Obama to ESPN: "I Will Trade the Healthcare Bill for a Re-do on my Bracket"

On Sunday, President Barack Obama scored the first major political victory of his young campaign. The Democratic controlled Congress was finally able to secure enough votes to ram home Obama's pet health care bill over the objections of Republicans.

However all was not well with Obama as Saturday handed him his greatest defeat. Kansas, who he had picked to win the entire NCAA tournament, was stunned by Northern Iowa 69-67 in the 2nd round.

Although he was bolstered by his health care victory, anonymous White House staff members told us that his mood has been sour all weekend, even with the passage of the bill. "He's just been moping around all weekend eating potato chips, he didn't even watch Sunday's games, he just locked himself in the Lincoln room. We had to get Pelosi to come in and bust the doors down so we could tell him about his health-care win."

On Monday President elect Barack Obama told ESPN reporters that he would "absolutely trade the health care bill for a re-do on my bracket, no questions asked."

Obama, who like many of the experts picked Kansas to win it all, now faces considerably longer odds in winning his pool. Although Obama has grown accustomed to long odds throughout his political career, these may be his hardest battle yet. Barack's team, BARACKetbusters, currently sits 4th in the USGovRulz Basketball pool on Yahoo!. Currently ahead of him is Democratic Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi's BBALLbreakers, Socialist Bernie Sanders' MarxMadness, and former President George Bush's Howulikemenow. However, because Kansas was eliminated he has virtually no chance of gaining the 64 point lead he would need to acquire in order to beat any entrant that picked the championship game winner. Barring a miracle from a Cinderella team like Cornell winning it all, he will not be victorious.

Reports from the Republicans say that they are seriously considering accepting Barack's offer, and a deal could come as soon as Wednesday. Obama has stated that they have until the sweet 16 begins on Thursday.

Tiger Woods Finally Back in the Headlines

It's Tiger, Tiger Woods ya'll!

For all of you out there going through withdrawal from a lack of Eldrick "Tiger" Woods in the headlines. Don't worry, you're about to get what you can't live without. Tiger is back and he's all over the front page.

Yesterday, a new report from the Associated Press has revealed that Tiger Woods is home from sex rehab and once again getting into golf shape. Although there is no timetable for Tiger's return to the PGA, this latest report may add to the rumors that he will play in the Masters, April 8th-11th and thus bring balance (and viewers) back to the tour. To get into "golf shape" Tiger Woods will spend the next month drinking Pabst, eating chili-cheese hot dogs, making passes at 16 year old drink girls and smoking between "5 and 12 Cuban Cigars a day."

If that wasn't enough to get your Tiger fix, right on the heels of that story comes this poorly written little piece of comic gold. A self-penned written statement from Tiger Woods' college girlfriend, Irene Folstrom, claiming that he in fact is a great guy who never cheated on her. More specifically, and I quote,

"I’m not naive, but I can say with certainty that he was faithful during the time we dated... Well there was that one time when I found him naked with that cheerleader on the 16th green, but he explained to me that he was just teaching her how to putt. It was weird because they didn't have any clubs, and i noticed he wasn't wearing his lucky golf glove, but I trusted him then and I trust him now."

She goes on to chronicle how she and Tiger would illegally buy alcohol and talk about the future.

"Tiger would put the whiskey bottle to his lips and tell me 'bitch, I'm leavin' you for a white woman,' and I would have to talk him out of it, and then when he would sober up and say 'he wanted to make a larger contribution to society.' Looking back on that I just have to smile because obviously he didn't come through on any of those aspirations. His contributions to society have been to hawk useless products to lower income teens. I don't really know what he was talking about... unless he includes having sex with porn stars making a contribution to society."

Naturally Irene Folstrom is not trying to get rich or famous off of Tiger Woods. How can we be so sure? Because she specifically states it in the first paragraph of the story.

"Tiger Woods was my boyfriend for a year and a half while we were both undergraduates at Stanford. I've never spoken to the press about him; I'm not coming forward now for money or to advance any pathetic showbiz aspirations, but merely to stick up for a friend. I haven't seen Tiger since the late ’90s, but I know who he is at his core because we were together during some of his most formative years and I have ESPN so I was able to watch him over the past ten years, although not in person because he always ignored my phone calls."

Obviously someone so honest and trustworthy would have absolutely not ulterior motives to talk about Tiger Woods in such a good light. Although that 200k that was "placed" in her mailbox, by an "unknown" stranger probably didn't hurt.

