Renaming the Stennis is dumb

If you don’t follow the U.S. Naval Institute, you could be forgiven for not knowing that there are a lot of articles written by Naval Officers thinking about the future of seapower. Some are good, some are not, but the fact that we continue to have officers that at least think about the future is a good sign. Unfortunately, the USNI articles have morphed from thinking about integrating cyber in future maritime conflicts to increasingly focusing on cultural issues. The latest in this string of articles that includes delving into the LGBTQ culture of Newport, RI, and looking at the Confederate connections in the Naval Academy is a proposal to rename the USS JOHN C STENNIS (JCS).

The JCS is named after Senator John Stennis of Mississippi, the last Democrat Senator from that state and one of the longest serving Senators in US history. Senator Stennis has an interesting history, and LCDR (ret) Reuben Green focuses on racist comments that he made in 1956 along with his criminal behavior as trial prosecutor in Brown vs Mississippi. The fact that John Stennis was racist isn’t up for debate, and neither is the fact that racism is wrong. The notion that to correct this we need to rename the JCS when she pulls in for a refit though is stupid.

Anytime we name anything after a human being, its going to cause controversy. The Navy named a replenishment oiler after Harvey Milk, who took plenty of controversial actions, including outing the homosexuality of a Marine that acted to save President Ford’s life for his own political gain. We also have a USS Gabrielle Giffords, who voted in favor of limiting sales of assault weapons, which more than a few military members own and use without issue in their personal lives.

Any human being we’re going to name ships after is going to offend someone. Should we rename the USNS Maury, who despite contributing much to the study of weather and oceanography, fought in the Confederate Navy? Or the USNS Cesar Chavez, who advocated against immigration? Should we look deeper into the Kennedy family, which has plenty of skeletons in the closet and has two ships named after John and Robert Kennedy?

There are two ways to solve this. The first is to try and pick completely non-controversial names. We can name ships after battles, cities, states and even fish (which might include bumblebees if you’re a resident of California). The other option is to continue naming ships after people, with the understanding that sometimes these people will let you down. Especially with an increasing digital trail that follows everyone, its likely that anyone in the future will have said something controversial that was captured in a video, social media post or a published article.

This brings up a larger question: As a society, can we accept that people are multi-faceted and will have things we both like and dislike about them? I want to answer “Yes” to this question. While Martin Luther King Jr. had extra-marital affairs that I don’t agree with, he should be celebrated for his work in desegregating America. I can accept that Matthew Maury was a brilliant scientist that advanced our understanding of weather and oceanography while also disagreeing with his choice to serve in the Confederate Navy.

We become less human when we attempt to create binary heroes that are all good or all bad. Renaming the JCS would open the door to renaming other ships, creating a very political process that will sway depending on who is in power, and is a door best left shut.

This post represents the views of the author and not those of the Department of Defense, Department of the Navy, or any other government agency.

St. John Fisher, St. Thomas Moore, Blueberries LightYear vs Minions, Another Taste of Lawrence’s CRT lesions for Youth and Pinball Under the Fedora

Today is the feast day of St. John Fisher and St. Thomas Moore who choose to die rather than betray the faith for gain in the world.

Given what we’re seen from the church lately with Bishops and priests (with some notable exceptions) unwilling to stand for the faith and Public servants either not enforcing the laws or enforcing them selectively based on political allegiance they seem to be saints critical for our time.

I’m shocked they haven’t been dropped from the calendar.

My wife is a blueberry person and would regularly buy muffins at Hannaford market. However a bit ago she cut open her muffin and there were no blueberries inside. This is despite the fact that the price for the Muffins has gone up considerably.

It led to some drama when we cut open the 2nd Muffin of the two pack:

All of this brings to mind Casino:

This is actually the “broken windows” theory of enforcement where if you take care of small things you cut down on large one.

Under the left this has become passé and we’re paying for it.

There have been a lot of excuses for the failure of Lightyear by the defenders of Disney, none on them involved the decision to push homosexuality in a film for kids.

Alas for the woke crowd unlike schools they can not compel attendance in theatres so if parents don’t want to push this junk on their kids they don’t have to.

The real fun is going to come with the new movie Minions: The Rise of Gru. You see if all the Disney apologists are right then this movie should do just as badly as Lightyear because all of the same issues they claim are holding back Lightyear’s take will still be in play when it comes out.

Of course if Minions The Rise of Gru is as big of a hit as it seems likely to be it will just be another proof of the media as the lying propagandists that they are.

