Reality: As U.S. military power diminishes, the vacuum will be filled by rival military powers, not some mythical democratic international arbitrator.

Robert Kagan – a Romney advisor – points out what isolationists like Ron Paul never seem to acknowledge:

But there is a danger in taking this wisdom too far and forgetting just how important U.S. military power has been in building and sustaining the present liberal international order.

That order has rested significantly on the U.S. ability to provide security in parts of the world, such as Europe and Asia, that had known endless cycles of warfare before the arrival of the United States. The world’s free-trade, free-market economy has depended on America’s ability to keep trade routes open, even during times of conflict. And the remarkably wide spread of democracy around the world owes something to America’s ability to provide support to democratic forces under siege and to protect peoples from dictators such as Moammar Gaddafi and Slobodan Milosevic. Some find it absurd that the United States should have a larger military than the next 10 nations combined. But that gap in military power has probably been the greatest factor in upholding an international system that, in historical terms, is unique — and uniquely beneficial to Americans.

The entire Robert Kagan article in the Washington Post is copied at end of this blog post.

——————————————————–
The importance of U.S. military might shouldn’t be underestimated – By Robert Kagan, Published: February 2

These days “soft” power and “smart” power are in vogue (who wants to make the case for “dumb” power?) while American “hard” power is on the chopping block. This is, in part, a symbolic sacrifice to the fiscal crisis — even though the looming defense cuts are a drop in the bucket compared with the ballooning entitlement spending that is not being cut. And partly this is the Obama administration’s election-year strategy of playing to a presumably war-weary nation.

But there is a theory behind all this: The United States has relied too much on hard power for too long, and to be truly effective in a complex, modern world, the United States needs to emphasize other tools. It must be an attractive power, capable of persuading rather than compelling. It must convene and corral both partners and non-partners, using economic, diplomatic and other means to “leverage” American influence.

These are sensible arguments. Power takes many forms, and it’s smart to make use of all of them. But there is a danger in taking this wisdom too far and forgetting just how important U.S. military power has been in building and sustaining the present liberal international order.

That order has rested significantly on the U.S. ability to provide security in parts of the world, such as Europe and Asia, that had known endless cycles of warfare before the arrival of the United States. The world’s free-trade, free-market economy has depended on America’s ability to keep trade routes open, even during times of conflict. And the remarkably wide spread of democracy around the world owes something to America’s ability to provide support to democratic forces under siege and to protect peoples from dictators such as Moammar Gaddafi and Slobodan Milosevic. Some find it absurd that the United States should have a larger military than the next 10 nations combined. But that gap in military power has probably been the greatest factor in upholding an international system that, in historical terms, is unique — and uniquely beneficial to Americans.

Nor should we forget that this power is part of what makes America attractive to many other nations. The world has not always loved America. During the era of Vietnam and Watergate and the ugly last stand of segregationists, America was often hated. But nations that relied on the United States for security from threatening neighbors tended to overlook the country’s flaws. In the 1960s, millions of young Europeans took to the streets to protest American “imperialism,” while their governments worked to ensure that the alliance with the United States held firm.

Soft power, meanwhile, has its limits. No U.S. president has enjoyed more international popularity than Woodrow Wilson did when he traveled to Paris to negotiate the treaty ending World War I. He was a hero to the world, but he found his ability to shape the peace, and to establish the new League of Nations, severely limited, in no small part by his countrymen’s refusal to commit U.S. military power to the defense of the peace. John F. Kennedy, another globally admired president, found his popularity of no use in his confrontations with Nikita Khrushchev, who, by Kennedy’s own admission, “beat the hell out of me” and who may have been convinced by his perception of Kennedy’s weakness that the United States would tolerate his placing Soviet missiles in Cuba.

The international system is not static. It responds quickly to fluctuations in power. If the United States were to cut too deeply into its ability to project military power, other nations could be counted on to respond accordingly. Those nations whose power rises in relative terms would display expanding ambitions commensurate with their new clout in the international system. They would, as in the past, demand particular spheres of influence. Those whose power declined in relative terms, like the United States, would have little choice but to cede some influence in those areas. Thus China would lay claim to its sphere of influence in Asia, Russia in eastern Europe and the Caucasus. And, as in the past, these burgeoning great-power claims would overlap and conflict: India and China claim the same sphere in the Indian Ocean; Russia and Europe have overlapping spheres in the region between the Black Sea and the Baltic. Without the United States to suppress and contain these conflicting ambitions, there would have to be complex adjustments to establish a new balance. Some of these adjustments could be made through diplomacy, as they were sometimes in the past. Other adjustments might be made through war or the threat of war, as also happened in the past.

The biggest illusion is to imagine that as American power declines, the world stays the same.

