Hello again:
Since it seems like I can't get anyone to read my diaries when I am serious (see my formal epistles on President Bush) I thought that I would return to my natural silliness.
The Democratic Party, and progressives as a whole have a long, and at times, sad history of supporting long shots, losers, and hopeless causes. Sometimes we succeed. All too often, we fail. Nonetheless, we always pick ourselves up and soldier on. So, too, the subject of the diary tonight, a group which has had glimpses of glory, only to have them snatched away by malign fate.
Now, you must be thinking to yourself, "That silly Glaze is going to ask us to root for the Cubs once they make the playoffs, because they are cute and cuddly and their best pitcher is borderline insane."
HAH!
No way, Hosea. Although I hail from the great state of Illinois, the state that has given us Barack Obama, Hillary Rodham (before she married good old Bill), Jason Isringhausen, and Abraham Lincoln, I would sooner slam my happy bits in a sliding glass door before I encouraged you to root for the Cubs, who are the epitome of corporate-owned incompetence. A victory for them is a victory for Corporate America (the Cubs are owned by the rightist Tribune Co) and for all that is wrong with this country. I am a Cardinal fan (the fact that the Cardinals are also owned by reactionary whack-jobs is something that will not be mentioned in this diary).
Nope, the stakes are much higher. In this case, a long-downtrodden group has a chance to return to the glory which should rightly be theirs, but which, inevitably, will be snatched from their grasp by the vicissitudes of nature, their own mortality, and the fact that their foes are evil, bloodsucking wretches.
University of Illinois football.
The Fighting Illini are now 2-1, with wins over Western Illinois (not a Division 1 school) and Syracuse (motto: "We're worse than Notre Dame.") Since 2 wins is usually a full season's worth for the plucky lads from Urbana-Champaign, the fan base is going wacko and thinks that they might defy history and win a few Big 10 games this year.
Combined record in the Big Ten, 2003-2006? 2-30.
But let's not facts and history stand in our way (It never has for W), and let me encourage you to take off the orange of Daily Kos, especially if you are an attrractive female between the age of consent and the age of death, and put on the orange and blue (blue state, right?) of the good old U of I. Remember that the school motto is "Learning and Labor", and what progressive couldn't get behind that?
Besides, we play Indiana tomorrow, a nasty state full of hooligans who vote Republican and wear red.
Oskee-wow-wow!
Glaze72