Atlantic Monthly Contributors's Blog, page 860

President Obama Bemoans State of Congress (Again) While Talking Iran

AP

For the second time in as many days, President Barack Obama let out the rhetorical equivalent of an exasperated sigh in regards to the blockage of his legislative agenda in Congress, this time while discussing Iran.

On Saturday, at remarks delivered at Washington D.C.'s Saban Center for Middle East Policy, President Barack Obama discussed U.S.-Israel relations, where the dialogue inevitably wandering to the recent interim agreement with Iran that would ease economic sanctions in exchange for a curbing of its nuclear program. Israel, seeing Iran as an existential threat, has long sought for a complete end of uranium enrichment and total elimination of their arsenal. What could be a major diplomatic coup for stability in the Middle East for the Obama administration has been slammed by those in Israel and its supporters. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu described the pact as a "historic mistake."

On Saturday, after Saban cited polls that suggested that 77 percent of Israelis don't believe the interim deal will stop Iran from producing nuclear weapons, Obama reiterated his faith in diplomacy. He did hedge, however, that if the end of the six months ends with no long-term deal — he called the odds at no more than 50/50 — "we are no worse off."

Obama went on to joke about the likelihood of Iran willingly halting its own nuclear program as highly improbable, and he leaned on familiar language to do so:

One can envision an ideal world in which Iran said, ‘We’ll destroy every element and facility and you name it, it’s all gone.’ I can envision a world in which Congress passed every one of my bills that I put forward. There are a lot of things that I can envision that would be wonderful.

The remarks come just over a week after the president, delivering a speech on immigration reform, was interrupted by hecklers in footage captured by C-SPAN. 

What you need to know, when I'm speaking as president of the United States and I come to this community, is that if in fact I could solve all of these problems without passing laws in Congress, then I would do so. But we're also a nation of laws. That's part of our tradition.

So the easy way out is to try to yell and pretend like I can do something by violating our laws. What I'm proposing is the harder path, which is to use our democratic process to achieve the same goal that you want to achieve. But it won't be as easy as just shouting. It requires us lobbying and getting it done.

Over the last few months, support for both Obama and Congress has nose-dived, although the administration continues to target Congress. In response to November polling data that showed record lows for Obama, the president's press secretary said that the numbers were still "sky high" compared to Congress's. The Heartland Monitor poll found just 9 percent of those polled approved of Congress's performance.

       

Rebecca Black Is Back, In Case You Thought the National Nightmare Was Over

Fun. Fun. Fun. Fun. Weekend. Weekend. (SCREEN CAPTURE)

Rebecca Black, thrust into viral fame at 12 with a widely derided music video "Friday," has returned to the cultural zeitgeist with a sequel track. And yes, of course it is named "Saturday."

She almost had us, too, with this recent and fairly charming video-blog of her watching "Friday" and sounding down-to-earth, cringing at her work just like you and I did the first five times we watched the video. It reiterated what we all sort of knew: that it's very difficult to blame a 12-year-old girl of reasonable means for wanting to be famous, and who was allowed to do so by the adults at Ark Music Factory, which makes "hits" for preteens. It also reminded us that the Internet — which has so far screened the video 63 million times — can be a truly cruel place. As she told Good Morning America: 

When I first saw all these nasty comments I did cry. I felt like this was my fault and I shouldn't have done this and this is all because of me. 

And I'll admit it was nice to see Katy Perry extend a rehabilitating hand, casting Black — the target of so much online mockery — in the music video for "Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F)."

Well, there goes that whole thing. Blameless no longer, and 16 now, she's cast us into the void with her for daring to believe in her for even a minute, and now I don't even know who to trust anymore.

Is it the worst? No. But it hits all the wrong notes of absent self-awareness, now with the benefit of production value that suggests serious intent. When we watched "Friday," we cringed because Black was young, naive, and awkward; now, it's clear she's making these decisions on her own, and yet it's the same bubble-gum, genetically-engineered hokum. It feels like an inside joke that's being forced on us, and it's infuriating.