What has been true since the time of Rome remains true today: There can be no world order without power to preserve it, to shape its norms, uphold its institutions, defend the sinews of its economic system and keep the peace. Military power can be abused, wielded unwisely and ineffectively. It can be deployed to answer problems that it cannot answer or that have no answer. But it is also essential. No nation or group of nations that renounced power could expect to maintain any kind of world order. If the United States begins to look like a less reliable defender of the present order, that order will begin to unravel. People might indeed find Americans very attractive in this weaker state, but if the United States cannot help them when and where they need help the most, they will make other arrangements.

Grigori Perelman

It ain’t no Poincaré Conjecture, but figuring out if the movie Inception’s dream timelines make sense is as close as I’m coming to solving anything. So the only thing I likely have in common with a mathematician from St Petersburg who solved the hardest math problem of the 20th century — Grigori Perelman was so upset that it took six years for lessor mortals to figure out what he had done that he refused to show up to accept a prestigious medal and a million dollars he was awarded — is that we are both divorced.

I actually don’t know for a fact that he is divorced, but given that he is described as a recluse who lives with his Mom, combined with the nearby photo, all point to a certain level of detachment.  Factor in the unclaimed money and I’m betting that somewhere in Russia there is a really angry divorce attorney and an ex-wife brandishing a newspaper clipping telling everyone, “see.” But to be fair, I am still a Match.com profile away from confirmation on this one.

Being a fan of Christoper Nolan when Inception was released in 2010 was like being a Scorsese fan when Goodfellas was released in 1990. Perfectly positioned to appreciate a film maker at his best. After I watched the complicated movie and heard that Nolan had worked on the script for about ten years, I had faith that the movie’s logic would hold up.  As any serious movie fan — aka Fellow Celluloid Freaks [FCF] — will tell you, we don’t mind fantasy as long it contains a semblance of logic.  Which is why laws of physics for Super Mario Brothers and cartoons in general are both proper and good.

Godfather Pausality

However, as Inception wound its way through all the distribution stages — from “Just-in” to always on to DVR’d to Godfather Pausality [stage at which channel surfing comes to an abrupt and unappealable halt until scene completion] — blasphemous grumblings began to appear about the inconsistency of the timelines associated with dream levels.

When I heard them, I wasn’t angry; I know movie fans, I know we are head-strong, talking loud, saying stupid things. So when the Nolan doubters turned up, I let it go. And I said to myself, this is the path Grigori and I have chosen [silent computation]; so I didn’t ask who gave the grumbles, because it had nothing to do with eventually spreadsheeting their asses straight to movie purgatory [now showing, Paul Blart: Mall Cop].

The Logic and Rules of Inception

• Dreams are a way of invading other people’s thoughts.
• Someone who would like to extract information [the Dreamer] from another person’s [the Subject] subconscious needs to do so when both are in a dream state.
• The Dreamer uses the Subject’s subconscious to populate the dream which the Dreamer [can also be the Architect] has created and can control to obtain the information.
• A chemical called Somnacin is used to immediately induce the level of dreaming required to access subconscious thoughts.
• The chemical is administered using a Portable Automated Somnacin Intravenous [PASIV] Device.  The MV-235A.  It’s remarkably similar to a Samsonite suitcase.
• When you dream, your mind functions more quickly, so time seems to pass more slowly.  The brain functions at a rate 12x faster than normal.  The rate of 12 is established when Cobb and Arthur indicate that one hour in a dream is equivalent to 5 minutes in the real world.
• When people are killed in a dream, they awake in real life.
• Extractors play the role of lawyers.  They spend their time hoping to profit indirectly from the accomplishments or misdeeds of others.
• However, in order for Extractors to accomplish Inception — the planting of an idea in the subconscious, not just accessing existing thoughts — Cobb’s team would have had to gone down to multiple dream levels. Dreams within dreams.
• The rules of dream time are compounded at every level down of dreaming.  So time at dream level 2 is accelerated at 12 x 12.
• Alas, If someone dies in a multilevel dream, they drop into Limbo instead of awaking in real life.  A kick replaces death as the way to return to real life from multilevel dreams.
• A kick is a feeling of falling which snaps you awake.  As in tipping over backwards into a tub of water, plunging vans and exploding elevators.  These, naturally, must occur in sequence.
• Multiple dream levels require a stronger dose of Somnacin.  Yusuf [the Chemist] has created an advanced Somnacin derivative which allows for the dreamers at each level to remain dormant until the kicks kick in.
• Under Yusuf’s advanced Somnacin derivative, the accelerated brain function speeds up to “about 20x normal.”  We will soon learn why “about” is important.
• Cobb and Ariadne describe the effect: “It’s basically a week one layer down, six months two layers down and ten years in the third level.”

Would it have killed them to have been more precise about the rate of the advanced brain function?

