PARIS — Not having stopped here other than for a change of planes in nearly a year, I was delighted by the invitation to try out British Air’s Open Skies, a boutique flight to Paris that leaves from New York or Washington with only 85 passengers. The kindness of my hosts came just at the right time, as Mr. Pleszczynski and I had been discussing the French Open — the Championnats Internationaux de France , as they have been known since 1925 — and a few other items on the radar screen concerning this dear and old country, eldest daughter of the Church presently embroiled in a couple of savage wars of peace in Africa and engaged in a soul-searching debate regarding the proper limits on the press with regard to the private lives of public officials. At the tournament, the only debates took place on this legendary site’s famous red clay, with most of the top players advancing through the first round yesterday and the day before, Sunday. The weather is perfect under the clear azure skies that my friends assure me have been the norm since the beginning of spring, turning even the gloomiest souls into dreamers, though raising concerns about drought. The stadium itself, designed like one of those classical French gardens that make you think the world is rational, is so agreeable and well-organized that visitors turn happy — and courteous — even as they approach the gates on the avenue Gordon-Bennett, named for the founder of the New York Herald , also the Paris paper of the same name (many streets in Paris’ western quarters are named after Americans). It is hard to imagine that Roland-Garros, named for an aviation pioneer and World War I ace, was in competition last year with other locations to continue hosting this classic event in the tennis universe. Of the other four tournaments in the tennis grand slam circuit, only the All-England, held at Wimbledon near London, has never considered moving: the Australian and U.S. championships have, by contrast, seen changes in their locations. These have been on balance happy moves. Although Flushing Meadows represented a sharp departure from Forest Hills with its classic handsome layout, its clay and grass courts, its class, you must allow, I suppose, that the huge season-ending event in U.S. tennis needs the space and the big-time environment its new digs provided. There were good reasons to move the Internationaux away from Paris’s west side to a proposed new sports complex in a northern suburb. There was space there for a state-of-the-art stadium and facilities that other sports could use, for training as well as competition. French educational authorities as well as private athletic clubs are willing and often quite dynamic, but when you talk to the individuals involved you usually hear a note of apology for the second and even third tier levels of French amateur and professional athletics, with the possible exception of solo sailing and fencing. If you build it they will learn, I suppose that was the argument. However, this is far from a sure thing, and the excellent athletes here (and on American basketball courts) who grew up in makeshift sports programs in eastern and central Europe underscore an observation someone made on the plane, money does not make champions, coaches and teachers do. Not to get romantic about this, and I am sure good facilities cannot hurt, other things being equal, but anyway the French tennis federation opted to keep the tournament at its location near the Porte d’Auteuil, which is just at the edge of the Bois de Boulogne in a neighborhood of sports stadiums, including the famous Parc des Princes football field, where the Lille club played an important game last Saturday, necessitating a major mobilization of gendarmes in full riot gear in anticipation of post-game fan exuberance, which fortunately stayed rational, as these things go, possibly because sufficient minds were concentrated by the highly visible police presence. The expansion and redesign of Roland-Garros, scheduled for completion in 2016, calls for using nearby space to lay out some additional courts for both competitive play and training programs. A retractable roof will be fitted over the center court, whose bleachers already seats as many, about 10,000, as other major tennis stadiums. It is a risky gamble to change the character of a tradition-bound sport in a radical way, and this includes the environment in which it is identified. With all due respect for the capital’s northern suburbs, they are not the venerable and expensive old west side with its wooded areas and tracks-and-field and vast elegant sun-lit apartments in handsome old seven-story buildings. There would not be the old racetrack across the street with its fin-de-siècle architectural motifs. There would not be the nostalgic small poets’ garden tucked away next door to the tennis stadium where children play and old men read verses inscribed on stones. It made sense in every way to build on what they already had. Roland-Garros has been improved upon several times since its original design, done in great haste to allow the famous Four Musketeers of French tennis to defend their Davis Cup against the revenge-seeking