The Yin Blog

Off to a bad bowl season for me

Wow, so far the 2011 college football bowl season is off to a pretty bad start for my teams. Cal lost to Texas, which was not surprising. What was surprising was that Cal had a chance to win, but blew it. You know, I remember when Cal was just plain bad, without a hint of teasing fans with moments of brilliance. You savored the rare victories not as a harbinger of greatness, but as a fluke of nature. But sometime around when I went to Cal in the early 90s, the Golden Bears became a Pac-10 pretender, often going to bowls though never really challenging for the conference title (except maybe in 1991). I think I prefer the more innocent Cal that was the doormat of the conference.

Anyway, then, tonight, I had the displeasure of watching Iowa almost mount a comeback against Oklahoma, only to blow it and lose by 17 points, while running on the treadmill. Perhaps that accounts for the slightly labored workout. . . .

Oh well, tomorrow brings the end of the trilogy of suckiness, with the undeserving 6-7 UCLA Bruins -- no doubt the worst-ever division "champion" ever -- against the 6-6 Illinois Fighting Illini, who went 6-0 and then 0-6.

And, yes, I will be rooting for the Oregon Ducks in the Rose Bowl, but that's only because I root for any non-USC Pac-12 team to beat any non-Iowa Big Ten team. Otherwise, I'm not a Ducks supporter.

Take that, Stephen Bloom!

So here's a piece of news (okay, opinion) that goes contrary to the desolate picture of Iowa painted by UI journalism prof Stephen Bloom. According to the Street.com, Iowa City is the #1 best place to move to if you need a new start:

Population: 150,000

This city is home to the University of Iowa, which helps contribute to its 4.7% jobless rate and 16.1% singles population.

Located on the Iowa River, Iowa City served as Iowa's territorial capital from 1841 to 1857, and the Old Capitol Building is still a local landmark.

"Iowa City really is a nice town," Sperling says. "It has an attractive downtown, a well-educated population and a great community feel to it."

That's pretty cool. Ironic that I left Iowa City, although I wasn't exactly looking for a new start. I'm not sure where they get the population figure, unless it's the metro area + the university students. And that also makes me wonder about the 16% singles stat. I have no reason to doubt that, but a good deal of that must be students. Anecdotally, former colleagues of mine who were single found romance rather difficult to come by.

My op-ed on the Nat'l Defense Authorization Act

The Oregonian has published my guest editorial on the National Defense Authorization Act, which Congress has passed, and which President Obama seems poised to sign into law. My ultimate conclusion:

In the end, the NDAA's detention provisions are largely unnecessary, in that they mostly maintain the status quo; the provisions that make changes interfere with the President's flexibility and "solve" problems that don't exist. Its most problematic aspect may be pushing the boundaries of the battlefield far beyond the Iraq/Pakistan theater to anywhere, including within the United States.

That Iowa article by that Iowa journalism prof

Some of my friends and colleagues in Iowa are chaffing over U of Iowa journalism professor Stephen Bloom's essay that takes a critical -- and somewhat condescending -- look at the state of the State:

Considering the state's enormous political significance, I thought this would be a good time to explain to the geographically challenged a little about Iowa, including where Iowa is, and perhaps more importantly, in both a real and metaphysical way, what Iowa is.

Here's a sense of what follows:

Whether a schizophrenic, economically-depressed, and some say, culturally-challenged state like Iowa should host the first grassroots referendum to determine who will be the next president isn't at issue. It's been this way since 1972, and there are no signs that it's going to change. In a perfect world, no way would Iowa ever be considered representative of America, or even a small part of it. Iowa's not representative of much. There are few minorities, no sizable cities, and the state's about to lose one of its five seats in the U.S. House because its population is shifting; any growth is negligible. Still, thanks to a host of nonsensical political precedents, whoever wins the Iowa Caucuses in January will very likely have a 50 percent chance of being elected president 11 months later. Go figure.

The ultimate point of Bloom's essay seems to be to question whether Iowa's first-in-the-nation caucuses every four years are desirable for the nation. He concludes that they are not, because Iowa is unrepresentative of the nation, it's insular, and so on.

In many ways, my path to Iowa bears similarity to Bloom's. Like him, I came to the Hawkeye State by way of California, and while I was most recently a lawyer by practice, I had in fact studied journalism and interned for some Bay Area newspapers. I had spent a year in the Midwest/South (in Oklahoma) for a clerkship a few years before, so perhaps I had been "exposed" enough to the Midwest before moving to Iowa.

Unlike Bloom, who has traveled to all 99 of Iowa's counties, during my 7 years, I more less stayed in Iowa City, with occasional visits to Cedar Rapids (mostly Sam's Club or the airport) or the Quad Cities (again, the airport). I certainly wouldn't claim to be any kind of expert about Iowa -- I do know enough to know that Iowa City is hardly representative of the state.

