College football Saturday open thread

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The matchups:


Let's start off with an early game that has some local intrigue as the 3-0 San Diego St. Aztecs go to the Big House at Ann Arbor to take on the 3-0 and No. 22 Michigan Wolverines and the Aztecs, old head ball coach, Brady Hoke.

The Aztecs have gone to the Midwest on multiple occasions over the past several years and have come oh-so-tantalizingly close against the likes of Notre Dame, Michigan and Ohio State only to come up short. Two weeks ago, they found a way to beat Army in a game they would've found a way to lose in years previous and last week they were down 10 to Washington St. at half before ripping off 28 straight points to win going away, 42-24.

As 8 point dogs we're saying, screw it!, this is the year the Aztecs get it done. Mark down a close one for the Aztecs today.




Your SEC game of the week: No. 14 Arkansas at No. 3 Alabama




Your Big 12 game of the week: No. 7 OK St. at No. 8 Texas A&M

If A&M follows through on its threat to bolt the Big 12 for the SEC, this will likely mean this will be the last time you will see this matchup. And if A&M does indeed leave, expect the dominos to start falling and the Big 12 to be no more.

Your ACC game of the week: No. 21 Clemson Tigers host the No. 11 Florida State Seminoles. Let's see how FSU responds after getting handled in their we're baaa-ack game against No. 1 Oklahoma last week.




ABC's primetime matchup: No. 2 LSU at No. 16 West Virginia

Yes, we know what you're thinking: a primetime game involving LSU... playing away from Tiger Stadium

ESPN makes a PAC-12 night call to the desert southwest

No. 10 Oregon at Arizona on ESPN 2

No. 23 USC makes their first roadie at Arizon State on ESPN

P.S. The PAC-12 says they are staying put at 12 teams. Sure they are. If Texas A&M bolts for the SEC, expect the PAC-10 to immediately offer an invitation to Texas who will bring Texas Tech, Oklahoma and Oklahoma St. along with them for your first 16 team super conference. Mark it down.



* SDSU running back and second-leading rusher in the nation, Ronnie Hillman.

A tale of two states

The plundering continues...

While many states have been struggling through the economic downturn, there's been a giant neon sign hanging over Texas that says "OPEN FOR BUSINESS."

In 2008, 70 percent of all the jobs in the country were created in Texas. In 2009, all of America's top five job-creating cities were in Texas.

More recently, "Texas created 129,000 new jobs in the last year -- over one-half of all the new jobs in the U.S. In contrast, California lost 112,000 jobs during the same period," according to "Texas vs. California: Economic growth prospects for the 21st Century," a new report by the Texas Public Policy Foundation released in October.

Texas is home to 64 Fortune 500 companies -- more than any other state in the union. (California has 51 and New York has 56.) For five years in a row, Texas has topped Chief Executive magazine's poll of the best state to do business.

Meanwhile, California is ranked dead last in the Chief Executive's survey. California state treasurer Bill Lockyer even went so far as to pen a Dec. 20 op-ed in the Los Angeles Times denying "the claim that we have a hostile business climate."

So why are businesses flocking to Texas and fleeing California? Well, as a recent headline from The Economist put it, in California "They paved paradise and put up the parking taxes."

Linked article points out that there is no personal income tax in Texas among other advantages that are attracting businesses and jobs to Texas.

Additionally, we would like to point out that the Texas legislature meets for 140 days... every other year. We believe there is something to be said for limiting lawmakers potential for legislative shenanigans and definetely something to be said for busting back California's lawmakers to that of a part-time gig.


But, really... how bad can it be here?

From Forbes:

Arnold Schwarzenegger was sworn in as the governor of California at the end of 2003 amid a wave of optimism that his independent thinking and fresh ideas would revive a state stumbling after the recall of Gov. Gray Davis.

The good vibes are a distant memory: The Governator exited office last month with the state facing a crippling checklist of problems including massive budget deficits, high unemployment, plunging home prices, rampant crime and sky-high taxes. Schwarzenegger's approval ratings hit 22% last year, a record low for any sitting California governor.

California's troubles helped it land eight of the 20 spots on our annual list of America's Most Miserable Cities, with Stockton ranking first for the second time in three years.

Hard-hit Central Valley towns, Merced and Modesto and even the state capitol, Sacramento make the list.


It was Oliver Wendell Holmes who said, “I like paying taxes. With them I buy civilization.” Unfortunately, with a bloated, inefficient, hyper-active and oft-times corrupt layering of governance that appears more concerned with cronyism and subsidizing a permanent underclass than performing basic services, that is no longer the case.

