Yeah, I'm Mad

That's right.  I'm mad and I'm not apologizing for it.

There is something greatly wrong with this country when we are returning to state where not only is open or thinly veiled racism increasingly common, but we are afraid to call it out as the insidious societal disease that it is.

Earlier this week, Pamela Ramsey Taylor, a  leader of a Clay County, West Virginia non-profit organization posted on Facebook that it would be refreshing to have a "classy" and "dignified" first lady in the White House instead of "a ape in heels."  Local Mayor, Beverly Whaling, responded that the post "made her day."  Clay County is 98% white.  Clay, the city of which Whaling is the mayor, has no black residents.  After the initial firestorm prompted by the comments, Taylor responded that the comment was not racially motivated, though she admitted how it could be seen as such.

I don't know if Taylor or Whaling can or will keep their jobs.  They shouldn't, but that's pretty much beside the point.  I'm also not going to go into the detail of the thrust of their comments.  Michelle Obama is one of the most dignified and classy PEOPLE to live in the White House, First Lady or otherwise.  I don't know what class or dignity anybody married to Donald Trump can bring to the White House, but it certainly pales in comparison to the embodiment class and dignity that is Michelle Obama.  Instead, I want to talk about the dog whistle that the classless Ms. Taylor blew in her comment, and that the equally classless Mayor Whaling responded to.  The idea that either one of these worms losing their jobs is an adequate response to what they've said is off the mark.  It's not enough because what they said is not the real problem; it's just a symptom of the problem.

The problem is that anybody is thinking this garbage to begin with.  The problem is that there is an entire group of people thinking like this.  The problem is that we have a candidate for president around whom the purveyors of the glory of a white America can gather.  The problem is that when these people are caught, they are allowed to sneak away with their tail between their legs without long term repercussions and without being called out as the racists that they are.  The problem is that they are backed by countless people who simply think the solution is to "not say that," or (more realistically) not get caught saying that.  The problem is that these people will continue to support and vote for people and policies that uphold the primacy of white America.  

The problem is that these people either think there is no racial divide in this country, that it is the fault of minority populations, or that the divide is not a problem.  The problem is that we have racists in our government and our voting population and that they are not called out for what they are until they are so embarrassed to show their faces in public.  The problem is that we don't shame these people until they are too afraid to make their voices heard, until they realize that THEY are the minority and that they're living in the past.  The problem is that we have enough of these people that the election process allows them to nominate and then elect a racist, misogynistic, xenophobic, bigoted bully to be the President of the United States.

The problem is that this person, these people, are in my country.  The problem is that we're afraid to call this deplorable woman what she is, a racist.  The problem is that she's not alone.  The problem is that the Republican Party disproportionately attracts racist voters and activists, but the good people in the party are either afraid to call them out for fear of losing their votes, or they don't understand the thinly veiled racism that these worms are spouting.  The problem is that the hypocrisy of expecting black Americans to take a greater degree of responsibility for "black on black" crime, or expecting Muslims to turn in members of their community as potential terrorism suspect while failing to take any responsibility for policing racism within one's own party (because we wouldn't want to lose their votes).

The problem is that racism is alive and well in this country and the vast majority of people are either afraid to admit even the possibility of that being the case, or they're afraid of being called oversensitive or "playing the race card."  The problem is that these deplorable neanderthals are allowed to be over-represented by a political system that was never designed to see that everybody was represented in government, and has not substantially evolved (with the exception of women's suffrage) since shortly after the Civil War.  They're over-represented because they can be manipulated by people who, in all honesty, may not be racist themselves, but are perfectly willing to harness the racism of others to get what they want.

None of these problems are addressed by either of these deplorable women joining the ranks of the unemployed (though they certainly both deserve to), because the deplorable ideas that they’ve displayed are not only alive and well, but they are a significant part of what propelled them, and so many like them, to positions of influence.

