UVA Beats Virginia Tech in Women's Volleyball

Greetings to our blog-readers in Ireland, Malaysia and Greece.

Though this blog has a slightly pro-Hokie leading (and an even more liberal bias; our apologies to Jonathan V. Last, a senior writer at "The Weekly Standard"), we did want to salute the University of Virginia's women's volleyball for their home win in Charlottesville over the Virginia Tech Hokies from Blacksburg.

The final score was UVA winning 3-1 (23-25, 25-19, 25-18, 25-19) with Natalie Bausback leading the Cavaliers with 17 kills and six blocks. Toni Jonowski had 13 kills for the 'Hoos and Haley Kole had 11 kills. The Cavs' are now 17-13 overall, and 10-8 in the ACC.

For the Hokies, Kathryn Caine had 17 kills and Lindsey Owens had 11 kills. The Hokies remain the team with a better record at 21-11 overall and 9-9 in the ACC.

This was the first time UVA won both matches against Va. Tech since 2005.

SIDEBAR: Our tweet of the night comes from our good friend Ali Arikan, a film and culture writer for "Slant" magazine. Arikan resides in his native Istanbul, Turkey, where it is now 9:30 a.m. (seven hours ahead of New York and Atlanta). Here is his tweet: "Another weird dream last night. I was at a library trying to pick out a book with Elizabeth Banks, Nuri Bilge Ceylan and Peter Labuza."

Banks is an America actress (we believe she played Laura Bush in Oliver Stone's "W"), Ceylan is an acclaimed Turkish film director whose films include the brilliant "Uzak/Distance" and Labuza is a New York-based film critic.

http://www.virigniasports.com

http://www.slantmagazine.com

http://www.weeklystandard.com (not an endorsement)

Quote of the Day- George Brett

Today, I am quoting the two legendary third baseman who were the center-point of the 1980 World Series between the Philadelphia Phillies and the Kansas City Royals.

Alas, Mike Schmidt's Phils beat George Brett's Royals, but the American League slugger got his own World Series ring in 1985 when the Royals beat the St. Louis Cardinals.

Brett, now 57, is originally from West Virginia, and he played his entire 20-year career (1973-93) with the Royals. Bret was also a 13-time All-Star and he was named American League MVP in 1980.

Here is his quote:

"If a tie is like kissing your sister, losing is like kissing your grandmother with her teeth out."

SIDEBAR_ I know magazines must be desperate for subsribers these days due to the increasingly annoying digitalization of everything. But, I was still VERY surprised to get a subsription request from the conservative magazine "The Weekly Standard." I am a liberal Democrat (but I live in a place that's more like Provo than Provincetown) and I subscribe to the center-left journal "The New Republic."

But, I did exchange a few pleasant emails with William Kristol, and as much as I disagree with him, especially about Sarah Palin, I can not say anything negative about him personally.

In the current issue, "Weekly Standard" contributor Jonathan V. Last has an article about how Superman will supposedly lose his American citizenship. I didn't get a chance to read the article, so it would be an assumption on my part that the article blames President Barack Obama. But, the right will probably blame him for yesterday's tornadoes in Alabama. As it turns out, Last, which would be a very bad last name for a politician, is an avid comic book fan. He apparently eulogized Captain America. This leads to wonder what he thinks about my personal favorite Marvel Comics character Howard the Duck. But, he probably doesn't have time to read this blog!

Quote of the Day- Leo Strauss

We don't quite agree with all the views of the late political philosopher Leo Strauss (1899-1973), a German emigre who was the leading influence of the neo-conservative movement (which is the general editorial position of "The Weekly Standard" magazine), but he did have a few interesting things to say. And, since we are featuring philosophers this month, including a quip from the very liberal philosopher Noam Chomsky on our other blog today, we figured we'd 'balance' things with a quip from Strauss:

"All there is to thinking is seeing something noticeable, which makes you see something you weren't noticing, which makes you see something that isn't even visible."

Quote of the Week- Jacques Derrida

This is the first entry in a series of quotes from famous philosophers that will run on Mondays in March. It is perhaps fitting as we posted a blog entry in "The Daily Vampire," which is also by Tilly Gokbudak (who is me, yes I think referring to yourself as if you are someone else is quite obnoxious too!), about names that we had not spelled correctly that we have a quote from Jacques Derrida (1930-2004).

Up until I googled him about a half-hour ago, I wasn't sure if the late French philosopher's name was spelled with one 'd' or two 'd's. Well, it is Derrida!

Speaking of which, we should mention that we butchered Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi's name in an entry last week, but like him, we refuse to apologize for any wrong-doings even if they are painfully obvious (unless, you can sue us and then of course, we will send you a dozen roses from FTD).

Derrida, who was the subject of a documentary film with his name in 2002, was born in Algeria as were many French intellectuals and cultural icons, including the late fashion designer Yves Saint Laurent.

The French philosopher is known for developing the critical theory known as 'deconstruction' and his work has been associated with post-structuralism and post-modern philosophy.

