Happy Memorial Day! Please Remember to Honor our Veterans.

Happy Memorial Day weekend from the entire staff here at OC Domer! (Um, that would be me.) I hope everyone has a terrific holiday with family and friends, and that everyone reports back here on Tuesday safe & sound (if exhausted and a little sunburned).

But please remember that Memorial Day belongs to our military veterans, and try to find some time to honor them this weekend, whether it's Old Glory flying proudly in the spot normally reserved for your big Notre Dame flag, or attending your local Memorial Day parade, or just inviting a lonely veteran over for a beer and burger at your family barbecue. You'll both be glad you did.

Irish v. Army in the new Yankee Stadium? Very cool.

The New York Times is reporting that Notre Dame Athletic Director Jack Swarbrick has been in very preliminary in discussions with the Yankees about playing some Fighting Irish football in the new Yankee Stadium, and considers Army an obvious opponent given the historical context.

Very, very cool. I have no idea how the new Yankee Stadium would work as a college football venue as far as views and sight lines, etc..., but the idea of playing there instead of the Meadowlands is very intriguing. Wake up the Echoes!

Charlie & Me & Michigan State

I don't want this blog to turn into "all Twitter, all the time" but I was pretty irritated with Coach Weis this morning. I woke up to seven text messages from Charlie, and I have to vent a bit about them. The subject is Michigan State, and I am a little disappointed in Coach Weis' apparent attempts to both (1) lower, and (2) raise expectations at the same time. Here are Coach Weis' Twitters from this morning, followed by my own muddled thoughts as I was still wiping the sleep out of my eyes.

Good morning. Day 3 of Michigan State. A beautiful day in South Bend, sunny and warm.

I won’t be surprised to see people in the pool when I go home today. Everyone is in good spirits as summer approaches.

Hey, I'm glad it's a nice day in South Bend. They had a long Winter and a lot of crappy weather this Spring. I am also always glad to read that Coach is hunkered down in the Gug watching opponents' game film. Nothing prepares you like preparation, or something like that.

Having watched multiple games on Michigan State, I was very disappointed in last year’s game. The defense held us in the game…

... but offensive production, including critical turnovers, cost us a chance at a big win on the road.

Yeah, Chuck, we were all pretty darned disappointed in last year's Michigan State game. Thanks for reminding me about how I felt that day. Here's an excerpt of my thoughts following the loss:

You can parse those numbers all you want, but the bottom line is the Irish offense was mostly unable to control the ball and move the chains, which meant the Irish defense spent too much time on the field trying to stop MSU's very effective running game, and eventually was worn down by Javon Ringer & Co. Just like I knew they would if the Irish "O" couldn't keep the MSU "O" off the field. Mix in some turnovers, missed field goal attempts, and Red Zone futility, and you have the perfect recipe for a very unsatisfying defeat.

[...]

But I don't get, I don't get, I don't get, I don't get, I don't get, I don't get, I don't get WHY THE FIGHTING IRISH OF THE UNIVERSITY OF NOTRE DAME STILL CAN'T RUN THE FOOTBALL!!!!!?????? I just don't understand it. I'm not going to analyze match-ups and videotape and break down the X's and O's of why. That shouldn't be necessary because I hold it as an article of faith that NOTRE DAME SHOULD BE ABLE TO RUN THE FOOTBALL!! We should be able to recruit talented, large, smart football players and teach them to consistently push around the smaller, less talented, less smart players from other schools. That our offensive linemen can't consistently win the battle at the point of attack is a FAILURE.

And what was that about "costing us a chance for a big win on the road." I understand that context is important, and that in the context of the post-2007 debacle, the Michigan State game may have looked "Big." But when you are Notre Dame, beating Michigan State, whether at home or on the road, should not be counted as a "Big Win." Beating Sparty should be routine. Ho-hum. Another day at the office. Next! Losing to MSU is Big. Beating them? Not so much.

These are the types of games where one big play can make the difference.

