YES. We ARE All Witnesses.

I stopped watching NBA games over a decade ago. A league without rules, or more specifically, certain rules for certain players and teams is really no better or interesting for me to watch than the “wrestling” in the WWE. At least the WWE now acknowledges that it is “entertainment” not sport. To me, the NBA is no different. I feel that the league and the officials conspire to market first, stay true the sport—well, that’s got to be 7th or 8th on the list.

With that frame of mind, I didn’t think I’d really care either way about LeBron James’ “Decision” about where he’d be playing the next few years of his career. I honestly hoped that he wasn’t going to come to my home town of Chicago. I get that he’s a superstar, but he’s always rubbed me the wrong way. My rooting interest was for him to remain in Cleveland. I’ve felt bad for them ever since Michael Jordan hit “the shot” over Craig Ehlo. As a fellow Midwesterner, I understand the draw of the home town kid whose made good.

So, with only that casual rooting interest, I was surprised at how deep and visceral my reaction was when the announcement came that Mr. James was taking his game to Long Beach. I had a feeling for him that literally bordered on hatred. Watching such blatant narcissism at the expense of and in the face of a home-town city, which had treated him like the “king” he claimed to be was literally painful.

I’ve heard people talk about how uncomfortable he looked up on that stage, but I have a hard time feeling sorry for him when it was his choice to be there. It’s ridiculous to believe that his decision was made just that morning. James has been a member of the Heat for two years now in all but uniform. How does “King” James choose to tell his loyal “witnesses?” He hides behind some kids from the Boys & Girls Club in a town in Connecticut.

But that wasn’t all. He spoke in third person. And perhaps most cruelly of all, he chose Miami without saying much positive at all about Cleveland. Oh, he pointed out that he played hard for them, he acknowledged all he brought to that team and the city, but all he said about Cleveland or the Cavaliers was that he had much respect for them.

Much respect. So. That’s nice. Huh?

That word has become a joke. Respect. When you respect a city, it’s people and it’s team, you don’t go on television, on an hour-long program glorifying yourself when you know your decision will hurt all those you leave behind. When you respect the fans and the team and the city, even if you do decide to leave, you cancel the show, you release a heartfelt press-release explaining your decision and begging the forgiveness of the people you supposedly respected.

You don’t make a spectacle. You don’t rub in an entire city—an entire state’s face just to appease your own narcissistic needs. Is anyone else tired of celebrities and superstars feeding and fueling their own narcissism in these kinds of spectacles and expecting us to be okay with it simply because they donate the proceeds to some charity? Congratulations Boys & Girls Clubs, you’re whores. And if I was dying of thirst, I’d crawl into the afterlife parched before drinking a Vitamin Water.

Your Nike commercials say it best LeBron. We are all witnesses. We witness not only your play on the court, but the way in which you comport yourself off it. We are not fooled by a pittance given to a charity, we know what this was about. It was all about you. It was one of the most gross and painful to watch displays I’ve ever seen.

And I can’t help but draw parallels. I remember back to when I did watch the NBA and I remember my childhood hero, Michael Jordan. Mr. James will never live up to that mantle. He’ll never reach the standards of excellence set either on or off the court by MJ. As witnessed by his induction speech into the Hall of Fame, Jordan obviously had that same narcissism, but throughout his career, he managed it, he kept it inside. He took challengers as affronts to his supremacy and he dispatched them like a cold-blooded assassin.

By all accounts, James has done nothing but choke in the playoffs. Instead of taking challengers as slights to your supremacy and vanquishing them, James chose to partner with at least one player who is arguably his equal or even his better. I learned all I’ll ever need to know about LeBron James last night. The Air is rare in the echelon where the masters reside and the King will never breath it.

And we’re all witnesses.

...your father's brother's nephew's cousin's former roommate

As things have unfolded over the past few weeks, and the Governor of my home state of Illinois has finally been removed, I’ve remained silent on the subject because some targets are just too easy. How do you lampoon a caricature? I mean, we’ve always had a good chuckle over Hot Rod Blagojevich’s hair, but as long as he was standing in the way of tax increases, installing open road tolling to make our commutes shorter, making medications cheaper for senior citizens and really doing a lot of great things for the state of Illinois, we really didn’t mind that much that he looked like a cartoon character.

Honestly, until this mess about selling Obama’s Senate seat came to light, most people thought he was doing a pretty decent job of being the governor. We looked at his hair and met it with a chuckle instead of an outright laugh. It’s okay to be funny looking in Illinois politics if you do a good job. Look no further than former senator Paul Simon for that proof.

And the truth of the matter is that until the scandal hit, Blagojevich didn’t go around acting like an ass either. He was typically well-spoken, poised and lucid. Sure, there were whispers of corruption, but it’s impossible to a politician in this state and not have corruption whispers. Hell, not long ago Chicago—the political corruption capitol of the world, arrogantly made it’s slogan, “The City that Works,” in what could only be a veiled reference to the fact that the system of corruption in place was a well-oiled, efficiently running machine.

Illinois residents aren’t really upset that Blago tried to sell Obama’s seat, though we’re not thrilled about the fact that he tried to extort one of our newspapers and a children’s hospital. We’re pissed that he, A) got caught, and B) acted like such as asshole after being caught.

The getting caught part is inexcusable and stupid. Richard Daley, the mayor of Chicago has been more crooked than a basket full of S’s throughout his long career as the mayor here. He gets things done though. He’s going to bring the Olympics to Chicago. He keeps our streets cleared of snow. He fills the potholes in front of our homes (as long as you’re a registered Democrat). Are there sweetheart deals in place regarding each of those things? Of course! Do we care? Nope. Will Daley ever find himself in a Blago-like mess? Of course not! Why? Because you can bet your sweet ass that while he waves the baton and conducts the orchestra, he’s always three or four steps away from the crime.

That’s what being a good politician means here. Get shit done. Keep the price tag low. We won’t ask. You don’t tell. Don’t make us look stupid. And that was Blagojevich’s second mistake. When he got caught with his hand in the cookie jar instead of having his cookies delivered to him, he went apeshit crazy!

When you look like a cartoon, you can’t afford to talk like one and that is precisely what Blago did. It took me a while to place it, but eventually I’ve gotten a handle on it. The absurd speech, the complete lack of sense and reason, the self-proclaimed martyrdom, the delusions of grandeur, the hairmet—he went from being the governor to being the Rick Moranis character Dark Helmet from the Mel Brooks movie Spaceballs.

Coincidentally, when the leader of your state is running around, appearing on talk shows, howling at the moon and doing an impression of a Mel Brooks character, it’s pretty much the epitome of embarrassment for his constituents. And when the constituency is anchored by a city that disdainfully accepts the nickname of Second City and constantly puffs it’s collective chest when it betters any other American city in any way—you’ve officially committed the most unforgivable of sins.

And now we have a new governor. After Dark Helmet was removed from office by unanimous vote and banned from ever holding office in our state again, Patrick Quinn took over and promptly assured us all that corruption was over and better times were ahead. He told us that we the citizens of Illinois would have to sacrifice to clear up the $3 million in state debt, and then without blinking an eye, approved $30,000 to remove Dark Helmet’s name from every sign on every tollway in the state.

This move has been widely applauded. Better to pay the boys some overtime and have them remove signs over the weekend than to suffer a little more embarrassment by having to read Blagojevich’s name on the way to work. A state in debt happily pays to expunge it’s association with a caricature of a governor. We go a little further into debt. We’ll be asked to sacrifice a little bit more to clear it up. It almost makes you wonder if perhaps a cartoon state didn’t deserve a cartoon sheriff?