History Repeating?: An Auburn fan/ "historian", attempts to predict outcomes of Auburn games by looking at seemingly unrelated historical events. A waste of time? Only if it doesn’t work.

So, I was wrong last week. One Hail Mary completion or a better review on a diving catch and I’m sitting here looking like Nostradamus. Instead, this week I needed to go back to the formula, consult the ancient runes, and cast lots to best determine how to use the power of the infinite now to determine the outcome of future events. We know time works in circular form.* We just have to figure out HOW.

This is not an exact science, it takes time to figure out the cosmic forces.

Finally, I was able to see the event which DIRECTLY** parallels this weekend's football contest between Auburn and Arkansas State. When I found it, I kicked myself. It was so obvious, so on-the-nose, how could I possibly be the only one to see the signs? This game has already been played, but it went by a different name back then.

Karl Marx’s speech in Amsterdam, 1872

From September 2-10 (some say it ended the 7th, some say the 10th), 1872, what was then known as the International Workingmen’s Association met in the Hague, Holland. At the end of this convention of Marxists and anarchists, many things had become clear. For starters, the anarchists were kicked out of/left the group for some reason other than the brutal irony of an association of anarchists. Also, Karl Marx, the Santa Claus of communism, gave a speech calling for more political-minded action from the Association. Marx thought the best course of action would be to inspire a class revolution through turning the Association into a sort of international political party. The headquarters of which was going to be in New York City. In America.

Marx literally said, “ America will be the workers' continent par excellence.” He believed that the influx of working-class immigrants was making the USA the perfect place to launch a Marxist revolution in the late 1800’s. Turning the Association into a political party in order to win elections, especially in America, would be a bloodless way of achieving the Marxist ideal.

Well, it didn’t work. Aside from the political party in New York never taking off (America is NOT the workers’ continent par excellence, after all) the anarchists started their own convention without Marx, declared his convention invalid, declared him to be a big fat dummy,*** and then persuaded some of his former comrades to join them. The International Workingmen’s Association disbanded four years later.

Auburn-Arkansas State

Ok, aside from the fact that big time college sports are kind of a socialist utopia, there are some obvious lessons to be learned from the past.

Auburn is in the SEC. There is no more bourgeois grouping of college football “haves” than the Southeastern conference. Our athletic department gross revenue is bigger than the GDP of the Marshall Islands (this is true). The system in college football is set up in order to make sure Auburn has a much better shot at being named champion than, say, a Houston team who is in something called an American Athletic Conference.

Arkansas State, on the other hand, is the proletariat. Operating on a shoestring budget and constantly falling victim to having their successful coaches snatched up by the Big Boys, the Red Wolves would love to start a revolution on Saturday. They would love to overthrow the Auburn Tigers and think we are in a perfect position to be beaten. They think Jordan-Hare Stadium is the workers’ continent par excellence!

Not so fast, Red Wolves. This one is going to get out of hand early. Auburn will come out and it won’t matter how many people play QB because they will all score touchdowns. Auburn will have more quarterbacks account for touchdowns than Arkansas State will have scoring plays.

Like the four years it took to disband the International Workingmen’s, it will take only four quarters to completely dismantle the morale of the Red Wolves. By the end of the game, they will switch their Red flags for white flags.

It’s a practical world.

Bourgeoisie 52

Proletariat 10

* Pay no attention to the lame-stream media

**open to interpretation as to how directly

***I like to imagine Marx’s meeting strategy to look like this (existential comics is one of the best sites on the world wide web).

Red Wolves, RED, you know, like Communism, get it?