Auburn-South Carolina is turning out to be quite a football game. (Hey, this SEC football ain’t so bad. :) It’s 24-17 Tigers with 5:45 left, and Auburn is about to punt. GO COCKS!

In a tangentially related story, if you’re watching the game on ESPN and you saw the ad for Fathead, you know why I’m wondering why there isn’t a USC fathead. (University of Southern California, I mean… not South Carolina. They have one of those.) Who the heck hell makes a college-football product and doesn’t bother to include the Trojans, the sport’s most dominant team of the last half-decade?!? There’s a Purdue fathead, but no ‘SC fathead?? It’s not like there isn’t a huge ‘SC fan base that would be willing to buy such a thing. I was totally going to buy one (and put it on our window, facing outside toward our fellow Domers). Bah!

UPDATE: On second thought: they cost $79? Oh… nevermind. Becky would kill me if I bought such a frivolous thing that costs so much. :) But, in principle, I’m still annoyed at the lack of a USC fathead.

UPDATE 2: Back to the “other” USC now. South Carolina’s tight end just dropped the game-tying touchdown, on a play that Kirk Herbstreit nonsensically called “a well-executed play that they didn’t execute.” Huh? Anyway, there’s still time! 2:50 left, and the Gamecocks are inside the 25 with a first down. GO USC!!!

UPDATE 3: And now Auburn’s safety just dropped the game-securing interception! Nobody can catch the damn ball!

UPDATE 4: Holy cow, what a first down! What a game! First down Cocks… 2:19 to go… ball at the 13.

UPDATE 5: 4th and 1, ball at the 5 yard line, 26 seconds left…

UPDATE 6: Incomplete pass to the end zone… and Auburn survives!

Oh, well. Helluva game. I feel chastened, and will refrain from making any nasty comments about the SEC for at least… oh… 36 hours. :)

P.S. I must admit, I was hoping South Carolina could get the touchdown, so I could say, “They need the extra point to tie it. Hey, that’s not a given — this is an SEC game!” (That’s not a nasty comment about the SEC; it’s a hypothetical nasty comment that didn’t actually happen. :)

P.P.S. Quote that wasn’t actually arrogant, but sounds like it out of context, of the day: “I looked like a genius tonight.” –Auburn coach Tommy Tuberville

With one out in the bottom of the ninth, 25-year-old Daniel Cabrera of the Baltimore Orioles is no-hitting the Yankees at Yankee Stadium. It’s on ESPN2.

UPDATE: Jinx! No sooner do I post this, but Robinson Cano just got a hit. Oh, well.

UPDATE 2: And then it ends on a double play on the next pitch! So, a one-hitter for Cabrera. Orioles win, 7-1.

It’s too early to tell whether any angels will get their wings tonight, but so far, it doesn’t look like it: Auburn leads South Carolina, 7-0 in the first quarter, and the Tigers just got an interception in their own end zone. D’oh! But another one of the Nifty Nineteen undefeated teams (albeit one that doesn’t pose problems for USC or Notre Dame), Texas Christian University, is trailing BYU, 17-10 with 2:05 left in the third quarter. TCU is the best hope for a non-BCS-conference team (er, not counting Notre Dame, obviously) to get into the BCS this season, but that hope will pretty much disappear if they lose tonight. (Boise State and Houston are the only other undefeated non-BCS-conference unbeatens left.)

UPDATE: A double-fumble comedy of errors in South Carolina! The Gamecocks fumbled, the Tigers recovered, an Auburn defensive linesman rumbled about 60 yards downfield toward the end zone, only to have it stripped and recovered by South Carolina!

UPDATE 2: Now it’s 24-10 TCU! The nation’s longest winning streak, 13, is in jeopardy. If the Horned Frogs lose, Ohio State and West Virginia would be tied for the longest streak with 11.

UPDATE 3: Touchdown Mormons Cougars! It’s 31-10 with 7:27 left. Looks like the Horned Frogs are done for.

UPDATE 4: It’s Auburn 14, South Carolina 10 at halftime.

Meanwhile… BYU 31, TCU 17, final. The Horned Frogs can kiss their winning streak, and their potential BCS bid, goodbye. Boise State is now the most likely non-BCS team to reach a BCS bowl. (But probably less likely than TCU was.) The Nifty Nineteen is now an Elated Eighteen. (Hat tip: Mike on the word choice.)

