BRIAN LIBBY

I Lost On Jeopardy!, Baby

Today I logged onto the ESPN website and found coverage of Jeopardy! Champion Ken Jennings losing after being the show’s champion for 74 episodes. I’ve been a fan of the show for years and love the idea of Jeopardy! getting main coverage from sports media. I don’t think of it as being a game show getting covered, which sounds inherently silly, so much as a case where a test of knowledge is treated as importantly as, say, putting a ball through a hoop. Granted, this Jeopardy! story is an exceptional case. Since doing away with the limit on being champion of the show for only five episodes, Alex Trebek’s game show has seen its ratings increase 22 percent over the same time last year thanks to Jennings’ impressive streak. This baby-faced little Mormon software engineer from Utah actually became a damn celebrity. (And yes, he is donating 10 percent of his $2,520,700 winnings – or about $34,000 per day – to the church.) But still to me the interesting thing has been the attention the Jennings juggernaut has received. I’ve already read about the streak in newspapers and online. And there have been fans and foes of Jennings develop during his time as champion, just like a sporting event. And yet it’s because of his big, geeky brain. I love it that such an innocent dork has been given his fifteen minutes of fame, and by earning it through more than 2,700 correct trivia answers. That’s always been the genius of Jeopardy! to me, that on one hand it has this sort of kitsch-by-association by virtue of being a TV game show. I mean, debonair as he may seem, Alex’s peers are guys like Wink Martindale and Bob Barker. But on the other hand, Jeopardy! is a celebration of being smart—or at least very well informed. (There's a difference there that people forget.) And to think that the man behind this is no other than Merv Griffin, that chubby lounge singer and talk show host whose face is branded on my brain in the form of childhood memory. Back in the grade school days, seeing Merv meant my dad had co-opted the family television and I couldn’t watch cartoons.

Decade of the Ducks

Yesterday my beloved Oregon Ducks lost the annual “Civil War” football game against Oregon State, which is for me virtually always the worst possible thing that can happen in sports. And not only did the Ducks get clobbered 50-21, but losing the game meant  Oregon has now suffered its first losing season since 1993. I’m not going to dwell on the negative, though. Instead, I’d like to celebrate Oregon’s unprecedented streak of success.

The decade of winning seasons began in 1994 with an improbable Rose Bowl run after Oregon had lost two of its first three games, only to bounce back with a string of wins and just get better each week. That year brought the greatest moment in Oregon football history: Kenny Wheaton’s game-saving, 93-yard interception return for a touchdown against Washington. Later that year, Oregon overcame a fourth quarter deficit against Oregon State to earn its first trip to Pasadena in 37 years. I remember watching the Civil War in a sports bar on Manhattan’s Upper West Side with the New York chapter of the Oregon Alumni Club. Not long after Dino Philyaw’s winning touchdown, I walked to the subway with a red rose in hand and tears in my eyes. Even though the Ducks ultimately lost the Rose Bowl to undefeated Penn State, being there to see Oregon run onto that field with my dad was wonderful, the culmination of a lifetime’s cheering for the Ducks.

The next season Oregon’s success continued with a 9-2 season and a Cotton Bowl appearance. I especially remember three games. In a come-from-behind win against Illinois, Oregon sacked their quarterback in the end zone and recovered his fumble for the go-ahead score after earlier being 19 points down. Later that year, the Ducks won at UCLA after stopping them at the one-yard line on the game’s last play. 1995’s regular season concluded with a hard-fought 12-10 win over Oregon State. The Ducks were behind almost the entire game, and  Sara and I were sitting right behind the OSU marching band. You can bet some trash talking went on, first from them but with us getting the last word.

1996 and 1997 were tough years, but each time Oregon squeezed out winning seasons. My best memory was the 1997 Las Vegas Bowl, a harbinger of successes to come. On the very first play from scrimmage against Air Force, Akili Smith threw an 80-yard touchdown to Patrick Johnson. After stopping the Falcons on defense, on the very first play of the next possession, Oregon tailback Saladin McCullough ran for another 80-yard touchdown. We won 41-14.

The 1998 Ducks were even better than their 8-3 record indicated. The season began with a 42-14 drubbing of Michigan State on ABC, with new tailback Ruben Droughns (the best Oregon RB of all-time in my opinion) running for 200 yards. Halfway through the season, though, came a gut-wrenching game against UCLA. Both teams were ranked in the Top 10, and before the game ESPN was broadcasting live outside the Rose Bowl. After falling a couple touchdowns behind early, the Ducks climbed back to take the lead. But Oregon fumbles gave UCLA the chance to force overtime and eventually win the game. Droughns also broke his leg that day and was lost for the season. Still, Oregon bounced back and finished with one of its better season records.

