Former Atlanta Falcons’ quarterback Michael Vick said that he will take full responsibility for his actions after entering a guilty plea to a federal judge this morning acknowledging his involvement in organized dogfighting.
During today’s press conference Vick apologized for lying to NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, Atlanta Falcons’ owner Arthur Blank and coach Bobby Petrino, as well as to his teammates. He also apologized repeatedly to any young people who have been following his case and may have looked up to him.
His experience has helped him find religion. “Through this situation I found Jesus and I’m going to ask himself for forgiveness and turn myself over to God.”
The Jesus-rehab ploy might even get him a gig in the NFL, again, after he exits the slammer. Say, with the Indianapolis Colts.
NO rational person would put everything at risk for a stupid hobby as did Vick. Shows the power of childhood circumstances. Makes people religious or republican too.
Powerful stuff, human experience and lack of exposure to alternatives == aka, edumacation!
I will redeem myself? I am going to take responsibiliy? GIMME A BREAK, it took him what a choice of 25 to 40 year prison sentence versus a shorter one if he pled guilty, yea some respability, this guy is unbelievable.
Good to hire savvy PR and lawyers.
Admit guilt in dog fighting so don’t risk being found guilty of gambling at trial – have a chance of avoiding a permanent ban on returning to NFL.
Play the Jesus card early, and often.
Depressing recent commentary:
http://tinyurl.com/yr3qfe
One final, sad, note: Michael Vick made any number of serious mistakes. His greatest may have been not moving his operation close to his day job in Georgia. Possessing a fighting dog is legal there. So is watching it fight.
#1 – bobbo
You’re right and people agree with you but perhaps you’re being a little too kind and perhaps Mr. Vick is being a little too optimistic:
http://tinyurl.com/2b4ftp.
These are some great Weasel Words he’s using. The only reason he considers himself guilty is because he got caught. Not for anything he did to the dogs.
My brother-in-law lives in the Atlanta area and he said it was a big thing in the local papers that the Falcons spent $80,000 on English, speech, and and public speaking lessons for him.
Most people’s opinions were that you should have a command of the English language after attending 2 years of college.
#6 – who cares? All the IQs in the NFL adds up to only one seat on the small bus.
4–Cinaedh, thanks for the link. How was I too kind?
I always wonder when people, including myself, do stupid things. What would have been the response if anyone had said “Vick, Martha Stewart, Myself–look at what you are doing. Its illegal (or stupid). Recognize all that will be lost if you are caught, and you likely will be. Weigh these things, balance. Choose your path.”
Would he really “Think”, hey, I’m a football guy, I can do what I want?” — Ummh, yeah, probably so.
“Thou shalt not use the name of the lord in vain.”
He could at least have waited until after he spent some time in the slammer prior to using the ‘Jesus card.’
Specially since he was not a Christian in the past. No follower of Jesus would use the torture of animals for personal pleasure and still be able to profess to be a Christian; the two are utterly incompatible.
(The same applies to hunting for pleasure also… the VP shooting 70 birds in one day for personal pleasure makes him utterly un-Christian by any perspective. Think about what Jesus would have to say about shooting clipped winged cage raised birds for pleasure.)
GENESIS 9:2 “The fear of you and the dread of you will be on every animal of the earth, and on every bird of the sky. Everything that the ground teems with, and all the fish of the sea are delivered into your hand.”
GUN NUTS —LIBS—CONS—LOONIES of all types. Found the above at the following website. Great pics if you don’t wanna read.
http://philbertsuggs.blogspot.com/
Didn’t bet on the dogs? So he was just watching the carnage for the enjoyment? Now that’s sicker than a gambling addiction!
Ooooh, just a minute…I’ve been corrected. He said this to get out of deeper shit than he’s already in.
I say cage match to the death between him and the meanest MF in prison. Let the dogs watch. Pay per view??
“I will redeem myself”
Redeem yourself for what? cash and prizes?
