Bonds, politicians act alike

Mr. Bonds went to Washington – although a few months later than many would have preferred.

When he accompanied the San Francisco Giants to play the Nationals this week, he had a few words for the congressional piranhas feasting on baseball’s steroid problems. Barry Bonds told them the obvious. Focusing on steroids was never more a waste of time than it is now, when the Gulf Coast again is under attack from Mother Nature.

More important matters are vying for Congress’ attention than whether baseball’s juices are synthetically produced.

“Right now, people are losing lives, don’t have homes,” Bonds told reporters. “I think that’s a little more serious. A lot more serious.”

Who else but Bonds would use a hurricane for cover?

The man is a phony, believing that smacking a ball 450 feet gives him latitude to talk smack about his enemies – real or imagined. Bonds still doesn’t understand that he alone created the environment of distrust that engulfs him. Yet he continually manipulates public perception to his advantage, much to the approval of his cadre of sycophants.

Instead of questioning Congress, perhaps Bonds should run for political office. He’s more than qualified to serve, considering his already ample supply of delusion.

Bonds turned on baseball’s congressional persecutors the same as he did on an inside sinker Wednesday against the Nationals. The pitch might have hit him had he not reached to it first, drilling it deep into RFK Stadium’s right field stands – his fourth home run in his last four games. Bonds stands seven homers shy of Babe Ruth’s 714 for No. 2 on baseball’s all-time list, a total he just might surpass before season’s end.

Bonds thinks his blistering return after missing 90 percent of the season from multiple knee surgeries offers him the right to scrutinize the scrutinizer. This sort of sanctimony is more than a little disingenuous, coming from somebody who can freely rant without fearing cross-examination or perjury, unlike those players subpoenaed to testify before a House committee in March.

But Bonds was actually right in calling out Congress.

It’s just too bad the admonition didn’t come from somebody a little more credible.

Washington had no business getting involved in the steroids melodrama. Politicians claimed they were investigating a serious public health issue, but Congress doesn’t empty its bladder unless the political timing is right. Its instincts are geared toward two things – raising money and getting re-elected.

Congress’ hypocrisies have been exposed for all to see, if anyone honestly looks.

This wasn’t crack cocaine going for five bucks a rock. It gave Democrats and Republicans an inroad to an important electorate and a convenient scapegoat that resonates with the middle class – pampered millionaire athletes. The players seemed oblivious to the repercussions of their steroid use.

So where was this congressional inclination to play the role of parent when it came time to protect the innocent from nature’s wrath?

All 535 members of the House and Senate should be summarily bounced from office for moral and ethical bankruptcy. The thousands left stranded on their rooftops in New Orleans were ignored long before the first winds came ashore because you could count their political contributions from the change in your pocket.

That’s the bottom line in Washington.

If anything, Bonds didn’t go far enough in questioning the motives of politicians who make a correlation between steroids in baseball and the rupturing of families.

But with Bonds, more people concentrate on the messenger than they do the message. It’s difficult to like Bonds, and it has little to do with his surliness toward the media. Who cares if he answers reporters’ questions?

He just comes across as a jerk motivated by self-interest.

Sounds like the perfect congressional candidate, doesn’t he?