SPECIAL REPORT: How and why Rich Rodriguez left West Virginia for Michigan

SPECIAL REPORT: How and why Rich Rodriguez left West Virginia for Michigan

December 22, 2007

By SHAWN WINDSOR

FREE PRESS SPORTS WRITER

MORGANTOWN, W..Va. — Before the death threats to his brother’s children, before the letters to the editor that rage against him in his local paper, before the destruction of his mailbox, and the printing of anti-Rod T-shirts, and the affixing of mocking posters to his gate at the end of his driveway, Rich Rodriguez was the most popular man in West Virginia.

And it wasn’t even close.

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He was a coal miner’s son who grew up in a holler just down the road from the focal point of the state: West Virginia University’s football stadium. He had walked on at that school and eventually earned a scholarship. He had devised an innovative offense at tiny Glenville State, a Division II college with a dismal football program in one of the poorest counties in West Virginia, turning the school’s games into a happening. He had returned to his alma mater as a kind of football savant.

Earning more prestigious bowl bids. Playing consistently on national television. Further branding the word Mountaineer — the school’s nickname. Spurning Alabama after that tradition-rich football college tried to lure him away last year.

And then, a week ago today, word got out that Rodriguez was leaving. For the University of Michigan, one of the haughtiest, and most successful, programs in the country.

Some 28 days after Lloyd Carr announced his retirement at U-M, a replacement had finally been found.

It was the end of a search that many alumni and fans said embarrassed the university. Still, U-M had plucked a hot young coach to lead it into the 21st Century, seemingly closing an unfortunate little chapter.

In West Virginia, however, the story was just beginning. Depending on the point of view, this past week unfolded in a tale of conspiracy and anger, ambition and treachery, big business, rabid fans and a local boy who grew up to be a hero only to become a traitor.

The level of vitriol has surprised even Rodriguez, whose guilt and empathy are slowly turning into defiance. What irks him the most is a theory bubbling from the hollers to the Capitol to the campus bars in Morgantown. A theory that suggested he threw the Dec. 1 game against Pittsburgh — the school’s traditional season-ending rival — to avoid a berth in the national championship game. Pitt was a 2861/27-point underdog. If West Virginia had won, the school would have earned its first shot at a BCS title.

But if the school lost, the theory went, Rodriguez would be free to pursue the Michigan job, because no coach would walk away from a championship game.

“Maybe I shouldn’t feel so bad about their anger, because that just shows their ignorance,” Rodriguez said. “I’ve been” coaching “here seven years. If they don’t know me by now … ” And he stopped himself, stunned at the accusation.

Even in a message-board filled, blog-crazed, 24-hour sports culture, the audacious conspiracy theory knocked the wind out of Rodriguez and his supporters.

“It is part of the grieving process,” said David Alvarez, a West Virginia native, Mountaineers booster and close friend of Rodriguez. “This is like a labor uprising. I feel sorry for everybody in it. Do I agree with all this? No. But I understand it. Hell, I didn’t want him to go.”

Why he did is the question everybody wants an answer to these days. The easy answer is glory and prestige and money. The more complicated answer starts with a journey back to the hollers, where a young boy with an insatiable drive knew his life wasn’t going be lived 100 feet below the ground.

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Grant Town is an old mining camp 45 minutes southwest of Morgantown. It is a melting pot of Italians and Germans and Spaniards, immigrants from all over Europe who arrived looking for work. At one time, there were restaurants and beer halls.

Joe Weir, an early Rodriguez mentor, coached football back then.

“When you won, everyone invited you in, offered you whatever you wanted,” he said. “But when you lost, you hid.”

The community lived for sports. It just so happened Rodriguez was a natural at them. He lettered in football, basketball, track and baseball in high school. His father had made him a deal: “You study or you practice and you don’t have to pick beans in the field. But you are not going to sit around and do nothing.”

Rodriguez didn’t mind the work, but he craved competition. The choice was easy.

“I remember we used to put a blanket over his head when we drove home after losses,” said his mother, Arleen Rodriguez, who still lives in Grant Town, population around 650. “We didn’t want to see what was coming out of him.”

He was like that from the beginning. He once won a local ping-pong tournament in junior high school. He got a big trophy.

After that?

“He didn’t care anymore,” said Vince Rodriguez, his father. “He was done with ping-pong and moved on to the next challenge.”

He attacked school the same way. In 12 years, his mother said, he earned one B. Everything else was an A. She remembers well the day her son got home with that report card.

“He was in a rage,” she said.

Perhaps more stunning was that they never had to tell their son to study. He used any free time to hit the books. Recess. Lunch. And then he hit the field, or the court, or the diamond.

Basketball was his best sport, and he had offers to play in college, but football was what he loved. And even though a few small schools were interested, he wanted to walk on at West Virginia.

“I wanted the biggest stage,” he said. “I wanted to prove I could play Division I football.”

He would earn a scholarship as a defensive back. When he finished playing, West Virginia coach Don Nehlen — who made the College Football Hall of Fame in large part for building the Mountaineers’ program — gave him a position as a student assistant coach. He moved from there to Salem College, which had 500 students and where, at 24, he was the youngest head coach in the country. A year later, the school dropped its football program. He returned to coach under Nehlen again, this time as a volunteer assistant.

His next move was serendipitous. Glenville State, about 90 miles south of Morgantown, needed a head coach. More important, the town had a wealthy, larger-than-life oil and gas baron looking for ways to spend his money. Eventually, he would take his helicopter from his driveway to Mountaineers games.

Ike Morris met Rodriguez in 1990, after his first year at Glenville State. Rodriguez had gone 1-7-1 and knew he needed kids from outside West Virginia to compete. That required money.

“So he came to me,” Morris recalled. “It took about 15 minutes to realize this boy was something special.”

Morris started funding recruiting trips to Florida and Texas and California. He started sinking money into the stadium. He started paying for scholarships.

“Anything,” Morris said, “that was legal.”

Rodriguez persuaded kids from around the country to make their life in a poor, rural county at a school their families had never heard of. Using the speed he recruited and a couple of ideas he got from the run ’n’ shoot offense, Rodriguez spread the field, and his teams began winning.

From there, he jumped on the Division I escalator with stops as a coordinator, utilizing his new high-powered spread offense, at Tulane and Clemson before returning to West Virginia as head coach in 2001.

He went 3-8 that first season. And then the victories began piling up, all just a few miles from where he’d grown up, where his parents lived, where his two brothers lived, where his wife Rita’s family lived. He was back in the hills.

From the beginning, though, he demanded that everyone in the program think beyond them.

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A week ago Saturday, Rodriguez spent hours on the phone with his friends and family discussing the offer U-M had made to take over its program. He was, by all accounts, an emotional wreck, conflicted, confused, fighting back tears.

No one wanted him to take the job. But few were telling him that. They knew that he had been battling with some in the administration at West Virginia. The issues were more personality clashes than anything else. After all, he had received a $1-million raise after turning down Alabama, bumping his annual salary to $1.8 million, which was $300,000 more than Carr made.

Rodriguez met with West Virginia’s president, Mike Garrison, last Saturday night. It didn’t go well.

“You had a young president and a young football coach backing each other into a corner,” said Bray Cary, president of West Virginia Media, a state communications giant headquartered in Charleston.

Cary, a West Virginia alum and booster, talked with representatives from both sides after the meeting. “They started kicking sand at each other,” Cary said, “like two kids at a sandbox.”

He said neither side would compromise and each side shared the blame for Rodriguez’s departure.

Michigan’s new coach has built successful programs in part because of the cult of his personality. But he can be abrasive and blunt.

“A wild man,” said his father, “that’s what he was when he was younger. Throwing clipboards. Stomping around.”

His parents and friends and fellow coaches say he has matured and calmed down considerably. But the drive remains.

“He’s the only coach I’ve ever had that hated losing more than me,” said Pat White, West Virginia’s star quarterback.

Rodriguez said in an interview Friday night at a Morgantown hotel that that was why he was constantly pushing the school to upgrade its facilities, to find more money for football operations, to budget more to pay his assistants.

He thought the school was missing the big picture. Some in the school thought he was ungrateful.

“An easy fix,” his friend Alvarez said. “It would’ve been an easy fix.”

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On the night of the Pitt game, Rodriguez sensed early that his team was in the muck. The Mountaineers, ranked second in the country, were playing hard, but heavy. Maybe it was the pressure. For whatever reason, they were playing the worst game of the season on the biggest night of their football lives.