Here’s the problem.  The numbers didn’t seem to add up [or down].  A cursory search on the web turned up these unsuccessful efforts at reconciling the timelines provided in the movie, see here and here.  But overlooked in all the computations were the fact that Nolan’s characters were conveniently vague about the calculations.  Yusuf indicated that the accelerated brain function was “about 20x.”  Cobb’s timeline was “basically one week down….”  With faith in Nolan and praying that higher math was unnecessary to justify that faith, I turned to Excel to help those afflicted with disbelief.

The answer is that the numbers work at an accelerated brain function of 22 times normal. Nolan is now free to proceed with the Dark Knight sequel.  See the spreadsheet below.

Inception’s ending is explained.

Click to view or print chart

Would it have killed Cobb to just say 22?

Asta-Qui did send word through untraceable channels [the pigeon supposedly took its own life and was then consumed] that Iran is a peace-loving nation, save for their desire to destroy Israel and settle accounts with Iraq and one of the Shah’s grandchildren who printed an offensive cartoon in a 1992 newsletter. He also threw his support, and that of nervous co-workers, behind Ron Paul’s presidential campaign.

Asta-Qui was surprised and quite pleased to hear that the intellectual underpinnings for the foreign policy of one of the United States presidential hopefuls was the non-Muslim Golden Rule. [Asta-Qui was initially confused and had inquired if gold played a role in all of Paul's beliefs].

The Paul campaign was thrilled to sign up their first supporters with scientific backgrounds. Far from being embarrassed, the campaign is doubling-down on ‘sloganeering for dummies’ as legitimate policy prescriptions. Their new stance on how to eliminate waste, fraud and abuse is to urge all Americans to “waste not, want not.”

For Americans living outside of Area 51, there are important questions to be addressed prior to the implementation of Paul’s Golden Rule. Who are the ‘others.’ Who gets to define the ‘others,’ the State Department or the White House? If the ‘others’ are not technically governments but operate with their implicit permission can acts of retaliation be grandfathered in? Will a listing of Muslim-based medieval crimes and their most appropriate Western equivalents be available to guide retaliations? Failing that, it could take forever to implement a chopping of a hand despite adequate documentation of the initial chop and a notarized OSHA waiver on file.

As for Asta-Qui Yege, the sky’s the limit. In chunks.

While sports in general and NFL playoff games in specific are not meant to be morality plays, it still feels good to witness people who have acted badly, criminally in Roethlisberger’s case, not continue to succeed on such a public stage. I assume it’s bad for the business of saving souls when louts, or worse, seemingly flourish.

While the defeat of a sports team obviously does not represent a punishment worthy of rape, any setback will do. People like Gerry Sandusky and Ben Roethlisberger indirectly help me by putting other sports emotions in perspective. For example, thanks to them I realize that the only place I hope to see Nick Saban suffer is at sporting events. For the likes of Sandusky and Roethlisberger, part of me hopes that their suffering only begins there.

But thanks to my Christian faith and many direct examples and some indirect ones, like Tim Tebow, I know that that part of me should not govern my thoughts or actions. I believe that the part of me that thinks that way is not so much wrong as incomplete. That part of me leaves God out of the equation and attempts to substitute my will.  Those thoughts, let alone actions, are not what I wish to defend come judgment day.

So for now I resist my un-Christian urges and work towards a day when I can truly pray for those whom I currently can only resist the urge to wish ill. While I hope I’m limping towards Heaven, the possibility exists that I’m actually slouching towards Gomorrah. Fear being a great motivator, I hearby resolve to pray for Nick Saban.

First thing on Tuesday.

What is Tebowing? [the verb]
To get down on a knee and start praying, even if everyone else around you is doing something completely different.

Uganda golf camp Tebowing

Ballerina Tebowing

A recent fun and occasionally heated [the 2 are related] sports argument began with a defense of Tim Tebow and ended up with my assertion that at least Tebow was not a rapist like Ben Roethlisberger. You will not be surprised that the family member I told this to is a Pittsburgh Steelers fan. He responded with the always solid advice of ‘put up or shut up.’  Given that one of my heroes, GK Chesterton, stated that even a bad shot is dignified when accepting a challenge, here it goes.  While writing a blog post destined to be read by friends and seen only briefly by dozens of others–who arrive courtesy of Google and Bing searches which were too general to be useful–may not qualify as ‘putting up,’ but it will have to do.

First a disclaimer: I have a parental role with 3 teenagers, 2 of the female persuasion. My sympathy for violent acts against women of drunken males who are typically civilized when coherent, is limited. When the perpetrators are wealthy athletes who use their money and status to select their eventual victims and then escape responsibility, my sympathy is nonexistent.

In an American court of law, ‘beyond a reasonable doubt’ is the standard of evidence required to validate a criminal conviction. I’m glad it is, there. But that standard is not an excuse to go through life as a moral pygmy, unable to form opinions and exercise one’s judgment because life does not unfold with a readily available youtube video or a detailed grand jury report to confirm events.

