Monday, May 12, 2008

Max Kellerman's Monday Musings Vol XI - The solution to what ails the world, How far do you need to go on Mother's Day and Why Dolan bought Newsday

Today's Max Kellerman and Brian Kenny show (IMHO) was strong on sports but also contained a great deal of impressive social commentary. One of the interesting questions asked at the beginning of the show was how far one needs to go to satisfy the obligation of Mother's Day observance. Brian Kenny talked a little about what he did for his wife on Mother's Day, before asking Max what he did for his mom. Max first said that he called all day before finally getting her on the phone around 8 PM. Under strong cross examination from Brian, this turned into leaving her a message at 2 PM and finally talking to her at 8 PM. But what else can you expect from a seasoned journalist like Brian who knows how to dig to uncover the truth behind any cover story.

"Meca" Robin Lundberg chimed in through robot/computer voice that he called his mom later in the day. The most interesting Mother's Day story would probably have come from Max analyzing what Louie Gold did for his wife on her first Mother's Day. Unfortunately, this is a story that will never be told (although Erica must be happy about it) since Louie Gold and Robin Lundberg are still muzzled. Interestingly, last Friday, caller after caller started their comments on the air with "Free Louie and Lundberg." The first couple of callers were humored by Max and Brian, but by the end the hosts seemed to have tired of this expression of popular sentiment. What can you say - by introducing the masses to Louie Gold and Robin Lundberg as vital elements of the show over the last eighteen months, the audience has come to appreciate them. While the empty suits at Disney/ESPN may have decided that they don't want Louie and Robin to speak on the air (and from the way Max and Brian were talking about it on Friday it seems like the call came from the corporate side), the people want to hear from Louie and Robin and its nice to hear the audience express their hakaras hatov (cognizance of the good performed by others - more on that concept later).

An interesting sports "related" rant was that getting rid of Stephon Marbury is the cure to all that ails the world. References were made to the vast improvement that the Nets made after trading him to Phoenix and the similar reversal of fortune for Phoenix after they dumped him on the Knicks. Max then said that when he sees world tragedies now (specifically mentioning Darfur and the earthquake in China) he keeps thinking that if they got rid of Marbury their situations would improve ("hey just get rid of Stephon Marbury and everything will be better").

There was also a clever take on the news today that Cablevision had bought Newsday. I can't recall whether Max or Brian came up with this logic, but together they theorized that since Dolan had to cede some control to Donnie Walsh when he was named team president, Dolan needed something else to meddle in, so he had his father purchase Newsday for him. The interesting question will be whether Newsday will go down the tubes like "The Wiz" electronics stores, or whether it will just have a complete reversal of direction like the Knicks, but continue to exist because people have no other viable option for Long Island news.

But back to the issue of hakaras hatov - Max talked about how he took his wife Erin out for Mother's Day (Happy Mother's Day Erin!) to a restaurant on the way back from the Hamptons. He said that there is a person who works there who really helped them out in securing things for their Labor Day weekend wedding. The problem was that when Max and Erin stop in, Max can never remember who the guy is and Erin has to remind Max about what the fellow did for them and how they owe him. This was just another example of how the show contains Torah undercurrents. The concept of hakaras hatov is well established in Judaism. From the very beginning of their education, children are taught about recognizing the good performed by others, such as when Moses did not hit the water to initiate the plague of blood or frogs because the water did not attempt to drown him when his mother put him in the basket. Sure enough from recognizing the debt owed to our mothers to the personal debt of gratitude that Max and Erin owed to this fellow who helped them with their wedding plans, the show carried the Torah thought of hakaras hatov.

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