It takes a mite amount of dipping to figure out what the heck the meaning is of the tenor of the “bathroom assault” on Kyrsten Sinema…

…. IE, the premise that this illegal immigrant / undocumented student had campaigned for her hard, and now she is betraying her on the campaign…

… A premise I see scattered about in the liberal / left – sphere of the Internet, which makes no sense to me given…

… Sinema actively ran as a “Centrist”, with all that that entails in the domain of American politics…

… Or, you know, apt to come in with that “a trillion here, a trillion, and soon we are talking real money” viewpoint in budgetary negotiations.

See, had Kyrsten Sinema been elected in campaigning as the Green Party activist she once was, then this line in defense of the bathroom assaulted may have a point. But I failed to see what the betrayal was…

Until I saw the Tweet explanation from her, assailing “tone policing” and coming in with the totality of negation for criticism based on historical grievances. From this position, there is no way any politico would not betray her. But working into specifics…

Kyrsten Sinema has a bill that does a, b, c, d, e, and f. She campaigned in support of b. B is what brought the Bathroom Assaulter into the campaign. Sinema thus ends up opposing b, because the bill’s a through f add up elsewhere.

The bathroom assaulter and those who claim betrayal have a fuzzy view of electoral politics.

I. LPAC and LORG Separation

LPAC sells its line on the California Recall effort: Even the fraud skewed map of the vote shows a totally divided population with about half of the counties in the state voting overwhelmingly for the recall.  The cities and counties along the coast, those who out of fear, ignorance, and outright craziness continue to tolerate their own destruction, voted against. Harley Schlanger, representing LORG, calls Newsom’s victory a victory for “the Presidential System” and lays this down in the historic tradition of the Larouche org’s 2003 fight against Gray Davis’s recall: We also have preliminary report on the defeat of the California Recall. Lyndon LaRouche famously warned, in 2003, that Recall is dangerous, as it is designed to manipulate momentary emotions, to undermine the US Presidential System, and replace it with a parliamentary system. Never mind their efforts during the second Schwarzenegger Administration to Recall him, and I suppose the effort to Impeach Cheney wasn’t an assault on the “presidential system” as much as one against the “Vice Presidential System”.

LORG’s repositioning continues, and we see it with: General Milley’s Role in Britain’s Attempted Coup d’Etat Against Trump—and Biden

Quite apart from LPAC with its As the Biden Administration digs deeper and deeper into the playbook of pure dictatorial fascism, it has begun to deny medical treatments necessary to fight COVID to southern states which have resisted his vaccine and mask mandates. Response: What a load of bollocks.

When confronted with this call to action from Miko Dzagi to Joe Walsh — Is anyone prepared to address the standard of truth, as Lyndon LaRouche would? Are YOU willing join Lyndon LaRouche and his movement, in heeding Benjamin Franklin, when he said the Constitutional Convention had created “a republic, if you can keep it”? — you can troll him by saying ” Sure. I will join LPAC and enter the fight!” (I believe this counts as LPAC trying to get at Glenn Greenwald.)

Speaking for LORG — August 14, Gretchen Small: “Think about the effect it will have on #USA, if volume 1 of #LaRouche’s important and influential physical economy works were available on library shelves across the country.” Collecting dust. The one volume of Larouche that was in the Multnomah County Library system — Dialectical Economics — appears to have been discarded — maybe it is floating out there in one of the library’s bookstores along with the discarded subscription to 21st Century Sci and Tech they had in a prior decade?

And one notice: perhaps just out of habit, this site sticks to publishing LPAC articles.

II. Memories

I signed up for a Lyndon larouche mailing list because they were like “do you think war is bad?” And I was like “yeah of course.” They called me for YEARS and actually I had a nice long conversation with one of the phonebankers once (I was very lonely)

True story when I was young traumatized lost and broken I heard a Lyndon Larouche interview on the Jeff Rense show, which I listened to of reasons explained above, and they gave out a number and I called it and A dude with a New England accent started walking me through a lil pre-screening thing, asked “do you have internet?” and I said yes and he said find a picture of Michaelangelo’s School of Athens painting and look at it and so I did and He started telling me about it and holding it up as this grand thing of humanity and don’t I want to be in that painting and of course sure fuggit yeah lemme in to the painting bro and then because it was true I started fessing up about Being all into occult stuff which I was back then for reasons I addressed at the beginning of this post and I asked if there was any place for a tarot nerd into golden dawn weirdness in their movement and the dude hung up on me. the end. PS that was one of a few times where being into a bunch of bullshit mumbo jumbo saved my bacon in spite of myself. It made me too crazy for the larouchies and so thank you crowley I guess? Anyway yeah the end

There must be 15 of them 😱. I’ve seen more people trying to push Lyndon Larouche bullshit outside of the post office. Definitely not news and definitely not worth flying over 🤦🏻‍♂️

Does anyone know anything about the Larouche Movement in Cape Breton? A number of people have let me in on the “Zionist-Rockefeller Axis” over the years, don’t know if this is unusual or not.

