Religion and Judgment

Some of my Facebook friends are having a mini-discussion about beliefs and issues and what being judgmental means. Most of them are Christians. It almost seems to me that to be religious translates into being inherently judgmental. Religions usually come with a full set of rules and regulations and laws. If you have faith in your religion then you must also believe in these various tenets - so it is natural to make distinctions between the people who abide by what is "right" as your particular dogma defines it and those who don't. Even those especially kindly people who don't condemn their fellow man for straying have, at heart, the desire to bring them into the fold of salvation.

Then there are people like me. I don't believe anything. I don't disbelieve anything either. I'm an agnostic. I just say I don't know. Furthermore, I don't think anyone else knows either, not for sure, no matter how much they profess to have the true answers. Personally, I don't care what faith anyone else follows. More power to them if they find comfort in Christianity or Buddhism or Paganism. Life can be frightening without boundaries to guide us. Sure, we may slip outside them now and then but most religions offer the means to find forgiveness for our transgressions, whether through prayer or confession or apology.

I find that a lot of Christians are offended when I verbalize my lack of belief even if I'm only answering a question and not trying to pry anyone away from their religion, something I'd never do. Usually, their response lies in indignantly quoting the Bible in a "there, take that!" tone of voice, as if they have proven their point once and for all, discussion over. I usually just let it go because if I say what I think, which is that I respect the Bible, even though I don't necessarily accept it, they are aghast. Most often, the discussion ends with being told I'm going to hell (something else I don't believe in, so this pronouncement doesn't affect me much).

If there is a God, I'm not convinced that s/he feels about issues the way we think He does (I'll stick with He here since the most common belief is that God is a male, which considering that most religions were started by men is understandable, I guess). For instance, my own opinion is that God probably doesn't care one way or the other if people are gay since, after all, if he created everything, I assume that means he thought of up the concept of heterosexual and homosexual. Maybe gays are only here to test the rest of us for compassion and understanding.

But even if He does disapprove of same gender sex, it seems like that's their business to work out with Him and not ours. The 85-90 or so percent of us who are straight struggle enough to stay true to our own principles so maybe being faithful spouses and caring parents and generous neighbors and helpful co-workers is what we should concentrate on.

I could think of a hundred Bible quotes right off the top of my head that we ignore every day. "Give what you have to the poor and follow me", for instance, hardly translates into "thou shalt not pass health care." We are lots more focused on the verses that point out the other guys' sins than the ones that point out ours.

I always have to smile in amusement when someone who has just experienced a tragedy, expresses the belief that "I only got through it because of my faith". It is so typical of the sense of superiority that goes along with religious belief. What do they think happens to people who don't have faith? Do we just disintegrate into a puddle of goo? Nope, you know what? We grit our teeth and get on with life just like you do. Christians don't have exclusive ownership of the ability to exhibit grace under pressure.

We say that God created us in his image but, actually, we've created God in our own image. Our God tends to have the sames biases and prejudices as we have ourselves. Imagine that. If I believed in God, my God would be a liberal and an environmentalist. He'd be kindly father figure, tolerant of our frailties, rather than a harsh authoritarian. My God wouldn't be the type to kill anyone's firstborn or to send a plague of locusts to destroy our crops or drown all of us but one boatload.

The fact is that none of us know the absolute truth and we won't until we die....and maybe not even then. In the meantime, all we can do is the best we can.

Fall Infestations

Fall is my favorite season but there are a couple things about it that I don't like. One of them is mice and the other is ladybugs. They infest my house, each taking a floor. The mice take over the downstairs; while the ladybugs rule the upstairs.

For some reason, mice have an affinity for the electrical cord on the hand mixer. They ignore the ($5) bag of dogfood sitting on the floor and go directly to the drawer than holds the ($20) mixer, where they gnaw off every bit of rubber coating, leaving nothing but bare wire. This is the third mixer that has bit the dust due to mice. They aren't attracted to any other cord - not the coffee pot or toaster or blender. I'd love to talk mouse talk long enough to ask them, "what the hell is it with you people and the mixer cord?"

