Author Archives: Sam Ross Jr.

Yesterday, we noted the need to sacrifice credibility and accountability that is necessary to maintaining membership in good standing with the Democratic Party.

Today, we turn our gaze to the travails of identifying as a Republican. No, this was not spurred by Kevin McCarthy’s ousting as Speaker of the House Tuesday.

But, make no mistake, McCarthy deserved it. Like too many two-faced members of Republican leadership, McCarthy made a promise to his membership, then reneged the first chance he got to hop into bed with the Democrats.

This is a common failing of prominent Republicans, the urge to pander to the Democrats, ostensibly to present a softer image that might attract the independents and late-deciders thought to be so crucial to winning national elections.

George W. Bush was a major factor in kickstarting this movement with his compassionate conservative crap. Never, do Democrat leaders attempt to soften their far-left drift in order to appeal to those outside their party. When Dems offer the olive branch, it’s as they attempt to hit you over the head with it.

Democrats figure their unholy alliance of lamestream news media, big tech, social media censorship and general attack dog tactics used to silence opposing opinions, will be enough to keep the Republicans in a position of eternal minority status.

Somehow, Republicans have been brainwashed into thinking that to change this they must alienate their base to attract fringe support. If that’s what it takes to win, I’d rather lose.

Apparently, I am not alone in this sentiment, which explains why McCarthy lost his gavel today. He won’t run again. Good.

I also find it instructive that the only Republican presidential winner in the past four elections was Donald Trump, the man the Republicans fought so hard to prevent from obtaining their nomination. Even after that, Republicans were late to support him. He was crass, blunt, offensive. That’s not a winning way.

And yet, Trump won, doing exactly what Republican elites said would not work. Trump did not pander to the left. He did not a present a soft persona, speaking in mealy-mouthed platitudes that he might never offend some gender-confused individual living in their parents’ basement while posting religiously on social media.

Trump delivered as best he could on his election promises, despite efforts of the bureaucracy, Congress and intelligence agencies to prevent him from doing so.

Now, Trump is being harassed in the courts because Democrats at all levels fear they cannot again beat him at the ballot box, no matter how many phantom votes they might drum up through their so-called “vote enhancement” methods.

One Congressman was on social media already today nominating Trump for the speaker post.

That isn’t going to happen. But what we do need to happen is for Republicans in leadership to put on their big boy pants. Stop pandering to the opposition and present a distinct, superior option to the voting populace.

A coalition of disaffected Democrats, tired of their party’s leftward lurch, and a similar contingent of Republicans, sick of their party’s gutless posture, just might be enough to win the next presidential election. Now, all we need is the right candidate.

It must be exhausting to be a democrat, awakening each day to the challenge of defending the indefensible.

To be a democrat in good standing, you must be willing to present the public face of having forgotten morality, legality and common sense.

On a daily basis, you find yourself rationalizing more videos of The Big Guy Biden, your party’s kahuna, freezing mid-sentence, falling down, offering to shake hands with someone who isn’t there, needing a guide to lead him off a stage, or playing loose with the facts by misstating his record.

If someone put a truth needle in your arm, you’d have to admit that you wouldn’t trust this guy to make it to the market and come back with a gallon of milk. But you must go on the record that he’s capable of leading this country.

Being a democrat means you have to pretend to believe the excuse of Jamaal Bowman, one of your Congressmen from New York, that he pulled a fire alarm just trying to open a door so he could get to a key vote on raising the debt limit.

Here’s where it gets tricky. As a loyal democrat, you had to scream “insurrection” and “obstruction of Congress” when Jan. 6 protesters were involved, even if they were egged on by feds that had infiltrated their masses.

Now, Brown seems to have been trying to obstruct Congress for political gain, but, as a Democrat, you have to be OK with the idiot defense, as in this guy thought that was how he could get the door to open.

As one panelist on a cable news show Monday night posited, if he’s that stupid, what’s he doing in Congress?

Speaking of which, being a democrat means backing twits like AOC, who spoke of the guy’s panic and fear in trying to “escape a vestibule.” If this guy panics because a door doesn’t open, is he really Congressional material?

Come to think of it, is someone whose qualifications mainly include the ability to mix a mean sloe gin fizz Congressional material, either?

If you’re a democrat, you have to say an unequivocal yes to both inquiries.