Embarrassed to admit that i couldn’t remember LaRouche’s name for a minute but luckily “The Sexual Congress of Cultural Fascism” is a phrase I will never forget.

Yeah I read about this stuff in Washington Post magazine a long ass time ago. Ran into some Lyndon Larouche people a couple times and they were just wacky

You’re going to build some old fat shit. Because day and night you will complain of the rest of your brain and no one is ready to finance your stupid plans. At some point, PV + storage may be a lot cheaper. […] I lived on Otto-Dischner-Weg in Munich-Pasing from 1996-1999. That was the time when Helga Zepp-LaRouche founded “Aufbruch” in Pasing and covered the whole area with her cell phone mast terror.

NOSTALGIC for the days when guys on sidewalk sold Muhammad Speaks or handed out a Lyndon Larouche or Krishna sheet, or the occasional paper from Little Rocket Man’s grandfather — and that was the extent of the parallel universe messaging business.

I grew up in MI & I have deep family roots there. There are def racist, rural pockets. I “recognized” Manchester right off the bat. There’s also a contingent of anti-gov’t loons that got a start back w/ Larouche in 70’s/80’s. They huddle w/ militia in rural pockets 2.

My problem is my need to generously share my opinion with those who irk me. As you may have noticed. The last time it happened, my loving spouse had to drag me away from a Lyndon LaRouche nutbag on the street. He was kind, but firm, let’s say.

I think I came face to face with him. The Tea Party set up a table in front of my P.O. in my small town on L.I. I objected to their picture of Obama as Hitler. I started talking about who LaRouche is and saw a man standing back smirking. Very chilling. I wish I’d confronted him.

He hated Bush/Cheney. I remember the bizarre intellectual genealogy that a couple Larouchites showed me on the Iowa campus: from Satan to Hitler to Hannah Arendt (via Heidegger) to the Frankfurt School to Duck Cheney(?).

They attacked me in Venice, CA years ago after I swept their Obama w/ Hitler mustache posters off their table. Punched & kicked me, a woman, then punched my 60smthng male friend who was driving by. Cops did zero.

Flashback to the time I stopped to have a lengthy, interesting conversation with a representative of the LaRouche cult about fusion power and globalization, only to read through their pamphlet and see them describe Obama’s domestic and foreign policy as “satanic bestiality”.

It always cracked me up when these groups (TPUSA etc) would set up shop on campus and literally the only people who would talk to them were 55 year old university employees. […] Lest we forget the LaRouche supporters

It was the 80s when I did it. I used to break the Larouche people’s balls back then too. […] Oh my God, Larouche popped in my head today randomly. As an older millennial, I think I’m in the last generation where he’d be a relevant pop-culture reference One of my all-time favorite jokes of mine was a zine I made in 08 w/ him on the cover that said “Eight Time’s the Charm

I missed being the kind of dipshit who orders Lyndon LaRouche newsletters by inches. Thank christ.

Some of my fondest memories of college are of the students coming together to performatively (in a good way) mock on-campus speakers. Especially, the LaRouche people but the homophobic speakers guild and young-earthers were also roundly mocked.

I hung out with some LaRouche kids when I was a freshman (they were on campus). Went to a real weird meeting with a lot of whiteboard graphs. (Curious the Webster Tarpley recommendation, given his partisan movements away from either incarnation of Larouche.)

Seattle used to have a bunch of LaRouchies. One time, having been engaged by a Rouchy, I finally agreed to take some literature to extract myself from the conversation; then he asked me to pay for it.

there were a bunch of Larouchites at the University of Akron when I went there. I was a graduate student in mathematics. They would approach me, not knowing anything about me, and try to blow my mind with shit like “did you know that imaginary numbers aren’t imaginary”?

