I was lucky enough to play a portion of my high school basketball career under Jim Brandenburg. To this day, I consider Jim to be the best coach and one of the finest people that I have ever known. I remember wiping away my tears the day that Jim told our team that he had accepted an assistant coaching position, at the University of Montana, following my sophomore year in high school. Jim was an outstanding coach who coached the University of Wyoming to several NCAA tournament appearances.

What I remember the most about Jim was how he used to stress that sports was one of the few things in life that was truly fair. And I believed him because his sense of fairness was in evidence each and every day in our day to day basketball operations.

            Much of what I learned about coaching and life came from my two years playing under Coach Jim Brandenburg. Jim helped me to understand, along with my father, that what we achieve in life is due to our innate talent, hard work and dedication. Ideally, the world of sports is the ultimate expression of democracy and that everyone competes on a level playing field.

            Conversely, the political world of today is fraught with double standards, hidden agendas and filled with many public servants who get elected for the sole purpose of cashing in on their positions of trust.

            The world of politics is not fair. It is not fair that President Bush has violated the Constitution by forging the creation and manifestation of the North American Union without the requisite approval of the two-thirds of the Senate. It is not fair to the American people that many members of Congress succumb to the corporate world of campaign donations and permits the exportation of American jobs to cheap foreign labor markets with impunity. It is not fair that the FCC has given into the corporate pressures and now allows six major multinational corporations to own 99% of the media in order to perpetuate the propaganda machine that would keep the likes of presidential candidate, Ron Paul, out of the national limelight as much as possible. It is not fair that corporate America, in reality, pays only an average of 8% in taxes, while the rest of us pay close to 50%. It is not fair a small group of men who run the privately owned and unelected Federal Reserve Board get to make money policies which benefit themselves often at the expense of American citizens.

Because politics are so unfair, many Americans turn to sports and admire the great skills of professional athletes in an arena which promotes fair competition. For a couple of hours, many sports fans believe that life is fair and justice is prevalent as we crown the champions of the sports world. But are sports truly fair?

            Consider game four between the Phoenix Suns and the San Antonio Spurs. The Suns facing almost certain elimination if they lose the game, mount a furious fourth quarter comeback and defeat the Spurs on their home court after wiping out an 11 point deficit. With 20 seconds to play, Spurs forward, Robert Horry, delivers a vicious body check into two-time Most Valuable Player, Steve Nash. Nash goes flying across the floor and slides into the scoring table in one of the dirtiest fouls in recent memory. Amare Stoudamire and Boris Diaw run up the sideline to check on their fallen comrade where they are intercepted by their coaches and sent back to the bench. They had no intention of entering a fracas which had broken out on the other end of the court between Robert Horry and Suns guard, Raja Bell.

In an earlier play in the first half, two opposing players became embroiled in a heated exchange which had the potential to escalate to far more. During the incident, Spurs star, Tim Duncan came all the way out on the court, well beyond the three point arc, in anticipation of a brawl. What does one incident have to do with the other? The NBA has a red letter rule which states that when an altercation takes place, player must stay within the vicinity of their team bench or they will face a one game suspension. Sports are fair, correct? Of course, the basketball public would expect that NBA Commissioner, David Stern, would distribute justice in a manner which is consistent with the ethos of fair play and punish all violators equally. At least that is what most of us felt that was going to happen. So what does Commissioner Stern do? He suspends Horry (6 points per game average) and suspends Stoudamire and Diaw (who collectively average over 30 points per game for the Suns) in the most one-sided decision in sports history.  

If Stern’s was intent on sticking to the letter of the law, for both teams, all four players would have been suspended. Instead, Stern demonstrated preferential treatment for superstar, Tim Duncan, by ignoring his obvious transgression and threw the other three players on the junk heap of suspensions. In what has become an all too familiar NBA precedent of superstar preferential treatment, the ultimate politician, David Stern, rendered a decision which will undoubtedly decide the playoff series in the favor the San Antonio Spurs.  

After Stern rendered his one-sided decision, it has been difficult to find a sport commentator, or fan, which applauds Stern’s decision as being fair. Robert Horry’s hooliganism was rewarded. If the Spurs end up closing out the series, Robert Horry made the most important play of the playoffs and should be named the series MVP for his thruggery. In other words, the Spurs are being rewarded for dirty play. Never mind that in game two, Spur’s player, Bruce Bowen attempted to kick Stoudamire’s Achilles heel while performing a dunk. Forget the fact that in game three the same Bruce Bowen flagrantly kneed Suns superstar, Steve Nash, in the groin in an obvious attempt to injure him. Both actions went unpunished by Commissioner Stern. And now, in the ultimate act of injustice, the Spurs are rewarded for perpetrating one of the dirtiest plays in recent NBA history.  

Horry’s play is reminiscent of an illegal alien immigrant that is rewarded for their criminal behavior through their receipt of free medical treatment, receiving a free education for their children and the eventual promise of amnesty as the ultimate reward for their felonious behavior for illegally crossing our borders and not paying their fair share in taxes. In both instances, a sense of fair play is conspicuously absent.

In the pivotal game five of the playoff series, the undermanned Suns played a valiant game and led the game until the final minute only to have the Spurs complete the work begun by David Stern and subsequently rode the crest of their three-point shooting and defeated the Suns in the last 30 seconds of the game. The Suns players and their fans reacted to the Suns challenge with overwhelming passion and a strong sense of outrage at the unfairness of Stern’s decision. Although this editorial appears to be primarily about basketball, it is actually about misplaced passion. 

If the rest of the country had the same sense of passion and outrage for the injustices being perpetrated upon the American people as the Suns and their fans have exhibited toward David Stern, we would be able to sweep all the corporate owned errand boys from the halls of Congress and restore this country to the democratic republic that it was intended to be.   

When we turn our televisions off, the game is over. Can the same be said for our unresponsive two-party failure of the D’s and the R’s.

If we are going to preserve our way life and hand off to our children the same America that we grew up in, then we have much work to do. This is work that can only be accomplished by a sense of passion accompanied by sense of outrage toward those who would steal our country from under our collective noses.

As the Spurs close out the series, Suns fans will experience a sense of remorse and anger that will endure for years. However, if the globalists succeed in closing out the United States of America, the effects will be felt forever! We need to begin to act with a sense of urgency and a sense of passion which is normally reserved for high profile sporting events.

Fellow Americans, we are in the fourth quarter and the bad guys are winning. Fortunately, the choice is ours and not David Stern’s. Many sports fans are calling for Stern’s head on a silver platter. If our Republic is to endure, we need to go after the D’s and the R’s with the same zeal as the Suns fans will undoubtedly go after David Stern.

In November of 2006, the country thought that they witnessed a political revolution and surely we would see massive political changes as a result of the Republican election debacle. It is sad to say that swinging the perpetual political pendulum back to the R’s in 2008, for the failed and unfulfilled promises of the D’s, will have no real impact on our country. As Suns fans seek justice through an NBA regime change, America needs to abandon the corporate owned two-party political system in favor of new political blood. If you are wondering what party can bring about the needed changes, please read further.

For your approbation,

Dave Hodges

State Party Chairman