Category Archives: Sports

Bullshit Jobs

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This story article was linked on Marginal Revolution. In the comments, a fellow named Bill points out that rent-seeking inevitably leads to worthless occupations. The source story is one of those snarky rants that have become popular with Millennials. They like that blend of pointless irony and dismissive disgust with reality. It seems like a strange affectation, as it implies a combination of naivete, obliviousness and solipsism. Of course, there is the strong possibility that millennials are in fact naive, dumb and solipsistic.

Economists will naturally reject the the assertion that there are “bullshit” jobs, because it lies outside their belief set. No profession is controlled by its tools like economics and since they have not tools to measure culture or biology, those things are left out of their models. That’s a story for another day. The important bit is that even in the private sector, loads of worthless jobs are created because they favor the state. Or, those jobs exist because they favor some cultural push by the state, like diversity training, for example.

One place you see this is in sports entertainment. In the days before cable, the sideline reporter did not exist. The reason is two-fold. One is women don’t know much about sports and therefore were not in the sports business. The other reason is no one would pay to have these bunnies on the field. The money was not there to do it.The job of sideline reporter is not a lot different than that of cheerleader. They pretend it is a real job, but it’s not. The girls come and go, because they are just not that important.

Government created cable monopolies have changed all that. ESPN can tax 100 million homes through their cable bill, which they do for about $8 a month. According to people who track this stuff, ESPN is watched by 20% of cable homes. That means the other 80 million homes are paying $80 bucks a year so ESPN can hire T&A to strut along the sidelines. ESPN is a great marketing machine, but it is mostly a rent-seeker. It spends a portion of its $9 billion in revenue bribing politicians and cable operators.

There is nothing new about rent-seeking. Government is the monopoly of force in a society, which means they can force people to do stuff and not do stuff. In a democracy, bribing elected officials so they will force people to do stuff that favors your business, is as old as democracy itself. Ben Franklin was a rent seeker. he got government contracts for printing and he got them by buttering up government officials. That’s how it works.

Franklin is a good example of how rent seeking can have unintended consequences down stream from the event itself. Franklin was a printer. His government contracts did not keep his presses running full time, so he he used the excess time to print fliers, newspapers and almanacs. In a way, government contracts underwrote the birth of the newspaper business in the colonies. Sports oligopolies and cable oligopolies are rent seekers that are altering the very nature of media, as a consequence of their rent seeking.

Put another way, rent seeking creates make work. Economics can understand the first part, but they struggle to understand the second part. they certainly don’t grasp the cultural impact of the second part. The legions of people in make work jobs want to keep those make work jobs. The employees of government contractors, for example, are the most effective lobbyists for more government. Northern Virginia, the home of government employees, media and political operators, is a billion dollar lobbying machine now.

Anyway, here is one of my all time favorite bits on the bullshit job theme.

Getting It Wrong

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The Left hates baseball, mostly because it is the one sport that has resisted the cultural nonsense we see in other sports. Blacks don’t dominate and there is little opportunity for them to showboat. That vexes the Left greatly. It’s also the sport with the highest percentage of old stock owners and front office people. Throw in the fact it has thrived, despite not being a TV friendly sport and its existence seems like an affront to the ruling orthodoxy. Therefore, the Left is always agitating to change the sport in order to ruin it.

A fine example of this is Major League Baseball’s decision to implement replay next year. There’s no need for this. Umpires certainly make mistakes and those mistakes alter the outcome of games. No one has ever been able to make the case that the overall results of the season have ever been altered by umpire mistakes. If I have to make ten decisions to save my life, one mistake kills me. If I have to make a million decisions and each one may shorten my lifespan by five minutes, any one call is meaningless to me.

That’s the case in baseball where each game features hundreds of small decisions by umpires. According to people who claim to have studied it, they get it right 90% of the time. That does not count the five hundred decisions on balls and strikes. Given that no one can come up with an example of a mistake costing a game, which then altered the outcome of the season, a big portion of the 10% in question either is self-canceling or irrelevant. That and the mistakes often cancel one another out even in the course of games.