Being a democrat means you have to applaud wildly when California Gov. Gavin Newsom appoints a gay, black, woman from Maryland to replace dead California Senator Dianne Feinstein, because Newsom was unable to find a black transgender woman from New Mexico in an attempt to tick more virtue signaling boxes.

As a democrat, you have to deny overwhelming evidence that our southern border is porous to the extreme, to the detriment of the nation.

You must believe Hunter Biden is just a victim and is guilty of nothing, but Donald Trump is not the victim of outrageous prosecutorial over-reach.

Also as a democrat, you have to deny inflation, rising interest rates, videos of shoplifting raids on retail outlets in major cities, and the decline of those major cities (almost all run by Democrats) into literal hell holes.

As a democrat, you can only admit a problem exists if you quickly add that it’s all the fault of Trump, a guy who’s been out of office going on three years. Yeah, it can’t be the fault of your guy, the stumbling, bumbling cadaver Biden.

Your modern democratic voter is the equivalent of the kid who used to claim the dog ate his homework. When I was in school, teachers and even the fellow classmates, laughed at these pathetic liars.

Now, these types are the backbone of a major political party. This should scare you. It should scare them, too.

Perhaps you’ve heard Democrats are saving democracy.

If not, better check your hearing and/or pulse. The Dems scream this anytime they get in front of a microphone. It is they, and only they, who can keep our form of government alive. Just vote early and often for them. Don’t rely on the usual vote enhancement to get the Dems through.

And how are the Democrats attempting to save democracy? Let us count the ways.

They are saving democracy by trying to put the top Republican challenger to Clueless Joe Biden in jail. This pursuit of Donald Trump began while he was in office and included the justice department and various agencies such as the FBI, suspending the rule of law toward that end.

They are saving democracy by declaring incumbent nincompoop Biden unchallengeable in primaries or debates and, if word today is to be believed, by forcing Robert F. Kennedy Jr. into a third-party run for president.

They are saving democracy by denying RFK Jr. secret service protection. Assassination anyone? Or maybe they’ll save democracy by fabricating charges that eliminate him from the election field.

They are saving democracy by having New Jersey senator Bob Menendez facing trial yet again on charges of influence peddling. It is reported that the senator’s wife was unemployed until meeting him, but since then business has been beating a path to the door of her international consulting business. Tales of alleged gold bars and allegations of money stuffed in clothes, a luxury car, make for the most salacious reading this side of Hunter Biden’s laptop.

They are saving democracy by making sure the “Big Guy” gets his cut from selling the brand.

They are saving democracy by making sure Zelenskyy gets his.

They are saving democracy by getting one final Senate vote out of Dianne Feinstein before she died, exiting life in a confused mental state similar to Biden’s.

They are saving democracy by insuring our southern border is no more than a free-spinning turnstile.

They are saving democracy by turning Democrat-controlled cities such as Chicago, San Francisco, Baltimore, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, New York City, Detroit, etc., etc., etc., into hell holes.

They are saving democracy by setting in motion plans to gin up another COVID-like “crisis,” locking down the nation, and guaranteeing those mail-in ballots fall like rain from the sky.

They are saving democracy by making sure criminals who are caught and/or convicted experience only minor inconvenience with bail or jail before being released back onto the streets to commit further misdeeds.

They are saving democracy by spending every waking moment trying to prop up, both figuratively and literally, the stumbling cadaver known as Joe Biden.

Please do us a favor, Democrats, stop trying to save your form of democracy.

News that the Steelers’ charter flight had an unscheduled stop in Kansas City early Monday morning, on the way home from Las Vegas, brought back memories of my days traveling with the team.

That was during my time covering the Steelers as a sports writer for the Tribune-Democrat, which was most of the 1980s. It was common back then for many media members, ranging from the big names of Pittsburgh television, to writers from podunk newspapers like Johnstown, to fly on the team charters.

Going on the charter flight with the players was convenient. You got on the plane at Pittsburgh’s airport, landed at the destination, and buses were waiting on the tarmac to whisk you to the team hotel.

After games, buses took you from the stadium to the airport, again often directly onto the tarmac. Remember, this was pre 9/11. Airport security was, shall we say, flexible.