This year, I've also had to replace pasta, crackers and cereal which got eaten before I knew the mice had staged their annual pilgrimage to the house. Now the cereal is on top of the freezer while the bread and noodles are crammed into the metal bread drawer along with the mixer.

Mom refuses to allow traps in the house. She says she'd be a nervous wreck waiting for the snap that indicated a dead (or even worse, wounded) mouse. If I wasn't home, she'd have to leave until I got back because she couldn't stand to think of a mouse body in the drawer.

So she puts out De-Con or Mouse Kill. She's been doing this for a couple weeks now. Every day she checks and every day, the bait is gone so she puts more down and by the next morning, that's gone too. I think the mice's digestive systems must have mutated, allowing them to flourish on De-Con.

Meanwhile, I go up to bed to discover huge clumps of lady bugs (not really lady bugs like we used to have, the cute little red and black spotted ones - these are bigger, orange Asian beetles and they bite) in the window frame and lady bugs crawling around on the lamp shade, creating monster bug shadows on the wall, and lady bugs wandering across the ceiling and in the ashtray and on my pillow.

I was afraid to spray the room with Raid for fear I'd die of Raid asphixiation so I sprayed them to death with Rave (hair spray) instead, on the grounds that I've been subjecting my respiratory system to clouds of hair spray for 50 years and if it was going to kill me off, it would have happened by now.

Let me tell you, Rave Mega Hold stops the little buggers in their tracks. It is kind of a lady bug equivalent of embalming. I went to sleep surrounded by a thousand lady bug corpses along with the body of one lone moth.

My secretary told me that I could prevent the influx of lady bugs by placing moth balls against the foundation of my house so Mom got some today at the store. I'll let you know if it works. In the meantime, I wish I knew what to do about the mice.

Success!

Well, the chili cook-off was a huge success again this year. We finally reached a long-held goal which was to have 100 teams register. We worry every year about the weather which can be iffy by the third week in October. This year was unseasonably cold but it didn't seem to stop people from coming.

We worried about the economy this year too and whether it would keep people home but actually, the chili cook-off is a bargain - $5.00 for an afternoon of family entertainment - 100 chilis to taste (if anyone is brave enough to try them all), the creativity of the showmanship contestants, music, the chance of winning prizes and at the heart of it all, the fun of running into friends you may not see often.

For the most part, our committee has consisted of the same people for its entire existence. The cook-off was the brain child of Bill Gerding and Steve Bowman. They conscripted the rest of us to come along for the ride and it has succeeded beyond anyone's wildest expectations. It is now the largest chili cook-off east of the Mississippi. In little old Wabash, Indiana!

There is a moral to the story of the cook off and that is you can do good and have fun at the same time and that starts with the committee itself. We meet in the back room of the Market Street Grill where we drink and/or smoke as we choose. We don't go by Roberts Rules of Order, in fact, we don't have much order at all. People jump in, interrupt, make fun of one another, throw in their thoughts as they please. Sometimes, we joke and laugh, losing our train of thought so that we have to go back and start over.

Somehow, in spite of what might seem like disorganization to those who run a tighter ship in so far as committee meetings go, we get everything done. It all comes together on time. Everyone does their part. Cook-off day dawns and the trains run on time.

I've have been on many boards in my years in government and attended meeting to numerous to count. Recently, I've resigned from all of them. I've done my part. Time to hand the reins over to the younger generation. No more City Council meetings or Board of Zoning Appeals or AACTION or Domestic Violence Task Force or Chamber of Commerce Governmental Affairs or Animal Control Board or..... all with their very formal Agendas and Minutes and Rules and Regulations. The only one I've stayed with is the Chili Cook-off Committee because it's more like play than work which proves, again, that it is possible to do good and have fun all at the same time if you have the right people.

Obama and the Nobel Peace Prize

My main reaction to President Obama winning the Nobel Peace prize was disgust. According to what I've read, the Nobel committee began consideration of nominees in February. February! Obama hadn't even been president for two months then. What could he possibly have done at that point to be a candidate for such an illustrious award?

"Well, isn't it prestigious for America to have our president win the Nobel?" people to whom I've grumbled have asked me and my answer is, "no, it isn't prestitious if its a farce. It isn't prestigious if people believe it was a rigged election. It isn't prestigious if it was based on politics instead of solid achievement."

