Do The Hustle aka The MS Maven Oscar Nomination Predix Extravaganza 2013

To paraphrase Screenwriter William Goldman, nobody knows anything, especially when it comes to Oscars. And I have to admit I miss the days when social media didn't exist and you guessed the how Academy voters would go. Now it's constant bombardment, which is just overkill. Put this way: I've probably seen more Oscar-bait than the voting academy.

Here are some basics before my predix:

1--Cate Blanchett is a lock to win Best Actress. Anything else is unacceptable.

2--Jared Leto is a lock to win Best Supporting Actor.

3--This Oscar Season is a tad longer than usual. Thank the Olympics for that one. Will be interesting to see the trends as a result.

4--Actor is the toughest category of the lot in terms of noms  and the winner I've seen in years; it's usually Actress that is loaded. For the fifth spot, I'm hoping Christian Bale, predicting Joaquin Phoenix, but will probably be Leo.

5--The surprise I predict is that Bruce Dern is not nominated and that Sally Hawkins is.

6--David O. Russell better get some Academy love come March 2nd.

7--Editor Thelma Schoonmaker deserves a Purple Heart for Wolf.

8--Gravity is still the most overrated film of the year...

9--...and Prisoners is the most underrated.

10--I don't know shit, either, despite now having seen most the possible nominees...



Enough w/ the preamble. On with the show:

Best Picture
12 Years a Slave
American Hustle
Gravity
Captain Phillips
Dallas Buyers Club
The Wolf of Wall Street
Nebraska
Her
---
Saving Mr. Banks
Philomena

Best Director
Steve McQueen
David O. Russell
Alfonso Cauron
Paul Greengrass
Spike Jonze
---
Martin Scorsese
Alexander Payne
Joel and Ethan Coen

Best Actor
Chiwetel Ejofor
Matthew McConaughey
Tom Hanks
Bruce Dern
Joaquin Phoenix (hey, he finally smiles!)
---
Christian Bale
Leonardo DiCaprio
Robert Redford

Best Actress
Cate Blanchett
Sandra Bullock
Emma Thompson
Judi Dench
Amy Adams
---
Meryl Streep
Julia Louis-Dreyfus
Greta Gerwig

Best Supporting Actor
Jared Leto
Michael Fassbender
Barkhad Abdi
Bradley Cooper
Daniel Bruhl
---
James Gandolfini
Jonah Hill
Tom Hanks

Best Supporting Actress
Jennifer Lawrence
Lupita Nyong'o
June Squibb
Julia Roberts
Sally Hawkins
---
Oprah Winfrey
Octavia Spencer
Sarah Paulson

Best Original Screenplay
American Hustle
Blue Jasmine
Her
Nebraska
Dallas Buyers Club
---
Inside Llewyn Davis
Enough Said
Saving Mr. Banks

Best Adapted Screenplay
12 Years a Slave
Before Midnight
Captain Phillips
The Wolf of Wall Street
August: Osage County
---
Philomena
Lone Survivor
The Great Gatsby

Best Cinematography
Gravity
12 Years a Slave
Captain Phillips
Inside Llewyn Davis
Prisoners
---
Nebraska
Rush
Her

Best Editing
Gravity
12 Years a Slave
American Hustle
Captain Phillips
The Wolf of Wall Street
---
Rush
Dallas Buyers Club
World War Z

Best Production Design
The Great Gatsby
American Hustle
12 Years a Slave
Gravity
The Hobbit
---
Her
Saving Mr. Banks
Oz The Great and Powerful

Best Costume Design
American Hustle
The Great Gatsby
12 Years a Slave
The Invisible Woman
Oz the Great and Powerful
---
Saving Mr. Banks
The Hunger Games
The Wolf of Wall Street

Best Sound Editing
Gravity
Captain Phillips
Rush
All is Lost
12 Years a Slave
---
World War Z
Pacific Rim
Her

Best Sound Mixing
Gravity
All is Lost
Rush
Captain Phillips
Inside Llewyn Davis
---
12 Years a Slave
Frozen
Her

Best Visual Effects
Gravity
Pacific Rim
Elysium
---
The Hobbit
World War Z

Best Makeup
American Hustle
Dallas Buyers Club
Bad Grandpa
---
The Great Gatsby

Nominations

 

12 Years a Slave          10

Gravity                            9

American Hustle             8

Captain Phillips               7

Nebraska                        5

Dallas Buyers Club         4

The Wolf of Wall Street  4

Philomena                      3

Her                                 3

 

My work is done here and 8:37am comes pretty early. The Maven will snap-to then. Happy Oscar!







