I think the worst kept secret in the political world was made official today with veteran Republican Senator Arlen Specter switching his party affiliation to become a Democrat.

To me, this is more of a survival tactic played by the senator since he was more than likely going to lose the upcoming republican primary for the 2010 election. Now if you are the democrats, you welcome him and take him in with open arms because he is one of the most respected people in congress regardless of which political hat he decides to wear. However, with the GOP fighting with every last breath they have to keep Al Franken from being seated in Minnesota, the problem still remains of having 60 seats to prevent a filibuster. Specter probably would have voted in line with the democrats against a filibuster even if he didn’t switch so it doesn’t really solve anything. In turn, Specter probably gets a less competitive primary challenge on this side or the aisle with the party backing him in the 2010 race.

Now if you are one of the very few moderates remaining on the conservative side, this really just brings to the forefront most of the problems you are facing. There is no longer exists such a thing as a moderate Republican. It’s either you are with the extreme right wing base with the likes of Limbaugh, Hannity, O’Reilly and Bachmann and that is a real shame. It shouldn’t matter if the vast majority of the people in this country are leaning moderately or completely liberal now, there should always be a respectable and honest but not lunatic opposition on the other side. You should have base a voice of reason from the minority to keep the party in power of over-extending their reach of power but we just don’t have that anymore in this country and it is quite a shame.

Wow, this certainly came out of nowhere! A fantastic new trailer for a documentary about greatest boxer of all-time Muhammad Ali called Facing Ali has debuted on Apple today. I had heard about some documentary but hadn’t heard of this at all until tonight and it looks simply looks amazing. I think Ali’s life story is a the most remarkable sports story out there and this documentary looks like it will be an unforgettable look at one of the greatest athletes ever.

Three-time World Heavyweight Champion Muhammad Ali defeated almost every top fighter of the golden age of boxing and symbolized the sport for generations of fans. Now, ten of his acclaimed rivals pay tribute to perhaps the world’s most beloved and inspiring athlete in Pete McCormack’s Facing Ali.

This documentary includes appearances by George Foreman, Larry Holmes, Earnie Shavers, George Chuvalo, Sir Henry Cooper, and Joe Frazier, among many others. Lionsgate is distributing Facing Ali with SpikeTV, but hasn’t set a theatrical release date for this yet.

It claims to change the way you see Muhammad Ali forever. I am not sure it will do that for me since I have followed and watched a lot of his old fights but it can certainly open the eyes of a lot of the younger Americans here about why he is considered the greatest of all-time.

I originally saw the clip on FIRST SHOWING.NET, so make sure the check out the entire article over there.

Popularity: 4%

Here is a story that my friend Joe Sullivan showed me who knows when since the story is initially dated September of 2006 but it really takes another step today. The entire story is available through New York Times: The Ballad of Big Mike.

It is about a guy named Michael Oher who had a really tough childhood which father not being around and his mother who had cocaine addiction problems. He never really got the proper education and ended up repeating first and second grade. He also attended 11 different schools during his first nine years as a student.

His life completely changed when he was 16 years old and had gotten into a private school named Briarcrest Christian School through a person he was living with. There,  a white couple with a daughter, Leigh Anne and Sean Tuohy, allowed Oher to move in with them and began taking care of his needs after becoming familiar with his difficult personal circumstances

At that age of 16, Oher had a measured I.Q. of 80, which put him in mankind’s ninth percentile. An aptitude test he took in eighth grade measured his “ability to learn” and placed him in the sixth percentile. He had finished his sophomore year with a 0.9. A better performance at the back end of his junior year, when he moved into the Tuohy home, raised his cumulative average to 1.564.

The Tuohy family connected him with a tutor, who worked with him for twenty hours a week, eventually bringing his low-D performance up to a 2.05 grade point average. A series of internet-based courses from Brigham Young University served as replacements for poor marks earned earlier in his academic career, enabling him to become eligible to play football in college.

As if the X-Men Origins film wasn’t getting enough promotion for the movie as it was, now they came out with this brilliant advertisement. Whoever thought of this one, definitely deserves a raise or a couple of claws or something.

I had been looking for this video online ever since I watched it on TNT during one of the basketball playoff games and finally found it tonight. Also, there is an entire Inside The NBA clip that I have attached after the break.

Wolverine Ad:

Popularity: 4%

I had my first trip to the new Yankee Stadium last night and two things stuck out to me: 1- The stadium is absolutely a modern marvel with video monitors literally everywhere to the unlimited array of foods available to eat and 2- the level of frustration of fans is rising remarkably and you have to wonder whether that is because these “fans” haven’t won a championship since 2000 and maybe just maybe, its starting to take a visible toll.

First let me talk about the stadium. I got there about two hours ahead of the scheduled 7:05 PM start so I would have plenty of time to walk around and check things out. I went in through Gate 8 which has is located by the bleachers and behind food court out in center field. I don’t know how new the technology is around the league more importantly in new stadiums, but the self-check in with your ticket seemed very interesting (picture 2). I figured we had gotten there a little too early since it was still two hours before game time but as the game (and plenty of empty seats) would tell, there just weren’t going to be a lot of people at a cold, windy, slightly wet weeknight game in April at the current outrageous prices.

I was at the second game of the season two years ago which marked the return of Andy Pettitte to Yankee Pinstripes, a game at which it started to snow in the later innings, and the stadium was still packed. Maybe I’m looking too much into it this early in the season but the official attendance at that game in April 5, 2007 game was 52,096 (56,886 capacity) and compare that to yesterdays game which officially was 42,065 (52,325) but it definitely felt a lot less occupied. That by comparison is 91.6% in 2007 versus 80.4% attendance last night. When was the last time you could imagine trying to attend a Yankee Game and have less than 90% capacity?