The case of what happened with Ben Roethlisberger and the twenty year-old female college student on the evening which began March 4, 2010 is a good example. Other than referring to the twenty year-old female as a victim, none of these bullet points are in dispute:

• Five female college students, most sorority sisters, hit the clubs on a Friday night in a small college town, Midgeville, GA.
• Roethlisberger, in town for a golf event, also hit the clubs with an entourage of six people, two of which were law enforcement officers.
• The Roethlisberger entourage and most of the females eventually went to three clubs that evening, Velvet Elvis, Brick and Capital City. 
• At each of the clubs, Roethlisberger ends up in the VIP area where his entourage can protect him from the crowds and invite women to join their group.
• The victim meets Rothlisberger at Velvet Elvis and allows him to buy her alcohol and was flirting with him there and at Capital City.
• Close to midnight at Capital City, the victim is asked by one of Roethlisberger’s “bodyguards” to wait for him in a “side door/hallway” an area adjacent to the VIP room.

• Roethlisberger and the victim move from that hallway to a small [9x5] nearby bathroom.
• The victim’s friends become concerned when she is missing, partly because she was so drunk. One of them attempts to get into the area where the victim went but is rebuffed by one of Roethlisberger’s bodyguards who tells her he doesn’t know where her friend and Roethlisberger are while simultaneously denying her access to the hallway/bathroom area.
• Another friend finds the club manager, who she already knew, and tells him [Rocky] that her friend is very drunk and shouldn’t be back there with Roethlisberger. He tells her not to worry, since Roethlisberger wouldn’t do anything that would “ruin his reputation.”
• The victim emerges after about 10 minutes crying and immediately tells her friends that Roethlisberger had raped her.
• They find a police car outside the club and report the rape immediately.
• The victim and five of her friends give written and video testimonies to the police later that same evening.

• After the police station, they head over to a local hospital where a standard rape evidence kit was collected from the victim.
• One of Roethlisberger’s law enforcement bodyguards is later dismissed from his job due to his involvement in the incident.

Here is part of the statement by the local District Attorney on why he declined to prosecute Roethlisberger:

The victim was driven by a friend to the Oconee Regional Medical Center, the local hospital in Milledgeville. An emergency-room doctor and two nurses examined her. Noted in their report was a superficial laceration and bruising and slight bleeding in the genital area. Everything else in the medical examination was normal. The doctor stated that he could not say these were or were not from any kind of trauma or sexual assault. A standard rape evidence kit was collected. The doctor found no evidence of semen or discharge. The swabbings from the rape-evidence kit were tested by the Georgia Bureau of Investigation crime lab in Atlanta, Georgia, and the initial testing found human male DNA present. Additional extensive testing was done, but because the sample was so minute it would not yield a profile. The crime lab advised that extracting DNA from Mr. Roethlisberger at this point was futile due to the fact that no profile was available from the minute male DNA sample submitted in the rape-evidence kit. Hence, that is when Mr. Roethlisberger’s attorney was informed that no buccal-swab samples for DNA would be needed from his client anymore.

Here’s where the criminal justice system and our consciousnesses need to diverge.

I read the victim’s statement believe her for two reasons.  First, she reacts like someone who has been victimized.  She emerges from the bathroom distraught and does the following without delay:  Tells her friends that she has been raped, finds a police officer, gives written and video statements at the police station and travels to a hospital to be examined for rape.  Her actions and the timeline reveal no indecision or hesitation.  The second reason are the comments she reportedly made to Roethlisberger as the rape unfolded.  They are so understated that they add to her believability.  She told him, “you don’t have to do this” and “this is not right.”  If someone was inventing a rape,  the comments attributed to Roethlisberger and her own would have been more incriminating.

The incident reminded me of a very good movie called The Sure Thing. Here’s the plot as simply as possible: A guy is setup with a girl who will ‘put out.’ Just before they will have sex, she asks him an innocent but devastating question, “Do you love me?” John Cusack’s character lacks the heart to lie and so there was no sex.  Behind the innocent and simple question was a great insight; even ‘sure things’ never want to be treated like ‘sure things.’

That’s why I can believe that the twenty year-old female, aided by her libido, alcohol and her imagination, was perhaps even hoping for some type of sexual encounter with Rothlisberger as she sat on the stool waiting for him in that hallway.  But when he emerged in that hallway right next to the VIP room with his penis hanging out, those thoughts began to change.  Fear elbowing out lust, as her intoxication begins subsiding.  When they stumbled into the small bathroom, any amorous thoughts likely vanished along with her hopes of dissuading him.  Then, not unlike the ‘sure thing,’ she pleads, “you don’t have to do this.”  Meaning, ‘hey, I want you, but come on … not like this.’