Did the committee mean for the peace prize to be a reward to the American people, by way of Obama, for having rid ourselves of the evil Bush/Cheney cabal in favor of a more politically correct president (politically corect, that is, in the eyes of people who consider the Nobel a commendation of the highest order). Was it meant as an symbolic honorific to America for proving that we have thrown off the shackles of racism in electing a black leader?

President Obama himself expressed his surprise at having been named the recipient of the Nobel Peace prize. But he shouldn't have been surprized because this has become his m.o. I think his greatest talent is convincing people to give him honors, awards, prizes....and elections he hasn't yet earned. He should be used to it by now.

I Don't Care Who People Sleep With...

My pre-going to work ritual includes watching Morning Joe on MSNBC while I put my make up on. I think I watch this program to get my blood stirring for the challenges ahead because, more often than not, Morning Joe pisses me off, most especially Our Lady of the Self-Righteous, Mika Brzezinski.

In a perfect liberal world, Mika would be the Chief of the Lifestyle Police because she knows what is best for all of us. People like me would be arrested and sentenced to walk five miles a day, eat a fat and sugar-free diet, drive alternative-fuel vehicles and watch only Mika-approved television programs (goodbye NASCAR with your ear-splitting, gas-guzzling engines and white-males-only entry application and idolatry of elemental men who settle their differences with skill and speed on a dangerous racetrack instead of smug discussion behind the safety of a podium).

And in the New World Order, we would have to have our sexual relationships approved by Mika. We would be allowed to consort only with our own kind because it goes without saying that in any affair between superior and subordinate, the subordinate is being coerced, at least, if the subordinate is a female. And that is true, even if the woman, herself, is screaming that it was voluntary and consensual and she's an adult who knew what she was doing and doing what she wanted to do.

"No!" says Mika, "you're a weak-willed victim even if you're too dumb to realize it!"

Which brings me to David Letterman. Who had an affair, or several affairs, with women on his staff. Which was found out by a producer who was in a tough financial situation. Who tried to blackmail Letterman for $2,000,000. Letterman went to the authorities who set up the producer and caught him after Letterman wrote him a check. At that point, of course, the story broke and became public. Letterman confessed on his show, rather gracefully, I thought. He handled it in a gently humorous fashion, which is probably what you'd suspect out of a comedian. Most of the people in his audience laughed. Of course, he was trying to protect himself. Wouldn't you?

All of which sent Mika soaring into the ozone layer of outrage. She was indignant that Letterman resorted to jokes when she thought torrents of tears, followed by a hiri-kiri sword would have been more appropriate. She was disgusted that his viewers, for the most part, agreeably, let him off the hook. She was irritated by the men on Morning Joe, none of whom took it quite as seriously as she did, being only mildly critical of Letterman. And Mika was horribly upset that none of the women involved were willing to come forward and file charges for sexual harassment.

Because, of course, it had to be sexual harassment, didn't it? There was no possibility that these were grown women making voluntary choices to have sex with who the hell they wanted to have sex with. Wouldn't surprise me if that didn't happen now. I've read on the blogs that some newspapers and magazines are offering big bucks to the first one who spills her guts. I'm sure Mika will have her on to cuddle and hug and urge her forward to admit how she was taken advantage of and used because she had no clue what was happening. Poor little pitiful thing.

So who will be the manipulator then? The man with whom she had sex or the one (assuming it is a man) who writes her a very large check for her teary-eyed story?

And it seems to be forgotten in all of this that David Letterman himself is a victim - of a blackmailer. And extortion is an actual crime, unlike extra-marital sex. But Mika evidentally isn't concerned about man-on-man offenses because I've barely heard a word about about the awfulness of the blackmailer.

Here's the thing. I don't care who people have sex with as long as it doesn't involve violence or children. I didn't care when it was Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky. I didn't care when it was all those Republican representatives and senators whose names I forget now because there were so many of them. I don't care when it is John Edwards. That doesn't mean I don't think he's slime but I don't care. What he does is between him and Elizabeth.

