Sunday Morning Coming Down

The President of the United States will not be attending Justice Scalia's funeral on Saturday for any number of reasons.  Will it look good if he is found on the golf course during the service?  No. Would it look good if he was assigned no role in the service. Not really. Is it possible that the funeral has taken on some political connotation which makes it really a no win situation if he did attend the service. Probably. After all, the President is attending the public ceremony at the Supreme Court on Friday.

In my world, for the time being, horse racing at Hialeah Park is important.  In about three weeks, the carnival which is quarter horse racing at Hialeah Park will move on to other venues. Meanwhile the State of Florida will be deciding whether or not to decouple slot machines and poker from horse racing.  The experiment in expanding gaming began by establishing a state run lottery to support education.  About $1.4 billion is pointed towards education after prizes and administrative expenses are deducted. In another attempt to have taxes paid voluntarily. Miami Dade County and Broward County voted to allow slot machines at existing tracks and jai alai frontons.  The expansion of gambling was sold in no small measure as a way to maintain jobs in the pari mutual industry and fund state government through taxing the profits of slot machines and indirectly controlling the the spread of gambling which was expanding at Indian casinos. Times change, not many people go ...

President Obama is going to visit Cuba, he will be arriving on March 21, 2016.  Maybe the President has tickets to the Rolling Stones concert on March 22, 2016.  The Tampa Bay Rays will be playing the Cuban National Team in Havana.  Who will be throwing out that first pitch? The visit is the first by a sitting U.S. president in almost 90 years.  Meanwhile, local Cuban politicians are denouncing the trip, ostensibly because the Cuban government hasn't made much progress in allowing more political freedom on the island. Calvin Coolidge was the last sitting president to visit the island.  Former President Jimmy Carter has visited the island twice since leaving office. The response of the local politicos is just so Miami.  But change is in the air.  More Internet, more direct flights, and soon, more people from the U.S. and even Miami will be visiting Cuba.

Yes, the President has the right to appoint a new Supreme Court Justice. The Senate also has the right to approve or disapprove a new Supreme Court Justice. The Senate approves all appointments of federal judges. It would seem reasonable that President Obama should be able to appoint a Justice to succeed Justice Scalia.  He has been successful in getting approval for Justice Sotomayor and Justice Kagan.  However, both of these appointments were approved by a Senate that had a Democratic Majority.  This seems to be what the Constitution expects to happen when judicial vacancies occur. It's an election year and the Republicans control the Senate.  I doubt President Obama would appoint anybody as conservative as Justice Scalia. If there were a Republican in the White House and the Senate was controlled by the Democrats there would be a similar impasse. It is overwhelmingly likely that any proposed appointee would delayed.  This tit for tat behavior seems to be ...

Lately, I have been quite interested in winning a particular bet at the race track in Hialeah. Yesterday, somebody won about $142,000 by being the only person  with a ticket that picked the all the winners in the last six races at Hialeah Park. All the numbers were covered in the last race. There would be a winner. The bet is sort of like a lottery bet because of the really large number of possible combinations that could win but giving the illusion if you were skillful and a little bit lucky, a 20 cent wager might be able to payoff big time. Each day the pool grew larger.  If there wasn't a single winner with six winners, 40% of the pool of wagers is paid out to all the winning tickets with six winners.  If nobody picks six, you are paid for picking five winners. The rest of the money is carried over to the next day.  Very lottery like.  As the pool grows more and more people play more money, more people pick six winners.  It can get expensive to cover...

Only in Miami might be the first comment.  Secondly, that is a gutsy move. Third, what are they thinking? Feeling   the Bern isn't just a political catch phrase in Miami any more. Lakatriona Brunson was named the new head football coach for Miami Jackson High School on Monday. Lakatriona, a physical education teacher at Jackson is the featured cast member “Bernice” in South Beach Towing, a “reality show” featured on the Tru Network. According to reports she is the first female high school head football coach in Florida. The Jackson Generals went all celebrity by hiring Luther Campbell who was the head of 2 Live Crew back in the 1980’s.   Campbell has recently been a defensive coordinator at Miami Central, Miami Northwestern, and Miami Norland High Schools. This may not just be a cheap publicity stunt.   Ms Brunson has been played football in a women’s league and was a member of the track team while at Northwestern High School.   Uncle Luke...