Here's that video, which undoubtedly we'll turn into a cultural touchstone for the next few days/weeks/months:

I suppose it's unsurprising. Black did, after all, admit in that Good Morning America interview that she was "one of those little girls who would practice her autograph ever since I was like, five years old." In that same interview, her mother said that Ark Music Factory's fee was the "best $4,000 I ever spent."

Now I want this Saturday to end.

       

With Grace, Alice Munro Delivers Her Nobel Prize Lecture Online

Screen capture, NobelPrize.org

In a video that speaks to the quiet dignity of her writing, Alice Munro accepted her Nobel Prize for Literature with a half-hour interview that went online on the Nobel Prize website on Saturday. The 82-year-old Munro, widely considered to be one of the greatest living masters of the short story form, decided in October that she was "too frail" to go to Norway to accept her award in person, so the conversation serves as the traditional Nobel Lecture.

In the interview, she spoke about her inspirations — "The Little Mermaid" plays a role — her techniques, the value of hard work, and her initial beginnings as a housewife in a sleepy Canadian community. 

Asked about how important it was that her stories were written from the perspective of a woman, she replied:

When I was a young girl, I had no feeling of inferiority at all, being a woman. This may have been because I lived in a part of Ontario where ... women did most of the reading. Women did most of the telling of stories. The men were outside doing important things and they didn't go in for stories. So I felt quite at home.

As she has in her past media appearances, she is the model of gentle humility, looking for all the world like a woman genuinely surprised that people even read her at all.

Stories are so important in the world, and I want to make up some of these stories. I want to keep on doing this. In a way, it didn't have anything to do with other people. I didn't need to tell anybody, and it wasn't until much later that I realized that the stories, that it would be interesting if one got to a larger audience.

She also offered thoughts on the process of editing yourself.

I think probably (the part that's hardest), it's where you go over the story and realize how bad it is. Y'know: The first part, excitement. The second part, pretty good. And then you pick it up in the morning, and you think, 'what nonsense.' But then is when you really get to work on it. For me, it always seemed worthy to do. It was always my fault it wasn't better. It wasn't the story's fault.

The most galling part of the interview, for Munro fans? She admitted that when she was young, she threw all her stories away... and still does, from time to time. Take note, then: there's a real treasure trove of unpublished Munro stories if someone has old garbage bags from Wingham, Ontario.

The Nobel Lectures in Physics, Economic Sciences and Chemistry will be webcast on Sunday morning Central European Time, while the Nobel Peace Prize lecture will take place on Tuesday.

 
       

North Korea Releases U.S. Prisoner Merrill Newman

Merrill Newman, from a photo taken during his detention in North Korea. (AP)

Merrill Newman, the 85-year-old California man who had been imprisoned in North Korea since late October, is back home.

The Korean War veteran was held in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea after going there as a tourist as part of a 10-day organized private tour of the impoverished country.  North Korea did not say why he was removed from his flight back to Beijing on October 26 until it released a video of Newman appearing to confess to crimes,  including killing soldiers and civilians in the North after the war. It's not known if the confession was coerced, but it was written in stilted English and it came more than a week after his initial detention.

North Korea officially "deported" him, which feels like more than just a bit of semantic trickery. 

It's all excellent news, and by all accounts, Newman's family and friends are thrilled to have him back. It's also good news for Vice President Joe Biden, right? This is, at the very least, a tangible saving grace of Biden's gaffe-filled Asia tour, right?

Biden told reporters in South Korea that he "played no direct role" in the release. He added that his office offered to let Newman fly home with him on Air Force Two, but State Department officials said he'd take a direct commercial flight to San Francisco.

Well, at least it's not like he got the VP job specifically because of his strengths in foreign affairs.

Instead, CNN reports that Newman's release "was the result of direct contact between Washington and Pyongyang." Bill Richardson, former presidential candidate and ex-governor of New Mexico, was involved in private talks.

