Connecticut Local Politics

Couldn’t resist the title huh?

Here is ESPN Radio’s Colin Cowherd yesterday “covering” the House’s investigation into steroids in Major League Baseball. First Colin makes fun of Congress, explicitly mentioning Connecticut’s own Chris Shays (R-CT04), then gives Shays’ “interrogation” of George Mitchell the one thing it was missing – clown music. The clip starts at about 1:22. Don’t miss the end, where Shays’ questions actually sap Colin’s will to live…

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Here is a little more from the steroid hearings:

Kevin Hench on Fox Sports labeling “The people of Connecticut’s 4th District” as losers in the first day of the hearings:

Rep. Christopher Shays (R-CT) delivered an embarrassing laundry list of mistakes and mispronunciations that pretty much removed all doubt as to whether Shays actually cares at all about baseball. The highlights: referring to the Black Sox as the “Blackhawks;” pronouncing Palmeiro “Palmeiree” not once but twice; referring to Mr. Palmeiree’s “three hundredth” hit; and mispronouncing Bud Selig’s name.

ESPN Baseball writer Jayson Stark liveblogging the hearings:

Rep. Christopher Shays has been MLB’s No. 1 basher on this committee for years, and he couldn’t wait to pound away again.
…
But Shays then made it obvious how little he actually follows baseball.

You might not have known, for instance, that that Black Sox reference involved the “1919 Chicago Black Hawks.”
…
Seems to me that if anyone in Congress is going to lecture baseball on how it runs its sport, that congressman ought to demonstrate at least some basic familiarity with the sport. Keep that in mind as you listen to Shays wax poetic throughout the day — and afterward.

The Daily News liveblogging the hearings:

“Why should cheating be a part of collective bargaining?” Shays asked. “Tell me why cheating should be a matter for collective bargaining.”

Mitchell responded by agreeing that using performance-enhancing drugs “is cheating and I’ve described it as such … But there is settled law in this country that drug-testing in the workplace is done through collective bargaining.”

Okay, maybe the pronunciation of the names of relevant players, or even the Commissioner(!) of MLB, or whether the Blackhawks or the White Sox threw the 1919 World Series (and which sport each played) was beyond the crack preparation undertaken for this hearing, but settled law about drug testing in the workplace shouldn’t be, right? I mean, Senator Mitchell apparently knew…

And finally, the Greenwich Time catches the Congressman’s response to his baseball pundit-critics:

Shays dismissed pundits’ quips about his baseball knowledge, saying the problem of steroid use by baseball players and children emulating them was not a laughing matter.

“I could care less,” Shays said. “I care about the kids. What we’re talking about players cheating, period, case closed.”

Who knew Helen Lovejoy was representing the Fourth District in Congress?

[I could only find it in Spanish.]