C10
R
K Eids sTHE SCORE by Fred Bowen
Are you ready for a better Redskins season? T
he Washington Redskins open their season Sunday night against the Dallas Cowboys.
Washington has made a lot of changes since last year’s disastrous National Football League season, when the team had a record of four wins and 12 losses. Let’s take a look at how the Redskins have changed. First, Washington has a new head coach. Mike Shanahan is a proven winner who led the Denver Broncos to Super Bowl championships in 1998 and 1999. He should be a big improve- ment over former coach Jim Zorn. The Redskins also have a new quar- terback, Donovan McNabb. McNabb is another winner. He led the Philadel- phia Eagles to the National Football Conference (NFC) championship game five times, and to the Super Bowl in 2005. But Washington fans will have to get used to rooting for, in- stead of against, the former Eagles star.
I like Jason Campbell, the Redskins
quarterback last season, and I hope he does well with the Oakland Raiders. But McNabb is probably better than Campbell. The Redskins also added some much-needed power to the offensive line, which is the quarterback’s main protection. First-round draft pick Trent Williams, as well as veterans Jammal Brown and Artis Hicks, should do a pretty good job of keeping the defense away from McNabb. With all these changes, do the Red- skins have a chance for a winning sea- son — and maybe even the playoffs? I don’t think so, and here’s why. First, the Redskins would have to
DAYNA SMITH FOR THE WASHINGTON POST
The zoo’s youngest elephant, Kandula, cools off in a new pool.
What’s new at the zoo? Lions, trails, tug of war.
There’s a lot going on at the National Zoo these days. Last week four lion cubs were born, and zookeepers say they are do- ing well. Also last week, the first part of the new outdoor elephant trail opened (to big crowds!). The zoo has also added new
PHOTOS BY JOHN MCDONNELL/THE WASHINGTON POST With changes that include a new quarterback, Donovan McNabb, the Redskins should improve on last year’s losing record.
win five more games to have a win- ning record. That’s a big assignment for any team. Still, four teams — the Cincinnati Bengals, San Diego Char- gers, Green Bay Packers and Super Bowl champion New Orleans Saints — all im- proved by five or more wins last season. So maybe the Redskins will pull it off this year. The second reason I don’t think the Redskins will have a winning season is that they have a rough schedule. As they do ev- ery year, they have to play their al- ways-tough NFC East division rivals,
the Cowboys, Eagles and New York Gi- ants, twice. Washington didn’t win a game against any of those teams last season. In addition, the Redskins go up against such Super Bowl contenders as the Indianapo- lis Colts (14-2 last season), Minnesota Vikings (12-4) and Green Bay Packers (11-5). Finally, the team doesn’t
Mike Shanahan is a winner.
have many solid substitutes in case of injuries, which al- ways happen during a long, hard-hitting NFL season.
That could hurt the Redskins’ chanc- es. If McNabb goes down (as he did in the preseason with an injured ankle),
watch out: Rex Grossman, who was never a star during his six years with the Chicago Bears, would be the start- ing quarterback. Or if some of the new offensive linemen get hurt, the 34- year-old McNabb will have to run for his life.
So although I think the Redskins will be better, I predict a 6-10 record for this season, or maybe 7-9. I hope I’m wrong, because so many kids love the Redskins. And I hope the winning starts Sunday night.
Fred Bowen is the author of 15 sports books for kids, including the football book “Touchdown Trouble.”
features at its Think Tank exhibit that allow you to interact more with the zoo’s orangutans. If you’re feeling strong, you can now play tug of war with an orangutan — the animal is on the other side of a glass divider! The orangutans also have new water mister buttons they can hit so they can spray visitors, or them- selves, or both. Keepers say the orangutans seem to enjoy seeing how people react. More features are coming soon, including a memory test in which visitors can compare their skill at recalling a series of images with the score of an orangutan. The encounters are designed to give the zoo’s orangutans more opportunities to think and make choices.
KLMNO FRAZZ
THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 9, 2010 JEF MALLETT
TODAY:Mostly sunny and nice
HIGH LOW 78 59
ILLUSTRATION BY GRAHAM WEBBER, 5, SILVER SPRING
The Redskins have won the Super Bowl three times. The Dallas Cowboys have won five times.
TODAY’S NEWS
STUMPED SPEECH Running out of ‘silver bullets’?
President Obama has fired off the phrase more than 60 times this term
Stumped Speech is an occasional look at the sometimes perplexing language used by politicians.
by Ann Gerhart
Today’s phrase: “NO SILVER BULLET” Definition: The solution we are with- out, for an endless array of intractable so- cial ills, including but not limited to the jobless rate, health-care cost contain- ment, clean energy, Christmas Day bomb- ers, the nuclear ambitions of rogue states. The politician who most often fires no silver bullets these days is President Oba- ma, in rat-a-tat style along with plain truth, real truth, easy fix, magic answer. He uses it to stiffen the American spine and to disarm his Republican opponents, and the man has strapped on a whole magazine in the past few weeks. On Labor Day in Milwaukee, Obama said: “Eight million Americans lost their jobs in this recession. And even though we’ve had eight straight months of pri- vate-sector job growth, the new jobs ha- ven’t been coming fast enough. Now, here’s the honest truth, the plain truth. There’s no silver bullet. There’s no quick fix to these problems.” (Adviser David Axelrod picked right up
on it Wednesday morning on NPR, telling Steve Inskeep: “We’ve been working on the economy day in and day out. There’s no silver bullet, Steve. . . . We would like some cooperation.”)
