Truth about Roswell!

You never expected Kayo Nelson to reveal the truth about the Roswell incident, did you? I've discussed this with many friends over the years and have decided it would make a good blog topic. So hold on! Charley Kayo Nelson is about to tell you the truth about Roswell!

I have a friend named Mike. (That's not his real name. His real name is "Bill.") (Ha, ha. That's a joke.) Mike was in the Air Force for many years and for quite some time was stationed at Nellis Air Force Base outside of Las Vegas. Having some familiarity with Area 51 nearby, Mike told me what he was officially supposed to do if anyone questioned him about UFOs and Aliens in connection with that good old mysterious secret air force base. The official policy was to be a bit wishy-washy and say something like "Well, I can't really comment on that."

Why? Because if people were focused on crazy things like UFOs in connection to Area 51, then they had been conveniently sidetracked and weren't focused on the real reason we had/have a secret air force base. The real reason? It did have something to do with aliens, only the aliens were from the USSR and not some planet on the other side of the galaxy. Area 51 was built to keep secrets from the Russians. Remember, this was during the Cold War and KGB and CIA spies and James Bond and all that.

So let's transfer this bit of knowledge to Roswell. A prototype of a spy balloon we wanted to send out over Russia (Project Mogul) was being tested and it crashed outside of Roswell, New Mexico. Now the US Air Force couldn't come out and say "Oh, yeah! That was a prototype of a secret spy balloon we're going to send out over Russia!" That would have been pretty stupid. So instead Air Force spokesman Walter Haut said something quite brilliant. He said what had crashed was one of them there flying saucers. Actually, he called it a "flying disc," but everyone knew what he meant.

Okay, he was following official policy, but it was a brilliant move. Nearly 70 years later and Mr. Haut's slight of hand is still working. People don't think "Roswell: Secret spy balloon." No they think "Roswell: Flying saucers! Visitors from outer space!" And so I say Walter Haut, very well played, sir.

Oh, in case you haven't looked up Project Mogul on the internet do so. Google it. That is all.

A lot of people lately have been asking what I think of Ron Gardenhire's status as manager of the Minnesota Twins. (If you consider three to be a lot of people.) As a fan of the Twins I will tell you what I think: It's time for Gardy to go.

Understand that it pains me to say that. Gardy's a good guy. He's won six division titles in his tenure with the Twins. That is a record that may never be broken. Unfortunately, it wasn't his ability to reach the playoffs that was ever the problem; it was his ability to advance. His first time in back in his first year as manager, 2002, he and the team advanced to the ALCS. After that it was six straight playoff series losses.

Nowdays we Twins fans would drool for the chance to win our division and lose in the first round. Four straight years of 90+ losses is also a Twins record that might never be broken. No matter how good of a manager we feel Gardy is, it's obvious the team needs a new direction. Someone to light a bit of a fire.

Who? An obvious choice would be Paul Molitor. Paul, however, has one big problem: He's part of the current regime. If it's a new direction we seek, the underling is not the answer. How about Doug  Mientkiewicz who's doing great things managing down in the minors? An intriguing choice, but I think Doug is a few years away from being able to manage in the bigs.

So I am going to throw out a wild card. You heard it hear first folks. This might sound crazy at first glance, but I think it's so crazy it just might work! Ozzie Guillen!

Yes I will say that again! Ozzie Guillen should be the next manager of the Minnesota Twins! Ozzie Guillen! Ozzie Guillen! Ozzie Guillen!  (That's to help the Google searches.)

A lot of people have been asking me "Charley Nelson, what do you think of the Ray Rice, Adrian Peterson, et. al. situation in the NFL?" Actually, they don't usually put in the "et. al." part. I added that on my own. But the question remains the same. So Charley Nelson will tell you what he thinks.

I know the sport of boxing quite well. There are some great people who are or were professional boxers. Wonderful people, wonderful friends. There are also, I'm afraid, some not so great people who are boxers. Many of these boxers grew up using their fists to solve all of their problems. Rather than be condemned for that, they were rewarded. They earned a career. They won fame and glory. So it's not too difficult to understand that some boxers have trouble separating what is appropriate behavior inside the ring from what is appropriate behavior outside the ring.

I see the same thing in the NFL. Pro football players grew up as big, tough kids who could knock other kids into the next zip code. Quite apart from being punished for it, they were rewarded. All of their life they have been treated special because they were big and tough and knew how to knock other kids senseless.  High school was a breeze for them because they were the big football star! Colleges begged for them to come to their school because "You're big and tough and can knock the crap out of people!"

Again, I am sure that most NFL players are good, decent men. But again I am not at all surprised that a good many of them have trouble distinguishing what is appropriate on the field from what is appropriate off the field.

Ours is a society that revels in violence. Truly, it is. Of course we want that violence to be contained to the playing fields and our movie and TV screens, but sometimes it's not going to be. Sometimes a man who grew up being told that his violent ways are a wonderful gift is going to use that wonderful gift the wrong way.

This is not in anyway meant to defend Ray Rice, Adrian Peterson et. al. What these men did disgusts me. It is to say, however, that the NFL has a serious problem on its hands. The expression "tip of the iceberg" comes to mind.