When it was over, and Pitt had won, 13-9, and 60,000 Mountaineers fans shuffled into the night, Rodriguez sat in a corner in the locker room with a towel draped over his head. He couldn’t move. He didn’t know what to say. He was desperate to compose himself to address the team.

At 44, he was savvy enough to know what that night had meant to the state. It was the most devastating moment of his life.

“I know it shouldn’t be, because it’s just a game,” he said, “but it’s true.”

For days, he didn’t sleep. Forty-five minutes here. Thirty minutes there. He walked around as if he’d seen a ghost.

The stunning loss, coupled with the bickering at the school, opened him up just enough for Michigan to slip in. Arkansas had called the week after the Pitt game and he’d told the Razorbacks that he wasn’t interested. But Michigan? That was different. That was a place on the stage that he’d always worked for, that was the big picture, with big facilities and big donors.

Although his life was entrenched in the mountains, life at his alma mater was a kind of paradox. All you had to do was take a walk around West Virginia’s stadium. It was small but rimmed with suites. It was flanked by a state-of-the-art medical school and hospital but also with a trailer park.

It was home and that was great, but he craved a place with more vision. Still, his mother said, “he kept telling me he didn’t want to leave.”

In the end, she said, he had to chase it. Not because it was Michigan, but because it was out there. Which is why, his father said, that “I wouldn’t be surprised if Rich goes to the NFL someday. Because that would be the next level.”

Rodriguez is adamant that the move is in no way a rejection of his home. Asked whether he had any regrets how the final events unfolded — from calling a recruit about accepting the U-M job before telling his team to deciding against a farewell news conference in his home state — Rodriguez said he had none.

He said he didn’t want the recruit, the country’s top-ranked quarterback prospect, to find out from the media.

As for explaining to West Virginians his reasons for leaving?

“If I’d done that,” he said, “it would have been: ‘Why? Why? Why?’ And I wanted to focus on the future.”

Rodriguez wants West Virginians to understand it is a job, a career, and he moved just like millions of others do when they want a new challenge.

That message is lost at the moment. He is one of them. Part of the West Virginia family that is roughly 1.8 million strong, a family led by a football coach, the most important job in the state.

“He could’ve been a legend here,” Alvarez said. “Not the next Bo Schembechler, but the first Rich Rodriguez.”

Alvarez understands and he doesn’t. He knows the appeal of the block “M” and the 110,000-seat Big House, but he wonders whether his friend experienced a midlife crisis. Others aren’t so kind. Filling the airwaves with bile. Penning wicked letters. Drawing sarcastic political cartoons. Threatening his brother’s kids at school. Monitoring private flights. Camping out at his airport to yell “O-H-I-O.”

Cary said a lot of West Virginians with little means spent whatever extra pennies they had supporting Rodriguez and his team.

“His success wasn’t just a symbol of pride,” Cary said, “but it was a source of hope in a state that hasn’t had much luck the last 40 or 50 years in terms of its economy or its image.”

That still doesn’t explain the conspiracy theories suggesting an unimaginable breach of ethics.

“People are saying planes are coming down, that I knew about Michigan before the Pitt game; it’s ridiculous,” Rodriguez said. “No one from Michigan contacted me or anyone on my behalf until well after the game.”

And then he thought for a second.

“You create your own monster,” he said.

He gave a state pride because he won, because he returned home.

Now he is leaving, to a place where it’s less complicated for him, to a place where the governor won’t show up at practice or rip him in the newspapers.

In Ann Arbor, the only question that remains is: How often will he need a towel?

Contact SHAWN WINDSOR at 313-222-6487 or swindsor@freepress.com.

Man Chugs Entire Bottle of Vodka Rather Than Turn It Over To Airport Security

Here's a bad idea:

A 64-year-old man was trying to get past airport security with a liter bottle of vodka, and, rather than surrender the bottle or pay an extra fee to check his carry-on baggage—he chugged the entire thing.

He was soon unable to stand or walk, and had to be taken to a nearby hospital to be treated for alcohol poisoning.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22219861/

Lloyd Carr vs Les Miles... The Numbers

Great coaches win at about a 75% clip, particularly when viewed over a long career:

Bear Bryant - 78.2%

Joe Paterno - 74.8%

Bobby Bowden - 76.2%

Over shorter stretches, great coaches can exceed an 80% winning percentage:

Bob Stoops - 81.9%

Pete Carroll - 84.4%

Barry Switzer - 83.7%

Back when Lloyd Carr was on the hot seat, defenders were quick to point out that the retiring Michigan coach has a 75.2% career winning percentage, seventh among active coaches and right up there with the all time greats. Is it reasonable, then, to ever fault a coach who is winning at an 84.2% pace, albeit over a three-year stretch? Most definitely, argue Les Miles's detractors, many who are still blood spattered from defending Lloyd’s 75.2% winning percentage like the pass at Thermopylae.

To resolve this paradox, those who dislike Les Miles’s coaching accomplishments at LSU make the obvious point: will you look at all the talent he has at LSU! They are quite comfortable, then, establishing a new standard: a great coach may win at a 75% pace, but if a coach has a lot of talent, 75% is failure, not success. A higher standard, say 85%, is required if you are loaded with blue chippers (no one has defined this, but those making the argument have already declared Les's 84.2% at LSU inadequate, so it must be at least this). Call this the “Carroll Standard,” after Pete Carroll’s sick 94.6% winning percentage and two national championships from 2003 to 2005, because clearly USC had ridiculous talent those years, and Pete was simply doing what should have been done.

Let's set aside the thorny problem of how we determine when great coaches have benefited from a glut of talent (say Lloyd in 97) and when they brilliantly overcame marginal talent, and grant the premise: Les Miles's winning 84.2% of his games these last three years is a substandard coaching effort because many coaches with that amount of incredible talent would have done better. In layman's terms, all Les did was mess up a sure thing.

Well, these people sure have high standards. Clearly, no other coach they put forward to replace Carr (Brian Kelly is a favorite, maybe Jeff Tedford) has to live up to that 85% winning percentage, but this is because they don’t have obscene talent at their disposal. If Les had crappy players and went 32 and 6, well then! Send the chartered jet!

Their argument breaks down if LSU’s talent does not trigger the Carroll Standard. So let’s take a look:



Oh my. Where is the insane talent down in Baton Rouge? In case those reading this rejection of conventional wisdom need more detail, looking at the starting line-ups for Michigan and LSU:



The Rivals rating proves to be a very appropriate measure for our purposes here. Detractors of Les Miles argue that he is winning with Nick Saban’s talent. He has proven he can recruit (another qualification for the Michigan job), so examining the incoming rating of current starters (many who were Saban's) will reveal a trend: if these numbers had been high, then the two losses each year prove that Miles is not meeting the Carroll Standard. If the numbers are lower than other SEC competitors, then the current players are outperforming their initial rating, suggesting that Les Miles is getting more out of his players than expected…a curious additional qualification for the Michigan job (Michigan being a place, as demonstrated by the data here, where players come in more highly rated and underachieve).

So why do so many think that LSU is loaded with extraordinary talent and not Michigan? Development?

Should Lloyd be held to the Carroll Standard?

The Miles-LSU Talent Glut argument is debunked. In fact, the analysis suggests the opposite: if one wants to claim that the best talent in the SEC is down in Baton Rouge, then Miles and his staff made them that way.

Congratulations University of Missouri Tigers

The University of Missouri Tigers football team had a great win over then #2 University of Kansas. That win gives Mizzou the right to play Oklahoma for the Big 12 championship and if they win that, a shot in the BCS title game. Who would have thunk it! What a great season it's been for them. Chase Daniel is a heck of a QB.

Good luck against the Sooners guys.

The Tradition: Thanksgiving Day and the Motor City

No other team in professional sports can claim to be as much a part of an American holiday as can the Detroit Lions with Thanksgiving. When you think of Thanksgiving, you think of football and the Lions.

The Thanksgiving tradition is older than 24 current NFL franchises, and Detroit’s passionate affair with the annual Thanksgiving Day game is evidenced by its growing popularity. Year after year, Detroiters look forward to not only spending Thanksgiving with their families, but they also enjoy sharing that time with the Lions.

The most recent illustration of this love affair has been shown by the support of the thousands of Lions’ fans who have flocked to the gates on Thanksgiving Day. With this year’s game being sold out, the Lions will extend their Thanksgiving Day sellout streak to 14 consecutive games.

November 22, 2007 will mark the 68th edition of Detroit’s Thanksgiving Day tradition, and the passion continues to burn brighter than ever before. The 2007 game will be the sixth played at Ford Field after playing the previous 27 at the Silverdome.

