DEFLATEGATE, REPUBLICANS AND THE DEATH OF SCIENCE!

To be transparent, I am a life long Patriots fine as that is the law here in New England. Much like the Red Sox supporters, football fans here in the area have suffered through decades of bad seasons that were so awful back in high school me and my friends would drive up to Foxboro and buy tickets the day of the game no problem. Try doing that today and be prepared to be disappointed. But after winning four Superbowls, the once lousy Patriots are now the team everyone loves to hate because "they are cheaters," or so the mantra goes. True, they got caught videotaping the Jets defensive signals back in 2007 that resulted in a $750,000 fine and a first round draft pick, but that is less cheating than say A-Rod juicing and no one seems to be calling for his life long suspension. There is a lot about this latest story about Brady wanting deflated balls but the more I look into it, the less certain I am there is anything there, bias be damned.

The report that came out this week that called out Brady as a cheater is filled with words and allegations that are totally not supported by facts. If you brought this before a judge, he'd laugh it out of court because you actually have to have evidence to charge someone with a crime and there just isn't any thing here. The report is a complete failure when it comes to logic, reason and a preponderance of facts. It uses words like "probably" and "most likely." Would you convict someone to go prison over evidence that said that the accused probably did it? Even better, would you jump out of a plane with a parachute that would "probably" work? Of course not. Hate the Patriots all you want but facts matter and here there aren't any.

Now it is true that Brady refused to hand over his emails which made him look Hillary bad, but that still doesn't imply guilt. Much the same way that my response to any police officer who want to search my car will be an emphatic NO, even though there are zero drugs in my car, Brady had lots of reasons not to share his cell phone with a witch hunt. He was right not to share it with the league, even if it makes him look bad in the eyes of public appeal, as God knows what they might have done with info outside of their purview, ala Kenneth Starr who turned White Water into a Salem Witch trial the same way. Never co-operate with people who are out to get you. I did just that when I was 14 when a rouge cop was after me, trying to plant evidence and harassing witnesses until the whole thing blew up in his face. I have good reason never to trust authority and apparently, Brady might have felt the same.

The only evidence I have found so far are texts between two disgruntled locker room employees that suggested that Brady wanted the balls deflated. How do we know that this whole thing wasn't some elaborate plan to extort money or items as later texts suggest when one of them demands goods for his silence? More importantly, where was the alleged ball deflating done? The best the league could come up with was a 90 second bathroom break, which was the only time the balls disappeared from cameras, that as far as I can tell is impossible to deflate 11 balls in that time. I watched three people attempt it in the MSM and no one came close. He was the only one in the bathroom at the time as security cameras attest to. So where did this alleged deflation happen?

I would also like to point out that once the balls where properly inflated, New England performed much better as a fully inflated ball will throw better than an underinflated one. They whooped Indianapolis regardless of the balls as they were the better team. And we still haven't figured out how all this came to be. The player the league said brought it to their attention flatly denies he had anything to do with it. So who noticed? And why didn't any of the refs say anything as they handled the balls for the entire first half? Why haven't they been disciplined as well?

This is typical of Republican bull where they invent a solution in search of a problem. They scream bloody murder about voter fraud even though there is zero evidence that such fraud is taking place. So they write new laws to stop said fraud, which isn't occurring, all the while using this as cover to keep minorities from voting Democrat. I have a feeling this whole Deflategate scandal is something similar. Some owners and coaches have their panties in a bunch because they keep losing to the Patriots and are seeking any way possible to bring them down a peg, evidence or not. This is not right regardless of how you feel about Brady and the Pats. It is this level of unscientific nonsense that is destroying this country.

We keep hearing about how global warming isn't happening, when all the real science suggests it is. We are torn on vaccinations because we don't trust with Big Pharma, with good reason, but not vaccinating your kids seems risky and stupid as well. The fact that vaccinations have risen ten fold since I was a tot also presents a problem but as science has become based on opinion rather than facts, a lot of us are left wondering what to believe in anymore.

But because we are now a society based on belief rather evidence, it's all coming apart. Religion, as I predicted thirty years ago, is still the most likely way the world will end, with an economic disaster close behind (my second choice from way back when). People want to believe Brady is a cheater because then they can crow about how all his wins are now tainted and some are calling for a year long suspension. WTF? If he was doing steroids sure, or if they hard core evidence he did something wrong, maybe. But this is all conjecture and the court of public opinion shouldn't matter one whit here. Brady should not be punished for something you THINK he did. If new evidence arises we'll talk. But until then, people need to shut up and get back to talking about things that actually matter.