ragin' asian fun fact

guess who has a bigger head?

according to this, i do. in the latest edition of game of shadows, the book on barry bonds and the steroid era of baseball, the authors include an afterword that give us this:

the authors detail in their afterword the freakish growth of Bonds' body parts in his years with the Giants: from size 42 to a size 52 jersey; from size 10 1/2 to size 13 cleats; and from a size 7 1/8 to size 7 1/4 cap, even though he had taken to shaving his head.

my cap size? 7 1/2. like bonds, my head has actually grown since college, when i wore a 7 3/8. but unlike bonds, i haven't hit 700+ homers while injecting horse sperm into my bloodstream...that and i'm not a douchebag.

anyways, also keep in mind that barry is 6' 2", and i'm a full eight inches shorter. this post is not so much about barry and his obvious steroid use, as it is about my own freakishly big noggin. i always knew that my head was kinda big, but with this discovery, i'm bordering on circus freak. what the hell is wrong with me!?

i'm very troubled by the fact that my head is bigger than barry's. i think i probably need to go see a doctor about this. god, no wonder my knees hurt when i work out, it's all the extra stress of having to carry this pumpkin around all day.

point/counterpoint - NBA allstar weekend in Las Vegas

in honor, (or rather dishonor) of the oscars, i present to you two columns for your consideration.

first, jason whitlock's column

The Black Ku Klux Klan shows up in full force and does its best to ruin our good time. Instead of wearing white robes and white hoods, the new KKK has now taken to wearing white Ts and calling themselves gangsta rappers, gangbangers and posse members.

Just like the White KKK of the 1940s and '50s, we fear them, keep our eyes lowered, shut our mouths and pray they don't bother us.

Our fear makes them stronger. Our silence empowers them. Our lack of courage lets them define who we are. Our excuse-making for their behavior increases their influence and enables them to recruit more freely.

We sing their racist songs, gleefully call ourselves the N-word, hype their celebrity and get upset when white people whisper concerns about our sanity.

problematic, to say the least.

but dave zinn counters

Jason: it's time for you and your sports writing brethren, all hot and bothered over All Star Weekend, to take a long overdue reality check. You rail against the violence of NBA "posses" yet turn your back to the fact that this is one of the most violent nations on earth. This is a country that imprisons 2 million of its citizens. This is a nation that spends 1.7 billion dollars a day on the military. This is the country that started an unnecessary war in Iraq that's killed hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and more than 3,000 troops. Surely a fan of Rosa Parks like yourself is familiar with the words of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. who said, "I knew that I could never again raise my voice against the violence of the oppressed in the ghettos without having first spoken clearly to the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today -- my own government."

As you heroically churn out columns in between trips to the local gentleman's club, a very real world beats with injustice. Black unemployment is three times that of whites. Unemployment today for young Black men aged sixteen to nineteen tops out at more than 30 percent, double that of young whites. And the latest Bush budget will mean all of this will get worse.

By devoting your column to the amplification of the worst racial stereotypes, you actually divert attention from the real issues Black America faces. In this post-Katrina world, it should be all too clear that the problem is institutionalized racism and poverty, not a kid in baggy jeans.

well put i say, but is Jason completely wrong? sure the thug element is the result of decades of systematic oppression, and whitlock's black KKK analogy seems a bit disingenious, but does that excuse the behavior of those in las vegas this weekend? seriously, that weekend, people got shot.

anyways, just two points of view for us to ponder. feel free to leave comments.

the ragin' asian reviews the 2007 oscars

worst. oscars. ever.

the NFL enters foucault territory

not content to dominate the sports cultural and economic landscape in the US, the NFL is now attempting to dominate language. as i mentioned earlier, the NFL has trademarked the word "Super Bowl" and aggressively protects that trademark by doing things like sending cease and desist letters to churches who are having super bowl parties. however, they've taken the next step and are attempting to trademark the phrase "the big game".

of course, on the surface, this as dumb as donald trump trademarking the phrase "you're fired". i argued for trump, and i'll argue now that it just makes no sense to me to allow people or entities to trademark phrases that are already a part of the vernacular. also, from a business point, it seems to be a slap in the face of fans. i can at least kind of understand the trademarking of super bowl, since bars and such can make money off of the intellectual property of the NFL by advertising a "super bowl party"....which sounds a lot more fun than "a final game of the NFL post season party". which is what bars end up doing anyway.