Birth of a 9/11 Truther— My dad would’ve been all over this shit.. He used to tell me “Conspiracy Theories” at night before bed lol. We’d read the Lyndon LaRouche newsletter together. He always said he was flagged somewhere on a government list just for subscribing to it lol. The OG twitter.

When I was at San Francisco State, there was a very active Lyndon Larouche group on campus. Batshit insane, but their rights to have meetings and set up tables was respected.

As an early millennial, my beliefs were based mostly on articles on Alternet and newsprint propaganda handed out at antiwar rallies by the ISO, Crimethinc, and LaRouche (the passing of time and the sense comes in that the odd interactions with Larouche cohorts are limited to your age cohort.)

I’m white. My parents were “like that too” – pops got Lyndon LaRouche newsletters, mom was big into alien astronauts and other such low-key cracker supremacist nonsense. Read Ayn Rand at 14. Odd to racialize alien conspiracy theories or peg it as white (let alone white supremacist) — pretty sure Black “Egyptologists” of the kind who influenced Sun Ra go that direction.

they had a 2 year strong game on vampus essen, always set up events before audimax economics and said “your professors are impotent, read larouche, we have to build the atomic Eurasian rail network as the ultimate fiscal impulse

I once joined a political cult…. Maybe you’ve all heard of Lyndon Larouche? In my defense, I was super young, naive and thought I was in love…

III. Dualing Touring — tilting at Nazi windmills

The college tour resumes at Michigan’s Wayne State University — Yesterday, an outside organization set up a display on our campus that was in no way consistent with the spirit, pride and values of Wayne State University,” Strauss said. “This organization’s display of antisemitic signage, which was set up without permission, referenced the Holocaust and was vulgar and reprehensible.”
WSU Chief of Police Anthony Holt said he learned of the display through a phone call from a patrol officer Wednesday morning. He could not confirm the name of the patrol officer who notified him.
“The patrol officer called in and said ‘there’s a group setting up tables on Anthony Wayne Drive and Merrick (Street). Do we know if they have a permit or if they’re allowed to do so?’” Holt said. “We sent a supervisor to the scene and then I got there. We had a conversation with them, and took it from there.”
TLO left campus after a conversation with Holt and other officers, he said. It does appear they have taken a liking to this institution of higher learning — probably hoping to grow in Detroit.

We see here they are making friends by the bushelful. why tf is larouche (a political cult) back on campus Answer: recruiting, and they will be out doubling squares any day now.

And the tour moves on to Rockaway, with the mayor commenting… Mayor Michael Puzio was quick Thursday, Sept. 23, to condemn an anti-Semitic offensive placard which was displayed by members of the Lyndon LaRouche, Jr. organization at the Rockaway Borough Post Office. College campuses and Post offices. Sure to dig up the archives on where the ADL fits in to the Vast Conspiracy — We condemn the LaRouche Movement for their offensive use of Holocaust analogies to advance their agenda. Several posters, including those stating “Green Energy: More Efficient than Auschwitz,” were found in #NJ & #NY. These comparisons are unacceptable & trivialize the Holocaust.

This shows the top of mind awareness Diane Sare has as they campaign in New York to defeat Schumer — Wow I just saw my first pack of LaRouchites in the wild on third avenue. Bizarre.

Meantime, it appears LPAC and the likes of Kesha Rogers are following Trump’s tour schedule. Kesha Rogers excitedly standing next to cardboard cutouts of the Trumps — sure to endorse her next ELE tion campaign, Cardboard Trump.

Just as well — Trump has already chosen a different cult for his political selling anyways. (Sometimes allies, always competitor)

IV. This Month’s Comparison Load

Andrew Yang, repeatedly. — Yang is the reincarnation of Lyndon Larouche, not in substance but in form and method. He will parlay his failed democratic presidential bid into a permanent grift where he bilks his cult followers out of money every election cycle until he dies.

Zach Snyder fans. Nathan Andrew, Holocaust denier. Marine Le Pen. Rose McGowan — “making a bold statement“. Michael Tracey. Larry Elder. Donald Trump, interesting positing that Larouche coulda been a contender. Jay walking turkey. Beto O’Rourke and a ” right back atcha” to Matt Rinaldi. Don’t even need to translate. Tucker Carlson, interesting in that the definition is essentially just a grand bag of conspiracies whether historically tied to the cult leader or not, and also interesting in citing “late 00s” — arbitrary a designation. Bappin. Kyrsten Sinema, or at least her fashion sense against temporary Larouche headquarters. (One of those long-shuttered holes in the wall that was a Lyndon LaRouche HQ in the 1980s.) Tulsi Gabbard, with a dash of gender specific commentary. Black Hebrew Israelites. SDS Radicals. (Behind a pay wall so do I not know specifics) — An anti-mask anti-vaxx protest. Either Unruhe or Haz — Not going to dip in to figure out who is who.