Obama in the Rose Garden, Sept. 3:
“There is no silver bullet that is going to solve all of our economic problems over- night.”
And on Aug. 30: “Now, no single step is the silver bullet that will reverse the dam- age done by the bubble-and-bust cycles that caused our economy into this slide.” In folklore across cultures, the silver
bullet is the true killer of witches, were- wolves and really big forest beasts, much as the stake through the heart is the only way to dispatch a vampire. It shows up in the Brothers Grimm, in Washington Ir- ving and in various ammo discussions in online arms forums, where a poster will wistfully ask where he can buy silver bul- lets. (The answer is, you can’t, and they wouldn’t work anyway; because of the
Discovery, toymaker Hasbro plan a cable network for kids
by Yinka Adegoke
new york — Discovery Communica- tions and the toymaker Hasbro said Wednesday that their new joint-ven- ture cable network The Hub — which is set to launch next month — would target an “under-served” market of children 11 and younger. The two companies said the chan- nel, which will replace Discovery Kids in 60 million cable and satellite homes, will fill a gap between chil- dren’s networks featuring preschool- age programming and shows for chil- dren in the 11-to-14 range. “There’s a space in this market and
we’re going to hit it hard,” Discovery Chief Executive David Zaslav said. Ex- ecutives said the new network will fo- cus on children 6 to 11 years old. The Hub, which will be run by chil-
dren’s TV veteran Margaret Loesch, plans to take advantage of branded en- tertainment from its parent compa- nies. At a preview event, The Hub ran clips of shows that feature such Has- bro toy brands as Transformers and G.I. Joe. Loesch ran Fox Broadcasting’s kids-
programming unit during its heyday of “Mighty Morphin Power Rangers” and “X-Men.” Loesch said the new channel would broadcast fewer minutes of hourly ad-
REUTERS TO THE RESCUE? The Lone Ranger might be able to slip Obama some ammo.
way silver shrinks when it cools, it wouldn’t work well as a bullet.) As rhetorical ordnance for politicians, the silver bullet showed up in connection with economic power in 1914, when soon- to-be British Prime Minister David Lloyd George said, “We have won with the silver bullet before.”
When Richard Nixon said, “How about
a silver bullet?” he was offering you a cold, dry martini, the late William Safire pointed out a few years ago. Lee Hamilton, a co-chairman of the
2006 Iraq Study Group, concluded there was “no silver bullet” the panel could of- fer in its report. Secretary of State Condo- leezza Rice asserted “there was no silver bullet that could have prevented the 9/11 attacks,” and former defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld said, “In this battle against terrorism, there is no silver bul- let.”
Obama had no need for “no silver bul- lets” in his books, “Dreams From My Fa-
ther” or “The Audacity of Hope.” The phrase never appears.
But since deploying it in the Demo-
cratic presidential debate on July 23, 2007, about energy woes — “There are no silver bullets to this issue. We’ve got to ex- plore solar” — he has held it close like a security blanket. There were “no silver bullets” at a wind turbine blade manufac- turing plant in Iowa, at a community col- lege in New York state, at a health-care town hall in Colorado. A review of the transcripts revealed he has reached for his “no silver bullets” more than 60 times since he started run- ning for president, a metaphorical depen- dency that makes you wish somebody could slip him a box or two of the ammo. Oh, Lone Ranger, where are you?!
gerharta@washpost.com
If you have any suggestions for Stumped Speech, send them to gerharta@washpost. com.
2 lead Latin Grammy nominations Associated Press
los angeles — The Latin Grammy nominations spread the love between established artists and newcomers, nominating songwriters Juan Luis Guerra and Alejandro Sanz in four cat- egories each. The nominations announced
Wednesday also recognized new tal- ents Jorge Drexler, an Uruguayan songwriter, and Mario Domm, the lead singer of the Mexican band Camila, who each were nominated four times. The rest of the nominations spanned the Latin Recording Acad- emy’s multitude of genres from across Spain and the Americas, with three nods each to Camila, reggaeton star
“There’s a space in this market and we’re going to hit it
hard.” — David Zaslav, Discovery chief executive officer
vertising than the limits set by the Fed- eral Communications Commission. But since so many of the shows are as- sociated with toy branding and mer- chandise, the station faces perceptions in some quarters that some of the con- tent in its shows is advertising. Executives from Hasbro, The Hub and the Silver Spring-based Discovery Communications disputed that claim, saying the channel would not be sig- nificantly different from rivals. Hasbro Chief Executive Brian
Goldner noted that rival children’s ca- ble network owner Walt Disney is the world’s third-largest toymaker in the world and Viacom’s Nickelodeon is the fifth-largest. “Almost every show on television is
branded,” Loesch said. The Hub, scheduled to launch
Oct. 10, is born of a joint venture be- tween Hasbro and Discovery and in- cludes a separate entity, Hasbro Stu- dios, that will produce programming. — Reuters
Jorge Drexler, left, and Mario Domm.
Daddy Yankee and Uruguay’s alt-rock- ers El Cuarteto de Nos. The Latin Recording Academy Presi- dent Gabriel Abaroa Jr. says this year’s awards competition had the most sub- missions ever. The awards show is scheduled for
Nov. 11 at the Mandalay Bay Events Center in Las Vegas.
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