Baseball 2008: Twins Lose Playoff Game, Did Better Than Expected.

The Minnesota Twins ended their season losing a one-game playoff to the Chicago White Sox Tuesday night 1-0, meaning that the Mighty Whities are the American League Central division champions.

It wasn't all that surprising when you think about it. The Twins, with their suspect pitching and light hitting, had won only two games all year at U.S. Cellular Field. And they hadn't played well on the road, period.

Still, the Twins did better than everyone (including, ahem, us) expected, with a lineup that was thrown together on a discount budget. How appropriate that the new ballpark, set to open in 2010, will be known as Target Field.

Elsewhere in baseball . . .

• Yankee Stadium and Shea Stadium in New York had just completed their final seasons, with neither the Yankees or Mets making it into October.
• But the Tampa Bay Rays and Milwaukee Brewers did.
• The biggest flop in baseball this season? Easy. It's the Detroit Tigers, whom everyone thought would roar into the World Series. Instead, they meowed their way to last place in the American League Central.
• No one gives Barry Bonds or Roger Clemens a job.
• The Chicago Cubs will once again find a way to avoid the World Series. One hundred years, and counting.
• Our Series matchup? Boston versus Philadelphia.

The House Flirts With Disaster

The House of Representatives did something on Monday that no foreign army or terrorist organization has managed to do: They came close to damaging the American economy. The Titanic had fewer people deciding its fate before the ship sank.

The House rejected, by a 228-205 margin, a flawed bill that would have bailed out Wall Street's financial behemoths from its own greed and ineptitude to the tune of $700 billion. In response, the Dow Jones industrial average on Monday fell 778 points, the largest drop in recent memory. Another megabank also bit the dust--Citigroup just bought out Wachovia's banking business.

It's all because a few representatives chose to do the right thing for their party and for their re-election, instead of for their country. The vote was along party lines. Democrats had 140 votes for the "rescue" plan, while the Republicans had 133 against.

Those who voted against the bill thought they were sticking it to Wall Street, impressing the constituents back home by not giving the people responsible for this crisis the golden parachutes they really didn't deserve. Well, guess what? Those Masters of the Universe will be getting their money anyway, whether it came from the government or not.

Instead, the "rescue" package was voted down the way other important legislation went by the wayside in the past few years: partisan bickering. Whether it was House Speaker Nancy Pelosi delivering a speech that offended Republicans, an outgoing President who no longer commands support in either party, or grandstanding by presidential candidate John McCain, maybe none of this should have been a surprise.

So what happens now? In lieu of withdrawing your money from banks and hiding them under your mattress along with your porn stash, we wait for lawmakers to come up with a better bill than the one they just defeated. Maybe this time there will be more room for debate. Maybe this time there will be more protections for average citizens than for CEOs. Maybe the economy can be saved after all. (At least Wall Street hopes so. The Dow gained 485 ponts Tuesday.)

Or maybe not.

Round One A Draw

Tonight's presidential debate between Senators Barack Obama and John McCain went on as scheduled at the University of Mississippi, hours after McCain deemed the negotiations on the federal bailout of Wall Street sufficient enough for him to split Washington for awhile.

Was it worth the trouble? The debate turned out to be a dead heat, just like the campaign, with neither candidate saying anything memorable or stupid. They both stuck to their well-worn positions on international policy: I'm the experienced one, and you're the new kid on the block. No, Senator, you and your party's policies have failed the country for the last eight years, and now we want our chance. It was like that.

The economy dominated the first part of the debate, to no one's surprise, given the gravity of the last week and a half. Both men offered up tax cuts as one way to solve the problem. But mostly there was the consensus that something had to be done, and quickly.

What stood out, really, was McCain's condescension toward Obama in terms of his experience and military service. He kept saying "You don't know what it's like", as if he were addressing his son on the ways of the world. Obama is a grown man. He can take care of himself.

After the debate, a telling moment came when the Obama campaign provided vice-presidential candidate Joseph Biden for TV interviews. Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, McCain's running mate, was kept out of sight. Understandable, since Palin came across as an incoherent fool when interviewed by CBS' Katie Couric. But it does not bode well for her debate with Biden Thursday night.

Now McCain and Obama can go back to Washington and help save the country from financial ruin, so that the next time they have a debate, they'll actually have something to talk about.

McCain a No-Show In Yoknapatawpha County?

Senator John McCain thought he was doing the right thing, suspending his campaign for president temporarily, to help work out a bill to bail out Wall Street investment firms' bad business decisions to the tune of $700 billion. The latest example is Washington Mutual, for which the government took over the assets and sold them to JP Morgan.

McCain also asked that Friday's appearance in Oxford, Mississippi with Senator Barack Obama to debate national security issues be postponed. How noble of the Arizona senator, making Obama and the people who run the debates look like fools insisting that the show go on while a national crisis is in progress.

If McCain went through with not showing up, the debate would have to be canceled. No one wants to see Obama debate an empty podium. Also, financial security is on most people's minds these days than national security.

But there are a few flaws in McCain's attempt to look presidential a few weeks before the election.

• Congressional leaders said that, with a deal close to being finalized, neither McCain's nor Obama's presence in Washington was required. They didn't want a preening photo-op with President Bush in the White House to obscure the issue. Well, that's what they got.
• McCain might be putting "Country First" with his focus on the Wall Street crisis. But if he wants to be President, he has to learn how to multitask. Even President Bush knows how to do that.
• Obama is now leading in most polls by as many as 10 points, thanks in part to the economic meltdown.
• After his nationally-televised pledge to suspend the campaign and return to Washington, McCain remained in New York to be interviewed by Katie Couric on CBS, blowing off an appearance on Late Show with David Letterman. We understand Letterman was steamed.

As of right now, there is no agreement among congressional leaders and President Bush to come to the economy's rescue, putting the debate in William Faulkner's home state in jeopardy. All the sound and fury is in Washington, signifying everything.

The Chicken Little Bailout

Congress is being asked to approve a $700 billion plan to bail out those financial firms that made bad loans to people who couldn't (or wouldn't) pay them back, leading to foreclosed homes and massive credit debt. Otherwise, we're told, the sky would fall.

Strange. That's what they told us would happen back in the fall of 2001, when Congress was inundated with bills intended to ramp up the nation's security in the wake of the September 11 attacks. Or when approval was needed to go to war with Iraq in the winter of 2003. Not a lot of thought was put into either of those, as we found to our horror.

The way things look now, in spite of all the wary debate going on in Washington and beyond, the bailout will almost certainly pass without much opposition. Because the Bush administration hasn't given Congress much choice. You either do this, they're saying, or risk a depression.

This economic crisis is not all President Bush's fault, though he has been a huge factor in where we are today (see: the war in Iraq). It's been a bipartisan effort dating back to the Reagan administration (with a brief blip when Clinton balanced the budget), leaving a legacy of government catering more to Wall Street than Main Street.

The proposed bailout would put a crimp into presidential candidates Barack Obama's and John McCain's promises of tax cuts, permanent or otherwise. One of them would have to face a massive deficit when they take office in January.

No matter how this turns out, Wall Street executive will get cushy severance packages totalling in the millions, and financially-strapped taxpayers will be stuck footing the bill without seeing much in return. Just like an old nursery rhyme, it's going to take all the king's horses and all the king's men and women to put this economy back together again.

Emmy Or No Emmy

When the 60th Primetime Emmy Awards began Sunday night after a nice tribute by Oprah Winfrey, the five nominees for best reality show host--Tom Bergeron, Jeff Probst, Howie Mandel, Ryan Seacrest and Heidi Klum--just stood onstage and babbled for what seemed like an eternity, admitting that they really hadn't prepared an opening. Then two of the male nominees proceeded to rip away Klum's tuxedo, revealing a negligee.

Aren't you glad the writers' strike is over?

