AMERIQUE:


A NOTE FROM THE EDITOR: It is the unspoken statistic, but it is as real as anything to do with the lingering U.S. war efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan. According to the military, 1,800 American servicemen have killed themselves since the initial invasion of Baghdad. That is in addition to the more than 4,000 who died in battle. This week, families of the soldiers who committed suicide asked President Barack Obama to change the government policy of not forwarding letters of appreciation to mothers and fathers of these servicemen. By week's end, the White House had reversed the policy and agreed that such letters are needed, as well... - Eduardo Paz-Martinez, Editor of The Tribune

Tuesday, August 24, 2010

Disgraced Baseballer Jose Canseco Ignores Brownsville...God-Whipped Town Wonders Why...

By DOYLE MAY
Sports Editor

BROWNSVILLE, Texas - He looks pretty much like every damned body in this town, so some are asking why disgraced baseball star Jose Canseco couldn't drive over from Harlingen to sign a few autographs. It's been that kind of month for the City at The End of The Rio Grande. A proposed dock for cruiseliners at the Port of Brownsville has gone nowhere, the idea bringing wild laughter from all points north.

And then Canseco came to struggling Harlingen up the highway.

"Why not us?" asked a forlorn Jerry McHale as he sat inside Cobblestones, the town's most popular watering hole. "What are we - dogmeat?" McHale left after five hours of boozing, departing the bar without tipping the bartender. "Asshole," the barback was heard to say as McHale ambled out at an angle only Stephen Hawking or Linda Lovelace could ever interpret.

Brownsville, indeed, is dogmeat. In the ledger of American communities looking for any morsel of progress or goodness, Brownsville is at the top of the list. It gets nothing but pain. The 46-year-old Canseco, in Harlingen with his uber-minor league Laredo Broncos to play the woeful Rio Grande Valley WhiteWings, won't come to town, even as he makes his Last, Great Border Baseball Tour.

It is yet another stab in this under-achieving city's heart, this one coming from the back, the scene captured in Sam Peckinpah's version by twenty cameras looking at it from twenty angles, blood streaming like raging rivers, spooked horses trampling heavyset women and crying children on dusty Main Street, portly, mustachioed men flashing fajita-like faces full of fear, their bodies gyrating like drunken winos, arms akimbo as they do their damndest to stand erect.

Jose Canseco wouldn't come to town.

Goddammit...
 - 30 -

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Doyle, please take a couple of Prozacs pills. We know, Brownsville like Harlingen are lost in the woods.
Please, don't be so hard on the city by the river. A good writer, always expresses unbiased views. Or objective views, something to that affect, as you can tell, I don't know too much about journalism ethics. Brownsville will do well, yes it will.
Be more positive, or were you just being funny??? fajita faces, where did come from??

Patrick Alcatraz said...

ANON:...You should know that Doyle May, our hard-as-nails Sports Editor, has no time for fools. "I write shit other Valley sportswriters won't write, so, yeah, get offa my cloud!" is what he wanted us to pass-on to you. Doyle gets a bit ornery, but isn't that what makes for great writers? BTW, Doyle invented the phrase: "There's a dog on the field!" to symbolize area high school football teams... - Editor

Anonymous said...

Mr. Editor, Doyle was kind of Hard on Brownsville, he must have been having a bad day.

Patrick Alcatraz said...

ANON:...Hard on Brownsville? If only! Tht sad-sack town needs a daily spanking. Complete camp of do-nothings, drink-everythings, take-everythings. And no, Doyle May never has a bad day. He's always on his game. Ha ha ha... - Editor

Anonymous said...

Maybe that is what Brownsville needs a good dose of hard core writings. I don't know Mr. Doyle but his writings are forcefull.
I noticed Mark Sossi the City attorney put a gag on the people that address the commission. He gave a legal opinion, that they don't have to be recorded and posted on channel 12 for people to see what tax-payers are complaining about.
For a part-time clown that makes around $120.000 a year of tax-payers hard earned money. He isn't tax-payer friendly.
The irony, non-of the Commissioners said one word, even the good looking lady who I believe her name is Melissa. They all sat dumb founded.

Patrick Alcatraz said...

ANON:...How Brownsville puts up with its pitiful politics is the Great Mystery of the Western Hemisphere. There are liabilities, yes, to allowing wild speech during City Council meetings. But, boys, they won't even look for a solution that would sit well with all involved. If you follow the City Council meetings of any town in the Congo...you will find strange similarities to what is happening in Brownsville... - Editor

Anonymous said...

Patrick, man "The Congo", you really let them have it, LOL. Brownsville, the New Congo, hey maybe a name change will get the people riled and ask the commission for a new city Attorney.