Barry Bonds: Congress wasting its time with steroid inquiry... HAHAHAHAAHA

Page 3 - Seeking answers? Join the AnandTech community: where nearly half-a-million members share solutions and discuss the latest tech.

SP33Demon

Lifer
Jun 22, 2001
27,928
143
106
Originally posted by: RabidMongoose
I used to support Bonds, but now with the information out, I think it's pretty clear that he's a cheater. It's a shame since he was already a great and HOF player in the 1990's.
Rabid! What's up man... :)

I remember when you used to love Bonds and we would argue for literally hours.

I think we even established that roids really wouldn't help you as much regarding reaction time (I think it was .2 seconds). Down to the physics involved and everything.
 

Ilmater

Diamond Member
Jun 13, 2002
7,516
1
0
Originally posted by: SP33Demon
While the government probably does have higher priorities, nobody can dispute the fact that baseball needed an outside party to come in and regulate its integrity. They should have hired the IOC to do the testing, they are the ones who found the Clear in the first place. Also, their penalties are fierce, you will be banned for a year or more for your first offense, and banned for life for a second.
Needed - past tense - is right. They needed someone to make them change. However, that's done now. Move on. Let baseball police itself.
 

BlueWeasel

Lifer
Jun 2, 2000
15,944
475
126
Originally posted by: 91TTZ
Originally posted by: BlueWeasel
Originally posted by: 91TTZ
Originally posted by: BlueWeasel
Originally posted by: 91TTZ

The record is held by Hank Aaron though. Ruth's record was broken long ago, so he can stop crying.

Uh, Ruth hit 714 homeruns and Aaron hit 755. Bonds is still at 706 or so.

Uh (mouthbreather), what are you trying to say?

Do I need to repeat myself, corky? Like I said, Ruth's record was broken a long time ago BY AARON, WHO IS BLACK, so I don't see what Bonds' point is when he's saying that people are angry at him for breaking a white man's record. It was broken by a black man long ago.

Nevermind, I just misread your response (the nested quotes threw me off).

Sorry about the inappropriate response. I edited it.

No offense taken....besides, shouldn't your argument be pointed toward SP33Demon? :D

Your point makes perfect sense to me at least. I don't know why he insists on making it a racial issue, even though the first occurrance like this happened back in 1974 with Aaron. I'm not a huge baseball fan or historian, but I assume the racial issues were pretty bad back in '74 when Ruth's record was broken the first time?

Either way, I just see Bond's tactics as nothing more than making issues just to get some of the heat off his sterioid use.
 

PingSpike

Lifer
Feb 25, 2004
21,765
615
126
Originally posted by: brian_riendeau
No, they don't. Its not the governments duty to ensure private sports organizations are fair.

Private sports organizations are not allowed to break the law.

Its not their job to enforce the law either though. Did you turn in every guy you knew who was drinking underage? Or did you just say "I don't care/none of my business"?

Its entertainment, no one dies or goes broke or anything serious because barry bonds used steroids.

Many people have died from steroids, typically from overdose at the high school and college level. I knew kids who shot up in high school just to get their tuition paid for by doing well in sports.

People die driving their cars to work in the morning. One guy even died from his own farts awhile ago. Should the government set to work making cars illegal and installing buttplugs in all American's assholes? And thats irrelevant because steroids already are illegal, but that doesn't mean a private organization should be *required* to police what its employees do. Would you like it if your boss came to your house randomly demanding a cup of piss? Weed is illegal, shouldn't employers therefore be required to make sure their employees don't smoke weed?

Baseball just looks bad. And who gives a fvck, its just a game anyway.

They're in there trying to get baseball, a GAME that people watch for ENTERTAINMENT to do something about a few of their players using steroids. DON'T WORRY EVERYONE! THE GOVERNMENT IS HERE TO HELP US ALL.

Just a game that generates billions in revenue and occupies the afternoons of millions of people around the globe. It is more important that you seem to think.

Yeah, baseball is pretty important. Because if tomorrow it suddenly ceased to exist, the entire world would fvcking collapse. When people came home and turned on the TV and said "Oh sh|t no baseball?" and then shoot their wives and then themselves. And when the soldiers in Iraq found out there was no baseball, they would lose the will to fight and be overrun. And North Korea would attack the weakened baseball-less United States, and without our baseball players we'd be unable to defend ourselves.

