Get Back in the Game

Today is the one year anniversary of the founding of the 9/12 Project. I won't get into the details of the Project, just say that if you are conservative and concerned about what is happening to our country, check out the 9/12 Project.  The start of this project was a call in to Glenn Beck's radio program.  A caller said he was so disgusted by what was going on with the government and media that he had just quit listening and paying attention to what was going on.  Beck's advice was to "square your shoulders and get back in the game."

Like I said before, almost everything will remind me of a Dallas Cowboy story.  In case you don't know, the Cowboys won 3 of 4 Super Bowls in the mid-1990's.  The only one they didn't win was won by the 49'ers.  The 49'ers beat the Cowboys in the NFC championship game (the real Super Bowl that year).  In the first quarter of the game, Troy Aikman threw to Michael Irvin on an early drive.  The ball bounced off Irvin's hands and was intercepted and run back for a touchdown by a 49'er.  Next drive, same story.  Cowboys are now down 14-0 and the game has just started.  To make a long story short, or at least not quite as long, three Cowboy turnovers turned into three 49'er touchdowns in the first 20 minutes of the game.  And the Cowboys were down 17 points at half time.  Cowboys' coach Barry Switzer gave the team essentially the same advice Beck gave his caller, "square your shoulders and get back into the game."  It was probably Aikman's best game as a Cowboy quarterback.   He fell short 38-28, but anyone watching knew who was really the best team.  The Cowboys took that loss and used it as the basis for their dominating season and Super Bowl victory the next season.

If Americans respond the way Aikman and the Cowboys did that day, we might lose the healthcare game, but win the larger game and get our country back.

Unfortunately, I am also reminded of another Cowboy story.  In the early 1980's, NFL players went on strike and the owners used strike busters in some of the season.  Kevin Sweeney was the Cowboy quarterback.  He was an effective college quarterback, but at only 5'9" he just wasn't built for the NFL once the big boys came back to work.  The season following the strike, the Cowboys invited Sweeney to training camp, even though he had no shot at making the team.  In the first preseason game, the Cowboys trailed the Houston Oilers by more than 40 points and the Texas Stadium crowd was chanting  "Sweeney, Sweeney, Sweeney!"  After an Oiler punt pinned the Cowboys offense inside their own 5 yard line, with under three minutes left in the game, Coach Tom Landry relented to the crowd's wishes and put Kevin Sweeney in at quarterback.  The crowd went crazy.  Sweeney goes into the huddle looks up at the scoreboard, the clock and the endzone, more than 95 yards away.  He looks around the huddle at the other third teamers now in the game, shakes his head and says,"Boys, I'm not sure I can win this one."  Two sacks and an incompletion later, the Cowboys punt and Sweeney's NFL career is over.

I hope America is more comparable to Aikman's Cowboys than Sweeney's team now.  I guess we will soon learn.