Was it really that bad?

What do Joe Paterno, Josh Groban, USC and the University of Texas all have in common?

They combined forces to produce what the Wall St. Journal is calling one of the worst college football seasons ever.

If there's one thing that sets apart the 2010 college-football season, it's how humiliating it has been for so many of the nation's proudest programs.

We're not just talking about an off year, like the one Penn State had. That happens. We're talking about several of the sport's biggest names enduring preposterous frustrations and indignities all in the same season.

Michigan's coach spoke emotionally at a team banquet about a Josh Groban song. Tennessee's coach made a lengthy analogy comparing his overwhelmed players to the Germans during World War II. Florida, a preseason top-five team, had its worst season in years. Then its coach quit. The same week that an ex-Gator won the Heisman Trophy. For a conference rival.

Every college-football season features a couple of bumbling behemoths, but this year is extreme. Six of the sport's top-10 teams all-time in winning percentage—Michigan, Notre Dame, Texas, Tennessee, Southern California and Penn State—aren't ranked in the Associated Press top-25 poll. Never have all six of those teams failed to appear in a season's final AP poll.

Apparently, the misery is causing fans to lose interest (or shield their eyes). TV ratings at both ABC and NBC were down over 10% this season for college-football telecasts. CBS fell too, though less significantly (4.5%).

Here's Derek Dooley, head coach of the Tennessee Volunteers comparing himself to.... Rommel?






Which school had the roughest go of it this past year? The Journal has the goods, here.

Seeing red in the recovery?

Newsweek compiles their top 10 locales poised for an economic recovery:


1. The Texaplex - Austin, Dallas, San Antonio and Houston


2. The New Silicon Valleys—Raleigh-Durham, N.C.; Salt Lake City; and urban northern Virginia—which offer high-paying high-tech jobs and housing prices well below those in coastal California.


3. The Heartland Honeys — Oklahoma City, Indianapolis, and Des Moines, Iowa—which are enjoying a revival thanks to rising agricultural prices and a shift toward high-end industrial jobs. Remember... people gotta eat.



Not making the cut, of course, is any place in the Lindsay Lohan of the Union, California.

Though not a guaranteer of economic sucess, the article notes a distinctive crimson hew to these recovery zones.

Texas two-step

Who says Texas brawn can't be matched by brain?

Part of being ungovernable is being clever as well.

Best combination of both you will read about all week is right here.

Conference realignment a' go-go Pt. II

That sound you just heard was the Pac 10's hopes for snagging Texas, Oklahoma and some others from the Big 12 South, crashing and burning. Looks like Texas and the others will be staying in a 10-team Big 12.

Shortly after Pac-10 commissioner Larry Scott confirmed to The Associated Press in an e-mail that the University of Texas had declined an invitation to join his conference, the Longhorns put out a statement saying they would "continue competing in the Big 12."

Oklahoma and Texas A&M also say they will stay in the Big 12, which on Friday seemed in danger of falling apart after Nebraska and Colorado both decided to leave over the next two years.

So, why is Texas, the belle of the realignment ball sticking around? Why else?

Texas had a meeting Monday with the other remaining nine schools in the Big 12 about a TV deal included in a plan put together by Beebe that would keep the league intact with its current programs, according to multiple reports.

Based on a TV deal in the works that could pay upwards of $25 million per year, Texas leaned toward staying in a 10-team Big 12 for the foreseeable future, Orangebloods.com reported, citing sources familiar with negotiations.

Texas stands to earn between $20 million and $25 million annually in television revenue in the reworked deal, including money from its own network, according to Orangebloods.com.

Unfortunately, the article does not say what network is involved. A new Big 12 network? Or is this a re-working of standing deals with either ABC or Fox Sports West? No clue.

It was just a matter of days ago that the Pac 10 looked to be one of the big winners in realignment a' go-go. Now, they're left holding the bag... and Colorado that without Colorado's Big 12 heavies making the move west, an awkward arrangement.

If things stabilize here nationally, look for the Pac 10 to add one more team to even things out (Utah or BYU out of the Mountain West Conference?) for a 12 team conference and the opportunity to play a conference championship game. If realignment continues apace, however, look for the Pac 10 to start picking off more teams from the Mountain West.

For their part, the Mountain West did some wheeling and dealing of their own, picking off Boise St. from the WAC back on Friday. Great move. The MWC now has 4 solid top 25 football programs (Utah, BYU, TCU and Boise St.) in a ten team conference making the decision to rebuff a Pac 10 invite that much easier.