Down 13-7 in the 4th quarter, one big play can turn a loss into a victory.

Each year a few games will come down to this. Who will make that one big play to determine the outcome?

This is the group of messages that really got under my skin. Michigan State should NOT be the type of game where one big play can make a big difference. It's Michigan Freaking State! These are the types of games that shouldn't be close in the fourth quarter. It absolutely should not be 13-7 in the 4th quarter. It should be 24-3 or 28-7 in the 4th quarter, and Notre Dame should be running the ball, moving the chains, and grinding down the opponent as the clock continues to run. There should be no doubt, and no suspense. No big play will make a difference because by that time the game is OVER.

Yes, Coach, every year a few games will come down to that one big play. But those games should NOT include the Spartans. They should include Michigan (once they get their act back together), USC, and the BCS Bowl game. The Notre Dame faithful ought not to be sitting on the edge of their seats praying the Rosary that Jimmy Clausen can find Golden Tate in the corner of the end zone to pull out a "Big Win" against Sparty.

These are the games you need to win if you want to compete for a National Championship.

No, Coach. Games against Michigan State are the games you need to win if you are Notre Dame. They are the games you need to win if you want to keep your job as NDHFC. If you want to compete for a national Championship, these games need to be satisfying, boring showcases of Fighting Irish dominance. If you want to compete for a National Championship, these games have to become gimmes, and the games against USC and other elite programs are the games that will define your place in Notre Dame history, for better or for worse.

Top 10 College Football Coaches

After doing a little research, here is what I have come up with as the Top 10 College Football Coaches:

1. Pete Carrol (USC)
2. Mark Richt (UGA)
3. Rich Rodriguez (UM)
4. Lane Kiffin (U. Tenn)
5. Steve Sarkisian (U. Wash)
6. Charlie Weis (ND)
7. Les Miles (LSU)
8. Bill Stewart (WVU)
9. Nick Saban ('Bama)
10. Urban Meyer (UF)

I have to admit, there a few surprises on this list, but you can't argue with the data.

Maybe I need to be a little clearer. I saw this article at fanblogs.com today about college football coaches on Twitter. They break it down by conference, but don't give us the really important stat: How many Twitter followers does each coach have? So I went and looked at each coaches' Twitter page and the list above is the Top 10 coaches by number of followers. Is there any meaning to be derived from this ranking? Maybe a little. I think the list reflects at least three factors: (1) Personal popularity quotient of the individual coach (See "Pete Carroll"); (2) Degree to which the coach and his program embrace new technology for reaching out to fans (and recruits)(See UW's Steve Sarkisian) and (3) Intensity of the fan bases following each program (See all those SEC schools on the list).

To complete the exercise, here's the list again with hyperlinks to each coach's Twitter page and the number of followers for each coach.

1. Pete Carrol (USC)(17,393)
   
2. Mark Richt (UGA)(3,959)
3. Rich Rodriguez (UM)(3,953)
4. Lane Kiffin (U. Tenn)(3,651)
5. Steve Sarkisian (U. Wash)(3,301)
6. Charlie Weis (ND)(3,190)
7. Les Miles (LSU)(2,773)
8. Bill Stewart (WVU)(2,009)
9. Alabama ('Bama)(1,896)
10. Urban Meyer (UF)(1,729)

(Note 1: The Alabama Twitter feed isn't Nick Saban's - It's a collective feed for the staff as a group. If it was just a Nick Saban feed I would expect his ranking to go up).

(Note 2: If you actually have a full and rewarding life, don't start following football coaches, or especially football bloggers, on Twitter. Nothing good can come from it.)

The Transparency President

So, President Barack Obama came into office loudly proclaiming "transparency" as a touchstone of his administration, calling forth a "new era of open government." He's gonna set up a website where average citizens can track where every dollar of stimulus money is being spent. His Attorney General issues a memo to all agencies requiring them to operate under a "presumption of disclosure" when evaluating requests for records under the Freedom of Information Act, and "not to withhold records simply because they can technically do so."