Whatever form of leftist “para social butterfly” is. (though, the insult isn’t that they are Larouchian but that they are infiltrated by larouchies.)

James Bond.

These statements from the unhinged Multicultural Solidarity Centre, Democratic Socialists, or Students for Socialism are 21st century Leftist crap akin to 20th century babbling from a bigoted bunch of baboons like the KKK, John Birch Society, or LaRouche Dems.

The relationship between South Korea’s government and its pop culture export of kpop music gets a — Probably but this needs examples otherwise it sounds like Lyndon LaRouche talking about The Beatles.

“trotskyizing” is a word?

Caleb Maupin, part legend in his own mind, part buzzing nuisance for leftists — And, ahhh He also made a book that was conspicuously saying his group was NOT a LaRouche-like Cult…

Curious thing on this one — Alex Krainer guy is a Larouche member. It appears no, but he became “Larouche adjacent” right here — where, upon getting impressed by the MAGA Larouche fan referencing him — he soon thereafter signed the “Exonerate Larouche” petition, for further feedback to become a heavyweight figure cited by the Larouchies.

V. History

9/11 “Reichstag Fire!” redux. I’m gonna outdo LaRouche. I’m gonna become a hardcore Leibnitz truther, and base my vision of communism entirely around this fact.

1.4 thousand responses to this tweet replicating a Larouche train map. I’m glad LaRouche still resonates with the public…and what the fuck is in Cheyenne??!! Is there a need to get horses from Wyoming to El Paso at 200mph?

That time Larouche came in second, behind Ross Perot, in a nonbinding North Dakota Democratic Presidential primary. 4 Years later, perennial “interesting guy” candidate Charles Woods is out of the picture, Perot has his own party, and this time around he loses to Roland Rievers.

Adlai Stevenson III dies. Calling it a career after the 1986 election debacle. And — Meh. my kingdom for a history of the Illinois Solidarity Party: shell party created by Adlai III after he won ‘86 Dem primary but refused to run on a ticket with the LaRouchies who won the Dem Lt Gov primary. then a year later it was used by Vrdolyak to run against Harold Washington.

Robert Dreyfus wrote for The Nation.

I didn’t watch the big interviews too closely, but I do not remember this “debating” in the Jones — Larouche appearances. A lot of obsequious flattery from the host and posturing from the guest.

That feeling when Singlaub the Moonies *and* Lyn get namechecked in the same readout. You read Hazardous Duty and its like dude how come you’re bringing up the larouche dudes huh? HOW COME and then boom. Thank you c. intel a. for finally scratching my itch

Apparently, there is an online holy war I have not been aware of over whether A is 432 or 440 Hz. And with that you get a thread of historical reckoning.

northern virginia was better when Lyndon LaRouche ran the place

VI. Daniel Burke Fights for Chinese Bricks

LORG takes its stand against the Blair – Trump war machine. Daniel Burke refers to BRI as “the single greatest economic policy in human history” — hyperbole much? — though, the approving use of this Stalin quote to blast Social Democratic Progressives fascinates me more (as too the tedious new trend to preface the “splain” — the second half of “explain” — with a derogatory first syllable usage, in this case “lib” — for easy no explain dismissal.) And here I trip over a challenge call to action comment from Daniel Burke — It is not enough to say, “I am socialist, like China,” or “I hate present US policy.” — where is any lump of support for “socialism, like China”? The basic thesis of the chapter in Mark Manson’s book is given credence as Burke reaches out to a depressed 21 year old with a generation bashing around article. — China’s government now doing more to fight emo kids, I hear.

A “patriot” asks the probing question — Do you believe the ur government, big business, and social media has been infiltrated by the CCP — – to which I can say — no, but the LORG has. MDZagi has some Larouche material he wants the Cajun Cowboy to read, and the message rings out — The Enemy Is the British Empire—Period! Noting the exclamation mark, which is not a period. MDzagi continues his flubbing by tweeting at Gretchen Smith an alarmist economic quote from Larouche on the size of the economic breakdown we are in … Currently… Presently… which, coming from a dead guy like Larouche is like quoting my granddad on how the burnt toast I am eating today is the worst burnt toast ever. And one more weird flub — The LaRouche Program for Mankind’s Durable Survival or kiss this planet good buy!! — Can’t really debate, double extinction coming — someone has to “buy” us.

