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Obama lauds virtues of 'heartland' at NCAA game
NBC ^ | 03-13-2012 | Domenico Montanaro

Posted on 03/13/2012 5:18:37 PM PDT by blf1776

President Obama displayed his knowledge of basketball strategy at an appearance at a first-round NCAA tournament game, but politics wasn't far behind. "It's great to see a tournament game, but it's great to see Ohio," Obama said during a halftime interview from the first game of the NCAA basketball tournament in Dayton, Ohio. With the United Kingdom's prime minister David Cameron next to him, Obama stressed that often foreign leaders "only see the coasts. But the heartland is what it’s all about." There is not doubt that Ohio is certainly "what it's all about" when it comes to electoral politics for a president expected to be in a tough fight for reelection this November.

(Excerpt) Read more at firstread.msnbc.msn.com ...


TOPICS: News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: basketball; cameron; ncaa; obama
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To: blf1776

You only need one big ball to play basketball. NASCAR needs two. Basketball is for sissies like Barry.


21 posted on 03/13/2012 6:18:33 PM PDT by FlingWingFlyer (It's time for Americans to WEAN the government off of OUR money!!!)
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To: FlingWingFlyer

22 posted on 03/13/2012 6:20:55 PM PDT by nascarnation
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To: nascarnation

There ya go! ;o)


23 posted on 03/13/2012 6:22:12 PM PDT by FlingWingFlyer (It's time for Americans to WEAN the government off of OUR money!!!)
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To: FlingWingFlyer
You only need one big ball to play basketball. NASCAR needs two. Basketball is for sissies like Barry.

Sissies don't last long on the basketball court. You obviously didn't watch the Tennessee-Kentucky basketball wars in the 1970s.

24 posted on 03/13/2012 6:23:32 PM PDT by Colonel Kangaroo
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To: Colonel Kangaroo

That was way before Obama’s time. It’s not the same anymore. Neither is football. I’d die to watch another 70s Raiders/Steelers game. They just don’t play football like that anymore. Bradshaw and Snake.


25 posted on 03/13/2012 6:26:28 PM PDT by FlingWingFlyer (It's time for Americans to WEAN the government off of OUR money!!!)
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To: FlingWingFlyer

I wonder what the dog would bring Zero, if he yelled out here we go?


26 posted on 03/13/2012 6:28:00 PM PDT by blf1776 (Mrs. Palin tear down that tent!!!)
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To: nascarnation

That picture is an indictment of the president, not the sport. I am certain he’d look no better driving a NASCAR.


27 posted on 03/13/2012 6:30:11 PM PDT by Colonel Kangaroo
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To: FlingWingFlyer

No sport is what it used to be. Skills in BB are way down, and I think Michael Jordan’s dominance masked it for a while. But the NBA of Magic-Bird days and before was miles ahead of today.


28 posted on 03/13/2012 6:32:42 PM PDT by Colonel Kangaroo
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To: Colonel Kangaroo

I agree 100%. Too many crybabies and show offs these days. Loyalty to their team and cities is gone. I always thought that was an important part of the whole sports thing. Now, it’s whoever will come off of the most money. It’s sad really.


29 posted on 03/13/2012 6:36:27 PM PDT by FlingWingFlyer (It's time for Americans to WEAN the government off of OUR money!!!)
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Comment #30 Removed by Moderator

To: blf1776
9 teams from one conference is obscene and an insult to other basketball programs.

That is, for the NCAA selection committee to reason that the 9th ranked team in the Big East is better or more deserving than the 2nd or 3rd rated team in some other conference is completely repulsive to me.

1. Big East has 9 teams: Unbelievably, the Big East has 9 teams in the 2012 tournament.

2. To me, selecting 9 teams from one conference is morally wrong, even if many people believe that the Big East has 9 of the best teams in the country.

3. Choose only 4 or 5 teams: I say that only 4 or 5 teams from a conference should be selected even if that conference claims that it has 6 to 9 teams that are better than 2nd or 3rd teams in other less well-known conferences.

4. In my strong opinion, if you are only the 6th to 9th best team in your own conference, then you don't deserve to go to the Big Dance.

