A happy Independence Day to all

Here’s a Happy Independence Day to all. We are celebrating our 241st year of independence from Great Britain and we celebrate in typical American ways with baseball, hot dogs, burgers, beer and fireworks. I hope you have been and will be careful. Please don’t drink and drive and look out for one another.

Especially on this Fourth, let’s remember that our form of government is fragile. We must work at it. The partisanship, the overall level of nastiness and incivility today bother me. The attacks on the media are outrageous and unwarranted. Without a free press, we die.

Perhaps we could start by trying to be a little kinder to one another. Yet we must speak out as Americans against those things that are damaging to our national fabric.

It seems to me to be self-evident that ....

Racism is wrong and unAmerican.

It is wrong — indeed evil — to deny LGBTQ citizens rights.

It is wrong to hold prejudices against any ethnic or religious group, but at the same time, it is equally wrong for an American to use religious beliefs to discriminate against any other group of Americans.

It is wrong to deny women full equality.

In the end, practicing and preaching that kind of prejudice and bigotry is to be a lousy American and for those misguided folks to celebrate this holiday while holding those bigoted views is to pervert and sabotage the true meaning of American citizenship.

Having said that, there is much to celebrate. So much progress has been made in so many areas. Yeah, we take a couple steps backwards every once in a while, but every time we do that, we take three steps forward.

Some Americans are strangers in their own land. I’ve felt that way at times. But I am a glass-half-full guy. I just hope that more of this Independence Day spirit works to fill the glass even more.

Oh, and for fun, a little further along this space there’s a U.S. History quiz — basic high school questions — so see how you do on this great American holiday.

Cranky me

I’ve seen some things on area amateur baseball diamonds that disturb me. In no special order.

1. Middletown’s home Legion schedule is fan-unfriendly. Starting doubleheaders at 11 a.m. on Sunday, or Monday or Tuesday

evening doubleheaders at 5:45 are hardly attractive to casual fans.

The road schedule is also daunting. Why play a doubleheader at Madison this Saturday at 10 a.m.? And spare me the games with AAU teams, which are nothing more than glorified scrimmages.

I get the regular season is too short, but the answer isn’t to add more games. That makes the pace dizzying and so helter-skelter than fans can’t keep up. This year Zone 3 played a 28-game zone schedule. Why not 21? That would enable games to be spaced out and give local fans clear options and would enable teams to use pitching sensibly.

I know Middletown coach Tim D’Aquila believes the more games his kids play, the better players they become. I get it, but there is also the law of diminishing returns.

How much better it would be if Middletown played single games on Wednesday, Friday and or Saturday nights. Fans’ concerns have to count for something and right now, they don’t count for much.

2. Could some umpires be a little more professional? Middletown uses the Hartford Board because of some disagreement about a thousand years ago that no one remembers or cares about. Most of the guys are good, solid umps. But.

I have seen the following much too often. Some umpires insist on having conversations every half inning with coaches. Stop it. Your job is not to schmooze with coaches, but to umpire a game and keep it moving. I umpired for years and that was drilled into us by our superiors.

I see umpires having conversations between themselves almost every half inning. Stop it. The plate ump should stand 20 feet or so down the line, counting warm-up pitches and asking kids to hustle. If a ball gets by the catcher in warm-up, the ump should be ready to throw another ball in play to keep things moving. We were taught that, too.

The base umpire should run down the right field line at the end of the inning or position himself to oversee proceedings between innings and should also be asking kids to hustle. Uhhh, run? Some umps walk and do it sloooooowly.

Umpires should never allow a batter to stand near the batter’s box while a pitcher — starter or reliever — is warming up. The hitter belongs in the on-deck area. But again the ump can’t enforce that if he’s off chatting somewhere.

In fairness, the guys who did the RCP vs. Glastonbury game Saturday did it right. No fraternization, no interminable chats and they kept the game moving. Good for them. 3. And for players. How about running out to your positions? I’ve seen kids on some teams walk so slowly to their positions each half-inning they likely gained weight as they walked. Hustle, you’re teenagers.