Not that they care anymore, they’ve given up on worrying about the pretense of being objective.

Speaking of schools here is another bit from that stuff I hinted at earlier that they are teaching elementary school kids in the Lawrence school system.

More of that Critical Race Theory that doesn’t exist

Funny for something that the left/media claimed was just a right wing fantasy there sure seems to be a lot of prepared items ready to be disseminated to public school kids in lieu of teaching thing useless things like reading, writing and arithmetic, particularly in schools were the parents don’t have a lot of other options.

I had planned to write something more extensive today about but I had forgotten about Juneteenth being a national holiday so the school crowd I tried to contact for comment might not have been in so I figured it would be fair to give them another day just out of fairness.

Of course I suspect I’ll be a tad busy the next few days…

…as PintasticNE begins tomorrow night and I plan on enjoying myself to the fullest.

As a teaser I have an interview with the owner of Cape Cod and Beyond a company that rents out machines who came down the house to pick up the Batman 66 machine that my sons and wife rented me for my birthday.

I suspect that you’ll see a lot more of these rental companies and the price of Pinball machines and the potential for investment continues to grow, but I think the real driver is the problem of where do you store these things if you don’t have to room for it.

The nice thing about a rental is there is always a fresh machines in your hands.

For the next four days I’ll be knee deep in pinball and I’ll forget about Biden, the Gas prices, Bad Government, and the lot.

We all need a few days away from it.

Honey bees and communism

The author checking on one hive. These bees were removed from the attic in a house, hence the odd comb.

A honey bee colony is composed of thousands of individual bees. Almost all of these bees are female workers. The workers spend their whole life working on behalf of the colony. Newly hatched workers take care of the inside of the colony, cleaning out honey cells, taking care of the young, and tending to the queen bee. As these workers get older, they begin flying out to gather nectar (which they use to make honey) and pollen (which is used to raise young bees).

Like all good little communist workers, the worker bees continue to work until they literally burn out. During the year, a worker bee lifespan is about 42 days. Some workers will get eaten by a variety of animals or other insects, while others fall victim to pesticides or bad weather. If she manages to survive all of these dangers, an old worker bee that can no longer contribute to the hive faces a dilemma. If she tries to retire to work a less intensive job, her sisters will pull her out of the hive and throw her off the landing board. Most spent workers instead commit a sort of bee-suicide, simply flying away and dying alone.

Life for the male bees, called drones, is not much better. Drones are larger and have better eyesight, but gather no nectar or pollen. Instead, they simply eat off the stores that their sisters build up. Drones fly out during the day looking for a virgin queen to mate with. If they succeed in this endeavor they die, as certain…body parts…break off during copulation. If drones don’t mate by the end of the year, before the onset of winter, the other worker bees will throw them off the landing board and keep them out of the hive, since they aren’t needed for the winter and take up space. I imagine this is a sort of “This is SPARTA!” moment for the worker bees, freeing themselves of the loafers that sat around guzzling their gathered honey all year.

Even the queen, who can live up to five years, doesn’t live the glorious lifestyle we would associate with her title. She lays anywhere between 800 to 3,000 eggs a day in the hive, allowing the hive to grow and stay strong. But as a queen ages and struggles to maintain this level of activity, the hive will begin building a queen cell, where it will raise a new queen. Once that new queen returns after mating, the honey bees will ball up around the old queen and smother her to death.

Honey bee society almost perfectly mirrors communism. No bee owns anything. The honey cells are open to all bees. Everyone does their job for the good of the hive. This model can be amazingly productive. Some honeybee hives can produce over a hundred pounds of honey in a year. Considering that a gallon of honey takes around 55,000 “bee miles” of flight to produce, the bees certainly prove that a communist society can produce good results when everyone is dedicated to the cause.

But bees also show the dark side of communism. Once a bee is no longer useful to the hive, its cast out to die without thought or mercy. Whether it is workers that are used up, drones that never mated with a virgin queen, or a queen that can’t lay enough eggs, the hive is fast to discard any bee deemed no longer useful. There is no bee retirement. Heck, bees can’t even live alone, as experiments have shown they die if not in the hive despite having plenty of food and water.

Honey bees give us a glimpse into what communist perfection looks like, a world that can be both amazingly productive and savagely dehumanizing at the same time. While not everything translates from bee to man, the similarities do exist. I wonder if bees were placed on this earth by God to teach lessons about ourselves. Wisdom is often described as learning from the mistakes and successes of others. Perhaps we would be wise to learn from the honey bee before attempting to model our society after a hive.