There’s nothing to be gained by adding instant replay. There’s also the fact that the games are long enough now. In fact, they are too long. When I was a kid, games last about 2.5 hours, with games often coming it under two hours. Today, games last three hours and in the post-season, they last four hours. That’s too long. Adding another reason to slow the flow of the game just means the games will drag out even longer. Frankly, if you wanted to ruin the game, making the games longer is what you would seek to do.

Frankly, I’ve never understood the fetish to turn sports into battles between teams of robots executing code. No one pays to see an ATM machine perform tasks. Put two chess playing computers on TV and no one watches. People want to see humans make mistakes. That’s the point of sports. The guy who overcomes a bad call to win is a hero, while the guy who lets a bad call ruin his focus is a loser. In baseball, arguing with umps is a part of what makes the game fun. A baseball game is not heart surgery.

There’s an error rate that is acceptable and for 100 years the game has existed within that error rate. The people obsessed “with getting it right” don’t get the point of the game. These are people who have become convinced that making columns in a spreadsheet happy is the point of life. Culture is about celebrating what makes us human. Sport is popular because it reenacts the ups and downs of life. It also features the conflict of men, but in a format in which no one dies in the combat. Replay advocates don’t get that.

The R Word

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The evidence that Progressivism is a cult is all around us. The main bit of evidence is how they engage in the most blatant of group think. In the clip below the nation’s second most famous lesbian thinks she is being clever by refusing to say the name of the football team at the heart of this terrible scandal. Of course, She has no idea why her cult is angry at the sports team. My bet is she has never seen a football game. She just hears the other loons howling about the team, so she starts howling so she can be part of the group.

Maddow, of course, is obviously struggling with mental illness. The disjointed mannerism, the inappropriate facial expressions and odd smirking are familiar to anyone who has been around people using heavy duty psychiatric drugs. Medication can make them functional, but they are never normal. She has discussed this in interviews, but I suspect she struggles to keep it together every day. Watch the clip and then imagine such a person working in your office. You would assume she is seeing a shrink every week.

http://youtu.be/DAs1-NAfDJI

Of course, this is an example of Munchausen syndrome by proxy, which is a mental disorder where a person pretend another is ill, so they can care for them. The other version is where the caregiver is actually making the person sick, so they can then care for them. A fireman who starts fires so he can be the heroic guy putting out the fires is another variation of this. In the case of childless lesbians like Rachel Maddow, they find victim groups to champion, so they can feel needed. Same idea, different victims.

That is the thing you see with Progressives now. They no longer deal in the practical, like economics, or even the temporal, like real people. Instead, they invent victims and then conjure ghostly causes like racism and privilege. The goblin that haunts the minds of Progressive women is always the heterosexual white man, so they imagine what evil white man must hate and then invent a victim group. From there it is search for proof, like the hunt for ancient aliens or Sasquatch. Here we have imaginary bigots and fake Indians.

Sometimes a Banana is Just a Banana

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The race hoax is becoming something of a trope these days. Usually it is the alleged victim who is behind the hoax. Sometimes it is the alleged victim simply interpreting a normal event as a racial assault, just to get attention. This looks like an example of the latter. In fairness, he could really believe he was the victim of a racist taunt, but most likely he is just doing what all blacks are trained to do these days and that is cry racism. it is not a matter of conditioning, as much as a part of their identity as former slaves.

Cameras cover every inch of a modern ballpark including the stands, concessions, gangways and bathrooms. If it did happen, they will quickly find video of it and locate the monster who did it. I watch a lot of baseball and the announcers always mention when something is thrown on the field. The fact that this player is currently the only witness makes me suspicious. The desire for victim point is so overpowering now, even black millionaires cook up scenarios where they are victims of down scale whites.

