10 Facts: ’10 Facts About Weed’

Posted on September 16, 2014 by Erik Schneider
10 Facts About Weed

Source:10 Facts– about marijuana prohibition.

“10 facts about weed. This list contains ten facts you didn’t know about the drug cannabis. Do you know interesting, amazing, fascinating and mind blowing things about the marijuana plant? Let us know in the comments…

10. There are over 200 slang terms for marijuana. Some of the more common nicknames include pot, grass, weed, hash and ganja.
9. More than 800,000 people are arrested each year for marijuana.
8. The last four presidents, including Barack Obama, have all admitted to smoking cannabis.
7. After alcohol, marijuana is the most popular recreational or mood-altering drug used worldwide.
6. In 2003, Canada became the first country in the world to offer medical marijuana to pain-suffering patients.
5. One-third of Americans think weed legalization would boost the economy.
4. Legalization would save the United States an estimated $14 billion per year.
3. Marijuana has been proven helpful for treating the symptoms of a variety of medical conditions such as cancer and AIDS and many more.
2. In the history of mankind, no one has ever overdosed or died from smoking too much weed.
1. Legalization has many benefits for the world: medical, crime, industrial, taxes and more.”

From 10 Facts

The idea that we lock people away in prison for several years for smoking, growing or selling pot, when we have overcrowded prisons with two-million people locked up in prison and many of these offenders being non-violent, when we don’t lock up people for drinking, possessing or selling alcohol or smoking tobacco, which are just as dangerous drugs if not more so, but for some reason aren’t considered narcotics, is more dangerous than illegal narcotics itself.

Alcohol and tobacco are both very addicting and can cause of serious diseases, including addiction. But also heart disease, liver disease, lung cancer, diabetes and others. Plus, the problems alcohol and tobacco bring to the society with our economy with people being less productive because they are sick from drinking too much. Or have clothes that smell like nicotine.And so many other issues facing this country, with multiple economic problems, seems very ironic to me,

This tells me the reason for marijuana prohibition is about politics and ideology and not policy. That politicians can’t come out on favor of marijuana legalization because they are worried about looking “soft on crime”. And if we legalize marijuana: “That could lead to other drugs”. Really? See that actually that happens with alcohol and tobacco. Again both legal.

If we legalized with regulation and taxation of marijuana and treat it like alcohol, what happens: fewer people going to jail and prison who didn’t hurt anyone. Which saves us a lot of jail and prison space. Money that could be spent on other priorities. We now spend more on our corrections system than our education system. More tax revenue would be collected because of the sales tax on marijuana. More well-paid jobs would be created, producing, growing and selling marijuana.

With these workers paying taxes off of their income. Instead of making all of their money on the black market not paying taxes, unlike people working in the alcohol and tobacco industry’s. We would save money on law enforcement because instead of going after people for marijuana activities, they could spend their time and resources on actually going after dangerous criminals. Who are actual threats to society.

I’m not arguing that we legalize marijuana today and let the chips fall where they may. What I’m saying is that we treat like alcohol. And give the marijuana industry no special advantage over the alcohol or tobacco industry. 21 or over to smoke, sell or produce marijuana. Licensed to sell or produce marijuana. No driving or flying or operating any vehicle under the influence of marijuana, etc. A significant tax on marijuana, because we are not talking about spring water here. Marijuana does have negative side-affects. This would be a much better approach than prohibition.

Just look at alcohol prohibition of the 1920s and 30s, that didn’t work either. Because if people want to do something bad enough, they’ll find a way to do it and the hell with the consequences. If you’re a true believer in limited government and a true disbeliever in big government, then you are for legalization with regulation and taxation of marijuana. Because support letting people live their own lives, as long as they are not hurting anyone else with their freedom protect everyone’s freedom.

 

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The New Republic: Jamie Holmes: ‘Why Can’t More People Escape Poverty?’

Posted on September 16, 2014 by Erik Schneider

Source:The New Republic– Poverty in America?

Source:The New Republic

“During this week’s Congressional Black Caucus special order hour on “Lifting Americans Out of Poverty”, Rep. Hakeem Jeffries’ explained the base causes that keeps many struggling American families at or under the poverty line.”

