In the time of the Roman Empire, civic life was divided between the Blue and Green factions. The Blues and the Greens murdered each other in single combats, in ambushes, in group battles, in riots. Procopius said of the warring factions: "So there grows up in them against their fellow men a hostility which has no cause, and at no time does it cease or disappear, for it gives place neither to the ties of marriage nor of relationship nor of friendship, and the case is the same even though those who differ with respect to these colors be brothers or any other kin." Edward Gibbon wrote: "The support of a faction became necessary to every candidate for civil or ecclesiastical honors."

Who were the Blues and the Greens? They were sports fans - the partisans of the blue and green chariot-racing teams.

~Eliezer Yudkowsky, A Fable of Science and Politics

No, no, not the Faith Forum...

Last night Modern Woodman Park in Davenport, IA (home of the Quad Cities River Bandits, a Class A affiliate of the St. Louis Cardinals) held their first ever Bobblection.

Fans arriving at the 7:00 p.m. game against the Burlington Bees will have a choice upon entering the ballpark. Left or right? Obama or McCain? The River Bandits will be giving away 2,000 bobblehead, 1,000 each in the likeness of the two Presidential candidates. Fans will have the chance to choose which bobblehead they want, thus casting their unofficial vote for the President. The bobblehead that runs out first will serve as the River Bandits fans' endorsement for the Oval Office.

There's no way I was passing this up. After all, it's baseball and politics - my two favorite things. So the Mrs. and I packed up the kids and drove the two hours to the ball park making sure we got their early enough. What we saw was nothing less than amazing.

Follow me over the bump for the details.

Change of pace - What are Kossack's thoughts about the World Series this year?  I think my Halos will defeat Kos' Cubs.  

Let’s face it, whether we like it or not, Barack Obama is the “Jackie Robinson” of presidential politics. That’s just the fact. And like Jackie he is going to have to go through a LOT of stuff to make it safely to home plate.

WGN in Chicago is reporting that the Los Angeles Dodgers have acquired hitter/sort of outfielder Manny Ramirez, age 36, from the Boston Red Sox as part a three way deal with the Pirates. Boston gets 30 year old outfielder Jason Bay from the Pirates, and there are also a number of minor leaguers involved, apparently from the Dodgers and probably to the Pirates.

I don't know why the Dodgers continue on the anti-youth movement, but they aren't ever going to win a World Series by taking declining Red Sox for the last two years of their careers (I'm lookin at you, Nomar).  I somehow don't see Jeff Kent and Manny being locker room pals, either.

He brought the BoSox two championships, but he was never fully comfortable here.

Names we are hearing now:

Sox send Craig Hansen and Brandon Moss (ouch) to Pittsburgh.

Dodgers send Andy LaRoche and a AAA player to Pittsburgh.

Dodgers get Manny.

Sox get Jason Bay.

The rumor mill has been in full gear all day about whether or not the Bosox are going to throw in the towel on Manny Ramirez and ship him out of New England.  Latest buzz is a three way trade with the Marlins and Pirates bringing Manny to South Florida, Jeremy Hermida to the Pirates and Jason Bay to Boston as the principals with some prospects and cash thrown about as well.

Trade deadline is tomorrow, Yanks picked up Pudge Rodriquez for a middle of the road middle reliever earlier today....

Generational change is upon us. The recent past doesn't look so good in the rear view mirror.

Tomorrow afternoon (July 16) in Washington, the US Postal Service is scheduled to issue the 42-cent "Take Me Out to the Ball Game" Stamp, commemorating the 100th anniversary of that tune.  But rather than holding a First Day of Issue Ceremony at a major league stadium before thousands of fans (where the song has been a staple of the 7th inning stretch for years), the USPS will hold it on the South Lawn of the White House, at the behest of that failure as a baseball executive (as he has with almost everything else in his life), our Chump in Chief, George W. Bush.  

Instead of a public ceremony, open to fans and stamp collectors alike, this 3:30 pm EDT event will be just another controlled media photo op with Bush and a bunch of little kids, brought there for his T-ball tournament.  More below the fold.

