Coupla Things...

* I've spoken before about my use of Netflix, and how I'm an unabashed fan of the service. Well Kyle recently got me a subscription to GameFly, which is the video game equivelent of Netflix. It was a two month membership, and I used mine from December to February.

I was not impressed.

Gamefly has several problems. First, they only have 2 or 3 distribution centers in the country, and so getting games takes too much time: a 6-7 day turnaround (3 days to receive the game; 1 day to process; 3 days for it to get back) was not uncommon at all. Coming from Netflix that has a 2-3 day turnaround, this was EXTREMELY frustrating. Also, the game availability was not nearl as diverse as it implies on the commercials. On more than one occasion--and remember, more than one occasion in 2 months when it takes a week to get a new game is a BAD percentage--the next game I was sent was the fourth of fifth game on my queue, not my first, second, or even third selection. Also, I was surprised by the lack of older popular games. For example, I signed up to get Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliances 2, which--while old--was one of both the Playstion 2 & XBox's most popular games. No dice.

So let me get this straight. You don't have enough titles of the brand new games (Mass Effect, Call of Duty 4, Conan), and you don't have enough of the old popular titles (BGDA2)...so what, exactly, do you have? The POS games that no one ever wanted? Wow, that's a great service!

Finally, the price was very disappointing as well. Their commercials advertise them as starting at $6.95 to $8.95. Of course that's going to be the cheapest offer that no one really wants. However, my "2 Movies at a time Unlimited trades a month" for Netflix is a very reasonable $15. The same deal from Gamefly? $24!

In conclusion, F Gamefly. It's an overpriced, slow service that does not have nearly enough inventory.

* Okay, it's time to go political. And obviously we're going to talk about the Dem's, since the Republican primary is over with (shame on you Mike Huckabee for continuing to run and wasting all of our time.)

I've found the last few weeks of the Clinton/Obama race amusing, for several reasons. First and foremost, I love the fact that its not Hilary's political views that have killed her chances, but the fact that she is such a monumental, evil bitch.

About a month ago, I went to my favorite place--wikipedia--and read up on all four candidates (Obama, Clinton, Romney, McCain--obviously this is before Rom dropped) stances on the various issues. Two things surprised me: 1) As much as I liked Obama and like the idea of him being president, I really didn't agree with many of his issues, and 2) to my great shame, I was surprised at how often Hillary and I agreed on issues. She really is far more conservative than she'd like people to realize.

Did this convince me to vote for her? Hell no. I've always been anti-Hillary because I think she's an evil, power hungry bitch. She's the type of person who would sell out her daughter in a heartbeat if she thought she could get away with it and it would gain her some votes. Most Democrats out there claim that Dick Cheney--I probably spelled his name wrong there, and I don't care--is evil incarnate, and I agree with you. However, if you consider him that, you have to look at Hilary the same way. She's the same person, just on the left side. Those of us in the middle, thinking rationally, can see that.

So anyway, I found it so fitting that what ended her chance at the presidency was going "negative"--meaning being a bitch--to Obama in South Carolina. She and Bill both went negative before that primary, it offended the people of SC who were on the fence, they voted for Obama in droves in what was supposed to be a tight race, she and Bill both admitted afterwards that they made a mistake by going negative, and that as they say is that. The damage was done, people in the middle got their suspicions of who she truly was confirmed, and Obama jumped out to a lead.

The irony is, in the position she is in now, she needs to be who she is--an aggressive, no holds bared, winner-take-all-I'm-fighting-for-my-life-and-I-don't-care-who-I-offend bitch, but she can't do that now since she already played that card and it backfired so badly on her. When you're trailing this late in an election, you have to come out "with your guns blazing" as the political pundits like to say, but she hasn't been able to do that in the last few debates. Anytime she started to make aggressive moves, Obama slapped her down with his position: "let's stick to the issues, I'm not lowering myself to dirty politics", and she hasn't been able to pursue it because she's smart enough to know how badly she will look.

So it's all over for Clinton. She has to play nice at a time when she should be playing mean, because she played mean too early and it cost her. With evil's own weapons are its plans undone.

Obama will win Texas. Dallas & Houston will vote overwhelmingly for Obama, Austin will be about even (I suspect a slight edge to Obama, but that could be the homer in me talking), and South and West Texas will vote for Clinton--but it won't be enough. East Texas will try to vote for Ron Paul (seriously, these people are CRAZY about Ron Paul. They love the guy...which is beyong frightening) even though he's not a Democrat.

Without Texas, Hillary is done. And then we move on to McCain/Obama, which, I must say, is the first time I've been pleasently excited about a Presidential race in my lifetime.

