This is the last blog regarding the World Cup 2014 unless something extremely crazy happens.  At this point, any one of the final four winning the Cup would not be shocking.  I will still go with Brazil to win it all even though they won't have Neymar and Thiago Silva.  On paper Germany is now a slight favorite but I think this may actually be advantage to Brazil.  There is still great pressure but instead of being heavy favorite they are a slight underdog.  They may play with a chip on their shoulder instead of a heavy burden.  And teams like Colombia, Costa Rica and France have lost top players and have played well.  Given the depth of the Brazilian team, they should be able to weathered the losses better than those teams.  So I will go with Brazil but as I said before, all four remaining teams can win it all.

There seems to be a lot more parity in this World Cup with the CONCACAF and African teams doing better than expected.  But I don't agree with those who think that the U.S. are close to winning the cup.  The U.S. has the best goalie in the world and we always produce great goalies.  We have speed and athleticism.  But our skill level are nowhere near the top teams.  We lost in possession in every game and the discrepancy in possession and shots in the Belgium game only points to our lack of world class skills.  The gap will not be closed completely in 4 or even 8 years.  Only Bradley and Dempsey can start on most teams in the world.  We have 5 Germans on the team and except for Green, Germany have no interest in them.  So unless we get athletes like Lebron James and Kobe Bryant to play soccer and we get a grass root system like they have in European countries, we have a long way to go before we can win the cup.  Sure, we can beat one of final four team on a given day, but to win four knockout round against the best teams, we can't do it in the near future.

My prediction of Roger Federer winiing Wimbledon almost came true.  He played a great tournament but unfortunately father time wins again.  I think this is his last chance to win another major.  I expect that Nadal will pass him in major titles.  Is he the greatest ever?  Given that he has a losing record against Nadal, even though Nadal was rising as Federer started to decline, it is hard to say that Federer is better than Nadal.  But I think Federer is still the best all around player, being in the top 3 of all time on clay, grass and hard courts.  This is something I don't think any other player can claim.

Great weekend of World Cup soccer.  It seems the quality of play in this tournament is much better than recent ones.  Two out of 4 games went to penalty kicks which is not best way to decide the game but was tremendously exciting.  The thought that Brazil could easily have been knocked out was just unbelievable.  CONCAFCAF earmed a lot of respect with the showing of Mexico and Costa Rica.  Mexico should have won but I think they made a mistake of packing it in with the lead.  Playing defense was right but you have to have a counterattack.  By taking out Dos Santos, they couldn't counter and let the Dutch attack at will.  Costa Rica almost suffered the same fate but hung on to penalty shots despite being down a man.  If someone watching this weekend do not like soccer afterward, you will never convert him.

The Holland-Mexico game was decided on a penalty shot.  It was a foul although as I talked about before, the punishment was much too great for the crime.  The Alexi Lalas said that it was an accumulative call. In other words, there were maybe possible penalty shot calls earlier on Mexico that was not called and so finally this one had to be called.  Other commentators also said that a play in the first half involving Robben should have been a penalty.  Interestingly, Robben said that the deciding call was correct but that he had dived on the first one.  So if you believe Robben, then the referee got it right.  But even in slow motion, the commentators felt that the first one was a penalty.  This goes to show how difficult it is to referee these games.  So again I call for more fouls called but less penalty shots so that the referee is not the deciding factor in these big games.

Obama is sending "advisers" to Iraq.  I hope they are not the type of advisers Kennedy sent to Vietnam.  Those advisers became a big military operation.  I trust that this will not happen.  But you never know.  As Vietnam proved, supporting a brutal dictatorship will not be successful even if the enemy of that dictatorship is a worse alternative.  So unless Obama can convince Maliki to change his way and bring the Sunnis into the government, the "advisers" we are sending will be of no value.