Source:U.S. Representative Hakeem Jeffries

If you look at why some people do very well in America, professionally, economically and most other things and why some people do well in these areas and why some people do OK, get by, but with not a lot of financial security and why some people are barely surviving and why some people can’t get by and fight and struggle for their survival everyday and need a lot of public assistance just to struggle to get by, it is about education.

It gets to education, because the better you’re educated and the more skills that you have to offer in the workplace and in other areas, the better you’re chance of doing well in life. It’s also about personal choices that people make. Do they finish school or drop out especially in high school. Which is generally a free ticket to poverty. Do they have kids when they are financially and emotionally ready to raise kids or not. Or do they have kids before they are ready to raise them well.

And before they have the skills that they need to make a good living in life. And do their kids have two parents that are both in their lives and raising them. Or do they have one parent without the skills and tools to raise them well in life. And do their kids finish school and get themselves the skills that they need to get a good job or not. Your level of education and the personal choices that people make in life, is the best indicator of how well they’ll do in life.

Whether people are self-sufficient or do they need public assistance to survive. Because they don’t have the skills that they need to get a good job and be self-sufficient. Wealthy, upper middle class, middle class people do well in life because they are well-educated. And have the skills that they need to get a good job. People in poverty in a lot of cases don’t have these skills and in most cases have to go back to school.

Because they didn’t finish school, to get the skills that they need to get a good job. And become self-sufficient, which is why education is so important especially public education in America. And why people need to be able and go to good schools so they can get the skills that they need to be successful in life. Going forward the way to finally win the War on Poverty in America.

A war that was declared back in 1965, instead of just talking about it, will be about education, empowering people in poverty to go back to school or go to school and get the skills that they need. To move themselves out of poverty and will be about reforming our public schools. So we are producing enough workers in America, so people don’t have to live in poverty as adults in the first place. Thats how we finally win this war.

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Helmer Reenberg: Senator John F. Kennedy- Speech to the Houston Ministries

Posted on September 14, 2014 by Erik Schneider

 

Attachment-1-175

Source:Helmer Reenberg– U.S. Senator John F. Kennedy: D, MA, 1960

From Helmer Reenberg

“Presidential candidate John F. Kennedys major address to a group of Protestant ministers on the religious issue. Many Protestants questioned the ability of a Roman Catholic President to make important national decisions independently of the influence of his church. Senator Kennedy answers those questions before an audience of Protestant clergy, many of whom may believe that he can not.
John F. Kennedy’s Separation of Church and State Speech.
Rice Hotel, Houston, Texas – September 12, 1960.”

From Helmer Reenberg

Sen. John F. Kennedy was an Irish Catholic Northeastern Liberal Democrat. Running for President in 1960 and then being nominated by the Democratic Party as their presidential nominee, in a country that was overwhelmingly Protestant. That was fairly ignorant when it came to Catholicism and didn’t trust Catholics. And had a lot of miss givings about Catholicism and were worried that a Catholic President would try to establish some type of Catholic theocracy, that would govern the United States.

So because of the ignorance about Catholicism in America, Senator Kennedy had to answer some questions and lay out his beliefs when it came to Church and State how his religion affects his life in 1960. I wrote a blog about this a few weeks ago on FRS FreeState , after former Sen. Rick Santorum now a Republican presidential candidate, commented on Senator Kennedy’s speech about Church and State.

Where Senator Santorum said that the JFK Speech made him want to “throw up”. And said that Freedom of Religion and Separation of Church and State is exactly that, that we as Americans have the Freedom of Choice in whether to practice religion or not. But that we are a constitutional republic in the form of a liberal democracy. And we are governed by a Constitution, I believe the greatest Constitution in the World. As far as the amount of individual liberty it guarantees and protects. That we are not a theocracy and government can’t get involved in religion. Other than to protect it.

If it’s a Theocracy you want to live in, based on your own religious beliefs and be governed by that, and not a constitutional republic, then I suggest you consider moving to the Islamic Republic of Iran. or the Islamic Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Because to be able to live in a country like that in the United States, would take a Constitutional Amendment in this country. Because we are a constitutional republic in the form of a liberal democracy. Not a theocracy, with Separation of Church and State.

