Thursday, January 25, 2007

Memo to NFL: Take Away the Guns, Not Home Field Advantage

A major news item in the lead up to the Super Bowl is the judge allowing Tank Johnson to travel with the Bears and play in the Super Bowl, even though he's facing serious weapons charges.

A minor news item reported on KFFL is that new commissioner Roger Goodell is moving ahead with plans to install radios in the helmets of offensive linemen to combat the effects of crowd noise.

It's time for the league to be more concerned about taking the guns out of the hands of its players, and less concerned about new and modern ways of screwing with Seahawks fans.

[Continued on Seahawks Fanhouse]


(to comment, click the green number to the right of the title above)

7 comments:

  1. I think it's funny. It's our fault that they are going to do the radio's. Personally, I don't think they'll help as much as people think they will. First off, they would likely have to have the headsets turned up to a painful point to overcome the volume of the stadium. I have had headset communication radio's under my motorcycle helmet and they get real loud, real quick. Somebody "key's up" and it's way too loud, Linemen will be ripping their helmets off pretty fast. It ain't no fun, trust me. Now, lets assume that those radio's are voice activated units and the QB will have the VOX unit. Wouldn't you assume that the crowd noise would not only engage the VOX unit, but also overwhelm whatever the opposing QB had to yell into his mike?

    Could be a lot harder to do right than they think.

    On to the weapons charges. The Judge granted him travel freedom so he could play in a "once in a lifetime opportunity". He had no license to bear arms. Thats a foul. You wanna play with guns, do it legaly. Obviously he has related charges against him preventing him from becoming legal with his guns. He should have been punished and not allowed to play in the show due to his indiscretionable nature.

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  2. Thanks Max, but the point of the piece was not to argue the merits of the Tank Johnson case, but rather to engage debate on the larger scale issue which is too many pro-athletes are running around with guns.

    It just seems like the answer is so friggin simple and the prescedent has been set with the motorcycle thing (see big ben) that I'm not quite sure why they just don't do it.

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  3. See, that's about what I expected from the red-neck contingent. But the constitution also protects our rights to "pursue happiness" however, if you're an NFL player and that happiness comes by way of a motorcycle ride, guess what...YOU CAN'T.

    Stick that in your "I need a grenade launcher to hunt deer" and smoke it.

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  4. I must say, Josch already said what I was going to say, but I'm going to say it anyway.

    "He had no license to bear arms"

    Didn't need one--the Constitution is his license.

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  5. Not that I really want to get into a constitutional debate, but using the "preamble pursue happiness" tactic is strawman. The preamble is not a "law".

    Also, the NFL player may ride a motorcycle without breaking any laws, he will however void a contract he willfully signed. That said, the NFL could write "You can't own guns" into their contracts, if the player willfully signs it and gets busted it would void their contract. You are confusing contractual and constitutional law. And my comment, while doing the same thing, was witty and relavant, yours was tragic, and ignorant. (insert winky smiley in case you lost your sense of humor, I'd check under the car seat)

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  6. I'm a Northeast bleeding heart liberal...I have no sense of humor!

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  7. In Washington CK, you need a license to have and carry a hand gun, not a Rifle, oddly enough.

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