The Pirates

Will things ever look up for my beloved Pittsburgh Pirates?? We celebrated our Seventeenth straight losing season by finishing 62-99 this year. We were mercifully spared a 100-loss season by getting a rain-out during the last week. There are many reasons for the streak; the inability or desire to spend money being just one. The predominant reason I believe is the management's inability to evaluate talent. It seems management is blowing things all over the place, as detailed in the news report below. This has Pirates Management written all over it...

Somali Pirates Attack French Warship By Mistake

"In a move that will bring some light relief to embattled cruise ship operators and freighter owners, Somali pirates in skiffs mistakenly attacked the French navy’s flagship in the Indian Ocean on Wednesday, AFP reports.

The pirates in two fibreglass skiffs mistook the 18 000 tonne La Somme for a commercial tanker . According to a French navy spokesman, the La Somme’s crew “easily saw off the brazen night-time assault by lightly armed fighters on two lightweight skiffs and captured five pirates”.

Strike one for the good guys. That said, it is quite staggering to see how many warships have had to be deployed to the Indian Ocean to try and keep the shipping lanes safe from piracy, and still the attacks continue. It’s a little bit like the Boer commandos tying-up thousands of British troops during the the Anglo-Boer War, or the Germans trying to crush the French Resistance during the Second World War. As a wise general once said, “Guerillas never win wars. But they never lose them either.”


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