Kelso's father did indeed get to see Kelso's son hit and throw and the old man was proud, impressed and amazed. Certainly, one of the top ten family moments.

Kelso's effort to qualify for WPT Event at Bellagio was something of an anti-climax. Pokkerroom let us play for about 45 minutes, cancelled the tournament, and paid $700 or so to those in the top half. Luckily, Kelso was in the top half at the time. Apparently, Pokerroom was supposed to have given us 2500 chips instead of the 1500 they did. Big deal, it's play money anyway. A good night on the baize at E-V Players Club last night, leaving Kelso two dimes to the better, but his effort to requalify for the Pokerrrom final ran aground when his A-2d with a three-diamond flop including the A, fell to an A with a higher kicker, leaving Kelso a proud 7th place finisher, but no ticket to final.

The nexus of horse racing, journalism and politics is today's topic and will be very arcane. A warning: there will be no profanity, so if you're easily bored, probably best to give this one a miss.

Well, yesterday morning's Tissus Of Lies arrived and Kelso was thrilled to see a front page article on the recently completed Fasig-Tipton yearling sale at Saratoga. Along with the Keeneland and Newmarket sales, this is one of the big ones. The story, supposedly a revealing look at the ways in which consignors cheat the buyers, was a perfect example of KELSO'S RULE OF JOURNALISM. Two disclaimers: (1) the author of the piece, Joe Drape, is a very good racing writer and has given Kelso tickets to the Belmont Stakes in the past (2) Kelso himself is an equity-stakeholder in a tech start-up which can solve many of the problems Mr. Drape highlights.

I'm sure the average Sunday Tissue Of Lies reader came away from reading that piece thinking "wow, what a larcenous bunch of people those consignors are...the breeding and sales industry sure is crooked...you can always count on the good old Tissue Of Lies to get to the bottom of things." The truth is vastly more complicated. In defense of the consignors, at many sales, the horses must run a short time trial before going under the auctioneer's gavel. How did Drape miss something so obvious as that? Deadline pressure? Took away from the thrust of his piece? Needed to shoehorn in that Charlotte Weber is a Campbell's Soup heiress? Who knows? Another glaring omission: yes, there are voluntary standards the consignors agree to live up to, but they are not nearly stringent enough and there is a knight-in-shining-armor on this, Mr. Satish Sanan, owner of Padua Stables and founder of A.I.R. (Alliance For Industry Reform).

Here's a good link to check out: http://news.bloodhorse.com/viewstory.asp?id=25831

Why was Mr. Sanan and his group not interviewed for this piece. Any one of them could have cited Mr. Drape chapter-and-verse on unethical sales practices.

And if there is a hero in the real story, there is also a villain: D. Wayne Lukas. It is common backstretch gossip that Lukas is the worst of the worst at taking buyers to the cleaners in these sales with all sorts of arrangement with who knows who? This, as Kelso said, is all gossip and Kelso does not want to libel Mr. Lukas, in fact the only crimes Mr. Lukas is provably guilty of is being close with Bobby Knight and being a fucking asshole. But the great Tissue Of Lies racing man, Drape, knows all of this already. Why didn't he ask Satish Sanan why he no longer has anything to do with Lukas? Why didn't he ask MC Hammer? Or Peter Brant? Or Joe Allen? or Magnier and Tabor?

Also, the use of opiates on sore legged yearlings is another common practice, surely, Mr Drape could have mentioned that.

The point here is not to lionize Satish Sanan, trash Joe Drape or Wayne Lukas, or promote Kelso's company (Kelso won't even mention its name here), but to illustrate, KELSO'S RULE OF JOURNALISM: if you know a subject very well and read any article on it, you will find outright lies, lies of omission, log-rolling, fear-induced non-reporting, and received wisdom and canards. Now, if Kelso found that from a great racing writer, writing a front-page story in The Tissue Of Lies, how accurate do you think the Tissue's coverage of life-and-death issues like war, elections, international affairs, etc.?

Sorry, there was a little profanity in there. Kelso is sorry. This was meant to be a "family" posting.

But Kelso's Nuts love YOU very much. He appreciates Mr. Drape's personal kindnesses past and present and does not love D. Wayne Lukas at all...Mr. Lukas is a disgrace.