I remember the players getting together small pots of money to tip the drivers, encouraging them to outrace the competition to the steps descending from the rear of the Boeing 727s the team often used. Think of skyjacker D.B. Cooper and his parachute jump from the rear stairway.

The reason for this haste was the team usually used four buses and there were no assigned seats on the planes, other than first class being for coaches and ownership. Getting to the steps quickly meant freedom to pick your favorite seat location. The media always sat at the rear.

Sometimes the flights didn’t go as smoothly as planned, with a notable example being the 1984 return trip from San Francisco. This one flight gave me new appreciation for what players can face.

The game itself was dramatic, with the Steelers coming from behind to hand the Joe Montana-led 49ers what would be their only loss in a Super Bowl championship season.

It was the final career game for veteran Steelers offensive tackle Larry Brown and rookie tight end Chris Kolodziejski, both of whom suffered catastrophic knee injuries.

Their injuries tempered the elation of the win. It got worse when weather conditions in the east forced the team’s flight to land in Cleveland. Buses had been lined up to make the drive to the Pittsburgh airport, where everyone’s cars were parked.

But the Buffalo Bills faced similar weather problems on their return flight, also landed in Cleveland, ahead of the Steelers, and commandeered the buses.

Eventually, more buses were procured. I was on the bus that held both Brown and Kolodziejski, each sitting up front to give them room to stretch their injured legs. As the bus went over a seemingly never-ending supply of train tracks leaving the airport, both moaned in pain, eliciting painkilling injections from the team doctor.

Imagine blowing out a knee and then having to endure a transcontinental flight back home, with a bonus layover in Cleveland and bus ride to the Pittsburgh airport.

There were many other notable flights, including the 1981 Seattle trip. The Steelers lost to the Seahawks, then emerged from the Kingdome to find a pea soup fog. The return trip was postponed and the team and media were checked back into the hotel we thought we’d exited for good hours earlier.

The next day dawned with more fog and a bit of news – backup quarterback Cliff Stoudt, who had become famous for qualifying for a pension without ever playing in a regular season game, had gone out on game night and broken his right arm attempting to smack a bar room punching bag arcade game.

Traditionally, media rode in the fourth team bus and head coach Chuck Noll sat in the front of the first bus. Stoudt, wanting to avoid Noll, attempted to slip onto the fourth bus where he found – glaring at him from the first row of seats, one Charles Henry Noll.

The plane eventually took off with the airport still closed. Word was the Steelers said they’d pay the fine Pan Am got for this breach of procedure.

And then there was a return trip from San Diego, when the plane was rushing down the runway to take off and suddenly slammed on the brakes, returning to the terminal area. A flight attendant told us there had a been a warning light possibly suggesting an engine problem.

Because the city of San Diego had expanded to encompass the airport, there was a curfew for takeoffs due to noise. That curfew was near as technicians on a cherry picker used flashlights to examine the engines.

Quipped broadcaster Myron Cope: “They’re out there running a two-minute drill with my life and I don’t like it.”

Eventually, the plane was cleared to take off, the Steelers supposedly agreed to pay the fine, and the team successfully winged back to Pittsburgh.

There are other memorable flights, like a return from Cincinnati and attempting to land in brutal wind, causing the plane to pitch and yaw wildly. Linebacker Jack Lambert, a notorious white knuckle airline passenger, was moved to scream to a closeby passenger to shut up during a hairy moment.

Once, coming back from Buffalo, the team plane circled aimlessly, somewhere around New Castle we estimated, so that the players would have time to eat their meals on this short flight.

And then there was a flight to Seattle that took about seven hours due to intense headwinds necessitating a refueling stop in Milwaukee.

But all these flights, like this week’s example, ended safely. To quote Shakespeare, all’s well that ends well.

Dahlia Street is trailer-free as of Thursday afternoon, but what are we to make of this turn of events?

Perhaps the trailer fairies mentioned in a previous post returned and completed their task, removing the last eyesore trailer and leaving this street pristine for the first time in more than a year, save for the one derelict car that remains.

The urge is to indulge in a George W. Bush “Mission Accomplished” post. But that would be as premature as that previous example proved to be.

It is safe to presume that the trailer people even now are busily hatching their next attempt to irritate any and all who refuse them their divine right, that being to claim public property as their own.

But, for now, the absence of the trailers begs one overriding question: Where did they go?