but from a meta-perspective, this is a bit of evil genius by the NFL. think about it, if they are able to control the phrase "the big game" and make it only apply to football, it essentializes "the big game" to only apply to football. game 7 of world series or the NBA final can no longer be referred to "the big game". what this does is marginalize the other sports, while reinforcing the idea that football is the only sport that matters. as foucault will tell you, language matters, and clearly the NFL understands this point and is doing their damndest to apply this concept in their attempt to take over the world.

link via deadspin

p.s. yes i know i'm a douchebag for bringing in foucault into this.

sports quick hits

these actually aren't so quick and i should probably just do a separate post on hardaway and kobe, but whatevs....you should be thankful that i'm even writing anything.

1) women are now going to receive the same prize money as men at wimbledon this year. this is most definitely a sign of progress, as the idea that men's tennis is as popular or entertaining as women's tennis has been obsolete for about ten years now. however, it should be noted that wimbledon is the last major to equalize pay for men and women, and so while we should feel good about this development, we should also say condescendingly to wimbledon officials, "it's about freakin' time".

2) scoop jackson has an in depth interview with tim hardaway concerning him hating gay people. it is interesting and taken at face value, it does seem that timmy is at least a little bit contrite. however, there are several things about this piece that make me skeptical. first, scoop even lays it out himself in the first paragraph

See, Timmy Hardaway and I grew up together, been tight for over 30 years, family linked through blood and love. So when the fallout unfolded after he said on Dan Le Batard's radio show that he hates gay people, I felt the right thing to do would be toss the man a life preserver.

to be fair, the interview is not a puff piece and jackson does well not to lob only softballs at hardaway. however, at the same time, jackson's intent, as stated above, was to give hardaway a chance to redeem himself. which leads us to hardaway's responses in this interview which is best summed up by this quote

Right now, learning. Learning that gay people are really no different than a lot of other people. Learning that they work hard, they do things in the community, they are responsible for building parks, rec centers, providing safe environments for kids, just things I had never associated with them before. [This last week] has opened up my eyes to the gay population and what they do. I'm getting a lot of knowledge about them that I didn't have. Which is going to make me a better person.

call me a cynical bastard, but this is publicist speak. and if you ever say hardaway when he was an analyst on ESPN, you know that the notion that tim came up with this statement himself is far fetched. but even if he did come up with that statement by himself, in the same interview this little exchange occured

But still you have issues with gays?

I still don't accept their lifestyle. No.

And you stand on that?

Yes. You know, we were brought up to not even condone or associate yourself with a gay person. If you knew of a gay person, disassociate yourself with them.

But Tim, you've been in Miami for years now and there is a strong and public gay community there. How have you still held on to that same mentality while living in Miami all of these years?

I just get away from it. I just walk away. I see it, I just go the other way, cross the street.

So at no point did you ever try to understand their lifestyle or way of life?

No. Never did. Never wanted to.

Do you want to now?

No. I don't want to … try to find some type of understanding of why they live the way they live or why they are the way they are. Maybe I could go to therapy, maybe someone can help me out with understanding [them], the sensitivity of the issue. But as a person, my beliefs are my beliefs. I don't have to condone it and I don't have to be around it. But I don't have to hate it either.

yeahhhhhh.....sorry to break the news timmy, but you still hate gay people. i've seen at least two major basketball writers (dammit, i can't find the other one), say that we should back off because he sounds really sorry about the whole flap, but i'm going to be one of those people who call BS on timmy. again, i'll use the black thing, if someone said they hated black people, and then later apologized, but said that they still stand by their assertion that black people suck, it wouldn't stand. the same should apply for the GLBT community.

3) a great essay on kobe, and his somewhat ambivalent place in a hip-hop driven NBA. the comments are even good

It was Iverson. He introduced and authentic and marketable new archetype that made MJ's blueprint of incessant smiles and Republican pandering obsolete. Kobe didnt find that out until it was too late. Great read. Back to the drawing board.

nice stuff...

4) this isn't sports related per se, but interesting nonetheless. a study says that playing video games results in better surgeons. i guess on the surface it makes sense, since playing video games develops hand eye coordination and concentration skills.