Carr to Announce Retirement

Michigan has scheduled a 10 AM press conference for Monday to announce the retirement of head coach Lloyd Carr.

Carr coached the Wolverines to a 113-37 record over 13 seasons. Before being named head coach in 1995, Carr served as an assistant under Bo Schembechler for 15 years. Carr's greatest accomplishment came in 1997 when he lead the Wolverines to a National Championship and was named the NCAA Coach of the Year.

Miss Teen South Carolina went to Ohio State

Well not really, but she'd bring up the ACT scores for sure! As you can tell, it's Michigan - Ohio State week here in Ann Arbor and just about everyone is wearing their maize and blue colors along with a few dimwitted Spartan fans who always have to wear green - or this years favorite, Appalachian State shirts, since Michigan State can't seem to beat Michigan if their lives depended on it it's no doubt they'd go for that cheap gimmick.

Anyway there are rumblings that this could be Lloyd Carr's last game and every player that played for Lloyd is supposed to be on the sideline so it holds some additional meaning this year if that is even possible.

Hopefully Lloyd gets the win because for as much heat as he has taken, there really aren't too many more professional and honest Head Coaches out there and it'd be nice to see him beat the Sweater Vest (Tressel) for the last time.

I've got some thoughts on who might replace Lloyd but we'll save that for another time.

In the mean time, Go BLUE!!

Shaun Rogers is a media darling and the Lions are 6-2

What kind of a joke is this? Seriously, the Lions are 6-2? When is this going to end and when will the Lions get back to their normal losing ways?

I think I'm going to just sit back and enjoy the run until it ends. When your team comes out of nowhere to over acheive and surprise everyone it is one of the greatest times in sports because nobody has any unrealistic expectations of the team and the fans and players can just enjoy the moment.

When the Tigers made their run to the World Series in 2006 it was great because nobody expected that to happen. Last year even though they had a good year, a lot of people considered it a failure because they didn't make the playoffs. Part of winning and success in sports breeds unrealistic expectations and sports radio helps to drive this.

Now hopefully they can at least beat the Packers in Green Bay for once then I'll be happy.

RIAA 1, Single Mom 0: RIAA Defendant Loses, Must Pay $222,000 For Allegedly Sharing 24 Songs

DULUTH, Minnesota -- Jammie Thomas, a single mother of two, was found liable Thursday for copyright infringement in the nation's first file-sharing case to go before a jury.

Twelve jurors here said the Minnesota woman must pay $9,250 for each of 24 shared songs that were the subject of the lawsuit, amounting to $222,000 in penalties.

They could have dinged her for up to $3.6 million in damages, or awarded as little as $18,000. She was found liable for infringing songs from bands such as Journey, Green Day, Aerosmith and others.

After the verdict was read, Thomas and her attorney left the courthouse without comment. The jurors also declined to talk to reporters.

The verdict, coming after two days of testimony and about five hours of deliberations, was a mixed victory for the RIAA, which has brought more than 20,000 lawsuits in the last four years as part of its zero-tolerance policy against pirating. The outcome is likely to embolden the RIAA, which began targeting individuals in lawsuits after concluding the legal system could not keep pace with the ever growing number of file-sharing sites and services.

"This is what can happen if you don't settle," RIAA attorney Richard Gabriel told reporters outside the courthouse. "I think we have sent a message we are willing to go to trial."

Still, it's unlikely the RIAA's courtroom victory will translate into a financial windfall or stop piracy, which the industry claims costs it billions in lost sales. Despite the thousands of lawsuits -- the majority of them settling while others have been dismissed or are pending -- the RIAA's litigation war on internet piracy has neither dented illegal, peer-to-peer file sharing or put much fear in the hearts of music swappers.

According to BigChampagne, an online measuring service, the number of peer-to-peer users unlawfully trading goods has nearly tripled since 2003, when the RIAA began legal onslaught targeting individuals.

At the time, BigChampagne says, there were about 3.8 million file sharers trading over the internet at a given moment. Now, the group has measured a record 9 million users trading at the same time. Roughly 70 percent of trading involves digital music, according to BigChampagne.

The case, however, did set legal precedents favoring the industry.

In proving liability, the industry did not have to demonstrate that the defendant's computer had a file-sharing program installed at the time that they inspected her hard drive. And the RIAA did not have to show that the defendant was at the keyboard when RIAA investigators accessed Thomas' share folder.

Also, the judge in the case ruled that jurors may find copyright infringement liability against somebody solely for sharing files on the internet. The RIAA did not have to prove that others downloaded the files. That was a big bone of contention that U.S. District Judge Michael Davis settled in favor of the industry.

Thomas, 30, maintained that she was not the Kazaa user "Tereastarr," whose files were detected by RIAA's investigators. Her attorney speculated to jurors that she could have been the victim of a spoof, cracker, zombie, drone and other attacks.

The jury found her liable after receiving evidence her internet protocol address and cable modem identifier were used to share some 1,700 files. The hard drive linked to Kazaa on Feb. 21, 2005 -- the evening in question -- did not become evidence in the case.

According to testimony, Thomas replaced her hard drive weeks after RIAA investigators accessed her share file and discovered 1,702 files. The industry sued on just 24 of those files.

(Courtroom sketch: Wired News/ Cate Whittemore)

Lions Kitna toughs it out

Lions' Kitna toughs it out

QB returns after concussion to lead team

Tom Powers / St. Paul Pioneer Press


DETROIT -- Jon Kitna had been carving up the Vikings' defense fairly well until he got knocked silly in the second quarter.

"I remember the play that I got hit on," he said. "I don't know exactly how I got hit or if it was that I got driven to the turf and it knocked me woozy for a while."

Out went Kitna about halfway through the second quarter. In came career practice-squad player J.T. O'Sullivan, who was elevated to No. 2 for the Vikings game because of Dan Orlovsky's turf toe. Suddenly, there was an air of apprehension at Ford Field.

As it turned out, for good reason. O'Sullivan had a bit of initial success, then struggled mightily. The crowd groaned and jeered, begging coach Rod Marinelli to let Kitna back into the game. Finally, with the score tied at 17, Kitna returned about midway through the fourth quarter.

The Lions started moving the ball again. At least the looming disaster that seemed to accompany every O'Sullivan pass was gone. Kitna eventually led the Lions to the winning field goal.

"You know, I've seen a lot in this league," Marinelli said of Kitna's return. "But that was special. What he did was special. You saw something really special — you saw toughness, which this town deserves. This is a tough town and they got a leader on this football team that is tough. It represents the city."

Kitna said he was sure he didn't have a concussion and began lobbying to return after halftime. Everyone else wasn’t so sure. At least not at first.

"I just hate not being on the field for my team," he said. "I hate it. I've sat on the bench enough that, when you get your opportunity, you just want to be out there. You feel like you're letting guys down."

Said safety Gerald Alexander: "He's a warrior. That's the reason why our players chose him to be a captain. We know that he has very good leadership qualities. He just showed that today — him having a concussion — to sacrifice himself for the team, especially on a run and things like that."

He completed 22 of 33 passes for 245 yards and a touchdown. Kitna also took off on a run late in the game, got hit and went airborne before crash-landing. On top of all that, he completed a pass to himself by grabbing a deflection and taking off with it.

"All of a sudden the ball is in the air and it's in my hands," he said. "You just react at that point."

O'Sullivan, meanwhile, completed 13 of 23, but was intercepted twice and was really struggling by the time he left the game. Among the many stops listed on his résumé, he spent a year on the Vikings' practice squad in 2005.

"I'm very proud of him," Marinelli said. "He came in under tough circumstances."

Bottom line is that the Lions are off to a 2-0 start.

"This game will get some attention," Marinelli said. "But I just want to get rid of it as fast as I can. We got our work to do for next week. We have a lot of things to clean up. The one thing we've got to keep emphasizing is toughness, character and team."

Kitna gives them a pretty good leg up on the toughness part.

Tom Powers can be reached at tpowers@pioneerpress.com.

Another win for Jenny on the block and the state of Michigan.

It looks like that trip to Germany awhile back really helped and is keeping jobs in Michigan. Great job Granholm...


Report: VW moving American headquarters from Mich. to Va.

LANSING, Mich. (AP) -- Volkswagen AG is moving its North American headquarters from Michigan to northern Virginia so it can attract a skilled young work force and get closer to its customers, The Washington Post reported Thursday.

The office of Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine said he would make an economic development announcement Thursday morning near Dulles International Airport. A spokesman declined to say it related to VW.

