Sacrifice and honor

I wrote the following several years back, and now I re-post it every other Veteran's Day or so. I do it for the same reason I pull Joseph E. Persico's "11th Month, 11th Day, 11th Hour" off the shelf and re-read chunks of it, because before today was Veteran's Day it was Armistice Day, and for me I suppose it always will be in some sense, because the Great War lit the fuse for all the fun and frivolity that came afterward, from World War II to Korea to Vietnam to Iraq and right on up to Fearless Leader's military hijinks in Iran. 

Besides, it expresses everything I feel about the men and women who have borne the burden for all of the above, so you and I wouldn't have to.  So I offer it again.

And if you see a vet today, thank him or her for their service. It's the least you can do.

 Every year on Veteran's Day I go back there, in my mind. It's been 21 years now since my wife and I toured the American sector of the Western Front, but on this day it always feels like I can reach out and touch it. It feels as near as my next breath.

It's why November 11, the day the guns fell silent, will always be Armistice Day as much as Veteran's Day to me. It ended a war that is mostly forgotten to us now, even though some 54,000 Americans died in six months there, and countless others brought nightmares home from it that would last a lifetime. 

These days, in that place where American boys fought and died in the autumn of 1918, there are neat green cemeteries from the Argonne to Thiaucourt, row upon row of white crosses arrayed in the geometry of remembrance. And, amid fields of wheat and the crumbling remains of ancient pillboxes, there is an immense dome of gleaming white marble.

Built in 1931 atop an escarpment called Montsec, it commands what was the old St. Mihiel salient, and now is just quiet French farmland. But though it commemorates the first major American operation of the Great War, hardly any Americans ever visit, or perhaps even know it exists.

I always wonder why that is so, when I think of that place on Veteran's Day. And I always will. 

It's an old bromide that we can never thank our veterans enough for their service, and yet somehow we always fall short. If we remember what they did for us in Normandy or Fallujah or on Iwo Jima or Okinawa, we just as readily forget sometimes what they did in Belleau Wood or Frozen Chosin or the killing fields of the Ia Drang Valley. And, more shamefully, we especially forget when they return home.

I met my share of veterans, in my four decades as a journalist. I met Korean veterans and Vietnam veterans and, once, almost 30 years ago now, a vet who survived both Tarawa and Okinawa in World War II. And I met a man who, when he was 23 years old, was shooting down Nazi jets over Europe in a P-51 Mustang.

That particular gentleman's name was Chuck Yeager. Perhaps you've heard about what he did later on, something involving the sound barrier.

In all cases, they were men who'd seen and done things no human being should ever see or do, and they will talk about those things only with the most extreme reluctance. It is not that they don't remember. It's that they are unfailingly polite, and don't wish to burden us with old fantastical tales. It feels too much like bragging about things no one should ever brag about.

Everyone who has ever experienced war in closeup knows that last. They leave the bragging to fools and charlatans who, when it was their turn to serve, hid under their beds. One of them, a vile gasbag of no particular merit, once mocked a decorated Vietnam War POW for being captured. But of course now Fearless Leader has only the greatest of respect for our veterans.

I won't think about him today. I'll think instead about the no-big-deal humility of Chuck Yeager, and the quiet dignity of the Korean War vets I met almost 30 years ago, and of so many other men and women of so much more quality and consequence.

Thanks, all of you. Thank you for you service, and your example.

Worst. Fan. Ever.

 Comes now news out of the hoity-toity section of Detroit, and, listen, if this isn't the all-time king of the intermittent Blob feature Fans Behaving Badly, they'll never be an all-time king.

It seems a visiting Bedford High School fan, apparently distressed that the boys were getting ball-peened 42-0 by Grosse Pointe South in a football game, walked into the Grosse Pointe school building and ... well, and ...

Pooped in the hallway.

"He did WHAT??" you're saying now.

Pooped. Defecated. Left a calling card. Choose your description.

Now, I have to admit, the Blob has been sitting on this (OK, bad choice of words) for a few days now, because I was extremely suspicious of its provenance. This is generally the Blob's standard social media policy in the age of artificial intelligence and political hack sites both right and left, and it's served me well. Otherwise I really might have believed Lauren Boebert had landed a job as a server at Hooter's (check out the meme!), or that Bill and Hillary Clinton had a marriage unblemished by cheating or scandal.