Up 14-0, a pitcher threw to first base to hold a runner on. What? If the kid stole second, third and home, it would be 14-1. Pitch!

4. And for base coaches

Is it asking too much for a. the first base coach to be in position before the first batter comes to the plate? and b. for the coach to actually run to first base? It’s a sport, for heaven’s sake. Act the part.

Taken together, all of this stuff diminishes the game.

Got it wrong

The plate umpire in the Middletown vs. Prospect/ Beacon Falls second game got a rule wrong.

Middletown had runners on base. Ryan Famiglietti got a base hit to right. Clean, obvious base hit, easily made first. The right fielder, in a vain attempt to get a runner at the plate, threw the ball on the fly off the backstop netting. Dead ball.

The rule requires a two base penalty from where the runners were at the TIME OF THE THROW. Famiglietti was at first base with the hit. The penalty required he be placed at third. The ump put him at second, saying the penalty was two bases from the start of the play.

Uhhhh, wrong. The play began with the throw, not the base hit. Famiglietti earned first base with the hit. Two bases meant the runner had to be placed at third. I know that and veteran umpire Hank Koritkoski confirmed that on Friday. The hit and the throw were different plays.

Prospect coach Jeff Clark also thought the ump was right. That makes two who were wrong.

To make it clearer, if a batter hit a routine ground ball and the shortstop threw it out of bounds, the runner would be placed at second. Two base penalty because the batter earned nothing. But in Famiglietti’s case, he was already at first. The penalty, by stopping him at second, was one base. He should have been sent to third.

Oh, and when I leaned out of the press box to discuss the call with some friends in the seats in front, the umpire heard me and began explaining his wrong call to me. Can we say rabbit ears?

Fun at Palmer Field.

Legion update

Middletown — at 16-4 — has engineered a remarkable turnaround. Last year this was a sub-.500 team and now it is a legitimate contender for the Zone 3 title. No question the biggest games of the season are coming up, starting with the double header with Meriden on Wednesday at 5:45 p.m. at Palmer Field. At this writing, Meriden leads the zone with three losses and is tied with Cheshire — which visits Palmer Field next week — and then comes Middletown.

The Meriden game will be the annual Norm Way Classic in which Way will be remembered for his service to America in WW II. Ceremonies will begin at 5:30 p.m.

Middletown plays two at Madison on Saturday at the ungodly hour of 10 a.m. and has two at Wallingford, one today at 7:45 p.m. at Westside Field and another Sunday at 11 a.m. The double header with Cheshire will be Fan Appreciation Night with gifts being raffled off including New York Yankee tickets.

RCP continues to roll along. The defending state champions are undefeated at 17-0. Coach T.J. Grande’s team played Berlin in a Sunday double header — see game story online and in these pages — then has a home-and-home series with West Hartford Friday (home) at 5:45 and Saturday (away).

For the record, RCP is the best Legion team I’ve seen thus far. It has excellent pitching and is terrific up the middle with catcher Trevor Whalen, shortstop Noah Budzik who makes all the plays, second baseman Amir Nitowski and center fielder Austin White, who runs down everything. Could be another very special team.

If RCP doesn’t win Zone 7, there should be an investigation.

Prior to Sunday’s games, here are the zone leaders from around the state. Zone 1 — Avon; Zone 2 — Orange; Zone 3 — Meriden and Cheshire tied, Middletown one game out; Zone 4 — Greenwich, one of three unbeatens at 19-0; Zone 5 — Oakville; Zone 6 — Waterford, also unbeaten at 14-0; Zone 7 — RCP, the third unbeaten at 17-0; Zone 8 — Tolland.

Here and there

The architect’s rendering of plans to redesign the baseball and football entrances to Palmer Field are excellent ... the construction will transform what are now tired, shabby entrances into inviting, attractive places ... Muzzy Field in Bristol did the same thing and it’s spectacular.