* I've got bad news for everyone out there trying to say the economy is fine: when Warren Buffett says you're in a Recession, I've got news for you, you're in a fucking recession. End of story. This is why Buffett is such a genius: does he have plenty of statistical data to back up his claim? Of course he does. But does he bring that up? Hell no. He just says, "Hey people, use some fucking common sense! Open your eyes and take a look around you!" You've got to love that guy.

* Speaking of Recession, is it too early to nominate Bernanke as the worst Fed Chairman ever? Can you please stop kissing the Republican's asses and do what's best for the American Economy, instead of trying to stick your fingers in the dam as more and more holes pop up while claiming that everything's okay?

And no, this isn't a ringing endorsement on Greenspan, either. Anyone with halfass good sense the collapse of the subprime housing market was inevitable, and Greenspan never did anything to curtail that. Shame on you, sir.

* I watched a pretty cool movie last night: The 9ines. It's a very surreal flick where you're really wondering, "Wait, what exactly is going on here..." until the end. It was at theatres for about 5 minutes, and there was so little pub on it that you really don't know where it's going until the end. I won't say anything else about it because I want you to go into it with as clean of a slate as I did. Enjoy.

* So I've really been torn lately on a very scary issue. The question is pretty simple:

If I were in college right now, would I bring a gun to class?

Sadly, I think we've reached the point where the answer is yes. I would carry a gun to every class I went to.

Look, we've got a problem here people. The latest shooting at NIU didn't even generate that much of a media frenzy. That's how commonplace shootings at colleges are becoming: it's not that big of a deal anymore. That fact is something that is so frightening that the general public, and more importantly, universities in charge of security, have not come to grasp yet.

Something must be done, because it is simply not safe for college kids to go to class anymore. So we have one of two options: 1) universities drastically stepping up security, which I would say as a minimum means 2-3 armed guards on each floor of each major campus building--yeah, I don't see that happening anytime soon, either--or 2) allowing students to bring firearms to class so they have the means to defend themselves in case another nutfuck goes on a shooting spree.

It's one or the other, because frankly people, the way things are being done right now are not getting the job done.

It's sad that this is what it's come to.

* Finally, of course, some Mavs talk.

I'm very pleased with the post-Kidd fallout. Damp is becoming a productive player. Stackhouse is slashing to the basket more. Most importantly, Dirk has been revitalized--playing with the anger/chip on his shoulder that led the Mavs to the Finals two years ago, taking the ball to the basket, bringing back the German sneer. It's been great to see his change in play from Day 1.

I've been very pleased with the Mavs performances. They've done everything that one could hope from them--except win.

Yeah. That minor detail. Look, I've long said that this is the big danger of midseason trades--it takes a while for teams to gel, to get on the same page, to mesh together. This isn't unusual, and is to be expected. The problem is, as competitive as the West is, NO ONE has time to go through a slump like that. I've been very impressed with the Mavs play in the Spurs--barring Avery's idiocy, but we'll get to that in a minute--and Lakers games recently. There was no shame in either of those losses, and frankly, to see the team playing this well together already was very encouraging.

But in a year this tight, you gotta get the W. It's simple math. The Mavs area already almost locked out of a top 4 seed, and the games against Utah and Houston this week--both of which are great teams--are now must-win affairs.

The good news is, this is truly baptism by fire, and is without quesiton preparing the Mavs for the playoffs with this intense of a regular season. They just have to make sure they get to the postseason first.

Win guys. Win.

As for Avery...

Here are the traits that make for a great coach, in no particular order: 1) Coaches to his players strengths, and not to a particular system (the anti-square peg in round hole approach, as I like to think of it), 2) Commands his players respect, 3) Is a calming influence when times everyone else is freaked out, and 4) Doesn't overcoach.

That's it. It's nice to be good at X's & O's, of course, and it's nice to focus on the details and improve individual statistics. However, those are the good traits any coach in the modern era must have, especially when coaching professionals.

Now let's look at Avery. He's always done a good job at 1. He's NEVER done a good job at 3, and never will. In the past, he's done 2, and has done a little bit of 4, but not enough to hurt you.

Today, however, he's doing an okay job at 1. He's lost #2 from the start of the season, when it was obvious by the Mavs terrible D that his players had tuned him out. He's still absolutely terrible at 3, which his T during the SA game proved without a shadow of a doubt (that T, to me, was a borderline fireable offense). The fact that he's benched Kidd and is still calling out plays like he did with Devin Harris, however, shows he's guilty of 4.

This is not good.

I'm not calling for Avery's head yet. But his performance this season has been poor, at best, and so far it has not improved. The Mavs will not win a championship this year. However, if they don't make significant improvement in the playoffs--a first round win against a non-elite team, and a tough 6 to 7 game loss with no blowouts to an elite team--then I would say Avery needs to go. Remember, this thing has about a two year shelf life after this year. We don't have time to sit around and hope Avery learns the nuances to being a good coach.

The future is next year. Period.

GO MAVS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!