian extremists are already talking of a Greater Albania, consisting of Albania, Kosovo and the Albanian-Muslim sectors of Serbia, Montenegro and Macedonia.

If these Albanian minorities should demand the right to secede and join their kinsmen in Kosovo, on what grounds would we oppose them? The inviolability of borders? What if the Serb majority in the Mitrovica region of northern Kosovo, who reject Albanian rule, secede and call on their kinsmen in Serbia to protect them?

Would we go to war against Serbia, once again, to maintain the territorial integrity of Kosovo, after we played the lead role in destroying the territorial integrity of Serbia?

Inside the U.S.-sponsored Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, the autonomous Serb Republic of Srpska is already talking secession and unification with Serbia. On what grounds would we deny them?

The U.S. war on Serbia was unconstitutional, unjust and unwise. Congress never authorized it. Serbia, an ally in two world wars, had never attacked us. We made an enemy of the Serbs, and alienated Russia, to create a second Muslim state in the Balkans.

By intervening in a civil war where no vital interest was at risk, the United States, which is being denounced as loudly in Belgrade today as we are being cheered in Pristina, has acquired another dependency. And our new allies, the KLA, have been credibly charged with human trafficking, drug dealing, atrocities and terrorism.

And the clamor for ethnic self-rule has only begun to be heard.

Rumania has refused to recognize the new Republic of Kosovo, for the best of reasons. Bucharest rules a large Hungarian minority in Transylvania, acquired at the same Paris Peace Conference of 1919 where Croatia, Slovenia and Bosnia-Herzegovina were detached from Vienna and united with Serbia.

Abkhazia and South Ossetia, two provinces that have broken away from Georgia, are invoking the Kosovo precedent to demand recognition as independent nations. As our NATO expansionists are anxious to bring Georgia into NATO, here is yet another occasion for a potential Washington-Moscow clash.

Spain, too, opposed the severing of Kosovo from Serbia, as Madrid faces similar demands from Basque and Catalan separatists.

The Muslim world will enthusiastically endorse the creation of a new Muslim state in Europe at the expense of Orthodox Christian Serbs. But Turkey is also likely to re-raise the issue as to why the EU and United States do not formally recognize the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus. Like Kosovo, it, too, is an ethnically homogeneous community that declared independence 25 years ago.

Breakaway Transneistria is seeking independence from Moldova, the nation wedged between Rumania and Ukraine, and President Putin of Russia has threatened to recognize it, Abkhazia and South Ossetia in retaliation for the West’s recognition of Kosovo.

If Putin pauses, it will be because he recognizes that of all the nations of Europe, Russia is high among those most threatened by the serial Balkanization we may have just reignited in the Balkans.

COPYRIGHT 2008 CREATORS SYNDICATE INC.

From GQ Blog:
The Godfather, Part II
by nate penn

In his first major interview in twenty years, the elusive Hal Steinbrenner talks to GQ about Roger Clemens and steroids, life with his "overbearing" father, and who's really calling the shots at Yankee Stadium

In February 2007, George Steinbrenner’s younger son, Hal, quietly took over the New York Yankees from Steve Swindal, whose marriage to Hal’s sister had come apart. A few weeks later, Hal’s brother Hank joined him. The ascent of the Steinbrenner sons, unrevealed for many months, was the surest possible indication that George—who spoke frequently of “letting the young elephants in the tent” but could never actually bring himself to surrender power—was unwell. “He wouldn’t have given anybody this opportunity,” says Darrell Gwynn, a former business partner.

But who were his sons? Little was known about them. Reportedly, both had done well in business, Hal managing the family’s hotels, Hank its thoroughbred farm. Neither had ever shown much interest in the Yankees, for reasons that were the cause of much speculation. “The father is not an easy man to work for, as we know,” says former baseball commissioner Fay Vincent. “I can’t imagine being George Steinbrenner’s son,” says Gwynn. “Shit, if you didn’t take the trash out, what would happen to you?”

During their first, busy off-season, Hank, 50, emerged as a sort of Sonny Corleone figure, impetuous and impudent, throwing down gauntlets left and right. “He wasn’t that way growing up,” says Yankee ex-COO Leonard Kleinman in surprise. (I’ll be told that at one point in his youth, rather than emulate his father, Hank had sought to distance himself from him, changing the name on his mailbox to read “Hank Stein.”) His outspokenness—on subjects ranging from A-Rod to Joe Torre to a possible trade for ace Johan Santana—led many to assume he was running the team, but behind the scenes the chain of command was a work in progress. “They indicated that now Hank is the baseball person,” a baffled Scott Boras tells me during the first, ill-fated round of A-Rod negotiations, “yet they had me talk with Hal.” The brothers handled major decisions tentatively, offering a controversial contract to Yankee manager Joe Torre only after days of deliberations (Torre would reject it) and angering superstar closer Mariano Rivera by delaying his inevitable re-signing. The absence of an enormous personality to blot out these mistakes made them appear more significant than they perhaps were. Throughout, Hal, 38, remained, like Michael Corleone, in the shadows—subtle, wary of media, a private family man.