Anyway, I held off until I saw numerous legit news organizations in the Detroit metro area had picked up the story. So, yeah, I guess it's true, and now come the one-liners, which don't write themselves but don't require a lot of outside assistance. 

Why did the Beford High football fan poop in a Grosse Pointe South hallway?

Hey, when you gotta go, you gotta go.

He just wanted to put the "gross" in Grosse Pointe.

He could only find the girls restroom and he didn't want to be accused of being one of those transgenders.

And last but not least:

Those three chili cheese dogs he ate before coming to the game were exacting their natural revenge.

Me?

As a former journo, I wanted someone to follow Jimmy Breslin's lead, sort of, when he interviewed the guy who dug John F. Kennedy's grave. 

I wanted to see an interview with the janitor who had to clean up the mess. Yikes.

A few brief thoughts on NFL Week 9

 And now this week’s edition of The NFL In So Many Words, the injury-prone Blob feature of which critics have said “I feel an injury coming on every time I read this thing”, and also “I got an injury that’ll leave you prone right here, pal”: 

1. “Oh, no! We’ve gotta play Carson Wentz again!” (Minnesota Vikings fans, after backup QB Wentz  started for injured Kyler Murray against the Buffalo Bills on Monday night)

2. “Oh, no! I’ve gotta play again!” (Wentz, before going 8-for-25 passing for 81 yards, two picks and a QBR of 2.3 in a 23-6 loss)

3. “Oh, no! We’ve gotta play Daniel Jones again!” (Indianapolis Colts fans, after starting QB Jones was not injured and therefore started in the 2-7 Colts loss to the miserably inept Dallas Cowboys)

4. “Oh, no! I’m not injured, which means I’ve gotta play for these miserably inept Cowboys again!” (Cowboys QB Dak Prescott)

5. “Oh, no! Jerry Jones still owns this team!” (Cowboys fans)

6. In other news, Jalen Hurts is still out for the season in Philly, and the Eagles lost again; ditto Lamar Jackson, backup QB Tyler Huntley and the Baltimore Ravens; Deshaun Watson missed Cleveland’s loss  to New Orleans with a concussion; and Justin Herbert remains hobbled by a dislocated offensive coordinator (Mike McDaniel) in Los Angeles.

7. “No, it’s just an owie. Mike and Justin will are getting closer to shouting distance of the same page every week.” (L.A. Chargers coach Jim Harbaugh, after the now 0-8 Bolts lost 44-22 to Houston and Herbert threw another pick, was sacked eight times and finished with a QBR of 11.8)

8. “Deshaun, Mashaun.  I did OK!” (Browns backup QB  Shedeur Sanders, who threw for 297 yards and two touchdowns, but couldn’t quite make the two-point conversion in overtime as the Browns lost 23-22.)

9. “Oh, no! All our defensive backs must be injured!” (New England Patriots fans, after watching Green Bay wideouts Christian Watson and Matthew Golden flame-broil the Patriots secondary for a combined 17 catches, 335 yards and two touchdowns in the Packers’ 45-27 win in Foxborough)

10. “Nah, we’re fine. We just suck.” (The Patriots secondary)

King Kyle

 Most of America likely missed this because it was too busy watching the New England Patriots poop the bed in Foxborough (and in front of Tom Brady, no less!). But Kyle Larson wrapped up his second straight NASCAR Cup title yesterday in the season's last race, although it didn't exactly come down to the wire.

Larson had already taken the drama out of things by coming to Homestead, Fla., with a 67-point lead. All he needed were nine points to clinch the thing, and he got one of them just for showing up.

The other eight he had by the end of the first stage of Sunday's race, which meant all he had to do the rest of the way was stay awake. He cruised to a 12th-place finish while race winner Ryan Blaney, Tyler Reddick and William Byron fought it out up front.

Larson celebrated standing atop his car with his three young children, one of whom held up a single finger to let everyone know who was No. 1 while the other two threw confetti at each other. It was a charming scene.

It also begins one of those legacy debates, on account of Larson's back-to-back titles are the first since 2010, and the 2026 crown is his third since 2021. 

This puts him up there in some rare air, as one of his Hendrick Motorsports bosses, Jeff Gordon, put it. The only drivers in NASCAR history ahead of him now are Gordon (four titles), and seven-time champs Richard Petty, Dale Earnhardt and Jimmie Johnson, the last driver to go back-to-back.