At the end of Newman's initial confession, there was this bit of writing:

If I go back to (the) U.S.A., I will tell the true features of the D.P.R.K. and the life the Korean people are leading.

Who knows why we don't know about the true features of the life the Korean people are leading? So yes: hopefully, Newman will tell us all. 

       

Economists Say Strong Job Numbers Are for Real This Time (Maybe)

AP

Good news, everyone! According to Friday's report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the jobless rate fell to 7 percent, which is a five-year low, and the country created more than 200,000 new jobs.

The Washington Post reported that an estimated 455,000 people joined the job market in November. Hurray!

Markets were even buoyed by the news, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average jumping nearly 200 points. Oh boy!

There are other good-news indicators that suggest that this time, the encouraging numbers may be for real. According to the Post, consumer spending was up 0.3 percent in October; manufacturing output is higher; hourly earnings and the length of the typical workweek are up.

This is just a clean sweep. It’s a very good report. It’s across the board.

- Stuart Hoffman, chief economist for PNC Financial Services Group

But leave it to The New York Times to cast a dour cloud over the whole thing:

“We still need more evidence that the economy is picking up momentum before we ring the victory bell,” said Julia Coronado, chief economist for North America at BNP Paribas. While the unemployment rate, which counts only people actively looking for work, has fallen to 7 percent, from 7.8 percent a year ago, she said that was largely because of people dropping out of the work force.

Moreover, the current level is well above the 5 percent rate that economists consider closer to full employment. At the current rate of job creation, unemployment would fall to 6.4 percent by the end of 2014, and still be around 5.7 percent in late 2015.

Of course, the Times isn't wrong to be wary, reminding us that there were hopeful moments of monthly hiring gains in early 2011 and early 2012 that promptly fizzled.

Plus, the November figure might have been distorted thanks to the government shutdown. Some federal workers who were counted as jobless in October returned to their jobs last month.

And the Times adds that things still remain bleak for some.

For people with less than a high school diploma, for example, the jobless rate last month stood at 10.8 percent. For African-Americans, it was 12.5 percent, or nearly twice what it was for whites.

No improvement was seen in the fate of the long-term unemployed, either, with the ranks of people who have been seeking jobs for more than 27 weeks actually rising slightly in November to 4.06 million. Employers remain wary of workers with long gaps in their résumés, and skills erode the longer people are out of a job.

There's also the fear that this brief joy could officially set off the tapering of the sweet sweet $85 billion a month in stimulus cash that is the federal bond-buying program. In June, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke actually suggested that the bond purchases would be gone by the time the jobless rate hit 7 percent. Fortunately for companies who still rely on it, stimulus is still being pumped in apace for the time being.

       

Spaghettios Honors Pearl Harbor with a Tweet That Will Live In Infamy

Uh-oh, SpaghettiOs. (SPAGHETTIOS VIA TWITTER)

It was a day that will forever live in infamy. One of the worst attacks on the American soil took place 72 years ago today, which, of course, the minds at SpaghettiOs decided was a perfect marketing opportunity. 

Late Friday night, the official SpaghettiOs Twitter account touched off an imbrogli-O with this post of its anthropomorphic noodle mascot smiling like an idiot and clutching the American flag as if at Iwo Jima:

Take a moment to remember #PearlHarbor with us. pic.twitter.com/B8E1cFKgEo

— SpaghettiOs (@SpaghettiOs) December 7, 2013

The tweet lasted more than 10 hours before it was unceremoniously deleted, but those who have seen it remain perplexed. There has been no comment so far from parent company, Campbell's, although a former director of digital marketing and social media for the company tweeted that the post was a "mistake." 

I find it fascinating and sad how the social media community turns on their own, when a brand makes a mistake. Don't throw stones...

