Pro Sports Athletes Could Radically Change America - #ForceTheVote

First and foremost, this is not to punish anyone for making lots of money.

One, I'm simply acknowledging that pro sports athletes, as a “collective”, could wield tremendous power in bringing about a radical change in this country, to finally acknowledge Healthcare as a human right. As every industrialized nation on this planet already recognizes.

And I'm not just talking about forcing a floor vote in the House, but forcing Congress, and Biden, and anyone else for that matter, to pass Medical For All, and do it now.

I thought “America” was about winners? We are the losers here, we are dead last in healthcare out comes. That should not be a source of “pride”, but one of shame and humiliation.

In the most cruel, and unusual way, America has abandoned it's people for profits and campaign contributors. We're the only nation on earth not providing some kind of real safety net for it's own people.

Denying people healthcare, especially during a pandemic is unconscionable. I can certainly understand why some people who have been bankrupted by our healthcare system are dropping F-bombs all over the place. A 9/11 level of death is happening EVERY DAY NOW!

How many more days filled with more deaths than 9/11 have to pass by before we admit, what we're doing is not working?

How many trillions have we as a nation spent waging the Global War on Terror, going now for twenty years, and terrorism has only increased around the world?

We are witnessing and experiencing, a genocide level of death unleashed by a willful, and criminally negligent administration, where all three branches of our government have displayed just how callus, disconnected with reality and without humanity, they truly are. We are the ones suffering as a result of it.

They would rather let Americans die, as they have, then give us medicare for all. And then they rob us blind through this legislative terrorism they have inflicted upon us, because, well the already wealthy need MORE and squeezing everything out of the “people”, will just about do it.

Why Pro Sports Athletes? It's economics silly.

Consider the following...

From MarketingDIVE.com:

The North American sports media market is set to grow at a compound annual rate of 3% through 2021 across segments of media rights, gate revenues, sponsorships and merchandise, according to PwC's 2017 Sports Outlook. Revenue overall could rise from $69.3 billion this year to $78.5 billion in 2021.

From Fortunly.com:

According to Kantar Media, this figure of $482 million represents the grand total of in-game, pregame, and postgame ad revenues. Super Bowl earnings from in-game ads alone amounted to $408 million in 2018.

Then this from Foxbusiness.com:

For the 2019 regular season as a whole, which runs from Sept. 5 through Dec. 29, NFL TV networks pulled in nearly $5 billion in advertising revenue, a 14 percent uptick from last season.

One reason for the big money: Commercials during football are not cheap. For the 2018-2019 season, the average rate for 30-second Sunday night spot was about $665,000.

But that's not all.
From TheStreet.com:

Every year Fox, CBS and NBC collectively pay the NFL $3 billion for the rights to broadcast the league’s games. This deal includes the rotating right for one of these three networks to host the Super Bowl.

Spend 3 billion to make 5 billion in a year, I'll do that all day long too!

Their “power” if you will, would be in their ability to act “collectively”, and shut down a tremendous amount of money flows into who's pockets, are the very people behind making sure you and your family do not get Medicare For All.

Simply by refusing to play until we get the legislation we want. The entire sports industry could be ground to a complete halt. We're talking hundred of billions in economic activity, that mainly the rich get richer from.

I mean just consider, the very same corruption of our government by “normal” Big Business and the Wall Street Banks through political campaign contributions happens in pro sports as well, but we don't hear much about the plantation owners, ah excuse me, Pro Sports Team Owners and their influence (political contributions) on our government.
From Espn.com:

American professional sports owners have contributed nearly $47 million in federal elections since 2015, according to research by ESPN in partnership with FiveThirtyEight, including $10 million to Republican causes and $1.9 million to Democratic causes so far in the 2020 election cycle.

That strong Republican lean is consistent with owners' spending in the 2018 and 2016 federal elections as well. A deep search in the Federal Election Commission database of campaign finances for principal owners, controlling owners, co-owners and commissioners from the NBA, NFL, NHL, WNBA, MLB and NASCAR reveals that this deep-pocketed group has sent $34.2 million (72.9%) to Republican campaigns or super PACs purely supporting Republican causes, compared to $10.1 million (21.5%) to Democrats over the past three elections. Less than 6% of contributions went to bipartisan or unaffiliated recipients.