#8 – bobbo
I suppose you weren’t “too kind” because probably there is no such thing as “too kind” in this life but my first impression was that you were giving him too much in the way of an “out” i.e. childhood circumstances and educational deficiencies.
I’m just not as nice a person as you, more’s the pity!
By the way, does anyone know what this means: “…most of which was gambling money provided by Vick, according to the documents.”
I don’t get it. If he wasn’t gambling, was he the bookie? Bookie’s don’t hand out money to gamblers, they take it from them. Are they trying to say he lent the money to his friends so they could bet? Or am I missing something?
13–Cinaedh==I’m just curious as to why Vick, or anyone else, does such a stupid thing. Lets say I’m 100% correct. Doesn’t make it less stupid or less culpable.
Everything he has said post arrest has been manufactured from his team and says little to nothing about him. The fact that he put it all at risk for “what” is all on him.
His actions will speak louder than his lawyer-&-PR-crafted words. But when you’ve lost so much that needs regaining, even his motivations for being a volunteer at the dog pound for the next 10 years will be suspect. I really don’t doubt he’s found religion. At least until he is comfortable again.
RBG
I fail to see where the Indianapolis Colts reference comes from.
He hasn’t bet on the dog fights. He’s just killed dogs. Oh, well that’s okay then. How the hell do people like this set their priorities and where’s their humanity?
Bobbo:
Quoting Genesis 9:2 is an old cheap trick, since it seems to justify on it’s own that humans can do whatever they darn well please to animals and the earth overall, while discounting the overall teachings of the bible as a sum. It’s called making quotes out of context.
If you actually know anything about the old testament, you know that there are several passages that indicate that before the flood people were actually vegetarian, and only after the flood did humans become meat eaters. Yet your quote takes place before the flood. So one way of reading this was that humans lived in harmony, not even killing them for food, yet dominating the animal kingdom. And in no way does the quote justify cruelty or killing for PLEASURE.
But it is all irrelevant simple because the new testament overrides the old testament. A true Christian always uses the WWJD (the new testament) concept when living his life and confronting moral choices, and I am certain that killing animals for pleasure, or torturing animals for pleasure are not something that Jesus would approve of.
Go ahead, call yourself a Christian if you want to, but in your soul you know that you are not a Christian if you do not apply the WWJD principle when asked tough questions about life, instead quoting out-of-context quotes from the bible in order to justify negative actions.
Awake, I guess this means that no one is a Christian. Also, those people in Guantanamo can’t possibly be Muslims, so there’s no reason to give them Korans, etc.
13 Or am I missing something?
“Vick, 27, pleaded guilty to a single count of conspiracy to travel across state lines for the purpose of dogfighting.”
He doesn’t have to prove he didn’t gamble, because the indictment on gambling charges is not going to trial.
“Goodell wrote. “Your plea agreement and the plea agreements of your co-defendants also demonstrate your significant involvement in illegal gambling. Even if you personally did not place bets, as you contend, your actions in funding the betting and your association with illegal gambling…”
They have evidence of his significant involvement in illegal gambling…
So his plea-bargain means he can continue to claim “I didn’t inhale…”
no, wait
“Read my lips, no new taxes”
“I didn’t have sex with that woman..”
“It was never about ‘Stay the course’…”
Okay, here it is:
“I never gambled”
hmmm is that a quote from Michael Vick, or Pete Rose?
Why do you mention the Indianapolis Colts? They don’t need a quarterback.
Thats why the bible is pretty obsolete, I mean give me the vaguest statement out there and i can make it say anything i want. What people need is a little compassion for living things.
oh darn, he played the Jesus “get out of trouble” card. Wimp.
How did he find religion so fast?
18–Awake, thanks for setting me straight–why is the Old Testament even still part of the bible given that 90% of it is wrong and hateful? Oops–how do the Jews interpret the overruled, wrong, and hateful early drafts of the bible and come up with such a virtuous religion?
