Champion boxer Manny Pacquiao scores victory in the political ring.
We were going to post about this earlier in the week, but then changed our minds. But today we’re feeling wordy, so here you go. If you follow boxing, you know Manny Pacquiao. He’s a punching dynamo, one of the toughest guys in the world, and has been on the sports pages for months due to the drama surrounding his on-again off-again bout with undefeated Floyd Mayweather. If you follow politics, you know by now that Pacquiao won a seat earlier this week to the Philippine parliament. He’ll be representing Sarangani province, which is on the island of Mindinao. Pacquiao won his post by beating a wealthy and entrenched political clan, and in defiance of those who predicted his congressional bid would fail the same way his 2008 attempt did. But this time Pacquiao was more organized, disseminating his anti-poverty message at a grassroots level, and outspending his opponent Roy Chiongbian. In fact, some observers have suggested that Pacquiao’s massive spending doesn’t square with his message about poverty, but we don’t particularly see that. Pacquiao spent what was needed to win and now claims that because he used mostly his own money he owes no favors to special interests. In our view, politics is about nothing but favors to special interests, and if you’ve spent millions of your own money your first thought might perhaps be to make some of it back. Just saying is all. But we admit to seeing events through an American prism. We don’t want to sell Pacquiao short—he’s passionate, seems sincere, and worked hard for his win. In politics, it’s sometimes possible for sincere outsiders to storm the palace. Maybe Pacquiao is one of those outsiders. And there’s always this: if he turns out to be just another corrupt corporate shill, Sarangani voters can always fly Floyd Mayweather into town to beat the shit out of him.
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The headlines that mattered yesteryear.
1939—Batman Debuts
In Detective Comics #27, DC Comics publishes its second major superhero, Batman, who becomes one of the most popular comic book characters of all time, and then a popular camp television series starring Adam West, and lastly a multi-million dollar movie franchise starring Michael Keaton, then George Clooney, and finally Christian Bale. 1953—Crick and Watson Publish DNA Results
British scientists James D Watson and Francis Crick publish an article detailing their discovery of the existence and structure of deoxyribonucleic acid, or DNA, in Nature magazine. Their findings answer one of the oldest and most fundamental questions of biology, that of how living things reproduce themselves. 1967—First Space Program Casualty Occurs
Soviet cosmonaut Vladimir Komarov dies in Soyuz 1 when, during re-entry into Earth's atmosphere after more than ten successful orbits, the capsule's main parachute fails to deploy properly, and the backup chute becomes entangled in the first. The capsule's descent is slowed, but it still hits the ground at about 90 mph, at which point it bursts into flames. Komarov is the first human to die during a space mission. 1986—Otto Preminger Dies
Austro–Hungarian film director Otto Preminger, who directed such eternal classics as Laura, Anatomy of a Murder, Carmen Jones, The Man with the Golden Arm, and Stalag 17, and for his efforts earned a star on Hollywood's Walk of Fame, dies in New York City, aged 80, from cancer and Alzheimer's disease. 1998—James Earl Ray Dies
The convicted assassin of American civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr., petty criminal James Earl Ray, dies in prison of hepatitis aged 70, protesting his innocence as he had for decades. Members of the King family who supported Ray's fight to clear his name believed the U.S. Government had been involved in Dr. King's killing, but with Ray's death such questions became moot.
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