Gosh- no one is asking for you to apologize or not to feel good, be proud as punch of whomever you like on any basis you like! Your team won some big ones in the last match-up against their rivals. I am feeling extremely proud of the Gators this week, but I don't claim victory proves we Gators are superior beings, morally or any other way (even physically) overall. It was a big win and players and paid staff get some perks this year, none of which accrue to me btw -- for me the winning is all in my head.

I do realize that football partisanship is a fringe activity seen as a form of insanity by folks (surely the majority?) not drinking the kool-aid. I understand all too well that being a winner only lasts until the next match-up and meanwhile, rivals will mumble and plot revenge so that round and round it goes. Human nature indeed.

I wince and look away from an otherwise promising policy argument from the creative class when it's smeared with shit, including wild-sounding, self-serving, credibility-killing vitriol against rivals. Some otherwise great football coaches manifested the same fatal flaw, hmmm . . .