Ban the Warriors

Danville, Kentucky -- Thomas Jefferson, the father of enlightenment liberalism, once wrote: "it is not by the consolidation or concentration, of powers, but by their distribution that good government is effected." Indeed, America has long grappled with the problem of power being concentrated in the hands of an elite few, preventing many honest Americans from sharing in the bounties of our great nation. President Andrew Jackson, hater of paper money and the plundering financial barons, recognized this problem and rightly vetoed Congress's attempt to re-charter the Second Bank of the United States in an effort to restore economic independence to the common man. President Franklin D. Roosevelt knew this, and rightly cracked down on the Wall Street marauders responsible for the Great Depression, re-distributing wealth from the rich few to the hard-working many. President Donald J. Trump will soon follow in this great tradition, and is on the precipice of launching a fierce attack on entrenched oligarchy and corporate globalist robbery like no President ever before.

Folks, the NBA should take a page from Jefferson, Jackson, Roosevelt, and Trump's book. It is not by the consolidation or concentration, of players, but by their distribution that good basketball is effected. Despite boasting more exciting superstar players than ever before, NBA basketball has never been less compelling. A historically good (but historically choke-prone) 73-win Golden State Warriors team added Kevin Durant last off-season. The Warriors and Cleveland Cavaliers absolutely cruised to the NBA finals, facing no real competition en route to winning their conferences. In the NBA, the rich keep getting richer. Next season the arms race will continue once the Cavaliers inevitably acquire Carmelo Anthony and Chris Paul. It's time to stop this madness before it spirals out of control, and the NBA becomes a two-tiered league of contenders and D-League wannabes.

President Obama's greatest mistake, other than attending an Ivy League school and being a weak-kneed liberal, was that he didn't break up the big banks after the 2008 financial crisis. Bernie Sanders knew this, and would've won the 2016 Democratic Nomination with this argument had George Soros and Debbie Wasserman Schultz not rigged the game to stop him. It's time for Adam Silver to do what Obama couldn't: break up the big teams, the teams that have become too big to fail. Redistribute the wealth by putting Kevin Durant on the Brooklyn Nets as punishment for betraying Russell Westbrook and the Oklahoma City Thunder. End the concentration of the league's premier talent in two teams, or basketball's inequality crisis will escalate until upward mobility for weaker teams is extinguished. The fate of the game of basketball is on the line.

The Thunder Must Not Resign Kevin Durant

Danville, Kentucky - As the final days of the Carter administration came to a close, I pushed myself to finally be able to eat three taco 10 packs at taco bell for lunch. I knew I could do it. I had the dream. I had the ability. And I had the hope.

But I couldn't do it. As taco 24 became 25, something hit me. I was not going to be able to do it. Sure, I assumed if I gave myself another chance, I'd do it. So I did. Another 15 dollars at the local Mexican restaurant, and I had dreams of finishing my promise much as President elect Reagan had promised to free the hostages in Iran. President Reagan fulfilled his promise. I didn't fulfill mine.

The Thunder are like my dream of eating so many tacos, not able to happen. They get close. They lose in the finals. They lose in the Conference finals. They don't get close: They lose in the first round, and they lose without even making the playoffs. The Thunder cannot keep doing this.


Sometimes the hardest time to rebuild is when the house is still standing. But if you don't rebuild while the house is up, you can end up like the 76ers. That may be unfair, but Sam Preste's love of analytics has me worried the East Coast values embraced in Philly may come to the lovable tract of land the Thunder play in along I-35.

Durant cannot win a title. He's not LeBron. He's not Steph. He's not James Jones. Those guys are winners. Durant sadly has not been. He's a nice man. A good man, but not the man they need.

Westbrook should be given the chance. When a company fails for too long, it's C.E.O. should resign. At least that used to happen, until NAFTA allowed any C.E.O. to stay in power by off-setting his failures with lower wages through offshoring jobs to Canada. Westbrook needs to be the C.E.O. of the Thunder. He's won on the Olympic team, and he's gotten close as the #2 guy constantly. He could be the winner as the #1 guy.

Perhaps most importantly, Durant did nothing to stop the trade of James Harden. When I was a union boss, I didn't let our company sell our workers out. Durant let the Thunder sell James Harden. That alone was a fireable offense.

The time to let Durant walk is not easy. He's well-known and has a family. It won't be easy for him to lose his job. But winning isn't easy. Doing what's right is hard.