The trailer spokespeople long had maintained there was no option. It had been insisted that these trailers, which multiplied over time (blessedly, not as quickly as rabbits or feral cats do), were plunked on the street because there was no other place to put them. This being offending and irritating to neighbors, which they were in spades, was but happy coincidence.

We recall some physics classes noting that matter is neither created, nor destroyed. So these trailers must be somewhere.

Could they now be employed to irritate law-biding citizens elsewhere? Let us hope not; or at least let us hope those aggrieved citizens have more proactive police and local representation than we in Southmont do.

More logical inquiries to the current state of Dahlia Street include will the trailers return in the future, like swallows to San Juan Capistrano, or buzzards to Hinckley, Ohio?

And what of the trailers’ ownership? Who exactly held title to said trailers and were they, as long had been claimed, all legally registered despite being from farflung locales such as California?

Just thinking out loud here, but it could be the true owners, facing fines and the like, tired of backing the petty protest and bowed to cost pressure. Think of it as a reverse of the old bromide about following the money.

There also is an element of a multi-front war, the sort of thing that has gotten others in overreach jeopardy throughout history.

‘Tis hard to concentrate on minding the trailers when there are social media jousts to be conducted and harassment to be dispensed elsewhere.

For now, it will need to be enough that the law and authority won yet again. But do not presume this will be the end of the quest to continue with the general offending of the populace.

For anyone checking to see if I am aware of recent neighborhood developments – and there seem to have been a few stopping by the blog already for that purpose – I know what’s happening.

I just choose not to write about it at this time; starving an attention whore and all that.

However, while you wait, some suggested listening: “I Fought The Law” (Bobby Fuller Four version) and “Authority Song” (John Mellencamp version).

As you were.

I tried to watch the Ohio State-Notre Dame college football game Saturday night on NBC – emphasis on tried.

This was because the guy doing play-by-play, who looked like he might not yet have a driver’s license, kept getting the details wrong.

A player gains 3-4 yards and this announcer says he hits a stone wall. Since this was a goal-line offense situation, the gain was noteworthy, not hitting a stonewall. And so it went, with the announcer being loose with his calls and my wife telling me to stop yelling at the television.

She was right and I audibled (clever football pun intended) to watching back-to-back John Wick movies on another outlet. I never did get back to the game.

But, in a case of making lemonade out of lemons, the struggling guy on the broadcast got me thinking about the late, great Carroll “Beano” Cook, and one of the quotes from him that you don’t necessarily find in online compilations.

The story goes that Cook, as Pitt’s sports information director, was at Army for a game vs. the Black Knights of the Hudson. The press box announcer kept botching his calls, awarding too many, or too few yards on any given play.

Eventually, Cook felt the need to critique the man, to which the announcer replied with the equivalent of, What difference does it make?

Shot back Cook: You must have been in charge of the body count in Vietnam.

For the younger audience, one of our failings during the Vietnam experience was exaggeration of the number of enemy killed. This sort of dagger quip was vintage Beano. No one really called him Carroll during his adult life.

It was Beano who famously quipped, after our hostages had been freed from Iran and then-MLB commissioner Bowie Kuhn had gifted them with lifetime baseball passes, “Haven’t they suffered enough?”

Beano was something less than a fan of baseball.

I had the great fortune to spend many hours with Beano when I worked as a sports columnist for the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. Beano often showed up before Steelers or Penguins games to mix with the media members in the press lounges.

Beano would hold court and I made it a point to get to his table early and leave late. Beano would depart eventually, often before the games had begun.

I can still hear his gruff voice explaining to me, “Sam, this is what it’s all about. I can stay home and watch the games on TV, but you can’t get this at home.”

Cook had gone from that Pitt SID job to a variety of posts with Pittsburgh sports operations, national networks and, eventually ESPN, which gave him his widest audience. Beano changed jobs often, but never changed his style.

By the time I met him, Beano mostly was a free-agent raconteur.

There never will be another one like him in sports media, partly because he was politically incorrect. Beano saw nothing wrong with admiring a woman’s beauty. Beano was blunt, a trait common to a man of his generation. But, he was not crass.

Beano also would not toe the corporate party line. He would be very saddened by what has happened to college football, with traditional conferences splitting in geographically illogical ways, the transfer portal becoming a full-blown free agency system for players, and various other ongoing bastardizations of the traditions that Beano revered.

