Spy/camera/video/witchhunt gate

I'm not the most objective guy out there, I'll admit that, but this whole Bill Belichick thing has passed the level of ludicrous and has wandered into the "Red Dawn" zone. (Referring to the Pat Swayze movie where Russians invade America. Like the Belichick debacle it has a puzzling premise to begin with, the players are transparent, your not really sure you should be wasting your time paying attention to it, and it goes on for way to long.) For anyone who has been in a cave on Mars with their fingers in their ears for the past week, the Patriots were caught videotaping the New York Jets defensive signals in the first quarter of their Week 1 game. Nobody has really conveyed to me why videotaping the opposing coaches signals is a big deal other than "it violates the rules," which is a garbage reason to begin with; America was founded on breaking the rules. To paraphrase Otter from Animal House, "Well, you can do whatever you want to [Belichick], but [I'm] not going to sit here and listen to you badmouth the United States of America."

Anyway... you're allowed to look at opposing coaches during the game, right? So what if you were to hire a stenographer to manually record the signals using words to describe them, is that cheating? Why is using a video camera such a freaking big deal. You're allowed take aerial photographs of the opposing defenses from a blimp and then send them down to the sidelines for the QBs to study but God forbid you should videotape the opposing coaches signals. Am I missing something here?

The worst part about this whole thing is that somehow no one is talking about that P.O.S. snitch Mangina. He had to have known the Pats were doing this while he was there (and winning rings, by the bye) but suddenly he has a moment of conscience two years later and decides to spill his guts to the NFL Fuhrer like he's an "unlawful combatant" in Gitmo. That's crap. There are two things I rememeber my dad telling me when I was little, (1) everything you touch turns to shit (which is a whole other issue) and (2) don't ever, ever, ever, snitch. But no one is calling out the Mangina (the 0-2 Mangina) for being a snitch.

Finally, you could almost hear all the studio analysts rooting for the Chargers on Sunday night, especially Jerome Bettis. He questioned whether the Pats cheated to beat his Steelers teams in two AFC Championship games. Hmmm... In 2002 I wonder what defensive signal they stole to have Troy Brown house a punt on your hapless Steelers and how they cheated when Troy blocked a field goal and flipped it to Antwan Harris who took it 60 yards to pay dirt. Regardless, when the Patriots put the BEAT DOWN on the Chargers (a team many had going to the Superbowl) they completely ignored it.

Well, I guess that's about that on the Belichick front, other than that this Pats team is unstoppable and will leave teams decimated in its wake as it unleashes never-before-seen destruction upon the rest of the league.