Ann Coulter has a point about soccer
I'm a liberal Democrat, but I have to admit that Ann Coulter makes some good points about soccer in her latest provocation/column. Her first sentences show that right-wingers can have a sense of humor:
I've held off on writing about soccer for a decade---or about the length of the average soccer game---so as not to offend anyone. But enough is enough. Any growing interest in soccer can only be a sign of the nation's moral decay.
This is meant for laughs, since offending liberals is an important part of her shtick.
If Michael Jackson had treated his chronic insomnia with a tape of Argentina vs. Brazil instead of Propofol, he'd still be alive, although bored...
Good point, though I watched part of the US versus some other country the other day, and I found it almost interesting.
You can't use your hands in soccer...What sets man apart from the lesser beasts, besides a soul, is that we have opposable thumbs. Our hands can hold things. Here's a great idea: Let's create a game where you're not allowed to use them!
Good point for a lot of Americans like me, who grew up playing baseball and basketball. For me the greatest athletes in the world are playing basketball in the NBA. Watching Lebron James kick a basketball around wouldn't be much fun.
I resent the force-fed aspect of soccer. The same people trying to push soccer on Americans are the ones demanding that we love HBO's "Girls," light-rail, Beyonce and Hillary Clinton. The number of New York Times articles claiming soccer is "catching on" is exceeded only by the ones pretending women's basketball is fascinating. I note that we don't have to be endlessly told how exciting football is.
Okay, but no one really needs to love Hillary, except maybe Bill. I voted for her in the 2008 primary not out of love but only because I thought she had a better chance of being elected than Obama. (I thought like Willie Brown, who told Obama in 2004, "Nobody named Barack Obama is going to get elected to anything.")
It's foreign. In fact, that's the precise reason the Times is constantly hectoring Americans to love soccer. One group of sports fans with whom soccer is not "catching on" at all, is African-Americans. They remain distinctly unimpressed by the fact that the French like it. Soccer is like the metric system, which liberals also adore because it's European. Naturally, the metric system emerged from the French Revolution, during the brief intervals when they weren't committing mass murder by guillotine.
Good point. This is how some bike people are trying to sell cycling here in Progressive Land. Look how much the Europeans like it! The French eat snails, too, but somehow that's never caught on here. Of course they call it "escargot," which, along with garlic butter, probably helps it go down the old pie hole better.
I've held off on writing about soccer for a decade---or about the length of the average soccer game---so as not to offend anyone. But enough is enough. Any growing interest in soccer can only be a sign of the nation's moral decay.
This is meant for laughs, since offending liberals is an important part of her shtick.
If Michael Jackson had treated his chronic insomnia with a tape of Argentina vs. Brazil instead of Propofol, he'd still be alive, although bored...
Good point, though I watched part of the US versus some other country the other day, and I found it almost interesting.
You can't use your hands in soccer...What sets man apart from the lesser beasts, besides a soul, is that we have opposable thumbs. Our hands can hold things. Here's a great idea: Let's create a game where you're not allowed to use them!
Good point for a lot of Americans like me, who grew up playing baseball and basketball. For me the greatest athletes in the world are playing basketball in the NBA. Watching Lebron James kick a basketball around wouldn't be much fun.
I resent the force-fed aspect of soccer. The same people trying to push soccer on Americans are the ones demanding that we love HBO's "Girls," light-rail, Beyonce and Hillary Clinton. The number of New York Times articles claiming soccer is "catching on" is exceeded only by the ones pretending women's basketball is fascinating. I note that we don't have to be endlessly told how exciting football is.
Okay, but no one really needs to love Hillary, except maybe Bill. I voted for her in the 2008 primary not out of love but only because I thought she had a better chance of being elected than Obama. (I thought like Willie Brown, who told Obama in 2004, "Nobody named Barack Obama is going to get elected to anything.")
It's foreign. In fact, that's the precise reason the Times is constantly hectoring Americans to love soccer. One group of sports fans with whom soccer is not "catching on" at all, is African-Americans. They remain distinctly unimpressed by the fact that the French like it. Soccer is like the metric system, which liberals also adore because it's European. Naturally, the metric system emerged from the French Revolution, during the brief intervals when they weren't committing mass murder by guillotine.