That said, since Bloom lives in Iowa City, it's striking to me that his day-to-day experiences seem to be so different from mine. As my good friend Nick Johnson points out, Iowa City is quite a little cultural wonder, in Iowa or anywhere else:

Walking along downtown Iowa City's Washington Street, following a reception at a restaurant that can match many of those on the coasts, we came upon an amazing piano player, 22-year-old Chase Garrett. He was sitting at a piano kindly placed on the sidewalk by those who thought it would be a nice addition to this community of literature (one of three so designated by the United Nations), theater, music, and creative arts generally.

Here is a direct link to the YouTube location of my video, and a link to Chase's Web site: http://chasegarrett.com//.

It turns out I'm far from the first person to discover this guy and upload his music to YouTube. Put "Chase Garrett" (in quotes) into YouTube search, and you'll see over 100 more.

From there we wandered down the hill to the Iowa Memorial Union (about three blocks). (Another nice thing about Iowa City is that an easy walk can get you to many of the places you want to go. If you're in a hurry you can bike. With time to spare, you can even drive.)

What we found in the main lounge of the IMU was a standing room only crowd, packed to the walls, waiting to hear a free lecture by Robert Reich, http://robertreich.org, once Secretary of Labor and now University of California, Berkeley, professor of public policy.

(Iowa City certainly had some very nice restaurants, including one with the best ribeye steak I've ever had. Seafood and Chinese food, though, were . . . um, as you would expect, not up to par with the West Coast.)

The main fact that seems to have escaped Bloom's article is that rural U.S. is quite different politically and culturally from large cities (especially those on the Coasts) and small college towns. Rural Iowa may be somewhat like Bloom's caricature, but I have a feeling that if Bloom had visited rural parts of California, or Oregon, or other "blue" states, he would have found them similar to rural Iowa. For example, check out Oregon's House District No. 2, which covers Oregon starting from about 100 miles from the Pacific Ocean all the way east to the Idaho border. It's solidly Republican, having sent Greg Walden back repeatedly since 1998, with routine vote percentages of 65+%. I'm guessing there are a lot of hunters there.

So, is "Iowa" (as depicted by Bloom) really that different?

My report on the Ho Ho 5K race

This morning, I ran the Ho Ho 5K race at Cook Park in Tigard, Oregon. This was another civilized race that started at a reasonable time (i.e., 10 am). That's one of the primary reasons I chose to enter this race instead of one last week, which started 2 hours earlier.

It was overcast and in the mid-30s this morning, but on the plus side, it was relatively dry. I wore a thermal longsleeve shirt and my Zombie Apocalypse 5k race T-shirt over that, shorts, wool socks, cotton gloves (my hands get cold!), and fairly new Asics running shoes.

Unlike the Turkeython, this was not a chip-timed race, so I tried to end up near the front of the pack. Before we started, the race organizer pointed toward a vehicle that he called the "Sleighburu" (as in a portmanteau of sleigh and Suburu). Soon, Santa Claus stepped out of the vehicle. Well, he was a fit Santa whose red suit hung pretty loosely on him! Anyway, Santa got back in his car, and we were told that when he honked his horn, the race would be on, and we could follow him to see the course.

Honk! Honk!

We started at the Cook Park parking lot and ran up a short hill toward Tigard High School, and then turned left to follow the Sleighburu. This took us into a residential neighborhood, which, being on the west side of the river, was not your normal Cartesian grid-like network of straight roads intersecting at 90 degree angles. At the end of the residential neighborhood part of the run, Santa was there to cheer us on.

From there, we headed into the park. The initial part of the trail was downhill, but it was mildly slick, and steep, so I actually ended up going slower there than I would have on flat terrain, since I was doing my best to slow down so as not to slip. Unlike the Turkeython, where I started in back and passed a bunch of people, here I started near the front and got passed by more than one runner.

Not too far inside the park, my right calf started to hurt. I figured it was a cramp and pushed through it as best as I could. The course then followed a dirt trail along the Tualatin River. This, I knew from my warm-up jogging before the race, was getting close to the end. I tried to speed up, but that calf problem was getting more serious.

When I saw the end of the course, I did manage to speed up a little. However, I discovered that the end of the course was actually on the other side of the tent -- in other words, we had to run a farther distance down the trail and then turn around and come back. Gaack!!

Anyway, considering the hilly course and my calf, I was surprised and fairly pleased that I finished in 23:05 -- or 7:26 min/mile.

As for my calf, it still hurts a bit to walk, so I think maybe I pulled it a little. D'oh!

Tom Cruise as Lee Child's rogue hero Jack Reacher???