I don’t know what the best way to combat this failure to evolve, but pretending there is no problem and allowing others to do the same is not part of that solution.  That is why I will continue to call out racism when I see it.  I will do my best to remain respectful in doing so, but I’m done sugarcoating the way I approach this topic.  If you can't handle that, then take a look in the mirror.  You are the problem.

Violence and Unrest in Milwaukee

Rally for justice.  Rally for truth. Rally to grieve with those who mourn.

Now is not the time for anger and judgement about what happened in Milwaukee that left a young man dead at the hands of a police officer.  The time for anger and judgement will come, but it is only with full information that anger and judgement, when warranted, can be directed to the right place.  The truth is that there are probably no clean hands when it comes to the problems of violence in our country and that includes you and me.

I would argue that if Smith, the young man who was killed, raised a gun to an officer, it is tough to blame that officer for responding with deadly force.  Even if it is true that the police officer that shot and killed Smith did so with actual legal and moral justification, that does nothing to detract from the conversation that needs to happen what our community expectations of police are and how we deal with race relations in this country.  In fact, I would go so far as to argue that recognition by those would be and have been critical of police that this latest incident was justified (if true) would go a long way toward establishing the actual, constructive dialogue needed to actually accomplish any meaningful reform.

Conversely, if it turns out that the officer did not act with full legal or moral justification, a prompt and proper response from the police department and any other applicable authorities would help establish that necessary conversation.  Everybody needs to stop trying so hard to make facts fit the narrative that they're pushing that they forget that nothing worthwhile gets accomplished without keeping a solid focus on the truth, whatever it may be.

This cannot continue to be a shouting match between two groups of people.  Neither has a monopoly on righteousness.  Neither has completely clean hands.  Neither can solve the problems of our society and keep the peace on its own.

Now is the time to cry, pray, mourn and gather.  It is also the time to listen, learn, consider, converse and remember that lives of all colors matter.  We all have a responsibility to leave a world, country and community to our children in which they can live theirs to the fullest.

My Fond Farewell to "The Best Soccer Show"

The Copa America Centenario is about to get underway. The Euros aren't far behind and MLS is in full swing, but something is missing from what some are calling the Summer of Soccer.

Less than a month ago I said The Best Soccer Show, the long-running american soccer podcast hosted by Jason Davis and Jared Dubois.  I never missed an episode but I very rarely got to listen to the show live.  Even though I learned of the show’s end with less than 12 hours notice,  I made sure that I was able to listen to most of the show live.  (My two year old prevented me from catching the beginning of the show.)  I had never called into the show before, but on this occasion I was able to participate in the show.  In fact, I had the honor of being the final caller they ever took on the show.  It was a privilege to tell Jason and Jared an abbreviated version of why their work meant so much to me and how it has literally changed my life.  As I told them, I truly cannot thank them enough for what they did for me.

My view of CenturyLink Field in Seattle.

In 2010, I was a law school student at the University of Wisconsin.  I had not devoted much time or thought to soccer in years.  I played rec soccer growing up but played my last season the summer before my sophomore year in high school ten years earlier.  Since then, I had reffed youth soccer for one summer and reffed intramural soccer in college, but I never followed the professional game at all. I doubt that I could have named ten professional teams anywhere in the world at that point.  I would not have been able to name many more players, past or present.

I would pay some attention when the World Cup came around, but that was about as far as I would go.  Once the World Cup was over, I would basically be unaware of soccer until the next World Cup. Even then, I would not know the players on my own national team and I would scarcely understand what was going on on the field tactically or strategically other than if the ball was going toward the goal I wanted it to go toward.

The order of events from 2010 is a bit blurry in my memory, but I do not think the order of events matters. I remember watching the England match with my brother at a Buffalo Wild Wings in Madison. I remember a group of law students huddled around one person's laptop as we watched what looked to be the dying breaths of the tournament for the USA, only to see Tim Howard, Clint Dempsey, Landon Donovan and Ian Darke create one of the most dramatic moments in the history of american sports. Some time during that summer, either as a primer for the World Cup or as a “what else is there” for after the tournament, a friend of mine introduced me to The American Soccer Show podcast.

