Pillow-Fight on the Right

If John Kerry had only been a Browns fan, he could have connected with the common man.

Comments

[joe]

It got pretty annoying, after 9/11, to listen to conservatives pretending to give a damn about people from the northeast.

It's a lot better now that they've returned to their open, regional contempt.

[Sam Wyche]

You don't live in Cleveland! You live in Cincinatti!

[jf]

Don't make me start tossing snowballs, Wyche.

[That guy in the dynamic cities]

Cleveland Rocks!

[Hakluyt]

The Cleveland airport sucks! 🙂

[chthus]

Are we talking paleo-Browns that wear the purple now, or the neo-Browns that wear the orange?

[joe]

Give it up for Dennis Kucinich, the only presidential candidate who lived in half a split-level in Cleveland!

[Kermit]

Coulda been worse. Coulda been Toledo.

[Herman]

Well, Gore would have been a better Browns fan.

[Phil]

If y'all start busting on Cleveland, I'm going to have to start kicking some asses. Fair warning.

[Ben]

If Kerry had been a Browns fan they would have been worse.

[Cedarburg]

It got pretty annoying, after 9/11, to listen to conservatives pretending to give a damn about people from the northeast.

It's been annoying for the rest of us the listen to Northeasterners weigh in on things out here in flyover country since waaaay before 9/11. Cry me a river.

[mattc]

I think we need a year were everyday "common" folk trade places with the "elitists" that run the government. By "common" I mean low-middle income earners like truck drivers, cooks, nursing aides, janitors, etc.

I wonder how much commotion that would really cause.

[dead_elvis]

If y'all start busting on Cleveland, I'm going to have to start kicking some asses. Fair warning.

Is it ok if we bust on the Browns? And what the hell is a "Brown" anyway? All I can tell so far is that a "Brown" has some mystical power to convey working-class sensibilities upon its worshippers.

[Herman]

But dead_elvis, what can Brown do for you? Or Dennis Kucinich?

[dhex]

"It's been annoying for the rest of us the listen to Northeasterners weigh in on things out here in flyover country since waaaay before 9/11."

it's only fair. we subsidize your dead end lifestyles, trailer park communities and meth mouth extravaganzas. gubmint cheese ain't cheap, you know.

[White Sox Fan]

If y'all start busting on Cleveland, I'm going to have to start kicking some asses. Fair warning.

How'd that last series against the White Sox turn out?

[joe]

Bush's Approval/Disapproval in Ohio? I'm glad you asked! 37/61. That's a -24 net.

[Double H]

Now I'm just a simple former White House assistant counsel...

[smacky]

Is it ok if we bust on the Browns? And what the hell is a "Brown" anyway?

NO, it is not ok for you to bust on the Browns.

If you must know, a "Brown" is a metonymic reference for poop. Hence, the Browns = the Shits.

[JDM]

"And what the hell is a "Brown" anyway?"

Sounds like an in for some plucky liberal arts student somewhere to write a graduate thesis.

[Phil]

s it ok if we bust on the Browns? And what the hell is a "Brown" anyway?

Please do -- I hate that effin' team. (Long story, don't ask.) They're named after Paul Brown, btw.

How'd that last series against the White Sox turn out?

Hahaha.

Number of World Series purposefully lost by cheating White Sox: 1

Number of World Series purposefully lost by Indians: 0

[smacky]

See, I am from Cleveland, so it's ok if I decide to rip on them.

[crimethink]

mattc,

I don't think the truck drivers and cooks running the government and writing books would cause that much commotion.

However, politicians and academics driving trucks and cooking might be a national disaster...

[Ruthless]

Sam Wyche,
Your quoting yourself has fuzzied the point.
Common folk live in Cleveland. Cincinnati is the home of 99.44% pure. In other words, pretty anal. (Or, at least as pretty as anal can be.)

[crimethink]

Phil,

As a Cubs fan, I'd usually give kudos to any Sox-bashers, but bringing up stuff from 86 years ago is kinda silly.

Sort of like in the 2003 playoffs, when commenters noted that the Cubs had lost 13 playoff series in a row -- of course, what they didn't point out was that 10 of them were World Series before 1945...

[smacky]

Common folk live in Cleveland.

Hey, fuck off, Ruthless. Where are you from, Arcadia? 🙂

[chthus]

Here's what a Brown looks like.