Say, what does Webster Tarpley think?

Here is one lost white nationalist offering the opinion — Larouche used to be super based until Eurasianism got him! Helga’s China positioning loses them one guy.

Elsewhere mDzagi answers a Trump Supporters question on what he would say to Biden with a bit of nonsense, as from a Larouche perspective there is nothing to ask the man given that he is a hologram.

That’s one reading list. — full of state lackeys. “trying to deny Larouche’s existence” is a thing that never happened, though plenty denied his relevance.

VII. Internationale

Making Waves in Germany’s election: Missing them — In my suburb there are no posters from #NoAfD, @diebasispartei or similar dubious groups. I like that.

BüSo with the continuous Zepp-Larouche light? Any original crazy existences that cannot afford posters and are therefore dealt with with street chalk?

For mainstream news coverage, we have this: 47 parties are in the running for seats in the Bundestag; it might be wise to brush up on arithmetic, maybe even calculus. This year Berlin has its own state election as well, with 34 parties competing for its House of Representatives and for all sixteen borough councils too. A good pencil-sharpener might be useful (or a ball-point). Mostly they are small, even tiny, like the Animal Rights Party, the Liberal-Konservativ Reformer, or a party run by the German widow of Lyndon LaRouche, an American provocateur of past years. Or the little German Communist Party. Few reach 1%.

Election results — A little bit like French election results where the Larouhies come in last, trailing the Trotskyites by roughly A 2 – 1 margin. So we see 1534 votes for the Trots and 737 for Team Larouche. But, I guess maybe they focused on a “First we take Berlin” strategy — where they beat we deal parties, and really does suck to be “New Berlin”. Team Larouche latches on to 0.03 percent or 587 votes.

There’s an idea, but I am pretty sure the Larouchies have dubbed Kraftwork and their progeny British — out of Tavistock. A Larouche-type cult for German-Americans centered around Krautrock, Marxism and Primitivism — and too techno for that last bit.

Jacques Cheminade is seen here accusing some media source which is shakily translated as “France Info” of accusing him of disseminating Larouchee 9/11 Conspiracy theories to the French public. Which strikes me as undeniably true, but this does give him an opportunity to do so again.

The “No Stupid Questions” canard — responding to Cheminade’s Larouchian import of 9/11 Conspiracy–

Cheminade took up and defended the ideas of Lyndon LaRouche, a notorious conspirator who believes that all the evil in this world comes from the British Empire. Cheminade was one of the first to publicly “ask questions” (obviously stupid) about the attacks

The Americans have just published official FBI documents showing that they have found links between the terrorists and the family of Prince Bandar bin Sultan, then ambassador for Saudi Arabia, a close friend of the Bushes. To ask questions seems legitimate to me …

Doubt is good, systematic suspicion is completely stupid

VIII. How many times worse than Hitler?

Brandon Brophy: It all comes together and connects, don’t it?

Translated, A haughtier than thou explainer: as I explain it to you. not having Oprah as a political reference but Larouche, it is not about ego, but common sense. the other way around, going to laugh with a Cesar Vidal live and learn politics with the fat man and the skinny man is stupid, it’s not about ego

Bold statement by Daniel Burke, in a tweet that has been deleted. The IMF is 100x worse than Hitler — reference to the Haitian migrant crisis –and… Huh. For this to be true, they would have to kill 600,000,000 Haitians. Yeah, I see why Burke deleted that tweet.

Not deleted is this insult to the working class, denigrating vocational education. Send Malthusians to vocational schools. Not really working for any mass movement, unlike the Communist he is tweeting at.

I see that in researching for his podcast on Larouche, True Anon found this 1996 brush back at the “Music of the People”, or Country music — any number of ways one can dissect the vortices of art and commerce — a random ad I’ve heard in that “anti-ad” formula moves through a faux Country song interspersed lyrics about “never left New York City, the only reason I went country is ’cause my rap career has ended”. The Larouchies, under the tutelage of Webster Tarpley I guess, went one or five step further — it is a British Project, the same British Project that brought Napoleon to power. Surely ye jest. Hm. Let’s listen to some Dolly Parton just for the Hell of it.