I'm willing to bet that they surly do not donate / contribute to congress persons who advocates for MedicareForAll. But we're supposed to worry about Russia?

These plantation owners, ah excuse me, Team Owners don't have to engage in quid pro quo, they simply donate to those members in congress who won't vote for MedicareForAll. No bribery or conspiracy required, just an ideological understanding, the slaves can't have healthcare unless they pay for it.

I'm also acknowledging that most, if not all, pro sports athletes can certainly afford to “strike”, when the rest of the country is living on pennies a day, lining up at food banks by the tens of thousands, and millions are facing evictions, while NFL players got a $100,000 annual base pay raise this past March with their new CBA.

From Forbes.com:

The CBA increased the 2020 minimum base salaries for all players to $610,000, from $510,000, which impacts the money available for an upfront bonus in rookie deals.

Heck, just consider how much “public funding” went into building these supersized sports stadiums, so these oligarchs can make even that much more money, while most Americans can't even afford to go to a game because they have become so expensive, and the state bleeds us dry in local taxes as a result of committing public funds to help pay (subsides) these supersize stadiums. It's absurd!

From Bloombergnews.com:

A Bloomberg Businessweek article this week spotlights Cowboys Stadium as a case study of a multimillion-dollar stadium project financed by taxpayer money. The Cowboys — the most valuable NFL franchise in terms of revenue — are one of 21 pro football teams to play in a stadium funded using public dollars in the form of tax-free municipal bonds. The $1.2 billion stadium was heavily subsidized by the City of Arlington, and taxpayers are on the hook for about $65.3 million over 29 years.

So, we the local tax payer, are on the hook for 29 YEARS! A permanent tax, even when you can't afford a ticket to one of the games.

From Vividseats.com:

How Much Are Cowboys Tickets?
No matter what you're looking to spend, Vivid Seats has tickets to fit your budget. Currently, Dallas Cowboys prices range from $45 to $20337, with a current median price of $238.

So, for a family of 4, it would be $180 bucks, just for tickets in the nose bleed sections. Yippie! Yee Haw! But every time you buy something locally, game or not, you are “taxed” for the cost of that monstrosity called Cowboys Stadium for the next 29 years!

What could be more a common ground issue than healthcare? It's a fact of life that everyone will need healthcare at some point in their life.

What could be more “patriotic” than to stand down, stop playing pro sports, so everyone in this country could have Medicare For All. By refusing to play until congress passes a medicare for all bill, would have a tremendous “economic” impact on the oligarchs, that, well, for lack of better words, OWNS these athletes, and buys and sells them like SLAVES.

No one would be able to call them "unAmerican" or un-patriotic"!

Pro sport Athletes have a tremendous amount of power to shut this “systemic” death machine down. They have the national profiles, huge fan bases, and this issue cuts across every “social justice” issue. EVERYONE needs healthcare in order to survive, live, and hopefully thrive.

They represent a "collective" power with no other rival on the national level. Hell, Bernie and all the so called progressives can not effect any change or shut anything down. They are proving to be as powerless and useless, as most American are felling right now, and their capitulation, is a FUCKING stab in the back to all of us!

No wonder people are losing it with the f-bombs! What's it going to take to wake people up?

Just saying America is great, is meaningless. In order for America to be Great, it's people must act greatly! But those with power are acting as if greed rules their character.

So, I humbly ask these pro sports athletes, act greatly, shut down pro sports until we get medicare for all! Show us how great a human being you are. Be a team player, and help for fellow team mates, i.e. hard working Americans who can't afford to go to your games anyway.

Or do you too have the ideological understanding as your plantation, ah excuse me, team owners, the slaves can't have healthcare unless they pay for it?

Asking for a friend...

Drinks

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RantingRooster's picture

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10 users have voted.

C99, my refuge from an insane world. #ForceTheVote

@RantingRooster Just having a handful of progressive hold a gun to Pelisi's speakership is a bit too simple. The narrow majority cuts both ways. A small cabal of Blue Dinos can play the same trick and more credibly since the GOPers would welcome them with open arms (until the time was appropriate to put the knife in). Compromise can be harder than it looks.

Of the Dems get the Senate then it might be time to try something. Of course many of the seeming M4A supporters will vanish once its passage looks like a real possibility rather than mere political theater.

