Our august Senator Arlen Specter has found another pressing cause which he feels he must look into and take it wherever it leads him. I respect Mr. Specter a whole lot but sometimes his pursuits leave a lot to be desired.
Over the last couple of days, Senator Specter has found it necessary to pursue Spygate to see if a smoking gun exists in this episode and if the NFL handled the New England Patriots with kid gloves. For those of you who don’t read the sports pages nor tune into the sports channels, a little backgroung is required here.
The New England Patriots admitted videotaping a game they were playing against the New York Jets earlier this year. This was after they had been exposed by the Jets front office. NFL rules do not allow teams to videotape opponents but enforcement of this can be challenging. Anyway, when confronted with the cache of evidence against their infraction, New England fessed up. The NFL Commisioner’s office appropritely hit the team’s head coach with fines and the organization with loss of draft picks.
As the Giants proved in last night’s game, whatever happened in Spygate doesn’t really matter. New England can be beaten and they were by a huge underdog. Mind you, I am totally against cheating and the Pats have been justifiably punished. End of story. Maybe, and just maybe there is more than meets the eye here. This is a matter for the NFL to deal with and that has been done. I would have loved to see the fines levied be a lot larger and the loss of draft choices severe enough to make others think twice about doing something similar. I am willing to live with how the matter was resolved.
Not Mr. Specter. Obviously, the tough economic times that most Americans are going through is not bad enough to make him rally his senate colleagues to get some action going and help right the ship quickly.
I believe we elect our representatives to do the “peoples business” in Washington. CEOs are hired to mind a company’s business. When they fail to do that, the shareholders will hold them accountable. Mr. Roger Goodell is the CEO of the National Football League and is arguably the most powerful man in sports. If he fails to mind the NFL’s business, his shareholders, yes, that is us the football fans will let him know by finding better things to do with our time than watching NFL games.
Mr Specter, please find something meaningful to do with your time. There are too many important national issues needing congressional attention for you to undertake the task of being the CEO of the NFL.
It is not about you. It is not about how frequently your name appears in the news. It is about doing the peoples’ business as the President so aptly implored Congress to do in his State of the Union address.
