By DAVID MARTIN

The 2008 Royals finished 13 games out of first place in the AL Central -- an improvement on the recent past with much work still be done.

The 12-game losing streak was out of the ordinary. Few saw the 13-2 finish coming. But at Jose Guillen's last angry glare, the club's record stood at 75-87 -- below average, not embarrassing and pretty much on par with spring-training predictions.

The hitting of Alex Gordon and Billy Butler didn't take the forward leaps that many foretold. At the same time, it was easy to imagine Brian Bannister, the brainy but hardly overpowering starting pitcher, struggling in his second full season, and that no good would come from journeyman Ross Gload getting 400 at-bats. Only the frequency and content of Guillen's outbursts were unknowns, his antisocial behavior being a fact as certain as his right-handedness.

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By CHRIS PACKHAM

Emo Boehner is very sad. The Fed is furiously printing new money, since sad congressional Republicans' feelings got hurt by a MEAN STUPID LADY, causing them to reject the Wall Street bailout plan and go listen to Death Cab while cutting on themselves because AT LEAST THEN THEY CAN FEEL SOMETHING! Specifically, the Fed is coughing up around $480 billion in emergency lending programs and injections of cash into foreign money markets. I'm no economist, but I am extraordinarily sexy. And I know that Venezuela's 1990s experiment in printing money resulted in runaway hyperinflation, and I am totally dreading paying upwards of $500 for a veggie burrito.

After the jump, stuff from the news, plus a long boring story about the dream I had last night. Click here, or on the Empress of Drama, John McCain:

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By CAROLYN SZCZEPANSKI

Kansas City already has plenty of famous mob bosses. Add Babette Geer to that list.

As soon as the Brookside resident saw Brent Schulkin's video, she knew she had to recruit a "Carrotmob" of her own. "It just talked to me," the environmentalist says. "I thought, I've got to do this."

Unlike the notorious Pendergast family, Schulkin's -- and Geer's -- mob aims to battle global warming through coordinated consumer spending. Like any organized crime ring, though, the business benefactors need to earn the mob's patronage by promising to funnel some of their profits into green retrofits.

In the past six weeks, Geer and a small volunteer team have been working to make this cowtown just the fourth city in the world to mobilize an underground army of green consumers and direct their financial arsenal at one specific location at one specific time.

Click here for a new YouTube video the group posted this weekend explaining Carrotmob's roots and why it wants you to buy generous amounts of liquor on October 21.

By DAVID MARTIN

An investigation into the firing of nine U.S. attorneys confirms the rumor that Missouri Sen. Kit Bond can't stomach Jeff Roe, the sharp-elbowed Republican operative.

I had heard that Bond and his people didn't like Roe (pictured) in 2004. I was reporting a story about Roe and the rough tactics he deployed against Republicans and Democrats alike. Congressman Sam Graves' longtime political adviser, Roe is famous for negative campaigning at Lee Atwater-Karl Rove altitudes. In an effort to beat back Kay Barnes' challenge this fall, Team Graves has resorted to homophobia, airing ads that decry the former Kansas City mayor's "San Francisco values."

Todd Graves, the congressman's brother, was among the nine U.S. attorneys who were told to resign in 2006 and 2007. An investigation of the firings released today found "significant evidence that political and partisan considerations were an important factor," as Bush administration critics have alleged.

Graves was the first attorney ordered down the plank. The Justice Department investigators who looked into the firings determined that complaints from Bond's office prompted Graves' removal.

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By JUSTIN KENDALL

Supposedly, it's hard to get a date in Kansas City. Maybe it's just easy to get laid here. So says Mingle2, an online dating Web site, which ranks KC in the top 10 most promiscuous cities in the United States.

Mingle2's Dating Report says the average Kansas Citian has slept with 11 people. But we don't have shit on Mobile, Alabama, where the average is 16.

Not sure how accurate information is since the "study" is based on Mingle2's online survey.

Wrap it up, sluts.

By CHRIS PACKHAM

It was probably during hour 36 of my three-day marathon viewing of all the DVD season sets of 1980s vagcom Designing Women that I realized how good women have been to me over the years. Maybe it was smart, sassy Julia Sugarbaker's tough but tender liberal moralism, or Mary Jo Shively's super-sexxxy pragmatism, but I realized that, unlike me, women are unlikely to think that posting filth on the Internet constitutes a reasonable way of making $1 million. The subsequent remodeling of the front of my house to look like the set of Sugarbaker Designs didn't go so well, given my limited budget, although the walls above the cat litter boxes definitely needed a coat of paint.

There was a big debate on Friday, which I didn't watch because I was working. What with the approaching economic Armageddon during which all the hedge fund managers will be raptured up to heaven — assuming your idea of heaven is bankruptcy and weekly visits to the unemployment office — this is no time to be sitting at home on a Friday night watching presidential candidates. Instead, I rolled up my sleeves and sharpened some pencils and went to a rock concert in Lawrence, producing this review for the Wayward Blog.

After the jump, some news links for the ladies. Which look exactly like news links for men, only with much less body hair. Click here or on the Vandana Shiva Endowed Chair in Transnational Feminism and Trapper John, M.D. star Gregory Harrison:

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By DAVID MARTIN
Robert Heacock, third from left, and Mayor Don Reimal, fourth from left, break ground.

The city of Independence broke ground earlier this month on a 5,800-seat events center. J.E. Dunn Construction, the metro's largest contractor, is building the $55-million facility on a no-bid contract.