At some point, ESPN will hold a town hall meeting on this so we can get lectured by them on banana etiquette. That’s one reason for the escalation in hate hoaxes. The Progressive media is so thirsty for these tales, they never stop to ask any questions. Of course, the demographics of the media make them especially receptive to anything that casts whites as immoral. The resulting pattern is a claim is made, it accepted on face value, then a long lecture from our betters and finally the truth is revealed and the whole thing is forgotten.

Putting my skepticism aside, there is something else going on here. The player is on social media looking for people to agree with him and tell him he is a good guy. It would appear some have decided he is a pansy who has over reacted. Others think he is mistaken. Some just think he needs to toughen up. His reaction to that is to threaten to leave social media. We now have black snowflakes, who fall to pieces whenever anyone tries to hold them to civilized standards of behavior. That seems to be an issue here.

The thing is, if it did happen the person who did it probably just happened to have a banana and chucked it on the field. This is San Francisco for goodness sakes. Anyone who has been to that park knows the stands are full of hipsters eating healthy. To an east coast guy used to grimy ballparks like Fenway, the first trip to San Fran was weird and unsettling. People bring their damned dogs to the park. The fan threw the banana because he was not done with his soy latte or his arugula salad.

Update:  Looks like I was mostly right. It had nothing to do with race. Jones is free to place that chip back on his shoulder and continue his hunt for the great white devil.

Why American Media Is Dying

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This story is a great example of what is wrong with the American media. First off, everyone knows that autograph brokers are grifters. They operate on the same moral plane as drug dealers and pimps. You just assume they are lying. Now, let’s assume ESPN does not know this going into the story. When the dirt bag tries to sell them the video, that should be the point when the reporter and editor realize they are dealing with a person who lies a lot.The fact it was done secretly makes this undeniably obvious.

Now, the press reports on shady characters every day so that’s not a big deal. What is a big deal is they decide to partner with the low-life by helping keep his identity concealed, so he can scam future athletes. By keeping his identity concealed, that’s what they are doing. If this guy’s name gets out, no one will deal with him. ESPN is helping him by keeping him anonymous. In the law, this is called accessory. ESPN is not directly robbing athletes, but they are facilitating it by helping this guy stay anonymous.

There’s another issue here. Why is ESPN making an issue of this? No one gives a crap what this kid is doing to make side money. The NCAA may care, but that’s their business at this point. of course, ESPN would never do this with the black athletes. They move heaven and earth to excuse the bad behavior. If this was a black kid, the story would be about how he is being exploited by the evil whites. Everything the media does is tailored to fit the anti-white narrative,m because the people running the media hate white people.

Putting aside the anti-white agenda, the problem with the media is they have an adversarial relationship with their alleged customers. Instead of challenging the people in charge on behalf of their readers, the media thinks they need to challenge their readers on behalf of the people in charge. In time, someone is going to figure out that attacking the media is a win-win scenario and that’s when the public turns on the press. Politicians sort of know it, but they never take it all the way. One day, some will figure it out.

Riley Cooper

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The root of the word culture is “cult.” Modern people hear the word cult and think of nuts living in a compound somewhere, waiting for the aliens to arrive. If you are old enough, you may recall Jim Jones and his wacky escapades in Guyana. We never think of our culture or customs as anything like a cult, but every society has their beliefs, customs and taboos. More important, every society has its rewards and consequences for either exulting the prevailing beliefs or violating one of the taboos. It’s what makes up culture.

Therefore, every society has its morality police who roam around testing private virtue in public ways. Paula Deen was sent off to internal banishment for being honest about dropping a now forbidden word in the before times. Travon Martin was sainted for confirming an article of faith about America, held by the people in charge. That is, white people secretly wish to kill black bodies. The morality police use these sorts of examples to both crush the wrong thinkers and warn the righteous of the consequences of sin.