So I’m shocked when it’s Hal and not his brother who consents to an exclusive interview with GQ. We meet in Tampa, at the team’s Legends Field spring-training complex, soon after archrival Boston’s second World Series victory in four years. (We’ll speak again in February.) He greets me at the reception desk on the executive floor of the complex, wearing khakis and an open-collared button-down. He’s surprisingly boyish looking. Though we’re nearly the same age, I call him “Mr. Steinbrenner,” and he doesn’t ask me to use his first name. As we sit down in a generically furnished conference room, I wonder why we’re not meeting in his office; turns out it’s adjacent to his father’s.

Hal proves to be cagey and prickly but also affable, modest, and disarming. (“If you’re going to use a photo in this article, let me know, will you?” he says. “As opposed to making me look like a dork. I’m hoping to get a date out of this, man.”) And so we begin what he informs me is his first major interview since his student days at Williams College some twenty years ago.

In the press, adjectives like reclusive, shy, and press-averse are often attached to your name. It’s your brother who’s been the face of the team.
I’m more introverted than extroverted, for sure, but I’m definitely not a recluse. Maybe we should have been a little more talkative at the beginning. I can’t speak for Hank, but for me, I had my hands full. I didn’t have time to sit down like I am with you. I’m glad I’m doing it now. But I’m a pretty private person. I don’t need to be seen; I definitely don’t ever want to be recognized or noticed. My dad is a wonderful promoter: He speaks his mind no matter who’s around. I tend to see myself as a little more political. That’s probably a word I shouldn’t use, ’cause there’s nobody more political than him. He’s good. But I’m a little more subtle, a little more calm. Hank has been talking to the press, and he’s taken a little heat off me.

Was there a distinct moment at which you and Hank took control of the Yankees?
No. I obviously became considerably more involved at a somewhat dramatic pace when Steve, my sister’s ex-husband, left [in February of 2007]. A couple months after that, I think Hank realized I could use some help.

Along with the adjectives I mentioned above, certain verbs have been associated with your name in the press.
Any of them good?

Not so much. Various sources say you “hate” and “avidly disdain” the media.
No truth to that. That was Bill Madden [of the New York Daily News]. Look, first of all, I don’t hate anybody. It’s a useless emotion. It accomplishes nothing. He even said I hate the players, which is certainly not true. We’ve all had issues with the media, okay, but at the same time, I understand, Hank understands, they’re in business just like we’re in business.

Am I comfortable dealing with the media? Probably not as comfortable as Hank is. Definitely not as comfortable as my dad was. Have I had disagreements with them in the past, disagreed with things they’ve written and the reasons they wrote them? Yes, of course. But again, I understand what the deal is.

If you really don’t feel any enmity toward the media, I would actually be surprised. Your family has been tabloid fodder almost since the day your dad bought the team.
Maybe I’m numb to it. Maybe I’m just used to it. Look, I care very much what my family thinks of me, my close friends, but I try not to pay attention to what strangers think of me. You could drive yourself crazy doing that, particularly if you’re reading the New York papers every day, which I tend not to do.

Was it always assumed during your childhood that you or Hank would one day take over the Yankees from your dad?
My dad would say, “Someday this is going to be yours.” “We’re counting on you, we’re counting on Hank.” “I’m not going to want to do this forever.” I don’t know [laughs] if that was true. George was very involved, and he loved it. He wanted us around, he wanted us here, but there was nothing that specific about duties. My background in grad school [Hal earned an MBA in 1994] led me to do certain things, like finance, that weren’t his strong points. Hank always loved the baseball operations and knew the statistics for every player. We each had our strengths. I know he saw that.

You call your father George?
That’s purely an office thing. I guess when you’re right out of college and working in the office, you don’t want to go around saying, [puts on little-boy voice] “Well, Daddy said this. Daddy—” Throughout the course of fifteen years, I think it took on a life of its own here, but certainly not at home.

You don’t call him George to his face?
No, of course not. That would be completely disrespectful.