— Adam Kmiec (@adamkmiec) December 7, 2013

Of course, this is the worst kind of opportunistic "real-time" branding that has become all too familiar in our new media age.​ For every perfectly timed, spur-of-the-moment tweet during a Super Bowl power outage, there are dozens more that feel prepackaged and tired. And then for everyone of those, sterilized by teams of experts and crowd-tested to the hilt, there's one that's in incomprehensibly bad taste, like the tweets by Gap and Urban Outfitters, among others, that encouraged shopping as a balm for Hurricane Sandy.

It brings to mind that old adage that any publicity is good publicity, but it becomes difficult to justify if the brand is derided on social media and comes off as completely tone-deaf and insensitive. (It was also technically posted on December 6.)

Of course, this is also when Twitter's response machine shines.

"You want a date which will live in infamy? I'll give you a date which will live in infamy." --@SpaghettiOs social media team

— Daniel Radosh (@danielradosh) December 7, 2013

"Uh-oh, @SpaghettiOs the humanity!" pic.twitter.com/FMY5AbYIvy

— Patton Oswalt (@pattonoswalt) December 7, 2013

@pattonoswalt Join SpaghettiO's in remembering Kent State. pic.twitter.com/7E9kfij6cf

— Adam Koford (@apelad) December 7, 2013

So yes, there are easy jokes to be made here. But it's also as good an opportunity as any to remember, even without this Spaghetti-Uh-O, what Pearl Harbor means to the United States. Even though our national memory is short and it happened 72 years ago, Pearl Harbor was for a very long time the single largest loss of life from a foreign attack on American soil. That still means something, even if there are fewer and fewer people around who can remember that terrible day.

So if you do what SpaghettiOs asks and actually remember what happened at Pearl Harbor, you might remind yourself exactly why it's wrong. Know that the weirdly terrifying O would not have been smiling had it known that 2,403 Americans were killed that day. Pore through Life magazine's fairly incredible collection of photos from the assault and see that any American flags struck by the attack would have been in tatters. Know, too, that the people who lived through that tragic day are getting older, and we owe it to them to remember. Know it, and remember it, because tragedy is wasted if it isn't.

       

Is Hip-Hop Finally About to Have Its Grammy Moment?

AP

The nominees are in for the 56th annual Grammy Awards, and amid the usual standbys and typical arguments about whether or not the award has lost true cultural capital, it seems clear who the early winner is: hip-hop. 

For the sixth year, the golden gramophone threw a primetime special announcing this year's nominees, and the leaders are atypical for an award show oft-criticized for getting it wrong on hip-hop. Elder statesman Jay Z earned nine nods, while Drake, who as you may recall started from the bottom, has four; rap wunderkind Kendrick Lamar got seven, while Macklemore and Ryan Lewis earned nods for three of the top four categories. (If the coronation of the Seattle duo as "Best New Artist" feels inevitable, but belated, it's probably because it is: Their ubiquitous breakout hit "Thrift Shop" came out in August of 2012.)

It's long been a frustration for a still "young" genre; hip-hop culture has become pop culture, now more than ever. It took until 1989 for the Grammys to even acknowledge the genre, and since then, rap has been largely marginalized to its own categories, taking home two awards for Album of the Year in Grammy history. (Lauryn Hill's The Miseducation Of Lauryn Hill and Outkast's most obvious crossover effort, Speakerboxxx/The Love Below. ) Emcees have long railed against this perceived lack of respect. "I never let a statue tell me how nice I am," rapped Phife Dawg of A Tribe Called Quest, while 50 Cent famously strode on stage when Evanescence beat him out for Best New Artist in 2004.

But this year, hip-hop's got a real shot of taking home major loot, especially in the big four categories: Macklemore and Kendrick Lamar made this year's Album of the Year cut. And considering one of this year's entries is surprise underdog Sara Bareilles - a nice story, but unlikely to move beyond surprise nominee - there's a 50-50 shot of rewarding one of the pair of critical darlings, despite legitimate challenges from Daft Punk and Taylor Swift. (And here's hoping it goes to King Kendrick, if for nothing more than an incredible and prolific year.)

