Republicans, Sports, and Free Markets

Daniel Koffler | June 29, 2005

Having conclusively dealt with all serious threats to national security, Republicans on the Hill are confronting a dire threat to the security of the Nationals:

Three months into their inaugural season, the Washington Nationals are in first place. Attendance is strong, hopes are high, and the team is reportedly turning a tidy profit.

But to some Capitol Hill Republicans there is a dark cloud on the Nats' horizon: the potential that their newly adopted home team could be purchased by billionaire financier George Soros.

Cue sinister organ music. Actually, Soros is only part of a consortium bidding for the Nationals, but any stake he might have in the team is too much for Rep. Tom Davis (R-VA):

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.

Presumably Davis is threatening to revoke MLB's exemptions. One of his colleagues went a step further:

Rep. John Sweeney (R-N.Y.)...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."

Hmm. This suggests a solution to the scourge of public financing of stadiums: Persuade Soros to buy shares in all the leagues, and wait for the GOP to take a righteously indignant stand against welfare for professional sports.

Story here; link via Josh Marshall. In May, Matt Welch threw a penalty flag at the case for taxpayer funding of stadiums and teams.

Comments

|6.29.05 @ 3:34PM|#

damn nationals.

|6.29.05 @ 3:39PM|#

FYI, in addition to nobody saying a word when the President's son bought the Texas Rangers, nobody said a word when Rupert Murdoch bought the Dodgers.

Instruments of the state used to advance the party.

|6.29.05 @ 3:43PM|#

Tom Davis is a god damn maniac. He is a disgrace to the state of Virginia, and the Congress. How he could justify a steroids hearing under the guise of "government reform" boggles the mind, except that after a while, you just get used to this sort of shit and it stops boggling your mind and starts filling you with rage instead. If there ever IS an armed rebellion against the Federal government someday, I do hope the bastards at LEAST have the decency not to act surprised.

In my opinion Davis here is directly threatening MLB with a repeal of the antitrust exemption if they should allow a particular person to own a stake in a particular team! Outrageous! He is ACTUALLY THREATENING RETALIATORY LEGISLATION if unless a POLITICALLY PREFERRED BUYER buys that team. He is (a) abusing his power as a member of congress, while (b) interfering with both the private right of contract and Soros' freedom to associate.

Can you imagine a politician threatening to rezone a commercial area if the financial backer of his political opponent tries to buy a grocery store there? Can you imagine what kind of country we'd live in if politicians who do things like that are allowed to get away with it?

Somebody needs to get to work on removing that motherfucker from office right now. Tom Davis is a clear and present danger to anyone he could even indirectly have influence over. He ought to be locked up.

|6.29.05 @ 3:50PM|#

I think any millionaire who loses his corporate welfare due to politics should have the right to sue!

We live in America where the peons have a God given right to have their money redistributed to billionaires! We cannot allow politics to get in the way!

|6.29.05 @ 3:58PM|#

Ammonium, Davis was talking about antitrust for the whole league; Sweeney was talking about something totally different -- public funding for a stadium.

Davis should be strung up by his balls for threatening legislation to "hurt" a league because he doesn't like somebody who might join it.

Sweeney, meanwhile, is only half-right; the GOP's attitude (and indeed, the attitude of every member of government) SHOULD BE "let WHOEVER buys the Nats pay for their own stadium."

|6.29.05 @ 4:01PM|#

independent worm,
"If there ever IS an armed rebellion against the Federal government someday, I do hope the bastards at LEAST have the decency not to act surprised."

Good line. Mind if I steal it?

|6.29.05 @ 4:02PM|#

Correct me if I'm wrong, but aren't many of the MLB owners members of GWB's Pioneers or Rangers? I don't remember this type of backlash when GWB himself was a MLB owner.

|6.29.05 @ 4:06PM|#

FYI, in addition to nobody saying a word when the President's son bought the Texas Rangers, nobody said a word when Rupert Murdoch bought the Dodgers.

<sarcasm cause="Sigh. Partisans.">
Wow. Man, no one said anything about either event until you just mentioned them. Especially not libertarians.
</sarcasm>

|6.29.05 @ 4:08PM|#

sigh..

Wake me up when it's time to watch the televised revolution.

sam|6.29.05 @ 4:10PM|#

Can you imagine a politician threatening to rezone a commercial area if the financial backer of his political opponent tries to buy a grocery store there? Can you imagine what kind of country we'd live in if politicians who do things like that are allowed to get away with it?

can you imagine a politician bulldozing property "belonging" to his political opponents and then giving the land to one of his backers? cause i can, although i may not have to imagine much longer...


(kelo really bothers me)



-sam

drf|6.29.05 @ 4:14PM|#

Indie Worm:

good call about the steroids testing and the congress. Don't you think it strange that all of a sudden Davis "hates" baseball when he lead the consortium (or at least was a member) to try to get beisbol to NoVa?