In 1990, it came out that your dad had hired a gambler to try to smear a Yankee player, Dave Winfield, whom he was feuding with. The commissioner eventually banned your dad from baseball for two and half years. Were you angry at him for his behavior? Did you feel it was defensible?
I don’t remember the specifics, but I can certainly tell you I wasn’t upset with him, no. I make it a real good point not to judge people, and I don’t like judging situations that I haven’t been involved with and don’t know all the specifics about. Quite frankly, I had enough on my plate right then trying to get through college. I certainly felt bad for him. Baseball is his love, and to be out of it for a couple of years was really hard on him.

Just before serving his ban, your father tried to enlist your brother to succeed him. Why didn’t Hank want to take over?
My God, that was seventeen years ago. I’m afraid my long-term memory is not quite that good. We had some good people in place; I know Hank knew that. Maybe he felt he wasn’t completely needed, but I can’t really answer those questions for him. Down the line, somebody will ask him and you can get his take. George is a wonderful leader, and there was no need for me to be involved. I was focusing on my major, psychology, and geology and astronomy.

A decade or so ago, press accounts indicated that you and Hank had no interest in taking over the team. As recently as ’05, your PR guy issued a statement saying that your and your brother’s “interests lie in other areas.” Were you interested in assuming control of the team?
Well, yes and no. My kids are first for me, and I was very concerned about having to be out of town and miss a lot of their life. That was one of the things I took into consideration when I didn’t step up the way people thought I should. There’s no doubt that everybody, including George, felt that Steve [Swindal] would be the one to take over. I can’t speak for George, but that’s my take on it. There’s a lot of talk about everything. We had always had a hotel here in Tampa, and I started getting involved with that. But my office has always been here, and I’m here four or five days a week or more.

Ten years ago, George still was very involved. There were certainly times, because he was a very hands-on guy and very overbearing, that my services may not have been needed. I’m sure Hank felt the same way from time to time. But I think my dad has certainly settled down, and I think he’s willing to let other people make decisions more than he used to. He’s still here every day, and we run everything by him.

You observe that your dad was quite hands-on, could be overbearing—
Is that a big surprise?

I think it’s been reported elsewhere.
Phew! No breaking news here.

Is it true that after the 2003 season, your father, in a fit of pique, wanted to get rid of employee dental benefits? Is it true that you persuaded him not to?
Yes, that’s true. That was a disagreement. Look, there have been plenty of those. I don’t really believe he was ever going to do that, but I can’t get in his head.

Did you minimize your Yankee responsibilities because your dad was difficult to work with?
Like I said, at times I felt like my abilities just weren’t needed. No hard feelings, just weren’t needed. Like I said, he’s a hands-on guy, and he made all the decisions himself. He listened to our input, but he still had the final say. I never got the impression that he was trying to exert control over me, beat me down.

When you learned that a reporter had surprised your father in his own house and interviewed him there, what was your reaction? Did you find it invasive?
Evasive or invasive? It was invasive. I think the way it was done was evasive. I’m not going to get too much into it, but was I upset? Of course I was upset. I mean, so would you be if someone did that to your father. It wasn’t done well. It was just an evasive operation that was uncalled-for. Leave it at that.

Do you find the media’s ongoing attempts to interview your dad as he’s leaving his car to enter the stadium similarly inappropriate?
I don’t find that as inappropriate. That’s just a fact of life.

Why is it that the family has chosen not to make a definitive statement on your dad’s health?
Because it’s a private matter. This is a private corporation. I’m not going to comment about my health, ever. It’s the concern of my family and close friends, and as far as I’m concerned, it ends there.

Wouldn’t it put an end to the media’s intrusions into your family’s affairs if you just said, “Look, this is what’s going on, now leave us alone?”
I could probably flip a coin on that one. No, I’m not convinced. Family matters are family matters. That’s the way I view it, and you bet I’m gonna stick to it. There is no doubt our fans have a right to know what’s going on with our baseball operations’ decision-making, because without them we would not be in business. Do people have a right to know about anything having to do with family, my personal family, my extended family? No. No. And if that creates controversy, well, so be it. You cannot beat me into submission on that. Nobody can.

To what degree was your father involved with the A-Rod and Torre negotiations? To what degree was he involved in the selection of Joe Girardi as the new Yankee manager?
He met with all three [managerial] candidates. He was there for all the Torre things, including the meeting with Joe. He was involved with the initial meetings about A-Rod; he was not there for the meeting with A-Rod and [A-Rod’s wife] Cynthia. But he was involved with every aspect of that meeting and what happened before and what happened after. He’s here every day, and we run things by him all the time. And there’s no doubt in the organization of who still is in charge.

Are the young elephants finally in the tent?
I think we are finally in the tent. I think he’s listening to our wisdom, our intuition, and going with recommendations we have, but it’s not like we’re going to make those decisions without him. It’s not like we feel we could. He is the general managing partner.

