Thoughts for the Day, April 8, 2025: A March Madness to remember

March Madness

I love these opening lines from a USA Today article following last night’s thrilling come from behind win by Florida 65-63 over Houston.

We just can’t quit you, March Madness, because you never forsake us sports fans. If you possess working ears, you’ve heard all about how college sports ain’t what they used to be. Maybe so, but March Madness ain’t ever stopped being three weeks of basketball splendor, either…some things never change: March Madness is awesome. So dang awesome. And though the national title game became no beauty contest, this goes down as a truly epic Final Four, complete with a championship decided in the final seconds.

All three games in the men’s final four had the winning team overcome double digit deficits in the second half. In the final game yesterday, Florida led for less than two minutes of the entire game as Houston took an early lead and held it until the final minute. Houston committed five turnovers in the final two minutes. It was exactly what Houston caused Duke to do in the final two minutes of the semi-final game.

On the women’s side, the madness continued in a different way as the UConn Husky women, annihilated the defending champion South Carolina Gamecocks 82-59. No one saw this coming, including UConn’s head coach Geno Auriemma. At one point UConn was leading by 32 points before they emptied their bench in the final minutes. The victory was UConn’s 12^th women’s championship under Geno Auriemma. Auriemma gets my Orchid of the Day

One of my favorite traditions of the NCAA Men’s tournament is CBS’s One Shining Moment which is a 3-minute video synopsis of the tournament with the song One Shining Moment playing in the background. It is always played at the conclusion of the telecast following the championship trophy presentation. See my Video of the Day.

In the first ever Thoughts for the Day-Tournament Challenge, Richard Kerns, a life-long friend from Spanish Fort, Alabama was the winner of the challenge. Richard picked Florida and ended up with 1,510 points. He will have $100 donated in his name to the charity of his choice.

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Tariffs

Don’t take it from me, take it from those who know and have major skin in the game.

Bill Ackman, a billionaire hedge fund manager who endorsed Trump wrote on X on Sunday and Monday that going ahead with the new tariffs was tantamount to launching an “economic nuclear war.” He pressed the White House to slow down and institute a pause on the levies. Here is what else he said about tariffs.

• “This is not what we voted for,” My Quote of the Day

• “The global economy is being taken down because of bad math. The President’s advisors need to acknowledge their error before April 9th and make a course correction before the President makes a big mistake.”

• “Business investment will grind to a halt, (and) consumers will close their wallets” if the new levies do indeed come into force. “We will severely damage our reputation with the rest of the world that will take years and potentially decades to rehabilitate,” he added in the post, which was viewed 10.6 million times.

• Unless Trump changes tack, “we are heading for a self-induced, economic nuclear winter, and we should start hunkering down,”

Andrew Hall, a billionaire oil trader who has been critical of Mr. Trump in the past, saluted Mr. Ackman on Instagram for being a Trump supporter who was speaking out about tariffs. “At least he is willing to reverse himself and call out this stupidity,” Mr. Hall said of Mr. Ackman. “Where are the other ‘financial titans’? Why aren’t they speaking up?”

Robert Wolf, a former chairman of UBS Americas, said. “I am not sure Wall Street can change the president’s mind “But hopefully his donors and Mar-a Lago friends are being frank with him on this flawed approach.”

Laurence D. Fink, chairman of the investing colossus BlackRock, took a blunter tone during a lunchtime address on Monday at the Economic Club of New York, warning that “the economy is weakening as we speak.” “Most C.E.O.s I talk to would say we are probably in a recession right now,” he told the group.

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Every country is a national security threat.

Article I, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution vests the power to lay and collect tariffs with Congress. The Founding Fathers intended for legislative oversight on taxation, tariffs, and related financial matters, viewing tariffs as strategic levers to be used with caution and prudence.

However, the Trade Expansion Act of 1962 and the Trade Act of 1974 under provisions like Section 232 and Section 301, allowed the President to impose tariffs in response to national security threats or unfair trade practices. However, these powers were still subject to specific findings and justifications, ensuring that executive actions were neither arbitrary nor unrestricted.

The current Republican led congress is abdicating its constitutional responsibilities for tariffs to President Trump by allowing him to define every country as a national security risk and defining unfair trade practices as any country that the U.S. has a trade deficit.

This is just another example of the current Republican congress being afraid of President Trump. Just as in 2021, when Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnel refused to find Trump guilty of insurrection, the current congress is not meeting its constitutional obligations to provide checks and balances of the executive branch.

Our democracy is at risk because we have a Republican congress who refuses to provide the checks and balances defined in the Constitution. Our democracy is at risk because we have a Republican congress that is not honoring their oath of office to honor the Constitution.

The current Republican congress gets my Onion for the Day. They should get an Onion for a Lifetime.

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How about those Tigers?

The Tigers defeated the Yankees today 5-0 behind the superb pitching of Tarik Skubal (6 innings) and Brian Hurter (3 innings). The Tigers hit four homeruns in the game, with three coming in the fourth inning. The Tigers are now 7-4 overall and 7-1 in the last eight games. They go for the sweep against the Yankees tomorrow afternoon with Jack Flaherty on the mound for the Tigers.

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Quote of the Day: See above from Bill Ackman

Orchid of the Day: Women’s head basketball coach Geno Auriemma, for winning his 12^th national championship with the lady UConn Huskies.

Onion of the Day: The Republican congress for abdicating its Constitutional responsibilities to President Trump.

Lyrics of the Day: It'll be, better than before, Yesterday's gone, yesterday's gone.

Why not think about times to come, And not about the things that you've done,
If your life was bad to you, Just think what tomorrow will do.

If you think you know the answer, send me your answer in the comments section of the blog.

Answer to Lyrics of the Day for April 7, 2025: Start me up. The Rolling Stones

Question of the Day: Has there ever been a more exciting men’s final four than the 2025 version?

Video of the Day: One Shining Moment | 2025 NCAA Tournament | CBS Sports

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