"Argo Fuck Yourself Still?": The MS Maven's Fearless Oscar Predix

Now is the time of year in which there is a nip of spring in the air, March Madness is a few weeks away, and The Maven is hoping Jim Buss or Mike D'Antoni don't sink the Lakers playoff chances. March Madness is a few weeks away and the Ohio State/Michigan game is several months away, but these two events fall behind in line to the granddaddy of all Maven High-Holy Days: The Academy Awards!

Most people watch for train wrecks on the Red Carpet and the show itself, and there will be several, along with some drag races (listening race fans?). I'm the geek who lives for the politics of the nominations, voting, and winners. Yes, politics is never far away in the Maven's line of thinking.

With that said, here are my fearless (and maybe even foolish) predictions. The following picks, along with their upset for each category (and I think there may be a couple but more on that in a minute), so here goes:

Best Picture: Argo
upset: Silver Linings Playbook

Best Director: Steven Spielberg
upset: David O. Russell

Best Actor: Daniel Day-Lewis
upset: Bradley Cooper

Best Actress: Jennifer Lawrence
upset: Emmanuelle Riva

Best Supporting Actor: Robert DeNiro
upset: Tommy Lee Jones

Best Supporting Actress: Anne Hathaway
upset: Sally Field

Best Original Screenplay: Zero Dark Thirty
upset: Django Unchained (the D is silent)

Best Adapted Screenplay: Silver Linings Playbook
upset: Argo

Best Animated Feature: Wreck-It Ralph
upset: The Pirates!

Best Foreign-Language Film: Amour
upset: Kon-Tiki

Best Original Score: Life of Pi
upset: Lincoln

Best Original Song: "Skyfall"
upset: "Everybody Needs a Best Friend"

Best Cinematography: Life of Pi
upset: Skyfall (will Roger Deakins finally win?)

Best Editing: Argo
upset: Silver Linings Playbook

Best Art Direction: Les Miserables
upset: Life of Pi

Best Costume Design: Anna Karenina
upset: Les Miserables

Best Sound Mixing: Les Miserables
upset: Argo

Best Sound Editing: Zero Dark Thirty
upset: Argo

Best Visual Effects: Life of Pi
upset: The Hobbit

Best Makeup: Les Miserables
upset: The Hobbit

Best Documentary Feature: Searching for Sugar Man
upset: The Gatekeepers (if Jews are involved, they always win)

Best Documentary Short Subject: Monday's at Racine
upset: Inocente

Best Live-Action Short: Asad
upset: Death of a Shadow

Best Animated Short: Paperman
upset: Adam and Dog

The Wins

(Note: Win totals won't necessarily match my predix)

 

 

Argo                                     4

Lincoln                                 3

Zero Dark Thirty                  2

Silver Linings Playbook       3

Les Miserables                    3

Life of Pi                              3

Amour                                 1

 

There are several burning questons that have cropped up in this last week building to the big show. Let me try to cut through the media mania:

 

1--Is it possible we'll have two actors to win three Oscars tonight? I hope so but would prefer Washington and DeNiro rather than Day-Lewis. The latter's was his weakest performance in his career (you gonna say he's better in it than There Will Be Blood? Didn't think so. It's a good performance but I don't think Lincoln will be remembered in 20 years. Do you remember Slumdog Millionaire or The Artist? Didn't think so. Don't hate Lincoln, like it, dig the politics in it, but there are too many glaring historical errors (don't even say one word about Argo and Canada; To switch the states who voted from IL to CT is pretty egregious), and there have been a ton of articles this past week about historical accuracy. I fully understand elements have to be dramatized to make it a film but still. And for the record, I don't think Field will make it a three x three night. They already liked here, really, really liked her twice.

