BALTIMORE, Maryland, Monday, April 10, 2017 - Alfred Lord Tennyson, the treasured and absolutely essential English Poet, wrote with almost amazing foresight those many decades ago:
Saw the heavens fill with commerce, argosies of magic sails,
Pilots of the purple twilight, dropping down with costly bales;
Heard the heavens fill with shouting, and there rain’d a ghastly dew
From the nations’ airy navies grappling in the central blue;
From "Locksley Hall" by Alfred Lord Tennyson (6 August 1809 – 6 October 1892)
For the life of me, I cannot fathom why Assad would even think of using chemical weapons. What other move could bridge differences amongst the factions which oppose him in the Western World and in the Factions elsewhere? In These United States, pernicious Ultra Leftists agreed with Moderates and even Conservatives in condemning the purely evil spreading of chemical weapons, especially where many of the most obvious victims were children, including not a few infants. Even a very minor intellect like Assad could have seen his wholesale condemnation coming when he chose such a bleak and evil course of action. But Assad went ahead and did it anyway, and Putin sat back and watched, raising not a single objection to Assad's very obvious actions. Now, when the USA's Chief Diplomat, Secretary of State Rex Wayne Tillerson, arrives in Moscow later this week, he will be fully armed with enough diplomatic ammunition to send Assad back to the dark ages, or, more probably, personally out into oblivion.
Try, if you will, to look at it from Assad's point of view. While Russia has allied with you, it is a pretty one-sided alliance. Russia wants an in into Middle East Politics and the Struggle to Control the region's vast petroleum reserves. Russia has already succeeded there. Even if it jettison's Assad and even all of Syria this very day, it is already in the Middle East and has become a major player there. Had Trump not upset Hillary Clinton in the fall elections, the USA could be on its way out of Middle East Power Politics, with Russia taking its place. But Trump did win, and now he is reasserting the USA's global hegemony. In the Middle East, the USA is already back in the driver's seat, and Trump would like nothing better than to quickly and completely send Russia packing back to the frozen north. Assad, with a complicit Putin fanning the flame, has proven immeasurably helpful in Trump's Middle East planning.
The Trump gambit in Syria was also greatly helpful in forever quashing the nonsensical idea that Trump colluded with Putin to defeat Hillary. It is becoming more and more obvious to many political observers around the world that the whole idea of such a stupid "colluding" happened only in the morbid minds of some ultra left idiots. Russia, of course, was nosing around trying to get in the way. But Trump was in no way on board in their lunatic plans, such as they may have been. With each passing day it is obvious that the only ones who gave any serious thought to getting Russian help in the fall elections were the mental giants running the campaign of Clinton the Fool (am I allowed to say that?).
Sports: The Orioles Win 4 of Their First Five; Lead AL East by One-Half Game over Rays; Maryland Goes 1-2 at Nebraska; Burnley Breaks 7 Match Slide With Win Over Stoke City and Draw at Middlesbrough; Claret 8 Points Clear of Relegation With 6 Matches Remaining
Orioles:
The Baltimore Orioles opened their 2017 Campaign with 4 straight wins before losing the series final to the Yankees. Outstanding pitching was the name of the game, along with clutch power hitting. In sweeping Toronto in the opening series, Kevin Gausman and Dylan Bundy. Gausman did not get a decision on opening day because the game went into extra innings. Bundy, however, got a win and was even more sensational. Baltimore fell behind the Yankees on Friday, 5-1, as well as Saturday. Each night they rallied to win. Manny Machado and Seth Smith hit homers on Friday. On Saturday, the Orioles were still behind in the 7th inning when the heart of the order came through without hitting the long ball. Chris Davis doubled and scored on Mark Trumbo's clutch hit. Then Trumbo stole second. Really, he did! With two outs and two strikes, Hyun Soo Kim singled, scoring Trumbo. In both wins over the Yanks, Brad Brach and Zach Britton pitched shut out innings. On Sunday, Showalter decided not to use either Brach or Britton and the Birds blew a 3-0 lead. The Orioles are 4-1 in first place. Tampa Bay is 5-3 and in second place. The Red Sox are 3-3 in third place. New York is 3-4 in fourth place and Toronto is 1-5 and dead last.
