Hell, Poot, we're all whores; might as well be the best.

In case you're the sensible type and you don't follow pro sports too closely let me be the first to let you in on something of great civic import 'round here in Hell-A: the Lakers won their 15th "world" championship of basketball. Amazing, right? It's amazing that people give a shit about this enough to: 1)trash a large swath of the city, 2)hold up traffic all day including during the morning commute, and 3)act like the city really needed this win during a trying time. Huh? Do I get money because the Lakers won? A tax break? How about a job? No. OK then, I guess the city didn't really need this that bad. Now don't get me wrong, it's fun when your hometown team wins a championship, even if it had just been the divisional championships. I mean, everyone else in the division lost, right? That still counts for something. Best in the NBA is obviously that one step better but I digress.

What really got me is that the talking heads and the mandarins in the hills were quick to jump out front and start saying that this would be an economic boost for the city and why not let the city that is in the midst of downsizing public services pay for half the parade. One million dollars for a parade that sparked enough extra bullshit that were you to factor everything into the final bill, like say a real economist might, the city would have paid in excess of two million dollars. Yeah, Antonio, there are more costs to tying up the middle of the city for a whole day in the middle of the week then just paying for cops and clean up crews. Thankfully, the rich kids decided they'd finally pay for something around here and so the parade went on as planned. Question, who pays for the riot damage, the lost man hours due to injury in the LAPD, the fire services, and the clean up from the spontaneous outpouring of idiocy on the night of the actual win? Right, Johnny Taxpayer. Fucking awesome. Love those Laker fans.

All in all, if you look at the pros and cons of having a pro sports franchise in your town the only way it makes sense is if you do it like the Green Bay Packers in good ole' Wisconsin. The town controls the team, has a stake in it that is both financial and historical. Most teams today have their municipalities over a barrel and they know it. The threat of a move sends mayors and councilmen and the rich dicks that can pay premiums for seats into a mad rush to placate the spoiled players and owners. The taxpayer usually ends up footing the bill. Maybe not up front but when you count such things as lost municipal parking lots or variances in zoning laws and the razing of public housing or other truly public space you can see it add up pretty quickly. Don't believe me? Read "The Real Cost of Sports and Who's Paying For It" by Mark S. Rosentraub. Try this stat on for size: sports franchises never account for more than 0.5% of jobs or salaries in any region. By contrast, in the average metropolitan area, restaurants provide nearly 7% of jobs. So why are we wasting so much time, money, and effort trying to attract an NFL franchise to LA? Why are we bending over backwards for the Lakers? Why, in short, do so many people spend so much of their overall assets giving a fuck about any of this? Some woman drove from Hesperia today so she could take part in the celebration bash. What? Over an hour each way to be jammed into the Coliseum with a bunch of midday drunks to make noise for some millionaires? How about this instead: For the fucking privilege of playing in LA the Lakers are going to give away half their season tickets, good seats, to underprivileged kids who otherwise would never be able to afford to see any pro sports, ever. I think that would be a much better way to say "Thanks for the support." But hey, that's just me and what the fuck do I know?

Peace out, bitches!