Pittsburgh Sports Radio Welcomes Another Future Mark Madden Victim

Move over 1250 ESPN Radio, 970 Fox Sports Radio, 105.9 the X from 6-10am and again at 3-6pm and 102.5 DVE every hour on the half hour, there's a new station coming to the already bloated Pittsburgh sports centered radio dial.

93.7 aka "B94" aka K-Rock aka "The Zone" aka B94 again, has again changed its format and acquired the unique call sign of "the fan."  Abandoning its pop format 93.7 has instead embraced the single most important thing in Pittsburgh, sports talk from sunrise to sunset.

But Is there any room on the Pittsburgh radio dial for another station completely devoted to Pittsburgh sports talk? Is there room for anyone (both figuratively and literally) on the same format dominated by the sports juggernaut known as Mark Madden.

A sample listening of "The Fan" over the past few weeks has revealed absolutely nothing that wasn't already on the radio dial. Paul Alexander and Joe Starkey are more than capable hosts from 2-6, and are superior to 1250's awkward trio of Paulson, Logan and Crow, but they add very little to the conversation. The same opinions are the same opinions, regardless of whether they're on the FM dial or the AM dial.

Mark Madden's ever skyrocketing ratings are a result of going against the Pittsburgh sports radio status quo. He's not intimidated by the Steeler hype machine and he's not impressed by the "old guard" of Pittsburgh sports media. He doesn't worship the Steelers, he barely tolerates the Pirates, he's constantly right about the Penguins, he's mouthy, he doesn't tolerate stupidity, and he's always entertaining. Listeners may hate him, but yet they can't stop listening to his show. Ratings keep rising and Madden keeps getting the last laugh. Madden succeeds by having opinions that differ from the homogenized stew that is Yinzer sports talk.

So far "The Fan" fails to impress. As the new station in town it had better embroil itself in some controversy, anything to get people talking about the station. Madden dominates by weaving a beguiling mix of sports, sex and outrage. "The Fan" is predestined for failure. Pittsburgh can't support a new sports station, and its doubtful they will be able to take down 970am or 1250am as they have the backing of Fox Sports and ESPN respectively. The X has the biggest name in Pittsburgh sports plus the Penguin broadcasts. No offense to the station or hosts, but if anyone thinks that Ron Cook and Jim Colony is going to attract more than a few token listeners, you're in for a Mark Maddenesque surprise.

Tiger Woods Story Completely Devoid of Any Connection to Music, No Reason To Be Covered by Music Blogs... at All

There is breaking news on the Tiger Woods story. But you will find no such coverage here. If someone is looking for a story on Tiger Woods they should check ESPN, or US Weekly, or one of the literally thousands of blogs that are falling all over themselves to chime in on the debate.

One could easily peruse websites and blogs like:
http://web.tigerwoods.com/news/article/200912117801012/news/,
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/news/story?id=4744216,
http://www.tmz.com/category/tiger-woods/
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1232544/Tiger-Woods-Jaimee-Grubbs-Kalika-Moquin-named-mistresses.html

to find all they need to know about the Tiger Woods story. Why coming to a blog like This Blog Goes to 11 would be as pointless as marrying Tiger Woods and expecting him to be faithful.

Why should a curious web surfer check a different blog? Because a music blog like the Rolling Scone has no reason to cover such a story as it has nothing to do with music or radio or anything even remotely close to something that could reasonably be blogged about by this esteemed blog or its parent company This Blog Goes to 11. 

 The only sniff of music involved in the Tiger Woods case would be his first mistress Jamie Grubbs, who appeared on the cable show "Tool Academy." "Tool Academy" of course was broadcast on VH1. The same VH1 which now exclusively runs programming that deals with "celebreality" and pointless lists, was rumored to show music videos. However making the leap from Tiger Woods to Jamie Grubbs to something that could be covered by a musically exclusive blog would go against all the blogging rules of etiquette and would never be tolerated in the blogosphere community.

Sure Tiger Woods is a sycophantic liar who only cares about his career and has abandoned his wife and kids to have a few dozen affairs with women not as hot as his wife, and his possible involvement with steroids only invites more criticism. However, this doesn't mean he's fair game for just any blogger to criticize. Only bloggers qualified in entertainment, law, sports, marriage, family, golf, sex, women, men, grass, arcitechture, gatorade, iron, wood, CBS, business, African-American issues, Asian interests or scandals should venture forth their opinion on the matter.

Needless to say Rolling Scone and This Blog Goes to 11 would never think of stooping to those depths stooped by less prestigious blogs. Rest assured you will NEVER see any coverage of the Tiger Woods story on these hallowed walls.