Jason Davis and Zach Woosley (a.k.a. The Ginge) were the host of the show talking about all things american soccer.  My interest in the game remained almost exclusively with the men’s national team, so I did not care about MLS or any other professional league except as it pertained to the national team or national team players.  Still, I listened for when those things I did care about would come up.

Not long after I started listening, Woosley stepped away from the show and was replaced by Jared DuBois. The balance and chemistry between Jason and Jared meant that even when I had no idea who or what they were talking about, I found them entertaining as much as informative. Jared, being a fan of the LA Galaxy provided a different perspective as compared to Jason's general MLS fan perspective. I had never followed any sport without having a favorite team basically handed to me as a birthright, but I did not have that with soccer. Hearing the different ways that they were fans but the passion they both still had for the game was contagious to me. I do not think I realized at the time how much of an impact the juxtaposition of their perspectives had on me. It made me able to just appreciate the game without needing to pick a team.

So, I listened and enjoyed. I learned about how MLS was so different from other leagues and other american sports. I learned about what other leagues mattered to Americans. I learned about the problems of not having soccer-specific stadiums. I learned what the Gold Cup, Confederations Cup, Copa America and the Euros were. I learned about how the federations and confederations work and how shady all of that is. I never felt like I was learning because the most important thing I learned was how fun it could be to talk about these things. Soccer did not have to be hidden behind an impenetrable wall of snobbery.

Along the way, the American Soccer Show became The Best Soccer Show. The information and fun never changed though. The Best Soccer Show may have been an aspirational or ironic title choice, but to me it was an honest one. The show stoked my desire to learn the game better, to understand it and seek out new perspectives as well. They made me feel included even though I had no idea the depths of what soccer was really about. They helped give me the confidence to experience it for myself.

In 2010, I experienced my first national team game at a friendly in Chicago. That same friend who introduced me to the show, Zach, convinced me to go.  It was an amazing experience. A couple of years later, while visiting my father in Boston, we went to watch an MLS match between the Revolution and the Red Bulls. I was excited to see Thierry Henry and Juan Agudelo play that night, but neither of them did.  I was pretty disappointed to not see Henry play, but I did not learn for some time that he never played on turf. Agudelo, though earning his first international appearance already, had not yet established himself as an every-game starter for the Revs. Still, at that point, it was safe to say that I was no longer the oblivious, theoretical soccer fan I had been, but it did not stop there.

My brother (left), dad (center) and me at Gillette Stadium before
our first MLS game. Yes, we're repping our other sports love.

Zach (left) and I at CenturyLink Field

In June of 2013, Zach and I (and our pregnant wives), flew to Seattle for the World Cup qualifier between the US and Panama.  While we were there, I almost literally bumped into Alexi Lalas as he was coming out of the Nike Store following a recording of his former podcast with Taylor Twellman.  On the street, we passed Jermaine Jones (who Zach had played pickup ball with while spending time in Germany the summer before Jones turned pro).  I shook hands with Cobi Jones at the American Outlaws party the night before the game.  We marched through the streets of Seattle to the match.  I do not actually remember much of the game.  I remember the atmosphere and the feelings.  I remember being part of something special.  I remember the energy.  I remember that for those 90 minutes, there was no place on earth I wanted to be more than right where I was.

Since 2010, I have been actively finding new friends to watch soccer with.  I have even started watching MLS and other leagues.  As opposed to years past when I would make minimal effort to partake in the World Cup, in 2014 I was having people over for the games, even people who were were not “soccer people.”  I never wanted to be the obnoxious soccer fan, but if people showed an interest, I was and am more than willing to help them get over that barrier to entry that kept me out for so long.  I had gone from being on the outside looking in, to being the guy holding the door open for other people.