Following through on these promises to the American people, the White House has announced that the $328,835 snapshots of an Air Force One backup plane buzzing lower Manhattan last week will not be shown to the public.

Er, wait a minute. That's not really following through on promises of "transparency," is it? That's more like a cover-up and stone-walling. Hmmm.

Of course, the President has broken many, many promises before, but many of those lies broken promises have been justified on the grounds that those promises were just campaign promises and thus don't really count. But these weren't campaign promises. These were statements made by the President of the United States within hours of being sworn into office.

So all that hoopla about open Government and transparency? What Obama really meant was that he was going to be "open" about things that happened during the Bush administration and would be transparent about releasing classified interrogation documents and privileged legal memoranda authored by attorneys in the Bush Justice Department. With respect to his own White House, Obama clearly reserves the right to withhold any information he wants to, laws like the Freedom of Information Act be damned.

Sorry about the confusion.

Notre Dame's Tim Brown Elected to College Football Hall of Fame

It was announced in New York earlier today that Notre Dame Heisman Trophy winner Tim Brown has been elected to the college football Hall of Fame. As reported by WNDU:

One of the greatest players to ever wear the gold helmet was named to the College Football Hall of Fame on Thursday.

Tim Brown became the sixth Heisman Trophy winner from Notre Dame in 1987. He later went on to a stellar career in the NFL.

The announcment was made Thursday in New York City.

Brown was the first wide receiver to ever win the Heisman and is one of two Heisman winners named to this year's class, joining Miami QB Gino Torretta.

"Touchdown Timmy" set 19 school records at Notre Dame and was a 2-time All-American.

The 6th overall pick in the 1988 NFL Draft by the Raiders, Brown was named to the Pro Bowl nine times.

Brown's class will be inducted into the Hall of Fame in December in NYC and enshrined in South Bend in July, 2010.

Congratulations Tim!

Coach Weis Working Hard for his Guys

First of all, congratulations to David Bruton! The OC Domer 2007 Player of the Year was drafted by the Denver Broncos on Sunday. He was the Broncos' 4th round pick, and taken number 114 overall. When I heard about Bruton going to the Broncos the first thought that jumped into my head was that maybe he could be the next Steve Atwater for them. Atwater was a hard-hitting, rangy safety that was noted for doing a great job coming up and defending against the run. Given David Bruton's penchant for being among Notre Dame's top tacklers the past few seasons, I think the Atwater comparison is apt. Steve Atwater was listed as 6' 3", 220 lbs with a 4.44 second 40-yard dash time. Bruton is listed at 6' 2" and 219, with 40 times from 4.40 to 4.46 seconds. Go Broncos!

It's disappointing that the Irish had only one player drafted in 2009, but not really surprising. This class was the recruiting class of 2005, which was the hybrid Willingham/Weis class. Weis gets the "credit" (blame) for the recruiting class, but it was Willingham and his staff who had done all the background and recruiting for this group and then handed it over to Charlie with a month left before signing day following the Super Bowl. To me, this weekend's NFL draft finally closes the book on the Ty Willingham era at Notre Dame.

The South Bend Tribune noted today:

Fifth-year seniors Lambert, Brown and Crum represent the final three pieces of the last full recruiting class of the Tyrone Willingham Era (2004), a class that now holds the distinction of not having one player selected in an NFL Draft.

That includes the 10 players from that class who transferred and finished their football careers at other schools, and running back Darius Walker, who jumped into the draft pool after his junior season.

Willingham's first, and as it turns out only, senior class at Washington also went draftless this weekend.

The 2009 Fighting Irish will be stocked with Charlie Weis recruits from top to bottom, from seniors down to freshman. Any personnel or roster deficiencies fall at the feet of CW. To coin a phrase, "No Excuses."