The casual dismissal of old news coverage on the cult because it is old –amusing tact. Apparently this is the supposed belief of Larouche: Just imagine believing that every human was in the living image of God and had the inborn capacity to contribute to the common good.

IX. People Responding

Touring Washington, DC and Houston…

The Responses are overwhelming. Gonna do larouche lit table part time when I retire…best way to meet the “security guard who speaks 5 languages” type of guys…my favorite guys.

We see the tricky political arena Helga and company are playing in within the list of kudos her tweet garners. Cursed be the thieving Afghans who have been drinking the blood of the nation for 20 years but still say don’t give money to Afghans — Hrm. From a liberal vantage point the biggest problem with Biden’s Afghan withdrawal was/is that the refugee program for Afghans who were backing our attempts was limited, leaving them now in the hands of the incoming Taliban. Funny ally as against their current supposed cries on Haiti.

X. Adjacent Twitterers

Caleb Maupin gets a this: Not trying to cancel you or anything but this post is kind of puzzling. I think we should acknowledge that Larouche was an ultraleft saboteur who sent deranged thugs to attack CPUSA members with nunchucks. Feel like you missed that bit of history.

Rcam exonerated Chaitkin: That one is actually by Chaitkin who I think was not aware of Larouche’s other ties– Chaitkin does good work especially. Doesn’t strike me as believable, but what ever.

Sometime back in high school, Ace Hardware Store was sole seller of a video of hi-lites for the Mariners 1995 season. And this video was the favored video of much of the male teaching staff — such that on those days when they had need to not teach anything — say, the day before Christmas Break — in plopped the video.

It was this or Forrest Gump.

The Mariners end up are a pretty sorry sports franchise, their 1995 ALDS victory proving to be “their World Series”. That year and the 2001 Record breaking year, fizzling in the playoffs, are the two seasons that will get any traction in Mariners fans’ imaginations — beyond stray games from Felix Hernandez and Ichiro Suzuki it is what can be held onto. I do not know if Ace or whoever the sports’ team could license it to, was selling a 2001 hit lite reel for small town high school teachers in rural Eastern Washington to foster onto their students. I do know there was a 1996 video which, given the team did not get into the playoffs, was just kind of sad. No teacher ever put it on to their classrooms.

Today I am following various major league baseball games — basically for the first time since 2018 — which, you can imagine, I faded away from through the summer. I just turned away from the Boston — Washington stream — the relief for the Nationals not holding onto a tie. So the Red Sox stay ahead, now tied with a Yankees team that just lost two to the Rays, now with the Mariners after last night’s loss hoping to stay one game back and tied with the Toronto Blue Jays.

Chaos follows suit in tie breaking scenarios.

It is a different set of rules since the mid 1990s — we have what might as well be a playing game as an official post season game, but that which does not feel like it, or — except for that “harbinger of seasons to come” hope, becomes kind of meaningless for the real goal — having a compelling damned video that rural Washington high school teachers will want to drop in to fill classes on days they are opting out of teaching. The dilemma is that the Mariners have no realistic shot of winning or making the damned World Series, so it is again incumbent on figuring some kind of season closing victory.

It dawned on me yesterday, if I am reading the tie breaking rules right, that the optimal effect would be a three way tie for that second playoff game with Boston and Toronto. This would set up that scenario where Boston opts for the one road game as opposed to the two necessary home victories the Mariners would have (holding a tiebreaker over Toronto.). Two home wins gives some ambiance for the announcer shout of “It just continues!”, before cutting out the hit lite reel and not really mentioning that they lost to the Cleveland Indians* in six… Or, in our case now, the Yankees in one. (Maybe they will win, but it is immaterial — the video would have the ” It just continues!” before no home crowd and a cut off of losing in five to the Devil Rays*.)

With that, I found myself quietly hoping for a Red Sox 2-1 series against the Nationals, a Mariners 2-1 against the Angels, and Toronto to sweep the Orioles. Which, I guess is almost still in order. The Yankees losing may complicate the picture. I do not think I want a four way tie — that seems to be setting up no home play game. I gather what I would be left with is hoping for a Red Sox win and Yankees loss.

* yes, I know. They changed their names. And so we will be able to gauge who are old fuddy duddys that refuse to keep up with changing times, and insist on maintaining tradition.