The Big Ten Has Just Opened A Window for 45

The Big Ten chickened out. It acted according to science. It succumbed to money.

And because it has done so, it has opened up possibilities for 45 to win the election. Indeed, 45 is already taking credit for it. (Except a Big Ten official denies that he had anything to do with it--typical.)

The Midwest remains the key for his victory. The Big Ten schools' capitulation to moneyed interests take away any specter of principled action. There will be football this fall, by golly, and it'll all start just before the election, on October 23.

Makes sense, of course. The other 'Big Five' conferences never really hesitated. Football is America, and in America, we celebrate ourselves with jerseys and colors and music and warfare. We pit ourselves against each other.

All perfectly renewed, now, in Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Iowa--states 45 carried in 2016, states in battle now, and states now satisfied that all will be normal. You can't Make America Great Again without football. You can't do it with football, either, but pitting ourselves against each other is what this president is all about--fake and phony conflict that can be exploited.

Count on it in campaign ads. Count on it in his next campaign speech. Nothing is so clean and pure as football--except nothing except basketball is as demonstrably exploitative, especially of black school kids, most of whom will never realize their dreams of the NFL.

But it doesn't matter, at least not to many of us. We'll go through the latest supply of black talent--much like slavery--coming out of the high schools, which will absorb great pressure, now, to renew their own seasons and keep the football factories in operation. Those schools aren't supposed to care, either.

There will be pre- and post-game parties, now that the sport has been renewed, spreading the virus where it wouldn't have, and shouldn't have, gone. Like bringing weapons to the statehouse in Michigan, it's their right, right?

The economy will recover, 45 says. In the meantime, they will say, divert your attention to this by returning to television, where you weren't going to do anything else anyhow but sit there on fall Saturdays, wear your school colors, even if you didn't go there, and cheer on the Badgers or Buckeyes or Nittany Lions or whomever. 

It'll all be normal now. Normal is the Republicans' greatest weapon. The normalization of everything, including a terrible president's lies, inoculates enough people to keep the madness going.

The point is that finally, things have settled in, you're finally comfortable, and all will be well. It won't, of course--the virus is due to gain new momentum as people come indoors again--but the election will be over by that time. Any notion to the contrary is absurd.

The operative seasons will be suspended, says the conference, if the virus hits more than 5 percent of the players. But it has to know first, and there are already stories emanating from other conferences of coaches telling players not to tell them if they get sick. Think that still won't happen? Think a player with symptoms won't wait until they're undeniable, in which case others will be infected?

But that's why Power Five conferences recruit so many kids: One goes down, another steps up. Don't worry: The factories won't break down. They haven't for meat and chicken, although thousands of workers have gotten sick and some have died. Nobody can see the shortages yet. But we expect casualties, don't we?

That's what former college football coach and celebrated grouch Lou Holtz said, comparing all this to D-Day, about as inappropriate as anything I've ever heard, as if sports, particularly football, really are war. You can say that in the locker room before a game, but outside of it, that's just dangerous nonsense.

Nothing that absurd needs to be said about the possible political effects of this decision. As people get more comfortable, they get to delude themselves that soon, all will be well. Not gonna happen, but the approximation of the feeling often obscures what else people have been feeling for the past four years--aghast at the crudeness, the cruelty, of this president. 

At this particular moment, anything that makes people feel better, however phony, can twist results. That's why we have to focus on the big picture, to judge by the whole record, says The Wall Street Journal in an editorial last Friday. But they're convinced that by doing so, people will want to return 45 to office. I hold them responsible if they do; they're smarter than that. At least I thought they were. 

But Michael Cohen says Republicans are stupid and gullible, easily taken to cultism. Millions will still vote for 45, despite what's in plain sight. This is a mentality that's not easily broken. And playing football again merely feeds it.

Be well. Be careful. Wear a mask. With some luck, I'll see you down the road.

Mister Mark