Centerfield

Terrorism: Judge Posner says "More of Same, Please?"

UPDATE:Deleted because, as Max pointed out, I just read the press version, which could easily be skewed rather far from fairness.

Waiting: What The Best Way To Line It Up?

There's a blog-thingie about lines going on. The question is, what's the best way to feed lines into something like a bunch of checkout linse. Interestingly for where the conversation began, the Corporate HQ Whole Foods' doesn't have the single line talked about, except for a special thing in the takeout section.

The ultimate Big Line I've seen in Austin is at Fry's Electronics. They very much have it down. I'm reimpressed every time I go.

A couple of comments on Tyler Cowen's blog about it, One Line To Rule Them All:

I've never seen a good study of when single lines are to be preferred.

I have, in my Computer Performance class, but I've long since forgotten it ;-) All I remember is that the answer is one line in most cases. One exception, I think, involves the case where some people wait in the feeder line for particular individual lines, gumming up the queue for everybody else. There may be other exceptions for some kind of feedback between lines. The above-mentioned Fry's doesn't let any of those kinds of hangups happen, of course.

. . . he always said it didn't matter which lane you chose, your average expected waiting time would be the same, and this was according to the efficient markets hypothesis.

It's definitely true that it doesn't much if you take subways, busses, or drive in N YC (or even walk, if it's close enough). It always comes to a mean of 50-60 minutes. Spooky.

Perpetual Open-Thread Motion

Embrace it. You know you want to.

It's Dead, Jim

46-53, immigration bill goes down in defeat

The bipartisan coalition that had shepherded the measure through so many obstacles failed to get the 60 votes necessary to end debate. The final vote was 46-53

Until Thursday morning, it was unclear whether the bill would survive the cloture vote. But in the end, opponents of the measure from both sides of the political spectrum gained enough support to derail the legislation. Liberals felt it did not go far enough in protecting illegal immigrants, while conservatives rejected the bill because they felt it would grant amnesty to the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants in the country.

Republican foes of the measure argued that the American public was broadly united in opposition to the bill and had made its views known by flooding Congress with phone calls and e-mails.

“What part of ‘no’ don’t we understand?,” asked Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.), who said the immigration fight had “reengaged the American people.”

Would the CIA have Funded the American Revolution?

If Ben Franklin or John Adams had delivered a proposal for supporting the Continental Congress to the CIA, here's what I think what would've happened, based on its lifetime performance: their request for support would've been denied. They would've been directed to redraft it as a request for pampheteering support. THAT proposal would've gone through. Instead, to oppose British tyranny, they would've chosen to support the Native American tribes looking meanest and nastiest in the office, just like the British did to us.

I can't think of any time in the last century when the US govt has supported DEMOCRATIC revolutionaries. There've been a time or two, maybe, when revolutionaries told a convenient lie about wanting democracy, but if they believed that from the Nicaraguan Contras, they were utterly uninterested in the truth (yes - in Nicaragua at that time, there were groups interested in democratic revolution).

The last example I can think of was the Panamanian revolutionaries, just over a century ago. That's hardly a comforting example, since it was pretty ethically casual - they were supported so TR could get a good deal on rights to build the Panama Canal. But at least they were democratic! Can you think of any more recent examples? No, the Northern Alliance were hardly democratic until AFTER they took over and got gobs of money to be democratic.

We've supported the restorations of toppled democratic governments, and kept democratic governments in power. But when it came to supporting revolutionaries, we've strictly supported multiple, undemocratic scum as far as I can think of and have read.

Every part of the CIA's strategy is wrong. First, a democratic group is better because they can bring the people on their side, giving you a much better hope of winning, the people of the country involved will like you instead of being annoyed, and the resulting regime will work much better with us and our alies.

Second, you need to support just ONE or at most two such groups, because, let's face it, this is a MILITARY struggle, and wars are won by having the mostest get there the firstest; that's alot harder to arrange if your money is going to lots of little groups instead of one big, popular, revolutionary group.

Third, the unethical have big disadvaantages in revolutions. Washington had the people on his side, won and established the first succesful democratic revolution in millenia because his soldiers and then his people rightly trusted him to not become just another king.

Jefferson's aid to Simon Bolivar paid many dividends over the years. So why don't we do it anymore?

This grumble was inspired by this post at Daniel Drezner's blog.

