It was a good fight, but very poorly called.  The referee allowed it to get as dirty as it could have been, but only gave "warnings", and never bothered to penalize either boxer. 

Tszyu had an obvious knockdown in the fight, but the ref called it a low blow.  Now I can somewhat give him a pass for that, but then you're not going to penalize Tszyu for it?  Later in the fight, after Tszyu was warned for a low blow, Hatton lept in with a low blow that was obviously intentional.  Once again, no point deduction.

There is no excuse for Tszyu to quit in that fight; I don't care if he was losing every round (and the judges as well as the press had the fight pretty close throughout).  But Tszyu will think twice about going overseas to fight another contender in his home country.  That was probably the most rabidly biased crowds that I've seen in for a fight, and there's no question it gave Hatton the edge intensity-wise and probably influenced the judges as well.

Tszyu should have finished the fight, and it was wrong for his trainer to tell him to quit when there was no dehabilitating injuries.  This is the 2005 equivalent to "No Mas", and it has tarnished an otherwise great career.

But regardless, Ricky Hatton deserves props.  He is a very scrappy fighter, and gave Tszyu all he could handle in this fight, and then some.  Coming in as a 4-1 underdog, Hatton had nothing to lose.  However, I hope there's a rematch, and it'll be on American or even Australian soil.  I doubt it, but we'll see.

I have been a big fan of Larry Brown for many years.  After all, he is a Tarheel, and I recall Kansas vs. Oklahoma as the first national championship game that I watched.  I always thought he was the reason the Sixers got to the NBA Finals in 2001, and Detroit is currently the defending champions.  It's a virtual tossup between Brown and Greg Popovich as to who is the best coach in the league.

However his recent actions have been both shocking and deplorable.  I don't recall any coach in a professional league that has been playing the shell game that he has.  He should have never talked about working for another franchise (President of the Cavs) in the middle of the conference finals series .
What has the Pistons franchise done to Brown to warrant him acting in this manner?  You would think he would be somewhat gracious towards the Pistons given that he got his first world title with a team that was virtually created before he got there (I think the only starter who got there after Brown was Sheed).  Even if Brown planned to stop coaching and wanted to do something else, there's no question that he should have waited until the end of the season.

And leave it to Larry Brown to do something that would get me and Bill Walton to agree.  Listen to this rant that Walton lays on Brown on ESPN's "Mike and Mike In the Morning" that leaves no question that Brown is in the wrong.  Brown wouldn't condone a player asking to be traded in this situation.  Brown wouldn't allow this type of drama to be created in his locker room, yet he's creating it here.  Why?  This isn't fair to the players he coaches, the front office that helped create that atmosphere to win the NBA title last year, and it isn't especially fair to the fans, who's going to be pointing to all of this drama if they knocked out of the playoffs tonight or in Game 7.  Brown's actions have no justifiable excuse.

Now that I think about it, I'm glad he didn't take the Carolina job.  I don't think Baddour would have given it to him anyway, but he was definitely a name that consistently came up for it once Dean, Guthridge, and Doherty left.

Kids, here's a bit of advice:  if a cop pulls you over and tells you to get out of the car, stop what you're doing and get out of the car.

A woman in Boynton Beach, Florida had to learn that the hard way.  As you'll see in the first of two videos, the woman was pulled over for speeding - the cop said she was going 51 in a 35 - and she had a broken tail light, cracked windshield, and wasn't wearing a seatbelt.  As soon as the cop out out of the car she tried to open the door of the SUV and get out.  When the cop told her to stay in the vehicle she informed him that she would do what she wanted, and cursed him out at every turn.

The officer calls for backup, finally gets her license and registration, and goes back to the car to run a check on her.  In the second video, he comes back and tells her to get out of the vehicle, but she refuses, saying she's on the phone with someone to come to the scene.  The cop told her to get out of the SUV SIX TIMES, and in the last four warned her that she would be tasered if she did not comply.   Another officer came on the scene on the passenger side, and when he tried to take the cell phone out of her hand, she swung at him. 

That's when the officer finally tasered her.  You'll hear a very high pitched scream from the woman as she was tasered, and she hit the ground.  After she failed to place her hands behind her back, she was tasered again.

After hearing about a prior incident that left a man dead, I haven't been a big fan of taser use.  But in this instance, the officer appropriately did his job.  This woman was hostile the whole time, despite knowing she was in the wrong from the get-go, she cursed the officer out, she never responded to his requests, he asked her several times to get out of the vehicle yet failed, called someone on a cell phone and told him they had a gun pointed at her, and started to resist when they moved in on her.

She had no one to blame for that incident but herself, and even in that I bet she was being a bit melodramatic.  She acted as if she was about to die.

Last week in Durham, NC three burning crosses were found in different places around the city.  One was near St. Luke's Episcopal Church on Hillandale Rd, another was found on South Roxboro St. just off MLK Parkway (is there a city in the nation that doesn't have something named after MLK?), and there was one found downtown on Dillard and Holloway streets.

Sean Hannity is demanding an apology by Arizona State Representative Krysten Sinema over her incorrect allegation that he broke federal law by crossing the U.S./Mexico border in April. 

On his radio show today, Hannity says if he doesn't get the apology in a week, he will sue Sinema for defamation of character, and he'll have legal counsel and fellow talk radio host Mark Levin defend him in court. 