The German automaker now employs about 1,600 people at its headquarters in the Detroit suburb of Auburn Hills and in nearby Rochester Hills.

The company will bring 400 jobs and will invest about $100 million as it shifts operations to Herndon, Va., the newspaper reported. It said the move will eliminate 400 positions, leaving 600 jobs in suburban Detroit.

Volkswagen of America's new president and chief executive said that northern Virginia's good schools, skilled workers and proximity to Dulles International Airport made it an attractive site.

"For a young talent, 35 years old, to come here with his family ... is a very important factor," Stefan Jacoby told the Post. "By reducing this organization by 30 percent, you need even more talents, more creative people, more motivated people."

VW decided in early 2006 that it wanted to move to the East Coast, which he said was home for most of its customers, Jacoby said.

"You want to work in an environment where you see your customers, where you see your cars on the road," he said. "You don't want to work where you basically see only American cars of the Big Three."

In Lansing, Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm met with Jacoby on Wednesday evening after a report in The Detroit News that VW was considering relocating to Virginia. Neither side commented after the meeting.

"The governor is always making the case for Michigan, and she will continue making the case for Michigan," Granholm spokeswoman Liz Boyd said earlier in the day.

The Associated Press left several messages for Volkswagen seeking comment Wednesday.

Economic development officials in Michigan's Oakland County, where VW's headquarters is located, also attended Wednesday's meeting in hope of making a pitch to keep the jobs, said Maureen Krauss, deputy director of economic development and community affairs.

She said after the meeting ended that she could not provide details on what happened.

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Associated Press reporter Matthew Barakat in Virginia contributed to this report.

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2nd-tier Appalachian St. stuns Michigan

2nd-tier Appalachian St. stuns Michigan

By LARRY LAGE, AP Sports Writer Sun Sep 2, 5:46 AM ET

ANN ARBOR, Mich. - Chances are, most of the 110,000 fans at the Big House had no idea exactly where Appalachian State is located. By the time they saw a blocked field goal in the final seconds, this much was certain: The little Mountaineers pulled off one of the greatest upsets in college football history. Appalachian State 34, No. 5 Michigan 32.
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The team from Boone, N.C., took the lead with 26 seconds left when Julian Rauch kicked a 24-yard field goal. Corey Lynch blocked a 37-yard try on the final play, and the Mountaineers sealed a jaw-dropping upset that might have no equal.

"It was David versus Goliath," Appalachian State receiver Dexter Jackson said.

Michigan's three stars on offense and its coach came back this season, putting the NFL and retirement on hold, with high hopes.

Big Ten title. National championship.

Looks like it might be time for Plan B.

Mike Hart, Chad Henne and Jake Long never envisioned stumbling this early in what was a promising year.

Neither did coach Lloyd Carr, who looked ashen as the upset unfolded.

It didn't take long to notice the second-tier power belonged on the same field because it made up for a slight size disadvantage with superior speed and, perhaps, more passion.

The two-time defending champions from former Division I-AA were ahead of the nation's winningest program 28-14 late in the second quarter, before their storybook afternoon seemed to unravel late in the fourth quarter.

Hart's 54-yard run with 4:36 left put the Wolverines ahead for the first time since early in the second quarter.

One snap after the go-ahead touchdown, Michigan's Brandent Englemon intercepted an errant pass, but the Wolverines couldn't capitalize and had their first of two field goals blocked.

Then Appalachian State drove 69 yards without a timeout in 1:11 to set up the go-ahead field goal.

"I've been dreaming about that kick every day," Rauch said.

Still, it wasn't over.

Henne threw a 46-yard pass to Mario Manningham, giving Michigan the ball at Appalachian State's 20 with 6 seconds left and putting the Wolverines in position to win it with a field goal.

Lynch blocked the kick and returned it 62 yards deep into Michigan territory as the final seconds ticked off. His teammates rushed across the field to pile on as the coaching staff and cheerleaders jumped with joy.

"We're still sort of shocked," coach Jerry Moore said after being carried off the field by his players.

Appalachian State has won 15 straight games, the longest streak in the nation. The Mountaineers are favored to win the Football Championship Subdivision, but they weren't expected to put up much of a fight against a team picked to win the Big Ten and contend for the national title.

That's the beauty of college football.

No Division I-AA team had beaten a team ranked in The Associated Press poll from 1989-2006, and it's unlikely that it had ever happened before. The Division I subdivisions were created in 1978.

"It is one of the biggest losses ever, but give all the credit to Appalachian State," Hart said.

The Mountaineers are not eligible to receive votes in the AP Top 25 poll because they're not in the Football Bowl Subdivision.

Appalachian State's win does seem to trump the game second-tier programs used to regard as their crowning achievement — The Citadel's season-opening win in 1992 over Arkansas that led to the firing of Razorbacks coach Jack Crowe following the game.

Carr will not get fired after this upset, but he might be wishing he had retired after last season when the Wolverines won 11 games before closing with losses to Ohio State and USC.

When it was over, he didn't second-guess decisions to go for 2-point conversions twice in the final 15-plus minutes, but did lament many mistakes, penalties and missed opportunities.

"We were not a well-prepared football team," Carr said. "That is my job, and I take full responsibility."

The Mountaineers improved to 7-36-1 against top-tier teams since 1978, the previous six victories all over Wake Forest, and took home a $400,000 check from Michigan to boot.

Armanti Edwards threw for 227 yards, three scores and two interceptions, and kept Michigan guessing with his mobility. He also ran for 62 yards. Jackson caught three passes for 92 yards, and scored twice, including his 68-yard reception that tied the game early and provided a glimpse of what was to come.

Hart, who went almost two quarters without a carry because of a thigh injury, ran for 188 yards and three touchdowns. Henne was 19-of-37 for 233 yards in a lackluster game that included a TD and an interception in Mountaineer territory.

Ordinarily those numbers should've been good enough for a win over a small school. Not on this day and not against Appalachian State.

"Someone said it might be one of the big victories in college football," Moore said. "It may be the biggest."


Appalachian State coach Jerry Moore is carried off the field at Michigan Stadium by players Tony Robertson, right, and Brad Coley, left, after upsetting No. 5 Michigan 34-32 in a college football game Saturday, Sept. 1, 2007 in Ann Arbor, Mich. (AP Photo/Duane Burleson)

If the football teams of the Big Ten were cars.

In ascending order of value...

MICHIGAN STATE
Big Wheel with streamers



HAHAHAHA WHEEEEEEEE THIS IS ENJOYABLE BECAUSE I HAVE THE MENTAL ACUITY OF A FOUR YEAR OLD LETS HAVE A PIZZA PARTY

INDIANA
Ford Probe that got totaled by someone without insurance



They weren't that good to begin with, even before the recent disaster. Now, it's a matter of finding someone willing to put in a lot of effort just to get things back to "two years ago." The choices are a heavy rebuilding operation or rolling with some ass-ugly Pacer, be it an AMC or Troy Murphy. All in all, it's a damned shame.

NORTHWESTERN
Purple Vespa




The vehicular version of a pushover. If you don't have a distinct geographical reason for opting for them (namely, living in Italy or Evanston), you need serious help.

MINNESOTA
Buick Skylark in a garage made of used tampons



They're not particularly popular, good-performing, or even much fun to look at, either in motion or standing still. To top it all off, the place where they're kept is unspeakably awful--does a greater discouragement to visitors even exist? Everyone knows they'd be better off outside.

ILLINOIS
Riced-out Honda Civic built and driven by Stevie Wonder



The exact antithesis of a "whole greater than the sum of its parts." In this instance, there's some definite quality, whether it be a nitrous system or J Leman, but there's practically no chance that it won't end very, very badly.

PURDUE
Mazda Miata



They were sexy a few years ago, but they've never really been physically imposing. Completely useless in the dead of winter.
[NOTE: "Krispy Kreme delivery truck" was too obvious]

IOWA
2002 Saab that just got out of the shop after your teenage son wrecked it




Man, they were a lot better a couple years ago, weren't they? All the "smart people" loved them as the embodiment of valuing substance over flash. Then you put it in the hands of someone who's emotionally fragile and prone to erratic behavior, and it got real ugly, real quick. Nobody's really sure how it happened, but there's not much point in dwelling on it. These days, everything looks better and you'd like to believe it's all fixed, but are you really 100% sure it can run like before?

