13 July 2005

I've seen a million faces and I've rocked them all...

I'm going to talk about two things today: Sports and Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

First the lighter side of this post.

I have a sense of confusion regarding 15-year-old female golf phenom, Michelle Wie. She quite possibly the female version of Tiger Woods. But she is the female version of today's Tiger Woods. She is incredible. She is beating women over twice her age and scoring better than some men with three times more experience. And she is doing this on her summer break from high school.

Now, there is some controversy about her playing in men's PGA tournaments. Some of the media is saying that she should stick to women's golf and not try to cross over to the side of the men. I patrially agree in the sense that there is a women's professional golf association and she has the opportunity to play in that. It's not like auto racing where there is no female circuit and women like Danika Patrick are forced to play with the boys. But I also feel like if she can keep up with the boys she should be given a shot to do so.

But let's hold up a second here. If Wie is allowed to compete in the PGA Amateur tournament and wins (beating all the guys), she will be eligable for a spot in the Masters Tournament next year. The Master's Tournament has always been an all-male tournament and Augusta National Golf Club is an all-male club. Some will say it's sexist to not let her compete if she makes the cut, but it would also be breaking one of the greatest traditions in sports. I really haven't made my mind up about this yet.

The next sports issue is Kenny Rogers, pitcher for the Texas Rangers. He was fined by the MLB for his behavior in knocking the camera away from two cameramen in a pre-game warm up. He publicly applologized for his outrageous actions and paid the fine. He was also an all-star pitcher in this years all-star game. When he was announced in the line-up the un-forgiving crowd at Detriot's Comerica Park viciously boo-ed him. I thought this was un-acceptable. In his entire career he's done one thing that he was publicly criticized for and after apologizing, the masses still can't forgive him. I guess that says a lot about the American sports fans these days. Since when did having a bad day and making a mistake become an un-forgivable action?? I'm just certain that all the jeering spectators have been perfect their whole life.


Now hear me roar about Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Investigators are bringing the mis-treatment of known-terrorist to the media's attention. According to the Associated Press, "Interrogators subjected a suspected terrorist to abusive and degrading treatment, forcing him to wear a bra, dance with another man and behave like a dog, military investigators reported Wednesday."

This seems to be a little much, but I also don't remember the last time that known terrorists were supposed to be treated like your average felons. Now, I'm not saying it's ok to put a guy in a bra and disgrace him like that, but I also don't know why it's anyone else's concern how we treat terrorists. Everyone with half a brain knows that prisons like that exist for alternative purposes that average prisons can't serve. And everyone could assume the kinds of things that go on in these places. Let's just say that I don't think that known terrorists are getting daily spa treatments there.

For as long as I've known, this kind of situation has always been a don't ask...don't tell kind of thing. But for some reason it's all coming up in our own media. I think it's bad for our country that the media is focusing so much on this. I think if there are going to be investigations regarding this ceratin situation, then they should be done privately. Having a biased media covering the whole situation is potentially distructive to our nation's entire process of dealing with detained terrorists.

There has been no accusations of prisoner abuse, however there is three cited occasions of prisoner mis-treatment. These were all violations of the Geneva Convention and Army Protocol and each person involved received discipline. I just don't think it should be covered so much because previously accounts of this nature have hurt the U.S. in world standing.

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]

<< Home