This post represents the views of the author and not those of the Department of Defense, Department of the Navy, or any other government agency. If you liked this article, consider purchasing a book from the author or donating to Da Tech Guy.

Opioids are no joke

The opioid addiction crisis in America has been in the news for quite a few years now. It tends to elicit the same politically-motivated responses from each side. The Left seems to ignore it mostly (since it hits a large portion of rural America that doesn’t vote for them), but occasionally someone uses it to argue for more lenient drug laws and better rehab options. The Right uses it to argue for more money for rural areas and occasionally rails about Big Pharma.

It’s hard to really understand what motivates someone addicted to opioids if you’re a regular person like me that doesn’t use illicit drugs. But I got a taste of it this past week. I had surgery last Friday on my shoulder to repair the over 18 years of damage the Navy has done to me, shoving me in submarines, airplanes and other small spaces that I was probably never meant to fit into. It all caught up, so I spent over two hours with a surgeon poking around my shoulder and repairing the various tears and installing a lot of anchors. When it was all finished, my brother-in-law drove me home with a large pack of medications, one of which was oxycodone.

Now, I’ve never had any narcotics, so I was careful to take the oxycodone on the prescribed schedule. By Sunday, I felt awesome. Sure, my arm was still in a sling and I was slowly working it back into a full range of motion, but I still felt great. I was walking around the house just fine, enjoyed being outside in my garden showing my kids what vegetable to pick, and I did plenty of “Netflix and chill.”

The chill dropped off on Tuesday. My prescription ran out, and that morning I had physical therapy. I would describe the crash of my mood like the drop as sudden, awful and gut wrenching. The last case was definitely true, since I threw up after the physical therapist had tortured me for 30 minutes. I spent most of Tuesday on the couch with some sort of ice pack on my shoulder, wondering what pain the next 10 minutes will bring.

Wednesday was better, and I learned to work through my pain, and by Thursday I was back to a much happier place. That brief glimpse of how effective oxycodone was, and how my whole world changed just after going off it from a weekend of use, gave me a far better understanding of just how powerful addiction is and the difficulty in breaking it. I have a lot more sympathy for someone that is in constant pain and just wants to feel normal, and if you can take a tiny pill (my oxycodone was the size of my thumbnail) to make it all go away, why wouldn’t you?

I can’t say I know what the answer to the opioid crisis is, but I can say some of our assumptions are flawed. I don’t think most people want to be addicted. I knew that while it was easy to take that tiny pill to feel better, long term it was a bad idea. Thankfully I have a family that can support me sitting on a couch for a while. What about senior citizens that don’t have family? What about the many single people who don’t have adult kids or even neighbors to check in on them? Thrusting these people into a bucket labeled “deplorable addicts” denies them humanity and makes it too easy and convenient to ignore their plight.

We need some actual solutions to opioid addiction that preserve our use of these drugs to manage pain while recognizing the power they have to destroy our lives if we aren’t careful.

This post represents the views of the author and not those of the Department of Defense, Department of the Navy, or any other government agency. If you liked this article, why not donate to Da Tech Guy or purchase one of the author’s books on Amazon?

SABLE / GERBEL Draft Face to Face League 2021 Plus AA Draft

AA Draft first

Franchise	Player	Position	Team	Round
Tampa Bay Mike	Paul Blackburn	Starting Pitcher	Oakland	1
Cleveland Mike	Gilbert Celeseino	Centerfielder	Minnesota	1
NY Yankees Sherwood	Gavin Sheets	Right Fielder	Chicago (a)	1
Oakland Patrick	Seth Brown	Right Fielder	Oakland	1
St. Louis Alvin	Riley Adams	Catcher	Washington	1
NY Mets Mark	Michael Chavis	Second Baseman	Pittsburgh	1
Washington Peter	Nate Pearson	Pitcher	Toronto	1
Colorado Brian	Christian Pache	Centerfielder	Atlanta	1

Round 2

Franchise	Player	Position	Team	Round
Tampa Bay Mike	Joe Ryan	Starting Pitcher	Minnesota	2
Cleveland Mike	A. J. Puck	Relief Pitcher	Oakland	2
St. Louis Alvin	Jake Rogers	Catcher	Detroit	2
NY Mets Mark	Chris Archer	Starter/Relivers	Tampa Bay	2
Washington Peter	Dustin May	Pitcher	Los Angeles	2
Colorado Brian	Ryan Braiser	Relief Pitcher	Boston	2

