PrintMay 18, 2008
A Specter haunts the NFL
Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA), ranking member of the US Senate Judiciary Committee, recently announced that he wants to have an independent US Senate investigation into how Roger Goodell, NFL Commissioner has handled the New England Patriots videogate/spygate cheating scandal. Nice to see that Sen Specter has enough time on his hands to spread his vanity all over this nothingburger.
Sen. Specter has been unwilling and unable to do the one job President Bush had expected of him when W supported Specter's anxious re-election campaign in 2004 -- successfully steer President Bush's nominees through the Judiciary Committee. Instead he's backstabbed the Bush administration at every turn while betraying former fellow Pennsylvania senator Rick Santorum in his unsuccessful re-election bid.
Having failed at the only job that really matters, Specter can buff up his resume as sports fan deluxe with his Philadelphia base by muscling onto center stage -- especially in the sport of laying the scent of red herrings across the trail of fox hunting dogs, the largely fruitless practice of the anti-hunting animal rights activists of 19th century Britain. To wit Specter's pledge to open an inquiry into the Supreme Court voting records of both Chief Justice John Roberts and Associate Justice Sam Alito claiming that their performance on the High Court so far has defied representations made to Specter during their confirmation hearings. All to divert attention from Specter's complicity in allowing Republican appointees to be hung out to dry before they withdrew their names out of utter exasperation and to avoid further character assassination.
But this extant shredding of taxpayer dollars via a snipe hunt through the NFL headquarters is nothing more than Specter trying to embarrass the NFL in a misguided pay back inspired by a typical quid-pro-quo back rub for one of his largest campaign contributors. I suppose it's only a coincidence that Comcast, headquartered in Philadelphia, has been the leading antagonist in the broadcast rights feud with the NFL.
But in all fairness to Sen. Specter, perhaps we can accept his denial of any motivation connected with one out of thousand of his campaign contributors. The actual root cause of Sen.Specter's mischief making is probably far simpler, adhering to the principle of Occam's Razor. He's just another disgruntled and bitter Philadelphia sports fan fed up with the longest championship draught in sports franchise history of any major American city. Sen. Specter is the perfect yahoo to represent the city suffering the ignominy of being the first professional sports team city in America to lose 10,000 games.
Who other than the fandom in Philadelphia would boo Santa Claus, cheer the Dallas Cowboy's wide receiver Michael Irvin's career ending spinal cord injury and commit such a backlog of lawlessness and rowdyism at Veteran's Stadium to warrant setting up a Municipal Court in the stadium basement on game day. Who but Philly sports fans would charter buses to attend the NFL draft in NY City just to boo the Eagles' selection of quarterback Donovan McNabb -- who finally brought the Eagles to its second Super Bowl appearance in 50 years -- rather than their heartthrob the pot smoking Hamlet wannabe running back Ricky Williams. Who but the Philly faithful would toss handfuls of triple A batteries at baseball outfielder JD Drew because he had the temerity to reject being drafted by the baseball Phillies and play for the St Louis Cardinals instead.
Philly sports fans and Sen. Specter, their unofficial capo-di-capi and regular weekly caller to Philly sports talk radio, reserve their most intense hatred for Boston sports teams. The modern era jealousy started in 1965 when the Celtics John Havlicek stole the ball from the 76ers' Hal Greer in the waning seconds of the 7th game of the Eastern Conference NBA basketball finals. If Sen. Specter had been around then he would have launched a Senate investigation into the sleaze ball tactics of the Celtics' legendary coach Red Auerbach, who would set up the visitors locker room in the Boston Garden so they only had cold water for showers and no heat during the winter. Auerbach rigged dead spots and loose boards in the Garden parkay floor, laid right on top of the permanent ice for the Boston Bruins hockey team and only the Celtics knew how the ball would really bounce.
So it's no surprise that Sen Specter would display both dubious motive and shameless opportunity less than 48 hours before the New England Patriots met their season destiny in the 2008 Super Bowl. Specter has already announced he's running for re-election in 2010. Nothing like getting a jump on more campaign favors and endearing voters. While Specter and his fellow barbarian Philly sports fans are no closer to championship sports, at least with the Patriots' Super Bowl loss they can wash down some schadenfreude stuffed in their Philly cheese-steak sandwiches with another throw-away bottle of long-forgotten Schmidts Tiger Head Ale.
