Tuesday, April 26, 2011

Winning by Drawing

This is the question posed on the website of the current US Chess Championships (http://www.saintlouischessclub.org/live):

What do you think is the best bid in an Armageddon game to receive black and draw odds vs. white's 45 mins + 5 seconds / move?:
More than 40 minutes
35-40 minutes
30-35 minutes
25-30 minutes
Less than 25 minutes

Please notice the question presupposes that an Armageddon game is de rigueur. Nothing could be further from the truth! The so-called 'Armageddon' game is an abomination! There should never, under any circumstances, be a game whereby a player can win by drawing! I would like to know the name of the person who first had the 'thought' behind this travesty. This 'thinker' should have been hit, immediately, with the full opprobrium of his peers and the weight of an inexorable slide into an immoral society, at the very least. He should have been held to public ridicule, thereby nipping this damnable black rose in the bud, consigning it to oblivion, where it belongs.
How do things like this come into existence without discussion as to whether or not they should exist? We are now suffering because nuclear power was foisted on we, the people, without any discussion whatsoever as to the efficacy of what is now Hell on Earth. It would seem appropriate to call it an 'Armageddon' game when one considers it, would it not?

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Hear! Hear!