Although we had only one player drafted over the weekend, that does NOT mean that more Notre Dame men won't get a chance to play football on Sundays. Early this morning my cell phone started buzzing with Twitter messages from Coach Weis. Here they are, in order:

• Good morning. I returned home late Saturday night from the ND Club of El Paso Texas. I spent Sunday watching Day 2 of the NFL Draft.
• I was happy for David Bruton winding up with Denver & my buddy, Josh McDaniels. Denver loves him as a safety, but even more on special teams
• After the draft, I worked on placing all our undrafted players. It looks like Mo Crum will go to Tampa, Grimes to Denver…
• Lambert to the 49ers, Kuntz to Indy, Justin Brown to Washington, and both Schwapp & Turkovich to the Cowboys.

I was very glad to read (1) that Charlie thought he had a chance to get seven more players signed as free agents and into NFL camps, and (2) that Coach is working hard for his guys. Clearly Charlie's Twitter messages are intended, at least in part, to get the attention of potential recruits who want to know that CW will do everything he can to get them their shot at the NFL if they prove themselves NFL-caliber.

There have been more developments since my break-of-dawn messages from CW. The SBT is now reporting that five Irish free agents agreed to terms Sunday night: Grimes (Denver), Kuntz (Indianapolis), Lambert (San Francisco), Schwapp (Dallas) and Turkovich (Dallas), and that Brown and Crum are expected to finalize agreements soon.

Although the odds of an undrafted free-agent making a roster are generally long, Notre Dame players have a way of sticking around in the NFL. Once these kids get into camp, the coaches see players that are of above-average intelligence, have been well-coached, have played big time football for four years, and who are high character guys. It's hard to let players like that go.

Good luck to all the NFL Irish as they chase their dreams.

Blue & Gold Answers

In the run-up to the 2009 Blue & Gold game last week I posed the questions that I hoped to see answered by the scrimmage on Saturday. Below are the questions I had along with my highly qualified answers.

I don't mean that I am highly qualified to give any answers, I mean that the answers I am giving come with a lot of qualifiers. Such as: It was just a scrimmage, a lot of guys were held out, both the offense and defense showed very vanilla packages, it's very hard to judge a team playing against itself. But the biggest qualifier is that I had just one very quick pass at the full game video. The UND website posted two videos of the scrimmage on Saturday. One was a highlight package that is mildly entertaining but largely useless. It featured multiple slow-mo looks at just a handful of plays, along with a game of Duck, Duck, Goose. That video is still available on the website.

The other was a compilation of what appeared to be most (if not all) of the plays from the game. That video is very useful as you can watch the bad plays as well as the good on both sides of the ball. I watched that video all way through one time on Saturday. I also tried every trick I know to save that video to my hard drive because they posted a similar video after the 2008 B&G game and then took it down soon thereafter. I wasn't successful capturing the feed, and sure enough it's not on the UND site anymore. So I got one decent look at the whole scrimmage.

Disclaimers and qualifiers aside, here's what I saw:

Specifically, here are the questions I'm hoping to have answered (at least tentatively) on Saturday:

How does Clausen look? Is his arm strong? Accuracy good? Is he consistently making the proper reads and throwing to the correct receivers? In short, does JC look like the QB we saw in Hawaii or the QB we saw against Boston College? I'm betting that we'll see Aloha Jimmy, but I would really like some affirmation in that belief.

• Clausen was a so-so 8 of 17 for 70 yards with no touchdowns and one pass intercepted and returned for a touchdown by B&G Defensive MVP Robert Blanton. Based upon the small sample of pass plays, I didn't think he looked quite like "Aloha Jimmy". But he looked confident and in control, and his arm strength and accuracy looked pretty good. Many of the incompletions were due to excellent coverage by the secondary, which is very encouraging. Compared to last year's B&G game, Clausen has clearly improved as last year his accuracy left a lot to be desired.

