It’s a nice baseball league you have here; it’d be a shame if something happened to it

June 27, 2005

Baseball in Washington seems to be something of a success right now. The Nationals are winning, merchandise is selling, and the stadium is full.

But Republicans are unhappy about the team’s ownership prospects. Since the team moved from Montreal, the Nationals have technically been owned they Major League Baseball until new ownership can be put together. Is the GOP concerned that a new owner might move the team? Or trade away star players? Or raise ticket prices?

No, Republicans are upset that billionaire financier George Soros has joined one of the seven ownership groups bidding on the team. And because Soros has worked to help Dems, the GOP is now threatening Major League Baseball, warning the league to reject Soros’ bid. Or else.

[T]he very prospect that Soros could have a stake in the team is enough to irritate Congressional Republicans.

“I think Major League Baseball understands the stakes,” said Government Reform Chairman Tom Davis (R), the Northern Virginia lawmaker who recently convened high-profile steroid hearings. “I don’t think they want to get involved in a political fight.”

Davis, whose panel also oversees District of Columbia issues, said that if a Soros sale went through, “I don’t think it’s the Nats that get hurt. I think it’s Major League Baseball that gets hurt. They enjoy all sorts of exemptions” from anti-trust laws.

Indeed, Hill Republicans could potentially make life difficult for MLB in a variety of ways. In addition to being exempt from anti-trust rules, baseball is still under scrutiny over the steroid issue. The Nats, meanwhile, hope to have a publicly-funded stadium built soon, though money for that venture is expected to come through the sale of bonds rather than a federal outlay.

Still, Rep. John Sweeney (R-N.Y.), vice chairman of the Appropriations subcommittee that covers the District of Columbia budget, said if Soros buys the team and seeks public funding for the new stadium or anything else, the GOP attitude would be, “Let him pay for it.”

It’s taking the corruption of the K Street Project to a whole new level. Congressional Republicans not only want to wield control over all political jobs in DC; they also want veto power over whether a liberal owns the local baseball team.

The really offensive part is the series of threats of retaliation against the league. The ham-fisted abuse of power here is absurd. Indeed, the differences between congressional Republicans and an organized crime family have practically disappeared. After all, what’s the message of these threats? It’s a nice baseball league you have here; it’d be a shame if something happened to it….

First they came for the lobbyists…

  • Well, this part, I find noncontroversial:

    . . . Rep. John Sweeney (R-N.Y.), vice chairman of the Appropriations subcommittee that covers the District of Columbia budget, said if Soros buys the team and seeks public funding for the new stadium or anything else, the GOP attitude would be, “Let him pay for it.”

    I think that should be true of anyone who buys the team; but, I live in NoVa and not DC, so I didn’t really get a say in the matter. I’m just tired of cities getting rooked by team owners into paying for their stadiums. The rest, though? I like to think that such hubris is punished eventually, but it’s not looking like it lately.

  • This could be the tipping point that causes Republicans to fall from their perch of power. Don’t mess with people’s sports …

  • I’m all for getting rid of baseball’s antitrust exemption, and there are a ton of valid reasons for junking it. But just because you don’t like a prospective owner’s politics–come on now.

    Oh, and does Tom forget that an awful lot of people in his district go to Nats games?

  • I’m with Scott here. Remember the “Stolen Honor” fiasco? Sinclair ran the risk of preempting the World Series–and had that happened, Kerry would be president now.

  • I don’t mind a politician, even a Republican one, using a little muscle to assist the people they represent, even when it comes to sports franchises, which are businesses after all. Our WA Senator, Slade “Fishstick” Gorton, was very helpful to us in keeping he Mariners in Seattle (hey, no cracks about our lousy record … all the way back to 1977).

    But this is bordering on religion, with liberals as sinner-leper-devils. Rove conveyed basically the same thing last week about our reaction to 9/11. It’s really getting very creepy and extremely un-American. Do any GOP operatives identify themselves as American? Aren’t some of them on OUR payroll?

    Sometimes I get the feeling we’re in a weird version of “Invasion fo the Body Snatchers” only this time the metaphorical paranoia isn’t aimed at the Commies but the Rethugs.

  • What’s amazing–or at least, should be–is that the exclusive club comprised by MLB owners is choc-a-bloc with very visibly partisan individuals. Guess which way they tend to lean?

    Cincinnati Reds owner Carl Lindner is a Bush Pioneer.

    Texas Rangers owner Tom Hicks is a Bush Pioneer, and owns Clear Channel. I think he bought the team from the ownership group Bush fronted for.

    George Steinbrenner was suspended by MLB in part for his excessive politicizing in the ’70s, and continues to be a major donor to Republicans.

    There are others as well–I just can’t think of them right now. The only Democratic-leaning ownership that I know of is that of the Boston Red Sox.

    And then of course you’ve got the media-conglomerate owners. Not that they’d ever be subject to pressure from Washington.

    Having killed irony and shame, they’re clearly now targeting hypocrisy.

    That said, I doubt Soros will buy the Nats anyway–

  • Here’s hoping that Soros, knowing he will never get the team, outbids the others by 100 or so million, and makes Selig and company look like the craven bootlickers to power that they are.

  • The Republicans are now eating their young. They’re knocking down their own bastions of conservativism. In the medical marijuana case, they promoted usurping states rights with federal control, with this Soros/ baseball matter they are now against unfettered capitolism and for federal meddling in what should be a private financial transaction. Plus, they waged a war against Iraq to take away some guy’s weapons — where was the NRA when that happened? First they went after Saddam’s weapons, next they’ll come after yours …

  • George Soros continues to be a favorite whipping boy of the right, their fear is probably based more on what the power of Soros’ financial holdings can accomplish more than anything else.

    Maybe some capable people could put together a short summary about Soros and some of his beliefs and a few of the things that he has accomplished, alongside with similar information about a few comparable right-wing funders such as Adolph Coors and Phyllis Schlafly.

    I’ll agree with the Capetbagger’s statement above, we are watching the Mafia Dons become more bold by the day, the news seems to have become the Godfather meets Orwell.

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