 

2--Never underestimate the power of Harvey Weinstein. His well-oiled machine keeps working like a whore on a streetcorner, and this year he's going all-in on Silver Linings Playbook moreso than Django Unchained (the D is silent), and this is a good bet (I'm still lukewarm about Django, but Christoph Waltz is the best thing in the film). And deservedly going all-in because this is an important film ("a message film" as they say in the media?) about how we deal with mental illness. Harvey hit it hard while the ballots were out, w/ most the cast appearing on about every show except a guest appearance on NCIS. I just hope David O. Russell wins either Director or Adapted Screenplay, for he's been around forever, well respected, and made this film because his son has suffered from mental illness. (Sidebar: the late, great Anthony Minghella and Sydney Pollack were going to make the film until their untimely demises. I think they would have done swell, too). I think Lawrence and DeNiro will be it's Oscars. If the film wins Editing, lookout! And it deserves this as well, although I think Argo will win this and it richly deserve it. I'm not much for musical interludes in films per they are usually space-filler, but the dance sequence is the best I've seen since the one in Summer of Sam, for a lot you need to know about the characters are in the dance, and it's quite moving, actually (yes, The Maven has a heart, sometimes). I'll leave it with this observation: If Harvey can help The Artist win, well...

 

3--Speaking of shifts, is anyone buying that Emmanuelle Riva will upset for Best Actress? She does deserve it, and like I mentioned before, any one of the five nominees in this category and Supporting Actor could win and I wouldn't be upset (still want Lawrence to win and my vote in Supporting Actor would go to Philip Seymour Hoffman for the peformance of his career; his last scene in the film blew me away in a way I didn't expect. It's a peformance not unlike Robert Duvall in The Apostle or Christian Bale in The Fighter, where something snapped loose that allowed the actors to show elements of themselves which kicked things up a notch. Do want DeNiro to win per his best performance since Raging Bull, the best peformance I've seen, male or female). Some are bringing up the old argument I've not heard in years, that a Riva win would be a career-capping Oscar. I hate those per award the peformance, not the career. She's great, she deserves it. But not sure. So it begs the question: Is Best Actress the new upset catergory, especially after last year's win by Streep (she was good, The Iron Lady so bad it almost ruined her performance. And I'll go to my grave insisting Viola Davis should have won, but let's not go there, I'm having a good day...). I hope not.

 

4--Nobody has seen Life of Pi so how will it win Director?

 

5--Still not seen Les Miserables. Plan on it, and despite my love for Russell Crowe, Anne Hathaway, and Hugh Jackman, I'm still trying to get enough beer together to watch the Academy screener...

 

6--Seth MacFarlane should be fun. If he's as snarky as he was when he announced the nominations, hardballs should be thrown, and that's what I'm hoping for. It should be Billy Crystal till he drops, and why the hell did he disappear in the second half of the show last year? Why even have a host then? I hope they don't do this to Seth baby.

 

7--I think the show itself will be a train wreck. The focus is on musicals, the producers are new and don't seem to know what the hell they are doing. The Chicago reunion will be nice, but lots of alcohol will be consumed. Gil Cates will be rolling in his grave methinks...

 

8--Ultimately, the final burning question: Could Argo be upset for Picture? Yes it can but is unlikely. But then remember when The Pianist had the mini-sweep when no one expected it? Still wondering if this can happen this year as well. Keep in mind, those were the 2003 Oscars for 2002 films, and it's 10 years hence, so... Silver Linings Playbook anyone?

 

Enough already. I'll be posting on Facebook and Tweeting like crazy (@Franster23), and as usual I calls em as I sees em. This is the first year I've not had money on the awards in over a decade. I hope I'm not wrong in my predix but hope I am wrong for my personal favorites. Here's to hoping you survive the telecast.

 

Happy Oscars, y'all! And, of course, shalom...





The FU Oscars

We are in the midst of the movie awards season and on the eve of the Screen Actors Guild Awards, things have become rather interesting in the past couple of weeks. We've gone from a wide-open race for Best Picture to one that has turned this uncertain Season into the "Fuck You" Oscars. To wit:

1--Screenwriter William Goldman once said about Hollywood, "Nobody knows anything." Applying that logic, nobody can answer why Ben Affleck was robbed of a Best Director nod from the Academy. Was he just a few votes short? It's not because he's an actor, because we have five in the past 30 years who have won Director: Robert Redford (Marty Scorsese was robbed that year), Warren Beatty (deserved), Kevin Costner (um...), Mel Gibson (no comment from this Appalachian Jew), and Clint Eastwood (vastly underrated still). In fact, I've said Affleck is an underrated director and hold to it, even if he made Gigli...

2--Argo is on pace at this point to win Best Picture. It won the Golden Globe (they're flaky but still) and just wont the Producer's Guild Award last night; the past five years the film that won the PGA went on the win the Oscar.