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Pricknick's picture

to avoid all professional sports period.
The nba players took a bow to obama and cancelled what may have been useful.
nascar is taking the heat for pissing off rednecks fans for banning the confederate flag.
Face it. The once great people of this nation have been educated to hate one another or anyone who is different. We love competition (as long as they're not taking our yobs) and hate peace.
Nice dream RR.
Aint gonna happen.
Fuck professional sports. If people really want to make a diference, and most don't, stop watching it.
Now get the other half of this nation to stop watching and you have progress.

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10 users have voted.

Regardless of the path in life I chose, I realize it's always forward, never straight.

RantingRooster's picture

@Pricknick My feeble attempt to get some attention to the fact, while Jimmy is pointing out facts (lol), that this guy Justin Jackson, who makes a base of nearly 700K annually and gets some of the best healthcare / training as money can buy, if he truly wants to help out, maybe he can get some of his NFL buddies and NBA buddies and take up the mantle as it were. Bring more attention to this issue to #ForcetheVote on the House floor at a minimum.

But yeah, I'm good at pipe dreams. Pot does that to ya, just ask Jimmy. lol.

Drinks

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C99, my refuge from an insane world. #ForceTheVote

Pricknick's picture

@RantingRooster
good at pipe dreams.
Now it's vape dreams.
I present the Mercedes of them all:

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5 users have voted.

Regardless of the path in life I chose, I realize it's always forward, never straight.

RantingRooster's picture

@Pricknick Maybe I can get one if I actually get a stimulus check, but I owe so much in back rent my land lord would probably freak. He wears a gun around here, makes me nervous. That looks cool though. I wish I could afford to vape, or have weed. Sad

Drinks

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C99, my refuge from an insane world. #ForceTheVote

gulfgal98's picture

@RantingRooster It is all good to be a dreamer. Without those who dream the rest of us would be mired in inertia. So those of you who do dream, keep dreaming.

I think this is a great idea and it looked like the basketball players were actually going to make a substantive stand until Obama talked them out of it. Why they believed Obama over their own internal consciences is beyond me.

The biggest obstacle to getting professional athletes to do a work stoppage is class. Once in the pros, professional athletes become much wealthier than most of the rest of us. And it is a rare athlete like Justin Jackson who looks outside his narrow window of sports.

But if it could happen, it would be a great thing. And as we reach a tipping point in this country between revolution and being impoverished more and more, a sports strike would look like a much better alternative to out and out revolution.

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Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?

“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy

snoopydawg's picture

@Pricknick

and maybe not so propagandized yet. They have been the ones out protesting against cops more than us old foogies. It’s going to be hard for democrats to get elected if no one votes for them. I’m seeing more people dropping them and looking for alternatives to democrats. Not republicans of course and even republicans are tired of the way republicans keep driving up the debt.

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10 users have voted.

Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.

@Pricknick Pro sports seems like it would be a good target for forming a co-op. Led by a few star players and a go-fund-me campaign they could start a league of their own. If the networks don't play ball, livestream it. Without labor, pro sports is nothing. Theres no factory to ship overseas to cheaper labor and laxer laws. It would be the shot heard around the world.

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Shahryar's picture

I agree completely with this concept. I don't think it'll work for several reasons.

1. Rich players want their money.
2. You'd be surprised and disappointed knowing how many support oppressive economic policies
3. Major league baseball,especially, is predominantly white and Republican
4. The NFL is shockingly pro Republican. I can never forget the San Francisco Chronicle reporting that of the 49ers responding to the question the players favored Reagan over Mondale 22 to 4.
5. There might be some traction on this among the NBA players but the network money would then go to college basketball.

Still, it's a great idea and I'd love to see it come about. If entire leagues joined together they wouldn't be Kaepernick-ed.

Would the owners use scabs? If so, would the players eventually cave?

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11 users have voted.
RantingRooster's picture

@Shahryar When people tell me life isn't fair and there's really not much we can do about it, I think about all the time wasted watching, discussing, reporting, just on "sports", from grade school on through pro sports.

Multiple TV channels cover nothing but sports 24/7/365, filled with advertising praying on our insecurities and fears, inducing us to buy, spend and consume.

Friday night high school, Saturday afternoon college, Sunday all day and night pro football, Monday night football, Tuesday NBA?, MLB?, Wednesday night NHL? Thrusday night more football. Rinse and repeat... Apologies to the lady's leagues, I really don't know the league letters...but I haven't forgotten about you either! (WNBA?)