Let's see if anybody is thinking this davis twaddlenock is a swell guy.


cheers,
drf

|6.29.05 @ 4:15PM|#

OK Eric, for "said anything," substitute "threatened coercive government actions to prevent the sale, from a position of great power, if the sale went through."

|6.29.05 @ 4:16PM|#

Or even better, substitute something grammatically correct that expresses the same idea.

|6.29.05 @ 4:21PM|#

FYI, in addition to nobody saying a word when the President's son bought the Texas Rangers, nobody said a word when Rupert Murdoch bought the Dodgers.

Instruments of the state used to advance the party.

And lets not forget the time when Congress enacted of the War Powers Act when Ted Turner bought the Hawks and Braves.

Or the time they set up those internment camps for aging hipsters when Paul Allen bought the TrailBlazers and Seahawks.

|6.29.05 @ 4:21PM|#

Joe-
I actually remember some minor concern by the ESPN baseball Mandarins when Newscorp bought the Dodgers.

Sadly, Davis is in the district next to mine so I can't vote against him.

This is a tough one for me. I dislike Soros, but think he has a right to buy (in this case a minority share) of a team. I dislike baseball for having an anti-trust exemption. I dislike Tom Davis for grand-standing and dislike Sweeney for using the threat of government action for partisan purposes. To take away something I dislike.

|6.29.05 @ 4:27PM|#

Maybe Moamar Ghadaffi's son will make a counter-offer for the Nats and create bipartisan support for these measures.

...and nobody said anything when Peter Angelos acquired the Baltimore Orioles. (or did they?)

|6.29.05 @ 4:27PM|#

I don't know what I hate more, stadium subsidies or asshole republicans threatening to revoke them for purely partisan reasons.

|6.29.05 @ 4:28PM|#

Politics in this country has become very similar to those in a third world kleptocracy.

|6.29.05 @ 4:29PM|#

OK Eric, for "said anything," substitute "threatened coercive government action

No Democrat in office threatened or attempted intrusive intervention those times? Ah, well. Every party has off days.

|6.29.05 @ 4:30PM|#

See, Herman, I'm totally cool with the ESPN guys getting their panties in a bunch.

I just don't like high officials threatening to use their power like that.

|6.29.05 @ 4:32PM|#

"No Democrat in office threatened or attempted intrusive intervention those times?"

Not that I recall having ever seen any evidence of. For. Dammit, I know this sentence ends somewhere.

Not that I recall. Stop. I await the evidence behind your both-house-poxing.

|6.29.05 @ 4:38PM|#

drf-
I'm sure the roid hearings were in large part because Davis was peeved Northern Virginia didn't get the baseball team, but he wasn't a prominent backer of the cause. None of the recently proposed stadium sites were in his district.

A lot of the grassroots support for Baseball in Northern Virginia petered out in the late 90s. By the time the Expos were being offered up for municipal extortion, it was down to hardcore seamheads, a handful of developers and county level politicos.

|6.29.05 @ 4:43PM|#

Dammit, I know this sentence ends somewhere....Not that I recall. Stop.

*heheh*

I await the evidence behind your both-house-poxing.

Oh, I don't know that you're wrong and see no reason to assume so - I'm just mildly surprised. It's not utterly stunning to me that Republican or Democratic office-holders occasionally decide against, aren't able to, or don't get around to being obnoxious at every single apparent opportunity. As I said, everyone has an off day. :)

If you mean to ask why don't I share your oft-repeated conviction that the Democratic Party is less evil in practice and in power than the Republican Party, well... You're welcome to try to round up the evidence for that mysterious belief.

|6.29.05 @ 4:46PM|#

FYI, in addition to nobody saying a word when the President's son bought the Texas Rangers
Comment by: joe at June 29, 2005 03:39 PM



I await the evidence behind your both-house-poxing
Comment by: joe at June 29, 2005 04:32 PM


You do realize it was the Democrats that passed the ED resolution in Texas that resulted in the GWB's involvement in the Rangers/property deal and the profit off of it?

More business as usual from those in power - no matter if you're Rep or Dem, they're both in on the corruption. I think the main reason the Dems are so busy crying now is because the Reps are leaving them out of the big money making deals - especially now that lobbyists only needs to bribe Reps to get their way instead of having to give the Dems a cut.

|6.29.05 @ 4:47PM|#

Herman,
I actually remember some minor concern by the ESPN baseball Mandarins when Newscorp bought the Dodgers.
As a Dodgers fan, I too was upset when Fox bought the team. Turned out ESPN and I were correct in being concerned about Fox buying the team. They made the worst personnel moves and had bad management the entire time. Of course, ESPN didn't think baseball should lose its anti-trust exemption over it.

|6.29.05 @ 4:49PM|#

You do realize it was the Democrats that passed the ED resolution in Texas that resulted in the GWB's involvement in the Rangers/property deal and the profit off of it?

I actually didn't, and I live in Texas, but I was even less interested in partisan score-keeping at the time than I am, now.

|6.29.05 @ 4:53PM|#

I just don't like high officials threatening to use their power like that.

But at least, you managed to say something with which you'll get little argument, here!

|6.29.05 @ 5:28PM|#

So much to bitch about:

Baseball doesn't need welfare or special protection.

