Pun Salad

Yes, Pun Daughter and I went to Fenway Park last night to see the Red Sox play the Washington Nationals. The Sox won, too: 6-3! They currently have a five-game win streak. Although they are currently in last place in the AL East, they are only a half game back of Baltimore. So watch out, Birds.

We got invited to the game by the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute (DFCI), thanks to the "Qualified Charitable Contribution" (QCD) I made to them at the end of last year. There were tax advantages: basically, DFCI gets a hunk of cash, a large fraction of which would have otherwise gone to Uncle Stupid's coffers.

Which makes it, pretty much, the most expensive Red Sox tickets—or any tickets, for that matter—that I've ever purchased. But I also got that cap, and there was a buffet with hot dogs. (Parking? Let's just say it cost more than a month's NESN 360 subscription.)

I should also point out that a few weeks after I made the QCD, DFCI made the news in an unpleasant way: Dana-Farber settles Justice Department suit over manipulated data.

Now my QCD was (to me) a lot of money. But it was (frankly) negligible compared to $15 million. And (worse) since money is fungible, the QCD cash I avoided sending to Uncle Stupid… effectively went to Uncle Stupid anyway.

Live and learn, I guess.

But the game? Ah, well, the "free" DFCI seats were in Grandstand 7, Row 12, out in left field by Pesky's Pole. This is not a complaint, just an observation: in their quest to pack as many fans as possible into the "lyric little bandbox of a ballpark.", I think the seats were designed for the typical 1912 human frame: short and skinny, probably still recovering from the Irish Potato Famine. Bottom line for me: uncomfortable lack of knee- and ass-space.

And (again, not complaining, just observing) the sightlines were … not the best. Vertical girders supporting the upper decks, and the upper deck itself blocked my view of basepaths (which were pretty far away anyway), the scoreboard, and most of the big screen above center field. (The Stadium Insider ranks Grandstand 7 among its "least favorite seats" at Fenway.)

And I didn't find out until this morning when I read the news: Willson Contreras, hitting a homer in the first inning that put the Red Sox in a 3-1 lead… got ejected in the second inning after appearing to protest an umpire's check-swing call. I was there, totally missed that.

Still, I had fun. I haven't decided on my QCDs for 2026 yet ("Let your portfolio grow tax-advantaged," my Fidelity guy advised.) So I could be back in 2027!

Also of note:

• "Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it." WSJ columnist Gerard Baker doesn't like the options on his political menu: America Is the Land of Endless Choice, Except in Politics. (WSJ gifted link) Good observations all the way through, skipping to his bottom line:

  Few things could induce me to vote for another four years of the sort of Republicanism we are enduring now. But one of them is definitely the alternative of Islamist-friendly, open-the-borders, defund-the-police, kill-the-billionaires socialists running the country. Out of America’s vast diversity we are somehow at risk of narrowing our choice to that between a rampantly corrupt, inept, ideologically and practically capricious personality cult of a party and a party of graduate student activists with terrorist sympathies and ideas about economics that were discredited half a century ago.

  There’s no prospect of a third-party breakthrough. But if I can live in a country where I can have my steak done medium-rare and washed down with a glass of a liquid that is one-third soy, one-third oat and one-third half and half, why can’t I choose a government that is sane, honest, patriotic, responsible and worthy of the people it governs?

  I will (once again) point out my modest crackpt proposal which would fix everything bad about everything.

• Well, except for Maggie Goodlander. Arnold Kling notes one party enthusiastically driving down the Road to Serfdom: The Democrats *are* the DSA.

  An ordinary political organization makes compromises. A revolutionary faction makes demands. An ordinary political organization will trade victories on some issues for losses on others. A revolutionary faction drives for victories everywhere. An ordinary political organization, once it is in power, accepts that eventually it will no longer be in power. A revolutionary faction, once it is in power, resorts to violence and terror to remain there.

  It is likely that DSA’s revolutionary goals are not shared by most Democrats, much less most Americans. But do not underestimate the effectiveness of revolutionary parties. Sometimes they win, as sheer determination and discipline overcomes minority status. The Bolsheviks won. The Nazis won. The Viet Cong won. The Islamic Revolution in Iran won.

  I hope that it can’t happen here.

  Have a nice day.

  "Have a nice day?" Sorry, Arnold, I have other plans.

• Who could blame them? Jim Geraghty's WaPo column observes: Not all states could stomach Trump’s Great American State Fair. (WaPo gifted link) He notes that many states declined to participate at what looks like a Soviet-style celebration of the Great Leader:

  Trump spoke at the fair’s opening ceremony last Wednesday night, serving up the usual tedious bellyaching (“As you know very well, a short time ago we were a dead country. We were dead”) and inaccurate boasting, as in, “Oil prices are plummeting downward today. It hit a new low, and the world is a much safer place.” Whether measured by the national average cost of gasoline or global crude oil, prices are down slightly from last month, not hitting “a new low.”

  Trump is incapable of just saying, “We should be so thankful for all we have inherited, God bless America,” and getting off the stage.

  If he couldn’t do it last week at the fair, he certainly won’t this weekend. As Trump posted online: “On July Fourth, at The Lincoln Memorial and Washington Monument, in beautiful and safe Washington D.C., we are going to host the most spectacular TRUMP RALLY of them all, a ‘TRIBUTE TO AMERICA.’”

  But as NHJournal reports, NH will be represented: America 250? New England Says No Thanks; NH Says ‘Live Free or Die’.

  As America marks 250 years since the Declaration of Independence, New Hampshire is standing alone in New England at the Great American State Fair in Washington, D.C.

  The 16-day America 250 celebration opened on the National Mall on June 25 and runs through July 10. Organizers describe it as a World’s Fair-style showcase of states, territories, civic groups, businesses, and American culture.

  But while the Granite State is showing up, its New England neighbors are sitting it out.

  Massachusetts, Maine, Vermont, Connecticut, and Rhode Island all declined to send official state agency representatives to the event, leaving New Hampshire the only New England state to take part. And they are not alone. Other states opting out include Illinois, Oregon, Washington, Pennsylvania, and North Carolina.

  I went to the National Mall for the Bicentennial shindig in 1976. Spectacular! And (arguably) the US was in much worse shape, politically and economically, back then.