But her ‘date’ was not a movie character written to do the right thing.  Her date was a wealthy celebrity accustomed to getting what he desired.  He was also drunk, physically imposing and likely upset that his bodyguard-aided selection process ended up with someone who was now having second thoughts.  So he ignored her no’s, her pleading and her tears.  One more reason why porn should come with a disclaimer. It would read something like this:

Warning: The women portrayed here are paid professionals. Do not attempt to recreate these scenes either at home or in public urinals unsupervised.

But even Roethlisberger’s drunken fantasies were no match for the victim’s passive tears, which is why there was “no evidence of semen or discharge” as he likely wound down in shame within minutes.  That’s the scenario which seems likeliest to me.  To think otherwise requires someone to believe that even an intoxicated female welcomed the idea of copulating in a urinal adjacent to the VIP room, enjoyed the sex [all 6 minutes of it], but then decided–in the 30 seconds between walking out of Roethlisberger’s Kohler faucet fantasy and seeing her friends–to engage in a criminal conspiracy in the hopes of further cashing in on the experience.

What do you believe and why?  It is not enough to say that we don’t know, when a young woman’s psyche lies in the balance.  What do you believe is likely?  If you are a Steelers fan and prefer to avoid the topic you are putting your sports allegiances ahead of your conscious.  Weak.  Those who actually defend Roethlisberger and believe the victim is lying don’t just have a different point of view. They have a point of view which is illogical and cynical in the extreme regarding the motivations of an attractive twenty year-old college student. Is that really the profile of a person we can reasonably believe that at the end of a Friday night of bar hopping with friends would instantaneously devise a lie which entailed making false statements to law enforcement, undergoing a medical examination for rape and enlist friends to perpetuate that lie?

When the people who doubt the young woman are also Pittsburgh Steelers fans, their motives call into question their integrity. As in, someone who believes the convenient at the expense of the meek. They side with the powerful out of expediency, not with logic or compassion.  Blessed they are not.

Roethlisberger rape related links:

Here’s what a false rape accusation might look like – 2nd woman – Andrea McNulty

TMZ – Link to Midgeville, GA police reports

TMZ part 2 – Police report about another [3rd] woman involving Roethlisberger

Art Rooney II – Documenting rape related charges

Peter King – Documenting rape related charges

Tim Keown – Documenting rape related charges

Pro Football Talk – Documenting rape related charges

ESPN – Documenting rape related charges

Politicol News blog – Documenting rape related charges

Penalty Flag blog – Documenting rape related charges

The Wall Street Journal weighed on on the SEC probe of the Marlins Stadium deal. I was most interested on their perspective on what the SEC probe could be expected to focus on. An excerpt:

A person involved with the ballpark’s financing said the investigation may revolve around the Marlins’ claims that the team needed public help because it could not afford to pay for a new ballpark.
…
The Marlins had argued that the team needed public help to shore up its finances. Financial documents published last year by the website Deadspin showed the team had been turning a profit.
…
Mr. Nortman, who teaches a class on SEC violations for Nova Southeastern’s law school in Fort Lauderdale, says the SEC will likely want to know whether the purchasers of stadium bonds were given full disclosure of the financial status of the borrowers involved, and also whether there may have been any “pay for play” involved on behalf of the parties.

Allow me to expand on “the team had been turning a profit.” According to Forbes — whose reporting the Deadspin financials validated — this is how the Marlins ranked among MLB teams in terms of operating profits in the years before, during, and after finalizing the Stadium agreement with local governments:

• 2006 – $43 million – #1
• 2007 – $36 million – #2
• 2008 – $44 million – #1
• 2009 – $46 million – #1

Appreciate the hurdle the Marlins face in defending themselves.  How to suggest that they did anything but misrepresent their financial condition?

See my recap of the Forbes Business of Baseball reporting on the Marlins from 2002 through 2010 [click here]. Each year is linked to the Forbes reporting for that year.

The WSJ article referenced is copied in full at the end of the post.

——————————————————————————-
MLB DECEMBER 5, 2011

SEC Examines Marlins Stadium Deal

By TIMOTHY W. MARTIN, REED ALBERGOTTI and MATTHEW FUTTERMAN

The U.S. Securities & Exchange Commission has opened an investigation into the public financing deal behind the Miami Marlins’ new ballpark.

SEC officials delivered letters to the city of Miami and Miami-Dade County Thursday, requesting financial records, meeting minutes and communications with the team and officials from Major League Baseball, according to a person familiar with the matter. Miami and county officials have until Jan. 6 to deliver the documents.

Public funding of the $634 million Miami ballpark has been controversial.

The federal regulators will examine nearly $500 million in bonds sold to fund the ballpark and the financial deal struck for stadium parking garages, according to the county and to a statement from the team.