Good point. This is how some bike people are trying to sell cycling here in Progressive Land. Look how much the Europeans like it! The French eat snails, too, but somehow that's never caught on here. Of course they call it "escargot," which, along with garlic butter, probably helps it go down the old pie hole better.
Labels: Hillary, President Obama, Right and Left, Sports, Willie Brown
posted by Rob Anderson @ 11:56 AM
14 comments
14 Comments:
Coulter hates the left and abhors immigration. Hence, her diatribe on soccer. Coulter’s inexplicable hatred of the Other is one reason why we should Never Trust Ann Coulter - at ANY Age, a new book available at www.coulterwatch.com/never.pdf.
Just shows how irrelevant curmudgeons like you are becoming. More people watched the U.S Portugal match than the NBA playoffs and the World Series this year. The NBA finals averages 15.5 million, and the World Series averaged 14.9 million. In contrast, over 25 million people watched the U.S. Portugal soccer game. http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/24/business/media/bigger-than-baseball-us-portugal-world-cup-match-outdoes-world-series-in-ratings.html
Coulter is just spewing. She probably could not tell the difference between a "Soccer" ball and a "Football".
She discusses "fumbling passes" and "throwing bricks", using words that are part of the lexicon but phrases that make any sense, a pass is either caught, or not caught - you can't fumble the ball until you've gained possession. And you don't "throw" a basketball at the hoop, you "shoot" it.
She's a moron.
"This is how some bike people are trying to sell cycling here in Progressive Land."
I'm a Republican and I wish we had more god damned bike lanes.
Anonymous, so what? The rest of the world thinks walking and biking are commendable activities. Here in the good old obese USA, we drive and watch football.
Love the world cup. Love the international part of it. I think the game mechanics need some work, most notably the flopping, accounting for stoppage time during extra time, and adding an additional ref on the field to catch some of the egregious fouls. I won't pay attention to soccer after its over, but will be looking forward to the next WC in 4 years.
If you or Coulter actually worked with measurements for a living, you'd understand why metric makes sense for a decimal number system (hint: it's not because "it's European")
"I wish we had more god damned bike lanes"
This high-mileage cyclist agrees that the existing bike lanes are god-damned indeed. Most of them are striped in such a way as to mislead motor vehicles into making dangerous right-hook turns across the path of cyclists at intersections. This phenomenon is of concern only to people who actually ride bikes in the city and will not show up in any surveys of people who don't ride but say they would "if only..."
I don't know why any experienced cyclist of any political persuasion would want more of these goddamned bike lanes. What we need is more intelligently-designed bike lanes with dedicated right-turn zones such as those recently added on Folsom at 6th Street, which effectively reduce the incidence of right hooks.
Don't hold your breath for this to ever happen in SF though. If you read SFBC and MTA publicity you'll see plenty of crowing about "parklets" and pedestrian bulb-outs but nary a word about painting away the right-hook turns. This is what happens when civic leaders allow their evangelical fervor to blind them to the realities faced by those who joined the congregation a long time ago.
I still think soccer is boring and that taking away scarce street parking and traffic lanes to make bike lanes on busy San Francisco streets is dumb.
I'm a conservative who's lived overseas, traveled all over the world, etc so I thought I'd weigh in. Soccer is hot, or at least relatively so, or Ann wouldn't be writing about it and getting so much attention for doing so. And yes, she is mostly joking and trying to get a rise out of liberals who think anything from Europe is wonderful and can "follow" a sport by watching 5 or 6 games every four years and go on and on about how great it is.
Bottom line - you should like what you want to like and not worry about what other people - liberal or conservative - think of you.
However as someone who has watched a few world cup games in their life, I do agree with many of Ann's points about the game - it is getting pretty close to unwatchable. The low scores, the penalty shootouts, the bad calls, the "dives", etc all combine to remove any assurance that the better team went home with the victory. FIFA really needs to overhaul the game. But I find a lot of other "traditional" sports (baseball) really boring too. I really only get excited about the Olympics nowadays.
--The Arcadian
Why do you have a right to park on the street?
Because the streets are public space.
"Because the streets are public space."
Again, why does that give you a right to store your private vehicle in this public space?
Because it's public space.
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