How close to being ready to play is Dayne Crist? Is he really all that? Rumors last season had Crist looking great in practice and ready to challenge Clausen for playing time. This spring we're hearing that Dayne's accuracy is off and he's struggling with running the offense and making the reads. I am hoping to get a good look at this young player and hopefully (there's that word again) get a good feeling about what will happen to the Irish QB situation when Clausen moves on to Sunday games.

• Crist was 4 of 10 for 40 yards with no TDs and no INTs. As with Clausen, many of the incompletions were due to excellent secondary play, which figures to be a strength of this team. I don't recall any "wow" plays with respect to Crist's arm strength, but I was favorably impressed with his poise and apparent command of the (presumably simplified) offense. A couple of bobbled snaps aside, I liked his decision-making, his sense of timing, and the touch on his throws, often to backs in the backfield). The "wow" came from a couple of Nate Montana's throws. He hit on the longest completion of the day. He showed very good accuracy in his couple of chances, and seems to have his Dad's knack for delivering a very catchable ball right on stride. Altogether, I feel about as comfortable with our depth and our future at the quarterback position as I have felt for a very long time.
  

Has the offensive line learned how to block in the power running game? Can they push defenders back when they have to? (And if they are pushing guys around, is it because they've gotten better, or because our D-line isn't stout enough?)

• Coach Weis is well known for saying "I can only go by what I see." Judging by that standard you'd have to say that the offensive line's blocking in the power running game is already significantly better than at any previous time in the Weis era. You may recall that Darius Walker put up some nice rushing yards under Charlie, but you must also recall that he usually did it on his own after eluding at least one defender in the backfield as he took the hand-off. Armando Allen had 70 yards on 12 carries for a gaudy 5.8 yards per rush. Robert Hughes and Jonas Gray each averaged about 4.4 yards per carry. There was clearly an emphasis on the straight-ahead power game versus the outside runs, and I am very hopeful our running game this year will force defenses to play us honest on first and second downs, and that 3rd-and-short will become automatic first downs with Robert Hughes running behind this unit. Keep up the great work Coach Verducci.
  

Will the re-built and very young defensive line be stout enough to defend the run while still pressuring the passer?

• I think they'll be able to pressure the passer, and I don't think anyone is going to beat our guys to the edge on outside running plays. But the guys up front got pushed around a bit in the power run game. If there is any area of concern on defense, this is it. Part of what we saw on Saturday is no doubt a case of an experiences O-line getting better. But part of it is a group of young defensive linemen who have to develop in a hurry. One has to hope that we jump out to some early leads in 2009 to force teams out of time-consuming drives on the ground. If we can force teams into playing catch-up this defense will feast. But if we're down late and the opponent is trying to run out the clock we may be hard pressed to force a punt.
  

Have the new coaches settled into their roles and is the staff functioning well as a unit? Are the players responding to the new coaches, playing hard, and getting better?

• Can't really judge the functioning of the staff other than by what we saw on the field. The team seemed excited to be out there, and they seemed to be playing hard and at a high level. From all that, I'd tentatively say that the new coaching hires and the reorganization of responsibilities seems to be working.
  

How well is Coach Weis getting around these days on his new wheel?

• He's certainly walking much, much better. He did say at the beginning of the post-game press conference that he was pretty tired and sore from being on his new knee that long on Saturday. And maybe it's just me but I think Coach is losing a little weight.

And so we head into summer workouts. Before you know it we'll be straining to hear any word on how the incoming freshman are looking in fall workouts. Will Manti Te'o live up to the lofty expectations? And then on to a schedule that sets up very favorably for the Irish in 2009. Less than 10 wins would be a real disappointment. You're tempted to put USC in the "L" column out of habit, but even that assumption must be questioned. The Irish defense actually played very well against the Trojans in the Coliseum last year, but they just didn't get any help from the offense. This year USC is breaking in a new QB. The offense struggled ("struggled" is being kind) against an outstanding USC defense in 2008, but that defense will be playing on Sundays in 2009. The USC game at Notre Dame on October 17th figures to be very close. Get your tickets now!

