How's your bracket doing?

Over the past week or two, my conversation with other people has generally turned to sports - specifically, to the NCAA tournament. But in joining in the fun, our President has received criticism from USA Today's Christine Brennan. Brennan complains that Barack Obama's bracket is sexist because he ignored the women's basketball tournament altogether.



There's a reason for that: the men's tournament is many times more popular than the women's tournament. For one thing, the ratings for the first rounds of the men's tournament - featuring all 64 teams and plenty of top-seeded teams blowing out the ones who earned automatic bids - dwarf the ratings of the women's championship game.



Though women's basketball enjoys niche interest that has been building for a decade and a half, the interest is simply not there. The WNBA has contracted a team and is trimming its rosters.


That's not to de-value women's sports - sports teach teamwork and all that stuff regardless of who is playing. It just isn't compelling spectator television programming. And President Obama didn't fill out a bracket for the World Baseball Classic, either.


All that said, I'll put $5 down that there's a women's bracket next year...

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

When I was in elementary school, on St. Patrick's Day I would always write Seamus O'Eltringham on my tests and worksheets. The teachers thought it was cute, and I didn't lose credit. "Eltringham" is Welsh, but I'm more Irish than I am anything else, so I felt comfortable doing it.

I awoke today to hear about President Barack Obama's... excuse me, President Barack O'Bama's Irish ancestry. There's a comment about political opportunism and messaging in there, but it takes a back seat - because for one day a year, everyone gets license to be Irish - even folks with a lot less Irish in them than our President.

Of course, this may be taking it a bit to far...

...But it's good for a laugh. Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Snowbama

Two inches of snow plus a little ice canceled schools in Your Nation's Capital and the surrounding areas over the past two days. I treated my walk to and from the Metro like an Obama Administration "process," taking it slowly and methodically because the unshoveled snow on the sidewalks had turned to ice.

Given that this weather is a mere dusting in places like the upper Midwest (and my adopted homeland of New England) President Obama has called on the DC area to "apply some flinty Chicago toughness."

You know something? He's right on about this one.