INVESTIGATING NEPA August 14, 2017

I am enjoying a quiet Sunday here in NEPA with family, and will be watching the Indy 500 and the 600 mile NASCAR race in Charlotte. But my heart is in St. Petersburg.  As many of my friends there will be beaching it and boating it, they won’t have the excitement and anticipation that comes with the first unofficial weekend of the summer.  This will feel more like Labor Day, with the wonder of how many more days on the water will be left until tarballs of oil, and dead marine life wash ashore.  The blame game is already underway, but BP, the Obama administration, the Bush administration, the lack of meaningful regulation, and our addiction to foreign oil have taken their rightful hits.  But the environmentalists have gotten away unscathed.  Blame the environmentalists?  Yes.  We need oil AND proper environmental protection.  But thanks to environmentalists we do not drill in the Alaskan wilderness, yet we deep water drill in the Gulf.  All the shallow water drilling in the Gulf of Mexico has been exhausted.  But if we were drilling in Alaska, and BP had an accident, it would have been contained with far less short and long term damage than the gulf.   

SPORTS!!  Of all the individual sports, auto racing is the one where American fans flock to mediocrity.  Every golf fan goes to the event or watches on TV to see Tiger and Phil.  Tennis tournaments have us anticipating the chance to see Roger Federer and the Williams sisters.  So why will TV bestow the lion’s share of attention at the Indy 500 on Danica Patrick, maybe the sports 10^th best?  She’s hot, marketable, and who among us wouldn’t love to see a woman win at Indy (which is why I would love to see longshot Sarah Fischer, who has paid her dues, pull the big upset.)  But at the end of the day, Danica will get the attention, and she just might finish in the top 12.  But she is better than Dale Earnhardt Jr. who has not been relevant as a driver for three or four years.  He has the best cars, he’s in the most commercials, and he won’t even make the top 12 in the points standings at the end of the year.  Junior is popular because so many of us loved his dad, and we miss him.  But if you liked the brash, bold, take-no-prisoners Dale, Sr. and you want to root for someone just like him, do what I do, and cheer for Tony Stewart.

And big ups go to Roy Halliday for the perfect game against the Marlins last night.   If you love the game of baseball, one of the purest joys is watching Halliday pitch.  As Carly Simon says, “nobody does it better.”