Round 3

Franchise	Player	Position	Team	Round
Tampa Bay Mike	Cody Poteet	Starting Pitcher	Miami	3
Cleveland Mike	Evans Philips	Pitcher	Los Angeles	3
Washington Peter	Dakota Hudson	Starting Pitcher	St Louis	3
Colorado Brian	Jesus Sanchez	Right Fielder	Miami	3

Round 4

Franchise	Player	Position	Team	Round
Tampa Bay Mike	Joe Connor	Left Fielder	Colorado	4
Cleveland Mike	Brian De La Cruz	Centerfielder	Miami	4
Colorado Brian	Alex Woods	Starting Pitcher	Los Angeles	4

Round 5

Franchise	Player	Position	Team	Round
Tampa Bay Mike	Jason Bosier	Third Baseman	San Francisco	5
Cleveland Mike	Kyle Isabel	Right Field	Kansas City	5

The Regular Draft

Round 1

Franchise Drafting	Player	Position	Team	Round
Tampa Bay Mike	Miles Straw	Center Fielder	Cleveland	1
Tampa Bay Mike (Via Cleveland)	Tyler O’Neil	Left Fielder	St. Louis	1
NY Yankees Sherwood	Mookie Betts	Right Fielder	Los Angeles	1
Oakland Patrick	Richie Rodrigues	Short Reliever	Atlanta	1
St. Louis Alvin	Tyler Anderson	Starting Pitcher	Seattle	1
NY Mets Mark	Anthony DeSclafani	Starting Pitcher	San Francisco	1
Tampa Bay (via Washington & San Diego)	David Fletcher	Second Baseman	Anaheim	1
Colorado Brian	Tim Anderson	Shortstop	Chicago (a)	1

Round 2

Franchise Drafting	Player	Position	Team	Round
Tampa Bay Mike	Jose Ramirez	Third Baseman	Cleveland	2
Cleveland Mike	Ryan McMann	Third Baseman	Colorado	2
NY Yankees Sherwood	Sean Murphy	Catcher	Oakland	2
Tampa Bay Mike (via Oakland Patrick)	Adolis Garcia	Centerfielder	Texas	2
St. Louis Alvin	Tyler Stevenson	Catcher	Cincinnati	2
Tampa Bay Mike (Via NY Mets Mark)	Omar Navarez	Catcher	Milwaukee	2
Washington Peter	Jose Altuve	Second Baseman	Houston	2
Tampa Bay Mike (via Colorado Brian)	Thomas Nighto	Catcher	NY National	2

Round 3

Franchise Drafting	Player	Position	Team	Round
Tampa Bay Mike	Carlos Rendon	Starting Pitcher	Chicago (a)	3
Tampa Bay Mike (Via Cleveland)	Dilan Cease	Starting Pitcher	Chicago (a)	3
Tampa Bay Mike (via NY Yankees Sherwood)	Nolan Arenado	Third Baseman	St Louis	3
Tampa Bay Mike (via Oakland Patrick)	Whit Merrifield	Second Baseman	Kansas City	3
Tampa Bay Mike (via St. Louis Alvin)	Tyler Ward	Right Fielder	Anaheim	3
NY Mets Mark	Tony Kemp	Second Baseman	Oakland	3
Tampa Bay Mike (via Washington)	Manny Magout	Center Fielder	Tampa Bay	3
Tampa Bay Mike (via Colorado Brian)	Yandy Diaz	First baseman	Tampa Bay	3

Round 4

Franchise Drafting	Player	Position	Team	Round
Oakland Patrick (via Tampa Bay Mike)	Kenley Janson	Relief Pitcher	Los Angeles	4
Cleveland Mike	Lorenzo Cain	Center Fielder	Milwaukee	4
NY Yankees Sherwood	Adam Duval	Right Fielder	Atlanta	4
Oakland Patrick	Kevin Newman	Shortstop	Pittsburgh	4
St. Louis Alvin	Gregory Soto	Short Relief	Detroit	4
NY Mets Mark	Ranger Swarez	Starting Pitcher	Philadelphia	4
Washington Peter	Luis Robert	Center Fielder	Chicago (a)	4
Colorado Brian	Trevor Richards	Long Relief	Toronto	4