And among those Larson joins with three?

Lee Petty, David Pearson, Cale Yarborough, Darrell Waltrip and Tony Stewart. That's some fast company.

It also makes the 34-year-old Larson the king of this latest NASCAR generation, as Petty was of his and Earnhardt was of his and Gordon and Johnson were of theirs. And hardly any of them excelled in as many different racing disciplines as Larson.

Over the years, he's raced twice in the Indianapolis 500, qualifying fifth and winning Rookie of the Year in 2024. He's won three Chili Bowls and four Knoxville Nationals in a sprint car. And one year he climbed into a sports car and won the Rolex 24 at Daytona.

This season, he turned the Chase into a parade, winning three of the 10 races and finishing in the top ten eight times.

"His natural, God-given talent is off the charts," Blaney said of him Sunday.

"I think he's got to be looked at as one of the all-time greats," agreed Larson's team owner, Rick Hendrick.

And Gordon?

"It's hard to pick the most impressive thing that he does because he gets in an IndyCar, he goes fast, sprint car ..." he said. "There's just so few guys that are capable of doing that."

Or almost none. 

Press what? Press who, Part Deux

 Well, shucky dern, as someone surely said some time.

("Don't bet on it," you're saying)

Looks like President Donald John "Jokes? Have I Got Jokes!" Trump said yesterday he was only funnin' with us about making UFC boss Dana White his new White House press secretary.

"Just kidding!" Fearless Leader said, or words to that effect.

You can take him at his word (never a winning move), or figure he played the just-kidding card because America reacted to his announcement by laughing hysterically and lampooning the hell out of the idea. The latter would include the Blob, who yesterday had great fun with the whole idea of some cage-match dude being the official mouthpiece of the President. And this after F.L.'s previous choice, Blonde Girl 5 Or Something, turned out to be incapable of public speaking, and a fake lawyer besides.

No doubt Fearless Leader didn't want that to happen again. Or even worse, have White end his first media briefing by sending one of his UFC brawlers into the White House press corps to punch Jim Acosta or someone in the face.

Too bad. It would have been great fun to see a celebrity cage match between, say, Maggie Haberman and Laura Loomer. Or a seniors bout between Carl Bernstein and Wolf Blitzer.

Or how about Fearless Leader himself, all tatted up and AI-ripped, versus Canadian prime minister Mark Carney.

First one to land a roundhouse tariff wins.

Script-perfect

 Of course Mario Cristobal thinks his guys got zebra-ed. It's Notre Dame. It's Miami. What would it be if someone's nose didn't wind up out of joint?

It would be Notre Dame-Wake Forest, is what it would be. Or Miami-Wofford. Or some other matchup without history and bad feeling draping it like Spanish moss.

So, yeah, here we came down toward the end last night in amped-up Notre Dame Stadium, and the Hurricanes were comin' on. Down 24-3 in the third quarter, Miami quarterback Darian Mensah finally got his mind right. He started throwing, and Elijah Lofton and Cooper Barkate started catching, and the Miami defense started smacking the Notre Dames in the mouth the way the Notre Dames had been smacking the Hurricanes in the mouth all night, and ...

And suddenly it was 24-17. And then 31-17. And then 31-24.  And Miami was at the Irish 18 with 3:43 left and fourth down coming up.

 Mensah threw to the end zone. Lofton, his big tight end, went up,  grabbed the football in both hands and came down with both feet in bounds. Then, almost instantly, his momentum carried him out of bounds, where Irish defensive back Luke Talich -- a former walk-on, how's that for a storyline? -- smacked the ball out of Lofton's hands.

Incomplete pass. Ball goes over. Notre Dame survives, 31-24, knocking off No. 1 Miami in a game it absolutely, positively had to have, and which will now enter its extensive pantheon of mighty lore-hung Ws.

"Luke Talich did what Luke Talich does," Notre Dame coach Marcus Freeman said.

This being Miami-Notre Dame, of course, his counterpart had a somewhat different take.

"Really, really disappointed that they negated Elijah Lofton's touchdown with two hands on the ball and two feet in bounds," Cristobal said. "I'm pissed off. It's bull****, and I'll leave it at that."

So was it a touchdown?

