Let's start with the brief, but apparently necessary, reminder that we're talking about sports teams here.  We're not talking about world events, like whether there is or is not such an ideology as "islamofascism."  We're not talking about torture or detentions.  Heck, we're not even talking about petty crime.

We're talking about a game.  Sure, it's a game that has been elevated to a mult-million dollar a year industry.  It generates a lot of passion.  But, essentially, it's a game.  It should be fun to follow.  Fun, as in "light-hearted."  Perhaps even exhilarating.  

Certainly, it can be frustrating.

One thing it most assuredly isn't is genocide.

Apparently, though, if you're a Colts Fan it's at least that bad.

Apparently, the Patriots are just like the Nazi's.

Let's ignore for the moment that Belicheck is anything but a "glory whore" as one bright Blue commenter claims.  In fact, let's just assume that everything people say about him is true, that the Pat's are the only team in the league to "cheat," that the franchise cares only about winning (that's right, ignore everything the Krafts and the players do in their communities), that they're the blackguard of the NFL.  Running up the score and crapping on the game.

So they're Nazi's?  Are you seriously going there?  Even as a joke -- especially as a joke -- this is sick.

I'm not sure which is more disturbing: the fact that someone actually made this comparison, or the fact that it's been received so positively over at "Stampede Blue."  

I credit the lone observer who notes that Godwin's Law says that whomever follows the degeneration of an argument down to the point where they invoke the Nazis is, ipso facto, the loser of that argument.  That person also noted that this argument actually started with that observation.

Well, I suggest we stop it.  Right there.  I can't think of a more inappropriate way to talk about a game.  I'd like to thank the media, notably Gregg Easterbrook and Indy local Bob Kravitz, for helping to make such comparisons more acceptable to the public by continuing to put "evil" and "Patriots" in the same sentence.  

Don't Easterbrook and Kravitz know that irony, sarcasm and satire are just big, scary words to midwesterners?  There simply aren't very many people in Indiana who know you're using hyperbole.  (I know what you guys are thinking out there in hoosierland: "Hyperbole?  Is that French?  He's un-American!!")

Let's keep it simple.  And let's try to remember: this is a game.  Not the apocalypse.

UPDATE: Apparently, they just don't get it. Yes, I know it was a joke. No, it isn't really funny. No, not even a little. Sorry.