5. Limiting big conferences like the Big East to 4 or 5 teams gives unknown college players in other conferences a rare chance to show off their abilities for first time on national tv. So I say give other teams a chance to go to the Big Dance.

6. BCS Football mess: The NCAA is trying to straighten out the football championship mess.

7. So I say this to the NCAA: While you are trying to straighten out the football mess, you should also take a hard look at the basketball selection mess, especially take a hard look on how 9 teams from one conference could be selected for the 2012 basketball tournament, while other conferences only had one team selected.

8. My suggestions to the NCAA on how to improve the selection process for the basketball tournament:

9. If you don't win your conference tournament, then you don't get a #1 seed.

10. This year, 2012, we have 3 out of 4 number 1 seeds who couldn't even win their own tournaments.

11. If conference tournaments do not mean anything to the NCAA selection committee, then let's get rid of the tournaments, because the conferences only hold the tournaments to rake in a lot of money.

12. Matchups: Have the committee name only the first 8 seeds in each region, but have the matchups between the first 8 seeds and the bottom 8 seeds selected by random selection.

13. The selection would go something like this and would be a tv rating success:

14. After the top 8 teams in each region are selected, the names of the rest of the teams would be placed in a hat.

15. A person would then select a team from the hat and that team would be matched up with one of the 8th seeds in each region.

16. For instance, the first 4 teams selected from the hat would be assigned to the four 8th seeds.

17. Once the 8th seeds are matched up, then the 7th seeds would be matched up and so forth, with all the matchups assigned by random selections.

18. Finally, and last, the 4 number 1 seeds would be matched up with the remaining 4 teams in the hat.

19. Many of these universities have some of the most powerful computers in the world, so they should be able to use those powerful computes to come up with a basketball selection method that is fairer to the colleges than the horrible selection method that is used today.

20. For instance, this is one thing I find bizarre about the selection process: If a team loses to a top team---say to North Carolina this year---by just a few points, that team is given extra points, even though the team lost. To me, that is bizarre reasoning.

21. In summary, my suggestions to the basketball selection committee are the following:

22. Only 4 or 5 teams---not 6 or 9---can be selected from one conference no matter how "superior" that conference is rated when compared to other conferences that only have 1 team selected for the Big Dance.

23 Random selection method: Seed the first 8 teams but select their opponents by random selection: The 8th seeded teams in each of the 4 regions are assigned opponents first, while the number 1 seeds opponents are selected last.

24 Oh, yes, I forgot to mention this idea: If a conference team makes it to the final four, then that conference gets two automatic places the following year.

25. For instance, Butler and Commonwealth University made the final four in 2011, so their conferences would have received two automatic places in this 2012 tournament under my proposed rule, even though both teams come from conferences that are not normally looked upon as major conferences.

26. 13 loses: It is unbelievable that a team can be in the tournament even though it has 13 loses, just because the team comes from a so-called “big” conference.

27. So I say we should have a new rule: You lose 11 games and you don’t get an at-large bid, especially when there are teams with less than 10 loses who deserve a bid.

28. Again, selecting 9 teams from one conference for the 2012 Big Dance is obscene, and so is selecting a team with 13 loses: You lose 11 games and you don’t get an at-large bid.

29. I don’t care what “big” conference you belong to.

31 posted on 03/13/2012 6:49:08 PM PDT by john mirse
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To: blf1776

O’bummer=FOS


32 posted on 03/13/2012 7:09:51 PM PDT by matginzac
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To: nascarnation
Need to post a pic of a REAL basketball player, not bench warmer...


33 posted on 03/13/2012 8:47:29 PM PDT by GreenLanternCorps ("Barack Obama" is Swahili for "Jimmy Carter".)
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To: blf1776

WESTERN KENTUCKY UNIVERSITY HILLTOPPERS: 44 conference championships, third-most in NCAA history. 40 seasons with 20+ wins, sixth-most in NCAA history. 38 All-Americans, 35 national post-season appearances, 22 NCAA Tournament berths. 14th in NCAA history in all-time wins. 8th in NCAA history in all-time winning percentage (.670). 2002 NCAA Division 1AA National Football Champions


34 posted on 03/14/2012 3:11:24 PM PDT by WKUHilltopper (And yet...we continue to tolerate this crap...)
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