And if it would happen to be me, I don't need Mika Brzezinski rushing to my rescue. I'm fully capable of freely making my own decisions and standing by them without anyone's assistance, thank you very much. I resent being told that my sexual choice was made out of foolishness and that I need my betters to sort it out for me.

In short, I believe Mika should mind her own damn business and let the rest of us do the same.

The More Things Change.....

I have been engaged with a member of my NASCAR discussion group and it has gotten pretty heated at times. He's a long time fan and he hates NASCAR, not the sport, but the sanctioning body itself. NASCAR may be the only sport that is privately owned and operated. It is a dictatorship. NASCAR makes its own rules and enforces them with whatever sanctions and penalties it pleases. At least half of all NASCAR fans believe it is corrupt and dishonest. To them, it does things like fixing drug tests so it can ban a driver it doesn't like or cheating on a speeding penalty or inspection to favor a particular team.

It is ironic that I left politics for essentially, these same reasons (the leadership manipulating elections to dictate the outcome, i.e. Obama versus Hillary) and now find myself embroiled in the same kinds of arguments I fled politics to NASCAR to escape.

This all started with my fellow discussion group member practically from the beginning but it has recently gotten more intense. Our latest round of debate was precipitated when NASCAR took Jimmie Johnson's and Mark Martin's cars back to the R&D Center for a post-race inspection after they finished one, two at Richmond. NASCAR said that it warned Hendrick Motorsports that while both cars were legal, the tolerances when the templates were used, was so small, they risked failing inspection if measurements varied by so much as a thousandth. They advised Hendrick it might be wise to back off rather than taking that risk. Which is where the story should have ended. But it didn't, because rumors became rampant that Jimmie (not Mark though, of course, because it isn't p.c. in NASCAR to say anything detrimental about Mark Martin) actually failed the inspection but NASCAR lied so as not to have to penalize him.

It all boils down to me preferring to take NASCAR's word and my friend (?) preferring to believe the sanctioning body is willing to risk it's multi-billion dollar industry to lie, cheat, steal and I don't know, probably commit murder as well. He gets off on his anti-NASCAR passion.

It is somewhat amusing to look back on our past posts. I am the classic Democrat, trying to use soft persuasion, walking softly so as not to hurt feelings, speaking in weasel phrases, like "I could be wrong, but...", never resorting to name calling or making the deads nuts claim that I couldn't possibly be wrong. Meanwhile, he's 100 percent Republican in his debating style. (I don't really know his political affiliation but I assume he'd consider this opinion on my part a compliment)

He accuses me of living in a fairy tale world and in a land of "Jimmie love" in which I refuse to accept that my driver is a cheater. He's got his 40+ wins and those 3 championships, not through skill and luck and strategy, but because NASCAR has the fix in for him. I am the soft-headed romantic while he is the tough-as-nails realist. I am obviously too stupid to know when I'm being conned. Occasionally, he apologizes if he "offended" me but then he goes ahead and offends me again, or he would if I offended easily, which I don't.

So, I left the bare-knuckle warfare of politics to find peace in NASCAR, only to discover that nothing much has changed.

Democrat Disappointment

I'm sorry for some of my friends. They had so much faith in Barack Obama, it was scary. I was a Hillary supporter but even if I hadn't been passionately in her corner, I would have been uncomfortable with the Obama worship some of them exhibited. To me, it verged on the cult-like, although it made them furious if you expressed that view. If you tried to talk them down, they lobbed ever more extravagant adjectives at you. "Obama, the Enlightened One".

I was accused of being old and cynical and perhaps I am, but I don't believe in putting human beings on pedestals - not movie stars, not athletes, and certainly not politicians. People who impute near God-like qualities to other men or women are bound to be disappointed. There are some folks who excel in various areas - in charm, in skill, in intellect, in courage - but in the end, they're simply people with their own fears and frailties.

Some of the Democrats really bought into the whole bipartisan concept the Obama campaign pushed so relentlessly. They truly believed that through the sheer power of his mesmerizing personality, Barack would win over the Republicans, so that we'd all be singing Kumbaya together, unlike, of course, my gal, Hillary, whom they would fight tooth and nail. With Obama, the lion would lie down with the lamb.