5) i don't know why i find this so funny. actually, i do. i'm going straight to hell.

p.s. almost forgot, what what in the butt

major announcement, re: britney playboy prediction

i've been conspicuously quiet on all of this britney spears nonsense. i guess i feel that this is really not that different from any of her other bizarre behavior over the years. really, is shaving your head really that different from getting married to no talent ass clowns or flashing your vajayjay all over the place. you know, obviously these things are really bad ideas, but nothing that you can't fix with lawyers, wigs, or panties.

i did want to comment a little on the media coverage of britney's latest round of meltdowns. you're probably like me, you know that there are much more important things that britney shaving her head, but you just can't get enough of the stories. but really, is there a need to talk to the lady who owned the hair salon where she decided to go uncle fester on us?

anyways, my roommate k was commenting that she thought that much of the coverage was a bit unfair in that everything was couched in terms of how britney's behavior is inappropriate for a mother. as if mother's were supposed to stop going out and stop consuming alcohol after they give birth. it reinforces a patriarchal idea that motherhood = losing your identity as a sexual being. which of course all feeds in to the idea that it is ok for men to discard their wives after they give birth to kids and run off with some bimbo half their age. which is totally unfair. this notion is nothing new, but it is most definitely reinforced with everything going on with britney.

now don't get me wrong...i'm one of those people who very strongly believe that once you do have kids, that you do have to in fact, give up some things that someone without kids doesn't have to. britney doesn't have to party every night without underwear. and in fact, i don't think she should. however, the reification of britney has made us forget, that she is only 25 years old, and i know plenty of 25 year old who were just as screwed up, if not more so than britney. and it just seems real harsh to label a 25 year old the worst mother ever. curiously enough, all the talk about federline being a bad father and such has seemed to disappear. i know, she is much more famous and he's been out of the limelight for a while, but it does seem a bit unfair. seriously, you think justin timberlake doesn't knock out as much tail as possible...he hooks up with scarlett johannsen and jessica biel and nobody calls him a man-whore.

anyways, like other people, it seems that she is seeking help (again). and like any other person, i wish her the best in her rehab. maybe it's me, but it seems like no one is rooting for her to get through this. i know, rehab seems to be the generic public relations move and who knows how serious she is about cleaning herself up. but britney if you're reading this, get better, clean yourself up. the sooner you do that, the sooner you can get yourself into playboy.

the last time i brought this up, i said that she'd be in playboy by the end of 2008. like trying to figure out the cowboys chances of getting back to the super bowl, there is just too much turmoil right now to make any kind of good prediction. it seems that there are plenty of signs that favor my prediction, but at the same time, i never would have predicted that she'd go apeshit and shave her head for no reason. that said, i'm going to have to take the 2008 prediction off the board until i get further information about her cleaning herself up. it's like the whole ice caps melting and putting los angeles and new york under water. you know it is inevitable, and everything that we are doing in terms of climate control indicate that the situation is not getting any better. but we just have no idea when it is going to happen.

lastly, i'd like to offer an optimistic take on the shaved head. often times, we as humans feel the need to mark inner transformation with a physical transformation. i know that i've shaved my head plenty of times to mark transition periods. so maybe this britney felt that she would mark her independence from drugs, alcohol, bad men, or whatever it is she is going to rehab for, by shearing her locks. sure it's far fetched, but we've seen weirder things.

p.s. teaching yourself photoshop is a great way to procrastinate.

sports quick hits

1) ESPN downsizes number eighty-eight. the rumor was that ESPN thought cocaine mike irvin was a bad public relations meltdown waiting to happen. on the one hand, i can't blame them, after all, this is the playmaker that we're talking about, on the other hand...well, there is no other hand because he was becoming unbearable as a football analyst.

2) the NBA all star festivities were this weekend, and a couple of things to note. first, i've said this before, and i'll say it again, how can anyone not like shaq.

deadspin put it the best, "who's gonna do this stuff after shaq retires?" also, i'd like to remind people that it shouldn't surprise that shaq can dance. after all, after hakeem, he is the most agile big man we've ever seen (and don't forget that shaq is toting 100 more pounds than the dream).

