(graphic by Terry Colon)

I know the Philly bloggers are against me, but that's OK. I'm up for betting a few bags of Cheetos with my Philly faithful.

Much respect to them. Email me (crooksandliars@gmail.com) if you want to get it on...Because of the idiot, Bud Selig we have baseball that will go into November so the weather is a big issue. I'm a typical "Obsessed Fan," when it comes to sports and the playoffs and I love to call pitches like a catcher and manage the game. I will be working on the further adventures for the Obsessed Fan in the future, but for right now it's all baseball.

I'm live blogging the game on The Huffington Post right now. I hope I don't break my laptop because of a call from the umps. And I am very superstitious. OK, on to the series...

Here's the breakdown as I see it

1B) Howard vs Teixeira

Howard has a monster bat, but his glove doesn't equal Tex's. Mark needs to have a good hitting series because they will pitch around A-Rod all series long. I do believe that Mark will have an impact on the field throughout, but it's really close.

Edge: Even

2B) Utley vs Cano

Utley is a far better hitter than Cano, drives in more runs and batting in the middle of the potent Philly lineup proves the point, but Cano did hit .320 and played excellent defense.

Edge: Utley

SS) Jeter vs Rollins

This is an intriguing match-up because Rollins won the MVP last year for the NL, but if we look at comparing them in 2009, Derek had a much better year offensively. Rollins hit just .250 with an OBP of .296. Jeter hit .334 with an OBP of .406, but Rollins can still be deadly and he has more range than Jeter. However, Jeter has shown an incredible feel for the game especially in the playoffs that I have never seen before. His instincts are scary.

Edge: Jeter

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(h/t Heather of VC)

Ed Rollins, who has run many a Republican campaign, crushed Sarah Palin's decision to quit her job as Alaska's governor on CNN's State of The Union yesterday. He called it a disaster and went as far as saying that he was insulted by it.

I guess she wants to go on the TV and the book tour circuit instead of helping Alaskans who voted her into office. Times are tough right now and she'd rather leave them all behind than try to help them get through this economic meltdown. Rollins didn't pull any punches.

ED ROLLINS, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: I think yesterday was a disaster, Friday was a disaster for her both in the sense that she was very incoherent in articulating why she was quitting and what she wanted to do with it.

And as I always say, you call press conferences to answer questions, not to basically raise questions. I think the serious thing here is 311 days ago, very few people in America, very few Republicans outside of Alaska knew who this woman was. She had a tremendous first few weeks as a campaigner, but she got super imposed on top of the Republican establishment. It's sort of like taking a helicopter and putting her on top of Mt. Everest, which John McCain was flying it.

Everybody else climbed up that ladder, and all of the sudden she's on top of the mountain. She didn't like it -- or she did like the top of the mountain. What she didn't like was coming back to Earth, flying back to Alaska to her job as governor.

I think the reality here is her biggest mistake is walking away from the job as governor. She would have at least had a record to run on. She is going to have a partial record today that's going to be very incomplete. I found her very insulting to other governors. We have 22 other Republican governors, 19 of whom are basically going to be out of this office after running in two years. Nine are term limited and many others have to run. And she basically said in the last year you run around and do all kinds of things, and I would predict to you every single Republican governor like most Democratic governors are at their desk trying to figure out how to get through the economic crisis. I think she insulted them. I think to a certain extent it showed a naivete and I think she basically left a big, big void in her resume.

Via Mother Jones:

Listen to the interview

Henry Rollins is best known as the frontman for the hardcore punk band Black Flag and later for his solo project the Rollins Band.

He performs regularly as a spoken word artist and a comedian, and has written and published books of prose and poetry. Rollins is a radio and TV personality, actor, and voice-over artist. He's done several USO tours to Iraq since the war began.

Mother Jones recently spoke with Henry Rollins about his USO tours, punk rock, the newest season of his television show, and the art of storytelling.

Mother Jones: The first thing I wanted to ask you about was your USO tours. Can you tell me about how and why you got involved doing those tours?

Henry Rollins: I do it because that's my way of protesting the war, and it's my custodial duty to go behind this president that started this needless war that's hemoraging [sic] everything from needless lives to money and everything else. And the fact that the soldiers don't dictate policy; they just go and do what they are told, leads me to believe I don't really have a beef with the troops, I have a beef with the people who sent them into where they are deployed. So I go and I meet these people without any hesitation and I quite like them. Read more...

(Cafe au lait photo via Bizzy Girl. Looks good this morning...)

The Sunday Talking Head Thread is up and ready for your perusal. It's a mixed line-up -- some old pros, some of the usual Sunday hot air crowd, a few celebrities thrown in for flavor.

The line-up says to me: immigration, the Middle East, Wolf Blitzer scored an exclusive with the leader of VietNam and perhaps a bit of disgust with the DOJ and Vice President Cheney, all rolled into one morning package and spread out over several shows. Oh, and Ed Koch and Ed Rollins will talk about how their political wisdom is better than anyone else’s.

What’s catching your eye on the blogs or in the news this morning?

Agitprop: G-Dub to World's largest largest democracy..."BITE ME"

Calling All Wingnuts: Terriffic site featuring recordings of our hero calling winger talk shows and challenging the unhinged hosts...with facts! Rush, Laura Ingraham, O'Reilly, and more.

State of the Day: I feel safer knowing that singer, Morrissey, has been interrogated by by both British and American intel authorities. Singers seem to be drawing special attention. Recently, Henry Rollins was labled a "possible threat" by the Australian government. WTF?

Petrelis Files We may be safe from singers, but...these two DHS audits might frighten you about the current status of U.S. ports.

Not a blog, but Business as usual by Joe Conason is excellent.

Roger Ailes: Konservative Komedy KornerPetrelis Files We may be safe from singers, but...these two DHS audits might frighten you about the current status of U.S. ports.

Not a blog, but Business as usual by Joe Conason is excellent.

Roger Ailes: Konservative Komedy Korner

Russert smears Arianna: Remind you of anyone?

I seem to remember FOX news running to the NY Post to try and smear Andrea Mackris before they finally settled the O'Reilly sexual harassment lawsuit for millions of dollars.

FDL spotted this last night:

"Big white bwana man went whimpering to Lloyd Grove at the New York Daily News this morning, resurrecting his rather phantasmagorical 1996 claim that Arianna hired a private detective to follow his wife around. An assertion for which he has no proof other than something he read in an Ed Rollins book...read on

Arianna's response:

"Somebody's feeling the heat...How else to explain the widely-off-the-mark responses from NBC's PR department in Lloyd Grove's column to our reporting on Russert's multitude of journalistic ethical conflicts. Instead of dealing with the charges head on, the media giant and its Washington bureau chief Tim Russert have astonishingly decided to get down and dirty, dredging up and faxing to at least one reporter a 12-year-old false claim that I hired a private detective to snoop on Russert's wife Maureen Orth while she was preparing a hit piece on me for Vanity Fair in 1994. ...read on

The Moderate Voice: These news operations have huge investments in the images of these news personalities. Both, at this point, are damaged goods. Can the damage be repaired?

Sure sounds like a swiftboating of Arianna to me.

Richard Bradley:

"Well, maybe NBC knows something I don't--but I doubt it. (Full discloure: I know Arianna a little and blog for her website--not that I get paid for it.) After all, consider the source of that charge: a ten-year-old memoir by Republican political consultant Ed Rollins which has been discredited by one of its own ghostwriters...read on"

In a land far, far away...Tim would have Arianna on his show and answer a few qustions for a change.