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CBC: ‘JFK’s Women: Scandals Revealed’ 

Posted on September 13, 2014 by Erik Schneider

JFK's Women_ Scandals Revealed (2010) - Google Search

Source:CBC– I believe this is then Senator John F. Kennedy (Democrat, Massachusetts) running for President in 1960.

Source:The New Democrat

“The dangerous sexual liasons of U.S. president John F Kennedy. This explosive bio reveals the President was prepared to risk his political career and his country’s security for sex.
Monday October 11, Saturday October 16 at 10 pm ET/PT & Sunday October 17 at 8 pm ET on CBC News Network.”

From CBC

If the media back then reported on public officials private lives as they do today, John F. Kennedy never becomes President of the United States. JFK was Bill Clinton on steroids when it came to having affairs with women other than his wife.

When it came to JFK’s private life, it is not just the multiple women, but multiple women at the same time and a different women on each night and a new woman that had connections to really dangerous and powerful people, who had goods on Jack Kennedy, that could’ve brought down his political career. Like how JFK was elected President in 1960 with the mob’s role in the Illinois election.

To look at it now I think it is somewhat amazing that the most powerful man in the world had so many people who all had the goods on them that could’ve brought him down or used him to blackmail him to get the President to layoff on their illegal operations. It is also somewhat amazing that a President of the United States could be so irresponsible with not only his own personal life, but then risk not only his own political career which is his business. But allow for that it affect how he did his job as President of the United States and having to make his own personal affairs part of his administration’s business.

But even with all of Jack Kennedy’s personal baggage, if anything his administration was tougher on people who had the goods on him, (so to speak) like the Italian mafia and actually went hard against the mafia and put forward policies that brought down the mafia over the years.

The mafia could’ve told President Kennedy: “We have the goods on you, so you better not mess with us, or we’ll release what we have on you to the media”. They had the goods on JFK, but JFK’s brother Robert Kennedy was a different story where they didn’t have anything on him. And RFK was also Attorney General of the United States. And his Justice Department went after the organize crime real hard.

You could say that Jack Kennedy was simply too irresponsible to be President of the United States. That his private life was simply too dangerous for him to be President. And again if his private life were public back then, he probably doesn’t get elected President and I’m not sure he would get elected President today with the same lifestyle. Because his private affairs wouldn’t of been private and the people would really know what kind of man JFK was.

The fact is as President JFK was very responsible in the job and in the White House, (when he was working) and his Justice Department actually went hard and brought down people who could’ve really hurt him politically. And I’m sure part of that had to do with the fact that he had the goods on some of these organize crime people as well. Similar to Bill Clinton the man in public was much different from the man in private. The man in private is reckless, but the man in public is responsible and does his job the best that he can do it.

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Roger Sharp Archive: President Jimmy Carter on 1980 Campaign, 3/21/1980

Posted on September 12, 2014 by Erik Schneider


Source:The New Democrat 

As much trouble as President Jimmy Carter was in politically in 1979-80, having an approval rating somewhere in the thirties and looking very vulnerable to Ronald Reagan in the 1980 presidential election with all the economic problems and the Iranian Hostage Crisis, President Carter whipped Senator Ted Kennedy in most of the Democratic presidential primaries. Senator Kennedy didn’t win many if any states outside of the Northeast in 1980.

With a better stronger more personally disciplined presidential candidate with the same popularity in the Democratic Party as Ted Kennedy had, President Carter would’ve been a lot more vulnerable and perhaps isn’t renominated for president. But Ted Kennedy turned out to be a lousy presidential candidate for a few reasons.

He didn’t want to be president and was running out of some obligation he believed he had to the Democratic Party.

He didn’t even know why he wanted to be president as Roger Mudd made clear in the CBS interview.

And he had a lot of personal issues that he was dealing with at that time. Like getting divorced and rumors around he was involved with multiple women.

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William Shanley: Jimmy Carter- ‘Discusses His Presidency With William Shanley, February 1983’

Posted on September 11, 2014 by Erik Schneider

William Shanley_ Jimmy Carter- 'Discusses His Presidency With William Shanley, February 1983'

Source:William Shanley– President James E. Carter (Democrat, Georgia) 39th President of the United States.