A person involved with the ballpark’s financing said the investigation may revolve around the Marlins’ claims that the team needed public help because it could not afford to pay for a new ballpark.

SEC senior counsel Drew Panahi declined to comment on the case.

In a statement, the Marlins said they were aware of the investigation. “Of course we will fully cooperate with the SEC’s investigation as needed and assist in whatever way possible.”

A Miami-Dade County spokeswoman said the county “will comply with the SEC’s request and provide the documents they’re asking for.”

It is not clear whether MLB has received subpoenas. A spokesman for the league declined to comment.

The financing plan for the 37,000-seat ballpark, which was built on the site of the former Orange Bowl and is expected to open next spring, has been a source of controversy.

Under the plan, city and county are responsible for nearly 80% of the stadium’s overall cost of $634 million, according to the Miami Herald, which first reported the subpoenas.

The Marlins had argued that the team needed public help to shore up its finances. Financial documents published last year by the website Deadspin showed the team had been turning a profit.

After the documents were published, Marlins president David Samson told the Palm Beach Post the team showed a hefty profit in certain years when it was conserving money for its ballpark project.

The public funding deal, which was struck without a public referendum, came as South Florida faced mounting struggles with high unemployment and a cooling economy.

In March, Miami-Dade County residents recalled mayor Carlos Alvarez—a move that was driven, in part, by his support for the ballpark plan.

Norman Braman, a Miami car mogul who filed an unsuccessful lawsuit in 2008 to block the ballpark deal, wanted to force a public referendum. Mr. Braman also wanted Marlins owner Jeffrey Loria to prove the team needed public dollars by sharing the team’s finances.

In a July 2009 Miami Herald editorial, Mr. Braman said he backed a public referendum because the tough economy meant the government needed to be fiscally responsible. He called a lot of the projected economic benefits “blatant exaggerations” and new jobs a “myth.”

In an interview Saturday, Mr. Braman said he was pleased to learn of the SEC investigation because Miami-Dade residents “are entitled to transparency.”

Mr. Alvarez could not be reached for comment.

While none of the bonds issued for the stadium project are in default, William Nortman, a former SEC lawyer who is now in private practice in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., said the SEC can still press charges if it believes that any financial information was misrepresented during the process.

Mr. Nortman, who teaches a class on SEC violations for Nova Southeastern’s law school in Fort Lauderdale, says the SEC will likely want to know whether the purchasers of stadium bonds were given full disclosure of the financial status of the borrowers involved, and also whether there may have been any “pay for play” involved on behalf of the parties.

“This is not the first time and may not be the last time” that the SEC has looked into bond deals in Miami, he said.

If the SEC finds wrongdoing in the investigation, it can choose to bring a civil suit against parties involved, issue fines or refer the case to the United States Department of Justice for possible criminal charges.

The Marlins drew the third-lowest attendance per game of the 30 Major League Baseball teams in 2011, drawing just 19,007 fans per home game.

Write to Timothy W. Martin at timothy.martin@wsj.com, Reed Albergotti at reed.albergotti@wsj.com and Matthew Futterman at matthew.futterman@wsj.com

I was slowly approaching the street light as I pulled off the I-95 Brickell exit.  To my left, a shiny foreign luxury car [Brickell Motors client no doubt] slowly glided alongside me.  The driver was a just past middle-age woman with an immaculate appearance, the look that screams realtor.  What really caught my attention, from my SUV perch, was the fact that the driver was intently focused for an extended period on the smartphone in her lap.

As she continued to glide and scan her smartphone, I was now perfectly situated in her blind spot.  I have rarely honked my horn with such glee.  The driver was startled, then annoyed.  With embarrassing satisfaction, I watched as she, not unlike an NFL quarterback, worked through her progressions. Had she drifted?  No.  Had she stopped too close to the car ahead?  No.  Had she been going too slow for the car behind her?  No.

Therein lies the beauty of this new weapon against careless drivers, the unidentified [due to disorientation] honker.  Under normal conditions, if we are honked at when we are not doing anything wrong, we might take a casual glance around.  But to the guilty and distracted mind of a smartphone-obsessed driver, there is always the possibility that they are about to glance up to a life, or deductible, challenging scenario.

So please dear and rare reader, whenever you observe the same, honk, then enjoy the momentary panic, as you drag another careless driver in from the abyss.  You’ll be doing good and bringing scorn to those who richly deserve it.

This summer, as part of a shameless plan to focus on reading shorter books to drive up my total books read for the year, I was working my way through the Penguin Lives series and got to Charles Dickens by Jane Smiley. Smiley wrote:

… Dickens more signal quality, the one most often commented upon by his acquaintances and the one he relied upon at all times, was his energy. It was in this period [age 26] that he took up the habit of long, vigorous daily walks that seem almost unimaginable today for an otherwise very busy man with many obligations. At a pace of 12 to 15 minutes per mile, he regularly covered 20 and sometimes 30 miles. Returning, as his brother-in-law said, “he looked the personification of energy which seem to ooze from every pore as from some hidden reservoir….”