Its a game. The movie Titanic generated millions in revenue, that doesn't mean it was vital, important or even good.

Do you think all boob implants should be made illegal in porn because it gives the enhanced starlets an unnatural advantage over the competition?

If baseball wants to regulate this, thats fine, its their game. But there doesn't need to be a government organization, funding by federal tax dollars that come out of my paycheck that makes sure baseball does what it wants.

Again, if you don't like the roids, boycott baseball. Thats what they'll listen too. But people won't, because in the end they want to see baseballs get hit out of the park, and dudes on roids can do that better.
 

Pabster

Lifer
Apr 15, 2001
16,986
1
0
Originally posted by: RabidMongoose
Originally posted by: edro13
I completely agree with him. Why should CONGRESS care about baseball? MLB should care, not the U.S. Government.

Because major league baseball is essentially a government protected monopoly.

Precisely. Anti-Trust Exemption. Maybe they ought to remove it as others have suggested...
 

SP33Demon

Lifer
Jun 22, 2001
27,928
143
106
Originally posted by: BlueWeasel

No offense taken....besides, shouldn't your argument be pointed toward SP33Demon? :D

Your point makes perfect sense to me at least. I don't know why he insists on making it a racial issue, even though the first occurrance like this happened back in 1974 with Aaron. I'm not a huge baseball fan or historian, but I assume the racial issues were pretty bad back in '74 when Ruth's record was broken the first time?

Either way, I just see Bond's tactics as nothing more than making issues just to get some of the heat off his sterioid use.
Nah, no argument, he was just noting that he didn't get what in the world Bonds meant since Aaron broke it already and paved the way for blacks.

The racial issues were big back then, you're right... it was 10X as bad as it was today. Which is one of the reasons why Aaron has a strong dislike for Bonds, Bonds doesn't know how good he has it these days:

The threat to Ruth's record prompted racial antagonism toward Aaron and his family. In 1973 numerous death threats forced him to hire a bodyguard. His daughter, Gaile, a student at Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee, received threatening phone calls and was the target of an abortive kidnapping plot. In spite of the hatred around him, Aaron finished the season just one home run short of Ruth's record.

More controversy surrounded Aaron as the 1974 season began. The Braves' management opted to bench their cleanup hitter for the first three games at Cincinnati so that he could break the home run record in Atlanta. Commissioner Bowie Kuhn disagreed with the move and ordered that Aaron play in the opening games. He played two of the three games and tied Ruth's record without breaking it.

On April 8, 1974, the stage was set for the breaking of one of baseball's most famous records.
Hank Aaron
In front of a record crowd at Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium, the forty-year-old Aaron faced pitcher Al Downing of the Los Angeles Dodgers. In the fourth inning he knocked a fastball over the left field fence, his 715th home run. The crowded stadium of 53,775 fans erupted in celebration as fireworks went off overhead. As he rounded third, Aaron saw his teammates and parents waiting for him at home plate. Looking back on his struggle to break the record, Aaron said, "Thank God it's over."

That was Aaron's final season for the Braves. Frustrated by the lack of support from local fans for the team and for himself, he returned to Milwaukee, where he played for two seasons with the Brewers. When he retired after the 1976 season, his career statistics included records for 755 home runs; 2,297 RBIs; 6,856 total bases; and 1,477 extra base hits.

 

PingSpike

Lifer
Feb 25, 2004
21,765
615
126
Originally posted by: J Heartless Slick

I agree with Bonds. Congress has much more important subjects to spending their time on. But then I am sure it is easier for them to hassle some baseball players compared to balancing the budget, dealing with health care, or finding out how the faith-based money is being spent.

Thats precisely the reason they're doing it. Because they're cowards. They just need another "safe" target to attack, that way they appear to be doing something without having to risk anything.

THATS what pisses me off so much about this. Of course steroids are a problem in MLB, and of course players are using them...but aside from the fact it isn't even the federal governments job to put its sticky fingers all over this, its not even a remotely pressing issue right now!
 
Nov 3, 2004
10,491
22
81
congress should spend its time/money on useful things... like I don't know... doing a better job for providing aid?
 

