Bread and Circuses

The economy is going into a recession. Naturally, Congress turns it attention to baseball.

You can’t expect congressmen to behave rationally. Some of them, having gutted the regulations which protected American goods and industry for centuries, actually believe they can solve the problems they created. This is something akin to shooting yourself in the foot and being seized with the revelation that you might be a doctor.

Maybe they just want to meet baseball players. Some people collect baseball cards, some subpoena Mark McGwire. Others just wait for the light to come on the camera so they can ask Bud Selig, "Mr. Commissioner, what did you know and when did you know it?"

I feel most sorry for people like Miguel Tejeda. Sure, he probably lied to Congress. But if you paid attention to government officials of all political persuasions who have testified before the House and Senate, you may reasonably have supposed that perjury was a right. Or at least a civic obligation.

For his troubles, Tejeda is now being pursued by the FBI. They think he hindered Congress in finding out whether Rafael Palmeiro lied when he said that he never took steroids. I forget when or why this became important to Congress. Why they should want to destroy the Orioles when they could take a thirty minute drive up the road and watch them collapse at $23 a head like the rest of us escapes me. Well, it’s like Fitzgerald said, the rich are different than you and I.

Roger Clemens now wants to rush into the fray and testify. A burning man running into a fireworks factory seeking relief. It’s hard to make sense of it all. The exhumation of Cy Young’s body can’t be far in the future.

It could be the reason baseball is on the hot seat is that Bud Selig and Donald Fehr are such easy targets. In the big league world of sports investigations, Selig and Fehr are batting practice pitchers. The dumbest congressman can step up to the plate and go yard with either of them.

But why baseball? And why not college sports?

The NCAA is a tax-exempt foundation dedicated to the proposition that the inability to write complete sentences should not prohibit participation in minor league sports programs masquerading as extra-curricular activities.

You want to talk about drug problems? Let’s bring some SEC coaches up to the Hill to testify as to why they raised the number of drug tests you have to fail to be suspended from athletics to as high as four.

You want to talk about violating the purity of athletic competition? Let’s talk about payments to athletes, interference with admissions policies, teams steering athletes to certain majors, tutors completing work for players.

Parade some big time coaches and athletic directors before the bright lights and get them to testify about violent crimes committed by athletes against fellow students. Find out why donations to multi-million dollar coaching contracts are tax exempt. Get some physically ruined ex-college players to testify how they took part in a multi-million dollar industry and somehow didn’t get a share of the proceeds or even worker’s comp when they were injured.

Turn over the rocks.

Write your congressman. Tell them, "no guts, no glory". Take down the charging elephant that is the NCAA and we’ll tip our hat to you. Until then, leave the cowering lions of baseball alone.

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