It is Tuesday in November, so the Mid-American Conference moves some football games from Saturday at 1:00 PM to Tuesday night as a result of the conference TV contract with ESPN. It is supposedly done because of money and TV exposure for the conference football programs. However, it never made sense to me. How is it better for the fan base? Instead of attending the game during the day on a Saturday, the fans have to rush from work to sit through cold November nights for 3 and ½ hours. Tonight, Eastern Michigan University is hosting the Ohio Bobcats. I can hear the band and cannon from my house, but I have no desire to attend the game even though it is less than a mile from my home. To show what ESPN thinks about the game, they do not even put it on their flagship station. The flagship station is showing the MSU vs Kansas basketball game. The EMU game is on ESPN 2.
The stuff his hitting the fan as it relates to vaccinations at our two largest state universities. As reported in the Detroit News, Michigan State and the University of Michigan are sanctioning students and staff who refuse to comply with COVID-19 vaccine mandates. Michigan State University has fired at least two employees and suspended 16 students for refusing to get vaccinated. The University of Michigan could soon follow suit. The school has put “less than 10 staff members” on 30-day, unpaid leave, university spokeswoman Kim Broekhuizen said Tuesday. She wouldn’t be more specific. UM has also placed academic holds on 422 accounts of students who are not vaccinated. Employees who aren’t vaccinated or don’t receive approval for an exemption by Dec. 8 will be fired, Broekhuizen said, and students with an academic hold cannot register for classes for the next term. MSU and UM were among the first universities to announce in late July that a COVID- 19 vaccine or an exemption would be required for all students and staff for the fall semester. Both universities set deadlines for compliance at the end of August. MSU and UM’s three campuses were among seven of the 15 public universities to require the vaccine, along with Wayne State and Grand Valley State universities.
Per the Detroit News today, Republican U.S. Rep. Fred Upton said he has received well over 1,000 calls including multiple “nasty” death threats since he voted for a bipartisan infrastructure bill that he helped write with GOP and Democratic colleagues earlier this year. More than 90% of the calls are coming from outside of Upton’s southwest Michigan district, a spokesman said, including one man from South Carolina who left this message: “I hope you die. I hope everybody in your f—— family dies,” while calling the longtime lawmaker a “f—— piece of s— traitor.” The congressman said the calls started after his Republican colleague, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, publicly posted the names and phone numbers of Upton and a dozen other GOP House members who voted in support of the bill, calling them “traitors.” Unfortunately, you could see this coming.
College basketball kicked off it’s season today. I believe college basketball is the best sport to watch on television. Games are usually over in 2 hours. There is plenty of action and the players are not so skilled that the game is boring, like the NBA. I am really looking forward to the coming season with Michigan being the favorite to win the B!G regular season title.
Yesterday, I had dinner with my college roommates. It is always great to get together with them. We all grew up in River Rouge and have stayed in the area, so getting together on a regular basis is easy. You can tell we are getting old. We met at 4:30 and were heading back home by 6:30. Which is much different than our college days, when it was 6:30 in the morning when we were shutting down after a night on the town.
Stay safe. Wash your hands regularly. Schedule your vaccine and booster. Wear your mask. Social distance.
Orchid of the Day: The start of the college basketball season
Onion of the Day: The idiots who called Congressman Upton’s office with profanity laced calls.
Quote of the Day: “It’s tragic, especially if it leads to violence. This is not what our kids and families ought to be seeing,” “It’s just a polarized, toxic environment. Worse than I’ve ever seen before.” Republican Congressman Fred Upton, who expressed concern about his staff who are taking the calls.
Tom, what about the size of the So called “Infrastructure” Bill that Congress has passed. We cannot sustain 1.2, 3.5 or 4 Trillion dollars. You cannot raise taxes high enough to support this amount. The Basketball season is starting way too early. Just my opinion
Joe,
I agree that we need to be fiscally responsible. I have no problem with the infrastructure bill. Even with the size of that bill, it will only put us back to what we spent on infrastructure as a percent of GNP in the early 80s. It is the other bill that has me concerned.