Panthers bite ... but it's sunny and 72!

^
This was supposed to be a big year for the NFL team in my adopted hometown, Charlotte. The Panthers improved from dregs of the league in 2010 to 6-10 last season, and looked especially good down the stretch. With young QB stud Cam Newton, a supposed genius of an offensive coordinator named Rob Chudzinski, a star receiver in Steve Smith and plenty of good (or at least decent) role players, 10 wins and a playoff berth seemed likely.

A Charlotte newspaper columnist who picked the Panthers to go 8-8 was ripped for being too negative. One of the team's best players, center Ryan Kalil, took out a full-page newspaper advertisement to all but guarantee the team would win the Super Bowl.

As Rick Perry would say ...

Oops.

Or as Emily Litella (Google her, kids) would say:

Never mind.

The Panthers are a mess. They are 1-5. They have found painful, last-minute ways to lose their last three games. Their young QB stud and genius offensive coordinator have been considerably less studly and geniusly this season. In each of the aforementioned three losses, they failed to pick up 1 yard at a key juncture, pretty amazing in that they have the best running QB in the league, two tailbacks with eight-figure contracts and a guy who was the most sought-after fullback on the free-agent market.

And as if all that isn't bad enough, Kalil is injured and done for the season.

On a positive note, today was another in a long string of absolutely beautiful autumn days in North Carolina, and this week is supposed to be filled with sunny, 70-something weather.

Take that, Chicago!
^

Top 3 things I'll miss about Rick Perry now that he has high-tailed it back to Texas

^

1. He was funny, especially when he was trying to be serious. Interestingly, his predecessor as the governor of Texas had a similar talent.

2. Any member of any middle school debate team would soundly thrash him in any debate about any subject ... and we need to feel good about our schools.

3. He advocated ... um ... uh ... he was in favor of ... no, wait, it'll come to me ... he opposed ... uh ... you know ...

I can't. Sorry. Oops.

^

Herman Cain, we hardly knew ye

^

So I'm reading the McClatchy Newspapers account of Tuesday's GOP debate -- the 406th of 874 scheduled debates, I believe. And I'm reading about the foreign policy opinions of Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich and Ron Paul and Rick Perry and Michele Bachmann and Jon Huntsman. And then I get to the final paragraph:

Businessman Herman Cain and former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum also took part in the debate.

Kind of reminds me of the time I flew from Oslo, Norway to Goteborg, Sweden on a small prop plane with members of the 1994 U.S. Olympic hockey team. The player in the seat next to me was sweating out the bumpy ride when I turned to him and said: "At least people will cry about the loss of you and your teammates. The newspapers won't even mention me until the final paragraph: 'Also perishing was a sportswriter from Minnesota.'"

Yes, Mr. 9-9-9 has reached that level of insignificance. It takes a special kind of incompetence to fail so miserably in that field of knuckleheads.

Oh, and speaking of turkeys ... tune back in tomorrow for my annual Turkey of the Year countdown. More fun than a trip to Plymouth Rock!

^

Hank Williams and ESPN honchos share award for dummies of the week

^

Hank Williams Jr. is a moron. His attempt to link Barack Obama with Adolph Hitler was so sad it was laughable.

That being said, what does his Monday Night Football intro song have to do with his politics? Does ESPN screen all contributors for their political views? If somebody at ESPN linked Rick Perry with Lucifer, would that person also be punished?

There is a time and place for political correctness. In this case, ESPN just looked silly.

^

Random ramblings: Rosie O'Donnell's figure or Michele Bachmann's mind?

^

The last time the Brewers won a division title, I had just graduated from Marquette. As an AP intern in Milwaukee, I got to cover their run to the World Series. How long ago was that? Well, I had a full head of dark, thick, curly hair.

There are four unbeaten NFL teams. Three of them are the Lions, Bills and Redskins. Just as you predicted, right?

Mike Vick is accusing refs of treating him like a dog.

President Obama says all those doo-doo head Republicans have to stop the partisan bickering.

If Illinois is one of the nation's 25 best college football teams, Rosie O'Donnell is one of the nation's 25 sexiest women.

With Jermichael Finley and Ryan Grant healthy again and reminding us how good they are for the undefeated Packers, the top sports story of 2011 had to be that Green Bay won the Super Bowl without them -- and a dozen other players who were hurt most of the year. Pretty much kills any excuse any team in any sport can make for having a lousy season. Forever.

If the president of the United States never had to think or talk, Rick Perry-Michele Bachmann would be just the ticket.

As impressive as the Cardinals' comeback has been, the Braves' choke job has been even moreso. It takes a special team to blow a 10 1/2 game lead in a month.

Tiger Woods has a new caddie. In less important golf news, Bill Haas won some tournament in which Woods didn't play.

^

Thankfully, CEOs won't lose bonuses to any tax hike!

^
Through their incompetence, intransigence or both, the fools and thieves in charge of our government have socked us with a financial penalty worse than any 100 tax hikes.

The lead-up to and aftermath of the Debt Ceiling Follies have resulted in trillions of dollars in lost wealth, and not just for the wealthy. I'm certainly not rich and I've probably suffered six-figure losses in my retirement accounts these past two weeks.

I say "probably" only because I'm too depressed to take a long look at my accounts and tally the actual damages.

As a moderate who believes in the wonders of compromise, I'd love to blame the tea partiers for all of this ... but I can't, even if they are the drivers of the U.S.S. Insanity. Incredibly, some of these line-in-the-sand yahoos are still complaining that they only got 99 percent of what they wanted.

The gutless "regular" Republicans couldn't think for themselves and let a minority of extremists in their ranks dictate the dialogue. I'm still waiting for one working-class (or unemployed) Republican to adequately explain why he or she would support GOP politicians who so obviously could give a rat's rear about anybody but the richest 3 percent of society.

Did I say 3 percent? Sorry. I meant 1 percent.

The even more gutless Democrats, meanwhile, routinely get pantsed by their rivals because they aren't tough enough. They could have prevented all this from happening by acting on the debt ceiling last December, when they had vast legislative majorities, but they were immobilized by fear. As for Barack Obama, what does the man stand for? More than 2 1/2 years into his presidency, I wish I knew.

It might take years for us to recover the savings we've lost in just the last few weeks -- and, despite Rick Perry's pathetic Prayer-A-Palooza over the weekend -- the fall is far from over.

But hey, at least our elected leaders managed to prevent the elimination of tax loopholes for corporate jet owners and hedge fund managers. The Republic is saved!
^