Assuming Notre Dame is at least moderately improved in 2009, based upon returning experience and normal maturity growth, a second loss on the schedule is hard to pin down. Michigan? They're still a mess. I think we win again, although not as easily as in 2008. Probably the most likely candidates for loss #2 would be Michigan State or Boston College just based on recent results against those teams, but we get them both at our place. Pitt and Stanford lurk out there as November road games. But if we're playing at the level I expect, those games will become very important for a team looking to make their case as a BCS Bowl invitee. Motivation at that point shouldn't be a problem.

Let the summer speculation season begin!

The Education President

Apparently when Barack Obama says he wants to be the "education president" he doesn't mean that he actually wants to provide a quality education to children. What he means is that his administration is a wholly-owned subsidiary of the National Education Association (i.e., the teachers' unions).

Juan Williams has an excellent (and infuriating) column on how the Obama administration is dismantling a very popular and clearly successful school voucher program in the District of Columbia. This is a program that helps get poor kids out of failing D.C. schools and into private schools where they have a much better chance at a real education, all without taking a dime out of the D.C. public schools' budgets. Win-win, right? Wrong.

The teachers' unions and the N.E.A. don't like private schools, and they don't like voucher programs, because they are a threat to the growth of their membership rolls and to their members' pay raises. And because the N.E.A. doesn't like these programs, the Democrats and Obama don't like them either - poor black kids in D.C. be damned.

What makes this even more annoying in the current political climate is that Obama's decision isn't about money. I mean, it isn't about money in the usual sense of "we don't have the money to pay for this." Congress just passed a gazillion dollar stimulus package intended to fund things a lot less important than the education of poor kids. But no vouchers for you! However, this decision is about money in the modern political sense. The N.E.A. and their fellow union travelers give a lot of money every election cycle to elect and keep in power Democrat politicians who agree with their views of education policy. Obama and congressional Democrats are unwilling to risk losing any of that campaign money, and the direct result is more poor kids in D.C. needlessly trapped in bad schools.

Remember that the next time you hear Obama or any other Democrat preaching from their soap box about those greedy, selfish, mean, evil, racist Republicans. You know, those same Republicans who believe poor black kids in D.C. deserve a chance at the same quality education as the rich kids living in the White House.

Stay classy Obama.

Spring Blogkeeping - Some changes at OC Domer

It's been fairly quiet here at OC Domer over the past few weeks. In part it's because I find it difficult to contribute to the conversation in any meaningful way during spring football practice, which I have written about before. In part it's because other events at work and at home have nudged my blogging habit to the sideline for a bit. And it's also because I have been doing a lot of thinking about the future of the OC Domer blog and what it will look like going forward. I'll have more on that in a moment, but first I want to point out some of the minor tweaks I've made to the blog in the past few weeks.

• I've discontinued the "OC Domer International" feature on the sidebar. When I first started the blog I was pretty fascinated with my traffic and where it was coming from. The novelty of seeing hits from exotic places around the globe led to creation of the list of other countries with OC Domer readers. It was a lot of fun, but the thrill is pretty much gone and I haven't been maintaining the list for a while now. Before discontinuing the feature I was up to about 80 different countries, which is pretty cool. One interesting tidbit about the OC Domer International feature: One of the most common recurring sources of traffic to the blog was Google searches for the phrase "twirlers" from Muslim countries. There are sects in Islam that practice twirling (basically spinning in a circle really fast until one gets really dizzy and enters an enhanced state). (I know that is a gross over-simplification but I'm not interested in a treatise on religious practices right now). The humorous part is that Googling the word "twirlers" (or variations thereon) for a while would hit on my Purdue preview post from the 2007 season, which was a sarcastic look at the Golden Girl and all the other baton twirlers and band auxiliary elements surrounding Purdue's football program. Somehow I doubt that the Golden Girl is what the searchers from these Muslim nations were looking for. Or at least I hope so.