Condolences to former Middletown Superintendent of Schools Carol Parmelee-Blancato on the passing of her mother Blanche.

After the first two oneand-done rounds of the state Legion postseason on Saturday July 15 and 16 — Middletown may play one or two games that weekend if it does not win the Zone 3 title — the survivors will play the eight zone champions in a best-of-three series July 18 and 19.

There will be eight survivors from that round and four will go to Bristol and four will come to Middletown for a traditional double elimination event ... there will be two games at Palmer Field and in Bristol on Saturday, July 22, two on July 23 and single games on July 24, 25 and, if necessary, July 26.

The winner from each site will come to Palmer Field for a best-of-three championship series with single games July 28, 29 and, if necessary, July 30 ... both teams — Connecticut gets two teams in the Regional — advance to the Northeast Regional at The College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Mass . ... the winner of that goes on to the World Series in Shelby, N.C.

Depending on how Middletown Post 75 qualifies and how many if necessary games are required, there could be a minimum of nine tourney games here ... and a maximum of 13 games ... happily, the schedule calls for no more than two per day.

Independence Day Quiz

OK folks, here are 15 U.S. history/civics holiday questions. Answers follow. This is high school stuff, so be prepared to be ashamed.

1. How many times does the word God — or synonym thereof — appear in the Constitution?

2. Since when did the Second Amendment give ordinary citizens the right to own firearms for individual protection?

3. How is the number of electoral votes a state has determined?

4. Which candidate for president got the most popular votes in history? Who was second? Who was third?

5. Who is the only president to serve two non-consecutive terms?

6. When was the last time Congress declared war?

7. How many members are there in the U.S. House of Representatives? Who is your member of Congress (Middletown)?

8. Who is the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court?

9. Which two presidents were impeached?

10. What war killed the most Americans?

11. Who was the only president to be elected more than twice?

12. What is the only Constitutional duty of the vicepresident?

13. How old must one be to be president? Who was the youngest ever to serve? The youngest ever elected? The oldest ever elected?

14. How many Justices on the Supreme Court?

15. What was the name of the court case that outlawed racial segregation in public schools and when did the court issue that decision?

Answers

1. Zero. God — or any reference to a god of any kind — is not found in the Constitution.

2. A lot of people think that has been the case since the beginning, which is nonsense. It wasn’t until 2008 in the Heller case that the Supreme Court ruled that individuals have a right to own guns.

3. Each state (and Washington, D.C.) has a number of electoral votes equal to the number of senators and representatives it has (or DC would have if it were a state). Connecticut has five representatives and, of course, two senators. 5+2=7 electoral votes.

4. Barack Obama in 2008, second was Obama in 2012 and third was Hillary Clinton in 2016. Clinton had nearly three million more votes than President Trump.

5. Grover Cleveland. He won, then lost, then won.

6. 1941 against Germany and Italy.

7. 435 in the House. The number is fixed by Congress. Part of Middletown is in John Larson’s district, the rest in Rosa DeLauro’s district.

8. Chief Justice John Roberts.

9. Andrew Johnson and Bill Clinton. Neither was convicted by the Senate. Impeachment is the term for bringing charges and is done by a simple majority of the House. The Senate tries the case and 2/3 is necessary to convict.

10. The Civil War was the bloodiest.

11. Franklin D. Roosevelt — 1932, 1936, 1940 and 1944.

12. To preside over the Senate and vote in case of a tie.

13. 35 years old. The youngest to serve was Theodore Roosevelt, who was vice-president when William McKinley was assassinated. The youngest first-elected was John F. Kennedy at 43. The oldest first-elected? Donald Trump at 70.

14. Nine justices. The number is fixed by Congress.

15. Brown v. Board of Education, Topeka, Kansas. 1954. The vote was unanimous.

Happy Fourth!