During a bygone era of Detroit Lions football misery, a losing coach who was trying to end his suffering cried out in anguish: "What's a guy have to do to get fired around here?"

He soon found out.

Recently, one of my in-laws who lives in the United Kingdom (UK) informed me that he had received a singular distinction: he'd been placed on "Putin's blacklist."

While he is a private individual, it was not beyond the realm of possibility. Following the dictum to trust but verify, I checked. He had, indeed, been banned from entering the Russian Federation. I felt a tinge of envy and the brutal ache of unfairness.