donations, please do so.
To Assist Sam & Jo Ard:
Sam Ard Care Fund
Wachovia Bank
PO Box 1089
Lake City, SC 29560
Account# 1010151706802
I got an e-mail from Ron in Northern California and they seem to have a problem there with their local newspaper. Besides firing 9 of the writers who covered the local news, they also dumped their coverage of NA$CAR. Pages of fluff about the stick and ball sports right off the wire services but not a single line of racing. So for you folks who read the Record Searchlight or other newspapers and are unhappy that they’ve dropped their coverage of NA$CAR and racing in general, you need to let them know that you’re unhappy with their paper. Write them a letter, call them, e-mail them, or quit buying them or cancel your subscriptions to get their attention. Nowadays, the only way to get the attention of some businesses is to hit them in the wallets. And more and more consumers are starting to do that.
Turning Fontana into a restrictor plate track? Oh please. That’s not going to improve it any even if they do put some banking in there. Plate racing with the Uni-Car is just a notch above the normal races they have there at the Otto Klubb Speedway. And Gilligan Sucker thinks this is a good idea? Consider the person who suggested it. His only points wins have been at plate tracks and what‘s he done lately other than be a corporate shill and official kisser of Faux King Brian‘s “la fleur de derriere“? Best thing they could do is turn the existing track into Mall of America 2. Barring that, since I know HRH won’t do that because he’s still got a home out there in LaLaLand, is fix the track surface, cut back to one race a year (like in February and send the second one back to Darlington) and stop trying to cater to every member of the Beautiful People and Film Actors Guild out there in LaLaLand and pricing the race fans out of the grandstands in favor of the fad fans and short attention span crowd. I normally wouldn’t say this, but as boring as the races have been and probably will continue to be at Otto Klubb Speedway, I think they should cut the length of the races there back to 100 miles. That way the short attention span crowd is happy, the Beautiful People can be in and out quickly so they can watch the Film Actors Guild Awards at home and enjoy their stewed prune, anchovy paste, and guacamole burritos (all the rage this year or so I’ve been told) from Rolfgag Pukes, and the honest to goodness race fans don’t have to sleep through the most boring races of the year. A quick 100 mile dash on the track, another 100 mile dash in bumper to bumper traffic to get home, and the race fans can be home in time to watch Speed’s Victory Lane show instead of the Film Actors Guild Awards.
Fox Sports has a poll on their web about whether or not Otto Klubb Speedway should be a restrictor plate track. Votes are definitely running against it. What they should do is run another poll as to whether or not the track should be on the schedule. That would get some real interesting results.
Once again over the weekend, there were lots of ads for the I$C tracks. This is not boding well for His Majesty. If they can’t sell out tracks that were normally sold out 6 months in advance before Faux King Brian took over the throne, are they going to finally get a clue to the fact that they’ve managed to price the core fans out of the grandstands and the fad fans aren’t coming back? Or that the short attention span crowd can’t remember to buy tickets?
And what is the deal with Larry Mac screaming, literally, about how great the Uni-Car is and the racing is, etc? Did he take lessons from Screaming Lord Sutch to “hone” his broadcasting skills? Bad enough we have to hear both owners of Motormouth Motorsports screaming when they’re in the broadcast booth and cheerleading and being shills, but to add another screamer to the cacophony of noise that’s going on is a bit too much. I don’t care how much screaming they do, it’s not going to make a boring race any more exciting or make a ill-conceived, poor handling box on four wheels race any better. Too bad there’s not a way to just have Mike Joy do the Cup broadcast. At least he keeps his commentary in the less than painful audio range.
Also, since Larry Mac has been saying that TV doesn’t drive the races, lets go back to the 2003 Daytona 500 that was ended early not because of the weather, or because of darkness (there are lights at the track), or a disastrous wreck that took out the entire field, but because Fox wanted to run the 300th episode of The Simpsons uninterrupted and without any delays. TV doesn’t drive the races? Oh please.
In the wide world of politics, nobody seems to be going after the NA$CAR Dads this election cycle. Interesting indeed, especially after they made such a big deal out of it last election cycle. So if you can’t find a candidate to vote for, write in Don Hamm or myself. The Laidback Racing Party. Just kidding folks. We do party, we are political, but we’re not a political party.