A U.S. View of Islam in 1946

The Moderate Voice has an intriguing (if long, you've been warned) article that includes a military intelligence review of Islam from 1946. It's strikingly similar to what a document today would say, and to what thoughtful media and bloggers have said. There are also good comments on the post.

But, of course, that's a big part of the problem we're seeing: the biggest thing that's changing is terrorist striking power as individual deadliness continues its long pattern of increase. Well, OK, and, also, many more Muslims outside the Middle East are under much better governments.

The Soviets are, of course, another big change. It's interesting that they were a major funding source and that the Muslim terrorists have also changed pattern to start striking at us and other Western European countries MORE. Were they restraining terrorists they supported? Except, they supported the IRA, which would seem to contradict that idea.

I'm tempted to suggest things have mostly been the same there since the similarly-timed rise of oil as a strategic energy commodity and the end of the Ottomans, except that I'm too lazy to look up if I'm right.

The Ever-renewing Friday Slacker Thread

You know what it is. You know why it's here.

Crisis of Confidence in Congress?

Mark Tapscott blogged about a crisis of public confidence in DC politicians, as indicated by some pretty bad poll numbers for Congress. Of course, the article IMHO is rather indicative of why we have a real crisis of confidence in the media class - he of course spins bad Congressional polls to mean a crisis in "America's Political Class". Plus, I don't think the word crisis means what he thinks it means.

That said, I certainly do feel pretty unhappy about Congress, remarkable since it's now a (D) Congress. And, apparently I have plenty of company.

My grumble is that the posturing/leadership ratio is very, very low. Did we elect them to be actors or politicians? But I'm not sure why this particular Congress is so bad. Thoughts?

So, whaddya think? Do you feel the same way? Why? What's annoying you most?

Curiouser and Curiouser

Mixed reaction to Clinton blaming Iraqis

Democratic presidential contender Sen. Hillary Clinton got a decidedly mixed reaction Wednesday morning at the Take Back America conference in Washington when she blamed the Iraqi government for the chaos in that country.

“The American military has done its job. Look at what they accomplished: they got rid of Saddam Hussein, they gave the Iraqis a chance for free and fair elections…. The American military has succeeded. It is the Iraqi government which has failed to make the tough decisions,” she declared.

This sparked a raucous reaction in the crowd of mostly self-proclaimed progressives, with much booing and heckling, and Clinton’s sign-toting supporters cheering.

Pretty curious. If there's one thing I hear over and over about Hillary Clinton, it's that she's an opportunist who'll say or do anything to gain the Presidency. So it's hard for me to cipher why she stubbornly refuses to just preach to the choir when it comes to Iraq. It's almost as though she isn't willing to just tell progressives what they want to hear in order to win the democratic nomination for 2008.

I'm sure her detractors will rush in to say she's so cagey and crafty that she's setting the stage for the general election. Maybe so, but given the zeal with which her critics on the right disparage her, it's hard to imagine she'd be stupid enough to think she could change many minds within the ranks of the right.

Seems to me the best explanation is that Clinton plans, if elected President, to offer the Iraqi government and its people a "sh!+ or get off the pot" choice. Unrealistic or unfair? Maybe, but I've heard much worse ideas elsewhere.

Juneteenth Post: The Problem With Reconstruction

In honor of Juneteenth, I dusted off and reconstructed a half-done Reconstruction grumble. A few months ago, I was grumpily reading some praise of Reconstruction.

Oh, what's Juneteenth? On June 19th, 1865, US General Gordon Granger landed in Galveston, Texas, proclaimed the restoration of US authority, and proclaimed that, per the Emancipation Proclamation, which the slaves hadn't been told about, they were free. Great excuse to party, I and many other Texans of all races say. That was also the day R

To me, Reconstruction was a sad time in American history. My strongly pro-Unionist view doesn't keep me from feeling that.

The problem with Reconstruction was that it had a phase that was revenge, not reconstruction. Martial law was briefly reimposed. Plenty of people who were (mostly) cooperating were deprived of rights to vote and to office. Many popularly elected Congressmen weren't allowed to sit because they had fought or helped on the rebel side. Many of the infamous carpetbaggers were given office, easily available becaue the rebel disqualification took most of the experienced politicians out of the running. On the one hand, most of said politicians were racist with a particular hatred of blacks; on the other hand, they could administer a state with a corruption level no more than that common to the age. It may look like a sort of rough justice, but it was no basis to found a democratic South on. It's no surprise that there was such broad rebellion against it. It spawned the KKK and turned it into a horribly popular group.