Source:The New Democrat

“Jimmy Carter discusses his Presidency with William Shanley – February 1983”

From William Shanley

I’m not going to try to make the case that Jimmy Carter was a great president, or one of our best president’s, because he clearly wasn’t. I have a lot of respect for Jimmy Carter as a man and even to a certain extent for him as president. But he had so much on his plate when he came into the White House in 1977 and that just grew with the economy going down and even into recession in 1979-80 and with everything that came up in foreign affairs, that I’m not sure anyone would’ve been very successful as president in just four years on those issues.

A big reason why Jimmy Carter was elected President of the United States in 1976 was because he was an outsider. Washington was very unpopular in the mid 1970s with Congress and the Federal Government more broadly because of Watergate and the gridlock that was going on. And here comes this Washington outsider who had never worked or served in Washington, who was a successful Governor of Georgia who had a lot of appeal because he was an outsider. And who ran as someone who would always tell the truth and would always do what he believes was right.

The fact that Jimmy Carter was such a complete outsider to Washington I believe was part of his downfall. It was not just that he was an outsider, but most of his White House staff except for a few including his Vice President Walter Mondale were outsiders as well. People with little to no experience in how the Federal Government works and how Congress works. And not knowing how to deal with Congress. One of President Carter’s classic mistakes was when he ran against Congress as President as someone who would take on Congress.

The problem with running against Congress, perhaps especially when your party controls both the House and Senate, Democrats controlled Congress both the House and Senate and with big majorities in both chambers. And President Carter needed to be able to work with his own party to get his policies enacted.

President Carter not only ran against Congress, but he was a liberal New Democrat back in the late 1970s when that didn’t become popular until the early 1990s, dealing with a progressive New Deal/Great Society Democratic Congress that wanted to expand the safety net in America. And go back to the 1960s economically.

Jimmy Carter is one of those classic examples as someone who would’ve done much better as President had he had some real experience in Washington before he became President. George W. Bush falls into this category as well. But had Carter served in Congress before the White House (in either chamber) and then went back to Georgia to run his business and serve as Governor before he became President, or served in the executive branch like in the cabinet or a combination of both executive experience at the Federal level and Congressional experience before going back to Georgia, he would’ve had the experience to do much better as President.

I see Jimmy Carter as an underrated President because of his success’s in foreign policy as it did with the nuclear arms agreement with Russia. His dealings with China, the Middle East peace agreement with Egypt and Israel, the Panama Canal Treaty, keeping America out of war as President, making human rights the priority of his foreign policy which contributed to the opposition in Eastern Europe gaining strength and being able to take on the authoritarian regimes in Eastern Europe. And with energy policy in trying to move America off of foreign oil. So I would give President Carter a B or perhaps even a B+ as President, but not one of our great president’s.

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ESPN: SportsCentury- Greatest Head Coaches: Vince Lombardi

Posted on September 9, 2014 by Erik Schneider

Greatest Coaches - Sportscentury - Google Search

Source:ESPN– Chicago Bears head coach Mike Ditka (1982-92)
Source:The Daily Press

“Some of the best ever on what it takes to be a great coach. All rights belong to ESPN and Sportscentury.”

From ESPN

Vince Lombardi

Source:Green Bay Packers– One of Vince Lombardi’s best quotes.

On this Thanksgiving and by the way Happy Thanksgiving to everyone out there, I thought it would be a great time to blog about Vince Lombardi, the greatest head coach of all-time, not just in football, but perhaps in team sports period.

I think you’ll have a hard time finding a better head coach because football is not just a huge part of our Thanksgiving holiday and Vince Lombardi is a big part of football. And the Green Bay Packers are a big part of our Thanksgiving football tradition. The Packers have played a lot on Thanksgiving and Coach Lombardi coached a lot of those games.

When I think of Vince Lombardi, I think of what a head coach should be when they are at their best and when they are the best at they are. Someone who constantly strives at making his team the best that they can, at getting the best effort and performance out of his team all of his players at the same time in the same game.