Sharing the game with my daughter before she
could even hold her head up.

When my daughter was born, I wasted no time in sharing my love of soccer with her.  Days after bringing her home from the hospital, I remember sitting on the couch with her in my arms with her empty bottle of milk on the end table and an EPL game on the TV.  Once she could walk, I put a soccer ball in front of her.  It was not about trying to turn her into the next Carli Lloyd.  It was, and is, about sharing the game I love with someone I love and hoping that some day we can share that love together.  When my son is born this summer, you better believe I will do the same with him.

I do not remember when the rumors started to swirl, but I probably first heard about them on The Best Soccer Show.  The Copa America Centenario was coming to the US. When Zach and I first heard these rumors, our thoughts were identical: if the US played close to us, we were going.  Through all of the personal twists in our lives since then, along with the real questions over whether the tournament would even be held, Jason and Jared were on my playlist and always near the top. They were the buddies I talked soccer with since Zach and I have not lived closed together since college.  Jason and Jared were the guys who, when anything big happened, you wanted to hear what they had to say about it whether you agreed or disagreed with them.  They never knew me other than through fleeting twitter interactions or that final call on The Best Soccer Show, but they were my friends.

No, they ARE my friends.

While The Best Soccer Show is done, Jason and Jared are not gone, nor are they even done podcasting together.  Even if they were, the gift they gave to me is worth a lifetime of my gratitude and friendship.  They gave me the chance to fall in love with the beautiful game.  They opened the door to new experiences and people that I never would have encountered had I not been willing to open myself up to them.  The Best Soccer Show was the catalyst for that by helping me build the basic knowledge base to not constantly feel lost in the soccer world and by always reminding me that above all else, soccer is supposed to be fun.

On my way back home from Chicago on June 7, I will not be able to look forward to calling in or tweeting at The Best Soccer Show about what happened like I had been hoping since “Copa Fantastico” became a reality.  I will not be able to look forward to their reaction podcast.  There won’t be a podcast.  My friends do not do that anymore. As sad as that makes me, that sadness is overwhelmed by the gratitude and happiness that comes from knowing that without Jason Davis and Jared DuBois, I would not have been there in the first place.  I would not have been any of the amazing places soccer has brought me or will bring me.  

Thank you, my friends.  You are The Best.

The State of the United States Soccer Federation

The state of U.S. Soccer is ugly. I'm not just talking about the pathetic attempt at new kits that Nike recently unveiled for this year, though they are quite ugly. The ugliness goes way deeper and to a more important place than fashion, and to both of of the senior teams.

On the men's side, the team had been in utter disarray for at least the past year. After an embarrassing end to the Gold Cup last summer and then failing to beat Mexico in the playoff for the Confederations Cup spot, 2016 is continuing in the same way 2015 ended: embarrassingly. It's not that the USMNT was beaten by Guatemala, just like the problem wasn't that they didn't earn a Confederations Cup spot winning the Gold Cup ire even the playoff, it's how they did those things.

First, they lost to teams they are clearly more talented than. That happens though. The game isn't played on paper. In the Gold Cup, the USMNT was outplayed and outshot in basically every game. In Guatemala, they were beaten because of simple mental errors that should have been handled by professionals. They could have lost by more if Guatemala had been more able to finish. To be fair, the U.S. Had chances in the second half, but that was after.  

Had half the team not been playing out of position, those errors are probably not as numerous or as bad.  The fact is that this is a hallmark of what Klinsmann has done with the national team.  It’s one thing to fill a gap or fudge a bit on the margins to get your best team on the field or even your best eleven on the field, but that’s not what is going on.  On Friday, we had a center back or defensive midfielder at right back, a right back at right mid, an attacking midfielder at defensive/holding midfield, and a holding/defensive midfielder at attacking midfield.  Klinsmann had a player for each position on the field and he just didn’t do it.  It’s like he’s playing musical chairs with his lineup (and yet somehow Benny Feilhaber is always left without a seat when the music stops).

