Congressional steroid hearings an abuse of power

We're at war. The nation's credit system and housing markets are headed down the toilet. One quarter of Americans don't have healthcare and about 2 million Americans are locked up behind bars. But Congress and the nation's media today will focus their rapt attention on steroids and baseball, with "Rocket" Roger Clemens scheduled to testify under oath, risking perjury charges if he lies.

Let me repeat that: Clemens will testify under oath to Congress. We couldn't get Condi Rice to testify under oath about 9/11, and myriad Bush administration officials under the GOP Congress were allowed to appear before Congress without risk of perjury charges if they lied. But now Congress will give a baseball pitcher the third degree? I can just see the D.C. pols thinking, "We've got to get that guy's testimony straight. The fate of the republic is at stake."

No wonder Congress polls lower, even, than the President! What a bunch of grandstanding fools.

I'll give Clemens this: If he testifies under oath at risk of perjury that his ex-trainer did not give him steroids, the chief argument of his critics will be taken away. Senator Mitchell and others have said that Brian McNamee's testimony was credible because he risked perjury charges if he lied. But if, after this hearing, Clemens is in the same position and there's no other evidence besides the informant, all you have is a he-said, he-said situation where no one can prove what happened.

Which is why this witch hunt was a bad idea in the first place, and why it was improper for the Justice Department to participate in this PR-driven investigation.

I'd still like to know why the Justice Department and Congress don't pay this much attention to the just as clear evidence of widespread steroid use among law enforcement?

Just to have mentioned it, and this is naught but suspicions from afar, but I couldn't help but suspect foul play when I saw in the New York Times that the pharmacist who allegedly sold steroids to New York City police officers in an ongoing scandal turned up dead. I kid you not, officials ruled it a suicide (because they found a note and a gun) even though police said he died from "gunshot wounds to the chest and head."

Have you ever heard of a suicide with two shots to the chest and the head? If the guy accusing Roger Clemens turned up dead under these circumstances, do you think there'd be a bigger media hoopla than the one-day story in passing that constituted coverage of this pharmacist's death?

I bring up the NYC police case because the Department of Justice (and hence Congress) actually has an historic role investigating police corruption. But under the Bush administration, DOJ has turned a blind eye to police use of steroids and focused on high-profile athletes. That may make bigger headlines, but the approach results in little public safety benefit, especially when you consider that the "path not taken" in the steroids investigation would have been to go after corrupt cops.

Using Congressional investigative authority to create perjury traps for athletes is a joke when the government doesn't have to play by the same rules.

UPDATE: Here's an oddity from the long, grueling hearing: I got to watch the last half of it, and there was a clear pattern among the Congressional questioners. With the exception of drug war zealot Indiana Republican Mark Souder, all the GOP members appeared sympathetic to Clemens, while the Democrats appeared more accusatory of the baseball star. That pattern culminated when, in his closing remarks, Chairman Henry Waxman, a Democrat, actually apologized to Brian McNamee for comments by his colleagues, even though all they'd said was that he is a liar and a drug dealer, both things to which he's already admitted.

I don't understand why Congressional loyalties would fall along partisan lines? What am I missing that explains this pattern?

The rest of the "new" evidence that came to light was hearsay that would never hold up in court, so unlike the ESPN talking heads I don't expect any perjury charges to arise from this episode in either direction.

Waxman told the press the hearing was held because Roger Clemens insisted on it, but that's not how I see it. I think the hearing was held because the Mitchell report irresponsibly named Clemens based on the word of an informant coerced with threats of incarceration. After that horse was out of the barn, all Clemens could do was try and clear his name. At this point, whoever you believe, Roger Clemens has done everything he could possibly do to try to achieve that increasingly unlikely goal.