Reconstruction was carried on along reasonable terms, more or less, until Congress revolted from Andrew Johnson's querelous hand and passed the first few Reconstruction Acts in March 1867, over Johnson's veto. They included a restoration of the martial law that had been ended earlier, forced rerewritings of state constitutions, and the above-mentioned disenfranchisement. The excuse was disenfranchisement and unfair laws against Blacks, two conditions also present in all but 2-3 Union states. This phase lasted until voters grew sick of it in 1872

In Texas, the case I've read the most about, the freed slaves ran a terribly corrupt government, that did what it wanted to the whiteys regardless of constitutional limitations.

Texans're still suffering from the fallout today(!). One long-lived result was the infamous Solid South - the South rebelled, and refused to vote GOP for a century. One-party democracies are never as healthy as two-party ones. The bit we suffer from today is that, shortly or two after Federal interence stopped, most of the South tore up largely well-drafted state Constitutions and replaced them with stupid reactionary ones that gave the state no power atall. Texas' Constitution is pretty useless, because 1/3 of the normal business of the State requires constitutional amendments. Two recent amendments involved allowing vineyards to sell certain places and Texas school financing. They're needed about every two years.

If Lincoln had lived, he would never would have allowed that to happen. His priority for the postwar South was to find a mechanism to speed Southern centrists back to seeing themselves as US citizens rather than rebels. During the war, he was always looking for ways to cement the border states on his side and to appeal to centrists in states under Union occupation. He evolved, for example, a 10% plan for occupied states to try and get a pro-Union electorate that anybody could join by taking an oath to Union. It was only marginally effective during the war, but it could potentially have been much more effective after the war if something like that had been tried.

It's ironic that his assassin leaned Confederate, since he doomed the states he sympathized with to all that has happened.

Now, I have to sadly admit that this probably would've improved only white governance; the blacks would've been maltreated in any scenario. I can only see only one likely improvement: that there would've been no KKK and instead some much weaker movement. So the enforcement behind Jim Crow wouldn't've been as deadly. More Southerners would've been against Jim Crow when it fell, but by no means the majority needed to overturn them.

Some think it was worth it just to get black Congressional reps; I think the democracy is supposed to be about the people, not the reps,

Recommended Reading: Carl Sandburg's Abe Lincoln, TF Fehrenbach's Lone Star: A History of Texas and The Texans

Bloomberg Bridging the Political Divide

A movement is born. Check out the long list of centrist speaker biographies, yet Mayor Mike seems to be getting the most hype.

Said Mayor Bloomberg last night:

"When you go to Washington these days, you can feel a sense of fear in the air, the fear to do anything or say anything that might affect the polls or give the other side the advantage or offend a special interest group... The federal government isn't out front -- it's cowering in the back of the room.''

I'm with Obama, but am going to have a hard time not supporting a Bloomberg candidacy if Hillary or any of the Republicans get the nomination of their party... and he chooses to run of course. A lot is to be learned, and Mike has got the luxury of waiting until the last possible minute to jump in the ring, which means the focus isn't really on him. However, with Congress and the President in the 30's one would think this would be the year that an Independent candidate could, if not win, make a major dent and prove an important point.

With this kind of media, as well as this and this, maybe Bloomberg is the right man, right time. Then again, maybe my complete boredom with any candidate who isn't named Barack is leading me down the path of wishful thinking.

Check out the issues page at his site. Seems the right mix of a common sense business approach and compassion for the poor that some of us have longed for.

Would Direct Popular Vote Improve the People's House Of Congress?

A pair of science fiction novels by Dan Simmons, Hyperion and Fall of Hyperion, and draws a picture of, among other things, a bicameral legislature with direct democracy for the peoples' house. It was called the All Thing.

One downside in the book that I suspect would be real was All Thing addicts - people with trouble balancing All Thing participation with the rest of their lives.

So, whaddya think? Could a system where any citizen could vote directly on issues work in real life? Better than the current House? Worse?

That could never've worked in 1789, because it just took took too long to research issues and stay up on their politics. Google, I think, has changed all that. There are very few issues you can't find out about, as more and more data appears on the Internet.

What Day is Today?

Oh, yeah, it's FRIDAY!

And the thread is open.

