This is not about politics. But, just as a dateline, I'll note that if Tzippi Livni looked like Sarah Palin, she'd still suck all the charisma and intelligence clear out of any room she'd walk into.

Now to what's really eating me at the moment. Not once but twice, the Mets lost games over the last few days after intentionally walking two consecutive batters. This is painfully stupid. Let me explain why.

In each case, the winning run was on third base with no outs. Let's first assume that the odds of each of the subsequent hitters getting an out, a walk, a single, a double and so forth are league average and independent of each other. Then, with a runner on third and no outs, the odds of the hitting team eventually scoring the winning run in this inning are 85.9%. After loading the bases, the odds go UP to 87.5%. (The calculations can all be found in The Book.) So, walking the bases loaded is not wise in any case. What makes it dumber, however, is that in fact the odds of a hitter doing something useful with the bases loaded are greater than the odds of that same hitter doing that same thing with only a runner on third (or even with runners on first and third). That's because wuth the bases loaded, a hitter has the advantage of knowing that the pitcher has nowhere to put him, and so has the luxury of waiting for a good pitch to hit.

These two games brought back memories of this game. Ouch.