SP33Demon

Lifer
Jun 22, 2001
27,928
143
106
Originally posted by: PingSpike
Originally posted by: J Heartless Slick

I agree with Bonds. Congress has much more important subjects to spending their time on. But then I am sure it is easier for them to hassle some baseball players compared to balancing the budget, dealing with health care, or finding out how the faith-based money is being spent.

Thats precisely the reason they're doing it. Because they're cowards. They just need another "safe" target to attack, that way they appear to be doing something without having to risk anything.

THATS what pisses me off so much about this. Of course steroids are a problem in MLB, and of course players are using them...but aside from the fact it isn't even the federal governments job to put its sticky fingers all over this, its not even a remotely pressing issue right now!
It comes down to the fact that many politicians are baseball fans. It holds sentimental value for them. And there are enough of them that give a sht to make a difference, so they united and took action. What you or I think they should be doing isn't going to change a thing, don't vote for them next time. It's the same thing as whether you think our dollars in Iraq were/are wasted, everyone has an opinion about it but you and I can't do a thing to change it until it's time to vote.

 

Vic

Elite Member
Jun 12, 2001
50,422
14,337
136
Originally posted by: RabidMongoose
Originally posted by: edro13
I completely agree with him. Why should CONGRESS care about baseball? MLB should care, not the U.S. Government.
Because major league baseball is essentially a government protected monopoly.
MLB is not "essentially" a government-protected monopoly, it IS a government-protected monopoly. The 1922 Federal Baseball Club v. National League Supreme Court ruling established that (what is today) the MLB was the "national pastime" and was exempt from the Sherman Anti-Trust Act (which prohibits monopolies). As the MLB acts as the government-protected monopoly custodian of the national pastime, Congress does have the right to investigate MLB should it believe that MLB is acting improperly in its stewardship of the national pastime. Don't blame Congress, MLB wanted it this way back in the '20s to protect themselves from scandal, competition, and its anti-competitive practices.
 

SP33Demon

Lifer
Jun 22, 2001
27,928
143
106
Originally posted by: Vic
Originally posted by: RabidMongoose
Originally posted by: edro13
I completely agree with him. Why should CONGRESS care about baseball? MLB should care, not the U.S. Government.
Because major league baseball is essentially a government protected monopoly.
MLB is not "essentially" a government-protected monopoly, it IS a government-protected monopoly. The 1922 Federal Baseball Club v. National League Supreme Court ruling established that (what is today) the MLB was the "national pastime" and was exempt from the Sherman Anti-Trust Act (which prohibits monopolies). As the MLB acts as the government-protected monopoly custodian of the national pastime, Congress does have the right to investigate MLB should it believe that MLB is acting improperly in its stewardship of the national pastime. Don't blame Congress, MLB wanted it this way back in the '20s to protect themselves from scandal, competition, and its anti-competitive practices.
Cool stuff Vic, never knew the history as to why it's a gov protected monopoly. ;)

 

mwtgg

Lifer
Dec 6, 2001
10,491
0
0
Originally posted by: Vic
Originally posted by: RabidMongoose
Originally posted by: edro13
I completely agree with him. Why should CONGRESS care about baseball? MLB should care, not the U.S. Government.
Because major league baseball is essentially a government protected monopoly.
MLB is not "essentially" a government-protected monopoly, it IS a government-protected monopoly. The 1922 Federal Baseball Club v. National League Supreme Court ruling established that (what is today) the MLB was the "national pastime" and was exempt from the Sherman Anti-Trust Act (which prohibits monopolies). As the MLB acts as the government-protected monopoly custodian of the national pastime, Congress does have the right to investigate MLB should it believe that MLB is acting improperly in its stewardship of the national pastime. Don't blame Congress, MLB wanted it this way back in the '20s to protect themselves from scandal, competition, and its anti-competitive practices.

WINNER!
 

DrPizza

Administrator Elite Member Goat Whisperer
Mar 5, 2001
49,601
167
111
www.slatebrookfarm.com
Originally posted by: IAteYourMother
congress should spend its time/money on useful things... like I don't know... doing a better job for providing aid?

C'mon. Give congress a chance. Give them something easy to solve for a change.
 

PingSpike

Lifer
Feb 25, 2004
21,765
615
126
Apparently the government has always been retarded. Shows what I think I know! But I still think they're just going after this because its a politically safe target.