I’m watching C-SPAN 2 now. The Senate is now voting on the Byrd Amendment, which would establish a 5-year “sunset provision,” meaning the Detainee Treatment & Trials law would have to renewed in five years or else it would expire. This is in keeping with Lojo’s comment, and it seems eminently sensible to me. Senator Warner’s statement of opposition on the Senate floor was utterly unconvincing; Senator Byrd’s statement made perfect sense. (After Warner made an almost incoherent argument suggesting that the Byrd Amendment would somehow allow terrorists to go free, Byrd responded with characteristic yet entirely appropriate bluster, “This amendment will not set any terrorists free!”)

I can’t imagine why anyone — whether pro or con on the broader issue — would oppose this amendment, except for baldly partisan reasons. I assume it will fail.

UPDATE: It failed, 52-47. Idiots. But now Byrd moved to reconsider and then table. Not sure what the significance of that is.

UPDATE 2: The overall bill passed, 65-34. Lieberman was among the 12 Dems voting in favor. That’s not necessarily a strike against him, as I’m still not sure how I feel about the overall bill… but I do think it should have been debated quite a bit more, and I also think the sunset provision should obviously have been added. (Lieberman voted “yea” on that.)

A deputy has died after being shot during a traffic stop in Lakeland, Florida, AP reports quoting the Polk County sheriff. Visit CNN for the latest.

Remember the hole that Robbie dug the other day? Well, he just dropped a tennis ball in it, ran maybe 6 feet away, then turned right back around, charged over to the hole, triumphantly retrieved the ball he'd just dropped there, and ran away with it. LOL!

Here’s an AWESOME highlight reel of last week’s Michigan State game… just in time to start getting psyched up for Saturday’s Purdue game:

(Hat tip: Andrew Leyden.)

The theme music is perfect for a game that occurred the same week as International Talk Like A Pirate Day, wouldn’t you agree, Alex and Wacko?

The Senate is debating the “torture compromise” as we speak. Andrew Sullivan is bidding farewell to habeas corpus. Kos wants a filibuster. Major conservative blogs seem strangely silent on the issue, kinda like how the major liberal blogs tend to say little or nothing about newsworthy events that don’t support their worldviews (e.g., good news in the war on terror). Hmm. Does the right-blogosphere’s silence speak volumes? Or am I just missing something?

Sullivan is also linking to Stephen Colbert’s take. As always, Colbert’s satire is a blunt instrument, allowing no room for subtlety or nuance. Still, in this case, it’s pretty funny. But is it right? Are Sullivan and Kos right? The debate rages in comments on my previous post.

Frankly, it isn’t the “definition of torture” part that concerns me so much (though I’m certainly not denying its importance), it’s the habeas corpus part. Cuz, uh, habeas corpus is important. And if what’s happening today is that Congress is explicitly endorsing the president’s right to effectively suspend habeas corpus without saying he’s suspending habeas corpus — kinda like how, back in the mid-20th century, Congress decided to start letting the president effectively declare war without saying he’s declaring war (or rather, without asking for a declaration of war) — that’s, like, really, really bad.

So, is all this “R.I.P., Habeas Corpus” talk just more over-the-top alarmism from Sullivan and wing-nuttery from Kos, or does it have some substance? Can someone who supports the bill direct me to a convincing argument from the right-blogosphere (or anywhere, really) that might persuade me Congress isn’t actually weakening one of Anglo-American society’s most fundamental liberties on the cheap?

At least tangentially relevant, given Sullivan’s politicization of the issue (”The only response is for the public to send a message this fall. … If this Republican party maintains control of all branches of government, the danger to individual liberty is extremely grave. Put aside all your concerns about the Democratic leadership. What matters now is that this juggernaut against individual liberty and constitutional rights be stopped”), is this post by Ann Althouse, quoting David Brooks: “Voters now confront a Republican Party that understands the breadth of the threat but has bungled the central campaign and a Democratic Party that is quick to criticize but lacks an understanding of the jihadists and a strategy for confronting them.” And that’s not all:

Worse, more and more people are falling for the Grand Delusion — the notion that if we just leave the extremists alone, they will leave us alone. On the right, some believe that if we just stop this Wilsonian madness of trying to introduce democracy into the Arab world, we can return to an age of stability and balance. On the left, many people can’t seem to fathom an enemy the U.S. isn’t somehow responsible for. Others think the entire threat has been exaggerated by Karl Rove for the sake of political scaremongering.