We are coming up on the 11^th anniversary of Beano’s passing at age 81, on Oct. 11, 2012. That would be 10-11-12.

Somewhere, I suspect Beano still gets a chuckle over his parting numerical flourish.

Let us talk about control. Individuals, elites, businesses, governmental agencies and governments themselves all like to feel that they are in control.

Sometimes they are. Often, eventually, they are not.

It was both fitting at the time – the mid-1960s – and prescient anticipating our present day circumstances, that the spy spoof TV series “Get Smart” had the hero agent working for CONTROL. It was a fictional counterintelligence agency that seldom, either with agent Maxwell Smart, or in total, was in control of the situations. It was ironically funny.

Loss of control these days shows in various ways, from the individual shuffling after his truck being taken away on a flatbed, pleading for a halt in a true Shane! Come back! moment, to headlines that greet us daily.

The elites of our Federal Reserve Board of Governors believe they are in control of the bond market with their machinations. The runaway rise in interest yields Wednesday and Thursday, despite the Fed types holding their fed funds rate constant in a Wednesday afternoon announcement, says otherwise.

People who earn their living specializing in following bonds are amazed at the volatility in what used to be a sedate, measured investment arena.

This inability to control the rise of interest rates is coming from the same people who thought just over a year back that they could control inflation. “Transitory” they called it then. The huge rise last year in prices and the continuation in 2023, albeit at a milder level, speaks to anything but control.

Our war hawks think they can control the situation in Ukraine, as they feed hush money to Zelenskyy. But NATO allies are growing tired and our coffers are growing low on reserves, leaving the Napoleonic Zelenskyy (a height and ambition reference) shaking a begging bowl short on fresh alms.

Someday, in the not-too-distant future, these hawks might awaken to a reality that control of our proxy has been lost and the Russians have been dealt provocation sufficient to unleash nuclear weapons.

Those in positions of power in left-wing cities think they are in control of their fates. They believe they can pander to illegal immigrants with promises of being sanctuary cities, but recoil in horror when those illegals take them up on their offer and they find their city resources unable, or unwilling, to meet the challenge.

Our government and many families think they can spend well beyond their means indefinitely, without consequence, either by running ever-increasing budget deficits, or by maxing out credit cards.

The government declares “crises” in order to divert attention and maintain control. Pandemics are created or imagined. Social media, with its typically leftist ownership and staffing, is utilized to censor dissent.

Lapdog news media outlets are co-opted to maintain the official narrative, no matter how it might conflict with the facts.

But what happens when the desired control is lost, both economically and politically?

Those fluent in Johnstown history can appreciate the metaphor of strained dams finally succumbing to the inevitable, with devastation to follow.

When control is lost, when the dams burst, damage is immediate and indiscriminate.

Likely those who would seek to control already are aware of that eventuality. You would do well to consider it, too.

The trailer fairies seem to have visited Dahlia Street very early Wednesday, before most were up and about.

It would seem these imps absconded with a trailer, one of many formerly moored on the street as an in-your-face protest of those who would depend on the rule of law being enforced, not to mention believing generally in good citizenship.

As a grandfather to three young girls, and being married to a woman who has “fairy gardens” of various figurines displayed during the good weather months for the girls’ amusement, not to mention entertaining them on sleepover nights with fairy stories, I am well-acquainted with the fairy world.

True, there are bad fairies. But mostly, there are good fairies, who seek to do helpful things for others. This is why I suspect fairies in the removal of the eyesore trailer. They helped a lot of people with their pixieish act.

It almost made me eager for another nightfall, that the fairies might do more good.

Imagine my surprise when, during the course of returning from a combination prescription pickup and pleasure drive, I saw strange activity on Dahlia Street Wednesday evening.

It was maybe 7:10 p.m. I’d been downtown and had heard firsthand the City Hall clock striking 7, then had come almost directly home.

It was a period of dusk, which the dictionary defines as the darker stage of twilight. Speaking of twilight, this was stuff fit for the classic Twilight Zone television series.

There was a figure evident in the gloaming, looking more like the bridge troll from the fable of Three Billy Goats Gruff. Said personage was fiddling with . . . a trailer . . . appearing to lash it to the back end of a tow vehicle.

