$30 Million

So the Mitchell Report, aka The Oogety Boogety Steroid Report, came out yesterday. I've already addressed my feelings on steroid "investigations" in baseball, so I'm not going to get into that again. Suffice to say, I think this whole brouhaha is stupid, hypocritical and, ultimately, irrelevant. But, hey, it's good to see George Mitchell finding some work, right?

There were three things, however, that caught my eye when I looked at the report:

1.) The sheer uselessness of steroids. My friend Mike, aka The Disgruntled Sports Fan (so-called because he follows Baltimore sports and Angelos could disgruntle an orgasm), noted that there were 13 (13!!) current or former Baltimore Orioles players on the list. No one doubted Brady Anderson's inclusion (50 home runs is clearly the anomoly on the back of his baseball cards), but some of the other names (Gibbons, Grimsley, Jerry Hairston, little Brian Roberts??) were a surprise. You would think that with that much extra "juice" they could have put together a winning season at some point.

From my Nats, I was amused to see fragile Nook Logan on the list. I would have been less surprised to find Robert Fick on the list than Nook. Also, Mike Stanton's steroids sure seemed to help opposing batters hit off of him while he was in Washington. Jesus, steroids don't help for shit!

2.) Steroids are expensive...

3.) ...but not as expensive, apparently, as THE MITCHELL REPORT! $30 million dollars. 30 MILLION FUCKING DOLLARS?!!?! And just in case you were wondering, yes, that's $30 million in taxpayer funds. And to produce, what, a paparazzi outing list intended solely to sully careers?? Look, I don't condone steroid use, I think it's pathetic, but what is really going to come of all of this? Selig says he'll punish the players, but as several legal experts have pointed out, he'd lose any punishment on appeal, since a.) most of this is hearsay, which is not specifically covered in the list of punishable offenses, and b.) the report was not a result of collective bargaining, so the players union is going to appeal ANY punishment doled out. Playing the percentages, I think the union is going to come out ahead on this one.

Do I think these players named used performance enhancing drugs? Yeah, probably. Do I care? Not at all. Again, the players on the list who were mediocre at best is more numerous than the Miguel Tejadas, Andy Pettites, and Roger Clemenses.

Speaking of Roger Clemens, the worst sports website on the internet has a poll on its front page, asking "Sports Nation" voters, "Would Roger Clemens get your vote for the Hall of Fame?" I'm not a huge Clemens fan, but, I mean, seriously, how is that even in question? As has been pointed out a million times before, if you left all "cheaters" out of the Hall, it would be about half the size it is now. President Bush remarked that the Mitchell Report means that "we can jump to this conclusion: that steroids have sullied the game." 60 players or so is such a small percentage that I think that's a bit extreme.

I don't know, I just think this was an enormous waste of time. There were no real bombshells (seriously, not even Clemens), nothing is really going to come of this, and now all you have is a bunch of pissed off players with high priced lawyers. And you know what that means.

Blah blah blah, you know what? I like watching towering home runs and pitchers who can hit 100 MPH. It's a sport, a game. If 60 senators were found to be tripping balls during Congressional sessions, that would require a Congressional investigation. For a game? Please. As my boss pointed out, there are 30 million better ways to spend our taxpayer dollars.

Steroids are bad, mm-kay, but if you're concerned about its proliferation, TEST EVERYONE. It's not rocket science.

Perhaps It Was An Ill-Advised Purchase

So, today is Day 846 of The Great Real Estate Investing Experiment. I thought it would be fun to reflect on the two plus years of this, and what I've had to go through. In that time, I've endured:

-2 house purchases
-2 failed house sales
-1 major housing downturn
-Roughly $80,000 in combined housing value drops, due to said housing downturn
-20 different tenants
-4 of which were mentally unstable and/or substance abusers
-1 of which was a phantom pooper
-4 water leaks causing extensive damage
-Including two in the past week
-Two sets of carpet replacement
-Two sets of hardwood/laminate replacement (one of which was due to one of the aforementioned water leaks)
-Two grease fires...in the same house...in the same kitchen...by two different tenants...within a month of each other...both made somewhat worse by their attempts to stop the fire by throwing water at it...the worst possible thing you can do with a grease fire
-0 condo association meetings attended
-2 condo fee increases agreed upon by those who actually attended those meetings
-1 pest problem
-1 of which was caused by the filthy, disgusting tenants and their filth

All of which has resulted in:
-1 Disgruntled Investor

Do As I Say, Not As I Do

It takes a lot for the Disgruntled Investor to go political on this site. In general, I hate politics and loathe what the constant childlike sniping between Democrats and Republicans is doing to this country. But sometimes, I see something that just makes me want to bang my head against my desk.

This, ladies and gentlemen, is why I hate politics.

-From the Associated Press

Clinton Opens Up About Attorney Firings

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) - Democratic presidential hopeful Hillary Rodham Clinton on Monday dismissed any comparison between the firing last fall of eight U.S. attorneys with the replacement of 93 U.S. attorneys when her husband became president in 1993.

"That's a traditional prerogative of an incoming president," Clinton said in an interview with The Associated Press.

Once U.S. attorneys are confirmed, they should be given broad latitude to enforce the law as they see fit, she said.

"I think one of the hallmarks of our democracy is we have a devotion to the rule of law," Clinton said.

She conceded that should she win the presidency in 2008, she likely would replace all of the U.S. attorneys appointed by President Bush. She said that's merely following traditions in which presidents appoint prosecutors of their own party.

Clinton argued that the Bush administration's firing of the eight federal prosecutors has caused an uproar because it is seen as a conservative push to shift the balance of power in favor of the executive branch.

Democrats have accused the Justice Department and the White House of purging the prosecutors for political reasons. The Bush administration maintains the firings were not improper because U.S. attorneys are political appointees.


Could someone explain to me how these two statements from above...

-"She said that's merely following traditions in which presidents appoint prosecutors of their own party."
-"Democrats have accused the Justice Department and the White House of purging the prosecutors for political reasons."

...describe different things??

Meanwhile, there are 500,000,000 more important things our Congress could/should/won't be working on while this political piss-match goes on.

....That sound you hear is me banging my head against my desk, knowing that this is going to go on for at least another year and a half....

...Disgruntled

P.S. T-minus 8 days until the second house goes up for sale. Stay tuned!