Well put. But the quote of the day goes to Tony Blair, who formulated the single most stirring and accurate condemnation of the 9/11 terrorists (”their barbarism will stand as their shame for all eternity”), and has again formulated a stirring bit of rhetoric for the war on terror:

This is a struggle that will last a generation and more. But this I believe passionately: we will not win until we shake ourselves free of the wretched capitulation to the propaganda of the enemy, that somehow we are the ones responsible. This terrorism isn’t our fault. We didn’t cause it. It’s not the consequence of foreign policy. It’s an attack on our way of life. It’s global. It has an ideology. It killed nearly 3,000 people including over 60 British on the streets of New York before war in Afghanistan or Iraq was even thought of. It has been decades growing. Its victims are in Egypt, Algeria, Indonesia, India, Pakistan, Turkey. Over 30 nations in the world. It preys on every conflict. It exploits every grievance. And its victims are mainly Muslim.

This is not our war against Islam. This is a war fought by extremists who pervert the true faith of Islam. And all of us, Western and Arab, Christian or Muslim, who put the value of tolerance, respect and peaceful co-existence above those of sectarian hatred, should join together to defeat them.

All very true.

But what about habeas corpus??

UPDATE: I just wrote this e-mail to Andrew Sullivan:

Andrew,

Can you point me to where in the current legislation the following statements are borne out as correct?

…[W]hat’s also new is that an enemy combatant may or may not be an American citizen.

Put all that together and you really do have the danger of taking emergency measures for wartime and transforming a peace-time constitution into an essentially martial system, where every citizen or non-citizen can be apprehended at will and detained without charge.

Everything else I’ve read, including portions of the statute itself, suggest that to whatever extent this bill alters or eliminates habeas corpus, it does so only for non-citizens. See for example this condemnation of the bill from HuffPost.

Now, if it did apply only to non-citizens, that wouldn’t automatically make it OK, obviously. But just as obviously, it is a very significant difference, and one that you are relying heavily upon in your condemnations of the bill. So I’m wondering what I’m missing or misunderstanding. The only support I see that you’ve provided in recent posts for the assertion that this bill applies to citizens is a link to a Washington Post article which states that the bill “does not rule out the possibility of designating a U.S. citizen as an unlawful combatant.” Well, first of all, that’s a rather flimsy and unsourced statement, but even assuming it’s true, failing to rule out a possibility within the language of one statute doesn’t mean that other statutes or precedents don’t rule it out. The question, it seems to me, is, does the statute rule it in? Or, if not, is there some other reason to believe that its “failure to rule it out” will have the effect that you fear?

Maybe this is something you could address on your blog. I’m predisposed to agree with you on this issue, I think, but I need to know more about the “citizen vs. non-citizen” angle.

Thanks,
Brendan Loy

With less than six weeks until the election, Lieberman leads Lamont by 10%, and Schlesinger is showing no signs of life. Et tu, Winston Sm1th?

P.S. Other polls show the race slightly closer, but with an essentially flat trendline since mid-August.

P.P.S. Asked by Pajamas Media “if he could forgive once close friends Chris Dodd, Al Gore and Teddy Kennedy, for endorsing his opponent Ned Lamont,” Lieberman responded, “I can forgive … but I probably won’t forget.” Audio of the full interview promised soon.

P.P.P.S. Quote of the day: “I think he’s very concerned that we’re within striking distance of winning this.” –Alan Schlesinger, polling at 5%. LOL!

USC and Notre Dame fans disagree about a lot of things. Should the Bush Push have been called a penalty? Is Pete Carroll is a great coach, or a poodle? Is Charlie Weis fat, or just big-boned? But we should all be able to come together tonight and root for South Carolina to pull the stunning home upset of #2 Auburn. (ESPN, 7:30 PM EDT.)

For Notre Dame fans, the rationale for rooting against Auburn is obvious. As the nation’s second-highest-ranked one-loss team, the Irish need every undefeated team above them to lose, except USC (until Nov. 25) and perhaps Michigan, in order to have any shot at the national championship game. For USC fans, the rationale is perhaps less obvious, but more specifically focused on Auburn: the Tigers, who have been neck-and-neck with the Trojans in the rankings all season, are probably the only team with a chance of keeping an undefeated USC squad out of the title game. Granted, USC is ahead of Auburn right now in the Harris and Coaches polls — just barely. But a combination of genuine admiration for Auburn’s 2006 team (and respect for its schedule) and a retroactive “sympathy vote” stemming from the Tigers’ 2004 exclusion could easily lay the groundwork for a Ohio State vs. Auburn title game, with USC exiled to the Rose Bowl (and, unlike in 2003, with no realistic shot at a share of the championship). In fact, I’d bet that probably will happen if both OSU and Auburn stay undefeated. But if the Tigers lose, the Trojans become the clear #2 team in America, probably immovable unless they lose. And then we can root for Auburn to beat all those other pesky SEC unbeatens. :)

Remember, kids: every time an undefeated SEC team loses, an angel gets its wings.