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It’s been a while. And that’s on me. For a multitude of reasons. The games that are supposed to be dirty had either peaked, gotten so filthy that it wasn’t fun anymore or were … well, just too depressing for words.

It’s pretty hard to top the combination of vacuous journalism, political intrigue and stump-dumb citizenry that was the 2008 election.

I’ve forced myself to try and ignore the fallout from baseball’s steroid scandal, because the 12-year-old kid inside me that thought he was going to join Jose Canseco in the 40-40 club one day wants to curl up in a ball and cry whenever I get too deep into that stuff.

And the media … well the media is dying the kind of slow and ugly death that brings to mind an MS patient, diagnosed with terminal cancer while battling full-blown AIDS. So I kind of felt like I shouldn’t kick the industry when it’s down, crying like a bitch for any semblance of mercy.

So yeah … I took a break.

(Also, I was writing stuff that was, you know, for publication. Which is okay, I guess, but you can’t fucking swear.)

And now it’s over.

Anyway, we’ll start by discussing the unusual honesty of Charles Barkley, because I used to like him a great deal. And I still might, though I feel that I really shouldn’t.

Chuck is funny. He’s smart and insightful. He can talk about things that aren’t basketball and he doesn’t feel the need to pump up the NBA or any of its stars. Barkley found himself a huge following by telling it like it is, while managing to make fun of Kenny Smith while he was telling it.

He co-wrote an excellent book — which is more of a series of interviews than a book, but whatever — with Michael Wilbon called Who’s Afraid of a Large Black Man?

It’s about sports, but it’s also about race and class and education and all sorts of relevant things, and it’s well worth a read. It shows off the side of Charles that his NBA on TNT gig only hinted at — that there’s some real thought behind a lot of those wisecracks and that the world could do worse than hear him out when he says he wants to run for governor of Alabama.

And then he went and got himself arrested for driving drunk. Which is a whole different kind of stupid.

I lost a little bit of respect for him, and so did a lot of other people, but mistakes happen. Chuck apologized, profusely, plead guilty and took his lumps like a man — a drunk driving idiot of a man, but he was at least took responsibility for his actions.

He served a few days in jail — literally, a few days, and got out this week. Whatever, right?

But the problem is that Chuck can’t give a disingenuous answer. It’s a gift and a curse.

Here’s Barkley on a Philadelphia radio station yesterday:

You never think about until something bad happens. But seriously, I can’t sit here and lie or BS you, I’m never going to be like that. But I’ve probably been out drinking and driving 100 times a year when, you know, you just eat and you drink or whatever, and you just get behind the wheel of a car and you don’t even think about it. This was, to me, I’m glad…it was a very valuable lesson for me. Because people never even think about that..I mean, I’m just going out drinking with dinner, or just going out drinking with you and the boys, and just like, “Let me go home.” It’s like, don’t even think about it. But this gave me, like, “Man, you could kill somebody!”

Yeah man, you could kill somebody, or something.

I don’t know whether I respect Charles more for being honest about some incredibly stupid behaviour on his part, or whether drinking and driving 100 times a year is so monumentally stupid that I don’t ever want him to open his mouth on television again.

It’s the quintessential problem with turning retired athletes and the like into commentators and public personas.

One the one hand, if they’re fake, most of us se right through it, and mock them accordingly for spewing platitudes to garner a paycheque in their twilight years.

If they’re real, and they talk about anything other than sports at any point, they’re inevitably going to say things — whether it’sabout public behaviour, drugs, women, race, homosexuality, etc. — that reflect how sheltered a life they’ve led and how out-of-step a lot of their behaviour and values are with what is socially acceptable for the rest of us.

So yeah, Chuck is a drunk driver, and he’s a fucking idiot for it, but how many other NBA, NFL and NHL talking heads have gotten into their car after having a few on several dozen occasions and would never, ever mention it, even after serving a three-day jail stint and displaying their stupidity to the world? Probably quite a few.

I’d say ‘Here’s to Chuck for being honest, even if he is a fool,’ but raising a glass to him seems wholly inappropriate.

At the very leas, however, I think any citizens of Alabama who were Afraid of a Large Black Man Running For Governor can probably rest easy.