In the original plan, Global Entertainment Corp. of Phoenix was going to build and operate the arena, which aspires to host a Central Hockey League team. Global's declining financial position -- its stock trades at about a quarter of the price it did two years ago -- led the city to take a direct role in the design and construction phase. (Global Entertainment will still manage the building.)

Though the city assumed contractual control, it didn't follow its regular procurement procedures. The city council approved the Dunn contract without a formally requesting bids.

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By PETER RUGG

For the second time this year, a soldier stationed at Fort Riley has filed a federal suit over the military’s religious practices.

Today, Spc. Dustin Chalker filed the suit today, in conjunction with the Military Religious Freedom Foundation. According to the suit, he was forced to attend three events in the past two years that featured prayers by the battalion chaplain. Chalker claims he was denied exemption from these events, stating that he was not religious. The suit names Secretary of Defense Robert Gates as defendant.

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By Alan Scherstuhl

Much of what critics have said about Miracle at St. Anna is true. Spike Lee's two-and-a-half-hour drama about four African-American soldiers stranded behind enemy lines in World War II Italy is too long. At its undisciplined worst, it feels like someone crammed half a dozen scripts into a wood chipper set on overdrive.

What a two-star review such as that by Kansas City Star critic Robert Butler fails to convey: corny and bloated as it is, the bad stuff isn't that bad, and the good stuff is thrilling in ways that only a Spike Lee movie would dare. It's not a perfect movie, but it is a moving and important one.

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By CAROLYN SZCZEPANSKI

"Bail out the homeless!" Anne Pritchett bellowed into a bullhorn. "Bail out the uninsured!"

While politicians scrambled last night to assemble a $700 billion package to rescue financial institutions and avert a threatened economic meltdown, demonstrators at the intersection of Blue Parkway and Cleveland Avenue hoisted placards and told evening commuters to oppose putting taxpayer money into the hands of mismanaged corporations.

"They're pushing us to do this without any thought," protester Rebecca Brock said of the proposed bailout. "It just sounds like bullshit to me."

"It's a classic example of disaster capitalism," said Doug Greer, who doesn't want the government sticking taxpayers with the bill for the financial sector's self-inflicted problems.

"My grandkids don't need to be paying for this," said Paul Rola, while holding a homemade, over-sized check made out to "Paulson's Pillagers."

Click here for a slideshow of a rush-hour protest that got commuters honking their horns and shouting their support.

By NADIA PFLAUM

So I was all, "Is that a Keith Haring dress?" And Christine was all, "Yeah, I think it is. I got it at a thrift store, but it's obviously that." Christine's a painting major at the Kansas City Art Institute, which explains (1) her getting the Haring reference and (2) her effing awesome style.

"People at the Art Institute have a lot of style," Christine said. "They're kind of on the cusp of it."

Christine is interning for designer Peggy Noland at the moment, and says that Peggy's doing a baby theme right now. "She's got diapers, and collars with big pillows on 'em, and stuff that says, 'I (heart) Mom.' I'm so into it."

It would be pretty hard not to heart that.

By PETER RUGG

Thanks to Scott Burnett, the Lansing Correctional Facility’s maximum-security inmates might have a guitar-therapy program.

This past spring, Burnett purchased six acoustic guitars and donated them to the prison. Burnett’s gift was inspired by British folk musician Billy Bragg's program Jail Guitar Doors, which provides musical instruments to inmates. Burnett hopes to establish an active arm of the group here in Kansas City.

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By JUSTIN KENDALL

Herm Edwards may need a hug after this season.

Yesterday, our friends at State of the Line broke down the growing trend of store clerks going Charles Bronson on the asses of would-be thieves. Buried at the end of the post was a link to a story drawing a "disturbing and accurate correlation" between crime and shitty football teams.

Earlier this month, the blog Sportaphile compared the NFL's worst franchises and America's 25 most dangerous cities. Nine of the NFL's bottom-feeding franchises are based in cities in the top 25. A tenth team, the Cleveland Browns, is the only team with a winning record in a dangerous city.

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By THE PACKHAM VIC 20

Exciting features:

The Packham Vic 20 automatically selects the first photo it finds in its initial Google Image search.

The Packham Vic 20 uses advanced BASIC programming to generate one exciting insult or vulgar epithet per topic.

The Packham Vic 20 includes one joystick port. Play all your favorite games!

The Packham Vic 20 works with any nondigital TV and will not disrupt your UHF reception.

The Packham Vic 20. TV not included. Monthly budget shown on screen not included. Family willing to make Eight Is Enough-looking child privy to family budget not included. Overdraft protection for family on very small budget shown on screen not included.

After the jump, find out where Chris Packham is.

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By JEN CHEN

The first time I realized that KC is a big small town was when I tried to crash a party in Prairie Village. As I documented in this Night Ranger column, I was infiltrating the party when I realized that (a) I knew the host; and (b) I had already been invited. What’s weird is that I knew only a few people who lived in PV at the time, so I’m still amazed that of all the houses in the area, I ended up at the one where I knew the owner.

Since then, I’ve collected stories about the random ways in which Kansas Citians are connected. I’ve wanted to write this “Big Small Town” story for a while, but I’ve had trouble approaching such a nebulous subject. I didn’t want the story to consist solely of anecdotes about how someone knows so-and-so, who’s friends with the brother of such-and-such. So I tried to figure out why this happens. I came up with a theory on how we interact; I thought that most Kansas Citians (especially those who grew up here) could be classified in four ways:

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