At the risk of incurring the wrath of the Domer legions, it sure looked like one to me.

Lofton had both hands wrapped around the football. His feet were both on the ground well inbounds. What happened after that, in the Blob's opinion, shouldn't have mattered.

However ...

However, as usual with these deals, what the Blob thinks is irrelevant. And in real time, the play doesn't look nearly as cut-and-dried. Lofton catches the ball, he almost immediately turns, Talich almost as immediately slaps it loose. So ...

So, nothin'. Notre Dame 31, Miami 24 it will be, forever and ever, world without end.

Biggest Irish win in quite a while, given everything. The fact it was against a No. 1, undefeated opponent; the fact it was Miami, with all that history; the fact it was payback of sorts for Miami's win in Miami last season, which pretty much knocked Notre Dame out of the College Football Playoff right out of the gate and elevated Miami, which went on to fall to Indiana in the national championship game.

Oh, yeah. And one more thing: The fact that last night likely sealed a CFP bid for the Irish, who are 8-1 now but who were ranked 11th in the first CFP poll, on account of they'd lost to BYU in the only significant game they'd played this season. 

Pretty much made everything script-perfect. But then, when Miami and Notre Dame play a football game --  hell, when Notre Dame plays any No. 1 team with desperation in the air -- when is it NOT script-perfect?

Press what? Press who?

 Don’t mind me, on this nicely chilled November morning. Just indulging a little alternative history, in the wake of recent news from our Fearless Leader in D.C. …

WASHINGTON, D.C., November 1973 — President Richard M. Nixon announced today that boxer Muhammad Ali will be his new press secretary, replacing Ronald Zeigler, with whom the President is said to be displeased.

“Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee, baby,” the President said. “Let’s see those a**holes Woodward and Bernstein (f-bomb) with me NOW.”

WASHINGTON D.C., November 1986 — President Ronald Reagan announced today that professional wrestler Hulk Hogan will be his new press secretary, replacing whoever the other guy was.

“The Hulkster kicked the Iron Sheik’s behind,” the President said. “He’ll easily keep those pencil-necked geeks in the White House press corps in line. And if he doesn’t, we’ll bring in Rowdy Roddy Piper to tag-team those punks …”

WASHINGTON, D.C. November 1862 — President Abraham Lincoln announced today that President Abraham Lincoln will be his new press secretary, on account of he out-wrestled all comers back in New Salem, Ill.

“I whipped Big Chet from Joliet in 30 seconds flat,” the President said. “I can surely handle these chumps …”

I’m sorry, what?

You mean you HAVEN’T heard the latest from Fearless Leader?

He’s offered the WhitecHouse press secretary job to his pal, UFC boss Dana White.

“Who?” you’re saying now. “For what?”

Dana White. For press secretary. And, no, I’m not making this up, because have you forgotten who we’re dealing with here?

This is the same President of these United States who’s run through Blonde Girls 1-22 as press secretary — the latest of whom, Katie Karoline Katrina or something, lasted all of five days. Clearly the Blonde Girl pool was drained.

And so, shifting gears, Fearless Leader announced he’s asking a mixed martial arts honcho to take the job.

Now, White does have extensive experience dealing with the media. Mostly, however, this has involved half-naked men and women who kick, punch and choke one another until their tattoos fall off. 

As far as we know, there’s not a lot of that going on in the current Regime — although who knows what Pete Hegseth gets up to after his daily ‘roid hit.

Anyway, Fearless Lesder wants White because he thinks Mr. UFC is a tough guy who’ll give those pencil-neck lefties in the Fake News crowd what-for. Even suggested he bring in a couple of his kick/punch/choke guys as enforcers, er, assistants.

In which case, here’s one more perhaps not-so-imaginary news item:

WASHINGTON, D.C. December 2026 — Chaos reigned in the daily White House briefing yesterday when Irish UFC legend Conor McGregor threw CNN anchor Kaitlin Collins to the ground and slapped an armbar on her after Collins dared to ask a question.

Collins has had an adversarial relationship with President Trump since asking him questions the President regarded as not sufficiently fawning.

“Tap out, b****!” McGregor cried as he locked Collins in the hold.

On Truth Social,  President Trump praised McGregor as a”true patriot, even if he has the misfortune to be Irish,”and said “we need more of  this in America.”