I mean if you look at it thats what the job of a head coach is. Of course they want to win and the head coaches that do win are the successful head coaches, that is win more than they lose and a lot more than they lose. But really the job is to get the best performance out of your players that they can deliver. There have been teams that were 7-9, 8-8, 9-7 and of course missed the playoffs, but their head coach had a good year or a great year. They even had a great record that year because of the team that they had and the players that had to play.

The level of talent that they had to work with and there been teams that were 10-6, 11-5 but they didn’t have very good seasons and didn’t win championships even though they had the talent to, because their players didn’t play very well as a team. They didn’t work very well together, their head coach didn’t get them to play as well as they could’ve. And they ended up basically having a mediocre or even a bad season because their head coach didn’t get them to play as well as they could’ve.

The job of the head coach is to get his team and all of his players to play as well as they can at the same time as one team and if he has a good team or a great team, like Chuck Knoll had with the Pittsburgh Steelers in the 1970s (to use as an example) then that will lead to a lot of wins and championships.

The Green Bay Packers of the 1960s didn’t have a dynasty in that decade and were the team of the 60s because they were loaded with talent and great players. They had some of those and some Hall of Famers, they won five NFL Championships in seven years from 1961-67, because they had the best teams and the best head coach. Best team and best talent are two different things. Best talent has to do with athletic ability and skills. Best team has to do with the team that plays the best together and plays the best as a team.

I’ll give you an example: Super Bowl 36 between the New England Patriots and St. Louis Rams one of the biggest upsets in Super Bowl history. The Rams I believe were a 10-12 point favorite they still had that great Vertical Spread offense (as I call it) with Kurt Warner, Marshal Faulk and all of those WRs. The Patriots were 5-11 the year before, snuck into the playoffs in 2001, winning their division. Beat the Raiders in a blizzard in the famous tuck game and then upset a very good Steelers team in the AFC Final. They had to beat two better teams just to make to the Super Bowl.

The Rams clearly had batter talent in that Super Bowl, but the Patriots had a better team and played better together and of course they had head coach Bill Belichick, perhaps still the best head coach in the NFL. Thats what Vince Lombardi had in Green Bay in the 1960s, he had the best teams, not exactly the best talent when he won those championships.

So to use my definition of the job of a head coach, then no one is better than Vince Lombardi at getting his teams and players to play the best that they can at the same time. And he is the best head coach of all-time, because he was the best motivator and perhaps the best motivator ever as well.

And he would put it simple: “You want to play for the Packers, you’re going to give me everything you have, or find another job or team to play for”. He knew when to ride someone and when to pride someone and do both of those things in a way that showed the player that he’s just trying to get the best out of him, kinda like a great father would be. Thats what made Vince Lombardi the best ever at what he did.

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CBS: Helter Skelter- Story of The Charles Manson Family

Posted on September 8, 2014 by Erik Schneider

Source:The Daily Press

In 1976 there was a two-part TV mini-series I believe on CBS about the Manson Crime Family from the late 1960s and even after their leader Charles Manson was arrested in late 1969 for his role in the Tate murders and other murders during the Manson Family murder spree from the summer of 1969, a summer Los Angeles will never forget. The Manson Family was still in business so to speak in the early 1970s and even up to 1975 with Lynette Squeaky Frohm’s attempt to assassinate President Gerald Ford.

And this mini-series was about the murders of the Manson Family in the Summer of 1969 and other business about the Manson Family. It was not a religious cult, there was some spirituality in it. But it was basically about a petty thief pimp career criminal who was never very good at staying out of prison. Who would get released from prison for the last time in the mid 1960s and work his way to the San Francisco area, pick up some girls in their late teens early 20s who ran away from home.

These were young adults late teens for the most part who seemed somewhat lost and build a family made up of high school and college dropouts. People that they believed were kissed off from society and Charlie Manson finally found a group of people who seemed like him, somewhat lost in the World. That didn’t seem to fit in with mainstream society and he founded his soldiers that would take out their anger against mainstream society.

