The Dr. ESP “Quote of the Year Award” goes to FCC Chairman Brendan Carr for his much maligned threat of ABC if the network refused to take action against “Jimmy Kimmel Live” for the host exercising his First Amendment right to criticize, even mock, the president of the United States. In an effort to pressure ABC affiliates, Carr warned:
We can do this the easy way or the hard way. These companies can find ways to change conduct and take action on Kimmel, or there’s going to be additional work for the FCC ahead.
From Carr’s perspective, the “easy way” was to merely threaten punitive action against ABC and its local affiliates, forcing them to respond in accordance with his desired outcome. The “hard way” would have involved unprecedented, direct FCC intervention which most likely would precipitate law suits resulting in expensive and time-consuming litigation. Carr chose to cut corners, taking the easy route, which as we now know resulted in ABC pulling Kimmel off the air for “an indefinite period of time.” Carr’s Pyrrhic victory lasted less than one week and resulted in Kimmel’s return to the highest ratings in the show’s 22-year run, grabbing first place against his late night rivals Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Fallon.
You might be asking, “Dr. ESP, why are you just now sharing an event which happened on September 17, almost three months ago?” As is so often the case, renewed interest in this past event, especially Brendan Carr’s quote, was triggered by a totally unrelated incident. In this case, the end of the ACC championship game when, in overtime, Duke University ended the University of Virginia’s hopes of being one of the 12 teams competing in the college football playoffs. To fully understand this synchronistic moment, I need to take you back to the fourth quarter. With just over five minutes left (5:02 to be exact), a Duke field goal gave the Blue Devils a 10 point lead, requiring at least two scores for UVA to tie or win the contest. At the 3:54 mark, the Cavaliers kicked their own field goal making it a seven-point deficit. However, throughout the game, Duke had a strong rushing attack that they could use to run out the clock. The UVA defense had different ideas. They forced a Duke punt with 1:44 left to play, a kick that was blown dead at the UVA four-yard line.
The “easy thing” to do would have been for quarterback Chandler Morris to throw deep passes to maximize yardage on each play. Instead the UVA offense took 10 plays to methodically cover the 96 yards, leading to a touchdown which knotted the score at 20-20 with 18 seconds on the clock, forcing overtime. I will not bore you with the overtime rules in college football except to say it is not “sudden death.” Both teams have an equal chance to match an opponent’s overtime score. When Duke scored a touchdown to take a 27-20 lead, UVA could re-tie the game with a touchdown of it’s own.
In college overtime, there is no time-clock or limited number of plays. Minutes earlier, UVA had demonstrated it could advance the ball with a combination of passes and runs. Yet, the coaches defied logic, and cued up a complicated trick play which they must have assumed would create an “easy” score to extend the overtime. Unfortunately, the only “easy” thing about the play was how easily Duke intercepted a pass, cementing their victory.
In theory, cutting corners can lead to efficiencies. But at what cost? I would argue the undesired outcomes in the above examples are inconsequential. Jimmy Kimmel, who takes two months off every summer from his own show, missed five episodes in September. UVA would have probably been seeded #11 or #12 in the football playoffs resulting in a first-round elimination by a more powerful SEC or Big Ten opponent who had a legitimate shot at winning the championship. Sometimes, however, it is matter of life or death.
No one would blame the Trump administration for conducting operations against drug cartels that allegedly flood the U.S. with fentanyl or other illegal substances. Inconveniently, for someone who wants to do it legally, that requires a lot of hard work beginning with gathering intelligence needed to identify the targets through the eventual capture and prosecution of the cartel chiefs and their operatives. But this administration is always looking for the “easy way,” even if it is a war crime or violates the U.S. code of military conduct. In this case, blowing the suspects out of the water and making sure their are no survivors to refute the administration’s accusations.
When it comes to immigration, it is easier to round up and deport everyone even if they do not fit the administration’s stated goal of ridding the nation of violent or dangerous immigrants. Two weeks ago, the conservative CATO Institute issued a report based on information gathered by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) since October 1, 2025. The data refutes the administration claim that ICE is arresting “the worst of the worst.” According to the report:
Of people booked into ICE custody this fiscal year:
- Nearly three in four (73 percent) had no criminal conviction.
- Only 8 percent had a violent or property criminal conviction.
- Only 5 percent percent had a violent criminal conviction.
One could argue Benjamin Netanyahu’s government chose the “easy way” to respond to the inhumane attacks on innocent Israelis on October 7, 2023. Instead of operations targeting the planners and participants in the October 7 massacre, admittedly an overwhelming task, the Israeli war cabinet opted to level a landscape equal in size to some of America’s largest metropolitan areas with more than equal their population density. (Source: Newsweek/October 17, 2023)
The “hard way” versus “easy way” model even applies to national health care policy. Reduce autism by telling pregnant women to steer clear of Tylenol. Blame everything on vaccines. Instead of addressing an inefficient, for-profit health care system, hand out $2,000 checks. And gone are the days when your personal physician tells you to exercise and eat better to control your weight problem. A monthly injection relieves you of counting calories or going to a gym.
Will this era of cutting corners ever end? In the Ozempic era, maybe the new meme is, “The opera is not over until the fat lady THINS.”
For what it’s worth.
Dr. ESP