Americans, at the time still led by the legendary Bill Tilden, who remains a contender in the perennial game of “greatest of all time.” This was back in 1928, and they (I mean the Mousquetaires) , won behind their own legendary champion, the crafty René Lacoste, known as the crocodile for the way he moved. Some tennis powers, as well as municipal bigs and ordinary citizens, question whether the proposed innovations can be successfully completed and worry about their cost, but those questions could be raised about a new venue as well. ME PERSONALLY, I WAS DELIGHTED for the innovation in my travel habits provided by my Open Skies hosts. Lately I have been traveling in African army cargo planes and broken down trucks, so the opportunity to see how the other half gets from A to B was welcome. Let me tell you, if you are an athlete — and I am, I say this purely as an objective fact not as a boast, the leading over-the-hill tennis player on Washington’s entire east side, which means I can beat Mr. Tyrrell, especially if we play after discussing critical questions relating to Republican Party politics over a few martinis — traveling on Open Skies is the ticket. They keep you in perfect comfort and get you on and off the plane and into Paris in record time. I have never spent less time getting out of an airplane and to my final destination, not that I am always sure what that is. They have the good sense to fly into Orly airport on the city’s southern outskirts and scarcely a quarter hour to the river, whereas the appalling Charles-de-Gaulle wasteland is way over in some distant zone to the northeast from which you cannot reach Paris in less than an hour. The seats are fantastic. Of course, my standard of recent comparison is benches in a Tupolev flying over an African desert (superb American-trained pilot, soldiers and their families, some with barnyard animals, but hey, I have also been in steerage). Seriously, this is the way to go. You can stretch your legs, you can have a drink — or several — you can read, you can speak to an elegant stewardess in any language you want, you can quote either Shakespeare or Corneille and she gets it, you can eat, you can not eat, you lean over and discuss restaurants and museums and sporting news with a fellow passenger who turns out to know more than you do instead of talking for eight hours about currencies and tips, or you can stay by yourself and enjoy the magic of moving through the clouds. How blessed we are! How foolish to let our human sins undermine all the wonderful gifts our God-given brains have made for us! Why cannot the Arabs get their acts together? Hah? I ask you. Not a single Arab competitor in high-level tennis. Well, the Russians have got there, several of them, at least among the women, have a clear shot at reaching the final next week, and look where they were just a few years ago. Freedom will out, my friends, and tennis is the index of its progress. After all — look at Rafael Nadal. This child of the New Democratic Spain — admittedly wracked by unseemly disturbances over the weekend, which threaten to cause real trouble down the road — this young man (24) from the Balearic Islands, was inconceivable during the years of the dictatorship. They had great players in Manuel Santana and Andres Gimeno, but not the explosion of talent across all fields, not just sports, which he epitomizes. I admit I am of those who sometimes asks whether Don Francisco got a bad rap, or at least an exaggerated rap, and whether the new Spain gets too wide a berth from American Deweyites (“the solution to the problems of democracy is more democracy”), but freedom, freedom — it is their country, let them deal with it. In the meantime, they have produced some fantastically good tennis players. One of whom is David Ferrer, who advanced easily to the second round. Rafa Nadal will try to equal the mighty Bjorn Borg’s record six victories here. The unexpected is always possible, but the man who may stop him is likely to be either Roger Federer or Novak Djokovic, who are in the same bracket and therefore will meet but for an upset. They both started out easily yesterday with straight set victories, although Feliciano Lopez forced Federer to a tie-break in the third. The only surprise on the men’s side, actually, was the comeback from two sets down by a 31-year old French qualifier, Stéphane Robert, over the Czech Thomas Berdych in a thriller whose final set (where there is no tie-break) went to 9-7. The Americans are not shining, with the graceful and fierce Williams sisters out of the running due to health problems and our teenage star Melanie Oudin already overwhelmed by the defending champion Francesca Schiavone. The men are represented by an attractive but weak field relative to what we usually send here, Isner, Querrey, Fish. The French have Gasquet and Monfils, maybe Simon, Tsonga, Bennetteau, while their Michael Llorda is already out. Perhaps the countries that sent the finest players of their time to Roland-Garros in its infancy, will be doing so again when all the renovations are finished in about four years’ time. It will be a gorgeous stadium then. But then it always was.