The Joey Harrington era began a few games into the 1999 season. Harrington had initially lost the starting job battle to AJ Feeley in fall camp only to wrestle it back mid-season. But while Feeley was more polished at the time, Harrington showed a remarkable fearlessness and relentlessness that would help Oregon come from behind to win countless games, none more impressive that season than against Minnesota in the Sun Bowl when Harrington found Keenan Howry for a go-ahead score with just a minute or two left.

2000 was like 1998 in that a very impressive record (this time 9-2) could have been even better. Oregon’s only losses were squeakers on the road at Wisconsin and Oregon State, the only time both Civil War teams were ranked in the top 10. The season-ending Holiday Bowl against Texas was a classic. Joey Harrington threw for one touchdown, ran for another, and caught a third. Cornerback Rashad Bauman outplayed receivers practically twice his size. Oregon finished in the Top 10 for the first time in its history.

Then there was 2001, that magical season. There were so many memorable wins, such as the 56-55 double-overtime game at Arizona State, or of course the come-from-behind Civil War win, which came thanks to Keenan Howry’s dramatic punt return for a touchdown in the driving rain. I walked around Portland for three hours waiting for that one to conclude, and ruptured my vocal chords with just one enthusiastic yelp upon learning we’d won. Oregon got screwed out of the national championship game after being #2 in both polls. But the Fiesta Bowl seemed like just as much of a challenge. Our opponent, Colorado, was considered college football’s hottest team at the time. But the Ducks won easily, 38-16. I remember Sammy Parker’s long touchdown reception in the second quarter and Maurice Morris’ astonishing touchdown, in which he rolled over a defender on his back, regained his footing, and marched for a third-quarter score. Tears again came to my eyes as the last seconds ticked away.

The last three years, while winning seasons, have been disappointing, but after enduring lots of losses in the 70s and 80s I never want to discount what a 6-5 record can mean. And those years were not without their wonderful moments. At the top of the list is last year’s historic win over Michigan, which put quarterback Jason Fife on the cover of Sports Illustrated. In 2002 there was a dramatic 31-30 win at UCLA. And of course last year culminated with a 34-20 victory over Oregon State.

However disappointed I am with this season, or no matter optimistic I remain about the future for Oregon football, neither is the subject here. We Duck fans have enjoyed a wonderful decade of unprecedented success, and sometimes you've got to smell the roses, even when you don't win the run for them.

New England, Texas, and Class Confusion

There was an op-ed piece in yesterday’s Oregonian by political consultant Kari Chisholm, one of many post-election postmortems to appear in the media since Black Tuesday, this one focusing on how the Democratic party should look to candidates from the west. Part of Chisholm’s argument got me thinking:

“Let’s face it: For all of his strengths, average middle-class American families simply couldn’t identify with John Kerry…He always came across as [a] prep-school liberal, part of the brie-and-chablis scene back East. Conversely, George ‘Dubya’ Bush has portrayed a regular-guy image, comfortable with the NASCAR-and-barbecue crowd. While Kerry tried to fake it with L.L. Bean camouflage hunting gear, Bush looked at home in his blue jeans and cowboy boots.”

What interests me is why in a contest between two rich blue-bloods, one seemed a man of the people and one didn’t. The difference, I think, is between our perception of New England and the Northeast versus our perception of Texas. In Texas, it seems, no matter how rich and privileged you are, somehow it’s still possible to maintain—at least to outsiders—this façade of being an average Joe. But I think a better way to explain it is that no amount of money can make a Texan seem culturally sophisticated.

In other words, then, John Kerry suffered against Bush because his home region is a modern, enlightened place, while Bush’s home is still one that takes the rough-and-tumble frontier as its cultural emblem, with intellectualism in effect frowned upon as being uppity. As a result, Kerry going snowboarding, however genuine a passion it may be, rings false, while Bush in cowboy boots and jeans on his ranch is, however phony it may be, rings true.

As Valarie pointed out last night when we were having this same conversation, why is it that so many American voters resist the idea of electing a president who’s smarter and more culturally sophisticated than they are?

The issue of class in America never gets spoken about much any more, especially in comparison to somewhere like England, where it remains a veritable obsession. But clearly it matters a lot here too. In the end, John Kerry seemed to come from a more upper-class background than Bush did, even though that of course is not true. Polling shows that voters lean Democrat on the issues themselves by a comfortable margin, so that means personality loomed large in this election. It didn’t help matters that Kerry was wooden and uncharismatic, but I think there was more that worked against him. For all the importance of Iraq, the deficit, and moralistic crusades and all the other issues, I can’t help but think millions of voters swindled themselves.