We also gather that former president George W. Bush has read a lot of Derrida's works and is a great admirer of his (that is a joke, but I think even my Republican friends like Bill Kristol* will find it amusing).

Here is our quote from Derrida:

"I never give in to the temptation of being difficult just for the sake of being difficult. That would be ridiculous."

We must profess that since there is a tuxedo cat named "Gizmo" roaming around here in the office, that we really like this photo, that slightly reminds us of Marlan Brando's pose in "The Godfather."

*-I am not actually friends with the neo-con intellectual Bill Kristol, who founded "The Weekly Standard" which I assume is to the 'far-left' of "Soldier of Fortune" magazine, but he did, much to my shock, personally answer an email (it was actually not political in nature even though I have much different views than Kristol) that I had assumed one of his associates would read. So, I do feel obliged to say nice things about him which might be harder to do if I read his columns, which I presume are rather negative towards President Barack Obama.

Status Update_ Underdog Versus Palinzilla

I had a surreal last night/this morning, in which I was the late '60s cartoon hero Underdog and I was saving New York City from Palinzilla, a 90-foot fire breathing robot that looked exactly like Sarah Palin.

While I fully sympathize with "Washington Post" columnist Dana Milbank, who has said there should be a moratorium on mentioning Palinzilla's name, I could not resist sharing this story.

In the dream, I gave her one simple whack across the nose and her circuits exploded causing her to malfunction and retreat back to the Hudson Bay. It was ironically sort of like a version of 'David and Goliath.'

Of course, some feminists may argue that my Underdog engaged in domestic violence, but my response would be: "Hey, someone had to save the universe from Palinzilla." Obviously, I do not condone domestic violence in any form and as it is since Palinzilla was a robot, I could argue Underdog was not hitting a woman because androids don't have genders!

SIDEBAR: Everyone in the world seems to be talking about the riots in Egypt today. On the left, "The Nation" has articles titled like "Fire in the Streets of Cairo: Will the Army Hold?" and "Egypt's K-Street Connections."

While on the right, John McCormack has an analysis of President Barack Obama's statement on Egypt in "The Weekly Standard." While I did not have time to actually read the article, I would presume given the magazine's politics, which are actually more restrained than some of their counterparts, that it was critical of Obama.

And, for those of us on the center-left, there is always the ever-reliable "The New Republic" in which Heather Hurlburt has an article about the five things every American should know about the riots which threaten Hosni Mubarak's 30-year reign as the president of Egypt. I was a bit humored and horrified to see that the article actually featured a photograph from a riot in Turkey, which is my late father's country!

The Post-Election Day Hangover

Mor


I recall one year when I was in college when my old high school pals Jake and Brett (not their real names) came over and we watched the Super Bowl between the New York Giants and the Buffalo Bills. The Giants won the game, but I will never forget the Jack Daniels hangover that my buds suffered. I was smart enough not to join them!

And, since my Twitter account is frozen up today, which I suspect is a result of following over 1,800 people, media outlets and organizations (yes, Paris Hilton is one of them) the day after a major election.

While Paris Hilton may not have won yesterday, the dubious choice that Kentuckians made in electing far, far right mad man Rand Paul (we actually like Ron Paul, his dad, but like George W. Bush this guy is crazier than his dad!) who according to "The Nation" even opposes abortion when a woman's life is in danger, may be just as fatal for the American political spectrum.

Closer to home, one of my friends (yes, the irony here kills me too) Republican Morgan Griffith from my hometown of Salem, Va., upset Cong. Rick Boucher, who was first elected to office when I was 12 years old in 1982! And, I was perhaps the only kid from East Salem Elementary School who watched the election results that night.

Boucher lost in part from a heavy turn-out in conserative parts of the ninth district, according to "The Roanoke Times," which we presume would include the truck-stop town of Wytheville.

"The Roanoke Times" also stated that Cong. Tom Periello, a first-term representative, who is actually younger than me at 36, lost to Robert Hurt, a conservative state senator from the town of Chatham, Va.

Chatham is in southside Virginia where local churches actually state to be wary of our friend Hot Stuff on a regular basis.

(That is Satan for those of who live in saner parts of the country/world; I am of course alluding to the Harvey Comics character that Perriello is too young to remember and Griffith might well be reading to his young children).

In my current state of residence, North Carolina, Congressional Democrats fared fairly well even though the state house fell to the hands of Satan (the Republicans) for the first time since 1898!

Cong. Brad Miller (D-NC) held off a Tea Party whacko named Bill Randall who like Clarence Thomas is African-American.

In an effort to somehow proclaim that the GOP is now the party of diversity, Fred Barnes of the conservative "The Weekly Standard" (We should mention that neo-con don Bill Kristol of that same publication actually sent me a friendly email during the Obama-McCain race which still shocks me to this day!; of course- it had nothing to do with politics) mentioned that two African-Americans won Congressional races yesterday.

They included Tim Scott of South Carolina and Allen West of Florida.

Hopefully, they will represent their constituents well. If not, the Democratic Party might want to find two fat, old white guys to run against them!