I read that the first time just as I had returned from one of my favorite activities, an hour long walk along the shore of beautiful Siesta Key Beach in Sarasota. I resolved then and there to make a nightly walk part of my routine.

Five months later, while not a nightly routine, I do walk about 2 to 3 times a week, typically for about an hour. Combined with the amazing iMapMyRun app, I now know how I compare to Dickens 12 to 15 minute mile pace. Now in my 50′s, my walks are between 16 and 18 minute miles. How the the mightly flabby have steadily fallen. In my 30′s, I regularly competed in basketball pickup games at public parks located in neighborhoods which qualified as Federal Empowerment Zones. In my 40′s I placed in the top 5 in 3 marathons among those with a body fat which exceeded 30%. Now this.

First, it’s hard enough comprehending that one of the most prolific writers ever took daily walks which lasted between 4 and 5 hours. On top of that, Dickens superior pace comes despite the fact that he walked the cobbly streets of London while mentally registering bizarre characters who would find their way into his novels, while I walk the paved, painted, and reflector loaded streets along Coral Way as it intersects the Roads neighborhood. I only mentally register unlit condo balconies and the occasional vagrant who eyes me as cautiously as I eye them.

So then how to justify or explain the disparity in pace and distance with a 19th century writer with lumbago? I can’t, unless of course Jane Smiley, Diane Stanley and Peter Vennema are inveterate liars.  I just have to look on the bright side, at least Dickens didn’t have a Masters in Fine Arts degree. Males who are physically outperformed by other males possessing an MFA — lowest known rung [to date] on the masculinity chart — routinely have their man card revoked for an indefinite period of time.

While there were various claims to Braman’s initial lawsuit, the Judge’s ruling focused only on one [Count 4]. Another claim [Count 5] was invalidated due to a Florida Supreme Court ruling.  They ruled that municipalities do not have get voter approval before committing ad valorem money toward bonds.

So the Braman trial boiled down to one issue. Did the baseball stadium serve a “paramount public purpose?”  Judge Cohen ruled that it did and it doesn’t read as though it was a tough call.  She wrote “… similar to the trend in Florida, courts across the country have consistently held that sports stadiums serve a paramount public purpose.”  Cohen relied particularly on one case she described as “strikingly similar” to the Marlins situation, the building of a stadium for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. I’ll leave it to others to wonder if the Poe case makes a po’ precedent [sorry].

Here is how Sports Illustrated has summarized the SEC’s request:

The parking garage tax issue is specifically mentioned by the SEC. Investigators also want records about the Marlins’ ability to contribute to the stadium complex’s financing, the team’s revenues and profitability, and whether any Marlins employees gave “any payments, loans, campaign contributions or any offers of anything of value” to city, county or state government officials.

The SEC also wants detailed information about the bonds used to finance the stadium and whether investors might have been misled.

Not all SEC investigations end in enforcement actions, but enforcement actions typically end in settlements that can include fines and other penalties. Investigators can refer individuals or companies to the Justice Department for potential criminal prosecution.

Now here are some of the issues documented in Judge Cohen’s order which were not part of the narrow “public purpose” issue she eventually ruled on:

• “The financial condition of the Marlins is unknown to anyone except the Marlins and MLB.”
• “… It is undisputed that the County has no idea whether or not the Marlins can satisfy any of their obligations under the BSA.”
• “… the terms of the negotiated deal are not a subject for this Court’s scrutiny”
• “While the Court agrees with Plaintiff that the Marlins are getting what amounts to a ‘sweet deal,’ this is, put bluntly, not the business of this Court.”

The reason I believe that the SEC probe is not a replay of the Braman trial, is that the SEC’s concerns differ greatly from that a civil court judge. I believe the SEC very much considers it its business if the Marlins obtained a ‘sweet deal’ through misleading representations to local governments. Especially if those representations were then relied upon to determine which government bonds to be issued.

Meet real Miamian’s favorite new fathead poster:

Federal authorities have opened a wide-ranging investigation into the Miami Marlins’ controversial ballpark deal with Miami-Dade County and the city of Miami, demanding financial information underpinning nearly $500 million in bond sales as well as records of campaign contributions from the Marlins to local and state elected leaders.

In a pair of lengthy letters delivered to government attorneys Thursday, the U.S. Securities & Exchange Commission gave the city and county until Jan. 6 to deliver everything from minutes of meetings between government leaders and Marlins owner Jeffrey Loria and Major League Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig, to records of Marlins finances dating back to 2007.