3) the dunk contest was actually lots of fun. of course, everyone is buzzing about dwight howard's sticker dunk. if you don't know what i'm talking about, press play below:

12 and a half freakin' feet. not to get all fanboy on you, but that's just sick. granted, he's a seven footer to start with, but man alive. what i really like is how creative the whole think was. think about it, he had to take the cheesy picture, get someone to photoshop it onto the sticker, go out and buy the sticker paper, print up the picture, and have someone get a tape measure for jameer nelson to emphasize the shtick. that my friends is good planning for a good comic bit. he really got jobbed on the scoring as he didn't advance to the final round. the sheer comedy value of the whole thing should have gotten him perfect tens all around. as if the fact that he placed a sticker higher at a height that is greater than two of me stacked on top of each other wasn't enough. however, i think that justice was served because after he put the sticker on the backboard, we were reminded during every subsequent dunk of the ridiculousness of his feat.

it also got me thinking a little bit and it's inspired me to start an official "rules of comedy". these rules are just things that are always funny. rule #1 of course is that monkeys in people's clothes is always funny.

rule number two of course was articulated perfectly on howard's sticker. rule #2....


please feel free to suggest more rules of comedy for my consideration

p.s. ironically, the best place on the web to find pictures of monkeys in people's clothes are animal rights websites that are trying to stop the (hilarious) practice of monkey's wearing people's clothes.

the ragin' asian goes to see Chuck D

my cell phone camera sucks.

on thursday, i was able to go see the incredible, rhyme animal, the unpinnable...D! that is, chuck d, leader of the seminal political rap group public enemy. and seriously, if you didn't already know that, you should be ashamed of yourself. anyways, the good folks at the ucsb multicultural center brought him in to talk about a bunch of random things. he has a new book out i guess, but pleasantly enough, promotion of the book at the event was minimal. in fact, chuck d didn't even mention the book until the very end of the night.

anyways, i was there for the same reasons that anyone who is interested in popular culture and anyone who came of age in the mid eighties. but more than anything, i wanted to have one question answered. this question revolves around everyone's favorite clock wearing, viking helmeted hype man, flavor flav. you see everytime i saw flavor of love on VH1, i felt sad. i mean here was the man who taught me that 911 is a joke, and here he is, reduced to reality's own minstrel show. and i always, wondered, "man, i wonder what chuck d thinks of all of this?" well, he addressed the issue and i have to tell you the answer was somewhat surprising. i was expecting chuck to be disappointed and all of that stuff, but it turns out, my own disappointment with flav's behavior was somewhat misguided.

chuck's opinion basically boiled down to one of public enemy's greatest songs: don't believe the hype. according to chuck, what we saw was flav being flav, and the entity that we should direct our ire against is not flav, but VH1. and now that i think about this, it makes total sense. we all know that despite the moniker, reality tv is all but reality. it is heavily edited and while flav may seems wheels off, it is the way that the show is edited that makes it seem like flav perpetuates every bad stereotype of black people. in fact, chuck said that all of this was flav's own private joke on the television industry. for example, did you know that flavor flav has a girlfriend? her name is liz, and she apparently isn't happy about some of the stuff that went on during the show, but liz and chuck are still an item. in fact, chuck said that flav is mocking all of those stereotypes by even exaggerating his behavior. i'm a little bit skeptical of the whole meta-satire angle, but since chuck d probably knows flavor flav than i do, i've come to the conclusion that i have no reason not to believe him.

anyways, i'm satisfied with this answer and i can now restore flavor flav to hip-hop visionary and revolutionary.

one more flavor related item that was discussed was his appearance on strange love, the brigitte nielsen/flavor flav show. the show made it seem that chuck was put off by brigitte, particularly at a PE concert. chuck said that he had no problem with brigitte being on stage, and the only people he was pissed off at was the tv crew who didn't adhere to the guidelines that he and flav set down before the show started. the way he talked about brigitte seemed very genuine. i believe his exact words were "he crazy, she crazy, so they're perfect for each other".

anyways, other than that, it was what you would expect from a talk by chuck d. he talked about politics, the music industry, and racism. one more interesting anecdote that he related was that he grew up in the same neighborhood as eddie and charlie murphy. he was discussing charlie's new found success, and he said that charlie was always the funniest guy in the room, but "the only thing was, he'll rob you too." good stuff.

tim hardaway hates gay people

no really, he said so himself. his quote on a radio show:

You know, I hate gay people, so I let it be known. I don't like gay people and I don't like to be around gay people. I am homophobic. I don't like it. It shouldn't be in the world or in the United States.

