November 2010 Archives

Sometimes I don't know whether to curse my addiction to college football or thank God for it, since it seems to be one of the few ways I can at least briefly get away from whatever is hanging over my head either to read, write or simply worry about.  I do know that I have matured a bit over the years to the point that the on-field performances of 18 and 19-year-olds now only affects my mood for five or six hours. I might add that's a damn good thing, given the dismal fortunes of the Georgia Bulldogs over the last few years. Having spent more than 30 years of my teaching career at four Southeastern Conference schools, I am no stranger to absurd overemphasis on football and certainly no babe- in- the- woods when it comes to the corrupting potential of big-time college athletics.

 My primary concern over the years has been the possible conflict with the institution's academic integrity, but I have to say I have personally encountered very little suggestion of even the hint of pressure from any athletic department on a campus where I have taught.  When I have had occasion to know them, the athletes in my classes have, with but one exception, struck me as nice kids doing their best in what was frequently an academic environment where they are clearly at a disadvantage.  The one exception, an extremely large fellow who was the most ostentatiously indifferent person I have ever been charged with teaching, made it a point not only to eschew note-taking, but even the pretense of it by coming to class sans pen or paper.  Just in case anybody in the class failed to pick up on the depth of his disinterest, he made it  a point as well to sprawl his considerable frame over several classroom seats with his "hoodie" pulled over his head.  After failing to crack 40% on any of his exams, he notified me just as I was assigning final course grades that he needed at least a "D" in order to remain eligible in his sport. The long and short of it is he didn't get his D but missed no playing time so far as I could tell.  After checking to be sure that his transcript bore the "F" he had so assiduously earned, I was left only to ponder how his academic fortunes had been resurrected.

Again, this story is truly exceptional within my own experience.  However, I know it is not nearly exceptional enough on today's college campuses, at least on those where athletics is truly a big-time business.  There are many angles here that are worrisome, not the least of them being the painful spectacle of watching kids who, for whatever reason, are simply not academically qualified to be college students straining and struggling to eke out by the thinnest of margins grades that will suffice to keep them in a school whose playing field and courts are the only places where they truly belong. I have discussed the whole business of whether scholarship athletes should be paid in this space before, and I don't intend to reopen the matter beyond saying that the discrepancy between the financial resources of many of these kids and the free-spending Freddy Frats and Sorority Suzies who swirl about them on campus is profound, troubling, and, I believe, even dangerous.  Every year brings more stories of assault, theft, or robbery, with collegiate athletes at the center.

 Just such an episode is part of the narrative of one Cameron Newton, who began his college experience at the University of Florida, where he not only racked up 13 traffic offenses in just over a year but topped it off by being discovered by police to be in possession of a stolen laptop, which he attempted to ditch by flinging out the window of his dorm room.  For this, he was charged with grand theft, burglary, and obstructing justice. After admitting his offense, he was placed in a pre-trial intervention program, where, of course, the charges were allowed to wither and die.  More recently, reports have surfaced that Mr. Newton further left his mark on the Gainesville campus by being charged with three separate incidents of academic fraud.  These charges, which he has declined to deny, were apparently before the campus judiciary when Newton decided to head for the decidedly  browner pastures of Blinn Junior College in Brenham, Tx., ostensibly because he feared he would get only limited playing time so long as Florida's superstar quarterback Tim Tebow was still around.  After a stellar year on the gridiron for the Fighting Blinnskis, Newton was ready to return to the big stage, and, needless to say, there was no shortage of suitors.  At this point , any knowledgeable college football fan - even if you have been in a coma for the last 12 months - should be able to guess on the first try where he wound up.  Given the excellent character record he already established, he was all but foreordained to wind up at Auburn, where playing fast and loose with the rules is a way of life, at least on the football side of things. 

The vast reaches of cyberspace are not nearly so vast as to accommodate a detailed discussion of the abuses that have characterized the Auburn football program over the years.  Hence, reports that Cameron Newton's father, a preacher, by the way, was shopping him around to the highest booster bidder before he became a War Eagle are almost instantly and intrinsically credible,  even before you factor in the sudden, expensive  repairs to the Rev. Cecil Newton's various church properties , which heretofore had reportedly been well beyond his financial means. Given that both the Universities of Alabama and Georgia  held out players then under an NCAA   eligibility cloud earlier this year, Auburn's defiant "You're damn tootin'/We're playing Newton" attitude since these allegations arose speaks volumes about that institution's regard for the rules that are supposed to govern intercollegiate athletic competition, not to mention its disdain for its reputation among its peers.

Always in great demand, the ol' Bloviator is off again to speak to somebody about something or other, but before he goes, he couldn't resist stopping by to say that for once his venture into prognostication has not ended in total disaster. Up until Tuesday, the Democrats held 255 seats in the House of Representatives to the Republicans' 178 (with two seats vacant.) The OB ventured that, when the smoke cleared, the GOP was likely to wind up just south of the Democrats' total.  Sure enough, with several races yet in doubt, the Repubs are sitting at 242 to the Dems' 185. In the Senate meanwhile, while yours very truly foresaw the Republicans grabbing hold of six new posts, they actually claimed only five.  Here in Georgia, the ethics-challenged former Congressman Nathan Deal bested his Democratic opponent Roy Barnes by 10 points, signaling that where statewide offices are concerned the Dems are pretty much dead meat hereabouts.  Up yonder in Delaware meanwhile, the goofball Sarah Palin wannabe Christine O'Donnell lost by a 16 point margin, a divide still much too narrow to instill any confidence in the wisdom or intelligence of the electorate in those parts. Much as the OB further prophesied, 22 of the 61 House seats taken over by the Republican are in the South.  This brings the southern Democratic membership in that body down to 37, meaning that nearly half the Dixie delegation is now black.  As I said two years ago, you never know what one election means until the next election has come and gone.  I should've added that even then you can't really be certain, of course.  Still, from the looks of the foregoing numbers, (plus the New York Times breakdown showing that 393 of 435 congressional districts nationwide voted more Republican Tuesday than they did two years ago), I'd say there's at least reason to suspect that we may have made too much of the 2008 results which seemed to suggest a pronounced shift to the left.  In a classic example of wishful thinking posing as journalism, a few days after the 2008 vote New York Times writer Adam Nossiter declared with ill-concealed satisfaction that the South had once again been banished to the margins of American politics, where it's so obviously belonged. With its white voters "leaving the mainstream so decisively," Nossiter predicted, "the Deep South and Appalachia will no longer be able to dictate that winning Democrats have Southern accents or adhere to conservative policies on issues like welfare and tax policy."

            In reality "the Deep South and Appalachia" had never been in a position to "dictate" the accent or policy stance of a Democratic presidential candidate even when Carter won the nomination in 1976. Moreover, although Bill Clinton had carried four southern states in both 1992 and 1996, his successful appeal to moderate whites outside the region as something other than the traditional Democratic "tax and spend liberal" meant that, like the broad-based Republican triumphs of the previous decade, neither of his victories required a single southern vote.  My point here, however, is not that Nossiter's history was off, but that so-called political analysis is also very susceptible to wishful thinking.  While the Democrats have every reason

to engage in some sober soul-searching after Tuesday, I'd say the Republicans may have less to celebrate than they think.

P.S.  The OB apologizes for the shameless plug, but he will be at Barnes & Noble on the Atlanta Highway here in Athens next Tuesday, November 9 at 7 PM talking about and signing within his new book.  He welcomes his faithful followers to stop by just to say "Howdy" even if you don't choose to buy a book, thereby denying the OB the wherewithal to buy his precious new grandson a suitable Christmas present.