So he’s still calling the shots.
Of course he’s calling the shots. You don’t think I’m crazy enough to make a decision without him, do you?

I have to ask this next question.
I’m sure.

On your dad’s rare appearances in public, some people, most famously Reggie Jackson, have said that he doesn’t seem like himself, that he doesn’t recognize them. Is he really able to participate constructively in baseball and business decisions?
I’m not getting into the health of my dad, my mom, anybody else. I’m just not going there.

Your dad had a council of advisers, all of whom were coequal, but he unilaterally set the team’s course. Do you think the team is going to be more hierarchical going forward?
I’m going to sound like a military-school guy, but I’m a big believer in chain of command. Under George, I think a lot of people felt like George was going to make the decision, no matter what, and they just didn’t make many decisions. The direction that we’re moving toward is more along the lines of how I think an efficient corporation should run. It doesn’t mean I’m right, but that’s my take. I don’t want to have to be here twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, analyzing every single piece of information that comes across the desk and feeling like I need to make decisions that other people are perfectly capable of making.

We understand this is New York. We understand winning is expected. We want to win. Even if that wasn’t the case, we would want to win; that’s just the way we are. But I think we’re both more introverted and more analytical. We tend to want to take time to come up with a solution to a problem, as opposed to making a seat-of-the-pants–type decision. And I think that showed in some of these off-season signings. Some people didn’t understand why we took so long to decide this or to decide that, but we want to get it right.

Who’s at the top of the chain of command?
What’s been determined is that this is a family business, and if we’re both gonna be involved, it has to be an equal thing, and we both need to be involved with all major decisions, whether it’s the stadium, big expenditures, or [the unconsummated trade for Johan] Santana, for instance. It’s well publicized in New York that we didn’t agree on that deal. My concerns were economical and financial, and I’m not gonna get into those, but I also had baseball concerns. I didn’t want to get rid of these kids! Boy, the last time we had three young pitchers like Philip Hughes, Joba Chamberlain, and Ian Kennedy, I couldn’t even tell you.

The Super Bowl this year was unbelievable, and the one thought I took away really has a lot to do with us this year, with these three young pitchers. Eli struggled a bit his first couple years. I think New York fans might realize now that if you give a young kid time, great things can happen.

Is it true, as the media has suggested, that Brian Cashman’s job is on the line because the Yankees didn’t do the Santana deal?
No, it’s not. I don’t know where the media gets this stuff sometimes. They gotta sell papers, I understand that. You gotta sell magazines, right? The bottom line is Cashman is with us this year. In any given year for the past thirty years, you could probably say, “This year the general manager’s job’s on the line.” That’s par for the course for that job, but certainly not because of one trade, no.

The perception in the media is that Gene Michael, the architect of the great Yankee teams of the late ’90s, hasn’t wielded a great deal of influence in the organization for some years. Is that true? What will his role be going forward?
As far as I’m concerned, it’s absolutely not true. Cashman and Gene talk all the time. Gene was down here interviewing the potential manager candidates, and he’s always been close to George. The two of them sometimes are kind of like Billy Martin and George, but there was always a level of respect there, and that hasn’t changed. I mean, his take on things is as good as anybody’s. We value his input, which is why he was part of all those interviews.

The Yankees signed Roger Clemens twice to record-setting contracts. Did you ever have any questions about the source of his ability, in his forties, to throw ninety-plus miles an hour?
Not on my end, no. Look at Brett Favre in football. I mean, it’s unbelievable what he’s been able to accomplish. Certain guys work extremely hard in the off-season—and Roger always did that—and are able to play longer than other players. No, none of us—at least I never thought, nor was it even discussed, that steroids was the reason why. You’ll see these guys in different sports throughout the decades, and they’re just a step above the rest, being able to compete at an older age. It’s amazing. That’s just what I accepted it to be.

Do you and your brother feel that the organization needs to address the fact that three players from the ’99 and 2000 World Championship teams were named in the Mitchell Report?
I’m not really gonna comment on that. It’s up to them to comment for themselves. There were a lot of names in the Mitchell Report. You saw it. I didn’t read the report page to page, so I just don’t know what the evidence was or wasn’t, how strong the evidence was or wasn’t, or any of that.

It’s been suggested that you and your brother would sell the team after your dad passed away. Given your uneasiness with public life, are you exploring this option?
No, we’re absolutely not planning on selling the team.

Are you willing to concede that Boston, my favorite team, is the superior organization right now?
No, I will never concede. They’ve got a lot of talent, and you’ve done very well the past few years, but let me put it this way: I don’t think you guys wanted to play us in the ALCS. So I will concede nothing. I think we’re better than you.

nate penn is a gq staff writer.