and she said.. "how you interpret the dream is probably more important than the dream itself"

I'm out of touch and, clearly, I must be missing something. Here we are in a heated race for the next presidency, and what is making congress go all a'twitter? Or, more specifically, the House Committee on Oversight and Gov'ment Reform?

Steroid use in professional sports.

Okay, so I'm a little late on the game here. I know it's been a major point of contention for a long time running now but I have to honestly ask: who cares? But before you start crying "me, I care!" I need to clarify my position. I care too, in as much as we would all like to think that sports are fair and there are no spurious advantages. However, I honestly don't want to pay my politicians to sit around debating the issue and slapping people's wrists. Do you?

To state a fact (and I looked it up, albeit on the blacksheep Wikipedia) the Oversight and Government Reform Committee's purview is:

.. jurisdiction to investigate any federal program and any matter with federal policy implications.

Is this some attempt to save face on the longest running war that the U.S. government has participated in? After untold billions in drug war money, are they trying to find one tiny slice of the pie that they can stuff down their gobs, faces slathered with pie juice, so that they can proclaim "Look, we won a battle"? Is it? Because I just don't get it.

I'm obviously not the only one:

The toughness displayed by the representatives on the Government Reform Committee at this silly hearing into an issue that has almost no impact whatsoever on the lives of average Americans contrasted markedly with the way the Senate Armed Services Committee, on the same day, handled its hearing into the CIA's torture policies since 2001.

There CIA director Porter Goss, a former House member himself, was treated with utmost politeness and decorum, and was allowed to fudge answers, or not answer questions at all.

It goes without saying that the MLB has dropped the ball on this one; has erred we could say. So does that mean we should turn to our government to investigate?

Is it the age in which we now live, with live CSPAN coverage, that is driving these sensationalist shenanigans? Certainly, more people's ears will perk up to these issues than, say, non-appropriation municipal affairs of the District of Columbia, and the Postal Service, including post office namings, holidays, and celebrations. But what can you do, right? We need us some fair baseball.

All this to give you this delicious quote from Eric Wilbur's sports blog on Boston.com:

Many had long suspected that [Roger Clemens] had dabbled in some sort of performance-enhancing drugs based on the dramatic upturn in his performance as he grew older and the way he doubled in size over the past decade. That’s what we loved about Clemens, we got older... he stayed the same age.

So, whatever.. getting to the point: now that elected officials are on the scene, this will all get sorted out, right? Well, back that ass up. Eric goes on to tell us:

.. half of the 41 committee members met privately with Clemens last week, [and were] posing for photographs and signing autographs.

Phew, everything is under control. I'm quite relieved. Plus, there has been some admission by MLB players of illicit drug use, so they'll get the wrist-slappy, right? Well, de-ride that donkey for a second..

We don’t exactly hear Miguel Tejada’s name every day and unlike Clemens, he’s still playing. Pettitte is going to pitch this season, and the only nagging he’ll likely hear about the Mitchell Report is about Clemens’ involvement, not his own. Gary Sheffield, Eric Gagne, Brian Roberts, they are all moving on, and hardly anyone is asking them about steroids as spring training approaches.

Hmm. It's kind of like the way my mom handled things when I was growing up. Admit you've done wrong up front and, hey, that's such an accomplishment (well, it was for me when I was 5) that we'll let the punishment slide. Hey, no big deal, back at it next week. Maybe we should call it the House Committee on Oversight and Making Sure Bad People Admit They've Been Bad So We Can Forget About It.