Talkin' trash to the garbage around me.

12 January, 2006

At last, the WaPo exposes arrogance and criminality!

At last! The Washington Post is finally running a story on how this man has failed upwards, how he has brazenly and repeatedly broken the law, with not even a shred of guilt on his conscience. And it was all published on Wednesday in... the sports pages?
So let's all pile on [Marcus] Vick. His response to being thrown off the team was to drop out of school and announce he'd follow his older brother, Michael, the Atlanta Falcons' Pro Bowl quarterback, to the National Football League. His comment on his dismissal from the team put him near the top of the list of athletes sounding arrogant beyond belief: "It's not a big deal. . . . I'll just move to the next level, baby."

And the truth is that if he can play, he'll be welcome at the next level. Professional sports teams don't care if you've been to jail, been stopped a hundred times for traffic violations, stomped on 10 opponents' legs or made profane gestures at opposing fans (which Vick did at least once this season). They care if you can play. Period.

All of which brings us to an issue that goes well beyond the troubles of Marcus Vick. His story reflects a much larger problem at all levels of sports: the existence of a place that we might call, for want of a better term, "The Land of Never Wrong."

Funny if how you change just the names and details, it could be the story of George W. Bush.