The U.S. was 30 seconds away from clinching a spot in the second round of the World Cup today.  I don't know how they allowed that last goal.  Shouldn't they all be back in the box to defend?  Even though we are still likely to advance, a crazy scenario is now possible.  If Germany and the U.S. ties both will advance regardless what Ghana and Portugal do.  Klinsmann is German and the German coach is his good friend.  If Germany and the U.S. play to a listless 0-0 tie, I will bet that there will be an uproar about an agreement between the two teams before hand!

A busy weekend in sports.  First the World Cup.  There has been more scoring.  Also couple of upsets, particularly Spain losing 5-1.  There were also a few games where a team comes from behind to win, not very common in soccer.  The new goal technology seems to be working well, without slowing down the game.  So a lot of positives so far.  There are still the usual problems with the game, however.  One is the calls on possible penalty kicks.  Soccer is still very low scoring,  So a penalty shot which is successful over 80% of the time, can very well decide a game.  Brazil benefited from such a call in its game against Croatia.  Then there are a lot of times, particularly on corner kicks where everybody is fouling each other and no calls are made.  In basketball where there are two hundred points scored, one bad call does not make that much of difference.  In soccer where there are only about 10 legitimate chances of scoring in a game,so one bad call is a big deal.

I suggest a rule change where unless there is an intentional hand ball or a vicious open field foul, the penalty will not be a direct shot from 12 yards.  Instead, you get a regular free kick from the spot of the foul.  If it is less than 10 yards from goal, the wall can be set up half distance from the shot.  In exchange for the less harsh penalty, the defense will be called for fouls in the box where maybe the referee would have let go in the past because he thinks a penalty shot in this instance is too harsh.  So basically I am calling for more fouls called in the box but less penalty shots.

The other controversy is the offside call.  It is very difficult for the side judge to see a pass that starts from 40 yards away and at the same time see if anyone got behind the defenders at the exact same time the passer strikes the ball.  Unless they come out with something similar to the goal line technology, I suggest that each coach gets one challenge per game for a video review.  I don't think that would slow down the game too much.

The U.S. starts their World cup chase tomorrow.  Klinsmann said that it is not realistic for the U.S to win the cup.  I agree with that.  But then I also agree with Bruce Arena who said that if we have 23 players better than Landon Donovan, we should be able to win the World Cup!

Alert!  Above paragraphs were written yesterday.  I decided not to publish till after the U.S. game today.  It appears to be a good move since the U.S. won!  Without jinxing the team, I think we have a very good chance to move out of group play with Portugal losing badly today.  If we can tie Portugal, I think we will be in because Germany would have locked up advancing before they play the U.S.  They may well play their B team.  We have beaten their B team before and even if we lose, it should not be anywhere close to 4-0!  So we need to tie Portugal!

The Spurs clobbered the Heat again to win the championship.  The Spurs are the ultimate team.  They are so well coached.  But I notice that they have 9 players who were born outside the U.S.  Could it be that these foreign born players are easier to coach than Americans?  I have not done any scientific research on this so I can't say for sure.  But my hypothesis is that foreign born players are happy that they made to the NBA and if they don't work hard and listen to the coach, they will not last.  Contrast that with young American stars who have been pampered way before they got to the NBA.  Also Americans who have poor work ethics are given more chance to succeed.  Witness Andrew Bynum and Kwame Brown.  So maybe the Spurs look for guys who are willing to sacrifice in the Popovich system and as a result they ended up with a lot foreign born players.

The Spur and Heat series also points out the importance of point guard play.  The Heat had none.  Basically, James ended up with the point guard work plus the scoring load.  This failed miserably against a championship caliber team.  Something for the Rockets to think about when they try to use Harden to run the offense while their point guards stand outside the three point line.