I'm almost ready to call it, but not quite. Remember when everyone thought Brokeback Mountain was a cinch to win Picture? Yeah, thought so.

Now, just a few observations at this point. I am not making my Oscar predix just yet, for The Maven has to ponder some various possibilities. Here goes:

1--If Argo wins tonights SAG for Ensemble Cast, game over. If it does not, say Lincoln or Silver Linings Playbook (my favorite of the year next to Argo) wins, things get downright interesting.

2--The only Oscar category that is a lock at this point is Anne Hathaway in Les Miserables. It will be it's only Oscar. I love her, and by rights she should have won for Rachel Getting Married, but I have to go get a growler of beer before I can watch the film and see which one ends first.

3--The other three acting categories are wide open. For Actress and Supporting Actor, any of the five could win and I would be happy, especially for the former category; I can't remember a year in which every performance made for a great slate of nominees. With Quevenzhane Wallis in the mix, this make this category quite interesting. Can she win? I don't know. For Supporting Actor, my favorites are Allan Arkin and Tommy Lee Jones (if Jones wins, will that be Lincoln's Oscar?), but I'm clueless at this point who has the edge. Coming off the heels of Meryl Streep's win last year of her third Oscar, could this be the time for DeNiro's third? Just asking...

4--Dovetailing off that notion, according to my friend and attorney, Allen N. Swords, Esq., when Reds was up for all four acting categories, only Maureen Stapleton won Supporting Actress. I think if anyone wins, it will be Jennifer Lawrence, deservedly, Hunger Games be damned...

5--Look at what is hot at this moment and when the Oscar ballots are due. At the moment, Wallis, Sally Field (does the Academy still like her?), Jessica Chastain, the Playbook cast, and Affleck are working the media like nobody's business. Les Miz has lost steam fast. Lincoln isn't Spielberg's (nor Day-Lewis's; he's made up to look like Warren Beatty playing Lincoln) best film (seriously, nobody in the next 20 years will remember Lincoln; they will Argo for it's unique). Nobody has seen Life of Pi (thank god).

6--Wither Zero Dark Thirty? At this point I actually think the film won't win any Oscars (unless Chastain wins), in large part due to the political backlash, but it's faded quickly in light of the Argo surge. This, despite the Time cover story this week on Kathryn Bigelow (yes, she was robbed, for I think ZDT is a better film than The Hurt Locker, and I'm a huge fan of it).

Enough at this point. Showtime for the SAGs. Viva Argo and Silver Linings Playbook!

Obama's Song of the Open Road...

The debate that has emerged these past few days following the inauguration of President Barack Obama this week is one of frivolity over substance. About every media outlet from CNN to Entertainment Tonight has pondered whether Beyonce lip synced her performance of "The Star-Spangled Banner." And despite the wall-to-wall coverage, it seems no one has a definite answer nor details regarding this.

While most of America has been catfished on this matter, the media buried the lead--Obama's inaugural speech. Unlike in 2009, his address greatly emulated Walt Whitman because he spoke more specifically to a broader spectrum of America, a protean country of uncharted territory and untested waters.

In most instances America turns its lonely eyes to the President as a figurehead whom it feels will address all of their needs and answer all of its questions. But that is not the role of the President in a changing American landscape. As he writes in his column in today's New York Times entitled "Obama Reboot," Charles Blow says about Obama, "He is the embodiment of their discomfort. He is the manifestation of their fear. He represents a current and future America--more socially liberal, more ethnically diverse, more the offspring of unconventional families--than they can accept." The traditional old-boys style of politics is slowly dying off--literally and figuratively--and is being supplanted by a more diversified citizenship. In the general election, blacks, hispanics, women, and other non-white voters outpaced white male voters. This caught many off-guard, as America is turning a corner into an uncertain future for what it means to be an American.

That said, Obama specifically referenced those who have struggled to fight for their rights. After many have lived for several decades socially complacent, he utilized his speech as a call to arms, if you will, to Americans to become proactive citizens again, saying, Being true to our founding documents does not require us to agree on every contour of life; it does not mean we all define liberty in exactly the same way, or follow the same precise path to happiness. Progress does not compel us to settle centuries-long debates about the role of government for all time – but it does require us to act in our time.  He is asking Americans to accept one another's imperfections and embrace such differences. Not only does Whitman say, "Do I contradict myself?/Very well then I contradict myself," but Obama is telling us we do this every day of our lives, whether we realize it or not, socially, politically, and personally.