What looked like a radical re-shaping of the landscape of college football as recently as this past Saturday has cooled off dramatically to where we might see 2012 come around looking pretty much like 2010.

Hey, Texas... if you secede, you won't have California to kick around anymore

This past spring we blogged on cities that were respectively the best and worst for jobs and how they mirrored the basic fiscal stability of the state in which they resided. L.A. Times article here takes the two states whose cities were over-represented for both the good and the bad and does the whole tale of the tape breakdown.

Texas vs. California.

Who ya got?

In America's federal system, some states, such as California, offer residents a "package deal" that bundles numerous and ambitious public benefits with the high taxes needed to pay for them. Other states, such as Texas, offer packages combining modest benefits and low taxes. These alternatives, of course, define the basic argument between liberals and conservatives over what it means to get the size and scope of government right.

It's not surprising, then, that there's an intense debate over which model is more admirable and sustainable. What is surprising is the growing evidence that the low-benefit/low-tax package not only succeeds on its own terms but also according to the criteria used to defend its opposite. In other words, the superior public goods that supposedly justify the high taxes just aren't being delivered.

California and Texas are not perfect representatives of the alternative deals, but they come close. Overall, the Census Bureau's latest data show that state and local government expenditures for all purposes in 2005-06 were 46.8% higher in California than in Texas: $10,070 per person compared with $6,858. Only three states and the District of Columbia saw higher per capita government outlays than California, while those expenditures in Texas were lower than in all but seven states. California ranked 10th in overall taxes levied by state and local governments, on a per capita basis, while Texas, one of only seven states with no individual income tax, was 38th.

This article is just so doggone chock full o’ goodies, we encourage everyone to read it in its entirety.

According to a report issued earlier this year by the consulting firm McKinsey & Co., Texas students "are, on average, one to two years of learning ahead of California students of the same age," even though per-pupil expenditures on public school students are 12% higher in California.

We just had to sneak that last one in there in case you didn’t follow our advice.

H/T: W.C. Varones

College football Saturday open thread

We’ll miss our hi-def LCD out in the high desert but there is something to be said for scanning the dial and trying to pull in a scratchy AM radio signal out in the wilderness.

A relatively slow weekend as there are only two games featuring two ranked teams: #5 USC goes on the road to another one of those Pac-10 snake pits in Autzen Stadium on the campus of the University of Oregon and #3 Texas goes to Stillwater to take on #14 Oklahoma St.

And we would be remiss if we neglected to mention B-Daddy’s Midshipmen of Navy (6-2) hosting the Temple Owls (5-2).

College football Saturday open thread

Our good friend “Jerry” is in Dallas for work and will be trying to get into the Oklahoma-Texas game aka The Red River Rivalry.

Other good games abound:

Trojans on the road against fortunate-to-be 4-1 Notre Dame.

And later on this evening, #4 Virginia Tech will be in Atlanta taking on #18 Georgia Tech and #2 Alabama will be hosting #22 South Carolina.

We may check in later but if not enjoy the rest of your college football Saturday.

The poll positions are set, let the jockeying begin

The AP college football poll was are released this morning and here is the way things stack up, right now.

1. Florida
2. Texas
3. Oklahoma
4. USC
5. Alabama
6. Ohio State
7. Virginia Tech
8. Mississippi
9. Oklahoma St.
9. Penn St.
11. LSU
12. California
13. Georgia
14. Boise St.
15. Georgia Tech
16. Oregon
17. TCU
18. Florida St.
19. Utah
20. BYU
21. North Carolina
22. Iowa
23. Notre Dame
24. Nebraska
25. Kansans


A little bit of history was made as the Florida Gators collected 58 of the 60 (96.7%) first place votes (Texas received the other 2) making the most overwhelming favorite since the poll was started in 1950. The previous high was the ’07 Trojans who received 62 of 65 first place votes (95.4%).

The template has now been set. When the two teams who will be playing for the BCS National Championship square-off against one another in January, their respective BCS standings journey can be walked-back week by week to this Saturday in late August.

To wit, a team like North Carolina may have too much ground to make-up at 21 to have a realistic shot at the title game, even if they go undefeated (this assumes that at least one or 2 teams ahead of them go undefeated).

And thanks for playing along TCU, Utah and BYU. The BCS has shown little regard for the non-BCS conferences though we will watch with keen interest BYU as they open up against Oklahoma on a semi-neutral site in Arlington TX on Sept. 5 and whose roster contains 3 other top 25 teams (Florida St. and conference foes Utah and TCU).

