The Tie-Breaker

On this day:

1419
Hundred Years’ War: Rouen surrenders to Henry V of England completing his reconquest of Normandy.
1883
The first electric lighting system employing overhead wires, built by Thomas Edison, begins service at Roselle, New Jersey.
1915
World War I: German zeppelins bomb the towns of Great Yarmouth and King’s Lynn in the United Kingdom killing more than 20, in the first major aerial bombardment of a civilian target.
1920
The United States Senate votes against joining the League of Nations.
1945
World War II: Soviet forces liberate the Łódź ghetto. Out more than 200,000 inhabitants in 1940, less than 900 had survived the Nazi occupation.
2006

The New Horizons probe is launched by NASA on the first mission to Pluto.

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National Review‘s Andrew McCarthy points out that the executive branch of the U.S. government has no Constitutional authority, acting alone, to acquire more territory – including Greenland – for the United States, whether through purchase or conquest.


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Chavez (and later Maduro) outsourced a lot of their policing and stability to violent leftist paramilitary groups called colectivos.

That might be a difficult negotiation.

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Study confirms that neither Tylenol nor vaccines is responsible for the rise in autism BECAUSE THERE IS NO RISE IN AUTISM TO EXPLAIN just a change in diagnostic standards.

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McCutchen — free agent, elder statesman, human embodiment of “good vibes only” — is still getting ambushed by Comprehensive Drug Testing (CDT) at his house on a Sunday morning.

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The Tie-Breaker

The penalty kick shoot-out became the norm in soccer competition in 1975 to make tournament games definitive. One wonders about its impact on the acceptance of soccer in the U.S.

Americans love competition, and they hate ties.

There might be changes afoot. We now have participation trophies, sliding scales like DEI and homogenized testing. Many colleges don't require SATs; AI may force more objective interviews. Corporate "teams" are everywhere.

Maybe it takes a village, maybe the starlet's breathless podium award acceptance speech is real. Maybe everyone who worked on the film deserves the award, too.

The problem is that sometimes an individual is quite enough. Madame Curie clearly did not need a village; she could think herself out of a vault. Indeed, she may be stalking this great land right now.

But a lot doesn't apply to the rest of us mortals. Team-building, Critical Theory, whatever the homogenizing effects of AI are, all appear to be a trend to "replace the frigidity of rugged individualism with the warmth of collectivism."

So we give participation trophies to prepare the child for the adult world of irresponsible success and defeat, of self-punishing redistribution. Success is no longer achieved on the shoulders of giants; it's just another brick in the wall, a sincere sharing like the starlet's speech, a perfect preparation for the faceless future of AI.

This is the world to come, where a prize honoring a significant peace-giver among our warring clans can be gifted, one to another, and handed around like the Stanley Cup to the losing locker room, brought home for a day or week by everyone within reach.

It may be ironic. Or satisfying. But it is symbolic of the great coming crisis: it ain't justice.