I'm not the biggest Hannity fan, but I think the woman should apologize.  If she didn't know the law, and didn't know where the actual border was, then she shouldn't have said anything about it.  Period.  She was in the wrong, and I don't think she wants to call Levin's bluff.  If the apology hasn't been given by next Friday, I wouldn't be surprised to hear about a lawsuit being filed in Arizona on the following Monday.

Now sure, this incident didn't hurt Hannity at all.  All he wants to do is embarrass this woman and the Arizona Democratic Caucus.  If I was the judge, I'd award Hannity a $1 judgement and charge Sinema with court costs, which would be stiff for wasting the court's time.  It's nothing more than a trivial lawsuit, so the best thing for Sinema to do is apologize and get this over with.

It's not that hard to figure out, actually.  The Spurs is probably the most adaptable team in the league, and can adjust their performance to suit their opponent.

But the Suns only know how to play one way:  run and gun.  Sure, Stoudamire can go buckwild on offense, but what is he going to do on defense?  Nothing.  Steve Nash has never been a defensive threat (his defense is about as easy as walking through a bubble), and thus never provided a threat to either Tony Parker or Manu Ginobili.

In other words, Steve Nash left the old Dallas in order to go to the new Dallas.  And just like the old Dallas, the new Dallas will watch the NBA Finals either at home or in the stands.  Meanwhile, the Spurs can take eight days off while they await Detroit or Miami.  That's what happens when teams try to play on only one end of the court.

Ha.  I wonder if Ambra heard about this.

At a Seattle concert featuring rapper Snoop Dogg on Saturday night, a fan caught a beatdown after getting on the stage and grabbing Snoop's shoulder.  The fan, Richard Monroe, claimed they allowed fans to come on stage.  Once he came towards Snoop and touched his shoulder, the other rappers on stage grabbed him and they gave him the worst whupping of his life.

This is the result of the beatdown:

A decades-old mystery has been solved, as the man who constantly tipped Washington Post writers Bob Woodward and Carl Woodward about the break-in of the DNC headquarters at the Watergate Hotel that led to the resignation of President Richard Nixon revealed himself.  W. Mark Felt, who was the FBI's Deputy Director - second in charge of the bureau - was the man who started it all.

All of a sudden, Deep Throat doesn't seem like the legendary hero everyone thought he would be.  The fact that the FBI's number two guy would run off to the press to force Nixon to resign rather than investigate the manner themselves seems more like a devious act rather than one of courage.

Why?  The FBI was having their own secret war against the Nixon Administration.  J. Edgar Hoover had died just a month before Watergate happened, and the Nixon Administration was trying to gain control of the bureau.  As Slate.com's Thomas Noah stated, the acting FBI director, L. Patrick Gray, had passed FBI Files on the Watergate case to Nixon White House Counsel John Dean.  Felt was also sore due to being passed up for the FBI Director spot.  All of these things compelled Felt to become Deep Throat.

The irony of the whole Deep Throat saga was that Felt himself was convicted for bypassing warrants while investigating the Weather Underground organization in 1980, and was eventually pardoned by Ronald Reagan.  Hence, Felt received a taste of poetic justice in that instance. 

UPDATE:  I've been doing some web surfing, and here's a good piece by Mark Russell from 2001 pointing to Felt.  Felt being Deep Throat isn't that big of a surprise since a number of people knew Felt had been a leaker to the press prior to Watergate.  Also, Thomas Mann had fingered Felt as Deep Throat in 1999.

- I took a long vacation over the weekend, and it was lovely.  Got to chill with some family members, and watch some sports.  And no, I didn't watch the Indy 500 or Coca Cola 600 (I don't watch many racing).

- Over the next few days I'm going to work on adding more feeds and the like.  If you want to subscribe to this blog, the xml feed is here.  I'll try to place a link on my sidebar.  For NewsGator and Bloglines subscribers, just click the respective icon on the sidebar in order to subscribe me.

- I plan to liveblog the NBA Finals, and if last week was any indication, that will happen soon.  San Antonio received a little bump by the Suns, but I don't see them defeating the Spurs three more games to win the series.  Miami and Detroit will take a little longer, but I think Miami will get it done.  Miami is simply too talented for Detroit to keep Miami contained and win low scoring games.

- Give me some time to get back in the mix.  I'll probably post a few entries tonight.

Michelle Malkin noticed a story that's only making a small bleep on the radar.  From the AP/USA Today:

The Democratic Party, the Rev. Jesse Jackson and two groups associated with the civil rights activist have agreed to pay a total of $200,000 in civil fines for campaign finance violations in the 2000 elections.

At issue in the Federal Election Commission case was about $450,000 in election spending by Jackson, the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition and the Citizenship Education Fund using funds from the groups. The two non-profit groups were incorporated, making their money corporate and subject to restrictions under federal campaign finance laws.

According to the FEC, the money was used for a partisan get-out-the-vote effort and voter registration speaking tour that was coordinated with the Democratic National Committee and included appearances by Jackson and Democratic House and Senate candidates.

If this was the RNC and James Dobson, this would be all over the news.

But I can't blame the media for this.  After all, we hear about the Democrats being busted on campaign finance violations so much it really can't be considered news anymore.