The Power of the NFL: Not even Rolling Stone Can Go Against It

Brian Tuohy posited the following to a number of media and other types inundating his Twitter with some of the lies from Goodell's speech (and that post - and it may be multiple posts, if one list of them is proven full and correct -- is forthcoming!) with the following challenge:

Hey all you whining sportswriters filling my feed with your anti-Goodellisms, why not actually investigate his lies & expose this league?

— Brian Tuohy(@TheFixIsInTuohy) January 30, 2015

Well, according to Deadspin, we might have another moment not unakin to the Bill Polian fiasco from September, as the Big Finger of Zot has ordered silence against someone daring to speak against the NFL again...

Rolling Stone is often known for inquisitive journalism, and not just about music.

So it's mysterious when Jeb Lund posts the following on his Twitter after the Goodell lie-fest...

Whew, that was a fun press conference! Anyway, football is inexorably devouring itself behind a desperate illusion. http://t.co/gv98UvdEoG

— Jeb Lund (@Mobute) January 30, 2015

Only to find the post either already or soon-after deleted as of 3 PM or so this afternoon.

Lund has moved it over to his personal blog, according to Deadspin, so let's see what he said:

He begins with a challenge to the 100,000,000 or so who swear fealty to all this:

Here's a horrifying game you can play during this Sunday's Super Bowl and the nearly 12 hours of pre- and postgame content: count the number of times you hear some variation of "deflated balls" and compare that to the number of times during Super Bowls XLV or XLVII you heard the phrases "two-time accused rapist" or "accused co-conspirator in a double murder." Or just compare "deflated balls" to "brain damage." Then see if the first number dwarfs a combination of the last three by an order of magnitude. It will.

The NFL loves accused rapists, brain damage, murder, etc.

To much of the male power elite in this country (in and outside of sports), this is Man Code. This is what it means to be a Real Man, so you can get what is just shown to the rest of us, taunting and implying that we aren't worthy of it.

For all the talk of harsh gridiron realities, the NFL hasn't been in the reality business for a while. Reality is its enemy, and the Super Bowl—the largest spectacle of the game—is paradoxically its most vulnerable creation. It is an event ballooned so large that the slightest puncture threatens to send it deflating into a long, suffocating series of fatal escaping farts.

Hence, this is why this year's Super Bowl is the most caustic event in American sports history. That demand for reality would run counter to everything that is (falsely) taught, and, if that reality were ever to be taught, you'd be so right-wing with the concepts of legitimate rape, killing the "lesser persons", etc., you'd make Romney look sane!

And yet, that's the NFL: The National Freefall League, The No... League (just ask ESPN how they did a nice job blackballing Michael Sam!), The No Fun League, Not For Long, etc.

The article goes on to state that, by the end of the six-hour preview, you will know the average ticket cost (and have it drilled that You Aren't Important (read: Rich) Enough For Our Country!!"), 30-second commercial cost (read: cost to keep the game close, last year excepted, into the fourth quarter), etc.

Or this detail on how NBC was already carrying water for the league earlier in these playoffs, as if to prepare them for portraying Sunday's farce as real:

"On raw audio, you could hear play-by-play man Al Michaels going over prepared comments about Goodell and his handling of the Rice domestic violence issue and the fatuous report by Robert Mueller. Following Michaels, color commentator Cris Collinsworth stated, "The decision initially to suspend Ray Rice for two games was a mistake, and the commissioner admitted that. But I never once in all my dealings with the commissioner doubted his integrity." He sounded like he was staring at a picture of a hooded man holding up a copy of that day's newspaper and a revolver to his son's head."

And then the blogger takes it to a much larger point:

In the macro sense, though, the air-sucking sound escaping from Goodell World started with the revelation that, on every down, every player on the line is pulverizing another bit of his brain and that, not only did the NFL deny knowledge of Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy, they actively sought to undermine it. The fundamental tragedy of the NFL—the fact that by merely working properly on every play, it risks destroying people—is one cast down from the game itself to send the real world shuddering. That the NFL's hermetic environment could only think to suppress the story while attempt to divert attention with "safe tackling" protocols and big fines for telegenic tackles only reified the severity of the problem and the psychotic clown show overseeing it.

People who watch and believe and swear fealty to the NFL WANT PEOPLE TO DIE ON THE FIELD.

It's really that simple. The only question is what gets "fed" to the people who watch this stuff. Is it simply the presentation, or is there something more there?

But you cannot take a look at the violence committed by fans (in the stands, in the parking lots, in homes and to wives and children across this nation) in the name of football and especially the NFL and not come to the conclusion that we've gone simply beyond "watching for the crashes" -- if "my player" hits another player hard, we "OOH! and "Aah!"...

And then we damned well hope the other guy DOESN'T GET UP.

That's the crux of Football Nation America. It's OUR house, and you can't come here -- and you're going to get crippled (or worse!!!) if you attempt to do so.

Read this article -- before the Goodell Commission can get to it as well! It's a good read.