Uh huh, sure thing. The Republicans impeached Bill and they swift-boated Kerry but Obama would pass his hand across their heads and convert them? I never believed that for one minute. For whatever reason, our national politics have degenerated into civil war. The Dems still don't want to admit it even as the Republicans are launching nuclear warheads in their direction.

Under the circumstances, I thought the best thing the Democrats could do was send a proven warrior to the front lines but a majority of my party disagreed. They were in favor Mahatma Obama and peace negotiations. How's that workin' out for you, folks? Have you seen any signs that the Republicans are starting to come around yet?

Think they are going to lie down and help Barack pass health care? If you do, you must see pots of gold at the end of rainbows. I think that, once again, a health care plan was murdered in cold blood. Oh, something may be passed that is sold to us as an "incremental improvement". They'll display the corpse and try to convince us it's still breathing, but don't believe it. The insurance companies and the politicians in their pockets, have screwed us again and the saddest thing is how enthusiastically we cooperated in our own betrayal. "By God, don't you dare give me healthcare!" citizens screamed at town hall meetings, convinced by the gazillion dollar pay-offs industry lobbyists made to our representatives and the booming voices of people like Rush Limbaugh who are able to pay for their drug rehab with a personal check.

Some people expected miracles from Obama but so far, they aren't coming to pass and I doubt they ever will. I never thought he had super-natural abilities. I thought he was bright, a nice guy, a well-intentioned guy, a not very experienced guy. I thought he'd probably be a decent president if he was tough enough not to be destroyed by the Republicans. I also thought he was a middle-of-the-road guy and not at all the liberal knight in shining armor so many Democrats were praying for. I thought he was a half-a-loaf compromiser.

So far, I'm not disappointed because I never annointed Barack Obama as the Democrat savior. For those who did, reality is beginning to bite.

Sweet Sixteen to Senior Citizenship

I had lunch with Donna today. We became friends the summer before our junior year of high school when I first moved to Wabash. From Sweet16 to 63. Hard to believe that many years have passed but our 45th class reunion was this summer, proving to us that we are, in fact, senior citizens.

Between us, we've been married to five husbands, borne two children, lived in several states and worked at jobs too numerous to mention. She was a telephone operator once, sitting in a room all night by herself, sticking cords into holes to connect callers. She used to dial me from West Virginia at 3:00 a.m. when her work was slow. Difficult to imagine in an era of cell phones and instant connections that phone calls happened that way. She also opened the first video store in our town when most of us didn't even know what a VCR was. Since then, they've become obsolete. I wrote a column and was provided one of the earliest computers by my syndicate when almost no private citizen had a computer. I could even send my columns electronically...at 1200 baud. Yee-hah!

None of the factories where either of us worked exist any longer, like the old General Tire down the street from me. Many Kentucky families, including Donna's own, moved up here to Indiana to get jobs at General Tire during World War II. My family moved to Wabash because of General Tire too. Mom was a Quality Assurance Representative for the federal government sent here to inspect gas masks.

I can't remember if Donna ever took her turn there but I did, cutting the excess rubber off of gasket pieces for a short time. It was piece work and the older women there warned me off producing too much which would cause them to get time-studied and the rate adjusted upward.

General Tire changed its name several times as it was sold and re-sold. A new sign would be put up out front but no matter what it said, we still called the place General Tire. It was such an elemental part of this community, we couldn't imagine that it ever wouldn't be there. Now, it's closed and weeds are growing up in the parking lot. Almost no place we have today pays as well, relatively speaking, as General Tire did. The workers came off their shifts black as pitch and stinking of rubber compound. They were, collectively, a rather rough bunch, prone to acts of violence during strikes. We felt sorry for them, having to spend their lives there in that hot, ugly place but wouldn't we like to have it back now? Thousands of Wabash families were raised on generous GT paychecks.

