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I have been dying for months now to write about the 2008 presidential campaign, and I’m going to touch on it for just a moment here, in part because this is my space and also to make an analogy to one of the most difficult issues facing the National Football League today.
John McCain is a person for whom I have tremendous respect. I disagree with his foreign policy vehemently, and I have tremendous concerns about what our Supreme Court could look like, given four more years of conservative oversight, but because of what appears to me to be his very real integrity, he’s a person I will seriously consider voting for. His only problem right now is what we don’t know about him, because he appears too moderate for conservatives and too conservative for liberals.
Barack Obama is clearly the smartest guy in the room, the criterion I believe should always be the first and, far and away, most important by which we select a president. And not only do I believe in most of the same things he does, but he speaks to my heart, as well as my beliefs. For well over 200 years now, America has been the greatest country in the world, and I believe that up until six or seven years ago, it was the most respected. Obama seems to understand that and appears to offer the greatest hope among our three candidates of reclaiming that respect for us the most quickly. He appears to truly offer a hope for change. His only problem right now is that his opponents, unable to find fault with anything we do know about him, have chosen to attack the eloquence with which he talks about a better America, what they paint as the lack of a public record and also the people around him.
Hillary Clinton is different. I have tremendous respect for what she has accomplished in her life, her toughness and obvious intelligence. But for any of us who’ve been paying attention, unlike her opponents, we know everything there is to know about her. And far too much of what we know is distasteful, dishonest and emblematic of everything that is wrong with our politics and, in some respects, our country today.
I believe we are at a crossroads in the history and evolution of this country we all love more than life itself and that all of the best answers lie in a great debate this fall between McCain and Obama. America cannot even dream of reclaiming our undeniable respect until we’ve restated our honesty and integrity. George W. Bush is not to blame for the disaster of the last seven-plus years; the people who elected him are. So, what will our answer be — to give ourselves a choice between two people about whom we still have a great deal more to learn but every reason to trust and respect, or a third who believes the process of earning our votes is a “contact sport” and the truth is an afterthought? I pray we are smart enough and, more importantly, good enough that this time, based on all we should know, we get it right.
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Gene Upshaw
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Now, how much do we really know about Gene Upshaw, the executive director of the National Football League Players Association? He is a member of the Pro Football Hall of Fame for his playing career as an offensive guard with the Oakland Raiders, the only player in NFL history to play in Super Bowls during three different decades, and he’s been the president or executive director of the NFLPA since 1980.
We also know that with the players’ union under Upshaw’s stewardship, the NFL has enjoyed an era of labor peace and unimaginable wealth and financial success that all other sports and entertainment vehicles can only dream about. The one potential black mark on his record is that those who played the game prior to Upshaw’s run as head of the NFLPA have not only failed to share in the riches he’s helped to create for today’s players, many are being neglected and ignored, and at times Upshaw appears unconcerned and unsympathetic. And we know that Matt Stover, player rep for the Baltimore Ravens, has called for a search for a successor to Upshaw.
What we don’t know is why Stover believes the time is now. It is common knowledge that the NFL owners believe the last Collective Bargaining Agreement that Upshaw negotiated is so favorable to the players that the owners are likely to opt out of it by November of this year, putting at risk their salary cap, which is, at least in theory, the envy of anyone who has ever owned a business and had to deal with cost uncertainty and labor unrest. The players want to get rid of a guy who got them a deal that good?
As a student of the game over the last 30 years, I believe the owners’ reported decision to opt out of the current CBA prior to at least a good-faith effort to find a better answer will be the biggest mistake, and the beginning of the most serious disaster, in the history of the NFL. And while I don’t know if this is a battle Upshaw can or will win, and I don’t know how he really feels about the older retired players he is currently failing to serve, I do believe the battle for the future of the NFL that’s currently on the horizon for the NFLPA is one it can’t afford to face without Upshaw at the helm. Here, the unknown should, in fact, scare the hell out of all of us.
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Owners, players digging in on revenue-sharing issue
By Hub Arkush, Feb. 8, 2008
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