Go here to read the rest:
We’ll Always Have Tennis — in Paris
This past Tuesday, two people were executed in front of a hotel in the Golden Zone in Mazatlan, a touristed area. As it happens, the Patterico clan was in Mazatlan that day. I swear I had nothing to do with it. Nor did I have anything to do with the headless body tossed in front of a restaurant the same day. The story of the double murder at the hotel barely merited a couple of lines in the Associated Press : Farther north, in the Pacific coast resort of Mazatlan, two men were shot to death in the parking lot of a hotel frequented by foreign tourists. Neither of the victims were tourists, but guests reported hearing the gunshots. A travel site adds these details : Also, a travel agent told TravelPulse.com he received an email from a client on the Norwegian Star who said other passengers in the vicinity reported hearing about 40 shots being fired. That was our cruise ship, and there was indeed a lot of talk about it, although it was mostly in the form of fourth-hand rumors that botched the details, as you would expect. As for us, we hadn’t gone into town, as we had opted for a boat ride around some estuaries that would keep us out of the town. I sort of wanted to see the cathedral afterwards, but I was the only one — and with all the previous reports of muggings and such in the city, I didn’t force the issue. I’m now glad I didn’t. As for the headless body, well, that didn’t even merit a single mention in any English-language Big Media source I could find. It took an exploration of Mexican newspapers to learn about the beheaded body. . . and the head, in a separate bag . . . and the body of the pig : Una persona fue decapitada y su cuerpo dejado en el acceso principal de un restaurante en la zona Dorada, en la cual se encuentran la mayoría de los hoteles, restaurantes y discotecas turísticas del puerto de Mazatlán. Junto al cuerpo que estaba envuelto en una bolsa de plástico negro, estaba la cabeza en otra bolsa negra. A menos dos metros dejaron un puerco muerto, al cual le dispararon en la cabeza los sicarios. El reporte de la Policía Municipal señala que la víctima no ha sido identificada, aunque autoridades presumieron que se trata de una persona secuestrada. El restaurante de la zona dorada, donde dejaron el cuerpo es El Habaleño, el cual a la hora en que dejaron el cuerpo decapitado y el cerdo, ya estaba cerrado. En este inmueble también ejecutaron a dos personas identificadas como Guadalupe Núñez el domingo pasado por la tarde. I include the Spanish for the benefit of readers who can read it, as I have no reliable translation. A horrible Google translation is available here , but I would ignore that. I’ll do my best at a rough translation, and then you smarty-pantses who know better can correct me: A person was decapitated and his corpse was left in the main entrance of a restaurant in the Golden Zone, where the majority of the hotels, restaurants, and nightclubs of the port of Mazatlan can be found. With the corpse, which was wrapped in a black plastic bag, was the head in a separate black bag. Less than two meters away the killers left a dead pig, which they had shot in the head. The report of the Municipal Police indicated that the victim had not been identified, although authorities presumed that it was a kidnapping victim. The Golden Zone restaurant where the body was dumped is El Habaleño, which was already closed at the time that the decapitated corpse and the pig were left. The previous Sunday afternoon, at the same location, two people were executed who went by the name of Guadalupe Núñez. Another story here (horrible Google translation here ) adds the charming detail that the killers, after dumping the headless body, carjacked a woman in a Lincoln to make their getaway. Again, the headless body dump and the double murder all occurred Tuesday, oddly enough, the same day we were there. I suppose the silence in English-language papers about the beheaded body in Mazatlan is no surprise. After all, in the very same AP story I quote above, it was reported that police had found seven hacked and mutilated corpses in the seaside tourist town of Acapulco the very same day. Three were found “dumped in a highway tunnel that leads into Acapulco’s tourist zone” with pieces of the bodies missing. Three more “bullet-ridden bodies” were found in the streets, and police “discovered a fourth body half-buried and lacking its head.” Heck, even that wasn’t the lede of the story, which was primarily concerned with the discovery of a rural camp suspected to be operated by one of the cartels, containing “72 sticks of commercial synthetic explosives . . . 14 rifles, eight grenades,” and “more than 4,000 bullets.” So I guess a single headless body with accompanying head is no big deal. Except that it is. Because the violence continues, even after we tourists depart. And it has ripple effects. The day after we left, gunmen sprayed a different tourist restaurant in Mazatlan with gunfire. That restaurant and three namesake restaurants were all closed. (Story here , horrible translation here .) Although none of the victims of these crimes were tourists, the cruise lines have had enough . After the double murder, Carnival Cruise Lines immediately canceled a planned stop in Mazatlan, and Norwegian Cruise Lines canceled its Mazatlan stop for the season. And that was, ostensibly, only because of the murders at the hotel. Never mind the headless body or the restaurant shooting the next day. This means that the nice fellow with the easy sense of humor who ran our little boat outing in the estuaries is going to have a much harder time finding guests for his excursion, with fewer cruise ships coming into town. And he, his son, and the other good people of this little city will continue to live in an atmosphere of increasing and constant violence. And all this is a picnic compared to Juarez. Mexico is a great place, huh?