Charlie Manson wasn’t intelligent in the sense that he was well-educated, he didn’t get through high school or make it to high school. He grew up in prison basically, in juvenile hall and probably didn’t spend much time in school there. He never knew his father and his mother was a prostitute who didn’t spend much time with her son and Charlie got moved around a lot as a kid. And probably didn’t feel very loved, as an FBI profiler once said about Manson on NBC Dateline. “Charlie Manson is an example of what happens when we don’t raise our kids well”.

Society in a sense has some blame here for creating Charlie Manson. Not to excuse Manson because he’s exactly where he belongs and will and should never leave prison. But society isn’t innocent here in the creation of Charlie Manson. And what Manson had in his crime family were the people who would take out revenge for him against society. “If you were part of the establishment and successful in life, living in the Los Angeles area and they knew about you, you were a target of the Manson Family”. To paraphrase Vince Bugliosi who prosecuted the Manson Family. Charlie wasn’t stupid but he wasn’t educated either.

Charlie Manson had talent to play and write music, but also to read people and know how they work and how he could work them up to the point where he could make people kill for him, Charles Watson, Patricia Krenwenkell, Leslie Van Houten, Susan Atkins and others. And they found their targets in actress Sharon Tate, Karen Folger and others and killed them. The Manson Family murders were some of the worst murders ever committed. Adolph Hitler, Saddam Hussein would’ve been proud of these murders.

The Manson victims literally being stabbed and hanged to death in their own homes and their blood being spread around their homes. The Manson Family literally left their mark and were begging for the death penalty with their murders. And were given the Death Penalty before the U.S. Supreme Court outlawed the death penalty in I believe 1973. The only reason why these serial murderers are alive today. Their lives being spared something they didn’t do for their victims and they are the poster children for why we need to raise our kids well. And the Manson Crime Family had to be stopped for them to pay their debt to society. But to put them out of business so they couldn’t strike again.

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HBO Sports: Lombardi- How Vince Lombardi Impacted the Washington Redskins

Posted on September 7, 2014 by Erik Schneider

Source:The Daily Press

In the 1960s the Redskins weren’t bad at least starting around 1964 when they traded quarterback Norm Snead to Philadelphia for future Hall of Famer Sonny Jurgenson. They also picked up tailback/receiver Charlie Taylor who would also end up in the Hall of Fame and you could make a good case that he’s the best WR of his era and of all time. And they picked up TB/WR Bobby Mitchell in 1962, who’s also in the Hall of Fame. Drafted tight end Jerry Smith who should also be in the Hall of Fame. Drafted linebacker Chris Hamburger who just went in to the Hall of Fame. Hall of Fame LB Sam Huff was still there.

The Redskins weren’t bad in the 1960s, but they weren’t very good either, they only had one winning season, 1969 Vince Lombardi’s only season in Washington and had several 7-7 seasons and a few 6-8 seasons, but they were building a lot of the success that the Redskins had in the 1970s started in the 1960s with the players that they drafted, including tailback Larry Brown in 1969 the Redskins first 1000 yard rusher. The Redskins had some of the best passing offenses in the NFL in the 1960s from 1964 and on, but they never had a solid running game until 1969 with Larry Brown.

But they also had some of the worst defenses in this decade unlike the 1970s and 80s when they were always in the top 10 in defense with George Allen and then Joe Gibbs where they win five NFC Finals from 1972-91 and three Super Bowls in that same period. Which is why Vince Lombardi and George Allen were so important for the Redskins to change the culture in how they operated.

When George Allen took over the Redskins in 1971 as head coach/general manager, I believe he knew he had a good nucleus, but that he had to add to it to make the Redskins a winner and contender. Which is what he did, he did not come to Washington from Los Angeles, where he was one game away from the Super Bowl a few times to have a 500 team or a team that barely has a winning record, but he wanted to build a champion win the NFC East, the NFC Final and the Super Bowl. He had very good teams with the Rams that always had one of the best defenses which was his background. He was George Halas’s defensive coordinator with (da Bears) before he went to Los Angeles to be the Rams head coach.