I never in a billion million years thought I'd be nominated for Album of the Year. I'm litterally shaking. Best birthday ever. Woah.

— Sara Bareilles (@SaraBareilles) December 7, 2013

Still, as ever, the Grammys made some controversial decisions. Robin Thicke's hit "Blurred Lines," which wormed into ears and dominated headlines all summer for its graphic music video and for being "rapey," is up for Record of the Year. Rolling Stone contributing editor Rob Sheffield has already come out against it, calling it the year's worst song even on purely musical grounds:

I guess the year's not over yet so it's theoretically possible a worse contender could emerge, but I don't see it happening. Let me put it this way: Christina Aguilera and Mariah Carey could pay their holiday respects to Lou Reed with a duet medley of "The Black Angel's Death Song"/"O Little Town of Bethlehem" and it would still be a distant second.

Most obvious major snubs include sister act HAIM, whose hit song inspired by this very website has made fans of listeners and critics alike; Janelle Monae, whose funky Prince-approved record didn't even make the Best R&B Album category; Kanye West, whose complex and wildly hyped Yeezus was recognized in only the rap categories; Lorde, who snatched major nominations but, oddly, not Best New Artist; the social wrecking ball that is Miley Cyrus; and Justin Timberlake, who was expected by many to sweep up, but walked away with just seven nominations and was shut out of the big three.

The 56th annual Grammy Awards will air live on CBS on January 26, 2014. The nominees in the major categories are below, but you can read the full list of awards and contenders at Grammy.com.

Record of the Year

Daft Punk - "Get Lucky"
Imagine Dragons - "Radioactive"
Lorde- "Royals"
Bruno Mars - "Locked Out of Heaven"
Robin Thicke feat. Pharrell Williams and T.I.  - "Blurred Lines"

Album of the Year

Sara Bareilles - The Blessed Unrest
Daft Punk - Random Access Memories
Kendrick Lamar - Good Kid, M.A.A.D City 
Macklemore & Ryan Lewis - The Heist
Taylor Swift - Red

Best New Artist

James Blake
Kendrick Lamar
Macklemore & Ryan Lewis
Casey Musgraves
Ed Sheeran

Song of the Year

Pink feat. Nate Ruess - "Just Give Me A Reason"
Bruno Mars - "Locked Out Of Heaven"
Katy Perry - "Roar"
Lorde - "Royals" 
Macklemore & Ryan Lewis feat. Mary Lambert - "Same Love"

Best Pop Vocal Album

Lana Del Rey - Paradise
Lorde - Pure Heroine
Bruno Mars - Unorthodox Jukebox
Robin Thicke - Blurred Lines
Justin Timberlake - The 20/20 Experience - The Complete Experience

Best Rock Album

Black Sabbath - 13
David Bowie - The Next Day
Kings Of Leon - Mechanical Bull
Led Zeppelin - Celebration Day
Queens Of The Stone Age - ...Like Clockwork 
Neil Young With Crazy Horse - Psychedelic Pill

Best R&B Album

Faith Evans - R&B Divas 
Alicia Keys - Girl On Fire 
John Legend - Love In The Future
Chrisette Michele - Better 
Three Kings - TGT

Best Rap Album

Drake - Nothing Was The Same
Jay Z - Magna Carta ... Holy Grail
Kendrick Lamar - Good Kid, M.A.A.D City
Macklemore & Ryan Lewis - The Heist
Kanye West - Yeezus Ross - God Forgives, I Don’t
2 Chainz - Based On A T.R.U. Story

       

The Next Space Race, Brought to You by Google

Moon Express

Moon Express, a company competing for a piece of the $30 million Google Lunar XPRIZE, revealed images and blueprints for a lunar probe it plans to launch in 2015 in a steps towards commercializing this country's access to outer space. 