A female candidate for President of the United States has already been a FLOTUS.  If that wasn't enough she has also been a Senator from the great state of New York and the Secretary of State. She has a daughter, she is a relatively new grandmother.  She is part of a foundation that has influence on a worldwide basis. She has a husband that has been the Governor of Arkansas and President of the United States.  His time in office has been looked at as the best of times by some and worst of times by others.  She stood by her man, when that wasn't easy. She's been active in health care reform, children's issues, foreign policies, and the fight against terrorism while in the Senate. The eyes have always been on the prize or The White House. She ran a strong but ultimately failing campaign for the Presidency.  She became a member of the current President's cabinet. As Secretary of State she has tried to emphasize diplomacy over military action.  Not s...

The Clintons might have been populists when they were in Arkansas but that dog stopped hunting. The chickens are coming home.  Nobody I know has a net worth of $80 million dollars.  Nobody I know is able to give speeches worth $60,000 for an hour.  All this crap about about being broke and having big legal bills when they left the White House is just crap. At some point folks that live in the public eye need to step back and really review their lives.  Where do Bill and Hil get the idea that their wealth shouldn't be looked at with a fish eye. Does anyone really believe the GOP won't be stirring this issue up should the Clintons get a third term.

This is a true story about a military escort who brings a young soldier who was killed in Iraq, home to be buried. This movie gave me a lot to think about. Most of us are very far away from this issue.

I'm glad most people that go to the race track do it for an afternoon's entertainment.  It is a good show, the horses are pretty, Hialeah Park is pretty, it is an interesting place to watch people and it can be reasonable, many places offer free entry and free parking.  You don't have to buy anything but it usually doesn't happen that way.  You start out with a plan and then go a little crazy. I know folks who are looking forward to the dark days of Tuesday and Wednesday.  The track is closed but stalls still need to be cleaned twice, the sheets need to be changed (new shavings in the stalls), the feed buckets need to be filled and the water buckets dumped and refilled before dawn.  Almost all the horses will leave their stalls for a time on the mechanical walkers, after which there feet will be washed inspected.  Others may have poultices applied to their legs.  Hay is distributed.  What you cleaned from the stalls is shoveled into the wheelbar...

"I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody, and I wouldn't lose any voters, OK?" Trump remarked at a campaign stop at Dordt College in Sioux Center, Iowa. "It's, like, incredible." The businessman, whose Trump Tower stands on the major Manhattan thoroughfare, cracked the joke Saturday to a receptive audience at the Christian college.  It was reported by NPR.  And the walk back has been maybe he could have said it differently. This is getting a little scary.  Our political candidates are being fed to us like fictional characters.  We know what they look like, we can listen to their speeches, we can listen to what others report, and if we are lucky we can review their record in public office.  But it has been reported that they spend a great deal of time dialing for dollars or making speeches for cash Modern marketing, polling, and focus groups have the voters so sliced and diced that the pollsters probably know more about us th...

Fugue for Tin Horns from Guys and Dolls Happy Rabbit x 3 "I got a horse right here his name is Paul Revere And here's a guy that says that if all weather's clear, Can do, can do, this guy says the horse can do." At the bar on Sunday the conversation went kind of like this: I think I'm gong to take .... off.  Raul was by the barn this morning and he wants to ride "Uno". Raul Gutierrez would be a late jockey change.  The track handicapper speaks kindly of the horse and the trainer.  The potential new jock is on a hot streak. The horse's last out was good and he is possibly getting some class relief.  I wonder how many times a variation of this conversation have taken place between an owner an a trainer.  The horse is finally feeling good.  I keep entering him in races and they never fill, this time we at least got the right distance.  The horse is in a tough race but I think we can hit the board The horse is ...