Should Congress Focus on Football Safety and College Bowl Games or Job Creation?
November 3, 2009 - Where exactly is investigation of football player safety listed among Congress's constitutionally enumerated powers? That is a question you might have asked yourself over the past week because last Wednesday, the House Judiciary Committee decided to waste your tax dollars by investigating the subject! This begs a number of questions. Perhaps the most obvious one is what does the Judiciary Committee have to do with the NFL? Just as importantly, in the event I missed the constitutional amendment that placed them in charge of the NFL, shouldn't they really be focused on the 96 open positions for federal judges across the country before they take up another topic? And then of course there is also the question of how this investigation will help those of you who are unemployed find a job?
This story is ridiculous on so many levels that it would be impossible to name them all. But of course, we'll give it that old college try.
The economy is in terrible shape. Unemployment is approaching 10% (NOTE: It actually exceeds 16% if you count unemployment numbers the same way that we did during the Great Depression). In some areas of the country, it is far worse. To prop up the economy Congress has decided to spend money like there is no tomorrow. Nearly $2 Trillion over the past year on stimulus bills and bailouts. And according to an article in the Wall Street Journal this week, the healthcare bill proposed by the House of Representatives will cost no more than another $2 Trillion dollars over the next ten years… "if we're lucky," their words, not mine.
We are fighting wars in two countries right now and our young men and women are dying on the battlefield. Yet word came out today that the White House is not likely to make a decision on deploying more troops to Afghanistan for another two weeks and there is little indication that Congress is going to push hard to get that decision moved up.
Yet with all of these things going on in our country, the topic of head injuries to NFL players is how Congress decided to use its time. Just in case you think any real pearls of wisdom came out of the hearings, you would be wrong. In one instance, testimony was entered in the record which read, "In layman's terms, hitting your head thousands of times appears to create a disease that slowly and quietly causes your brain cells to die." Personally, I didn't need congressional testimony to figure out that hitting your head can lead to an injury.
Don't get me wrong. I have nothing against the NFL. I'm an avid football fan… both college and professional… and I think it is important for players to be as safe as possible. With that said, this subject's importance doesn't even make the top ten list when compared with all of the major issues faced by the United States and its citizens.
Unfortunately, Congress still doesn't see things that way. Since the hearing last Wednesday, another House bill is gaining momentum to scrap the BCS College bowl system for football and replace it with a national championship.
Have members of Congress lost their collective minds? This is not what they are elected to do! People are losing their homes and their jobs. They are spending their life savings just to keep their heads above water. And when their savings are gone, they are more often than not finding themselves out on the street.
Using government resources on issues like football is not just a waste of money, it should be considered criminal in the current environment. If nothing else, it is costing taxpayers' money. Money to keep the Capitol lights on. Money to pay members of Congress and their staffs - not just for the hearings but to take time to prepare for the hearings too. Money to pay for Capitol Hill security. It's as if the Capitol's rotunda has been flipped upside down and turned into a commode, and your taxpayer dollars just being flushed down it.
It is time for Congress to stop this nonsense, and it is time for the American people to vote all of these buffoons out of office.
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