As for me, I worked as a realtor (good luck surving on what you can make selling houses in Wabash these days), a bartender (in a rock and roll bar where we had so much fun, most of us would have worked for nothing, and sometimes did when, it was all we could do to scrape the money together to pay the band on Saturday night) and a secretary (serving both sweethearts and shitheads - my favorite bosses: a Democrat mayor and a Republican sheriff). I was also employed in other factories bending pipe and cutting hose and taping harnesses, running a laminating machine and a drill press, soldering and stamping and inspecting. And for one horribly memorable shift, I worked in a chicken house which was a mini-Auschwitz for birds instead of humans. Afterwards, I wouldn't even accept my day's wages, it felt so much like blood money.

I worked at a Sheriff's Department and travelled the country bringing extradited prisoners back to face justice in Wabash County. I didn't care so much about the justice as the fact that most fleeing felons run to cool places, with beach towns being at the top of their list. Transporting a prisoner from Fort Lauderdale isn't exactly like taking a vacation there but, on the other hand, traveling is lots more fun when you do it in a fully marked squad car.

Donna and I both seemed to gravitate to government in our later work lives. I worked for a Mayor, a Sheriff, a Prosecutor, a School Principal. She worked for a high school, a county auditor. Some of our friends went on to the automotive industry and made more money than we did but, nearing retirement, the security of government turned out to be a a positive.

I was consumed by politics; she thought politics was the province of hypocrites and shied away from getting involved, although we both tended to be liberal Democrats.

She loves the Indianapolis Colts and Peyton Manning; I love NASCAR and Jimmie Johnson. We both love to read.

She's a dedicated Grandma; I'm not a Grandma at all.

Sixteen to 63. We have shared graduations and weddings, poverty and maternity, death and divorce, happiness and heartbreak....47 years later we're still facing whatever comes together.

Republicans are Crossing Over.

A few weeks ago, I wrote about how many NASCAR fans I think are certifiable in their penchant for paranoia. Now I have to say the same about the Republicans. (Of course, those two groups may be largely interchangeable so perhaps I'm really talking about the same people).

At a recent meeting of our Chili for Charity Cook-off committee, one of the members, who is a teacher, sounded off loudly about how he would not attend the convocation his school scheduled to allow students to watch a video made by the president to urge them to get their education.

"They can't force me watch!" he declared furiously.

And I'm thinking, "what's the big frickin' deal?"

To hear them tell it, the Republicans believe Barack Obama has Pied Piper-like qualities, able to lure their children, en masse, into converting to socialism, communism, fascism (whatever ism they are most afraid of). Maybe they even doubt their own strength to resist the president's magnetism. Why else would a 64-year-old man find watching a video so fraught?

Schools all over the country were in an uproar about WHAT TO DO! Parents protested that Obama was out to brainwash the youth of America. It couldn't be allowed because, I guess, our students are so weak-minded that even hearing so much as a few words by a president that didn't agree in jot and tittle with their parents' own political philosophy would corrupt them totally, turning them unthinking Obamabots. In today's Republican America, the kids must only be exposed to the party line. There is no such thing as debating issues, listening to opposing points of view, tolerance of the ideas of others....

Most schools ended up letting parents make their own decisions which may be the proper course of action, although I have my doubts about where that resolution eventually takes us? Can parents also make their own choices about curriculum, required reading, letting kids be taught by African-Americans, Hispanics, Muslims? Does it lead to educational anarchy when parents get to call the shots about what or by whom their kids can be taught? I'm more inclined to think that the school system should make the decisions and any parents who disagree should find a private school that suits the comfortable environment of unquestioning non-diversity they require to feel secure, a school where judgement is discouraged in favor of obedience.

And when it finally all came down, what did President Obama say? Why, he encouraged kids to stay in school and get their education. That was about as subversive as it got. I'm sure the parents who saved their children from this kind of terrible propaganda heaved a huge sigh of relief and self-satisfaction.

Get a grip, people. You're losing it.

The Chase is On!

The last few weeks have been rather relaxing. I could watch the NASCAR races without biting my fingernails to the quick because, barring major catastrophe Jimmie's place in the Chase was secure. By the last two races, he'd locked in, so he was absolutely and positively safe.

Now it is back to high stress racing when my nerves start sizzling from the minute the green flag drops until the checkered does however many hours later.