It's madness to me.

What if we shut down sports, say for a year or two, and ya know, focused on a national effort to ya know, make life better for everybody, like giving everyone healthcare, which might make this place less horrible?

I'm like, why sacrifice our grand parents to save the economy, when we can just save our entire country by shutting down sports till we get medicare for all.

Drinks

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C99, my refuge from an insane world. #ForceTheVote

@RantingRooster don't forget the advertising sports affords for the military.
I think your idea is great.
We need less circus, much more bread.

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"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981

Shahryar's picture

@RantingRooster

No tv, no money, just neighborhood games. I root for the Los Angeles Angels, whose best player is Mike Trout. But I'd happily give up following them and play softball once a week. It's much more satisfying to play then to watch or, if you can't play, to watch people you actually know.

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snoopydawg's picture

BLM sure could have used the boost from the NBA if they had striked. Struck? Gone out on strike. But no Obama had to open his trap and derail it. And it’s not just them. Air traffic controllers just threatened to stop working and the government caved. Grocery workers, auto workers and so many other industries could strike and we’d see some changes. Maybe. France has been protesting for 2 years and they still are. They have gotten some concessions, but they’ve still out there every weekend.

We are witnessing and experiencing, a genocide level of death unleashed by a willful, and criminally negligent administration, where all three branches of our government have displayed just how callus, disconnected with reality and without humanity, they truly are. We

The world is watching congress decide that some Americans are not worth anything to them so they are getting rid of them. There is no other way to look at it. And for crying out loud some ass said that people need to budget better and save more money just for times like this. How can people be so out of touch with what millions are going through?
"No more money!"
"We’re going to be paying for this for decades."
"I don’t need more money."

Propaganda is used because it works.

Did she feel some pressure or is she not serious?

Some of Hillary’s ex campaign folks have setup a pac or think tank to keep MFA from happening, but of course they are not doing it by themselves. Lots of lobbying groups are also working to make sure it doesn’t happen.

What’s up with Rising? I’m only seeing 2-3 videos a day from them. Does everyone need to join to see them? And what’s up with Jimmy? He says no one has any money so enjoy the videos, but he’s still making me pay to see all of his. Anyone know?

Good essay, Mr. Rooster.

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10 users have voted.

Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.

RantingRooster's picture

@snoopydawg Maybe you have a "subscription", and can just cancel it. I just get what ever he pushes out to you tube. I can't afford to subscribe to anybody's channel / patreon account etc...

If it ain't free, I'm f-ked. lol Sad

Drinks

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7 users have voted.

C99, my refuge from an insane world. #ForceTheVote

snoopydawg's picture

@RantingRooster

I can usually watch 6-8 shows a day but this week it’s less. I’ll join to see if it makes a difference. I’m talking Rising not Jimmy. But again he says his shows are free but the website says different.

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5 users have voted.

Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.

ggersh's picture

@snoopydawg JD, BJG, Lee Camp, Graham Elwood, Richard Medhurst, on and on they're all free

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3 users have voted.

I never knew that the term "Never Again" only pertained to
those born Jewish

"Antisemite used to be someone who didn't like Jews
now it's someone who Jews don't like"

Heard from Margaret Kimberley

snoopydawg's picture

@ggersh

All week there has only been 3 available and one is 1 minute long saying 'hey welcome to Rising, we're covering this today.' Usually there 7-8. Never counted cuz why would I? I'll hit subscribe and see.

I can see most of Jimmy's, but I don't know how many he puts behind a paywall. I 1st thought Rising was on holiday schedule. Dunno..?

Thanks.

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3 users have voted.

Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.

snoopydawg's picture

@snoopydawg

A republican will step up and take the blame just wait.

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7 users have voted.

Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.

gulfgal98's picture

@snoopydawg I do know that Jimmy had addition content for his Patreon customers, but every video of his or anyone else's that I have watched or posted was off the regular YouTube. Sure we have ads with those, but I do not mind having to watch an ad or two.

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3 users have voted.

Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?

“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy

phillybluesfan's picture

614AB624-F025-4B5C-96BA-C58894A08E77.jpeg

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Few are guilty, but all are responsible.”
― Abraham Joshua Heschel, The Prophets