A couple of new items today, but first I like to comment on Bergdahl.  Thanks to LBOAYM, I read O'dwyer's article which I agree with almost completely.  It was obviously a PR disaster for Obama.  The news conference with Bergdahl's dad was dumb.  The only thing I can think of is that Obama thinks the dad looks more like the Duck Dynasty guy than a Muslim.  The reason I held off commenting was whether I agree with the trade at all.  This is where I disagree with O'Dwyer.  I don't think I would have traded given the uncertainty of how he was captured.  I understand the ideal of not leaving anyone behind.  I also disagree with the conservatives who say that this makes the enemy more likely to try to capture American soldiers.  I think even if we don't trade, the enemies will capture Americans any time they can.  In fact, if we don't trade, they are more likely to kill them and display them on tv.  So not negotiating will not make our soldiers any safer.  But given the known controversy of this case, I would not have traded at this time.

Eric Cantor loses!  Does this mean the Tea party is back in control.  No, but I guess you should not write its obituary either.  So in liberal California, the Tea party candidate loses to an unknown.  In a conservative district in Virginia, the extreme conservative beats a conservative.  Neither of these have any national significance.  It just means the GOP is split and while they will do well in the mid term election, they will have problems in the 2016 presidential election.

Iraqi militants took over a Mosul, the second largest city.  It seems the current government is in trouble.  It goes to show you, you can't bring democracy to another country by force.  All you are trading is one dictator for maybe something worse.  Al Qaeda was not in Iraq before Hussein.  Now, after billions of dollars and thousand of American lives lost, you have more sectarian violence.  In fact, this militant group is even worse than al Qaeda.  So Obama was right when he was a senator:   The Iraq invasion was wrong.  He is also right in not using military force in Libya, Egypt and Syria.  Until we have a reliable partner, military action in this part of the world will not bring good results.

A few follow ups today.  First, Donald Sterling is going to sell his team for $2billion.  As they say the rich gets richer even if they are not good people.  He made out better than McCourt did when he sold the Dodgers.  But unlike McCourt, who took his money and faded from the public, Sterling still cares what people think of him.  All those ads touting his charity contributions were designed to make himself look good to the public.  So was his rambling attempt to defend himself on CNN.  But no matter how much money he accumulates, he will never be fondly remembered by the people.  So he would fail at the one thing he wanted: adoration from the public.

Neel Kashkari did beat out Tim Donnelly for second place in the California gubernatorial open primary.  So he gets the distinction of losing to Jerry Brown in November.  I am not sure why he tried to win this impossible race and spend a lot of his own money.  I think the GOP in California is relieved that a moderate is going on the ballot instead of the tea party Donnelley.  They helped Kashkari, I think, because if Donnelley is on the top of the ballot in November, it would drive away moderate Republicans and independents who may vote for Republicans in elections that are winnable.  They would not win much anyway but with Kashkari, maybe they win some of the close races.

The U.S. did win all three of the send away games before Brazil.  They looked pretty good without Donovan and the German Americans that Klinnsman kept on the team maybe helpful.  (Except for Julian Green, who is too young to be on such a big stage).  With Ronaldo's fitness in question, maybe we can get out of the group of death.  But I still rather have Donovan in there.

I am rooting for the Spurs.  But all those people who were making fun of Lebron for getting cramps during the first game were not being fair.  Some people even said that he should have stayed in.  People like James, Kobe, and Jordan would play in serious pain and nobody should ever doubt their injury.  As expected James came back today and helped the Heat even the series.  I hope the Spurs win the series but I don't want it being decided by an injury.

Can't anyone be a decent closer once they go to Detroit?  I can't remember a decent closer in recent years on the Tigers.  Saw Al Kaline on the ESPN telecasts tonight.  He still looks good and is as humble as always.  Too bad he can't pitch.  Is Willy Hernandez or Fred Gladding still alive?

It is shocking that Landon Donovan is left off the U.S. soccer team.  Donovan is the greatest player in U.S. history and at age 32 may have passed his prime.  But he is not way over the hill either.  There is no way that he is not one of the top 23 players in the country right now.  Klinsmann has not given any reasonable explanation for leaving Donovan off the team.  To say he is a step behind others is not an explanation.  That is like saying someone is just better than him.  But in what way?  Is Donovan out of shape?  I don't think so.  He is playing full time with the Galaxy right now.  Is he slower than others? I don't think so.  I would bet he beats at least 3/4 of the team in a foot race.  Certainly not because of experience since he has the most caps and goals on the team by far.