DRM

Digital Rights Management is a system of computer controls to make it harder to make copies of data. The kind of data that's currently controversial is media data, because media industries are horribly fluffing it. You know, when you're a CEO, I think you have a responsibility to learn about ongoing technical changes in your industry and chart a thoughtful plan forward. If you can't, it's time to hand the reins over. Too many people depend on you.

Here's a interesting article about DRM problems here, that inspired this post.

Personally, I'm not convinced that DRM is necessarily hopeless or useless. But - DRM currently is being used in part to support utter, hopeless technological and social denial on the one hand and on the other hand to make money from that denial.

Sorry, can't resist twisting the knife about that denial. You know, when Microsoft proposed hardware standards in the computer industry that they hoped will close computers so Linux couldn't run on new PCs, the industry didn't stand for it and didn't let the standards get anticompetitive. When RIAA attacked the Internet as evul, standardized performer contracts to squeeze liberty, decided to send legal letters to many (now former?) customers, and refused to even think about talking about reasonable Internet distribution terms, all the big audio industry CEOs stood and saluted.

The video industry hasn't been quite as clueless, or as nasty. It's also been slow on the uptake, but it's always been experimenting a bit, too. It hasn't been a tenth as evil. Please note, media execs: I've only bought two big-label CDs since I decided you were evil, in contrast to 20-30ish over the same period before that. All my other music buys have been strictly small-press.

Contra Lessig in the link, I think DRM is helpful when it's done without the catering to denial (FORGET about closing every screen in the world, dude!). If it's done by continually open processes. with open and reasonable goals, then people would able to understand what they could do with data, and the mechanisms would be reasonable threshold-raising, not dreaming the impossible dream.

Especially long-term, DRM isn't just about media. When 3d printers are widely available, and there's a biggish library of designs for them, it'll also come in handy for raising a barrier to piracy of non-open-sourced physical product designs. So, this could also be about chairs, tables, and food.

Similar ideas have long already been applied to computer software. As you probably know, alot of closed-source, commercial software limits itself to requiring activation codes that are shipped physically printed on the software distribution somewhere. That's far more reasonable, somehow, than suing your customers and anybody who might solve your problems except, eventually, Steve whom you just trust somehow. Now, some software makers make their products a misery to use, or turn your computer into a spying ratfink (hi, MS, EA!), but they are and always have been a minority of vendors. Now, it is true that some of that minority have been growing disturbingly larger and larger.

Open Thread

Open thread, or as some folks in the weirder-accented local environs of MA say, "open tread."

So tread wherever you want. My starter?

Curt Schilling came within one out of a no-hitter. But don't feel sorry for him. ESPN says that the Blue Jays' Dave Steib came within a single out THREE TIMES. Poor b@$tard. Every time a no-hitter occurs, I regard it as an infrequent and remarkable but largely randomly determined event. When you look at the list of mediocrities who have done it and the list of outstanding pitchers who haven't, that tells a story. Not to say skill isn't involved. Sure it is. Mediocre guys do it on that day they had great stuff, for example. And Nolan Ryan doing it, what 7 or 8 times, also tells a story. Skill matters. But luck is inexorably involved as well.

As the sabremetrically inclined will know, Voros McCracken touched on this when he demonstrated the very substantial luck component of baseball by showing that pitchers experience a great and largely random variation in batting average allowed on balls that are put into play. Pitchers don't seem to have the ability to, say, make ground balls more likely to be outs than singles, or to control fly balls so that they find outfielders' gloves.

A misunderstood centrist result

The WaPo contends that the collapse of the immigration bill "represents a scathing indictment of the political culture of Washington"; blame (and of course, it is "blame" not "credit," because trad media doesn't take sides - right, Joan?) lies with "opponents on the right and left, on congressional leaders who couldn't move their troops and on an increasingly weakened president and his White House team." All in all, they conclude, "it added up to another example of a polarized political system in which the center could not hold."

I suggest that the WaPo has it precisely backwards. The "political culture of Washington" is usually portrayed in the MSM as partisanship and party-line votes. Within that rubric, this was anything but an exemplar for situation normal; quite the contrary: The people voting against cloture were drawn from all corners of both parties. Olympia Snowe and John Kyl voted against cloture; Max Baucus and Bernie Sanders voted against cloture. Mary Landrieu and Mitch McConnell voted against cloture. Barbara Boxer and Susan Collins voted against cloture. Cloture was opposed by the most senior Senator (Robert Byrd) and the most junior Senators (Tester, McCaskill and Webb).