as i said before just two posts previous to this one, here's an opportunity to confront the issue of sports/homophobia/masculinity head on. imagine if a pro-athlete said that he hated people of color...oh wait, john rocker did and i don't think it turned out good for him. let's see if the same thing happens to hardaway.

again, i'll reiterate my point: sports writers and sports franchises would have you think that sports is ok with gay people in it. this quote shows that some athletes clearly aren't. so let's really write about it and ask athletes why they hate gay people so much. however, i suspect that hardaway will get a pass on this. which is stupid, since it is essentially the same as someone saying that they hate black people.

lastly, i find the last part of hardaway's quote amusing. by definition, if homosexuality shouldn't be in the world, then we can infer from that statement that it shouldn't be in the US. there's no need to tack on the united states part at the end.

three posts in one day, man i must really not want to do any real work.

what's next, short round for commissioner?

the dallas cowboys just hired dat nguyen to the very confusing title of defensive quality control/linebackers coach. the linebackers coach title i get, but defensive quality control? once upon a time i was a quality control person at a robot factory (don't ask) and all i did was look over circuit boards to make sure that all the right transistors were in the right place. so maybe dat will get to look over defensive players before games to make sure all their junk is in the right place.

but i digress, i'm pretty sure that this makes the first vietnamese person ever hired to be a coach in the NFL. unlike their black colleagues, there is little fanfare accompanying this announcement. i understand that the history of black players in the league is different, but still, an milestone of sorts for the vietnamese community. i guess norm chow was the first person to break the asian color line, but still, come on people! this is a historic moment!

not that i'm mad, cuz i'm really not. but i do think that this is a nice illustration of how asians are perceived as being more assimilated than other racial groups. this is even more of a paradox because of the fact that in general, asians are stereotyped as being decidedly un-athletic. this is a fading stereotype with asians excelling in fringe sports like ice skating or skateboarding, but again my point is, this is an interesting moment in the NFL, but it is not perceived as one because nguyen is part of a racial group that is treated differently from other racial groups.

anyways, as a person of vietnamese descent, i am pretty happy that this has happened. dat nguyen doesn't get his due as a trailblazer for asian-americans, being one of the first to play in a major team sport in the US. so let me be one of the first to hail his contributions to asian-american history.

breaking the silence

the title of that post is much more dramatic than it needs to be. anyways, as you know i am a terrible blogger these days, i've really missed the window on the superbowl, but i had nothing different to say than anyone else...game sucked, commercials sucked, prince rocked, and rex grossman sucked. but i did want to weigh in on the whole john amaechi coming out of the closet thing. if you don't follow sports, a former NBA player, (and i use the term "player" loosely as he was in the NBA for all of five years averaging a whopping 6.2 points a game) came out of the closet, told everyone he was gay, is going on a book tour, etc. etc. again i have nothing new to add to the usual commentary, but i did want to point out a couple of things about the coverage. mainly, that this all sounds familiar. like other forms of journalism, sports journalism has seen a marked decline in quality and originality, (see anna nicole smith coverage). after amaechi came out, you heard the exact same arguments....that america is ready for a gay pro athlete, that current players would be okay with it, except in the showers (what a ridiculous argument), that so and so would not be okay with it, etc. etc. etc.

my point is, that the way this stuff is covered prevents any kinds of real examination of the issue. why haven't any of the major columnists pointed out that gays in women sports are muc much much more accepted than in male sports. why don't they make the connection that it is because of the hyper masculine discourse that is so important to sports. why don't they talk about the fact that sports has an extremely bad track record with homophobia. why don't they make the connection between the fact that most of the players who most violently oppose gays in the lockerrooms are all christian. why don't they say, that homophobia is rooted deeply in several variations of ridiculous religious laws. why don't they call for the NBA to make a definitive statement that they would welcome any gay players and would sanction any players or teams who discriminated or harrassed gay players?

do you see what i'm getting at? it really does us no good to publish these stories or write about them unless good questions and discussion arise from it. but the mainstream press can't be bothered with this kind of thing. all they can do is cover the sensational moment that comes to pass after the initial announcement, then the columnists spout out the same tired cliches that we heard when that guy in the NFL came out.