Read the original here:
Headless Body Dumped in Front of Restaurant in Mazatlan; Patterico Denies Responsibility
Tuesday This is a compelling tableau. I am at the Great America Hotel in Salt Lake City. Truly, this is a great American hotel. Lavish lobby. Comfortable, well-decorated suites. Superb room service, in fact, I would say the best room service I have ever had. That was last night after I flew in from LAX. This morning, bright and early, I am at a conference of the Economic Development Corporation of Utah. This group has state and local government officials, high executives of corporations with a major presence in Utah, and educators. You, faithful readers, know how I often talk about how crazy people look in Los Angeles and generally everywhere I am, right? Disheveled, sloppy, clothes and persona giving off a vibe of insanity ? You know how I often wonder where the clean-cut, wholesome, well-dressed, sensible people are? Utah. At least here in this room. The people here, men and women, young and old, are well dressed, neat, orderly, speak well, are friendly and self-confident. Forbes just ranked Utah as the best state in which to do business, and I can see why. This state is about hard work, about work as a moral virtue, about work and thrift and prudence as moral duties. It is a state where families stay together and where parents and children value learning. The result? A high productivity, very low unemployment economic powerhouse. Where are the Americans who can compete with China? Utah. And the best of them — or some of the best — are in this room. I love Utah and I love these people. Anyway, I spoke and answered questions, and then took a short nap, and then headed off to the ultra-neat SLC airport. Again, the people here look as well ordered and well mannered as the people at LAX look out of it. I got in my little plane — all coach, 1 and 2 seating — and off I flew to ORD, which you sensible people know as Chicago. I was met by a simply beautiful young Chinese woman with a cart who took me to my gate for my next flight. The airport was packed. An immensely fat, smelly man followed me to get his picture with me and to shake hands with me. When he finally got his picture and his sweaty handshake, he said, with an evil cackle, “You shouldn’t shake hands with strangers.” Heh-heh. Good point, but that’s what I do. I washed my hand, visited with a very drunk U.S. Army sergeant on his way to Afghanistan, told him I would pray for him, and then went on to my next plane. It was an even smaller commuter, headed to Syracuse. I slept the entire way, and arrived with a start in Syracuse at midnight. I had not had dinner and was hungry. The airport in Syracuse, at midnight in mid-October 2010, was jam-packed, standing room only. Why? Who knows? I asked my driver if my hotel had 24-hour room service. “Of course,” he said. “It’s the best hotel in Syracuse.” Naturally… no room service. But a helpful desk clerk tracked down the bartender, who was about to leave. The bartender, for the promise of a large tip, brought me orange juice, toast, butter, orange marmalade, and water. I tipped her 40 bucks. It is amazing how useful money is when you’re on the road. Paying human beings for personal service, good personal service, is one of the best uses for money. After all, waiters, bartenders, taxi drivers, bellhops, those hard-working people, get paid modestly. A reasonable tip changes their hour and even their day. And after all, why don’t they deserve it if they do a good job? I ate some toast — a good, bland food — and drank some orange juice, and read my speech, then took a long shower and went to sleep. However, I was too jacked up from all of my travel to sleep. I tossed and turned, then took a sleeping pill, then another sleeping pill, and next thing I knew, it was morning. I spoke to a fine group of men and women in the insurance industry in the Syracuse region, which is a really beautiful area of upstate New York. We talked about insurance, and how vital it is to protect your loved ones with life insurance, and to protect your health and your retirement with insurance products. They were a good audience, laughing at my jokes and applauding for the soldiers whenever I mentioned them. Very kind and intelligent people. I also stayed afterwards to sign autographs and take photos with the nice people, men and women of all ages. Then, off to Syracuse airport to fly to D.C. The airport there is extremely neat and clean, which I love, as you can tell. I was punished for my sins by having to wait for about three hours while my plane was delayed. The agony was compounded by the many phone calls I got telling me I was overdrawn in various accounts. I — so far — always have the