Round 5

Franchise Drafting	Player	Position	Team	Round
Oakland Patrick (Via Tampa Bay Mike)	Bailey Ober	Starting Pitcher	Minnesota	5
Washington Peter (via Cleveland Mike)	Chris Taylor	Everywhere (but c)	Los Angeles	5
NY Yankees Sherwood	Jacob Stallings	Catcher	Pittsburgh	5
Oakland Patrick	Mark Cana	Left Fielder	Oakland	5
Oakland Patrick (via St. Louis Alvin)	Paul Segal	Short Reliver	Seattle	5
NY Mets Mark	Kiki Hernandez	Center Fielder	Boston	5
Washington Peter	Mark Melancon	Short Reliever	San Diego	5
Colorado Brian	Ian Kennedy	Short Relief	Philadelphia	5

Round 6

Franchise Drafting	Player	Position	Team	Round
Cleveland Mike	Cedric Mullins	Centerfielder	Baltimore	6
NY Yankees Sherwood	Sonny Gray	Starting Pitcher	Cincinnati	6
Oakland Patrick	Yu Darvish	Starting Pitcher	San Diego	6
St. Louis Alvin	Jaylin Garcia	Relief Pitcher	San Francisco	6
NY Mets Mark	Emanuel Chase	Pitcher	Cleveland	6
Washington Peter	Alex Reyes	Relief Pitcher	St. Louis	6
Colorado Brian	Casey Mize	Starting Pitcher	Detroit	6

Round 7

Franchise Drafting	Player	Position	Team	Round
Cleveland Mike	Josh Harrison	Second Baseman	Oakland	7
NY Yankees Sherwood	Nick Castellanos	Right Fielder	Cincinnati	7
Oakland Patrick	Hanson Alberto	Third Baseman	Shortstop	7
St. Louis Alvin	Aledmys Diaz	Third Baseman	Houston	7
NY Mets Mark	Michael Brantley	left Fielder	Houston	7
Washington Peter	Francisco Lindor	Shortstop	New York (n)	7
Colorado Brian	Joey Gallo	Left Fielder	Yankees	7

Round 8

Franchise Drafting	Player	Position	Team	Round
Cleveland Mike	Kyle Farmer	Shortstop	Cincinnati	8
NY Yankees Sherwood	Christian Yelich	Left Fielder	Milwaukee	8
Oakland Patrick	Luis Arraez	Third Baseman	Minnesota	8
St. Louis Alvin	Alex Verdugo	Left Fielder	Boston	8
NY Mets Mark	Drew Rasmussen	Starting Pitcher	Tampa Bay	8
Washington Peter	Chaz McCormick	Center Fielder	Houston	8
Colorado Brian	Nick Madrigal	Second Baseman	Chicago (a)	8

Round 9

Franchise Drafting	Player	Position	Team	Round
Cleveland Mike	Lury Garcia	Second Baseman	Chicago (a)	9
NY Yankees Sherwood	James Tallon	Starting Pitcher	New York (a)	9
Oakland Patrick	Reese McGuire	Catcher	Toronto	9
St. Louis Alvin	Corey Seager	Shortstop	Los Angeles	9
NY Mets Mark	Pete Alonzo	First Baseman	New York (N)	9
Washington Peter	Rhys Hoskins	First Baseman	Philadelphia	9
Colorado Brian	Luke Weaver	Starting Pitcher	Arizona	9

Round 10

Franchise Drafting	Player	Position	Team	Round
Cleveland Mike	George Alfredo	Catcher	Miami	10
NY Yankees Sherwood	Marcus Seminan	Second Baseman	Tornoto	10
Oakland Patrick	Elias Diaz	Catcher	Colorado	10
St. Louis Alvin	German Marquez	Starting Pitcher	Colorado	10
NY Mets Mark	Tejay Antone	Relief Pitcher	Cincinnati	10
Washington Peter	Tucker Barnhart	Catcher	Cincinnati	10
Colorado Brian	Jose Uquity	Starting Pitcher	Houston	10

Round 11

Franchise Drafting	Player	Position	Team	Round
Cleveland Mike	Clayton Kershaw	Starting Pitcher	Los Angeles	11
NY Yankees Sherwood	Ryan Montcastle	First Baseman	Baltimore	11
Oakland Patrick	Jordan Romero	Short Reliever	Toronto	11
St. Louis Alvin	Bret Gardner	Centerfielder	New York (a)	11
NY Mets Mark	Yonni Hernandez	Third Baseman	Texas	11
Washington Peter	Anthony Rizzo	First Baseman	New York (a)	11
Colorado Brian	Kyle Schwarber	Leftfielder	Boston	11