PENN STATE
1994 Toyota Camry




They're an old standard, one with a look that even a drooling Notre Dame fan could immediately recognize. They hold their value better than anyone else out there, and they're being maintained by a kindly old man who doesn't put any undue wear and tear on them. They've been helped by the occasional upgrades (in this case, starting freshmen like Derrick Williams would be akin to, oh, let's say a CD player).

WISCONSIN
Ford F-250 driven by a total douchebag





Built for one thing, and one thing only: power. They're awfully dangerous when they hit full speed, and they enjoy plowing over defenseless animals (raccoons, Temple Owls). If you see them coming toward you, buckle up; hitting the brakes is for pussies.

MICHIGAN
BMW 760Li




While it's been a few years since you could toss around a label like "best in the world," you'd be crazy not to respect the hell out of them. If you want to talk shit, it'd better be about aesthetics; even then, while they're kind of weird-looking, the look is as distinctive as it is classic. All quality-based criticisms can easily be dismissed as unadulterated jealousy--unless they come from...

OHIO STATE
Aston Martin that runs on the blood of puppies




Without question, the prettiest car on the lot, and boy are they fast. Pure excellence. Nonetheless, there's still an unmistakable stench of reprehensibility to them, whether it's slaughtering man's best friend or the unchecked use of sweater vests. A bumper sticker that says "Satan is my copilot" would just be restating the obvious. In the name of all that is holy and good, fuck them.

In related news, Comcast denies monkeying with BitTorrent traffic

http://news.com.com/8301-10784_3-9763901-7.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-5

August 21, 2007 4:52 PM PDT
Comcast denies monkeying with BitTorrent traffic
Posted by Marguerite Reardon

Comcast on Tuesday denied rumors that the company is filtering BitTorrent traffic running over its network.

BitTorrent is a peer-to-peer file sharing protocol used to distribute large data files such as video. The protocol has been used widely throughout the Internet to distribute pirated movies. And sites that use the protocol have been targeted by the movie industry to stop the illegal distribution of copyrighted video.

Broadband providers have also not been big fans of BitTorrent because the use of the peer-to-peer protocol can clog networks with huge files. The blog TorrentFreak claims that several Internet Service Providers have been "throttling" or limiting BitTorrent traffic on their networks for the past two years. And last week, the blog accused Comcast of going even further to limit the use of BitTorrent on its network.

The blog claimed that some Comcast users had noticed that their BitTorrent transfers were being cut off and that they experienced a significant decrease in download speeds.

Over the past few days, these claims have been widely circulated throughout the Web. But when I spoke to Comcast spokesman Charlie Douglas earlier today, he flat-out denied that the company was filtering or "shaping" any traffic on its network. He said the company doesn't actively look at the applications or content that its customers download over the network. But Comcast does reserve the right to cut off service to customers who abuse the network by using too much bandwidth.

So what constitutes "too much" bandwidth? Douglas didn't specify exact figures, but he gave a few examples that would likely get subscribers into trouble. For example, someone who sends more than 13 million e-mails a month, which breaks down to about 430,000 e-mails a day or 18,000 e-mails an hour, would likely get a letter or phone call from Comcast about excessive use. Sending roughly 250,000 photos or downloading more than 30,000 songs a month might also raise an eyebrow at Comcast, he said.

"More than 99.99 percent of our customers use the residential high-speed Internet service as intended, which includes downloading and sharing video, photos and other rich media," he said. "But Comcast has a responsibility to provide these customers with a superior experience, and to address any excessive or abusive activities usage issues that may adversely impact that experience."

In the rare instances the company has to enforce its policy, Douglas said that Comcast contacts subscribers to work out the issue. But he firmly reiterated that the company doesn't filter or throttle back traffic.

The issue of shaping traffic or blocking certain applications is a hot one and goes right to the heart of the Net Neutrality debate, which has been raging for more than a year. Broadband providers claim that their networks have finite resources and they must be allowed to identify traffic in some manner to set quality of service parameters to ensure users get certain levels of service. But consumer advocates say that the network ought to be neutral and traffic should flow freely to ensure that all applications are accessible.

Personally, I can see the merits of both arguments. It makes sense that broadband providers would want to protect their network assets. But it seems like a slippery slope in terms of how far we allow these service providers to go. And I can see why consumer advocates might be concerned that AT&T or Comcast might block applications like Google's YouTube, which could potentially compete with their own services.

There's also the issue of privacy. If operators are identifying applications and protocols to ensure good quality of service, couldn't they also identify the content of my e-mails or see which songs or movies I downloaded?
Topics:
Broadband

Comcast is starting the Tiered Internet, whether we like it or not.

Comcast Is Starting The Tiered Internet.. Whether We Like It or Not

Update: Visit Save The Internet and let your voice be heard!

Sunday afternoon I finished setting up a dedicated rtorrent server for seeding Ubuntu .iso images. I do my best to hand out all the CDs I can, but I also figured I could make use of the bandwidth I have to do the same. Once I got on that idea I realized I had access to two Comcast connections (family) where I could drop in two more of these “rtorrent appliances”. So, I got to work setting a second one up and dropped it on the network at my Dad’s house.

Wasn’t I surprised to find that my seeds weren’t taking off. After some quick Google searching I found that Comcast is cutting torrent connections nearly across the board. All across the internet people are complaining about Comcast not letting them seed anymore–and many of these for completely legal material!

I know bittorrent is associated with a lot of pirating. Hell, so was ftp and whatever other protocol you want to drop in here. This doesn’t mean that it is *only* used for pirating. This doesn’t mean that there aren’t legit reasons to use the efficient protocol. Apparently Comcast doesn’t see it this way.

The way I see it this is the first step toward a Tiered Internet, whether or not any such thing is approved in Legislation or by the consumers. Comcast doesn’t care. They are simply cutting off access to part of the Internet, plain and simple.

I would not be surprised at all to soon hear that Comcast will allow bittorrent traffic, for an additional fee. If you *really* want to use that protocol you can pay us more, but otherwise we don’t deem it as part of “normal internet usage”. Once that starts what is to stop the avalanche that will happen next?

“You want access to YouTube? It really uses a lot of bandwidth and we weren’t expecting most people to use more than casual browsing and email. That’ll be $5/mo additional.”

If Comcast is able to start cutting off access to internet protocols they are already to the Tiered Internet that will only become grounds for corruption and extortion. Who will be next?

The telecoms like the idea of a Tiered Internet because they can then extort both sides of the product. Since they are the middle-man they can charge more to the consumers for access to “the whole internet” and charge more to large domains and take pay-outs from big online powerhouses to provide “better or preferred” access to them.

What do I mean by that? We all know Google pwns the internet. We start getting into the Tiered Internet setup and Microsoft gives a big payout to Comcast, requiring them to limit access to Google, while preferring access to Windows Live Search (or whatever the hell its called). They’ll make up some reason why its more efficient for bandwidth or some BS and you’ll have to pay more to get to Google. They would be in the perfect position to rake in huge piles of money from both ends, with nothing to stop them.

The internet needs to stay open. The *whole* internet. Not the convenient internet. Not the bandwidth friendly internet. Not the bribed-into-becoming-the-new internet. The whole internet. All protocols. All sites. All networks.

If Comcast is allowed to continue cutting off even one protocol we’ve already lost. Voice your opinion. Contact your local office. Complain. Make some noise. Switch providers.

Until then I’ll be getting these two Comcast connections switched to a competitor. It may be a slower internet (in my area) on DSL, but at least its the whole internet.

Update: Visit Save The Internet and let your voice be heard!
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Deadspin's preview of the Detroit Lions.

NFL Season Preview
NFL Season Preview: Detroit Lions

millenmyman.jpgBelieve it or not, folks, the NFL season is much closer than you can possibly imagine. So close, in fact, that, if we're going to fit in every NFL team preview by the start of the season, we have to go this early. So there you have it.

Last year, we asked some of our favorite writers to opine why Their Favorite Team Was Better Than Yours. Ultimately, we found this constrictive, and it also might have killed James Frey. So this time, we've just asked them to just run free, talk about their team, their experience as a fan, their hopes, their dreams, their desires for oral sex. All our teams are now assigned; if you sent us an email and we didn't get back to you, we're sorry, and we accept your scorn. But today: The Detroit Lions.

Your author is Michael David Smith, who covers the NFL for Football Outsiders, the New York Sun, AOL FanHouse and Pro Football Talk. His words are after the jump.

--------------------------

This will be the Detroit Lions' shortest season ever.