Moon Express's MX-1 will apparently be able to do a lot of things, and has been described in a number of ways. Fox News said it "is big enough to scoop up some rocks and dirt, store them in an internal compartment, and return it to Earth," and that it "looks for all the world like a pair of donuts wearing an ice cream cone." Moon Express CEO and co-founder Bob Richards said "we call it the iPhone of space,” adding that it is "very small." Small like an iPhone? No, small like "You and I could put our arms around it." 

Fast Company described it as "a futuristic machine that looked to be part hovercraft, part Mars rover." According to Fast Company, an engineer said that MX-1 is a lunar lander, clarifying "“Well, like, it goes to the moon." 

The Moon Express itself pairs scientific exploration with commercial success to justify the project — a jarring combination in a field currently floated by nonprofits. The company's heavy use of startupy buzzwords in explaining the project may explain some of the confused coverage. For example,  the Moon Express website first explicitly explains MX-1's function: 

About the size of a large coffee table, the MX-1 is a completely self-contained single stage spacecraft that can reach the surface of the Moon from geosynchronous transfer orbit (GTO) commonly used to place communications satellites above the Earth. It is also designed to be a flexible spacecraft platform that can support a number of applications including serving as a flexible, agile upper stage for existing launch systems enabling Earth orbit cubesat deployment, satellite servicing, and "space tug" applications such as cleaning up space debris.

Then moves to the company's grand ambitions:

"The MX-1 is not just a lunar lander, it is a spacecraft workhorse with many markets" said Moon Express Co-Founder & CEO Bob Richards. "The MX-1 is the 'iPhone of space'; a platform capable of supporting many apps including our core plan of exploring the Moon for resources to of benefit to humanity."

And finally spells out their bottom line:

"Moon Express is introducing the MX-1 as the first of a series of robotic space vehicles based on a scalable patent pending design to operate in Earth orbit and deep space destinations. Moon Express will utilize the MX-1 in its maiden technology demonstrator flight in 2015, delivering a number of commercial and government payloads to the Moon and pursuing the $30M Google Lunar XPRIZE. 

If successful, they'd be the first private company to land on the moon, and maybe the first to make money off the moon too. The company isn't shy about the potential for mining the rock for its valuable minerals.

So it's difficult not to see Google's project as anything but a means for the often annoyingly forward-looking company to incentivize research in the hopes that it could lead to major profit — or at least publicity — in addition to knowledge. But with NASA bleeding funding, it's increasingly tempting to find merit in private, for-profit space exploration. 

       

Metro-North Ordered to Make Immediate Safety Changes After Crash

Emergency workers examine the site of a Metro-North train derailment in the Bronx borough of New York, December 1, 2013. (REUTERS/CARLO ALLEGRI)

The Federal Railroad Association issued an emergency order to Metro-North Railroad today, telling the rail company it must place two operators at the helm of trains traveling routes with major speed limits. The order comes days after a train traveling at 82 mph — more than 50 miles above the speed limit — derailed on a sharp curve, killing four and injuring more than 70 passengers. That train's conductor says he may have "zoned out" before the fatal crash, applying the brakes too late.

The Feds said the emergency order is a temporary measure to ensure safety until the Metro-North is able to permanently upgrade its regular procedures.

The New York Times has details on the directive: 

The order calls on Metro-North to provide the railroad administration with a list of main track locations with a maximum speed reduction of more than 20 miles per hour. The railroad is to identify “appropriate modifications to its existing automatic train control system or other signal systems to enable adequate advance warning of and adherence to such speed restrictions,” the administration said.

CBS reports that the first lawsuits were filed yesterday by survivors who say the derailment was preventable. The crash fatalities are unprecedented for Metro-North, which started in 1983, though it has maintained a poor safety record of late. The accident has led to calls for all railroads to install state-of-the-art (but expensive) safety systems that currently exist, but most companies lack.

       

Why American Soccer Fans Are Bummed About Their 'Group of Death' Sentence

Well, for starters, it's called the "Group of Death."  