Now we have Riley Cooper, a stupid redneck who was caught dropping the magic word at a country show. At this moment, his career as a professional football player is close to being over simply because he holds views that are different from the ruling cult. The pressure on the Philadelphia Eagles to cut him will be high. If he is cut, no team will sign him, fearing a visit from the morality police. It is OK to sign a murderer or rapist. Those are just crimes against people. Signing a racist would be a crime against the gods.

The same people snuggling up with a picture of MLK every night are now claiming Riley Cooper must be punished because he is white. In other words, it’s not about racism, as a universal concept. It is about hating white people as a sign of virtue. In this case, a white guy using the word “nigger” is bad because he is white, not because using the word “nigger” is always bad.  One day soon, whites will be forced to use separate drinking fountains and have to ride in the back of the bus, just like a , well, you get the point.

Civic religions operate on fear. In cases like this, it is the fear that people will notice the nutty contradictions. Cooper is not working math puzzles in his free time. He is a dumb jock, but he sees the double standard every day. His teammates call one another “nigger” all the time and it is considered cool. In other words, he foolish decision to get tanked up and start yelling “nigger” is not a problem because he said a bad word. it is a problem because it underscores this obvious double standard. He must be punished.

In the name of racial tranquility, they are now demanding that the black players denounce their teammate. It is not enough to hang the scarlet “N” on the white guy, they have to dictate the thoughts of the black guys too. A cynic would say our rulers like it when we are trying to kill one another. That implies a logical intent. The more likely answer is it is simple zealotry. They have been trained to yell at the white racist and defend the back victim. If the black guys don’t join in they must suffering from the effects of institutional racism.

The best part of this, the part that should lead one to think there is not only a God, but he has a wicked sense of humor, is the presence of Michael Vick. This is the guy who was found to be torturing animals for pleasure. He would drown puppies in buckets of water and electrocute them. If he really needed to get off, he would hang them from trees. By any reasonable standard, Michael Vick is a demented and dangerous lunatic. News actors are running to him for his opinion about the monster that is Riley Cooper.

This is all madness and it will end poorly. Humans are designed to be suspicious of and antagonistic toward those not like them. We evolved in small groups and suspicion of outsiders was always an evolutionary advantage. In the case of disputes over precious resources, tribal hatred rising to the level of religious faith. In a modern, multi-ethnic society such as ours, a certain amount of friction is natural. Deliberately exacerbating it is a good way to get a civil war, but the social justice warriors probably want that.

The Drawbridge Effect

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The drawbridge effect is a phenomenon often noted by bad thinkers. That’s where a group of over-class types gentrify a formerly beaten down area. Once it gets going, they begin to raise the drawbridge to keep out the hoi polloi. That usually means jacking up property taxes, layering on building regulations and limiting development. The city of Cambridge Massachusetts is a good example. Try building a house or building an apartment building in that city and you will be met with waves of regulators and community activists.

That’s why the population of Cambridge Mass is lower than it was in 1950.

We may be seeing something similar in the world of college sports. This story shows how it works. In this case, the big five conferences have hoovered up all of the good properties. They have left the undesirable properties in what they call the mid-major conferences. All of the conference commissioners have indicated two things. One is they are no longer interested in adding teams. The other thing is they now want special rules for themselves. They are, after all, the elite and being elite means not abiding by the rules

In America these days, there is one set of laws for the prols and another set for the people in charge. As we see in college sports, the people at the top lock in place a set of rules that give them the bulk of social benefits. Those same rules will spread the costs onto everyone else and make it impossible for the prols to compete. The drawbridge is the set of rules and regulations promulgated by the people in charge. Throughout America, the sound you hear is the raising of the drawbridge. What matters is which side you’re on.

Roid Rage

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Baseball is getting around to penalizing players in the last round of PED troubles. The Biogenesis scandal promises to take down 20 players using old lab records. Baseball seems determined to use this case to make an example of some guys. Banning players for 90 games is a big penalty and puts the player at risk of a permanent ban. Braun is a confirmed liar and now he has two strikes against him. Another pinch and he is gone for good. That’s the theory anyway. We’ll see if it actually happens.