i'm kind of whining, i know, but it's become harder for me to take any kind of sports journalism seriously. maybe the lines between entertainment world, the commercial world, and the sports worlds have become so blurred that basically, i feel like following professional sports is like following proctor and gamble. the point is, ESPN.com should let me write a column about this whole thing. but since i'm such a terrible blogger, this will never come to pass. this post was pointless. i'm gonna stop right now.

don't ask, just enjoy

cats.






link via boingboing

the official ragin' asian super bowl prediction

every fiber of my football instincts tell me that the line on this game should be at least 10. what we have here is a matchup of people overrated because of the past. the bears have a great defense, but not a historic one. they were much better at the beginning of the year because they had two of their best players not injured, mike brown and tommie harris. of course, they are injured now and that's why we don't see the 60 minute lights out performance that the truly dominant defensive teams give.

the colts offense isn't as good as it used to be. sure, every now and then they'd put up a 38 point game, but there were some games where peyton and company struggled to get over twenty points. now everyone seems to think that the no huddle can do no wrong. these guys aren't even close to teams like the 2000 rams or heck even the broncos the year before.

so what does this all mean, i guess it means we have to take a look at the other phases of the game. the bears offense appears to be putting up points, but thomas jones and cedric benson are decidedly unappealing. the colts defense on the other hand seems to be playing really really well in the playoffs, so the colts have the upper hand in this matchup. special teams, well that's a no brainer since devin hester will force the colts to punt away, giving the bears field position. so it seems to me that we're all tied here and that i should go with my gut.

but then i got an email from an old college buddy who is the single biggest bears fan i've ever known. it reminded me of many a sunday spent nursing a hangover, while watching curtis conway, neal anderson and jim harbaugh play to full stadiums. these teams were no good, but chicago fans' enthusiasm for their team never wavered. y'all remember that saturday night live skit, the superfans, with george wendt, mike meyers, and joe mantegna? well, one morning in chicago, i was flipping through tv stations and i ran across the mike ditka show. now keep in mind, at this point, ditka was no longer the coach. anyways, at the end of the show, they open it up to questions from the audience, and the first guy is this 300 pound polish dude, with a heavy chicago accent. he's wearing a jacket and a hat with about 15,000 bears pins all over them. it turns out, the superfans are real. seriously, there really wasn't much different between what i saw that morning and what you see on saturday night live. what is my point? good question. i guess in a game that has me analytically vexed, that i'm just going to go with my heart. chicago is one of america's greatest city. it blows new york and san francisco out of the water. i know that i'm usually an advocate of pure rational analysis of sports based on numbers...but ahhhh, screw it, the city of big shoulders has always been good to me. bears 34, colts 21.

now we know why tony dungy wants to beat the bears so bad

it's because he may be a homophobe! he is apparently scheduled to be honored by an organization called the Indiana Family Institute. progressives probably have had their radar tripped as any group with a name like that is sure to be very anti-gay. lo and behold, they are. in any case, let's wildly speculate....young gay men are much more likely to commit suicide than the rest of the country...tony dungy's young son recently committed suicide...tony dungy hates gay people...i'm not saying that one thing caused the other, but i'm just saying...

anyways, of course, i have no kind of real evidence to say tony dungy's son killed himself because he was gay and his dad hated him for it. i'm sure that there are several other reasons why tony dungy is responsible for his son's death. either way, it is sad to see someone who we thought was a good person, take such a hateful stance by being part of an organization that actively seeks to oppress gay people.

what is kinda disturbing to me, is that this is getting no real play in the press. the only place i've seen this is on the alternative sports blogs, deadspin and with leather. seriously, isn't this a big story? here's a guy who everyone seems to acknowledge is a great guy, and he's taking a very controversial political stand here. why hasn't anyone asked him if his son was gay? ok, that was a non-sequiter, but seriously, why hasn't anyone asked him his stance on gay issues? i suspect that the NFL is putting the kibosh on all of this as not to detract from their premier event, but still, i'll join the alternative sports blogs by saying, if tony dungy is doing this, that makes him an a-hole.

for those of you who don't understand the very very bad pun in the title of this post, click here.

bonus NFL douchebaggery! the NFL just told a church who was going to have a fundraiser by having a super bowl party after the morning mass, that they can't! as i've mentioned before, the NFL aggressively protects its right to print money, and if that means that st. barts church in BFE, indiana can't repave their parking lot, well...someone has to pay for the lunch buffet at the owner's meetings.