Why should our hardworking public servants be spending valuable time and taxpayer dollars investigating whether Roger Clemens doped up or if the Patriots cheated? It seems to be minor issues in a time where there are slightly more important things to worry about for Americans. The guy with no job ain’t gonna buy any tickets anyway.
Two words: teevee cameras.
Out of curiosity, how many taxpayer dollars do you estimate were spent on that hearing?
I think it was a mistake to make a whole hearing about Roger Clemens. Clearly there’s a problem in baseball with steroids, and I think Major League Baseball did as much as they could to stonewall the Mitchell report while maintaining a guise of cooperation. I think both the owners and the players have had a wink-and-a-nudge agreement that they could skirt or outright ignore Federal laws on steroid use, and somebody ought to hold them – MLB, the owners, and the players as groups – to account. However, I would have a hard time seeing how to hold those disparate groups to account in criminal courts – owners may have looked the other way on steroids, but they didn’t jam the needles in any player’s butts. If they did wrong and cannot be held to account for criminal actions, I have no problem at all with making them answer questions before the glare of the kleig lights.
I fully acknowledge that there’s a strong anti-sport sentiment on this board… or if not anti-sport, then some sort of passive-aggressive dislike of professional sports. But baseball is big business and a lot of people care about it. Just because some Doper doesn’t care about it, doesn’t mean it isn’t a legitimate issue in the public square. We can’t all spend all of our time listening to classical music, wringing our hands about international affairs, and so on. I do plenty of that, but I’d also like to see someone whack baseball upside the head with a 2 by 4 and make it a respectable sport and business once again.
We have a very big government and we’re fully capable of dealing with many issues at the same time: today in the House there are 28 hearings on subjects like veterans benefits, gas prices, Army readiness, border enforcement, Cambodia and foreign debt, the Department of Interior’s budget, Al Qaeda, Medicaid, and small business taxes. Are you saying that professional sports, a major American industry, doesn’t belong on that list at all? Why shouldn’t professional sports be subject to occasional examination by lawmakers?
Man…you need to get a grip! Turn on some classical music, pick up some obscure book no one else outside of this board has ever heard of, gets some cheese and a bit of wine from the new Mongolian vineyards and open up Mother Jones or The Progressive! Feel the vibes flow into you and those bad thoughts of sports and other pedestrian things flow out of you…
Feel better?
I’m in quasi-agreement with you here. Obviously, the US government IS involved in all those issues, and since that is the case they really should be involved in this to. Of course, there is the question of whether or not the Government should be involved in all those things in the first place…but seeing as how A is A and reality is reality, Baseball is, as you say, important to a lot of folks AND it’s big business. This makes it the business of the Government.
-XT
I don’t really get the “taxpayer dollars” argument. Pretty much all the key players in these hearing gigs are on salary. That means they’re making the same whether they hold a hearing or not.
The House can hold many hearings at the same time and during the same day. It’s actually quite ludicrous how many hearings the Congress holds on an annual basis, but just suffice to say, while this is a “big deal” for sports journalists and sports fans–to Congress this is nothing. They do hearings every single day, most of them do not get this level of attention, but this one is literally like a grain of sand on a sand dune.
That’s not an inappropriate level of interest from a legislative body that spends an immense amount of time holding hearings and investigating things. A legislative body cannot legislate from ignorance, thus it needs to investigate an incredibly wide range of issues regularly.
All of the rooms they are using are long paid for, they are set up for this. It isn’t like setting up a stage for a rock concert, it’s like turning on the lights and printing up some paper.
You’re right, Ravenman. (the sports team? bias bias )
I suppose in a time of relative calm, this would seem like a more pressing matter, but in the light of all of our current problems, it doesn’t seem like a very good use of resources. However, I’ll admit to a lack of interest in baseball, which undoubtedly colors my judgement, and your argument that baseball as business does need attention from someone is agreeable to me.
However, I still refuse to believe that Arlen Specter really has nothing better to do than investigate the Patriots.
However, in the interests of sparing the hamsters and in view of the other thread I’ll let this one die unless someone else wants to ask stuff.
It can all be reduced to to phrases:
“antitrust exemption”
and
“touching on interstate commerce.”
Either one of these gets the attention of a certain legislative body.
Actually, I’m a 49ers fan. 
Really?? And I thought I was the only one…
-XT