Round 12

Franchise Drafting	Player	Position	Team	Round
Cleveland Mike	Garrett Whitlock	Relief Pitcher	Boston	12
NY Yankees Sherwood	Bo Bitchette	Shortstop	Toronto	12
Oakland Patrick	Raimel Tapla	Left Fielder	Colorado	12
St. Louis Alvin	Josh Bell	First Baseman	Washington	12
NY Mets Mark	Charlie Morton	Starting Pitcher	Atlanta	12
Washington Peter	Matt Chapman	Third Baseman	Oakland	12
Colorado Brian	Tyler Wells	Relief Pitcher	Baltimore	12

Round 13

Franchise Drafting	Player	Position	Team	Round
Cleveland Mike	Michael Wacca	Starting Pitcher	Tampa Bay	13
NY Yankees Sherwood	Brain Daubach	First Baseman	Boston	13
Oakland Patrick	David Peralta	Left Fielder	Arizona	13
St. Louis Alvin	Jena Seguria	Second Baseman	Philadelphia	13
NY Mets Mark	A. J. Pollick	Left Fielder	Los Angeles	13
Washington Peter	Tyler Alexander	Starting Pitcher	Detroit	13
Colorado Brian	Ketel Marte	Centerfielder	Arizona	13

Round 14

Franchise Drafting	Player	Position	Team	Round
Cleveland Mike	Dalton Varsho	Catcher	Arizona	14
NY Yankees Sherwood	Nelson Cruz	First Baseman	Tampa Bay	14
Oakland Patrick	Max Kapler	Right Fielder	Minnesota	14
St. Louis Alvin	Carlos Hernandez	Starting Pitcher	Kansas City	14
NY Mets Mark	Casey Saddler	Relief Pitcher	Seattle	14
Washington Peter	Nathan Eovaldi	Starting Pitcher	Boston	14
Colorado Brian	Jack Flattery	Starting Pitcher	St. Louis	14

Round 15

Franchise Drafting	Player	Position	Team	Round
Cleveland Mike	Chris Sale	Starting Pitcher	Boston	15
NY Yankees Sherwood	Justin Turner	Third Baseman	Los Angeles	15
Oakland Patrick	Michael Conforto	Right Fielder	New York (N)	15
St. Louis Alvin	Andrew Knizer	Catcher	St. Louis	15
NY Mets Mark	Ronald Torreyes	Third Baseman	Philadelphia	15
Washington Peter	Zack Greinke	Starting Pitcher	Houston	15
Colorado Brian	Mike Zunino	Catcher	Tampa Bay	15

Round 16

Franchise Drafting	Player	Position	Team	Round
Cleveland Mike	Kolton Wong	Second Baseman	Milwaukee	16
Oakland Patrick	Dylan Carson	Right Fielder	St Louis	16
St. Louis Alvin	Cody Bellinger	Center Fielder	Los Angeles	16
NY Mets Mark	Johnathan Shoot	First Baseman	Detroit	16
Washington Peter	Wilmar Flores	Third Baseman	San Francisco	16
Colorado Brian	Tyler Glasnow	Starting Pitcher	Tampa Bay	16

Round 17

Franchise Drafting	Player	Position	Team	Round
Cleveland Mike	Dylan Moore	Second Base	Seattle	17
Oakland Patrick	Tommy LaStella	Second Base	San Francisco	17
St. Louis Alvin	Zach Thomphon	Starting Pitcher	Miami	17
NY Mets Mark	Johan Moncado	Third Baseman	Chicago (a)	17
Washington Peter	Jackie Bradley Jr.	Center Fielder	Milwaukee	17
Colorado Brian	Pablo Lopez	Starting Pitcher	Miami	17

Round 18

Franchise Drafting	Player	Position	Team	Round
Cleveland Mike	Giancarlo Stanton	Outfielder	New York (a)	18
Oakland Patrick	Eric Swanson	Relief Pitcher	Seattle	18
St. Louis Alvin	Yordan Alvarez	Left Fielder	Houston	18
NY Mets Mark	Ryan McKenna	Left Fielder	Baltimore	18
Colorado Brian	Spencer Patton	Relief Pitcher	Texas	18

Round 19

Franchise Drafting	Player	Position	Team	Round
Cleveland Mike	Jeff McNeil	Second Baseman	New York (N)	19
Oakland Patrick	Lance Lynn	Starting Pitcher	Chicago (A)	19
St. Louis Alvin	Kodi Whitley	Relief Pitcher	St. Louis	19
NY Mets Mark	Mike Yazstremski	Right Fielder	San Francisco	19
Colorado Brian	Edwardo Escobar	Third Base	Milwaukee	19