Something else on the political front. Some NA$CAR folks or folks associated with NA$CAR are getting involved in the political process. Or at least helping to fund it. DW picked Rudy Giuliani, giving $4600 to his campaign as has HRH Faux King Brian who donated a fair amount of our hard earned ticket money to Rudy as well as to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee and something called the Blue Dog Political Action Committee which is a Democrat PAC. Jeff Gordon and his teammate Jimmie Johnson are also Rudy fans with a $2,300 donation from each to his campaign. Mikey and Buffy both are Rudy fans having donated $4600 to his campaign. Mafia Mike is another Rudy fan donating $2,300. Jim France is spreading his money around a bit by contributing to Rudy, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, and both Republican and Democratic candidates in various states, including Charles Rangle of NY. Sounds like he’s trying to hedge his bets and maybe keep the track idea alive there. Jim Hunter is also a Rudy fan. Is there some kind of trend here? Roger Penske was also on the Rudy bandwagon. Rick Hendrick donated to both Rudy and John Edwards. This might explain why they’re not courting the NA$CAR Dads this cycle. They don’t have the money to pay into the coffers of the political candidates. The team owners, Beach Boy Bubbas, and drivers on the other hand do. Maybe The King should run after all?
One of the other things that keeps getting repeated is that it’s the track promoters fault about everything that goes wrong. Well, let’s see here. We hear most of the excuses about things going wrong coming from the I$C tracks. And who owns I$C? The Frances. The same folks who own NA$CAR. So since they own the tracks and do the promotions, aren’t they accusing themselves of not promoting their own tracks and races? Bet they and their apologists/mouthpieces/Kool Aid drinking revisionists didn’t think of that did they? Oopsy!
They seem to offer up excuses for a lot of things. The poor performance of the Uni-Car isn’t because it was an ill-conceived design from Toyota. It’s because the teams can’t figure it out. The races being boring isn’t because the Uni-Car doesn’t live up to all the hype that surrounds it. It’s because of the track promoters. The water coming up through the track at Otto Klubb Speedway wasn’t because of a design problem with the track; it was the fault of the Uni-Car pumping the water on the track from the seams. The cars bouncing around at Daytona isn’t because the track needs to be repaved, it’s because of the suspension on the Uni-Car. Tires blowing out after only a few laps isn’t because it’s a poorly designed tire, it’s because the teams did something wrong with the camber or air pressure. And of course, the one that angered a few folks was attendance and TV ratings weren’t off because of the fact the Faux King Brian has chased away a lot of the core fan group and turned the drivers into vanilla flavored clones along with their cars, it was because Dale Jr. didn’t win a race last year. More folks are starting to see through the excuses from HRH and his Kool Aid drinking mouthpieces, revisionists, and apologists and are using their wallets, purses, and remotes to express their dissatisfaction with the excuses and poor performance. But I’m sure the Beach Boy Bubbas will come up with an excuse for that too.
Otto Klubb Speedway is the new Darlington? Good Lord what an insult to every fan who ever attended a race at Darlington and every driver who ever raced there. There’s a big difference in size, shape, crowds (they actually have them at Darlington), and they actually have racing at Darlington and not snooze-a-thons. Definitely a case of apples and oranges. Whoever thought of that comparison should be taken out behind the garage area and given a little bit of Joe Weatherly’s “special treatment”.
It’s time to break out the hip waders folks because the fecal matter is getting deep on the campaign trail. People calling each other by their actual names, the pot calling the kettle black on experience, several “second takes” and spin by candidates
and family members. It’s time to be worried folks.
One candidate defends their record and when
you check it out, it’s not that great. Another one
spouts all kinds of promises and yet when you
check out the promises they made to their
constituents versus what they delivered, there’s a
gap as wide as the Grand Canyon. It’s getting so
ugly it’s making Quasimodo look like a
Hollywood hunk. Check them out for yourself.
Check their records, find out if they’ve delivered
on promises made to constituents, find out if they
really are part of the status quo. It’s time for the
people to take back the country, so use your vote
wisely in November.
You’ve got to hand it to the folks in the US Coast Guard and what they’re doing not only here in the US by intercepting drugs and protecting the ports but also the job they’re doing in the Arabian Gulf protecting the ports there, intercepting terrorists, and keeping the shipping lanes safe. Not to mention their “normal” job of rescuing folks here at home. A big SALUTE to all the fine men and women of the Coast Guard for all that you do for us.
Motherhood, Apple Pie, and John Wayne
Mad Mikie
Curmudgeon at Large
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