Thursday, December 15, 2005
On Strike
After being completely disillusioned after the 2004 election and having a rather extreme reaction (moving across the world) to my newfound cynicism towards all things political, I've found myself finally starting to engage again.
It reminds me of my turbulent relationship with Major League Baseball actually. Throughout my childhood I loved watching baseball, collecting baseball cards, going to the ballpark and I especially loved the Milwaukee Brewers. Don't laugh! Remember that at the time they had major All-Stars like Robin Yount, B.J. Surhoff and Paul Molitor. In 1992 the Brewers were 92-70!
But then the players went on strike for an entire year in 1994-1995 over salary caps! I mean c'mon now! Even the overpaid NFL players have salary caps. I was only 14 and to a young baseball fan this was a travesty. Then, of course, my team got progressively worse over the next few seasons and started losing its best players and I just got fed up I stopped caring about baseball altogether. Even my own successful little league career lapsed around that time.
However, after a few years of not caring about Baseball, I started to get over it. I began to enjoy going to the ballpark again. I went to a few White Sox games and Cubs games the summer I lived in Chicago. I went to a couple Orioles games while living in D.C. I even kept my loyalty to my home town team, the Brewers, and made it to a few games at their new stadium Miller Park.
But it's never been the same. Although I still love to play the game and be at the ballpark, my passion for America's game is gone.
In a nutshell, this is how I feel about politics right now. I'm sick of the players and completely disallusioned with my crappy team (the Democrats). Yet still, I feel loyal to the team I once knew and can't seem to get playing the game or being where the action is out of my system.
Ironically, I turned my back on baseball the same year I got turned onto politics . I was 14 when I met Sen. Bill Bradley and read his book Time Present, Time Past. From that time I knew that politics and current affairs would be my new passion. I'd certaintly found my new hard ball.
By the way, what I wanted to do was write this post on my thoughts about what Democrats should do to actually have a platform instead of simply bashing everything the Republicans do, but I got sidetracked with this long baseball analogy. I guess I'll wait until next post, it could be another long one...
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It reminds me of my turbulent relationship with Major League Baseball actually. Throughout my childhood I loved watching baseball, collecting baseball cards, going to the ballpark and I especially loved the Milwaukee Brewers. Don't laugh! Remember that at the time they had major All-Stars like Robin Yount, B.J. Surhoff and Paul Molitor. In 1992 the Brewers were 92-70!
But then the players went on strike for an entire year in 1994-1995 over salary caps! I mean c'mon now! Even the overpaid NFL players have salary caps. I was only 14 and to a young baseball fan this was a travesty. Then, of course, my team got progressively worse over the next few seasons and started losing its best players and I just got fed up I stopped caring about baseball altogether. Even my own successful little league career lapsed around that time.
However, after a few years of not caring about Baseball, I started to get over it. I began to enjoy going to the ballpark again. I went to a few White Sox games and Cubs games the summer I lived in Chicago. I went to a couple Orioles games while living in D.C. I even kept my loyalty to my home town team, the Brewers, and made it to a few games at their new stadium Miller Park.
But it's never been the same. Although I still love to play the game and be at the ballpark, my passion for America's game is gone.
In a nutshell, this is how I feel about politics right now. I'm sick of the players and completely disallusioned with my crappy team (the Democrats). Yet still, I feel loyal to the team I once knew and can't seem to get playing the game or being where the action is out of my system.
Ironically, I turned my back on baseball the same year I got turned onto politics . I was 14 when I met Sen. Bill Bradley and read his book Time Present, Time Past. From that time I knew that politics and current affairs would be my new passion. I'd certaintly found my new hard ball.
By the way, what I wanted to do was write this post on my thoughts about what Democrats should do to actually have a platform instead of simply bashing everything the Republicans do, but I got sidetracked with this long baseball analogy. I guess I'll wait until next post, it could be another long one...
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