Ultimately, Obama is pushing back against our accepted sense of normalcy and in his progressive words he emulated Whitman when he proclaimed, "For now decisions are upon us, and we cannot afford delay. We cannot mistake absolutism for principle, or substitute spectacle for politics, or treat name-calling as reasoned debate. We must act, we must act knowing that our work will be imperfect." He is pushing back against the pervasive passivity that is all around us and telling us not to solely look to him for answers. As Whitman tells the reader in Section 2 of "Song of Myself,"You shall no longer take things at second and third hand, nor look through the eyes of the dead, nor feed on the spectre of books,/You shall not look through my eyes neither, nor take things from me,/You shall listen to all sides and filter them from your self." He also says in Section 46, "You are asking me questions, and I hear you,/I answer that I cannot answer, you must find out for yourself."

America's comfort zone is being challenged by a compassionate president whose life is the Whitmanesque embodiement of America: Hawaiian-born to a white American mother and a Kenyan father, raised in Kansas, Ivy-educated, adopted Chicago as his hometown, and lived a life serving citizens young and old, rich and poor, black and white as a professor and community organizer before delving into formal politics. If in this media-driven society it takes Beyonce to serve as a pop culture olive branch to motivate Americans out of their complacency, it ain't what Uncle Walt would imagine. But it's a start.

A coda: As he left the inaugural stage to attend the luncheon, he turned around to look out toward the Mall and the thousands of people still milling about, saying, "I want to take a look, one more time. I'm not going to see this again. This is a fitting metaphor for what Obama continues to represent, a wide-open vista of where we have been and where we hope to go in the future. The road goes on forever...

Happy Oscar Nomination Day! aka The 2012 MS Maven Oscar Predix Extravaganza

Folks, it's that time of year when the skies look like Central Ohio and it's cold as shit outside. Why, you ask? Because The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences have moved up their Oscar nominations by two weeks! The awards season now resembles a Chinese fire drill. And I thought all the shifting around was bad in college football!

Alas, Happy Oscar Nomination Day! This is The Maven's High Holy Day (next to Selection Sunday for March Madness, the Ohio State/Michigan game and the Clemson/South Carolina game). Not much of a preamble here, except to say I hope Amour, The Beasts of the Southern Wild, Silver Linings Playbook, and Zero Dark Thirty reap a lot of nominations. And I think the wild cards this year are Emmanuelle Riva in Amour, Quvenzhane Wallis in Beasts, Judi Dench in Skyfall, and Michael Haneke for Director for Amour. And who the hell knows how many films will be up for Best Picture. The Academy needs to go back to five films instead of trying to please everyone...

Enough. I didn't predict every catagory because it's almost, well, too much to deal with. Here are the predix. Alternates are below the short line. And complaints are welcome...

Best Picture
Zero Dark Thirty
Lincoln
Les Miserables
Silver Linings Playbook
Argo
Life of Pi
Beasts of the Southern Wild
Django Unchained

Best Director
Steven Spielberg
Kathryn Bigelow
Ben Affleck
Michael Haneke
David O. Russell
---
Quentin Tarantino
Ang Lee
Tom Hooper

Best Actor
Daniel Day-Lewis
Denzel Washington
Bradley Cooper
Hugh Jackman
John Hawkes
---
Joaquin Phoenix
Jean Louis Trintignant
Jack Black

Best Actress
Jessica Chastain
Jennifer Lawrence
Naomi Watts
Emmanuelle Riva
Quvenzhane Wallis
---
Helen Mirren
Marion Cotilliard
Rachel Weisz

Best Supporting Actor
Tommy Lee Jones
Alan Arkin
Leonardo DiCaprio
Christoph Waltz
Javier Bardem
---
Robert DeNiro
Dwight Henry
Philip Seymour Hoffman

Best Supporting Actress
Anne Hathaway
Sally Field
Amy Adams
Judi Dench
Helen Hunt
---
Maggie Smith
Nicole Kidman
Jacki Weaver

Best Original Screenplay
Zero Dark Thirty
Django Unchained
Amour
Moonrise Kingdom
The Master
---
Flight
Looper

Best Adapted Screenplay
Lincoln
Argo
Silver Linings Playbook
Beasts of the Southern Wild
Life of Pi
---
The Perks of Being A Wallflower
 Les Miserables