A glance at the vote tally demonstrates that the suggestion that this voting lineup represents situation normal in Senate votes, still less a "scathing indictment" thereof, is fantasy. This bill didn't fail (as the WaPo contends) because the center couldn't persuade the fringe; I suggest that it failed because the center didn't support it. Partisanship didn't kill this bill - bipartisan consensus did.

(Cross-posted at SF)

Danger On The Internet, WIll Robinson

It's official: the Internet is dangerous (hat tip, slashdot).

Hey, Obama, I thought you said you were going to come out AGAINST stupid politics of division. I must say, I feel a tad divided against.

Yes, it's true, the Internet IS dangerous. It's pretty dangerous to people unwilling to pay attention to ongoing events and adapt a bit.

Just Stupid Nationalism, or Russians Casting Wistfully Acquisitive Eyes at Neighbors?

Good thing Estonia's in NATO. Non-kowtowing to ethnic minorities has long been an excuse for invasions.

Acually, treatment of WWII has long been an interesting thing to look at in Russia. If Japan has its thing about the comfort women, the USSR had a positive cult about WWII war deaths. The leadership loved to remind people of these deaths, er, liberating Europe.

Now, it's true that tens of millions of Soviet soldiers died in WWII, but I'd say that had as much to do with Stalin's interest in death as anything else. He was always coming up with excuses to kill more. He'd insist that an objective be reached by an unreasonable date, and would kill generals (and, of course, by implication, soldiers under the resulting bloody generalship) who failed. He shot any Soviet soldiers taken prisoner and later repatriated. Unlike the democratic Allies, there is no evidence of him caring about reducing Soviet war deaths, just about winning the war with as much turf under his thumb as possible. It's no surprise that the bloodiest front in history was between two tyrants both interested in maximizing deaths, still unexcelled sixty years later, despite the continued advances of warfare since then.

One interesting measure of Russian leadership is their attitude toward these WWII deaths. Yeltsin's Russia was curious and horrified. Putin's is unconditionally proud of them again. Like his other predecessors, Putin likes to use them to try and keep public opinion hot and bothered and on his side.

One action goes rather beyond this. Estonia has been subject to cyberattack, that has made its life somewhat harder. Why the attack, one wonders? Is Russia just trying to see how far something that probably won't provoke armed retaliation can damage Estonia? Is he stupid enough to hope that this kind of intimidation can convince Estonia to rejoin the Russian Empire?

Censorship's in Vogue

Over at Stubborn Facts, our amigo Tully is all over Hugo Chavez's restricting the media. In the link just given and other , so stop by and scroll round.

Well it looks like coming down hard on those meddlesome media kids is catching:

Pakistani president restricts TV media

President Pervez Musharraf, the embattled military leader of Pakistan, sharply tightened restrictions yesterday on the nation's broadcast media. The move was the latest signal that Musharraf , a general, intends to respond to a wave of popular unrest by cracking down on perceived foes instead of acceding to calls that he step aside or allow fair elections to be held. The restrictions appear aimed at diminishing the role the country's independent television stations have played in galvanizing anti government sentiment during a 3-month-old political crisis.

Musharraf's administration has increasingly sought to limit television coverage of large anti government rallies across the country, which has been avidly followed by many Pakistanis.
The tightening restrictions on Pakistani media mark a major reversal for Musharraf, who had previously ushered in greater freedom for newspapers and broadcast outlets.

Under the new media rules, which were set forth in an emergency ordinance signed into law by the president yesterday, broadcasters can lose their licenses, have their premises sealed, and be fined more than $160,000 for violating government directives.

Now there's going to be more sympathy in some quarters round here for the difficult finesses Musharraf faces as an ally of the US. At least compared to Chavez, who many of us find easy to dislike. But the bottom line for me is that if you're trying to silence the media, any democratic pretense is probably teetering on the brink of unsustainability. I don't think shutting down news reporting is a good idea, and the fact that Musharraf is doing it is a bad sign, both for his rule and for the prospects of our alliance with Pakistan. A fundamental precept of our war on terror and against islamic fundamentalism is that it's all about democracy and self-determination. That precept just became an even harder sell...

Dad, where's the money for nana's check come from?

Magical fairies son. Here, have some ice cream and a playstation.