money in my many other accounts to cover the overdrafts, but it’s still maddening. I think I set it up that way, with many different accounts, deliberately to scare myself so I won’t be any more of an overspender than I am. This is my main flaw, besides overeating and flirting. I spend too much money. It is almost unbelievable how extravagant I am. Now, mind you, this is by my modest standards. I am not the Aga Khan. But I spend too damned much, especially on mortgages and women. I am a sucker for any cute girl who asks for money. I am a pitiful, weak creature. How I even survive, I don’t know. I once saw a Dutch movie about a poor woman who gets thrown out literally on the street because she cannot pay her rent. That is my dreadful fantasy nightmare of what will happen to me. Finally, the plane arrived and took me down to D.C. I slept the whole way, and then went to my apartment, met up with my pal Russ, then walked over to Clyde’s for a late supper and enjoyed the music. It was truly fun to be back at Clyde’s. Long ago, an old flame named Cathy R. used to work there as a hostess and I keep expecting to see her there. Of course, she worked there a mere 36 years ago, so I probably won’t see her, but I keep hoping she will be there and she’ll be 17 and I will be young, too, and she’ll smile at me and I will be in heaven. However, ain’t gonna happen. We had our dinners, and I watched the young people enjoying themselves. I was enjoying myself, too, so how old can I be? I strongly recommend Clyde’s on M Street in Georgetown. Friendly service, excellent food, moderate prices, all in all, a remarkably upbeat and cheery spot. Friday I walked around Foggy Bottom, where I lived so very long ago in the days when I was a young and active fellow with the girls. Every block tells me some story of youthful romance. Long ago, Wlady and I were discussing teenage crushes and he said, “Sometimes, I think those are the only things that are real, the only things that last.” I have forgotten my teenage crushes long since, but the ones from my twenties — wow, do those linger. I felt things with a certain intensity then that is largely absent now except for my wife, my son, my daughter-in-law, and my dog, Brigid. Every step, every paving block tells me of long-ago adventure. Alas, some also tell me of how incredibly — incredibly — crazy I was in those days. I mean, it is almost beyond belief. And this was on prescribed medication. Almost all of the great crises of my life, except for the loss of my parents, have been caused by what might loosely be called “iatrogenic” causes, namely causes initiated by doctors. Psychoactive drugs have been far more dangerous in my life than alcohol or illegal drugs. I mean to tell you, friends, I was really a dangerous case 38 years or so ago, on the meds my doctors prescribed. Well, as usual, God saved me. I could easily have wound up dead or in prison, but God saved me and put me back on the path to sanity. I really have to laugh when I meet people who deny there is a God. I have seen Him working, and working hard, to save me. His eye is on the sparrow, and I know He watches me. Monday This has been an interesting time. I flew in yesterday from DCA to ORD, again. I had a wonderful dinner at Coco Pazzo with my pal John Coyne. We talked about politics, the decline of America, the morass we find ourselves in morally and politically and economically, and especially demographically. This country is becoming a less developed country because we have less developed people. We have people who won’t work and won’t learn. As my pal super smart David Paglin, who used to be a high school teacher in urban schools, so aptly said, “It’s not that they can’t learn. It’s that they have no idea that there is any value to learning.” It would be easy, but racist and untrue, to say that this is primarily a black youth problem. It is, alas, a problem across the nation, but painfully concentrated among those who most need to learn to lift themselves up the economic ladder. We cannot be a first world power or a world leader with students and workers who basically do not care to learn and may not even know how to learn. I know I have said this before and I am sad to say I will say it again. After dinner, John and I got caught in a startlingly powerful downpour. Luckily, we had umbrellas provided for us by the great Peninsula Hotel in Chicago, so we only got a bit wet, but what a downpour. John is an astounding conversationalist. Just as sharp and well informed as a man can be. He and our former colleague, Aram Bakshian, are about as brainy as there are on this planet. Well, that was yesterday. Today, a kind driver drove me up to Milwaukee, where I was to speak at an event arranged