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2012-02-27 11:18:40

Three mouse clicks

A: Always glad to be asked. My column this month is going to be shorter than most. I pretty well have to keep it that way if I am to use it as a parody to the shortest half time speech ever given by a coach. This “speech” happened more than 90 years ago. World War I had ended one year earlier. Perhaps…for the first time ever…the country was really “ready for some football.” It was November 15th, 1919. Notre Dame, led by its infamous coach Knute Rockne, was playing Michigan State. On the team for Notre Dame was arguably one of the greatest college football players of all time…George Gipp, who led the team in passing and rushing his first three years. Notre Dame had just come off a mediocre season of 3-1-2, but today in this new season…they were 6-0, and they were playing the only team who had beat them the year before (7-13 at Michigan State). The national press had teased this game for weeks as being the premier matchup of the season. It was a sunny, chilly November afternoon. The full-house crowd, saturated with hope, anticipation and “payback”…couldn’t have been more enthusiastic. The game began. Notre Dame won the toss and elected to receive. They ran the ball back to the Michigan State 45 yard line. Then things went bad. The first play from scrimmage, they got an in-motion penalty. The next play from scrimmage…same penalty. The next play, facing 1st and 20, they fumbled. For the rest of the first half, this is how it went…penalties, dropped passes, fumbles and mistakes dominated Notre Dame’s play. The halftime score, was 0 to 0. It could have been worse. Michigan State had a missed field goal and a touchdown that they had scored was called back. The crowd…although exuberant at the beginning of the game…was now booing…big time. The gun sounded for halftime. The Notre Dame players, very soberly, walked off the field. They knew they had played like “goats.” No team since Rockne had taken over had ever played a worse half of football. The players filed into the locker room. Each took a seat on the bench. No one said a word. They were waiting…waiting…for Coach Rockne. They knew it wasn’t going to be pleasant. The minutes passed. It seemed like hours. Then the gun sounded for the start of the second half…but still no Coach Rockne. Though still silent, they exchanged looks as if to say, “What happened to Coach?”, “Where is he?”, “Did he leave us?” and “What do we do?” A minute after the gun sounded to start the second half, while all of the players were still sitting with heads down...in nervous silence on the bench…they heard a loud boom. Someone had kicked the locker room door open. It sounded like an explosion. It was Coach Rockne. He stood just inside the door. He took a long, slow glance around the room. He didn’t say a word. He then walked slowly up and down the bench, looking at each player, but no player looked back. He walked back to the door as if to leave…but at the last moment he turned and faced them. After a brief pause…he scowled and with his raspy, throaty voice asked sarcastically, “Fighting Irish?” He then turned and walked out of the locker room with the door slamming shut behind him. Notre Dame came back and played a perfect second half of football. They had no fumbles, no penalties, no dropped passes…and no mistakes. They beat Michigan State 13-0 and went on to have their first perfect season under Knute Rockne. Last month, after sitting and listening to literally dozens of conversations over the past several months, about the direction of our country…the hate…the partisanship…the rampant out-of-control spending…the deficits…the debt…the looming bankruptcy of Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid…illegal immigration…the inability by our elected officials to get anything done…and not hearing one idea, plan or solution in all of these conversations to solve these problems…I offered one. It was a melded plan that I thought would have to find support among the majority of all persuasions, whether the right, center, left, Democrat, Republican, Libertarian or Independent. This plan would take care of most every major concern we have in our country, and it is in synch with the majority of every ideological position. I then proposed a way that this plan…this solution…could be propagated by each supporter of the same with only three mouse clicks. That’s right…three mouse clicks by everyone supporting it and it could happen. All that each needed to do was detailed in last month’s article, which can still be read in its entirety by going to www.theqandatimes.com and clicking the link on the home page titled, “Article By Charlie Traffas From The February ‘12 Issue.” That’s the first mouse click. The email that you would send to others is already written. You just have to click the link on the home page of this site titled, “WIP Email To Send To Two People.” That’s the second mouse click. After you put in your name and email address and two email addresses to which you will send the email, you click “Send.” That’s the third mouse click. These mouse clicks, made by the majority of those The Q & A Times touches each month, to two other people, going on for eight levels, could touch the entire population of the US in very short order. It was an idea…a plan…a solution…with an easy method of propagation…for everyone to do just a little…and together…we could all do something about the mess we’re in. The first and most important thing this process would result in is getting millions of like-minded people connected, and creating a united force that could not be ignored. We might all be surprised at what we’re able to accomplish after this. How has it worked thus far? Not very well…at the time this column for this month went to press, less than 2% of the total number of households and businesses we touch each month had taken the time to do their three mouse clicks. Yet, since this article was published, I have received 76 positive emails and/or calls to every negative one I received. So if the idea…plan…solution…is acceptable…and perhaps even “applaudable”…and no one but a few on the extreme fringes can find fault with it…why not more mouse clicks? Rockne got great results in the way he closed with, “Fighting Irish?” I wonder what kind of results we could get closing with, “Concerned citizen?”