Limbo

It has been nearly two weeks since I last posted an entry on this site. I’ve been trying to come up with something to say for most of that time. But after the presidential election, it’s hard to go back to posting an entry about, say, leaf blowers. (I went for a walk today and they were blasting everywhere. Maybe I’ll stroll through the industrial district where it’s quieter!) Yet so many of my feelings coming out of the election seem half-formed, and I don’t have the energy to flush them out.

Take the possibility of election fraud. In the two states that essentially decided the election, Ohio and Florida, there are reasons to be suspicious. But I want to be careful about embracing conspiracy theory, because it’s clearly self-serving. At the same time, I’m very suspicious of electronic voting machines that leave no paper trail and are owned by GOP-friendly corporations. It practically invites conspiracy theories. And I certainly wouldn’t put it past the Bush administration to cook the books.

I’ve also thought in recent days about moving to Canada. It sounds facetious, something to crow about just for affect. But I’ve been serious. After all, more than any time in my life I feel just outright ashamed of my Americanism. But as one friend reminded me this week, leaving the country to those who hold power now is not the answer. More importantly, though, I’ve been fortunate enough to carve out a life for myself here in Portland, writing and taking pictures for a living, and I don’t want to give that up and start all over again.

Another question the election has wrought is my faith. I don’t want to go to Hell for not believing, but I also feel a profound guilt by association when it comes to sharing beliefs in any way with those conservative Christians marching in step with the president and moralizing about everyone but themselves. Valarie has even considered converting to Buddhism, and I don’t blame her. I’m appalled by how Bush and so many in the Christian right have taken the terrorists’ bait and practically embraced a religious war. And don't even get me started on gay marriage.

Ultimately, of course, life will go on. Even if, as I worry, the seeds of World War III are being sown by George W. Bush as much as by Osama Bin Laden, hopefully Armageddon will come a few decades down the road. Maybe that sounds selfish, but regardless of what side you’re on we all just want to get back to our lives. Strict Muslims on the other side of the world want to pray to Mecca without bombs and McDonalds cluttering the way. Here at home we want to keep standing that house of cards made of IRA accounts, organic produce and i-pods. Whether they’re wearing turbans and hunched in caves or waddling through their McMansions in elastic-waste Dockers, I just wish we could wrestle back the world from whackos and get on with our lives.

The Horror, The Horror

Well America, happy? Because you fucked up. Big-time.

As I write this, there’s an urgent warning on the web of a dense fog advisory. How fitting. At least half of the people of this country obviously were wandering blindly through the voting booth.

I can understand electing George W. Bush in 2000 (I use the term ‘electing’ loosely, of course), what with his smokescreen of being a moderate. But now? After all we know?

I want to know just who are you fucking retards who said to yourselves, “Invading another country with no sufficient justification? Check. Incurring the hatred of pretty much the entire world? Okey dokey. Going from a budget surplus to trillions in debt? Priceless. An attitude about civil liberties reminiscent of prewar Germany? Sounds like the way to go. An economic policy that overwhelmingly favors the richest one percent? I’m down with that. A self-righteous, arrogant, holier-than-thou attitude infultrating every last policy decision? Super-size me!”

This morning, just minutes after John Kerry has officially conceded, I can’t help but feel that the country is headed in a downward spiral from which we may never recover. And this time there is no terrorist to blame. We did it to ourselves.

We are living a moment in history when millions of Muslims around the world have declared a religious war upon the United States, and instead of approaching that challenge with reason and level-headedness, we’ve given the reigns to a religious fundamentalist of our own. Imagine if during the Cold War we’d elected somebody like Curtis LeMay, the Air Force general who felt the only way to defeat the Soviet Union was with a pre-emptive nuclear strike. That’s the kind of mentality we have in the White House.

And it isn’t just the rich people and religious fanatics who re-elected Bush. What truly pains me is to think of the regular people—those who may go to church but don’t get in your face about it, those in the middle class whose pocketbooks will be hurt as much as their ultimate security—who also cast their votes Republican this year. They seem to think it’s wrong to vote out a wartime president. You poor saps.

I’ll probably take some criticism for saying this, but the next time there is a terrorist strike in America, as much as my heart will go out to the victims, in the back of my mind there will be the inevitable thought that, as a nation, we were asking for it. We had the choice to restore sanity and reason to our leadership, and we went the other way. We actively sought the downward spiral.

Nice going, all you voters whose states are marked red on the electoral map. You stupid, clueless motherfuckers. You can take your stars and stripes and shove them up your assholes. I want to barf all my stomach acids right on to Old Glory right now, because I’ve never been so ashamed to be American.