  My other obsession besides the triumph of workers over the running dog employers is baseball. Let's see if we can do this with the following rules: talk about what you see your team doing WITHOUT trashing another team. We're going to do something unusual on this site--be civil throughout. If you want to say something about another team, it's got to be nice. This is for the love of the game.

The All Star Break marks the traditional (though not mathematical) half way mark of the season.  What a season it has been so far.

Did you ever notice that McCain never seems to be on camera without Cindy, Lindsey Graham, or Joe Lieberman being within, like, 10 feet of him?  Just you keep watching the news and tell me I'm not right.  You can't do it.  I think McCain might have issues being alone (as alone as you can be with at least 50 people around you all the time, but you know what I mean)...

I think McCain08 misses McCain00.  I think that's why he has that misplaced half grin/half grimace and painful laugh.  McCain00 still lives and breathes inside McCain08 and it makes him uncomfortable (not like Kuato/George in Total Recall, but you know what I mean)...

No, wait, let me take that back... it must be like Total Recall... why else is McCain going to hire Schwarzenegger's campaign manager (ten thousand McBlogger points to anyone who posts a photoshop of McCain as Kuato/George)...

And, while I have more ruminations about McCain, which I will share shortly, I must say I have a problem with the Netroots Nation agenda, if you will just humor me...

Some people know how to to put the "fun" in "fundraiser."  Orange to Blue candidateJim Himes held an event at a minor-league ballpark in CT-04 to raise a few dollars and raise his visibility in the district.  I thought it was a great idea and a great excuse to bring my 2-year-old out to a game.

Until late last week, Exxon-Mobil was the sponsor of the seventh-inning stretch at the Washington Nationals' stadium. The incongruity of a company that has poured $10s of millions into trying to undermine understanding of global warming having a prominent role in the greenest stadium in professional baseball sparked a movement to "Strike Out Exxon at Nationals Park!"

Friday, the first day of protests, the announcer announced Exxon-Mobil's sponsorship of the Seventh-Inning Stretch but Exxon-Mobil's name didn't appear on the main scoreboard(even as Exxon-Mobil advertising did show up on banner ads around the stadium).  At Sunday's game, the billboard simply said "Seventh Inning Stretch" and there wasn't a syllable from the announcer about any form of Exxon-Mobil sponsorship.  One has to wonder, is there an impact from public embarassment?  Is Exxon-Mobil being sent to the dugout step-by-step?

Last evening, amid gorgeous weather, a call to action sent me out to the ballgame.  While the 14-inning game was great (GO NATS!), play on the field wasn't the only action.

The Strike Out Exxon campaign began yesterday.  The Washington Nationals new stadium is the "greenest" in baseball. Yet, who is one of their principle advertisers: that great friend of the environment Exxon-Mobil.  A coalition has come together to call attention to this absurdity and to Exxon-Mobil's roadblocking of action against Global Warming.

In non-breaking news.

I was watching the Yankees-Padres game on the Yankees Propaganda Network YES last night and they break for a financial update from the fox business channel. They gave us a financial update and an attack on Obama.

I'm watching the stories go by today, and I am reminded of a lesson I learned from my baseball coach when I was younger. It relates to how a team which is the best in the league can lose the championships simply because they convince themselves it is a sure thing.

You see, Obama is doing well... at this point in time. Sadly, there is not an election right now, or today, or anytime soon. In fact, polls that show anything now are as useless as trying to determine how many chickens you'll have in a year by counting the eggs you have in your basket now.

The Washington Nationals have a beautiful new stadium. A tax-payer paid stadium. A stadium padded itself on the back for its green attributes.  This beautifully green stadium is plastered with: advertisements for that every so environmentally friendly Exxon-Mobil.  Yes, that Exxon-Mobil that has so happily (and generously) supported global warming denialists as a path to keep the taps running as long as possible on their ability to dump their trash into the atmosphere without financial constraints. This is now going further:  visitors to the stadium have the ability to work their tightened muscles during the Exxon-Mobil 7th inning stretch.  Wonder whether they hand out some black massage oil to work out those kinks and knots built up during tense games?