I’d happened onto the equivalent of a Bigfoot sighting and, in the excitement of the moment, didn’t think to pull out my smart phone to snap a quick photo as evidence. I guess you will just have to take my word for it.

As I slowly continued along the street, the figure got into the tow vehicle and drove off. I followed cautiously to the end of the block and made a right turn to head to my garage.

Imagine this! The tow vehicle and trailer turned into the alley ahead of me.

Now the Mustang I was driving seemed to hesitate for a moment. Perhaps the machine was recalling the trauma of recently almost having been backed into on the very same alley, by a similar looking vehicle.

But the troll/fairy/elf/imp/sprite at the wheel of the tow vehicle continued driving with his freshly claimed trailer.

Me? I stabled the Mustang and went inside to share – with appropriate excitement — what I had seen.

And I can’t wait to see what visions Thursday will provide.

Last week, Answer Man tried to talk Steelers fans down off the bridges in the wake of the one-sided thumping by the San Francisco 49ers.

A week later, things look a little brighter and Answer Man is feeling the flush of accurate prognostication.

The original thought was based in part on the reality that the Steelers are the NFL’s Rasputin. You need to shoot them, poison them, drown them and hang them before they are vanquished. Also, the Steelers still could and should win 9 or 10 games due to the pathetically easy schedule, coupled with the fact that the division rivals can’t seem to sweep the Steelers.

If you watched Cleveland choke Monday night, and lose star running back Nick Chubb for the season in the process, you got a little preview of how AFC North opposition seems to tremble at the mere sight of the three hypocycloids (stylized red, blue and gold stars) in the Steelers’ logo.

Already Cincinnati is 0-2, with star quarterback Joe Burrow limping due to a lingering calf injury.

Baltimore is 2-0, but the Ravens still have the wildly inconsistent Lamar Jackson at quarterback. Even as the announcers were praising Jackson during a Sunday telecast, he made one of his characteristic poor reads on a passing play, narrowly avoiding an interception.

Then, an apparent strip sack of Jackson and subsequent Cincinnati recovery was wiped out by a questionable penalty against the Bengals

Shifting narratives on a dime, the telecast then showed a montage of Jackson fumbles from the previous week.

Jackson will make mistakes at critical junctures. Count on it.

Yes, the Steelers can’t expect to score two defensive touchdowns a game, as they did vs. Cleveland. And there will come a time when Kenny Pickett won’t be able to count on the opposing quarterback out-stinking him.

But the Steelers also have what should be easy wins vs. the Las Vegas Raiders and Houston Texans coming up, so they should be 3-1 heading into an Oct. 8 home game vs. Baltimore.

Now Answer Man reaches into his metaphorical mailbag, the one he stuffs with questions of his own making.

Q: What did you think of former Yankees star pitcher David Wells showing up for an oldtimers day event, taping over the Nike logo on the jersey and generally blasting the Woke movement that has invaded sports? Sign me, Auntie Antifa from Bitter End, Tennessee.

A: Auntie (Anti?), it did my heart proud to read what Wells did, then to see him double down on it all during a Tuesday morning appearance on a cable television business show. I just wish he had more current athletes standing up to the politicization of sports.

Q: Are you buying more optimistic talk from the Pirates’ front office about the future? Sign me, I.M. Doubtful from Nothing, Arizona.

A: Hey, Doubtful, it’s been wait until next year almost annually since I was a young man. This year the slogan seems to be at least we’re not as bad as Oakland and Kansas City. The Pirates could be better next year, but you seldom go wrong betting on the organization to find a way to screw up things.

Q: When are big-time college sports going to cut the student-athlete crap and admit to being the semi-pro operations that they are? Sign me, Nomar Hypocrisy from Embarrass, Wisconsin.

A: Nomar, if someone can keep a straight face regarding the Colorado football program, with 86 new players on its roster this year, then there is no hope for truthful discussion. This sort of thing, and the free-agency of the transfer portal, has turned college football into an outright NFL minor league. College men’s basketball is no better, being largely an NBA farm system. Don’t forget these “amateur” student-athletes making money from merchandising their names, images and likenesses. Sure, those performing in most women’s sports, as well as men’s minor sports such as fencing and wrestling, tend to be traditional student-athletes. But as far as the high-profile college sports, to quote from the Great Biden, “Come on, man!”