As for making fun of them, as you can see, there's really no need.

[joe]

Politicians cooking. *shudder*

[Phil]

crimethink: Our last championship was in 1948. The Black Sox is pretty much all I've got here.

[dhex]

"Politicians cooking. *shudder*"

heh, they come to the table covered in food, remains and scraps caked around their mouths, and tell their guests to fight over who gets to lick the spoon.

[Phil]

Wait -- I also have some video somewhere of Ozzie Guillen with his finger jammed up his nose to the second knuckle during a game. Let me see if I can find it.

[Ruthless]

smacky,
As Martha would say, "common" is a good thing. At least for purposes of this thread.

Uncommon dude that I am, I live in the Elysian Killing Fields of Over-the-Rhinistan of Sinincincinnati.

[ChrisO]

Funny, the Cleveland Commoners and the Atlantic Elitists all get savagely reamed by the government.

Cleveland: local taxpayers bilked for two publicly funded sports stadiums (stadia?) to support perennial losers, though at least the Browns have been champions within living memory.

Boston: every taxpayer in America bilked to pay for the Big Dig, the most egregious public works project since the Great Pyramid. Local taxpayers also pay for Joe to spend his workday posting on H&R.

Washington: working hard to catch up to Boston with the Springfield Interchange project and the installation of jersey barriers on every fookin' sidewalk, just in case someone actually finds it worthwhile to terrorize the plush-bottomed bureaucrats and lobbyists who work so hard to waste our tax dollars.

New York: too much reaming of taxpayers to list here. At least they turned the Jets down. Maybe there's hope yet...

[Rick Barton]

Browns? A thread featuring the Browns? Would it be inconsiderate of me to bring up this one name at this time...

JOHN ELWAY!!!

Ha Haa!!

[Ricky]

How is throwing the World Series cheating? It's not like they broke any rules. They just let the other team win.

[ChrisO]

Funny, the Cleveland Commoners and the Atlantic Elitists all get savagely reamed by the government.

Cleveland: local taxpayers bilked for two publicly funded sports stadiums (stadia?) to support perennial losers, though at least the Browns have been champions within living memory.

Boston: every taxpayer in America bilked to pay for the Big Dig, the most egregious public works project since the Great Pyramid. Local taxpayers also pay for Joe to spend his workday posting on H&R.

Washington: working hard to catch up to Boston with the Springfield Interchange project and the installation of jersey barriers on every fookin' sidewalk, just in case someone actually finds it worthwhile to terrorize the plush-bottomed bureaucrats and lobbyists who work so hard to waste our tax dollars.

New York: too much reaming of taxpayers to list here. At least they turned the Jets down. Maybe there's hope yet...

[ChrisO]

My post was so profound I posted it twice... 😛

[smacky]

ChrisO,

Nothing that is said about the Browns can possibly be profound.

[Phil]

Cleveland: local taxpayers bilked for two publicly funded sports stadiums (stadia?) to support perennial losers, though at least the Browns have been champions within living memory.

Umm . . . the Browns have not held a division or conference title since 1989. The Indians were Division champions in 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999 and 2001, and American League champions in 1995 and 1997. If you're one of those people who thinks those things are meaningless, you've never watched the draft or had to worry about home-field advantage.

You're right about the stadium-bilking, though.

Ricky, if you don't understand why accepting money to purposefully let the other team win, in order to benefit oddsmakers, is cheating, I don't think I can explain it to you.

[Happy Jack]

Axis of Elitism

And here I thought "liberal" was the word for evil incarnate.

Cincinnati is the home of 99.44% pure.

Only if they shut down the bridges to Covington and Newport.

[ChrisO]

Umm . . . the Browns have not held a division or conference title since 1989. The Indians were Division champions in 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999 and 2001, and American League champions in 1995 and 1997. If you're one of those people who thinks those things are meaningless, you've never watched the draft or had to worry about home-field advantage.

I guess I meant 'real' champions, not division or conference champions. The Browns last won the NFL championship in 1964, while the Indians haven't won the World Series since 1948, correct?

Either way, the taxpayers have been the real losers.

[Rick Barton]

Maarrty Maarrty Maarrty...

