The New Republic

"Having spent the better part of his life with one foot in both the world of sports and the world of politics, Allen will draw parallels and contrasts between the two arenas."  

He played a few years of college ball at pre-George Welsh Virginia, which barely counts.  Maybe he should have kept both feet in the world of politics.

- FWright

July 7, 2009 at 4:36pm

His father was once seranaded by the Chicago Bears as a "Horse's Ass" - actually when they won the NFL title over the Giants. Subsequently he went on to trade the same draft choices to two different teams for veterans he wanted for the Redskins.  One way to surmount challenges, learned in Washington I guess.

- jemerk

July 7, 2009 at 4:43pm

How ironic. George "macaca" Allen looks to sports to encompass what is virtuous in politics.

Some excerpts [I'm sure]:

"We all marvel at the ability of macacas to infiltrate, infect and then infest sports once deemed fit only for those other than macacas. Who would ever have guessed that golf, women's tennis and presidential campaigns would be within their reach in our lifetime?!!"

"I predict that within the next five years macacas will rise to the top in horseshoes, polo, synchronized swimming, darts and ping pong as well. Even croquet and intelligence test are now within their reach."

"In 2012, America will need a conservative leader able to root out the truly gifted macacas from the rabble. Surely, Michael Steetle and Clarence Thomas are not the only ones."

"It is now obvious that a macaca able to excel as a quarterback or a pitcher may excel in turn as a Congressional aide, intern or security guard."

"While I concur with Congressman Peter King that Michael Jackson was a pervert, I do not consider dancing to be a true sport. Nor did I consider Jackson to be a true macaca. To be perfectly honest I don't know what the hell to call him."

"I disagree with conservative colleagues who suggest that Obama's basketball prowress is proof that both his mother and father were macacas. On the contrary, it is proof only that God does indeed work in mysterious ways".

gw

- iambiguous

July 7, 2009 at 5:25pm

like it didn't help he was a big oaf. and if he were short and underweight, well then he would have had no merit then. His father has been out so long that I doubt whatever inside dirt he has is all that interesting, and if it doesn't have that it is probably really painful, George Will baseball painful.

- blackton

July 7, 2009 at 5:57pm

"Allen will illustrate how 'characters with character' in the meritocracy of sports can provide principled, competitive examples of the ways to surmount challenges facing America."

Except the meritocracy of athletic competition ensures that "character" is entirely irrelevant to achievement. Look, I love Craig Counsell. He's the Batman of modern sports. But it doesn't matter how much "character" Counsell has -- and the man has "character" in more spades than a chump like George Allen could even imagine -- the fact is that Counsell just doesn't have enough natural talent to carry a team for a season, much less make it to the Hall of Fame. And while it's nice to sing the moral praises of great players like Cal Ripken or Nolan Ryan or Tom Seaver or Tom Glavine, the bottom line is that each man would have been on the road to Cooperstown even had he been the asshole of the century. (As several of baseball's greatest players have been.)

And I'm confining my examples to baseball, which is the one sport where the development and maintenance of talent are probably most likely to be coincident with good personal character. Once you move into the contact sports Allen is most familiar with, you start to face a much more consistently inverse relationship between individual achievement and what conservatives would normally count as "character." As witnessed by his father's success.

- rhubarbs

July 7, 2009 at 6:03pm

At the risk of tastelessness, it seems odd that this should be appearing just as the seamier side of Steve McNair's life (McNair generally being regarded as a "good guy" of great "grit" and "character") is being aired out in the aftermath of his death.  (Oh, and remember that if McNair had played in NYC or LA the McNair Watch would have picked up where the MJ Watch left off.)

- cspencef

July 7, 2009 at 7:14pm

I wish I could hack into the printing press. I would change the title to The Triumph of Character: The Life and Times of George "Macaca" Allen.

- liberal reformer

July 7, 2009 at 7:36pm

When I hear the phrase "characters with character" in reference to sports, I tend to think of either Bill Lee or John Kruk.  Somehow, I don't think those two would make it into Allen's book, but who knows?

- wildboy

July 8, 2009 at 9:25am