When you're a Lions fan, in the Matt Millen era, the season doesn't last 16 games. It lasts until you've decided it's just too painful to keep watching and you can't take it anymore. Now, you might think that after all the pain we've suffered during the Millen era, we Lions fans would have decided, permanently, to stop watching about five years ago. But Lions fans aren't that different from the fans of the other 31 NFL teams. We allow ourselves to get swept up in the belief that this year could be our year, and when Week 1 of the NFL season begins, we're as excited as everyone else.

But every year we eventually realize that we don't have a team worthy of our excitement, and during the Millen era, that realization has come sooner and sooner each season. In 2001, we Lions fans didn't give up until December. Sure, the Lions started the season 0-12, but we just couldn't believe that Millen had made our team - which went 9-7 in 2000, the year before Millen became general manager - the laughingstocks of football. We kept watching in disbelief, week after week, as the Lions became the subjects of the only funny jokes Jay Leno has told this millennium.

In 2002 the Lions were almost as bad as they were in 2001, but the first-round draft choice that year was Joey Harrington. We just knew Harrington was our Quarterback of the Future, and he managed to keep us interested until Thanksgiving.

In 2003 we had new head coach Steve Mariucci to keep us going until mid-November. Mooch was such a nice guy that he just had to succeed. All successful football coaches are nice guys, right?

In 2004, the Lions teased us by starting 4-2, and that guaranteed that they'd keep us optimistic until at least Halloween. Yeah, they went 2-8 the rest of the way, but at least they waited until December to reach double-digit losses.

The last two years things have changed a little bit, and we've had no choice, in both 2005 and 2006, but to give up on the season in Week 2. In both years, we watched our Lions get their butts kicked up and down the field by the Bears in the second game of the season. Do you realize that the Lions have played the Bears in Week 2 for two straight years, and the combined score is Chicago 72, Detroit 13? As a Lions fan living in Chicago, I had to give up on the season after both of those games.

But this year it's going to be even worse: This year, Week 1 of the NFL season matches the Lions against the Oakland Raiders, the only team worse than the Lions last year. And that means a loss in Week 1 would cause us to abandon all hope.

And really, is there any doubt that the Lions will lose Week 1? These are the Lions we're talking about.

Sure, they've added rookie wide receiver Calvin Johnson. He looks great. And yeah, Mike Martz is our offensive coordinator. He makes things exciting. And Jon Kitna insists the Lions will go 16-0, and he'll throw 250 touchdown passes, while Roy Williams believes the offense will average 75 points a game. These guys are optimistic.

But these are the Matt Millen Lions we're talking about, and having a few guys around who make things exciting doesn't change the fact that the rest of the roster is as devoid of talent as NFL rosters get. Although drafting Johnson is one of the few Millen decisions I support, consider this: After selecting Johnson in the first round of this year's draft, Millen chose Michigan State quarterback Drew Stanton in the second round. At a press conference that day, Millen told the assembled reporters, "You guys are probably more familiar with him than I am."

It's not surprising that Millen would draft a quarterback and know less about him than the Lions' beat writers do. This is, after all, the general manager who made Cory Redding the highest-paid defensive tackle in the NFL this off-season. I like Redding, but seriously: This is the NFL of the salary cap era, when every dollar you spend on one player is a dollar you can't spend on another player. Do you think anyone on earth, other than Millen, believes Redding deserves to be the highest-paid defensive tackle in the NFL?

Other problems in Detroit include the once-promising young running back, Kevin Jones, who suffered a foot injury in December that might not allow him to run at full speed at all in 2007. And an offensive line that was the worst in the league in 2006. And the fact that their best defensive player last season, cornerback Dre Bly, was shipped to Denver because, it was reported at the time, "he doesn't appear to fit in Rod Marinelli's defensive scheme." Yeah, talented players just don't fit with what they're trying to do in Detroit.

So, as a Lions fan, instead of previewing the whole 16-game season, let me just tell you what will happen in Week 1: The Raiders are going to beat the Lions, with quarterback Josh McCown (a former Lion) leading Oakland to the victory. Starting 2007 with a loss to the only team that was worse than the Lions in 2006 will tell us Lions fans that the season is hopeless. And all we'll be able to say for the rest of the year is the same thing we've been saying for five years: Fire Millen.

First Day of Programming for the new Big 10 Network Announced

The first day of programming on the Big Ten Network has just been announced …
- 11 am: The symbolic launch time was going to be 10 am, but like the misnamed league itself, it starts at 11.
- 11 am to 11:01 am: Great Ohio State Performances vs. the SEC
- 11:01 am to 11:05 am: Ads for the Big Ten Network
- 11:05 am to 11:30 am: Dr. Phil: Helping Michigan State cope with living in Michigan’s shadow
- 11:30 am to 12:30 pm: The Jim Tressel Variety Hour. Along with his always edgy monologue, watch as the Buckeye coach performs magic, does a little soft-shoe, and joins Sanjaya to bring down the house with a rendition of “Besame Mucho.”
- 12:30 to 12:31: Great Moments in Non-Revenue Sports History
- 12:31 to 12:40: Ads for the Big Ten Network
- 12:40 to 12:42: Michigan Running Backs and the NFL
- 12:42 to 1: Ads for the Big Ten Network
- 1 to 2: Flavor of Zook
- 2 to 3: The BTN True Hollywood Story: Iowa and the 1986 Rose Bowl
- 3 to 4: The Joe Paterno Party Machine. The legendary head coach welcomes Common, Hot Dollar, and Maroon 5
- 4 to 5: Pat Fitzgerald is 35 … and Coaching
- 5 to 6: Battle of the Mediocre Former Head Coaches. Watch as John Gutekunst, John Mackovic, Jim Colletto, Bobby Williams and Don Morton compete in media relations, film study, booster kissing and maintaining institutional control.
- 6 to 7: What Not To Wear: Stacy and Clinton raid Joe Tiller’s wardrobe and subject him to the 360-degree mirror in an attempt to makeover the Purdue head coach
- 7 to 7:30: Ads for the Big Ten Network
- 7:30 to 8: Top Chef: Trying to recreate the Wisconsin experience with brats, La Bamba burritos and Parthenon gyros
- 8 pm to 11 am: A loop of the Total Gym infomercial, hosted by Chuck Norris and Christie Brinkley

Some other top shows that missed the cut or are on hiatus until the end of football season are:

11:00-11:02 Highlights of Indiana football
Mr. Magoo starring Joe Paterno
Deal or No Deal with Ron Zook
Who Wants to be a Millionaire with Jim Tressel
Guess What's in Joe Tiller's Mouth
Dance Fever with Cheif Illiniwek
True Hollywood Story: John Goss & the 2005 season
Queer Eye for the Straight Guy: Jim Tressel offers sweater vests to all of the straight guys
The Real World: West Lafayette
Are You Smarter than an Ohio State Football Player?
Cheaters with host Jim Tressel
So You Think You can Dance? starring the U-M basketball team
The Price is Right with host Ed Martin
COPS: The Clarett Years
Open Mic with Brent Petway
Hooked on Phonics infomercial starring Andy Katzenmoyer
Media Relations for Dummies starring John L. Smith
Are You Smarter than a Michigan Athlete with a General Studies Major?
The Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest with the Wisconsin cheerleading team
Burn Notice: special remote location on MSU's campus
Cribs: The Ohio State Top Recruits Edition
The Man Show: with host Penn State alumnus John Amaechi

Who's My Tiger?

No, it's not her. It's Curtis Granderson. After the catch he made last night to save a tie game against Cleveland I am a believer. The way he handles himself and plays is just fun to watch. I look forward to seeing him play in a Tigers uniform for many years to come.

Why I see John Edwards as a big phony

Why I see John Edwards as a big phony
By BRAD WARTHEN - Editorial Page Editor
Related Content

* External Link Read the "Director's Cut" of this column, plus links, and post your comments at Brad Warthen's Blog

MONTHS ago, I observed on my blog that I think John Edwards is a phony — a make-believe Man of The People.

It’s not so much that he’s lying when he says he wants to help One America — the Deserving Poor, whom he wants to vote for him — get what it has coming to it from the Other America (that of the Really Rich, to which he disarmingly admits he belongs). I think he believes it. But I don’t, and here’s why:

Strike One: Sept. 16, 2003. The candidate was supposed to appear on a makeshift stage on Greene Street in front of the Russell House.

He was supposed to arrive at 4 p.m., but it was past 5 before he showed. When his appearance was imminent, his wife appeared on the stage and built expectation in a manner I found appealing and sincere. Then I saw Mr. Edwards step to an offstage position just behind the bleachers to my left. None of the folks in the “good” seats could see him.