As for the real business of the evening, the HBO miniseries John Adams won a record 13 Emmys--eight in the previously held Creative Arts awards, and five in the prime time telecast--including outstanding miniseries.

The drama categories went to Brian Cranston for AMC's Breaking Bad as Best Actor, Glenn Close for FX's Damages as Best Actress, and Mad Men for Best Drama.

NBC's 30 Rock won seven Emmys, including two for Tina Fey for writing and for Best Actress, one for Alec Baldwin as Best Actor, and one for Outstanding Comedy.

In one of Fey's acceptance speeches, she told the audience where to find the low-rated 30 Rock in various forms of media, including the show's regular Thursday night slot on NBC. ABC, the network that televised this year's Emmys, must not have been amused.

The Daily Show and The Colbert Report, usually running in tandem on Comedy Central, did the same thing in the comedy/variety category. Colbert won for writing, while Daily Show took home an Emmy for best overall.

It was also a night for nostalgia, with salutes to classic TV shows such as Seinfeld, Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In, and The Mary Tyler Moore Show. Tom Smothers got a writing award for The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour--40 years late (Presenter Steve Martin explained that Smothers originally left his name off when the show's staff won the Emmy, so as to not hurt the then-controversial show's chances). And Don Rickles, still delivering comedic insults at 82, was honored for the HBO special "Mr. Warmth: The Don Rickles Project".

But the Emmy are still capable of doling out questionable awards such as the one Louis J. Horvitz won for directing this year's Academy Awards telecast. Horvitz just happened to be directing this year's Emmy telecast, and made his acceptance speech from the control room. How lame is that?

Oh yes, we did promise to tell you who won for best reality show host. But first, we should tell you that The Amazing Race won the Emmy for outstanding reality-competition show for the sixth straight year. And that Jimmy Kimmel, spoofing the conventions of reality shows, made the audience wait until after the commercial break to reveal the winner.

Get on with it!

OK, if you insist. The award went to Jeff Probst of Survivor.

Now do you understand why the people who make TV either don't own a set, or are too busy to watch it? They're hoping we don't return the favor.

Brother, Can You Spare a Billion?

In the last few weeks, the United States government has become the owner of last resort to financial institutions that went way overboard in providing bad loans and investments to folks who couldn't afford to pay it back, putting the country's economy at risk. Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Bear Stearns, and now American International Group (AIG) have been the beneficiaries.

No such luck for Lehman Brothers, which filed for bankruptcy. Or Merrill Lynch, which quickly sold itself to Bank of America.

(It makes you wonder about the financial health of the local banks--U.S. Bank, Wells Fargo, TCF Bank and others--although we have heard reports that Wells is a candidate to buy out Washington Mutual, another institution on the brink.)

As a result of all this, the markets have rebounded sharply in the last couple of days, but the example has been set. If you're a big corporation and you can't pay your bills, Uncle Sam has the deep pockets to get you out of trouble--even though he's got a deficit problem of his own. To paraphrase Paul Simon, the same courtesy isn't available to the mortal man (or woman).

How is it possible for the American economy to get so screwed up? There are too many people living in homes they can't afford, in hock to credit card providers, and are unable to save because of the rising cost of just about everything. Jobs are either being eliminated or sent overseas. And there's no guarantee Social Security will be there for the millions of Baby Boomers and beyond when they retire, because no politician wants to touch it if they want to get re-elected. Neither presidential candidate has much of a plan at this point to remedy the situation.

A plan is in the works to fund an agency that would deal with with bad bank loans, similar to the one that arose out of the savings and loan scandal of the 1980s. It would cost more, certainly, but the alternative--we're told--might be worse.

According to a USA Today/Gallup Poll, 23 percent of respondents believe the country is now in a depression. We may not be there yet, if you believe the government's unwillingness to call the current crisis a recession. But the days of selling apples on the street, Dust Bowls and people jumping out of buildings might be providing a warning for what's to come. And, a few weeks from now, voters will be deciding whether we're going to get an FDR or a Hoover to lead the country out of tough economic times.