by the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee College Republicans. I got a tour of the student union, then a visit with the college newspaper editors, and then felt hungry. My car took me over to a Whole Foods near campus. Now, bear in mind, I have only been to the Whole Foods in Beverly Hills, which was not my cup of tea for the main reason that the food looked strange. But this Whole Foods was immense and cheerful and had helpful staff. I was directed to the hot soup counter. I had an amazingly good bowl of potato soup. It might have been the best soup I have ever had. As I slurped it down, I looked over and saw that I was sitting next to an astonishingly beautiful red-headed young woman dressed in red stockings, a tweed skirt, and a stylish jacket. I talked to her and learned she had just gotten back from a year teaching in Paris to French-speaking children who were learning English. Her name was Sarah, and wow, was she great looking. I think it’s almost automatic how men react to a beautiful woman. I liked her but, of course, I am old and long married, so I just tipped my hat and went back to campus. The event was a foot-stomping, enthusiastic, standing ovation crowd of conservatives being talked to by someone they liked a lot, namely me. It had been financed by the Young America’s Foundation, and I am grateful. It was an intoxicatingly great evening of speaking, followed by about an hour of picture taking, and then lasagna with the CRs, and then back to Chicago. The enthusiasm of the people in the audience was just unheard of. Something is coming in this country. If my crowd tonight is any indication, for Mr. Obama, it is later than he thinks.
Originally posted here:
Connecting in Chicago
US Issues New Travel Advisory For Lebanon
Read the original:
US Issues New Travel Advisory For Lebanon
I spent Saturday at the OneNation rally in Washington, DC. The intent was to cover the rally and see first-hand what I was certain would get significant media coverage. This, for me, was an awakening. I live in the heart of DC, and work full time in the political sphere. I am relatively new to the game, but I do not consider myself naive in this regard. I’ve joked about the left being communists and socialists, but I am not certain I ever believed that they were truly avowed opposition to all that is American. I suppose I wanted to believe that at the end of the day, every American loved their freedom enough to fight for it. I was wrong. What I saw was the unions that are supposed to be there to support workers exploiting busloads of them, shipping predominantly black groups in matching tee-shirts down from Baltimore and New York and other places on the East Coast. I saw union workers that were provided not only with paid time off, but compensation, free travel, and boxed lunches. I saw unions directly aligning themselves with the Communist Party USA. I have a hard time believing that the majority of those blue collar union workers consider themselves Communists. I am not certain when it became okay to be a Communist in America. Our Freedom is such a deeply ingrained value that I took it for granted that we’d win out; that these people were such a minority that they were completely insignificant. I was right in one regard: They are a minority. I know this has been posted on this site already, but it’s worth looking at again. Here’s the comparison shot between Glenn Beck’s 8/28 rally and yesterday’s OneNation rally: Just to recap: Glenn Beck did not pay any attendees. He did not orchestrate buses, nor did he provide any travel assistance. The unions paid for the travel costs, paid them for their time, provided meals… and still drew an embarrassing crowd. What I was wrong about is their insignificance. These are the same people that will be doing GOTV for the Democrats in November. They are the ones that will be busing people to the polls and stuffing ballot boxes. As LaborUnionReport pointed out, the options are clear. If nothing else, the Left is good at exploiting people who feel as if they owe the Democrats their equality, and we would be silly to ignore the amount of money they are willing to spend on this midterm election. We are now in a period where Americans can choose unapologetic Communism vs. uncompromising Freedom. The line has been drawn in the sand. We do not have a choice but to keep fighting back. We have not yet won anything. GOTV . Don’t underestimate the unions. We have a hard battle to fight, and we’re now just 29 days out. This is what we’re up against (photos via @Ben_Howe ): This is a fight against Communism and Socialism. This is what we’re up against. Do. Your. Part. GOTV.
Read more here:
The Communist Contingent Draws A Line In The Sand
