greybeard
07-12-2008, 03:35 PM
Okay, I know it's a made up word, and the saying is too, but I think that you know that this is about. No? Promises unkept, and me, who can care less about baseball having to foot the bill to build a stadium in my town, just like everywhere else except Seattle and we know what happened to them, on the promise that the thing would pay for itself. Yeah, I'm waiting, and month's down the road we, my city that is, has not seen a nickle yet.
A nickle, hell, not a read cent, a farthing, a rupple for God's sake. Me, I'd take my share in bannanas.
This is the story. The owners of my city's ballclub, the Nationals, not only have paid no rent since the thing opened because items on a punch list haven't yet been completed, they also have not turned over any tax money, not tax money on tickets, no tax money on hot dogs, no tax money on parking (oops, there ain't no money on parking because nobody built anybody).
How do they get away with this? You try not paying your mortgage because the builder hasn't gotten all to all the things on the punch list yet, see how long it takes for the foreclosure sign to go up. And, you tell the hotdog guy you'll pay your sales taxes to the government quarterly, not when they are incurred, and see what he does with that dog you ordered.
That's what the owners of the Nationals have done to my city, which means to me since, unlike them, I've had to actually go into my pocket for this stadium of theirs. Now, I could maybe understand their withholding something, not really but I'll humor you, for these punch list items, but comeon, as Warner Wolf used to say, they've played 48 games in the freaken place and are averaging 29 thousand fans. That ain't bad. We have heard no public complaints about these check list items. To the contrary, all the sports writers in town have been falling all over themselves over how great the new stadium is. Heck, the Pope I am told even loved it; couldn't believe that he got to address the masses (cute pun, huh) from the pitcher's bound and felt just like Roger pumped up on roids.
Anyway, me, I never bought this it-would-pay-for-itself-nonsense and could not believe that my city was going to pay to build a stadium so some fat cats could make millions putting on a game that nobody in my city actually plays--the public high school my kid's attend is the only one in the District that thinks that baseball is still a sport, about this I do not kid. I ranted and raved about this when the process was going on, but even my friend Bill, who is a fiscal conservative but does love his baseball, told me to shut up.
All I got to say to them and to you, the next time one of these stadium deals are "proposed" with a hammer held over a city's head, is that you need to ask the proposers to "pass the cheese, please." They'll reply quizzically, "But there is no cheese," which is exactly my complaint!
A nickle, hell, not a read cent, a farthing, a rupple for God's sake. Me, I'd take my share in bannanas.
This is the story. The owners of my city's ballclub, the Nationals, not only have paid no rent since the thing opened because items on a punch list haven't yet been completed, they also have not turned over any tax money, not tax money on tickets, no tax money on hot dogs, no tax money on parking (oops, there ain't no money on parking because nobody built anybody).
How do they get away with this? You try not paying your mortgage because the builder hasn't gotten all to all the things on the punch list yet, see how long it takes for the foreclosure sign to go up. And, you tell the hotdog guy you'll pay your sales taxes to the government quarterly, not when they are incurred, and see what he does with that dog you ordered.
That's what the owners of the Nationals have done to my city, which means to me since, unlike them, I've had to actually go into my pocket for this stadium of theirs. Now, I could maybe understand their withholding something, not really but I'll humor you, for these punch list items, but comeon, as Warner Wolf used to say, they've played 48 games in the freaken place and are averaging 29 thousand fans. That ain't bad. We have heard no public complaints about these check list items. To the contrary, all the sports writers in town have been falling all over themselves over how great the new stadium is. Heck, the Pope I am told even loved it; couldn't believe that he got to address the masses (cute pun, huh) from the pitcher's bound and felt just like Roger pumped up on roids.
Anyway, me, I never bought this it-would-pay-for-itself-nonsense and could not believe that my city was going to pay to build a stadium so some fat cats could make millions putting on a game that nobody in my city actually plays--the public high school my kid's attend is the only one in the District that thinks that baseball is still a sport, about this I do not kid. I ranted and raved about this when the process was going on, but even my friend Bill, who is a fiscal conservative but does love his baseball, told me to shut up.
All I got to say to them and to you, the next time one of these stadium deals are "proposed" with a hammer held over a city's head, is that you need to ask the proposers to "pass the cheese, please." They'll reply quizzically, "But there is no cheese," which is exactly my complaint!