So is it because Klinsmann is still upset that Donovan took time off last year and he thinks that Donovan is not as committed to soccer as he needs to be?  If that is the case, he is wrong.  I think if Donovan did not take his leave of absence last year, he may be burned out this year and be of no use to the Galaxy or the national team.  Is Klinsmann going for the youth movement since he does not think the U.S. can get out of the group of death and so might as well let the young guys get experience for 2018?  Again that would be wrong because even though it is unlikely that the U.S, can get out of the group, it is not an impossible task.  They can certainly beat Ghana and Portugal is maddeningly inconsistent despite having Christian Ronaldo.  And players like Julian Green will not play much if at all in Brazil anyway.  They have 4 years and many friendlies and tournaments to get ready for 2018.  So the youth movement can start after the World Cup.

Even if Klinsmann does not think that Donovan can be effective for 90 minutes, it is important to have a player like him on the team.  Lets face it:  the U.S. will not beat anyone by a big margin.  The best they can hope for is play great defense and get a goal from counterattack or a set piece.  These are the situations where Donovan is by far the best American.  I want him to take that free kick at crunch time.  If he can't run 90 minutes, put him in during the second half of a close game.  He is our best chance to get a goal or assist on one.  If the game goes into a shootout, I want Donovan to be one of the shooters.  So I think it is a big mistake to leave Donovan off the team and the chance of the U.S. to have a successful World Cup just went down 50%.

Karl Rove said that Hillary Clinton may have brain damage from an injury.   He defended himself by saying that a presidential candidate's health should be under scrutiny.  He is right about that but Clinton has not declared her candidacy.  I mean, are we going to make Chris Christie's obesity an issue now before he is a candidate?  At least Chrisitie is in office right now.  Clinton is a private citizen.  This sort of attack may fire up the base but to independents it seems like Rove is scared that Clinton will be the nominee.  If Clinton does have brain damage why would Rove be scared that she runs?  You mean your candidate, whoever he or she will be, cannot beat a brain damaged person?  If she is incapable of being the president, it will come out in the campaign.  She may get herself disqualified by, for example, not remembering which 3 cabinets she would get rid of if she becomes president.  So by attacking Clinton now, Rove just makes himself look scared of Clinton.

I predict that Amy will win DWTS.  I would agree that Davis is the best dancer left but I think the difference in skill is so small between the two that Amy will overcome that with the voting.

The movie about Dan the Korean adoptee is now on YouTube.  Look for aka Dan on YouTube.  The movie is broken down into 7 segments of about 15 minutes each so there is interruption with the flow as you click for the next segment.  There is also some repeated scenes.  But the excellence of the movie makes these minor annoyances irrelevant.  Please be sure to check it out.

There is an Indian-American running for governor here in California.  His name is Neel Kashkari.  He has no chance of winning because the latest poll shows that he is only favored by 2% of the voters vs Jerry Brown who has 47%.  He even trails another Republican, Tim Donnelly, whohas 10%.  Even though he has no chance of winning and based on what I read, I don't agree with him on several topics, I will keep an eye on him.  This is due to the fact he is an unusual candidate and I want to see if his unorthodox candidacy can at least beat his Republican opponent in the primary and give Brown a run in the general election.

First of all, Kashkari has never run for office, so he is not a career politician.  Despite not known by the electorate, he is endorsed by the likes of former governor Pete Wilson, Congressman Darrell Issa and Mitt Romney.  Trained as a mechanical engineer, he eventually got his MBA and a job at Goldman Sachs.  It was at Sachs that he worked under former Treasury secretary Hank Paulson.  Paulson tabbed Kashkari to be in charge of the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) in 2008.  A life long Republican, he voted for Obama in 2008 and stayed at the helm of TARP after Obama took office.  He left to work for Pimco in 2009.  He voted for Romney in 2012.