His face was impassive, slack, bored: Another crowd, another show. Nothing wrong with that — just a professional at work.

But then, I saw the thing that stuck with me: As his introduction reached its climax, he straightened, and turned on a thousand-watt smile as easily and artificially as flipping a switch. He assumed the look of a man who had just, quite unexpectedly, run into a long-lost best friend. He stepped into view of the crowd at large, and worked his way, Bill Clinton-like, from the back of the crowd toward the stage — a man of the people, coming out from among the people — shaking hands with the humble, grateful enthusiasm of a poor soul who had just won the Irish Sweepstakes.

It was so well done, but so obviously a thing of art, that I was taken aback despite three decades of seeing politicians at work.

Not enough for you? OK.

Strike Two: Jan. 23, 2004. Seeking our support in the primary he would win 11 days later, he came to an interview with The State’s editorial board.

He was all ersatz-cracker bonhomie, beginning by swinging his salt-encrusted left snowboot onto the polished boardroom table, booming, “How do y’all like my boots?” He had not, it seemed, had time to change footwear since leaving New Hampshire.

The interview proceeded according to script, a lot of aw-shucking, smiling, showing of genuine concern, and warm expressions of determination to close the gap between the Two Americas. Then he left, and I didn’t think much more about it, until a week later.

On the 30th, Howard Dean came in to see us for the second time. Again, I was struck by how personable he was, so unlike his screamer image. I rode down on the elevator with him afterward, along with my administrative assistant and another staffer who was a real Dean fan (but, worse luck for Gov. Dean, not a member of our board). I paused to watch him take his time to greet everyone in our foyer — treating each person who wanted to shake his hand as every bit as important as any editorial board member, if not more so. I remarked upon it.

“Isn’t he a nice man?” said our copy editor (the fan). I agreed. Then came the revelation: “Unlike John Edwards,” observed the administrative assistant. What’s that? It seems that when she alone had met then-Sen. Edwards at the reception desk, she had been struck by the way he utterly ignored the folks in our customer service department and others who had hoped for a handshake or a word from the Great Man. He had saved all his amiability, all his professionally entertaining energy and talent, for the folks upstairs who would have a say in the paper’s endorsement.

At that moment, my impression acquired stony bulwarks of Gothic dimensions.

Strike Three: Sept. 22, 2004. I dropped by a reception held for then-vice-presidential nominee Edwards at the Capital City Club that afternoon. I had stuffed my press credentials into my pocket after arrival so as to mix freely with the high-rollers and hear what they had to say. (They knew who I was, but the stuffy types who want writers to stand like cattle behind barriers did not.) Good thing, too, because there was plenty of time to kill, and there’s no more informative way to slaughter it than with the sort of folks whom candidates want to meet at such receptions.

It was well past the candidate’s alleged time of arrival, but no one seemed to mind. Then a prominent Democrat who lives in a fashionable downtown neighborhood confided we’d be waiting even longer. We all knew the candidate had a more public appearance at Martin Luther King Park before this one, and no one begrudged him such face time with real voters. But this particular insider knew something else: He had bided his own time because he had seen Sen. Edwards go jogging in front of his house, along with his security detail, after the time that the MLK event was to have started.

As reported in The State the next day: “Edwards was running late, and the throng waiting to rally with him at Martin Luther King Jr. Park took notice. They sat for two hours in the sweltering heat inside the community center, a block off Five Points.”

We were cool at the club, drinking, schmoozing, snacking. So he’s late? What are these folks going to do — write checks for the Republicans?

But my impression had been reinforced with steel girders: John Edwards, Man of The People, is a phony. And until I see an awful lot of stunning evidence to the contrary, that impression is not likely to change.

Visit http://blogs.thestate.com/bradwarthensblog/.

Rudolph Guiliani Would Be A Terrible President

Rudolph Giuliani would be 'terrible' president

By Philip Sherwell in New York, Sunday Telegraph
Last Updated: 2:13am BST 06/08/2007

The former top antiterrorism aide to Rudolph Giuliani has launched a stinging critique of the former New York mayor over the September 11 atrocity, attacking a key pillar of his challenge for the White House.

Rudolph Giuliani
Rudolph Giuliani's nomination campaign owes much to his role on September 11

Jerome Hauer, New York's emergency management director from 1996 to 2000, said Mr Giuliani was closely involved in locating the city's crisis control room in the World Trade Centre complex, even though it was a known terrorist target after the 1993 truck bomb attack which killed six people at the site.

The location proved disastrous in 2001 as the building was set ablaze in the collapse of the adjoining twin towers.

The condemnation by Mr Hauer, a leading US expert on biological and chemical terrorism, provides fresh ammunition to Mr Giuliani's foes, who want to undermine the widespread acclaim for his actions in the aftermath of al-Qaeda's attack on the towers. It follows similar criticism from the main firemen's union.

Mr Hauer's comments signal the sort of scrutiny that Mr Giuliani will face from his political rivals' research teams if he remains the Republican frontrunner for next year's election.
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Mr Giuliani's advisers reject the criticisms as the inaccurate recollections of a bitter man who puts politics over principle, and maintain the command centre was sited at the World Trade Centre on Mr Hauer's recommendation.

Mr Hauer, who now runs a consultancy firm, said that the former mayor vetoed his proposal to site the emergency command centre in Brooklyn as he wanted it to be within walking distance of his City Hall offices in Manhattan.

"Rudy would make a terrible president and that is why I am speaking now," Mr Hauer told The Sunday Telegraph. "He's a control freak who micro-manages decision, he has a confrontational character trait and picks fights just to score points. He is the last thing this country needs as president right now."

Mr Hauer is a registered Democrat voter but his expertise was so highly rated by the Republican Bush administration that he was chosen in 2002 to co-ordinate America's public health preparation for future emergencies, including attacks with weapons of mass destruction.

He has gone public with his criticisms after Mr Giuliani blamed him for the location of the New York command centre during a television interview.

"That is Rudy re-inventing history," he said. "We had found a good facility in Brooklyn but Rudy's people and then the mayor himself made clear that the site had to be walking distance from City Hall."

Mr Hauer also accused Mr Giuliani of failing to sort out turf battles between the city's police and fire departments, and of appointing inexperienced cronies to key positions.

And he was dismissive of Mr Giuliani's assertion that Judith Nathan - a former nurse who was then Mr Giuliani's girlfriend and is now his third wife - had co-ordinated the Family Assistance Centre relief operation after September 11.

"Rudy told me to find a role for Judy. She came along to some meetings and her heart was in the right place, but it's baloney to suggest she ran the centre. And now he says he would take her advice on chemical and biological terrorism? Give me a break."

Mr Hauer's assessment has put the focus back on the former mayor's handling of the aftermath of the outrage. Pro-Democrat firemen's unions and the relatives of some victims of the atrocity blame Mr Giuliani for failing to introduce an integrated emergency control system.

They also say he failed to ensure co-ordination between the police and fire brigade, despite the 1993 truck bombing. In addition, they claim city authorities knew that firemen's radios did not function properly - seen as a key reason why 343 of them died when the towers collapsed, since many would not have heard the order to evacuate.

Mr Giuliani's White House campaign owes much to the reputation he gained as "America's mayor" for his role in the 2001 events and his hawkish national security credentials.

He holds a comfortable lead in polls of prospective Republican nominees, followed by former Tennessee senator and actor Fred Thompson, who has yet officially to declare his candidacy.

Detroit City Council votes to tear down Tiger Stadium

Detroit City Council gives group OK to demolish Tiger Stadium


DETROIT -- Whether called Navin Field, Briggs Stadium or Tiger Stadium, a ballpark has stood on the corner of Michigan and Trumbull for 95 years.

In less than two months, a public-private partnership charged with determining its future can request bids for demolition. By Oct. 23, a demolition contract can be awarded with the work completed within a year.

The Detroit City Council voted 5-4 Friday to hand authority of the stadium's future to the city's Economic Development Corp.
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Tiger Stadium has been empty since team owner Mike Ilitch moved the ballclub to Comerica Park in 2000.

What followed has been nearly eight years of debate, discussion, accusations and finger-pointing about whether the stadium should be saved _ in part or whole _ or torn down completely.

"This allows us to move forward," said Matt Allen, press secretary for Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick.

The Economic Development Corp. also was authorized to work with The Old Tiger Stadium Conservancy on plans to preserve the field and retain a portion of the stadium behind home plate.

However, council members voted down a proposal that would have transferred the land the stadium sits on from the city to the Economic Development Corp. for $1.