His name is Yoni Gruskin, and if you're a boomer, he and his buddies have an eye on the size of your social security check. Not to mention any medical and prescription benefits you might be planning to make Uncle Sam pay for when the time comes. And can we blame him?

Youths don't want our IOUs

"As it is right now, the government is spending at a rate that it can't sustain," says Yoni Gruskin, the group's executive director. "We believe our generation will be the ones who will pay the consequences of the misguided spending policy... ."

"...We certainly believe that the baby boomers are entitled to proper retirement and medical benefits, but those need to be paid for," he said. "As the interest on the debt keeps mounting, it will really tie the hands of our generation to perform the basic needs of government."

Good luck Yoni! You're gonna need it.

Back Talk

There's a blog I just saw, that I want to recommend, Back Talk. It's way into evidence. It has a highest ratio of graphs to posts of any blog I can think of.

And alot of that evidence is, I think, about some pretty interesting topics.

Have Aliens Sucked Hollywood's Brains?

Right now, there are three summer blockbusters in Austin theaters. All three have the number 3 at the end, Of course, the number 3 doesn't automatically mean badnesss, but in Hollywood, that's where the odds are.

I'm annoyed because I went looking for a not-too-tired blockbuster, and failed. The best set of reviews was for Spiderman, and even the ones who liked it thought it was a bit tired, lacking story discipline, and way too long. Mostly, those reviews were all over the map. We ended up renting the second season of Firefly, a much better choice, I think. So far, it's really good (WHY did they cancel that series, again? More sucked brains?).

To be fair, there is one blockbuster I'm looking forward to: But it doesn't help Hollywood's case much, because the story there came from a book. JK Rowling's Harry Potter books translate well to movies precisely because they show admirable discipline at sticking to te a well-chosen part of the actual books, which in turn are written by just one person.

Also, the proportion of remakes has gone up pretty drastically both in movies and musicals in recent years.

Have all the scripts possible been done? Do they have some monkeys in the back, typing away, that've gotten into repeats?

Friday/Weekend Open Thread

Slackers!

Will the Real John McCain Please Stand Up?

One of the reasons I have embraced the candidacy of a Democrat is that I have been absolutely disgusted to watch the big Republican 3 tripping over themselves to see who can pander to the scorched earth, burn 'em at the stake crowd the most. For instance, I prefer the John McCain of 2000 - 2006, much more than I prefer the John McCain of 2006 - 2008. However, Brian's post earlier, and this article, are really good news.

The common wisdom that the best way to run for President is to chase your base in the primary and rmove to the center in the general election, is flawed. IMO, McCain, Romney, and Giualiani are going to have a hard time recovering from some of the promises and statements they have made over the last few months. What is the point of winning a primary only to lose in a general election? Although Obama, Clinton, and Edwards are doing some reaching to the base themselves, I don't feel it has been as blatant as those on the other side, and I fully admit that is a personal perception. In other words, I think we are getting more of the real Obama, Clinton, and Edwards than we are from the Republicans.

More important than the politics of it, McCain is right. I to think that his stance on the issue isn't perfect, but it is a step in the right direction. This is an issue where most Republicans have become down right mean spirited and stepped completely and utterly away from reality. Good for the Senator for trying to reel them back to the real world. I still think the country would be best served by a McCain/Obama general election.

NFL's Stank O' Hypocrisy

NFL: No alcohol for team functions, flights

NEW YORK (May 31, 2007) -- NFL clubs may no longer serve alcohol at team functions or on buses or flights, extending a ban that until now applied only in locker rooms.

NFL owners and executives were told by Commissioner Roger Goodell that the rule pertains not only to players but to owners, coaches and guests.

"I believe that no constructive purpose is served by clubs continuing to make alcoholic beverages available, and that doing so imposes significant and unnecessary risks to the league, its players and others," Goodell wrote to all 32 teams in a letter obtained by The Associated Press.

Everyone got that? Alcohol has no constructive purpose, and in fact it's downright dangerous. Unless you pay $7 for it while sitting in the stands. Oh, and by the way, this serious and important moral stand that we the NFL are taking to protect our players, team functionaries and important guests? It doesn't extend to our policy on accepting giant piles of sponsorship money from alcoholic beverage companies. That's just business, and it's entirely unrelated. Got it?

It's dangerous, and we can see no possible use for it. But if you're an NFL fan, please keep drinking it.