Ron Swoboda’s 1967 Topps baseball card

The Times-Picayune’s Doug MacCash asked New Orleans celebrities for their thoughts on the possibility that Dec. 21, 2012 is the end of the world.

Among those who responded was 1969 New York Mets World Series hero Ron Swoboda, who is now a sportscaster in New Orleans.

“So many of us in New Orleans already eat and drink like the world is coming to an end tomorrow,” Swoboda wrote, “and when it doesn’t, we don’t have to change anything. At its heart it’s the same benevolent nihilism all over again.”

Applying a certain reassuring logic to the situation, Swoboda rhetorically asks: “If the Mayans were so smart, why did the jungle win?”