The first 26 races almost seemed to be the tale of two seasons. The high achievers in the first 13 races were not necessarily the high achievers in the second 13. Jimmie and Tony Stewart and Matt Kenseth and Kyle Busch shone at first, then all of them trailed off as time went on. In the end, neither Matt nor Kyle even made the Chase. Jimmie and Tony had built up enough points to stay at the top but face it, their last few races have been dismal.

Meanwhile, Brian Vickers and Denny Hamlin and Kasey Kahne and Mark Martin, all of whom had struggled at the beginning, came on strong at the end. Those are probably the four with the most momentum heading into the Chase races.

Finally, Jeff Gordon, Kurt Busch, Juan Pablo Montoya, Carl Edwards, Greg Biffle and Ryan Newman maintained their place in the point standings, not with flashy performance, but steady competence.

So, if this is a season of divisions, perhaps, we can assume that the field will be tumbled again. That could mean that Jimmie and Tony's string of bad luck has ended and they'll be ready to fire up. Maybe, those who have been blazingly hot in the last several races will cool off. Or possibly the consistent middle will just stay consistent and tortoise their way to the championship while the hares self-destruct around them.

I've always been terrible at predictions but I'll make some none the less, just to show that I have the courage of my NASCAR convictions.

First, I put my faith in past experience. Jimmie and Tony are former champions with generally excellent execution, despite the series of glitches, like oddball lug nuts and inoperative radios and broken axles, that have caught them up in recent races. I think they'll be back at the top during the Chase. I'd include Jeff Gordon in the top three as well, simply because he's kept himself there all year.

Second, I'd be surprised if teams that haven't excelled in the first 26 races suddenly jump into superiority in the last ten (although last year, Kyle Busch was the exception that proves the rule in the opposite direction). This means that Roush will continue to be good but not great. Ryan Newman and Juan Pablo Montoya will remain the middle. (I don't buy the theory that Juan will now take the gloves off and race all out. I'm not sure it would work to establish a dynamic of cautious points racing for the Race to the Chase, then be able to suddenly flip your strategy in the Chase, but we'll see.) Kurt Busch is capable but I'd guess his crew chief leaving him right at the start of the Chase will be at least some distraction. For one thing, I wouldn't think there wouldn't be too much love lost between them (which may be part of the reason Tryson is leaving in the first place) and it may prove difficult for them to work together cooperatively. Busch is already a bit on the temperamental side and now Tryson doesn't have to take any crap.

Third, we wait to see if any of the last of the season high performers can keep it up. If any of them can, I'd say it would be Denny Hamlin because he's been oh-so-close to being in the brotherhood of the elite before, just hovering on that edge. He seems to have found his footing now. It doesn't feel like a flash-in-the-pan, but the real thing.

No so, Brian Vickers. There may be championships in his future, probably are. That whole team is outstanding considering they are only three years old but I believe they'll be tripped up in the end by that very inexperience. They'll fit into that "need to lose one to win one" category.

Kasey Kahne is a hot property right now, capable of winning a championship but I doubt it happens until RPM gets all its ducks in a row and gets settled. They've been such a muddle of mergers and manufacturers that it seems like it would be hard for Kasey to put blinders on and ignore it all. It's bound to bleed through no matter how hard he tries to work around the stress.

Mark Martin - Mark is the one I find it most difficult to be unbiased about. If I put on my objective hat, I have to say that despite his early ups and downs, he seems to have found his stride and that stride could take him right to the championship. He's probably the most driven of them all. Jimmie and Tony and Jeff and Kurt can say they are champions. Whatever happens this year, that will never change. Maybe that takes a tiny bit of the edge off. Their places in the record books are secure.

The rest of them are young. Denny Hamlin and Brian Vickers and Carl Edwards, et al, at least have the assurance that if they don't get the trophy in 2009, they have several years ahead of them to accomplish that goal. By contrast, this is put up or shut up time for Mark. Last chance to git-er-done. That adds an extra element of motivation to Mark's racing and could provide the edge.

So, what do I think is going to happen? I'm afraid to be arrogant enough to predict with any confidence for fear I'll be a jinx....but my fervently hoped for conclusion is Four in a Row for Jimmie.

I may need a ten-week prescription of Valium until we find out.