Predictions

Welcome once again to my favorite weekly post, Always Bet with Black. And, as per usually, we kick things off with a picture from Britty.

"happy will kill you", by Britty

Ah. She's her brother's sister ain't she?

Anyhoo, for reasons known only to him, instead of the old format, young dits has decided to pick all of the bodog.com games. He insists that this will make it easier for you, the reader and consumer.

What he's doing is that he's showing you the spreads they have (pretty much the initial ones) and what he's betting on, using a gambling term known as "units". The units, typically, will vary week to week. But it's basically a confidence rating. That's really all you need to know.

We'll keep track of both his actual money picks and his total picks. Possibly even picks by conference.

Also: we have no idea if Random Numbers is coming back this year, because of the Dutchman being busy with actual things. But we do know that Rabbit Day will be back.

Because it is awesome.

Picks below the jump?

The village chief of Khuan Kong, Thailand would humbly request whom it may concern to cease the dumping of dead bodies on his rubber plantation, foretold or otherwise...and also garbage.

After Obama and his team ran a campaign that made Swiss Clockwork look like a '78 Pinto and made the U.S. Marine Corps. look like a bunch of undisciplined hooligans, everybody expected pretty much the same from the transition. And then came Richardson and his pay to play. HRC and Bubba's international influence-peddling. Holder's involvement with the ridiculous pardons of Marc Rich and FALN. And the icing on the cake: Treasury Secretary-designee Tim Geithner's missing back-taxes, which is about as perfect a metaphor for Wall Street as I can imagine. My coworker commented that his vetting process must be seriously FUBAR, and I agreed.

But then I thought this morning as I was dodging the conspicuously armed cops and bomb-sniffing dogs on the metro (the next five days are going to be amazing here in the nation's capitol) that there's no way they could consistently screw up like this; that they could hit every note during the campaign and then fumble the political ball so badly once they won the election. With all the talk of Obama creating a pragmatic, competent, effective administration, maybe they didn't mess up - maybe they just don't care about the political game. Who cares about the Marc Rich pardon - maybe Holder is the best person for Attorney General, politics be damned.

At least that's what I'm praying: that his selections are pragmatic and post- (or maybe supra-) partisan, more about governing well than scoring political points. Because if they aren't, and his fuck-ups really are fuck-ups, then I'm afraid we're stuck with another president whose brilliant campaigning won't lead to brilliant governing.

~

What are we hoping for exactly? I'm a cynic at heart, so I can see why sane people would worry about the Obama Phenomenon. And every one of us should have to answer this question. It's inspiring to hear that this election is about "the past versus the future." That "we are the change we have been waiting for." It's easy to wade into a crowd of your own generation, 100,000 strong, chanting happy generalities. But this doesn't have a great track record over the last 400 years. It usually leads to policies that are stupid, followed by death. And Committees.

That's why I gave a snarky toast last night. Warthog and I were drinking our liberal microbrews in our costal sports bar. The Sabres had just spanked a great team on the road. Our Man is about to lead our party into every house of government, tossing out the cruel legacies of the old farts before us. The toast I got the bar into was "Barack Obama! Tomorrow belongs to us!" Because I'm a dick.

~

Not speaking of myself or anyone else here: do you know what the big problem is with this line of attack?

The same problem there is with this one.

IT'S BEING MADE IN AMERICA.

The last place to talk about reflexive devotion to the family you were born with, the town you grew up in or the person you're expected to marry, for the love of your scowling ancestors.

We're restless. We're ornery progress junkies. And for every "Small Town," there are the entire careers of Bruce Springsteen, Bob Seager and everyone else who couldn't wait to get out, change names, and define their own weird lives. Many of us do, and the rest reserve the right.

So when you preach reflexive debt to anyone with your last name, and stay-local-die-local canton loyalty, you're preaching to another country.

S'why the wench is dead.

The one concrete thing I learned?

The Spirit is going to suck.

Suuuuuuuuuuuuck.

~

To tonight's debate.

"Ooh, I'm not sure I would have mentioned Delaware in that context."

...

I actualy don't think Obama cleaned up as much as the networks are saying. Especially early on, he stumbled with the format. And his Detailed answers ended up Unfocused As Hell more than once.

But as with every previous debate, time was kind to the dems. McCain and Palin have both been coached to stick to key phrases, and it shows. The "wall street corruption" and "main st." and "surrender" memes sound retarded, literally retarded, the 7th time you hear them in one debate. By the end you realized they were so worried about going off message, they weren't even pretending to think of answers to individual questions. That's insulting, when you've been forced to listen to it.

McCain's been selling the next month to pay for the week in front of him. For a while now. If no one takes Palin's cue to shoot Obama, I think he's lost this thing.

And if they do, who the hell wants to win?

Another stellar pick from the Random Number generator.  With no "off" games on the board this week, it can't do too badly. But I'd like to point out that it picked PSU, OSU, and Michigan. I gotta respect an algorithm based on atmospheric noise that picks the hometown favorites.  And that also has a soft spot in its digital heart for hating on Minnesota. Despite its successes in the last two weeks, the RNG played it safe this week and predicted that the enimitable ditriech. Full predictions after the jump.

Since I've been busy with the election and wishing I had the money to drink some Green Label today, I never got to the games of the First Round. Ah well:

1) Detroit did not choke as badly as they could have, and neither did San Jose.

2) DC found their identity as a young, inspiring team who bring their fans ticklishy close to success and then drop them to the ground, crying.

Take a seat Washington. Take a seat for ten years, and we'll talk.

Ahem.

Ok, so technically it doesn't. Who cares.

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The Heisman trophy is given out tonight. The Finalists are: Colt Brennan, Chase Daniel, Darren McFadden and Tim Tebow. All logic points to Tim Tebow winning, being the first Offensive Lineman/Running Back/Quarterback/Sophomore/Deity to do so.

I'm hoping that its Chase Daniel. Just to fuck with everyone.