Burress, Stallworth, Pitino and Obama

I almost wrote this column after hearing The Panel’s Bill Sammon, Charles Krauthammer and Cici Connally obligatory ”I’m a dog lover”, Michael Vick paid his debt to society and deserves a second chance rhetoric, before exuding all the righteous indignation and disgust they could muster to assure us that, ”but I wouldn’t hire him”.

No word yet if Sammon, Krauthammer & Connally would hire anyone that had performed, paid for or had an abortion; plead guilty to DUI; or committed adultery on a restaurant table.

But, being a USC Fighting Gamecock whose favorite line ever uttered on television was Ben “Chicken George” Vereen’s, “I’m gonna win my freedom” (training and fighting gamecocks) on Roots, I decided to remain silent thinking I lacked a certain moral standing to cry enough’s enough when it comes to animal abuse.

And then on ESPN this week came Dan Le Batard’s revulsion at Plaxico Burriss’ two-year prison term for someone who only harmed himself while Stallworth and Vick harmed “others.”

Others?

Pardon the Interruption but I’m Mike DeVine

And while I agree that Burress’ two-year sentence for violating New York’s unconstitutional gun law was too harsh (I wish he had challenged it in court), one cannot seriously equate Dante Stallworth’s dead human victim of felony DUI (for which the NFL player served 24 hours in jail) with dead or live but injured canines.

Must Gamecock now declare that he is a dog lover? Ok, yes but I don’t want a medal for it and I don’t apologize for hoping my roosters scratch out some Bulldog eyes in Athens in three weeks, but I digress.

I have, since age 6, owned many pooches and house trained them and presently dog sit for friends on a periodic basis, but I mainly love other peoples’ dogs in backyards these days. I would never attend a dog fight and would certainly have berated Vick to his face for engaging in such low class, redneck behavior.

Honestly, I probably wouldn’t be able to stomach even a real cock fight, BUT, I reserve my greatest degrees of disgust, revulsion and righteous anger for those that harm human beings. You know, the creatures made in God’s image? Remember them. Those are the one’s that aren’t safe from President Barack Obama via abortions in the womb; as born alive infants having survived a botched abortion outside the womb; the Shiavo-like seriously disabled and useless also outside the womb; and those the government option deem best suited for morphine than pacemakers. But I digress again.

Ole’! and don’t they eat dog in Laos?

Moreover, when I see many of those that preach cultural relativism re Muslims that abuse women but not Latinos, Southerners and blacks that fight animals, I am a bit put off? Ole’ bullfighting? Eat chikin-fi-la? Horse racing, Winn Dixie greyhounds? Tyson trucks? Chicago stockyards? Do catfish feel pain?

I am also put off when reminded of so many divorce clients I refused to take on when they started off with the “its the principle of the matter”, quickly followed by the “if my house was on fire, I would save my cat before my husband”. No fee would ever have been worth enduring a client that can never have their hatred satisfied.

Enablers need second chances too

Michael Vick did wrong. He got caught up in a cultural phenomena, that coupled with his superstar coddling treatment in college and the NFL, led him to see himself as above the law. He betrayed a great man in Falcon’s owner Arthur Blank.

But don’t you think that the Home Depot CEO now wishes that, the first time he saw Vick show up late at the Flowery Branch, Ga. training camp, much less at the Georgia Dome, accompanied by his “posse”, that he had drawn a line?

Can we hope that Joe Torre takes some scissors to Manny Ramirez Samson’s ponytail? Again, I digress. Maybe it was in Vick’s contract that he was above the rest? I doubt it. Maybe Manny had an “I don’t have to cut my hair like all the rest of the players that have ever played for Torre even if I get caught taking steroids” contract provision? Again, I doubt it.

But wouldn’t you think that a morals clause is implied for any executive position (high crimes and misdemeanors against 19-year old interns, maybe?), especially if one is responsible for college students?

But then, even if such a clause is expressed in writing, it doesn’t matter so long as you can hide the violation for six years. Rick Pitino needs no second chance since Cardinals hate Wildcats more than they hate brazen infidelity.

Would The Panel suspend Pitino?

Still waiting on that episode, along with the one on the human “other” Stallworth harmed.

Yes, I love dogs, even when they are humans in a culture that’s gone to the dogs. Will Vick be as protected from PITA protesters as are those that seek court injunctions to perform 3rd trimester abortions in protester-free solitude?

I agree with Juan Williams that Michael Vick should get a second chance. Christ and America beleive in such. I would also give Stallworth, Burress and Pitino second chances. Pitino should have been fired, but after a time, he could come back to coaching.

I don’t use the word “deserve” with respect to such second chances. I’m a Baptist after all, who believes that even if Mary was the only human on Earth, Jesus would have had to die to save her. Original sin and the wages of sin are death, and all that.

In a legal sense, I reserve the use of the word “deserve” for contract law. See Pitino’s contract and get back to me.

Mike DeVine’s Charlotte Observer, Examiner.com and Minority Report columns

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

Originally published @ Examiner.com, where all verification links may be accessed.