Brett Favre - Green Bay Packers

My youngest child asked me recently for my take on the Brett Favre situation. She said her husband who knows of my great admiration for Favre is curious. The question forced me to pull my thoughts together on the great Green Bay Packers quarterback and his decision to “Un-retire” and play again.

Several years ago some players squawked about their contracts and wanted them enhanced. Favre was quoted as saying that men ought to keep their word and live up to the contracts as written. My reaction to his retirement is in the same vein: he made his decision and told everyone who needed to know. Based on this the Packers leadership made their decision to go with his backup, Aaron Rogers, and begin a new era. Now Favre wants to play again and be the number one QB at Green Bay. I love Brett Favre for all the thrills he gave us over the years and for leading the Packers back to the Super Bowl. But I also believe he should live up to his decision. He gave his word he was done. Let it be. The Packers owe him more than money can ever repay but they too have rights and other obligations. They should not backtrack at this late stage and tell Rogers he has to sit again for another year. It is not fair to that young man. His time has come. He deserves the chance to prove himself.

The Packers also ought not to have trade Favre to his team of choice if in doing so they will endanger their changes of winning the division title and going on to the playoffs and maybe the Super Bowl. The whole thing may play out next week and be resolved in a matter of days. What ever Favre does, including playing elsewhere for someone else, I will continue to admire his accomplishments, but I will also continue to be a fan of the Green Bay Packers.

Save the mice?

"Dear Editor:
"Are we on the verge of losing our collective minds in America? First it was save the whales and then the bobtails. Now someone has come up with a plastic water bottle gizmo that humanely catches and holds "the live mouse until you release it." (Home and Garden Section, pg 1D, July 13 Post & Courier).

"What do we do with this probably disease-carrying live mouse? Take it to a neighbor's yard or to the waterfront and put it on a container ship headed for the South China Sea or the Adriatic?

"And what does this mean to the role of cats in our lives?"

(My Ltr to the Editor, The Post & Courer, Charleston SC, published July 22, 2008)

ANWR = 4 cents a gallon?

Harper's Magazine has an impressive track record for research so it comes as somewhat of a surprise when the editors say (August 2008, pg. 13, Harper's Index) research indicates that the "Estimated amount by which per-gallon gas prices would change if the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge were drilled" is a minus four cents per gallon.

The green area in the photo is the area proposed for drilling.

Happy 4th of July

(Lyrics (originally a poem) by Katherine Lee Bates.)
O beautiful for spacious skies,
For amber waves of grain,
For purple mountain majesties
Above the fruited plain!
America! America!
God shed His grace on thee,
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea!
O beautiful for pilgrim feet
Whose stern impassion'd stress
A thoroughfare for freedom beat
Across the wilderness.
America! America!
God mend thine ev'ry flaw,
Confirm thy soul in self-control,
Thy liberty in law.
O beautiful for heroes prov'd
In liberating strife,
Who more than self their country loved,
And mercy more than life.
America! America!
May God thy gold refine
Till all success be nobleness,
And ev'ry gain divine.
O beautiful for patriot dream
That sees beyond the years
Thine alabaster cities gleam
Undimmed by human tears.
America! America!
God shed His grace on thee,
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea.