The Hat

As pitchers and catchers and others soon will be arriving for baseball's spring training in Florida and Arizona, perhaps it is time to give "a tip of the hat" to this annual rite with a newly formed modest prediction for this baseball season coupled with a real life hat story. As many of you know, in spite of springtime enthusiasm the fabulous and fabled Yankees have never quite lived up to their full potential of an undefeated season. Unfortunately, I think this will not be the year to achieve this goal given that A.J.Burnett has been dispatched to Pittsburgh. That said, I'm formally curtailing my annual forecast of an undefeated season to a far more modest one of achieving a record of 150-12 resulting in winning their Division by 58 games over the second place Red Sox. That's my tip for this spring, summer and autumn. And now that the NY Giants were victorious over the Patriots in the Super Bowl and given that the NY Knicks have a genuine point guard in heretofore unheralded Jeremy Lin, I think we can anticipate a trifecta success this year against all comers from Boston...Patriots, Celtics and, alas, the Red Sox. Now to the hat. The hat you see in the photo nearby was obtained by my $43 contribution for the early construction phase of the Presidential Library of 43 (get it...$43 for 43). I received this hat just after Christmas and have been wearing it in the hope of accelerating the time to spring training, and frankly to annoy 'progressives' in my neighborhood. While I must give a tip of the hat to the mild weather we've had this winter, equally I must acknowledge that I could not accelerate the inexorably slow calendar of winter. But I did succeed in annoying (and frightening) many liberals. My best random encounter was a couple of Saturdays ago when walking Harry at about 8 a.m. and wearing my GWB hat who did I encounter? None other than the esteemed former governor of Vermont, the former head of the DNC, the uber-liberal of the north, the former Democratic presidential candidate of 2004 Hee-haw fame. Believe it or not, Howard Dean in the flesh (well not so much in the flesh as it was still winter and he was wearing a very Vermont-like North Face ski jacket). Still, no words were passed but his eyes became as large as dinner plates when he realized what he was reading on my hat. I have no doubt that he felt he was completely safe from encountering red state Republicans or a real right winger on the upper east side of Manhattan. There he was...speechless. I smiled. Harry was sufficiently well mannered as to not have peed on his leg. Much more later on baseball, politics and how the Obama regime continues to shred the constitution.