His philosophy was simple. Tough take charge defense that takes away the run to attack the QB. Run the ball on offense, protect the QB and take a few shots down field on offense off of play-action and win the turnover battle. That if you do these things well you’ll win much more than you lose and when he came to Washington that’s what he wanted to establish. He knew he had a good group that he had to add a few pieces to make them winners and contenders,which is why he brought in some Rams, like defensive tackle Diron Talbert who reminds me a little of DT Dave Butz who Allen also brought to Washington. As well as linebacker Jack Pardee who would later be the Redskins head coach from 1978-80 and others.

The Redskins in the George Allen era were nicknamed the “Over the Hill Gang”, not because his players couldn’t play anymore, but because most of them were in their thirty’s when they got there. Or were going bald or were coming from teams, like QB Billy Kilmer’s case that no longer wanted them and when you get released from the New Orleans Saints like Kilmer did in 1971 you are starting over and trying to find a place for yourself. Because the Saints were awful their first few years, but it all worked for Allen in Washington because he sold them on the idea that they are here to win. “Thats why I brought you here and kept you here to win and become champions”. Something a lot of these players had never done before.

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Howard Cosell Fan: The 1972-73 Washington Redskins

Posted on September 5, 2014 by Erik Schneider

Source:The Daily Press

The 1972 Redskins didn’t win the NFC Eastern Division Championship their first in thirty years or win the NFC Final their first in thirty years because they had overwhelming talent. They had very good talent with wide receivers Charlie Taylor, WR Roy Jefferson, tight end Jerry Smith and tailback Larry Brown. And on defense with people like defensive tackle Diron Talbert, linebacker Chris Hamburger, LB Jack Pardee and others, one of the best defenses in the NFL. I believe the best in the NFC that only gave up 217 points. They didn’t accomplish these things because of great talent. They weren’t the Cowboys Doomsday Defense, or the Vikings Purple People Eaters or the Rams Fearsome Foursome or the Steelers Steel Curtain.

They were a bunch of tough guys who could play who all had character, that all wanted to win and never were champions before. Thats why George Allen the Redskins head coach/general manager brought them to Washington to become champions. George Allen’s whole philosophy was about the team, “how do I get forty men (as was the case back then) to play the best that they can and play together”. (And I know this sounds corny)

But that’s how George Allen operated. His favorite drink was milk probably because he didn’t spend much time drinking other things or even thinking about other drinks that he liked, because he was all about his team. “How do I get them to play the best that they can and play together at the same time”. And everything else including his family came after his team as his kids would tell you. In the 1960s the Redskins had a pass first explosive offense that was built around QB Sonny Jurgenson, WR Charlie Taylor, WR Bobby Mitchell and TE Jerry Smith. That didn’t run the ball very well or play a lot of defense, sort of like the Miami Dolphins with Dan Marino in the 1980s.

But George Allen came from the Chicago Bears and Los Angeles Rams where they played tough defense always had one of the best defenses in the NFL. With ball control offenses so that’s exactly what he wanted to establish in Washington, but the difference being that he was able to bring those defenders to Washington. Diron Talbert, Jack Pardee, but had a lot more offensive talent to go with his defense, which made the Redskins very explosive on both sides of the ball.

Allen inherited a team that was like 5-9 in 1970 the year Vince Lombardi died and took them to 10-4 and into the NFC Playoffs and 11-3 in 1972 as they won the NFC East, beat the Cowboys in the 1972 NFC Final, became NFC Champions. And went to Super Bowl 7 where they lost to the undefeated Miami Dolphins, but I believed the Redskins had the better team. The 1972 Redskins were a team that represent what a good team looks like, with star players, but other players on the team who are also good. But know their roles and everyone playing together and playing their roles.

George Allen was not perfect, the way he handled Sonny Jurgenson and Billy Kilmer and then later Joe Theisman. All three of them playing at the same time was a tragic mistake, that I believe cost him a championship. Sonny Jurgenson was clearly his best QB and should’ve led his teams until he retired instead of splitting time with Billy Kilmer. Who was at best a journeyman QB and a part-time starter and Joe Theisman should’ve replaced Jurgenson when Sonny retired. But George Allen’s whole philosophy was built around “how to get the most out of my team at the same time to win as many games as possible” and he had a lot of success with that philosophy.

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