Economic Development Corp. authorizing agent Art Papapanos said his group is looking for a demolition company to begin work on clearing part of the stadium, but without the land transfer they would have to go back to the city council before choosing a developer.

Kilpatrick has long supported a mixed use of residential and retail for that site.

The issue has been so contentious that Ernie Harwell, Hall of Fame sportscaster and longtime radio voice of the Tigers, offered suggestions to the council.

Harwell said he would prefer a downscaled stadium, seating 8,000 to 10,000 people. It would be used for high school baseball, soccer or even lacrosse. He also suggested making part of the stadium that's spared from the wrecking ball a museum celebrating Detroit's music history.

"Tiger Stadium has meant a lot to generations," Harwell said after addressing the council. "If we can't (save part of it), we'll have to keep Tiger Stadium in our memory, our mind and our heart, and cherish it that way."

A downcast Bill Dow, an attorney and member of the Tiger Stadium Fan Club, said the council's vote has doomed the entire stadium. The Fan Club would like to see about 5,000 seats of the old park saved.

Dow pointed to tight deadlines imposed by the Economic Development Corp. on The Old Tiger Stadium Conservancy.

The Conservancy has to submit preliminary plans and sources of funding to the Economic Development Corp. by Oct. 15. The Conservancy has until March 31, 2008 to demonstrate that it has pledges or commitments for funds to preserve part of the ballpark.

Dow said the Oct. 15 date does not give the Conservancy enough planning time.

"They are absolutely set up for failure," Dow said. "This (vote) should have been put off until September."

But council members appeared eager to settle the issue before taking the next month off.

"This needs to be brought to a close," Council President Ken Cockrel Jr. said before the vote. "We could delay it until September, but that's another 30 days of angst."

The council approved a plan allowing for Tiger Stadium seats and other ballpark memorabilia to be sold.

Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.


Sad to see the old stadium go and while I had a lot of great memories of games and events I've witnessed there, I would rather have it torn down and keep those memories instead of preserving part of it in some sort of perverted form like a condo complex or something.

Honestly the best idea I've heard yet was to build a supermarket on the site since the City of Detroit no longer has a major supermarket in it's city limits since all the Farmer Jack's closed down last month.

Backlash forms against 'zero tolerance'

Backlash forms against 'zero tolerance'





By RAY HENRY, Associated Press Writer Fri Jun 15, 1:06 PM ET

PROVIDENCE, R.I. - Fifth-graders in California who adorned their mortarboards with tiny toy plastic soldiers this week to support troops in
Iraq were forced to cut off their miniature weapons. A Utah boy was suspended for giving his cousin a cold pill prescribed to both students. In Rhode Island, a kindergartner was suspended for bringing a plastic knife to school so he could cut cookies.
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It's all part of "zero tolerance" rules, which typically mandate severe punishments for weapons and drug offenses regardless of the circumstances.

Lawmakers in several states say the strict policies in schools have resulted in many punishments that lack common sense, and are seeking to loosen the restrictions.

"A machete is not the same as a butter knife. A water gun is not the same as a gun loaded with bullets," said Rhode Island state Sen. Daniel Issa, a former school board member who worries that no-tolerance rules are applied blindly and too rigidly.

Issa sponsored a bill requiring school districts to decide punishments for alcohol, drug and non-firearm weapon violations on a case-by-case basis after weighing the circumstances. It passed the Senate and House and now heads for the governor's desk.

Some have long been aware of the problems of zero tolerance. For the last decade, Mississippi has allowed local school districts to reduce previously mandatory one-year expulsions for violence, weapons and drug offenses.

More recently, Texas lawmakers have also moved to tone down their state's zero-tolerance rules. Utah altered its zero-tolerance policy on drugs so asthmatic students can carry inhalers. The American Bar Association has recommended ending zero-tolerance policies, while the American Psychological Association wants the most draconian codes changed.

"It may be a bit of self-correction that you're beginning to see where the pendulum is coming back," said Kathy Christie, vice president of a research clearinghouse for Education Commission of the States in Denver.

A decade ago, more than three-quarters of public schools surveyed reported adopting some version of a no-tolerance policy, according to the U.S.
Department of Education.

"Zero tolerance" became a popular political buzzword during the waning days of the Reagan administration's "War On Drugs," and the rules spread rapidly after a series of high-profile school shootings, according to a report issued last year by the American Psychological Association.

A 1997 survey of more than 1,200 public schools by the U.S. Department of Education found that 79 percent had zero-tolerance policies against violence, 88 percent for drugs, 91 percent for weapons and 94 percent for firearms.

Some parents have mixed feelings about zero-tolerance rules. Christine Duckworth, 50, is the mother of an 18-year-old daughter who just graduated Portsmouth High School in Rhode Island, which has a zero-tolerance policy.

Duckworth said she wanted her daughter safe at school, but she said rules must reflect that teenagers make mistakes.

"I think there's pretty much always a gray area," she said. "You're dealing with individuals. How can you possibly apply one law to every single person and their circumstances?"

There are some signs that policies could be changing.

Texas decided in 2005 that schools can consider students' intent and other mitigating factors before punishing them for any offenses other than those involving firearms, and Rep. Rob Eissler said he wants the weighing of those factors to be mandatory.

"It's hard to legislate common sense," he said. "If we get intent into part of the code, I think we'll be in good shape."

Critics of zero-tolerance rules cite multiple problems. Academic achievement often lags in schools with the highest rates of suspension and expulsion, even when socio-economic factors are taken into consideration, said Cecil Reynolds, chairman of the APA's Zero Tolerance Taskforce.

"The kids feel like they're walking on egg shells," he said.

Reynolds also questioned what lessons zero-tolerance rules teach, citing reports that a 10-year-old girl was expelled from a Colorado academy after giving a teacher a small knife her mother placed in her lunchbox.

"What she learned from the school was, 'If something happens and you break a rule, for God's sake, don't tell anybody,'" Reynolds said. "Zero-tolerance policies completely ignore the concept of intent, which is antithetical to the American philosophy of justice."

The principal at Portsmouth High School in Rhode Island — whose mascot is sometimes depicted carrying a rifle — censored a yearbook photo because it showed a student who enjoys medieval reenactments wearing chainmail and holding a sword.

Citing the cost of litigation, the school relented this year and recently published in the yearbook graduate Patrick Agin's senior photo showing him with the sword.

Agin said he understands rules against guns and drugs, but he was perplexed about how school administrators drew distinctions in his case. He never brought the sword to school.

"You can't really have a zero tolerance," he said. "We have track and field. We throw javelins. If you think about it, you can pretty much make anything into a weapon."

Ohio Sucks!

As a Michigan sports fan it has become painfully obvious that the State of Ohio sucks. Having whacked us in darn near every sport imaginable over the last few years I have come to the conclusion that we as fans need to go on an all out Ohio Sucks campaign just like they have against us. We have likely taken this rivalry for granted over the years as Ohioans have always been a bit crazy about anything Michigan, especially Ohio State fans but we need to step up our game and let our teams know that losing to the state of Ohio is simply unacceptable and won't be tolerated any longer. So Lloyd Carr we will start with you. No more losing to Ohio State. I don't care if they cheat, it just won't be tolerated.

Jim Leyland, you're next. No more losing to Cleveland and the stinking Indians. You're now on notice. Mike Babcock, don't even think about losing to the Blue Jackets. John Beilein, you are now in charge of the basketball program as well as all the other sports at U-M, no more losing to OSU!

Last but not least, the Lions. You've obviously got the most work to do Rod Marinelli. You can start by beating the Cleveland Browns in the annual pre-season game and any other game you come into contact with an Ohio team.

This is now all out war and we need to explain it to our respective coaches.

So there it is, don't lose to any more Ohio teams and the world will go back to being the nice happy place that it was with Ohio teams sucking.

Oh, and by the way.....

Uh Oh!

The Pistons lost in double OT to Cleveland at home in Game 5 of the East Finals, a game they should have won if not for an inhuman effort by LeBron James.

What's next? They have to now do the same thing they did last year which is win 2 games in a row with the first one being in Cleveland. Once again their opponent the next round, should they advance, is sitting at home watching all this and resting.

What is frustrating for a Pistons fan is that they shouldn't be in this position but their arrogance and lackluster play have contributed to this.

I don't know if the Pistons will be lucky to pull this out but I do know that with the Tigers getting beat up by Cleveland, U-M's record against Ohio St and now this, I'd really like somebody in the State of Michigan to beat someone in the state of ohio.


Jeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeez!