Congress And John McCain - The Game Remains A Game

BRAVES CLINCH! BRAVES CLINCH!

Ahem. That's fourteen in a row.

Let's see if we can get anything done in the post season this year.

The good news comes in the midst of an unsettling baseball week. I mean, how often is it that John McCain gets on SportsCenter? I must say, I called this one. See the past post I wrote about what was going to happen to the suspensions for steroid use. The Commish has proposed 50 games, and the players union proposed they'd be "willing to accept" harsher penalties. What's Congress' response? They seem amused by the fact a baseball players' union is even trying to attempt to negotiate with them. It's no play ball in this case guys. McCain was hinting at the fact that he was more concerned with three strikes and your out rather than whether or not its a twenty or fifty game suspension for the first offense.

What's more amusing is the union's response (which has been unbelievably delayed for SO long) comes just one day before the congressional committee's hearing, which of course McCain chairs.

It really is cracking me up. Here we have a group of distinguished gentlemen (no jokes please) who are voting on things such as healthcare reform, hurricanes, wars in all parts of the world, most favored nations, and what the hell to do about the UN, when along comes a bunch of the same damn athletes who used to make fun of guys like these in high school thinking they can debate with them, that they have half the intelligence to even negotiate with these guys, saying they are "willing to accept" harsher punishments. The MLBPA is clearly out of their league. You can just see it in McCain's amused eyes, "By God, you'll do what the hell we tell you to do or there will BE NO union, no league, no millions, .....just foreclosed-on MTV cribs."

And then came the response from McCain regarding the Palmeiro situation. I still hold my ground on this one. My ground is I don't know how to feel. I'm pissed at him, but I still have this guy's 1988 Donruss baseball card in a scrapbook from when I was a kid. How can you hate that? You can hate it by not voting him into the Hall of Fame. Mr. 3000 hits, no hall of fame. Go sit in the eternal dugout with Pete Rose. Now he's only made it worse by blaming Tejada. Just go home man, and don't come back until it's with an apology.

Oh what a week. The sport is in some dark days right now, and this is coming from a baseball freak. I listen to my podcasts: MLB daily, and also the ESPN radio podcast - and instead of talking about the amazing 51 homers Andruw Jones is hitting, the fourteen straight division titles, the Boston/New York showdown..again, the Angels scrapping down to the wire victory, the Indians' hysterical turnaround, the magic being thrown off the mound by old timers Roger Clemens and Randy Johnson, the 47 year old phenom Julio Franco, Barry pumping life back into the Giants - and fastballs -and all the great stuff in baseball this year, we are being forced to talk about the cheaters. The ones who are making our American game corrupt, impure and comical. It's just not right.

I'll be in favor of whatever punishment Congress imposes so long as the game remains the game. In the meantime, I'll be watching re-runs of real baseball. I've got the Little League World Series on DVR, Bull Durham on HBO, and The Natural on Showtime.