Best Cinematography
Lincoln
Skyfall
Zero Dark Thirty
Les Miserables
Life of Pi
---
The Master
Argo
Django Unchained

Best Editing
Lincoln
Zero Dark Thirty
Silver Linings Playbook
Argo
Les Miserables
---
Skyfall
The Dark Knight Rises
Cloud Atlas

Best Production Design
Les Miserables
Lincoln
Anna Karenina
Life of Pi
The Hobbit
---
The Master
Django Unchained
Moonrise Kingdom

Best Costume Design
Anna Karenina
Lincoln
Les Miserables
Snow White and the Hunstman
Cloud Atlas
---
Django Unchained
The Hobbit
The Master

------
Nomination Totals
Lincoln                            11
Zero Dark Thirty               9
Les  Miserables                9
Silver Linings Playbook    6
Skyfall                              6
Argo                                 5
Life of Pi                          5
Django Unchained          5

Note: Totals won't necessarily fall in line w/ my predix

The 8:37am announcement comes pretty early when The Maven has been sleeping in for the past month. Seasons Screenings and let the games begin...

And the Weak Shall Inherit the National Title Game?

Let's me just be clear here on The Maven's High Holy Day, aka Rivalry Saturday: Anyone who claims the SEC is still the power conference to beat is still pretty strung out on the tryptophan from gorging on turkey. Let us count the ways:

1--Texas A&M QB Johnny Manziel, aka Johnny Football, exposed weaknesses on Bama's defense. Plus, explain why Bama plays more cupcakes (Jacksonville State), some toward the end of the season, than most major conference teams.

2--Auburn is terrible. Their offense (what little there is) resembles a Chinese firedrill. Look for Gene Chizik to possibly get the boot by next week.

3--ABC's Jesse Bradford, obviously in the tank for the SEC, claimed yesterday that Alabama and Georgia were the two best teams in the country. Georgia? They beat one quality opponent--Florida (though I think they may have a few things exposed today against FSU--while also beating Buffalo, Florida Atlantic, Missouri, Georgia Southern (another late game), cupcakes all. Georgia is not that strong and are ranked way higher than they should be. When they play a real opponent, then I'll listen. Until then, get back on your tractors and go home.

4--Proof that my opinions are not biased: LSU, my SEC team, has been ranked way too high all season. They have no QB and have hung on by their fingernails in most games. The Arkansas game should have been a clear win, not a nail-biter.

5--South Carolina, coached by Steve Spurrier, a family friend, has done decently this season but it will be hard to judge the season w/ the loss of Marcus Lattimore, a terrific athlete and honorable guy; I'm a fan despite his playing for the wrong team. This Clemson game will be interesting, to say the least, but I think my boys will hopefully expose their weaknesses on defense due to our uptempo offense.

6--Tennessee. "Rocky Top" my ass. Derek Dooley is a good coach and was great for Louisiana Tech but just not a good fit for UT. And I don't blame him entirely for their problems. When you have thugs like QB Tyler Bray mouthing off about being "paid to perform," the team has a major problem, one Dooley couldn't control which is the worst quality in a coach. Bray isn't a leader but a self-centered player who doesn't put the team's interests first, and this hurt UT. Four overtimes and Missouri still wins? A much-improved Vandy beats UT by 23? If the Vols don't beat Kentucky (talk about a cupcake in the SEC) today, they will go 0-8 for the first time--and it could happen. Dooley won't coach the game, Bray will be mulling over his NFL prospects. Maybe Bray could go be the new QB for the Cowboys since they don't have one at the moment...

For the past few years, all I've heard is how weak the Big 10 is (or is it Big 12 or Big 14? Hell, I can't keep the number of teams straight), how they are down. As players and coaches change this will happen. The ACC? Stronger in basketball obviously but it's still my conference. If players from UNC, Miami, and Florida State can stay out of trouble long enough...

But I argue the SEC is down now. Bama is still strong and will be hard to beat, I admit. Oregon is just as strong. Kansas State has a strong QB in Collin Klein, a Heisman hopefull (while we're at it, how about some Heisman love for Clemson QB Tahj Boyd? But I digress...). Notre Dame has just been damned lucky. As much as I abhor USC and especially that pansy Lane Kiffin, I hope USC beats the Irish to bust the BCS wide open. Notice in all the reallignment of conferences the SEC is largely untouched, save for the addition of Missouri and Texas A&M (which I'm sure Bama was pleased by)? I still say just have four major conferences and stop the idiotic, out-of-region reallignment. Maryland in the Big 10? I wouldn't allow them to touch my beloved conference on those Helen Keller-designed uniforms alone...