I find Kashkari's story interesting because he uses his work at TARP on his resume as a badge of honor.  His Republican opponent, of course, says that no Republican should vote for someone in charge of TARP and voted for Obama.  Most Republicans have accused Obama as a socialist for TARP, not mentioning that it was Paulson's idea under Bush that TARP got started and it was run by a Republican even when Obama took over.  Many Republicans say TARP was a waste of tax payer's money.  But now a Republican running for office with backing of moderate Republicans, is saying that TARP saved the financial market.  There is argument on both sides but if Kashkari beats Donnelly, will other Republicans support Kaahkari?

The other thing about Kashkari is that, unlike most politicians, he does not speak in vague terms.  He has already written what he would do if he was governor.  Now I don't agree on some of the things he say such as no raising of the minimum wage and no corporate income tax for 10 years for any company that move to Californiia. But he isputting it out there for discussion as oppose to someone who says:  "I am going to create jobs".  Kashkari also does not mince words.  He told a mix crowd at Berkeley that reversing the ban on affirmative action as advocated by Democrats is just a way of saying there are too many Asians at Berkeley.  He is not afraid of being politically incorrect.

So he has a lot of people on both Republican and Democratic sides mad at him.  By the way, his remark about not raising the minimum wage came right after Romney said that it is reasonable to raise the minimum wage.  So Kashkari is not afraid to antagonize one of his own big name supporters.  So to sum up, he has no chance of winning.  But I am hoping he will have a decent showing even though I am not sure if I would vote for him.  But having both sides attack him while bring concrete ideas for discussion, makes Kashkari a candidate that I am interested in following.

This past week Neal Rubin of the Detroit News tried to rewrite history.  He published an article on the 1982 case of the killing of Vincent Chin.  To summarize the case:  Chin was having a bachelor party at a strip joint when two unemployed auto workers, mistaking Chin to be Japanese, hurled racial epithets at him.  A fight ensued but was broken up.  All involved were thrown out of the bar.  The killers, Ebens and Nitz then got a bat out of their car, hunted Chin down the street and beat him to death.  For this murder, the killers were given probation, no jail time.  The case pulled the small Asian community of Detroit together to protest.  It drew national attention but the fact remains that these two killers got away with murder.

Now for unknown reason, Rubin claims evidence show that Chin is partially at fault by throwing the first punch.  This is a complete lack of logic.  Not only has Rubin failed to prove who started the fight, it is absurd to assign fault to the victim in this case.  Let's say a slur was aimed at that person's race, ethnicity, religion, or sexual orientation, would it not be reasonable for that person to stand up for himself?  It would be totally understandable that a black, Latino, Jewish or gay person may throw the first punch in this situation. Sure, a monk may not respond to a slur but I would think that no monk would be in a strip joint.  So if you are calling someone names in a bar, aren't you the one looking for trouble in the first place?  But let say Chin started the fight, it does not matter when it comes to assigning blame because that fight in the bar was OVER when they were kicked out.  If Chin had gotten hit, fell and hit his head and died in the bar, one can argue that accidents happen in a bar fight.  But the truth, and nobody disputed this:  Ebens and Nitz had time to cool off after leaving the bar but they chose to get the bat and hunt Chin down.  A lot of time had passed for them to change their mind but they chose to use a weapon!  So this was pure murder and you can't rewrite such history.  Chin is being slurred once again 32 years later.

The Chin case mobilized the Asian community.  We were not successful in getting justice for Chin then.  But we are a bigger and stronger community now.  We cannot let anyone insult us in the media today.  The Chin case has mobilized us again 32 years later. We have way more economic power today than 32 years ago.  If we get no apology from Rubin or the Detroit News, it is time to plan economic boycott and other pressures against them.