I’m more fascinated by Elvis wearing the camel-toe outfit. Yeehaw!!!
How about a new NFL league. The misfits! The criminals! Sign up OJ Simpson, Vick…heck get williams out there. They could use two of his bongs with some chain between them as first-down markers. No over-time, sudden death street fight cage match style decides a tie score.
And thus Christianity slipped a little closer to extinction, much to the bewilderment of it’s adherents.
Bobbo –
In post 24 you demonstrated your total ignorance on matters of religion. You do not only do not know the relationship of the old testament to the new testament and their places in Christian theology, you have no clue about Judaism at all.
Where did you get your information? From Elvis wearing a camel-tor outfit? It sure sounds that way.
Thanks for the debate, and now I can comfortably cross you off the list of of people that “have a clue”.
One thing I cannot stand about America is we have these totally ignorant boobs who haven’t done dick in their life delighting in the fall of others. People are so egotistical that they actually take pride in thinking, “If I had a $100 million and 4.2 speed, there is no way I’d do something so stupid, man.”
Of course, many of the morons who condemn Vick are probably using screens made in Korea. (Think about it), suck down hot dogs, Big Macs, and Chicken McNuggets and wouldn’t think twice about suing a drug company for inadequate drug testing, which is first done on animals. And while having an abortion is a woman’s right, killing a dog is totally wrong … well, unless an animal shelter does it.
Vick broke the law, and because of that, he put himself at the mercy of our Draconian legal system. Typically, a first time nonviolent offender wouldn’t be put in jail for doing what Vick did, but prosecutors were hell bent on making names for themselves. And today, the judge made one of the most narcisstic comments I have ever heard. The concept of judges and prosecutors being public servants has almost become an oxymoron.
Vick should be suspended from the NFL, and he should be put on probation, fined, and be forced to do community service, but jail for mistreating animals he owned? Please. Animals are people’s property, and an owner should be able to kill said animals whenever he wants. In their natural state, dogs are ruthless, carniverous, killing machines. Earth to PETA, the reason we have domesticated animals is for our own benefit.
People may be sickened with what Vick did, but I am more sickened by a legal system more enamored with making a name for itself than doing what is best for society. We have the highest percentage for incarcerated citizens in the world. When are we going to substitute mercy and compassion for venegance and ruthlessness?
#28…JZ….Spoken like a true ex-con. Or a Liberal who has never actually lived in the real world. This is exactly the kind of person who should be sent to prison, why?…..because so many kids DO look up to him and try to emulate him. His actions make killing, and doing it cruelly *ok* to these kids. Micheal Vick dosen’t live in the wild, nor did the dogs he bought and trained to be killers. While dogs may be *animals* in the wild, these were domesticated *pets* until some sick bastard bought them (Vick and friends) and trained them to be killers for their entertainment and profit.
It’s humans(and in your case I’ll use the term loosely) like you that make me prefer the company of animals. There are few animals that kill just for the pleasure of it(and the ones who do….happen to belong to the same family tree that we fell off of), the vast majority kill to defend themselves from being eaten or to feed themselves and their babies.
Vick may have bought these animals, but he had no right to kill or maim them in the way he and his friends did. That is the sure sign of a very sick individual and you apparently are in the same class.
While I don’t like PETA or it’s tactics or logic……at least they have an admirable goal in mind…..you and people like you and Vick I just plain dispise. You may think Vick should be punished for breaking the law, in reality, your no better than he is.
Some of us morons believe abortion is a womans right, but oppose the act itself, and oppose the death penalty and don’t eat the products you mentioned. And lets be honest here, I’ll bet your part of the moronic masses as well.
>> Animals are people’s property, and an owner should be able to kill said animals whenever he wants.
For a long time society thought of black people the same way.
It was OK to torture, kill, or abuse black people in any way, since they were property.
jz, I guess that by your definition of property, that was ok.