I watched “Dancing With the Stars” with my loving wife. Emmitt Smith won the competition along with his dance partner, Cheryl Burke. Grasshopper No. 4 said I grossed him out when I said that Emmitt had a cute smile. That charismatic grin and a lot of enthusiasm took his team over the top. At the end of the last dance Emmitt slapped his partner on the ass. He can’t do that! That could be grounds for sexual harassment.
Then I was flipping channels and I came across a basketball preseason game with Texas Tech playing Oklahoma State. My favorite coach, Bobby Knight, was prowling the sidelines and his team was winning big time. One of his players failed to fight for a rebound. As the player approached the bench during a timeout, Bobby decided he would give the player some loving tips. As the kid stood in front of Knight taking the barrage of comments, he had his head down. Knight wanted to look the kid to look him in the eye so he clenched his fist and lovingly “popped” the kid under the chin to get his head up. To put it mildly, the kid got the message. In fact, it showed the kid sitting on the bench afterward trying to see if he had broken his jaw or something more serious. The incident was dismissed as a “teaching incident”. Seems to me it could be close to child abuse.
And then there is Sony’s new Play Station 3. The new unit is out today and there are only 400,000 available. So people are lined up outside the major retailers to get the first editions. People are standing in line with $600 in their pocket to buy the first units. One Walmart store had only 10 units available and had to turn hundreds of people away. Some people were selling their spot in line in for $100, $200, and $300. Then the people who bought the unit were re-selling it on ebay for amounts as high as $3,500. One report had bidding as high as $8,000. Is this a great Country or what? Robbery was committed on people standing in line. Dah! They make a great target for thieves. To top everything off, a person was shot in Connecticut for refusing to yield to a thief. Is everybody nuts?
Finally there is Terrell Owens. He is the “fruitcake” receiver for the Dallas Cowboys. He feigns injury, mocks the coaching staff and falls asleep in strategy meetings. His outrageous behavior gets written off as eccentric. He is not a role model! I repeat, he is not a role model! Guess what? He has written a childrens book. You’ve got to be kidding me!
Maybe it is the newly elected liberal Democrats that are encouraging outrageous behavior. What else could explain the strange things going on? Maybe it is just a sign of the times.
Love,
Dad