Every four years, soccer fans, pundits, and soccer fans who think they're pundits roll out the ominous-sounding phrase: "The Group of Death." Like junior high theater geeks racing to the bulletin board to see if they got the part they wanted in Rent,  those fans and pundits scour each World Cup brackets for the toughest set of four teams. This year, the consensus is that it happens to be Group G, which contains Germany, Portugal, Ghana, and yes... the United States. 

No one actually dies playing in the Group of Death, but there are reasons that fans of the American team are kinda bummed about the cards they're dealt.  Here's why: 

The U.S.'s Weaknesses

Like most sports, soccer is about minimizing your weaknesses and exploiting your strengths. One of the problematic areas for the United States has been their defense and possession — two important factors that have plagued the United States for quite some time. Back in May, the U.S. lost an embarrassing exhibition to Belgium 4-2, displaying a tendency to play down to their competition. "Certainly we will talk about those turnovers, a lot of balls lost too easy and too fast ... Which makes you run behind it and lose energy." USA manager Jurgen Klinsmann said. 

The team has played better since then, but the possibility of regressing to that kind of form makes U.S. fans nervous. 

Germany Has This Dude...

Mesut Özil is the guy that is projected to give the U.S. fits. Though he has the appearance of a sad muppet, Özil is one of the most talented and creative attacking midfielders in the world.

The good news for the U.S. is that soccer isn't a one-man game. The bad news: Özil has very talented teammates. And he will be orchestrating a stable of talented German attackers and midfielders who will test the U.S. defense and midfield. 

The Caveat: Germany is playing the U.S. last in the round-robin group stage and its fate in the World Cup may already be decided when the two teams face off. That could, depending on how everything shakes out, mean that the game could end up meaning very little to the Germans and a lot more to the U.S. 

Portugal Has This Dude ...

Cristiano Ronaldo is considered one of the best and most talented players in the world. He makes people look downright foolish sometimes. "If he comes to play the U.S. aren’t going to be able to contain him without using a soccer version of Hack-A-Shaq, and unlike Shaq with free throws, Ronaldo is deadly on free kicks," USA Today's Mike Cardillo explains.  U.S. players "Omar Gonzalez, sax or no sax, Matt Besler, DaMarcus Beasley and whomever plays right back aren’t going to hang with Ronaldo if gets to run onto a ball in space," he adds. The rest of Ronaldo's teammates aren't slouches either. 

The Caveat: The U.S. will be playing Ronaldo in the city of Manaus. It'll be like playing in a rainforest— humid, hot, and heavy. Maybe he'll get tired or lost or something. 

Ghana Has History

Ghana has some major athletes, but the biggest advantage they have over the United States is that they are the team that's knocked the U.S. out of the last two World Cups. 

The Caveat: Revenge? Someone on the team has got to be sick of losing to these guys. 

The Bright Side

Even with all this bad news, there are some things to look forward to and some things for U.S. fans to hang their hat on: 

Bad haircut ratio. Soccer players inexplicably have the worst hair decisions of any professional sport athletes on the planet. The United States has, far and away, the least embarrassing haircuts of any team in the draw and possess the best ugly haircut-to-sensible haircut ratio of all the World Cup teams.  The U.S. has improved every single year since the last World Cup (where they played fairly well), and now is the time to put it all on display. If the team wants to be considered the best in the world, it needs to beat the best in the world.  The U.S. is one of the fittest teams in the world. "These games won’t be won in the first 15 minutes, but they very well could be lost in the final 15. Who is going to be able to keep running on empty in the stifling jungle? Bet on the U.S.," writes USA Today's Matt Foss.  The U.S. plays better at the end than the beginning. Traditionally, the U.S. hasn't started out strong in its World Cups. They've advanced out of group play in two of the last three World Cups, but each time they did advance they did it by the skin of their teeth. If the team can beat Ghana in that first game, then all bets are off.