Steroids and Government

RALEIGH, N.C. – A member of the House committee that
held hearings on steroid use in March says Congress may feel compelled
to get involved in testing major league players for banned substances.

"At this point I think (the chances are) getting better and better because
of baseball’s inability to police their own players," Rep. Patrick McHenry,
R-N.C., said Saturday on the ESPN program "Outside the Lines."

from the Associated
Press

We are starting to hear, on the airwaves of talk radio
as well as around the blogosphere, backlash against the US Congress for
spending so much time on the steroid scandal in baseball. Don’t they
have better things to do with their time, we hear repeated from both
ends
of the techno-political spectrum.

Well, no.  Baseball is still the national pastime,
part of the essence of what makes us unique. A baseball game is a distillation
of the American Spirit, and the spirit of baseball is in danger.

Of course Congress should get involved in issues affecting
the American Spirit. While defense of the nation must come first, at
least during times of war, defense of the values we are fighting for
must never flag. Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty.

It would be tempting to take a libertarian position
on this one, privacy uber alles, and say what consenting adults do to
their bodies is their own business and nobody else’s. Or to somehow diversity
pro sports into an au natural division and an unlimited modification
division, like car racing. This would present interesting possibilities and certainly
stretch the limits of science and our concept of what it means to be human.

However, the deciding influence in determining our position
on this one is the fate of the kids.  It would be disingenuous to
pretend that if professional athletes were allowed to use performance-enhancers,
that high school, college and amateur jocks would leave them alone until
and unless they turned pro.

Unfortunately, our enlightened media have
turned pro athletes into objects of obsession and de facto role models
for millions throughout America. This causes incredible and unhealthy
distortions in the minds of the athletes, in the aspirations of America’s
youth, in what people spend their time thinking and talking about, and
in the value system of our society.

So yes, Congress should get involved with cleaning steroids
out of Baseball.  And with the way sports are promoted, how "student"
athletes are  recruited and treated, how much athletes are compensated,
and what lessons professional sports are teaching kids. Sports can be
incredibly constructive; of discipline, teamwork, character, mental and
physical health, local pride, family togetherness and integration of
different kinds of people.  It can also be disturbingly destructive;
of the athletes first and foremost, but also of the emotions of the fans,
the marketing of human flesh, the concept of fair play and the innocence
of youth.

The United States produces the best athletes in the
world, but our professional sports system is eating
our children alive,
and it especially likes minority children.  It is rapidly becoming
a cancer at the very heart of the daily national experience. Somebody
needs to clean up the faded glory of American sports, but we doubt Congress
has the vision or the guts to do it.