The great error baseball made was agreeing to a bunch of rules and procedures that invite the lawyers into the room. They want this stuff out of the game for a some very good reasons. The press may claim fans don’t care, but the press is full of idiots. The home run blitz we saw in the last decade was getting ridiculous and would have undermined the game. Plus, someone was going to have a stroke or get seriously injured. Former players would be in TV boo-hooing about how they wrecked their bodies for those evil owners.

The way to do it was not an overly complicated process negotiated with the union. The first step was to ban all of the names in the Mitchell Report for life. Following the example of gambling 100 years ago, would most likely make cases like the one we see today unnecessary. Banning the players they knew cheated and were named in the report would have sent the same message Kenesaw Mountain Landis sent to baseball when he banned the Black Sox players for life. That would put an end to this for even the dumbest players.

Death of Cable

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One of the things I think will be very interesting to watch over the next decade is the breakup of the cable monopolies. By that I mean the end of forced subsidies through the cable bill. I doubt we ever see multiple cable outfits servicing the same area. What we wil see in most areas is at least one satellite operator, a cable provider, a fiber company and a wireless company offering combinations of voice and data. TV will be offered as a part of the data package as just another internet service. Consumers will shop the providers based on their needs. Metered service will become common.

As is always the case, some areas will have several choices, while others have one or two options. A big city like New York will not have DirecTV, but Boise Idaho will not have fiber or cellular. More important, the content  will be unbundled from the pipe. Instead of paying Comcast $120 a month for TV and Internet, you will pay Comcast $50 a month and buy the content you  want from a broker or the originator.

The content providers are fighting this hammer and tong. The reason is they are currently making hundreds of billions from people who don’t want their product. Take a look at ESPN. They make $9 billion a year in revenue. Two thirds of that is from subscriber fees. Most estimates say that roughly 20% of households watch ESPN. Yet, 100% pay $8/mo to ESPN as it is part of the basic cable package. As soon as those folks get the chance to cut their bill by $70 a year, they will take it.  This Atlantic story goes into the details.

Of course, those billions coming out of cable bills into the channel operators like ESPN, Yes, NESN and FoxSportsNet will force them to change their business models. They will recoup some through other means like higher fees, but most of it will come through downsizing. Part of it means lower fees content suppliers, like sports leagues and syndication companies. It also means smaller players will have great access to customer and thus create alternative media. Live streaming will be the next big thing.

Olberman’s Nine Lives

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The news brings word that foaming at the mouth lunatic Keith Olbermann has been hired by ESPN. They plan to stick him on late night and promise he will not talk about politics. I guess we are supposed to believe that no one else could possibly fill that time slot so they had to hire a screaming fanatic to do it. That’s what Olbermann is and that’s what he will be in his new gig, a screaming fanatic in the mold of Father Coughlin. That’s probably unfair to fans of Coughlin, as they never passed themselves off as intellectuals.

Olbermann walks around thinking he is a genius level IQ when he is probably just about average for the population. That’s because like all fanatics, he conflates morality with reason. This has always been a feature of the Left. They see themselves as the anointed and anyone who does not see that must be stupid or evil. That gives them license to celebrate their brilliance and do anything they like against their opponents. The fanatic has no limits on his virtue or his vengeance. That’s why Olberman is a nut.

Regardless, it is emblematic of what has gone wrong in America. This idiot keeps getting high paying gigs, despite being a stupid dickhead that everyone seems to hate. Failing up seems to be the way the over-class operates. The more you screw up, the higher you climb. It is only in the wretched world of reality do we see a connection between performance and remuneration. Get fired from a few sales jobs for being an asshole and you end up working the drive through. Screw up in politics or the media and you get rich.