A Very Special Blogpost

Sitcoms in the 1980's would occasionally do a "very special episode" which was code for "serious," like when Father Mulcahey did a tracheotomy, or when Tom Hanks played Alex P. Keaton's alcoholic uncle, or when Jessie Spano was so excited.

This post is along those lines.  My apologies in advance.

Almost eight years ago I opined that "we stand at the precipice of what's shaping up to be the most transparently corrupt four year stretch of our federal government's history."  We're now at a newer precipice that is simultaneously more transparent and more corrupt.  I could write at length about how crooked it will be when a major government contractor decides how the government will spend money but I have bigger concerns.

One of the key concepts that makes the oldest democracy in the world so great (despite some people saying it needs to be made great again, I think it's great and always has been) is the separation of powers.  Click on that link to the Library of Congress website, they have a nice short summary of the doctrine.  I'll wait for you.

You're back!  You now know that the Founders separated government powers to avoid a monarchy and preserve individual liberty.  You also now know that one of the key separated powers is the appointment of federal officers--the president picks them but the Senate approves them.  This prevents the president from putting unqualified cronies and lickspittles in positions of power.

President-elect Trump recently twat from his fugazi Twitter platform that he wants to avoid Senate approval for his cabinet picks, and that the next Senate majority leader must agree.  Predictably, the three clowns senators vying to be the Senate leader practically tripped over themselves in a rush to acquiesce to Trump's demand.

This is really bad.  It's so bad that National Review's Ed Whelan says it's bad.  We are watching Trump aggregate a separated power of the Senate unto the Presidency before he's even sworn in, and no one plans to stop him.  It's only going to get worse once he's back in the Oval Office.

The worst way it gets worse is Trump's pick of Matt Gaetz for Attorney General.  All of Trump's picks so far are stars of the MAGA extended cinematic universe.  I don't know if this is because Trump's Diet-Coke-and-Big-Mac addled brain can only come up with people he sees on Fox News, or if it's red meat for his cult base, or both.  They're all bad in their own unique ways but Gaetz terrifies me.

Gaetz was not selected for his legal experience or acumen.  He apparently practiced for nine or ten years, and six of those years coincided with his time in the Florida House so I doubt he was billing 2000 hours a year.  Wikipedia says that after graduating from Marshall-Wythe he was at AnchorsGordon, a nine person shop in northwestern Florida.  I am not being an elitist when I say this is not the right resume for the person tasked with leading 10,000 lawyers, the FBI, DEA, OIG, ATF, INTERPOL, and lots of other important stuff.

Gaetz got this job because he'll do whatever Trump wants--he's one of the aforementioned unqualified cronies and lickspittles.  And what Trump wants is to use the police power of the federal government to harass and maybe even imprison people who opposed him.  Once that becomes the new norm there will be no opposition because all dissenters will be gagged or too scared to say anything.  Can you think of any reason why Gaetz wouldn't do this?  Why he wouldn't do this gleefully?  You don't think that if all the AUSAs of good conscience resign when asked to corruptly investigate or indict Trump's enemies, a glut of mini-Gaetzes won't rise up to take those jobs?

I can deal with the head of hair at DoD, the doge assassin at DHS and Pat Summerall's kid as CoS.  But I fear that Gaetz as AG is the beginning of the end of the world's oldest democracy.

And now back to your regularly scheduled dipshittery.

This Week in Wrenball: 10 Years Later

There was a modest amount of Tweetnoise this week related to the notion that W&M coach Tony Shaver's run at W&M might be coming to an end. Something called @CoachingChanges (which, honestly, is probably a Russian bot) suggested that new W&M AD Samantha Huge's ambition might lead her to dismiss the only coach to ever get the Tribe within one game of the NCAA Tournament during the CAA era.

Things got a bit, if not heated, then maybe confusing, as Tribe fans, conference rivals, and impartial media types weighed in unanimously to suggest such a firing would be absurd, bordering on criminal.

Why yes, I am number one.

But as I thought about CoachingChanges' perspective, I could at least understand. Shaver's been at W&M for 15 years with zero NCAA Tournament appearances. In any other context, that'd be a death knell - would've been years ago, to be honest. But W&M is sui generis in terms of its hooping history.

From 1985 to 2007, W&M went 3-22 in CAA Tournament play. In the 18 seasons before Shaver took over in 2003, the Tribe finished .500 or better twice. Twice. In his 15 seasons, W&M has done it eight times, including the last five in a row (we're guaranteed to do so this year). He's won 20 games four times, a mark W&M reached five times in the 96 years before he arrived. After three mediocre campaigns to begin his W&M career, Shaver's squads have gone 11-10 in CAA Tournament play, making four league finals.

Those numbers only tell part of the story. Pre-Shaver, W&M was a whipped fanbase, devoid of hope, of belief, of anything but morbid fascination with a serious of no-chance rosters wearing our colors.

And then, like a bolt out of the blue, that happened. W&M rode a string of three buzzer-beating victories to the 2008 CAA Tournament final against George Mason. And while we lost that game, it changed everything. As G:TB wrote at the time:

"But as we noted in this space just yesterday, the loss does nothing to diminish the joy this unlikely group of kids brought to W&M’s generally subdued alumni. For the briefest of moments we were allowed to pretend we belonged, to plan trips to the Boise or Sacramento or Tacoma subregionals, to shout ourselves hoarse watching a game that actually mattered, and to dream. Generations of us had never even allowed ourselves to dream. When we talk about this team, that’s the thing we’ll remember – not that they finally fell short, but that they let us dream, hope, and care. And at some level, that’s the magic of college basketball, that an obscure school from a mid-major conference can make otherwise mature (it’s in the eye of the beholder, people) adults let loose the bonds of logic and rationality and really, deeply believe in the most unlikely outcomes."

This year's Tribe squad closes out the regular season with home games against UNCW and the College of Charleston. W&M is currently 16-11, 9-7 in CAA play. We're all but assured of playing Towson in the 4/5 game in the first round of the conference tournament, and we don't match up well with them. If we escape that gauntlet, top-seeded Charleston probably awaits. It's going to be a tough road.

But we've still got the nation's best shooting team, an offense that's capable of going plaid and beating anyone. And we've got a coach who knows how to win games when throats get tight and kids get nervous. In a league like the CAA, anything really can happen, even for William & Mary

And so we dream, hope, and care. That's what Tony Shaver has given us. And even though we've been so close and not yet crossed over the rainbow bridge, dreams and hopes and cares are enough. We didn't have that before.