• I have dropped the sidebar ad for the FootballFanatics.com website. Not because I don't believe in the products (it's a great place for your Irish merchandise), but because I wasn't seeing any return on investment. It's actually pretty darn funny. When FootballFanatics first approached me about advertising on my blog, I really agonized about whether I wanted to commercialize OC Domer, which I do because I enjoy it, not to make money. Part of me didn't want to "sell out." But I decided that I believed in the product and would really be doing my readers a service by offering them a trusted source for their Notre Dame gear. So I opened my account with them and put up the ad. I sold my soul. And that ad generated exactly ZERO sales for FootballFanatics and ZERO cash for the OC Domer. So it's gone. I may sell out for Google Ads instead. We'll see.

• Fairly early in the history of OC Domer I was seeing traffic coming from Facebook.com, but I wasn't a member of Facebook and I couldn't see what was generating the hits. So I signed up for Facebook. My page isn't very fancy, but it gives me another way to keep up with my kids, and I even have a few Notre Dame football players as Facebook friends. I have added a badge that links to my Facebook page in the sidebar, and the badge even includes my Facebook status. If you're on Facebook, "Friend me!"

• One of the biggest stories to come out of spring football this year is that Notre Dame Head Football Coach Charlie Weis is "Twittering." Twitter is an internet application which has been called "micro-blogging." Basically Twitter allows a user to use the text messaging feature on their cell phone to broadcast short messages to anyone in the Twitter world who has signed up to "follow" that user. The user's Twitters (I think they are actually called tweets or twits?) also are automatically posted to the user's Twitter web page. Coach Weis is Twittering under the handle NDHFC. As of this moment Charlie has 1,877 followers, including OC Domer. I have installed an application at the top of the OC Domer sidebar that shows my readers NDHFC's last five Tweets, as well as a link to NDHFC's Twitter page. So come back to OC Domer to follow Coach Weis' Twitter updates, or sign up to follow him yourself. Charlie tends to send a flurry of messages in the morning when there is going to be football activity that day, and a flurry at night recapping the day's football events. He's kind of fun to follow as he doesn't really have the hang of the very brief Twitter text message format yet. He tends to send long messages that take up several Tweets. This morning's flurry of updates was all about the upcoming Blue & Gold game.

• In order to figure out the best way to install the NDHFC Twitter feed on the OC Domer sidebar, I had to sign up for Twitter myself and tweak one of their applications to get the NDHFC feed. At any rate, OC Domer is now Twittering too. I've added a Twitter badge to the sidebar that will take you my Twitter page. If you're completely insane you can follow my utterly ordinary existence. I have a way to go to catch up with Charlie's 1,877 followers. I tend to Tweet about current events from my own Right Wing Extremist perspective.

Which brings me to the biggest change at OC Domer, and the one that I have been thinking about a lot lately. In the history of the blog I have occasionally posted my thoughts on political topics. Ironically, the political posts tend to generate a lot more feedback and comments than my very thoroughly researched and cleverly written football posts. Many of the comments I get on those posts are positive and supportive, but a certain percentage come from folks who not only disagree with me, but who feel that such posts have no place on OC Domer. Given current events in America, I have been moved to write more about politics and other topics and I have been debating about whether I wanted to put those items on OC Domer or whether I wanted start another blog focusing on politics and current events. At the end of the day I decided that OC Domer is my baby and it is who I am. I don't owe it to anybody to partition my life according to their preferences. So right now I intend to start putting more politics/current events posts on OC Domer. I expect that the vast majority of my readers will be able to cope with that. Some will enjoy the posts, some will ignore those posts. The immature will attack me for daring to post my personal opinions on my personal blog, and they will call me names if they disagree with me rather than engage in civil debate. Some will stop reading me altogether. I'm a big boy, I can take it. OC Domer will still largely be about Notre Dame and Notre Dame football, especially during football season. But we're going to be branching out and growing the brand, so to speak. I just wanted to give my readers a heads-up and an explanation before we make this minor change in course.