(just reliving Mile High Stadium memories)

[JD]

Hey, wait a minute - what's with that quip about Covington? My family's from Covington. (Or Fort Mitchell, really, but nobody knows what you're talking about when you say Fort Mitchell.)

[smacky]

JD,

And some of us aren't brunettes or redheads here. That's karma biting you in the ass. 🙂

[Johnny Clarke]

And I'd always thought the Browns were some species of alien, like the Greys. Glad ya'll cleared that up for me. So, where is this "Cleveland" place, anyway?

[Rick Barton]

No WASP aristocrat has ever pulled rank on me without seeming ridiculous, and none has put me on the defensive for being who I am.

Which reminds me of a WASP joke. These two WASPS had been meeting for years on Saturday afternoons to play chess...

WASP 1: "We've been meeting to play chess for three years and you've never once asked me how my wife is doing or how my kids are doing"

WASP 2: "I'm sorry. So how are your wife and kids doing?"

WASP 1: "Fine"

[drf]

Rick.

ow. that hurts still. (but I respect Elway more than probably any other quarterback of my lifetime). fumble. "the shot". sigh. snif.

Whitesoxfan: i bet you think that the sox never get media coverage in chicago, too. don't turn into a chest thumping asshole redsox jackoff type of fan. sheesh. it's great for chicago. the sun times has bigger circulation than the trib. Espn has more sports listeners than WGN, etc. etc. etc.

you see, others, chisox fans have this danish style inferiority complex. it's not that there are that many die hard fans, like they'd have you believe. they just play this card to contrast the bitchy-jetta-driving-cell-phone-yapping denizons of wrigley. i've been to Comiskey and now the cell, and think: state fair crowd. wife beaters, etc. it's the same as people liking dubyah because he's "not an intellectual" (*I believe he is much much smarter than 1) he likes to play and 2) than kerry)

Reinsdorf, in his moment of triumph - a victory that is AMAZING for baseball - mentions the cubs.

STOP IT!

the sox deserve major respect for how they played this year. it is beautiful baseball. it is good for chicago. it is good for baseball. The match up with St Louis would be fantastic. It is exciting, great baseball. And the Sox get to raise their banners. They were not really in danger of losing the title. Cleveland played awesome ball down the stretch but 1) it wasn't sustainable and 2) too long ball dependent. It would have been a sports tragedy to have such great ball lose like that.

Good Luck Sox! You've EARNED this. Now take it! Much respect to the TEAM. And enjoy the season and more success! (I'll sit by and be happy for chicago and the AL Central and raise a glass. It's the White Soxs' Time. YOU EARNED IT!)

drf
(raised an Indians and Cubbies fan)

[Shem]

American League champions in 1995

Yeah, I remember that. After we in Seattle went to all the trouble of stealing the Yankee's lunch money in the ALDS, you guys came along and stole ours. You guys deserve the Browns.

[drf]

100-44 in 1995.

the indians cleaned up - not winning the ALCS woulda been a huge upset. almost as bad as the tribe's choke in 1954...

what about the boz... denver fans would say that seattle deserved him. man, tho, that steve largent was amazing.....

[Shem]

drf-Yeah, but you guys would have had a much harder time with the Yankees than we did. You can't have gone better than 50/50 against them, whereas the 1995 Mariners were some sort of magnificent Yankee-killing machine. We shold have done better against the Indians too, but choking is what we do best.

The Seattle Seahawks are why I love football. My uncle and I made a bet every year from 1993 to 2004; I said that the Seahawks wouldn't go better than 8-8 in the year. I lost only three times in 11 years. The beautiful thing was nearly every year there was some reason to believe in a good season, but every year they found some way to screw it up.

[Jason Sonenshein]

I live in Cleveland, but I'm a Hamilton Tiger-Cats fan. Does that make me an elitist?

The Cleveland airport sucks! 🙂

I know, you libertarians think all municipal airports suck, but I've found Cleveland Hopkins Int'l Airport to be about as pleasant as an airport can be. The parking is convenient. I've never had to wait long to check in or to get through security. Everyone says that the fares are lower at Akron-Canton, but the few times I've had occasion to fly, I didn't find any deals there that justified driving all the way to Stark County.

[James Kabala]

Is there really any professional team whose fan base isn't primarily working-class? Even in the evil land of Bos-Wash, I would say that most teams have their most devoted followers among the non-elite.