I understand that Gonzales and Orozco were not the first choice pairing for this game.  In fact, both of the first choices, Besler and Brooks, were out with injuries from training (another shock in the Klinsmann era).  In truth, Orozco shouldn’t have been on the team.  The team has plenty center backs and plenty better than him.  You could say that Klinsmann was vindicated in bringing so many center backs with to suffering injuries, but you would be wrong.  If you play Yedlin, an EPL right back, at his position, you can move Cameron to the position he plays in the EPL.  You get the added bonus, apart from two players playing the positions that got them noticed, an extra midfielder who can actually maintain possession of the ball.  Instead, we got a lineup that was indicative of tactical simplicity rather than nuance, sophistication or common sense.

We have a coach committed to playing as many half of his outfield players out of position, despite evidence at the club and international levels that it is a mistake, bringing in players who are not performing and ignoring players who are.  Players seem lost.  That’s probably a result of so many players playing out of position, and the consistent inconsistencies with regard to tactics, lineups and formations.  Experimenting requires controlled and uncontrolled variables.  Klinsmann seem to not have a concept of the controlled variable portion of experimenting.  Whatever logic there is in the way Klinsmann approaches his tactical and roster choices, it’s completely beyond me.

The chaos with the US Soccer program is not just confined to the men’s national team.  Despite the women’s team winning the World Cup, having the World Player of the Year and a slew of talent, there are problems off the field for the women’s team.  After being forced to play the sport’s signature event, the World Cup, on artificial turf last year because  FIFA takes women’s soccer about as seriously as Jim Rome takes the sport in its entirety, US Soccer sent them on a “Victory Tour,” and did such a poor job of vetting venues that one of the matches had to be cancelled because of how bad the field was.  That’s after forcing them to put up with substandard practice facilities.

This is the United States Women’s National Soccer Team: the reigning World Cup champions, the most decorated team in the history of women’s soccer, the crown jewel of American soccer, and they’re playing and practicing on fields that they don’t even feel safe on?  Follow that up with the commencement of litigation over impending collective bargaining between the team and the federation and it does not add up to a good look.

I could go into a diatribe about how Sunil Gulati, the head of the USSF, should have been dealing with these issues rather than playing powerbroker at the recent FIFA election, in which the federations simply got to select a new breed of corruption from the large assortment, but the fact is that there was and is nothing stopping him from multitasking these issues.  Maybe he learned something from the USWNT field debacle and maybe the collective bargaining process is going on as all sides expected.  It still isn’t a good look, but maybe he’s doing the best he can with the circumstances.

It is fairly clear that Gulati thinks things are okay with the men on the field though, or at least that the idiotic contract extension he gave Klinsmann before the World Cup has boxed him in so tight that all he can do is watch as the disaster slowly unfolds in front of him.  That’s the BEST case scenario and if that’s what’s going on then there is hope for him to learn from that.  The worst case is that he still doesn’t get that Klinsmann is a disaster of a coach (though he seems to be more suited to the Technical Director role that was included in his extension).  He could still be clinging to the idea of the great German international coming and showing Americans how to futbol. If that’s the case, there is no hope as long as Gulati is in charge.

Primary Season

As primary season officially gets underway, keep this in mind: While the primaries are a de facto part of our political system, they are not legally such. They aren't governed by your votes, they're controlled by the respective parties and subject to their manipulation. The parties can, will and have manipulated the nomination process to suit their needs and there's nothing to stop them from doing it because whichever party it is, it's their party, not yours (especially if you're not a dues paying member). This primary system is one of the countless ways our system is engineered from within and manipulated from without to deliberately and perpetually limit your choice by maintaining a two-party political system that is enshrined NOWHERE in the constitution.


If you're not pissed, you're not paying attention.