One and Done....

Jose’ Medellin, a Mexican national and here in this country illegally, was executed in Texas late Tuesday for the slaying of two teenage girls back in 1993. The girls, before they died, were subjected to gang rape, beating and strangling by Medellin and 5 of his fellow gang members.

All manner of human rights groups, The International Court of Justice, the country of Mexico AND the Bush Administration asked that Medellin be retried as he was not informed of his “right” to seek help from the Mexican Consulate as per the 1963 Vienna Convention. (quick aside: between Bush Administration’s handling, or lack thereof, of the Ramos/Campeon Border Patrol Agent situation and now, this, we're wondering what sort of pictures of Bush the Mexican government has in its possession).

Governor Rick Perry's response: "the world court has no standing in Texas."

"It is striking the difference of perspective between the United States and many other countries," said David Fathi, U.S. program director for the group Human Rights Watch, which had opposed the execution.

You got that right, boss.

This is just a reminder of the type of nonsense to which this country will be vulnerable upon further entanglements with supra-national U.N.-type courts.

Exit question: Assuming Medellin was afforded legal counsel, why would it then be reasonable to assume that Medellin, an illegal alien, should be afforded any more protection and legal advice than a citizen of this country would be afforded?

How will we ever survive the summer without them?

The Governor of one of the largest states in the Union was on Hedgecock’s show last week. With a diverse economy and a diverse population, it is a challenging task and sharing an international border with Mexico, this state has also struggled with the issue of illegal immigration. But despite these hard economic times, the governor of this big ol’ state is not facing a budget deficit of $15 billion dollars…. So you know, now, who it is we are not talking about.

If you figured, though, the guest was Rick Perry, the governor of Texas, you would be correct. A state without an income tax, though, a slightly higher sales tax and admittedly higher property taxes still manages to post a surplus during this economic stretch to the degree that Texas is going to have a sales tax holiday. As Perry himself said: “We thought it would be nice to give back to the people”. Yes, he actually said that.

Now, how is California, the state whose Governor was not on Hedgecock’s show, going to give back to the people? Well, raise taxes, of course including a plan that will raise California’s high-end marginal rates to twice the national average. That, and attempt to pass (still) a $14 billion state-run health insurance program (and when Obama becomes President, there will be absolutely zero chance of any overlap, double-payments, he paid-she paid, abuse, fraud or any other general Charlie-Foxtrotting between the state and federal health insurance plans… none whatsoever) and the most expensive climate-change program in the nation.

So, how does Texas do it? How does Texas not only maintain a hard cap on spending and a rainy day fund but a surplus to the extent they can afford a sales-tax holiday in the worst economy since… whenever? We are neither economists nor political scientist types but we believe the answer is quite elegant in its simplicity and it resides in one of the largest differences between two states that are in many ways, very similar.

You see, when a state legislature gathers but once for a few months every two years, there’s only so much they can “accomplish”. “Doing the will of the electorate” takes on a different meaning given the time constraints. There’s only so much that can get done when they are limited to 140 days out of 730 in which to enact legislation and, you know, “give back to the people”.

So while Congress goes on recess for the summer without doing anything meaningful to lower prices at the pump yet decides to throw away more money on farming and ethanol subsidies and, via the mortagage bailout, people who least deserve a federal life preserver, be thankful for this 5-week respite where it will be physically impossible for them to “help”, “aid”, “assist” any more than they have already… so help us, god.

Probably not the response she was hoping for.

Texas Governor, Rick Perry, was a guest on Roger Hedgecock’s show a few days ago. He concluded that the Federal Government was abrogating their responsibility to enforce the border and decided to do something about it. He went to the legislature and requested and received $100 million dollars for border enforcement. Perry’s not real big on the wholesale use of fences. They do however, serve a purpose in strategic locations. Its "boots on the ground" that are the real key to border enforcement, Perry believes. He claims that there has been a 65% drop in crime in border regions since he put his plan into effect.

While trolling around the state governor site to dig up some dirt, we found this which is a letter from Perry to Representative Sheila Jackson Lee, who, from the nature of the response was bitching about the presence of the Minutemen along the Texas border. (Not incidentally, Jackson Lee is on the House Judiciary subcommittee on Immigration and Claims).

Perry responds very respectfully stating that the Minutemen are private citizens and can come and go as they please. He also states that because of her standing in the referenced committee, she has the power to do something about illegal immigration. He ends with this mild little zinger: “If you want to send the Minutemen home, I urge you to make sure we have enough federal agents on the border to secure it.” Zip….