It's Late In The Game ...

OK, get the picture in your mind.

We've completed three quarters in the football game (American football, not soccer!), and we're getting ready to start the fourth quarter. It's 3:00 in the afternoon, and this is the type of game that could easily go into overtime. The game is being televised on ESPN, and they're on a commercial break, so there's a lull in the action on the field.

On one side is the Green Bay Packers, a strong team rich in football tradition. They have an incredibly loyal fan base, and the fans take their wins and losses very seriously.

On the other side is the Miami Dolphins. Another team with strong traditions and loyal fans.

The score is 21-14 in favor of the visiting Packers. They're winning but it wouldn't take much to turn this game around and have the home team Dolphins pull an upset and send the Packers all the way back to Wisconsin with a terrible loss.

This is the last regularly scheduled game for the season. The winner will go on to a championship game, while the loser ends their season and heads for the showers.

Both sides have suffered injuries. Several key players from each team have already been carried off the field in a stretcher, some already in a local hospital. The game on the field has been very tough, very physical, very mean and personal.

While everyone is waiting for ESPN to come back form their commercial break the fans are doing their chants and cheers. Music is being played over the stadium's sound system. The cheerleaders are doing what they can to fire up the fans. An occasional player walks up to the fans and urges them to cheer and pull for their team. The stadium is filled with a strong atmosphere of the joys winning and depression of losing.

The crowds are in a frenzy, and then the unthinkable begins.

One entire section of fans from the Packers' side of the field suddenly walks out of the stands and onto the field. Both the referres and stadium security try to hold back the throng, but to no avail. The group takes their place on the Packers' 40-yard-line and begin screaming in unison. About this time ESPN has come back from their commercial break and now all their cameras focus on the group of fans camped out on the field. Then a spokesman from the fans comes forward, grabs a microphone, and begins speaking directly into one of ESPN's cameras, his voice and picture being carried out across the entire nation.

The ESPN commentators are in complete shock. Something like this has never been done before. All the ESPN analysts are going through all their research to see if anything like this has ever been done in any sport ... in any country.

The spokesman then hands the microphone to the coach. The coach, only moments before concentrating solely on the game, now has this to contend with. He grabs the microphone and begins speaking:

The spokesman quickly grabbed the microphone away from the coach and began screaming into the microphone, the cameras catching his every word:

With all this hubbub going on the ESPN cameras hadn't noticed that another group of fans had exited their seats and had taken a position on the field, this time on the Dolphin's 40-yard-line. And now their spokesman grabbed the microphone and began his conditions:

The poor coach is now flabbergasted.

Then one of the TV cameras notices another crowd forming on the 50-yard-line, this one becomming quite large. As this crowd grows one person steps forward and grabs the microphone for himself and begins his own rant against the frazzled coach:

The coach, now absolutely beside himself in shock, tries to explain the situation to this last group:

By now there are ESPN cameras scanning the entire field as well as the stands. People all over are screaming at each other. The players are wandering around trying to figure out what's going on. The coach is being pulled by each of the groups. The announcers in the pressbox are giving their commentary on the ruckus on the field. The referees are wondering what they should do. Everything is in chaos.

What would you do about this football game?

What would you do about Iraq?

Excellent analogy!

Besides the fact that your analogy got to be a little tedious and obvious I did sort of enjoy the imagry.

SWITCH CHANNELS

This is
a. why I seldom watch football on ESPN, but much prefer the Direct TV channels that during the course of such an event would have cut to about fourteen different Pizza Hut commercials and tempted me not only with every pickup on the market but also made me hungry for a grilled chicken subway.
b. am not much of a fan of Green Bay except when they play the Dolphins
c. why I will place any team at all over the Dolphins in any game no matter what the odds, some teams you just have to love seeing lose.

Like I said above, the analogy got to be a little tedious and after all of that a simple answer seems sort of painful to put down here. I would normally say it's too late to cut and run, but in the context of comparing the war to a football game it just seems to sort of hurt for some reason.

Still, I appreciate your point and your football game reminded me a lot of that one playoff game the Dolphins played against Jacksonville in the 1999 season (January 2000) where everything that could go wrong did go wrong right down to the sprinklers on the field activating during the third qaurter. (Marino's last game) How I loved that game, despite the fact that my latino/miami boss and his wife went whacko and tried to fire one whole department here that I got to cheer for Jacksonville, in English no less. Dolphins lost, 7 to 62

I agree with stevenpd, this is a great analogy. As for what I would do about the game, I would most certainly urge the players to see it to the end. All the sacrifice from the players would be for naught should they decide to cut their chances for further injury and just go home. The Dolphins don't want to quit, they want to win. But they would certainly love to see the Packers "pack it in." It would be an instant victory.

The same holds true for our involvement in Iraq. While there have been lives sacrificed, and some measure of carnage that has seen the bloody end to many an American soldier, we are in the lead. We are ahead by more than a touchdown. From freeing the women from tyranny, to overthrowing a hateful dictatorial regime, to helping the Iraqi people start to enjoy a freedom and control of their government that they have never seen since Hussein, we have put far more points on the scoreboard than we have suffered loss. Most definitely, we should see this to its conclusion, where we will be victorious.

I thought it was an interesting and amusing analogy, even if I stopped reading about halfway through due to the tedious length.

What would I do about the game? I'd laugh and I wouldn't care. It's a football game. The players get paid tons of money whether they win or lose. It would be a rather exciting event that would be hilarious to watch.

As for Iraq, I really don't understand our goals anymore, what still needs to be done, or why we were even there in the first place. Therefore, I don't see any reason for staying there, especially since I didn't see any reason for going there in the first place.

Great analogy! Kudos to Shamalama!

While I see where brother S is going with this, and agree with his premise, in order for this analogy to work one has to assume that all of the "fans" are really supporters of the "team". I believe there is ample evidence that a great part of the "section of fans" who are for "ending the game now" were never fans and didn't want the "game" to be played in the first place, no matter what the circumstances were/are.

Swooooosh! Nothin' but net!!!