I love reading Lee Child's series of novels featuring ex-Army MP Jack Reacher, even if Reacher's frequent brutal and amoral murderings of the villains leave me somewhat ill at ease. (Then again, "24" is probably my all-time favorite TV show, and it's not like Jack Bauer is a paragon of morality.) I should be excited that Hollywood may be finally making a movie version.

But really, Tom Cruise as Jack Reacher? Reacher is 6'5" and about 250 pounds. He uses his immense physical size and strength to batter his opponents, often to death. He doesn't use fancy martial arts of any sort. He describes himself as a brawler. He likes delivering elbow strikes to the side of the head, or headbutting.

Don't get me wrong. Although I think Tom Cruise comes across as quite a strange guy these days, I've generally found myself liking his movies. That's a testament to his acting skills. That said, the sheer gap in physical match between Cruise and Reacher is pretty stunning.

Reacher is pretty laconic. It's too bad the former Governator is too old to play him. He'd be a decent choice. Off the top of my head, The Rock is probably the closest high-profile actor to match Reacher. But not Cruise. Please, no.

Things that make me (sort of) wish I'd stayed in math/science

Overall I'm quite satisfied with where I am, but reading columns like these about the physics of "Angry Birds" or why the melting death scene in the movie "Volcano" is scientifically wrong do make me sort of wish that I'd stayed in math/science instead of coming over to the dark side (aka humanities). The closest I can come is writing about the legal issues in "24" (here and here).

Who I'm rooting for in various college football bowl games

First off, as I noted earlier, I'd prefer a 4- or 8-team playoff to the current BCS nonsense, as I can't really see why Alabama, Oklahoma State, and Stanford, among others, should have to be making off-the-field arguments about who deserves to take on LSU. But the games have been slated, so here's how I'm rooting:

Las Vegas: Arizona State > Boise State. I kind of feel bad for Boise that they never get any respect, but I generally root for Pac-10/12 teams (other than USC, of course).

Holiday Bowl: Cal > Texas. This one is pretty obvious, but also, Texas strikes me as a pretty unlikeable football team, considering that its selfish TV deal is what's put the Big 12 at death's doorstep. Also, as a default rule, I root against teams from Texas (and New York).

Sports: Florida State > Notre Dame. This one is hard because it's two bully teams, but FSU law gave me an offer, and ND didn't. Petty of me to use that as the tiebreaker, I know.

Alamo: Washington > Baylor. There's the "root for the Pac 12" rule and the "root against Texas teams" rule at play.

Insight: Iowa > Oklahoma. Two teams that I have some geographic connection to, having clerked in Oklahoma City (just north of Norman, OK, where the Sooners are located), and having taught at Iowa for seven years. I tend not to like Big Ten schools, but Iowa is the exception; and 7>1.

Fight Hunger: UCLA > Illinois. Here we have two teams that don't deserve to be in bowls at all, with UCLA being 6-7 and Illinois winning its first 6 games and then losing its last 6. But UCLA is my second favorite team.

Chick fil-A: Virginia > Auburn. I'm rooting against Auburn because I still think Cam Newton should have been disqualified and Auburn stripped of its title.

TicketCity: Houston > Penn State. Let me put it this way, I am so disgusted with Penn State (over the Sandusky matter) that I would root for USC to beat them!

Outback: Michigan State > Georgia. Michigan State got screwed by the BCS; it's ridiculous that the Spartans got passed over for a BCS bowl in favor of Michigan, when Michigan State BEAT Michigan, and the only reason Michigan State has one more loss is that they played in the Big Ten championship game, while Michigan stayed home. Yes, I don't like non-Iowa Big Ten teams, but I don't like SEC teams either.

Gator Bowl: Florida > Ohio State. Two more bully teams, but the tiebreaker for me is that it looks like Ohio State is going to get away with much lesser penalties than they deserve over the Terrell Pryor scandal.

Rose: Oregon > Wisconsin. I don't particularly like the Oregon Ducks, but I really don't like the Big Ten.

Fiesta: Stanford > Oklahoma State. The "root for Pac-12" rule applies here.

Sugar: Virginia Tech > Michigan. This is tough, because neither team deserves to be in a BCS game, and perhaps Virginia Tech is even less deserving than Michigan. I guess I hope for an ugly and sloppy 9-6 kind of game. My rooting against Michigan is probably due to the family rivalries and the like.

BCS Championship: Alabama > LSU if Stanford has annihilated Oklahoma State (or vice versa); otherwise, LSU > Alabama. If the Fiesta Bowl is a blow out, then I would like to see utter chaos at the top of the rankings, which would be Alabama beating LSU, leaving a bunch of deserving 1 loss teams (LSU, Alabama, Stanford/Oklahoma State) all with claims to be #1, with the Fiesta Bowl winner being able to point to a destruction over a quality opponent. But if the Fiesta Bowl is a hard fought victory, then I guess LSU would deserve support for a pretty remarkable year.