Round 20

Franchise Drafting	Player	Position	Team	Round
Cleveland Mike	Trevor Story	Shortstop	Colorado	20
Oakland Patrick	Jorge Alcala	Relief Pitcher	Minnesota	20
St. Louis Alvin	Corey Knebl	Relief Pitcher	Los Angeles	20
NY Mets Mark	Austin Hayes	Left Fielder	Baltimore	20
Colorado Brian	Devin Williams	Relief Pitcher	Milwaukee	20

Round 21

Franchise Drafting	Player	Position	Team	Round
St. Louis Alvin	Jesus Agular	First Baseman	Miami	21
NY Mets Mark	Tony Gonsonlin	Starting Pitcher	Los Angeles	21
Colorado Brian	Andrelton Simmons	Shortstop	Minnesota	21

Round 22

Franchise Drafting	Player	Position	Team	Round
St. Louis Alvin	Willie Adames	Shortstop	Milwaukee	22

Round 23

Franchise Drafting	Player	Position	Team	Round
St. Louis Alvin	George Springer	Center Fielder	Toronto	23

Round 24

Franchise Drafting	Player	Position	Team	Round
St. Louis Alvin	Albert Pujols	First Baseman	Anaheim	24

Tragedy of the Commons: HOAs

Homeowner Associations, or HOAs, are a sneaky way that fascism crept into our daily lives. HOAs are ubiquitus in most residential neighborhoods, and unless you buy an older home or build from scratch, its hard to escape them, since around 80% of new homes are built into an HOA.

The original idea behind an HOA seems to be a way for cities to dump the responsibility for maintaining small residential parks. Rather than have the city maintain it, an HOA would collect fees and do the dirty work. Even better, HOAs could enforce codes on everything from mulch color to weeds in your lawn, which would keep home values up as well as property taxes. From the government’s perspective, its a win-win.

For homeowners, its a total loss. HOAs have taken on a mind of their own, going so far as to foreclose on people’s homes and sell them at auction. We’re not talking just one or two homes. In Colorado, one HOA had filed 2,400 foreclosure cases against homeowners. Many of these followed a similar pattern: a homeowner gets fined for some stupud nonsense like weeds, and if they don’t pay up, the HOA tacks on legal fees and late fees. Once you reach into the thousands of dollars, it becomes almost impossible for a homeowner to pay it, so the HOA files a foreclosure case and attempts to kick the homeowner out and sell their house at auction.

Kicking someone out of their house for weeds in the front lawn and selling the house at auction. Read that sentence out loud and ask yourself how any person could stoop that low.

HOAs try to rip out perfectly good trees, beat people up for free speech, and even punish someone for having the gall to put out a dog treat dispenser. By far the worst problem is that the HOA tries to regulate your life while you’re in your own home. It’s bad enough dealing with morons at work, but at home? HOAs were one of the main reasons I built a custom home not in a community (which you can read about here).

HOAs don’t often get national media attention, but your HOA probably controls your well being a lot more than most national politics do (except for Biden-flation). These monstrosities need to be dismantled and destroyed. Some people are doing just that through legal means, like the Colorado legislature that is limiting fees and foreclosure cases. Many people are pushing back. When one HOA tried to stop a thin-blue-line flag, multiple neighbors began flying the same flag. As Stu Scheller likes to say “We can’t all be wrong.”

If you’re in an HOA now, I recommend getting onto the board and dismantling it on the inside. That’s what one of my neighbors has done. He has approved and expedited nearly every neighbor request for their property, making sure people can do whatever they want to their property. If you can’t do that, you should bring up HOA reform with your state representative, so that instead of debating what person to name the next highway after, they might actually make your life better. It’s a fight worth fighting, and unlike national politics, your voice can really make a difference.

This post represents the views of the author and not those of the Department of Defense, Department of the Navy, or any other government agency. If you enjoyed this article, please consider donating to Da Tech Guy and purchasing one of the author’s books.

The Current 1970 League Waivers list and a quick update on how it works UPDATE with current claims

Wanted to get out the list of players available on Waivers so people can decide who they want. Remember this is how waivers works

A team makes a waivers “Claim” on an unsigned player:

If no team with a worse record makes a “counter claim” The player goes on your 35 man roster Tuesday at 1 am
If a team with a worse record makes a “counter claim” on that player, the team with the worse record now becomes the claiming team and gets the player if no worse team makes a claim before the deadline.

