freestateofpatrick.com blog

Continuing a Memorial Day theme this week and remembering those who have fallen, if you should happen to come up behind my Nissan pickup truck, a good shade of maroon, you would see the above, a VT magnet, but it is not just any magnet.

“The memorial project honors the service of 1st Lt. Jeff Kaylor (management science and information technology ‘01), killed on April 7, 2003, during the initial invasion of Iraq, and 1st Lt. Tim Price (forestry ‘01), killed by a Baghdad sniper on Sept. 7, 2004. Shortly after Price’s death, Locke White, the university’s licensing director, suggested creating a piece of merchandise that would honor these fine young men, and the idea of a memorial magnet grew from there.”

Memorial Magnet Story

http://www.vtmagazine.vt.edu/winter08/corps.html

Virginia Tech’s Women’s Softball Team is headed for the College World Series. Read some of these links to learn more. Roanoke Times Article World Series Bound  Hokies Defeat Michigan

While perusing the website of the Atlantic Coast Conference, an organization I have loathed most of my adult life because of the way it acted towards my alma mater, Virginia Tech, I noticed something interesting about the two Virginia universities that are now members. So far this year, the two Virginia schools have TEN ACC CHAMPIONSHIPS. Virginia Tech for this year has four ACC Championships: Football, Women’s Indoor and Outdoor Track and Softball. (This is the same number as UNC and twice the number of Duke, who did not want Virginia Tech in the ACC.) Last year VT had four championships: Women’s Indoor and Outdoor Track, Golf and Softball. Virginia Tech has nine championships altogether since joining the league. Virginia for this year has six ACC Championships: Men’s Cross Country, Women’s Swimming and Diving, Men’s Diving, Men’s Tennis, Rowing and Women’s Lacrosse. UVA had three championships last year. All Hokies and Wahoos should remember what the great man Frank Beamer once said, “There will be a day when all Hokies and Wahoos come together to realize we all hate North Carolina.” As for me, I hold my nose and say “just send the big check to Blacksburg Swofford.”

Read more about VT’s ACC Championships here http://blog.techsideline.com/?p=249?PHPSESSID=b3bece238f1654354df09fa2d0a90ddc 

See how smart Mark Warner was… “Joining the ACC, expanding Lane Stadium and scheduling more home games has been good to the bottom line of the Virginia Tech football program. Tech reported football income of $40.75 million for the 2006 season, the latest numbers available. That was by far the most in the ACC and 88 percent more than the $21.69 million the Hokies generated in 2002, two years before they left the Big East.” Read more by clicking here It has been a great year for the athletic teams in Blacksburg with a BCS Bowl Appearance and Conference champs in football, a final four men’s soccer team, a twenty win men’s basketball team and top four ACC regular season and Drew Weaver’s win at the British Amateur and Masters appearance.

“Warner, who left the Virginia governor’s office in early 2006 as one of the most popular governors in the commonwealth’s history, often speaks on the importance of entrepreneurial growth. In the 1980s, Warner co-founded Nextel (now Sprint Nextel) and later became a founding partner of Columbia Capital Corporation, a technology venture fund in Alexandria, Va., and Waltham, Mass. He has helped create more than 70 telecommunications and information technology companies, many of which later went public. “Supporting and growing emerging companies, and providing an environment to foster their development is fundamental to our country’s success,” Warner said. A native of Indianapolis, Warner graduated from George Washington University in 1977 and from Harvard Law School in 1980.”

 “One of his biggest symbolic successes for rural Virginia came when he pressured the University of Virginia into blocking the expansion of the ACC athletic conference if it didn’t include Virginia Tech, located in rural Blacksburg. ‘Mark Warner–if he did nothing else, he will forever be known as the Wizard of Oz,’ says Mudcat Saunders of the deal that put Virginia Tech into the high-powered ACC.” 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_CAQjuusBpI

Former Virginia Governor Mark Warner will be in the town formerly known as Taylorsville this week campaigning for the seat in the United States Senate that John Warner (no relation) is retiring from. I plan on voting for him for one reason shown above. The Governor of Virginia is the governor of all the Commonwealth of Virginia and not just Charlottesville. Mark Warner got that and being a graduated of George Washington, not UVA, he had a broader world view realizing that membership in the ACC would help the economy of Southwest Virginia including the incredible economic impact that Hokie Football brings to the entire state. He applied pressure to the University of Virginia to block expansion being the vital third vote as UNC and Duke voted against expansion unless Virginia Tech was included. Warner applied pressure in other ways to other ACC state governors and university officials. While the Democratic Party does not seem to notice that the only way they capture the White House is running a Southerner (Johnson, Carter and Clinton), Mark Warner might be the next one down the road. Apparently, I am not the only one who has thought about that. That would give Virginia connections to nine U. S. Presidents (George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, James Monroe, William Henry Harrison, John Tyler, Zachary Taylor and Woodrow Wilson.)  Mark Warner is running against Jim “Car Tax” Gilmore for the senate and I am not impressed with the latter. I am not in favor of Warner just because he got Virginia Tech into the ACC, but because he thought outside the box. He showed that he would not just bow to pressure from Charlottesville, but that he could stand on his own for the good of all Virginia. Virginia will have two Senators, both Democrats, who have minds of their own next year if Warner replaces Warner. I don’t think the liberal Demigods, I mean Democrats, will get what they are barganing for with Jim Webb and Mark Warner. Anyway, Mark Warner is in Patrick County this week and if you see him you might be able to say you saw a President one day. He sure would beat who is running in 2008. www.markwarner2008.com

Virginia Tech’s Women’s Softball Team won their second straight ACC Championship this week on the strong pitching of Angela Tincher. The team is playing in the NCAA tournament in Knoxville this weekend.

http://www.roanoke.com/sports/college/wb/161632

More about Angela Tincher

http://www.vt.edu/spotlight/achievement/2008-05-05-tincher/2008-05-05-tincher-spotlight.html

This was Virginia Tech’s Ninth ACC Championship

http://www.theacc.com/this-is/accchampionships.html