Maryland:
Maryland only won one of its three games at Nebraska, and the lamentable series cost them in the Big Ten Baseball Standings. It probably will also knock the Terps out of the Top 25. They were #24 going into the series. Friday night, Brian Shaffer pitched an 8 inning complete game, but the Terps couldn't get a clutch hit and lost, 3-1. Saturday, on national TV, Maryland played the way it was capable and beat back the Corn Huskers, 8-5. Sunday, the pitching disappeared and the Terps lost, 8-4.
In the win on Saturday, Maryland came through in front of 6,615 fans at Haymarket Square Field in Lincoln. A.J. Lee was the big star, The sophomore third baseman was 3-4 with a home run and three runs batted in. Ryan Hill was the winning pitcher, moving his season record to 3-0. He bailed out shaky starter Taylor Bloom in the second inning and ended up going 4 and one-third innings and allowing only one run. Ryan Selmer pitched the final one and two-third innings to earn his fourth save. In between Hill and Selmer, Andrew Miller threw one and one-third innings of one-hit baseball to keep Maryland in the game.
Minnesota did not play conference games over the weekend and remain at 6-0, good for first place. Nebraska is second at 4-1-1. Maryland and Michigan are tied for third at 6-3. The Wolverines hadn't lost a game since losing the first two games of the Maryland series in late March. But the win streak, which had reached 9 games, ended Sunday when Michigan lost to Illinois, 7-5. Purdue is in fifth place at 5-4. Three teams are at .500 and tied for sixth: Indiana at 4-4-1, Iowa and Indiana, each at 3-3.
Maryland is now 20-10 overall. They have two mid-week games scheduled: Tuesday they host West Virginia (4 pm) and Thursday they visit George Mason (3 pm). Then, next weekend, Penn State comes to College Park. The Nittany Lions are 11-20 overall and 1-5 in the Big Ten. On paper, it seems to be a weekend for the Terps to gather some wins, but they have to do it on the field for that to happen.
Burnley:
More and more it looks like Burnley will easily avoid relegation and bring a second consecutive year of Premier League Soccer to Fortress Turf Moor. The Claret had hit their rough patch, but apparently have survived it. A streak of seven straight matches without a win ended on April 4 when Burnley defeated Stoke City, 1-0, at Turf Moor. The Claret followed that up at Middlesbrough on this past Saturday, April 8, when they earned a draw. Burnley is currently 12th on the Premier Table with 36 points. They are tied with Leicester City, which has the same number of points and the same goal differential, but has played one few match than has Burnley.
Swansea is the top relegation-ranked team (18th place in the 20-team league), and it has 28 points with the same number of matches played as Burnley. Here is the Premier Table up to this minute:
1 Chelsea: 31 matches 40 goal dif. 75 points
2 Tottenham: 31 matches 42 goal dif. 68 points
3 Liverpool: 32 matches 28 goal dif. 63 points
4 Man City: 31 matches 25 goal dif. 61 points
5 Man Utd: 30 matches 22 goal dif. 57 points
6 Arsenal: 30 matches 22 goal dif. 54 points
7 Everton: 32 matches 21 goal dif. 54 points
8 W. Brom: 32 matches -2 goal dif. 44 points
9 Southham. 30 matches 0 goal dif. 40 points
10 Watford: 30 matches -12 goal dif. 37 points
11 Leicester: 31 matches -12 goal dif. 36 points
12 Burnley: 32 matches -12 goal dif. 36 points
13 Stoke: 32 matches -13 goal dif. 36 points
14 West Ham: 32 matches -15 goal dif. 36 points
15 Bournmth: 32 matches -14 goal dif. 35 points
16 Crystal Pal: 31 matches -8 goal dif. 34 points
17 Hull: 32 matches -31 goal dif. 30 points
18 Swansea: 32 matches -30 goal dif. 28 points
19 Mid 'bro: 31 matches -15 goal dif. 24 points
20 Sunder: 31 matches -32 goal dif. 20 points
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