Claims and counter claims can be made in either the chat room or the message center. The timestamp on either message will determine which claim comes first.
Only one waivers claim can be made per week.

VERY IMPORTANT: While this won’t be a problem week one of wavers REMEMBER that if a player any at bats or innings used by a player released into waivers ARE STILL USED UP IF YOU PICK THEM UP.

Example Joe Lahoud is currently on Seattle’s Roster

As you can see Lahoud has had two at bats and one walk. for Seattle. If for whatever reason I released him those at bats would still be used up so if another player wanting a last chance A power off the bench picked him up in waivers he would only have 38 (or 37 depending on how dynasty counts appearances

Anyways here are the players available.

The Batters

Tommie Aaron Atl
Luis Alcaraz KC
Hank Allen Mil
Bob Allison Min
Luis Alvarado Bos
Max Alvis Mil
Bob Aspromonte Atl
Bob Barton SD
Del Bates Phi
Curt Blefray NYY
Buddy Bradford Cle
Ron Brand Mon
Angel Bravo Cin
Gates Brown Det Claim NYY 6/23 Claim Successful
Ike Brown Det Claim Sea 6/11 Claim Successful
Bob Burda Mil
Jim Campanis KC
Darrel Chaney Cin
Ty Cline Cin
Gene Clines Pit Claim Pit 6/12 Claim Successful
Wayne Comer Wash
Mike Compton Phi
JIm Davenport SF Claim Philadelphia 6/25 Claim Successful
Tommy Dean SD
Bob Didier Atl Claim Washington 7/10 Claim Successful
Doc Edwards Phi Claim Pittsburgh 7/8 Claim Successful
Jim FAirey Mon
Mike Fiore Bos
Bobby Floyd KC
Tito Francona Mil
Vern Fuller Cle
Len Gabrielson LAD
Phil Gagliano Chc
Russ Gibson SF
Gus Gil Mil Claim Washington 6/25 Claim Successful
Greg Goossen Wash
Cesar Gutierez Det
Jimmie Hall Atl
Jackie Hernandez KC
Mike Hershberger Mil
Jim Hutto Phi
Johnny Jeter Pit Claim NYY 6/11 Claim Successful
Frank Johnson SF Claim SF 6/11 Claim Successful
Mike Jorgensen NYM
Rick Joseph Phi
Van Kelly SD
Lou Klimchock Cle
Andy Kosco LAD CLIAM Pit 7/15 Claim Successful
Ed Kranepool NYM Claim NYY 7/3 Claim Successful
Coco Laboy Mon
Keith Lampard Hou
Leron Lee StL
Charlie Manuel Min
Dave Marshall NYM
Don Mason SF
John Matias Chw
Rich McKinney
Jerry McNertney Mil Claim Minnesota 6/25 Claim Successful
Jerry Morales SD
Rich Morales ChW Chw Claim Seattle 6/27 Claim Successful
Russ Nagelson Det
Syd O’Brien Chw Claim Pittsburgh 6/25 Claim Successful
Don Pavletich Bos
Jim Price Det
Frank Quilici Min
Tommie Reynolds Cal
Rich Rollins Cle
John Roseboro Wash
Chico Ruiz Cal Claim Cincinnati 6/20 Claim Successful
Mike Ryan Phi
Chico Salmon Bal
Dick Schofield Bos
Rich Severson KC
Mike Shannon StL
Ron Slocum SD Claim Minnesota 6/20 Claim Successful
Willie Smith ChC
Russ Snyder Mil
Bill Sorrell KC Claim SF 6/18 Claim Successful
Bob Spence ChW Claim Sea 6/18) claim Successful
George Spriggs KC
Marv Staehle Mon
Larry Stahl SD
John Stephenson SF
Ron Stone Phi Claim Pit 6/18 Claim Successful
Gary Sutherland Mon
Ken Szolkiewicz Det
Javis Tatum Cal Claim Phil 6/18) Claim Failed! Successful COUNTERCLAIM MONTREAL 6/20
Bob Taylor SF
Hector Torres Hou
Pete Ward NYY Claim SF (6/24) Claim Successful
Ray Webster SD
Al Weis NYM
Don Wert Det
Floyd Wicker Mil
Walt William Chw
Ron Woods NYY Claim Minn (6/11) Claim Successful