Dylan: Things Have Changed

A worried man with a worried mind

No one in front of me and nothing behind

There's a woman on my lap and she's drinking champagne

Got white skin, got assassin's eyes

I'm looking up into the sapphire tinted skies

I'm well dressed, waiting on the last train

Standing on the gallows with my head in a noose

Any minute now I'm expecting all hell to break loose

People are crazy and times are strange

I'm locked in tight, I'm out of range

I used to care, but things have changed

This place ain't doing me any good

I'm in the wrong town, I should be in Hollywood

Just for a second there I thought I saw something move

Gonna take dancing lessons do the jitterbug rag

Ain't no shortcuts, gonna dress in drag

Only a fool in here would think he's got anything to prove

Lot of water under the bridge, Lot of other stuff too

Don't get up gentlemen, I'm only passing through

I've been walking forty miles of bad road

If the bible is right, the world will explode

I've been trying to get as far away from myself as I can

Some things are too hot to touch

The human mind can only stand so much

You can't win with a losing hand

Feel like falling in love with the first woman I meet

Putting her in a wheel barrow and wheeling her down the street

I hurt easy, I just don't show it

You can hurt someone and not even know it

The next sixty seconds could be like an eternity

Gonna get low down, gonna fly high

All the truth in the world adds up to one big lie

I'm love with a woman who don't even appeal to me

Mr. Jinx and Miss Lucy, they jumped in the lake

I'm not that eager to make a mistake

(I'm with Bob)

Did anyone catch the ESPN West Coast drive-in show this morning when The Cowherd said that Ortiz and Manny were the best 3-4 combo since Gerhig and Mantle? Seriously. And when someone in the studio corrected him by saying it was Ruth and Gehrig, he dismissed it by saying Ruth finished playing in 1927 and Gehrig and Mantle played in the 50s and 60s. The Worldwide Leader, folks!

It's clear that the overriding issue here is the legitimacy of the letter. Those defending the legitimacy are missing the point of the skeptics. It's not that getting caught masturbating in a small conservative town can't happen, but did it happen as described in this letter? As a professional editor and writer, I seriously doubt it for all the astute observations made by other skeptics. What really bothers me about this though is that I'm a big fan of Cary's advice and I really enjoy the comments this column generates. But if this starts feeling like letters to Penthouse, it's going to stop working for all but the most gullible. That puts Cary in a (what's the word?) pickle. If this column starts being driven by phony letters, it then becomes nothing more than Penthouse without the juicy sex. What to do? Tennis, the ball's in your court.

After being a virtual voice in the wilderness here today on the not-so-dumbness of having the All-Star Game settle home field for the World Series, imagine my shock in tuning in PTI and finding an ally in baseball-hatin' Michael Wilbon, a relentless kurd in the way of the eternal civil war between the New York Sunnis and the Boston Shia. How is it that Wilbon was able to see how psyched the players were at the end of the game (even the ones long out of the line-up) while all the Kingster could see was player unhappiness with Bud's budding little brainchild? Was Wilbon's TV closer to the action than King's? The only players not in Milton Bradley Anger Management who could possibly have a beef with this system would be those on the ONE team that might possibly get aced out of home field. The rest of the players could care less (and if KK is going to argue otherwise I hope he's going to offer more evidence than some locker room popping off). Given the historical perspective of most major league players, by the time Evan Longoria plays in his second mid-summer classic, most of them probably aren't even going to remember home field ever was determined any other way.

Maybe you've expounded on this in the past and I missed it. If not, would you mind telling your readers what's so dumb about having the All-Star game decide home field for the World Series. I really don't get how injecting some competitive consequences into a competition is so dumb.

One of the greatest on-the-one-hand/on-the-other-hand pieces ever written.

Obama totally undercut his lovely speech on patriotism with his media-induced aside condemning Clark. It's that kind of craven behavior that drains the meaning out of words about the glory of American ideals. The question now occupying this long-time Obama supporter's mind is this: are Obama's last two weeks a sign of cowardice or cynicism?

And a big fat JEER for Mr. New Politics. There is only one response a (ho-ho) change candidate should have made in this scenario, and that is this: "Wes Clark is an adult American who actually fought for his right to free speech, so he's entitled to say anything he wants and as the Democractic nominee for President I will defend to the death that right even if I disagree with it."

Stop throwing people under the bus, Barack! It's getting damned unseemly.

Before the ballots are counted in November, we can already rule Olbermann and Bill Clinton as two who lost their way during campaign 2008. The downward trajectory of Olbermann's reputation underscores the serious problem with advocacy journalism. As we should condemn the Democratic Party when it mimics the Republican, we should also condemn any news organization that mimics FOX by swilling agenda-driven news.