We'll see how the games shake out today and during the Championship games next weekend. The pundits will still find a way to argue an SEC team should be in the National Championship because they're in the tank. A film critic once said the worst film by Italian Filmmaker Federico Fellini is better than most films out there. Did this critic see Fellini's Satyricon?  

Lasting Impressions...

The October Surprise many media pundits said would occur did not appear as a political Molotov cocktail in the waning days of the election, but rather as a nasty bitch of a storm named Sandy.

The last week of any election cycle is always a calm before the storm in which there is not much more to say, and the media grasps for any sliver of a percentage point's difference between a myriad of polls.

However, many in the media wonder always what the lasting impression will be to the electorate at large before they head to the polls. Many believed it would be the monthly jobs report, released Friday, which showed the rate holding pretty much steady at 7.9%, still below the 8% threshold (as the media deems the threshold, anyway). Or perhaps a gaff by one of the candidates on the campaign trail would seal the deal.

It was neither of these elements. On Wednesday, President Obama and New Jersey Governer Chris Christie appeared on the ground on the Jersey shore to survey the damage, meet those who were affected by Sandy, and hold a press conference. Many on the right have thrown brickbats at both men claiming this was political posturing. This was genuine.

Whatever your political persuasion, this was a case of two men from polar opposite political spectrums reaching out to one another in a time of crisis. Lower Manhattan, Long Island, New Jersey, and many areas along the Eastern seaboard lay in ruins, without power, without food, and for many without homes. In some ways (and this is saying something coming from me, who barely dodged moving to New Orleans two months before Katrina and is still moved by it six years hence), this was worse than Katrina. And it's been amazing to me that for a major city and artery of this country that after Thursday, the media coverage of this event has been pretty scant--"those people," like it's not part of us. When I've taught essays about New Olreans and Katrina, the attitude arises that that region and the citizens asked for it in an odd way, because of geography, income, etc. Many would say that with 9/11 the calvery came out to help, but where is that contingent now in the very same region that so affected and still echoes in our consciousness throughout our country, a flashpoint if you will?

But I digress somewhat. Say what you will of Obama and Christie but they both reach out to people in a time of need. Obama, a cool, academic customer who is rather insulated by the system but is paradoxically more comfortable and laid back speaking to and meeting common people, so he was in his element on Wednesday when he met with many New Jersians. (And rememember back in July after the shootings in Aurora, CO, Obama reached out to many who had been wounded, primarily in private). So was Christie, more blohard at times but always one to speak his mind with passion (and I appreciate this, despite not being a member of his party), but always with the needs of the citizens of his state placed first. At least they both got off Marine One to reach out to people...

Where was Mitt Romney during all of this? In a town in Ohio (Ohio, Ohio, Ohio, baby!) at an orchestrated photo-op where he had cases of canned goods trucked in to set up an event to look like the citizen of Ohio were contributing food for those affected by Sandy. And this is emblematic of the Romney campaign: canned, forced compassion that is a bit out of step with reality. Why didn't he go to the East coast, his presumed home area (or is it Michigan, I can never keep it straight), and survey the damage or speak to citizens in need instead? A friend pointed out that he is not the President (yet) and not in a position to do this. I think if Romney had done this, it would have created perhaps the impression that many had hoped to see at some point on the campaign trail: a moment of  honest compassion.

Sidebar: Where the hell is Vice-Presidential Candidate Paul Ryan? I've not seen him a week after the Republican Convention, when he made a joint appearance with Romney. Is Romney backing off of his choice? Notice that Ohio Senator Rob Portman has been connected at the hip of Romney for much of the time post-Convention? Methinks Mittens may have felt a twinge of regret here in not choosing him...

But the famous final scene (sorry, Bob Seger), I believe, will be of two men from opposite spectrums dispensing with the political and showing their honest, unguarded selves. This wasn't a political event in and of itself (though the aftermath of Sandy is nothing but political for Bloomberg and the boys, so let the games begin), but one where human need was placed above all. Will this joint appearance solve the very complex problems of a region never having seen a weather anomoly such as Sandy? Of course not. But it's a start, one that showed President Obama doing his job and looking presidential. This is what compassionate presidents do.