Super Bowl Contest
Needless to say, we have a host, a multitude, a veritable galaxy of perceptive and prescient, and far-seeing readers. But occasionally one emerges who stands out as a true prophet or seer.
Back in April, we held a contest for newsletter readers to predict who’d make the 2016 World Series, and who’d prevail. There was a clear winner: long-time TWS subscriber Janis Evans of Chagrin Falls, Ohio—who predicted before the season started not only that the Indians and the Cubs would face off in the fall classic, but that the Cubs would take it in seven games. Which is precisely what happened.
What makes this prediction even more impressive is that Janis, a Cleveland-area resident, is an Indians fan. (She’s also a longtime member of the Chagrin Falls city council and ran for mayor last cycle, coming in second in a three-way race.) So Jan picked her favorite team to go farther than almost anyone expected—and then to fall just short. Such a combination of far-sighted prophecy and tragic realism is impressive, and rare.
So we rewarded her appropriately. Our own Jim Swift, whose parents happen also to live in Chagrin Falls, and who had attended games six and seven and therefore suffered through the tragic denouement in person, delivered Jan her winnings on Christmas Eve at Rick’s Cafe in Chagrin Falls.
Here’s what Jan took home for winning: A $50 gift certificate to Rick’s Cafe a well-regarded Chagrin Falls restaurant (where, Jim says, Jan seems to know everyone), lunch with the Swifts, an autographed copy of Matt Labash’s Fly Fishing with Darth Vader, an audio copy of Jack Kemp: The Bleeding Heart Conservative Who Changed America (with a note from temporary Indians fan Fred Barnes), a copy of Irving Kristol’s The Neoconservative Persuasion, an extension of her subscription, and various TWS stress heads, drinking mugs, and the like. So you can see the rewards for success in these competitions are pretty impressive….
In any case, as I watched the Giants and Packers slug it out in beyond frigid temperatures at Lambeau Field (yes, Steve Hayes and John McCormack will be insufferable at the editorial meeting this morning), it occurred to me we should have a Super Bowl competition, so that someone else can demonstrate Janis-like clairvoyance. We’ll do this despite Geoffrey Norman’s devastating critique of the NFL a couple of months ago in the magazine. After all, even I, who agree with Geoffrey’s piece and have watched little professional football this year, have gotten kind of interested now that it’s the playoffs.
So: Which of the eight teams currently in contention will make the Super Bowl? Who will win? And what will the score be? Email your picks here.
I can’t guarantee the winner the kind of personal attention Janis got from her quondam neighbor, Jim Swift. But presumably the winner will live in a place where someone here at TWS has relatives, or friends, or an occasion to visit, so we’ll try to give the winner an equivalent reward with a similar personal touch. Or perhaps you’d prefer not to be bothered by one of my colleagues—after all, what if the person who lives nearest to you is Matt Labash? In any case, if you choose, we’ll spare you the personal touch, but still deliver the loot.
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Labash, and more…
Are you aware that every week you can read, online, (the concept of a regular schedule is something to which Labash has always had deep and principled objections), the terrific “advice” column, “Ask Matt Labash”? Here, Matt takes on all questions, about both the world at large and your world in particular. His wisdom that often carries the weight of Scripture. Not Psalms or Proverbs, necessarily. But the minor prophets, anyway. The very minor ones. (Think Nahum, if he were a fishing bum who drank Maker’s Mark.) In any case, in recent months Matt has shed light on everything from what kind of firearm Jesus would carry to Hillary’s shaggin’ wagon to how to live like Johnny Cash. So ask him whatever you dare, either here or at [email protected]. A
And speaking of the human condition, the new issue of the magazine also, in the course of its look back at the Obama presidency, occasioned for me some reflections on the human condition. Lee Smith’s devastating critique of Obama’s foreign policy led me to reflect more broadly on American foreign policy in general; indeed it’s spurred to me to begin to sketch out an article on “The Case for American Liberal Empire.” Chris Caldwell’s essay on Obama’s “legacy”—what he calls “the servile alternative to self-rule the country has lately been offered”—makes you think about the meaning and conditions of true self-government. Andy Ferguson’s demolition of the latest effort of Obama’s “courtier’s courtier, the boot-licker against whom all boot-licking must be measured,” invites reflection on the deeper failures and blindnesses of today’s progressivism. And there’s more! So do set aside perhaps even a little more time than usual for this issue.
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As for the Trump Administration…
So much for—and good riddance to—President Obama and his administration. What of their successors? It’s very hard to tell at this point, I think. There are signs that make one hopeful, and others that fill one with foreboding. We at TWS will be following the zigs and zags ahead. I suspect much of that will be done online, and even on Twitter, since the targets for comment will be fast-moving. The challenge in the weekly magazine will be to step back from the day-to-day and analyze the bigger picture in a way that separates the forest from the trees, while also doing justice to the more important trees.
For now, I’m struck by this: Whatever Trump’s future successes and failures, his victory may have opened up the “space” (as they say in the academy these days) for a much broader range of political debate and policy outcomes than one would have imagined a year ago. Some of the outcomes could well be very different from those Trump intends or that either his supporters or critics now expect. With things in such flux, it’s a good time to have a chance to weigh in. It will be an interesting four years.
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Onward!
Bill Kristol