I thought it right that the SEC extended their focus beyond Miami to Bud Selig and MLB. After all, in Miami’s version of The Wire, the Marlins just have one of the Towers. Bud Selig is the Avon Barksdale character pulling on the strings. Speaking of which, the Stringer Bell role in this play is a combination of Rod Manfred and Bob DuPuy.

In the hopes of obtaining public financing for the new stadium, the Marlins lied to reporters and fans about their finances.   Who knows, for now, what they actually told or shared with government officials.  They did it all with the blessings of Major League Baseball.  Given that David Samson would often make silly [here], misleading [here and here] or false [here and here] statements about the Marlins finances, especially on his radio show, it must have all seemed like a very clever game to them. They acted, as Mr. Omar Little once commented, as though it was “all in the Game, y’all, all in the Game.”

The Braman trial has now become like a grand jury report for the SEC. Every government official who testified at the Braman trial is going to be spending a lot of money on attorney fees. The Marlins and MLB must be hoping that those attorney’s are very good because those officials are not the endgame in this investigation. Hard to imagine how this ends without some admission of guilt or complicity on the part of the Marlins and a fine which significantly increases their share of the stadium costs. Pigs get fat, hogs finally got someone’s attention that didn’t think it was a game and is in a position to do something about it.

The repercussions are just beginning. At the SunSentinel, Juan C. Rodriguez considers the initial effects:

With the new stadium, the possibility of another “market correction” as the club termed its pre-2006 purge would seem unfathomable. Yet the investigation conceivably might unnerve free agents looking for deals of five-plus years. Ultimately, players in most cases follow the money, but whether warranted or not, some might shy away from not having no-trade protection in light of this new specter.

The Marlins earlier this week with their 3-year, $27 million commitment to Bell silenced skeptics who believed their dalliances with upper echelon free agents were some kind of ruse. Though the SEC investigation barely is off the ground, the Marlins already may have lost whatever small earnings they made in public trust.

Update 12/04: My blog is mentioned in Juan C. Rodriguez’s article about the Marlins reaction to the SEC filing.

Articles referenced are copied in full at the end of this blog post.

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Marlins say baseball business as usual in spite of SEC probe

By Juan C. Rodriguez, Sun Sentinel

10:57 p.m. EST, December 3, 2011

Keeping the focus on the field instead of the finances is proving no easier for the Miami Marlins than it did for the Florida Marlins.

Buzz around the Marlins late Friday went from free agency to a federal agency, specifically the Securities and Exchange Commission and its probe into the club’s stadium deal with the City of Miami and Miami-Dade County.

The Miami Herald reported the SEC has issued subpoenas for all matter of material from the City and County regarding the $634 million project.

The Marlins released a statement saying they were aware of the investigation and were ready to fully cooperate with the SEC. In addition, no further comments would be forthcoming because it was an on-going matter.

Jorge Costales is a certified public accountant and blogger (www.2thinkgood.com) who’s researched and written extensively about the Marlins’ finances.

He believes this probe could mean serious trouble for the club in light of testimony offered during the Norman Braman trial. Remember it was Braman who filed a lawsuit trying to derail the stadium project.

“The Braman trial has now become like a grand jury report for the SEC,” Costales said.

“Every government official who testified at the Braman trial is going to be spending a lot of money on attorney fees. … Those officials are not the end game in this investigation. Hard to imagine how this ends without some admission of guilt or complicity on the part of the Marlins and a fine which significantly increases their share of the stadium cost. Pigs get fat. Hogs get the SEC’s attention.”

A Marlins official said the investigation would not impact the club’s roster construction and pursuit of top-level talent this offseason.

It may not have a bearing from the club’s standpoint, but whether it gives some free agents pause can’t be discounted. They may now have concerns about signing a long-term deal to play in Miami only to find themselves on the trading block after a couple of seasons if the result of the investigation impact the franchise financially.

Fox Sports on Friday reported one potential roadblock between the Marlins and left-hander Mark Buehrle is the club’s policy not to give no-trade provisions. The Marlins have no plans to change it for Buehrle, Jose Reyes, Albert Pujols or anyone else.

With the new stadium, the possibility of another “market correction” as the club termed its pre-2006 player purge would seem unfathomable. Yet the investigation might unnerve some free agents looking to stay in one spot the next five-plus years. Miami-based agent Barry Praver doesn’t foresee the Marlins having difficulty signing players.

“Let’s don’t rush to judgment,” he said. “This is speculative. If one of our clients wants to play for the Marlins, it’s business as usual.”

The Marlins earlier this week with their three-year, $27 million commitment to closer Heath Bell silenced skeptics who believed their dalliances with upper echelon free agents were a ruse.

Though the SEC investigation barely is off the ground, the Marlins already may have lost whatever small gains they made in public trust.

jcrodriguez@tribune.com or @JCRMarlinsbeat on Twitter.