The protection they are being granted should be granted to everyone. We have with our feet the only monopoly protection we need.

How unbelievably petty for congress critters to gripe about a political opponent who is a bagillionaire buying a business and running it how they choose. How disgusting that legislative action is threatened. You'd think this was something important like an Aussie conservative bagillionaire owning a media outlet.

I hate them all.

|6.29.05 @ 5:42PM|#

ESPN is a direct competitor of Fox, so some of that might've bled through in their trepidation over Murdoch.

|6.29.05 @ 6:45PM|#

ESPN is a direct competitor of Fox, so some of that might've bled through in their trepidation over Murdoch.

Which is funny because ESPN's parent company already owned (or at least partially owned at that point) and competed with (in terms of fan support) the Dodger's LA neighbor: the LA... er... Anaheim... er... California Angles.

Pots and kettles.

Andrew Ian Dodge|6.29.05 @ 7:01PM|#

Subsidies for sports are wrong plain & clear. It is pathetic that its takes Soros to finally convince goverment to stop it but stopping it is a good thing all around.

|6.29.05 @ 8:08PM|#

Depends on the state, of course. In Florida the state Republicans have been consistently blocking attempts by the Marlins to get a taxpayer-funded stadium.

In North Carolina the Republicans consistently oppose special tax breaks to lure individual businesses, and opposed proposed use of taxpayer money to try to bring a baseball team. This was easier for them since the Democrats almost always control the state Legislature.

In both those cases, and elsewhere in the South, the Democrats tend to be conservative Democrats who work hand in glove with industry. This leaves room open for the opposition Republicans to have some quite libertarian ideas on economics-- although they tend to have the same social conservative views as the Democrats. (Or the same fairly socially liberal views in the larger towns.)

|6.29.05 @ 11:04PM|#

Tom Davis is a dangerous stupid fucking douchebag. Can we draft a libertarian-leaning Republican in his district to run against him? Please? Doesn't all of Cato live in Northern Va.? I'll pledge $100 and work my ass off.

|6.30.05 @ 12:07AM|#

Baylen -- I concur. The guy is an out-of-control menace to society. Unfortunately i think his district is limited to Alexandria. I live in NOVA but not there, but i do know some Cato guys who do, though I don't know if other stuff he does they might like though I can't imagine what. Don't know what the Alexandrians see in the guy, he adds nothing of value to their situation. He's just a crass, cynical, granstanding cocksucker trying to make a national name for himself and nothing more than that. Hopefully the folks there will wake up and smell the coffee.

Matt|6.30.05 @ 1:01AM|#

God. This is a real dilemma. On one side, we have Soros and a business venture that, despite being popular and profitable, still comes begging and whining to the government for subsidies. On the other, we have members of the US Congress...'nuff said about that.

Who to root for?

It brings to mind Kissinger's line about being sorry that both sides can't lose.

|6.30.05 @ 1:34AM|#

Matt -- Soros hasn't asked for public funding of a stadium. He doesn't even have ownership of a team yet. This is about the prospective discouragement of private ownership, as threatened by a member of Congress. Privately funded stadiums can and do exist in baseball (the SF Giants have one).

I agree that that public stadium finance is bullshit. But Davis is talking about repealing a federal law about an antitrust exemption (which as far as I know has nothing to do with public stadium finance) for THE ENTIRE LEAGUE, if ONE TEAM is owned by Soros.

Unfortunately, Daniel Koffler did an inelegant job of framing the issues, stating as he did that Rep. Sweeney's threat (to somehow get STATE GOP'ers to go against any theoretical appeal by a Soros-led ownership group of ONE TEAM to win STATE approval of public stadium funding which (a) hasn't happened yet, and (b) Congress has nothing to do with (yet)) was somehow a step FURTHER than what Davis proposed, which was to repeal a FEDERAL LAW that applied to ALL TEAMS, even the non-Soros ones (which would be the other 29 teams or however many there are).

Don't let the inartful presentation fool you. The threat of the antitrust exemption repeal is FAR more significant than the attentuated threat that somehow Sweeney would influence the DC City Council to not publicly fund a stadium. Soros could pay for his own damn stadium (and in my opinion he should, if he buys the team).

The only thing this is REALLY about is a member of Congress (Tom Davis, whose tax-dollar wasting bullshit we've seen enough of already) threatening to change federal law because he doesn't like the political viewpoints expressed by ONE potential owner out of the entire Major League Baseball ownership group.

|6.30.05 @ 8:26AM|#

"especially now that lobbyists only needs to bribe Reps to get their way instead of having to give the Dems a cut."

That just makes my heart smile.

|6.30.05 @ 10:22AM|#

I'm amazed that noone has used the term "cognitive dissonance" in this thread yet. This kind of opportunity doesn't occur every day.

Oh, and I am in Alexandria. This city runs on tax dollars and association money. The normal free-market rules simply don't apply here. I'm sad to say that I really don't think that a Libertarian would get much play. Which is not to say, as others have pointed out, that there aren't quite a few around. I seem to remember that Nick did an article recently asking why so many libertarians live in particularly unlibertarian places. Perhaps the cornucopia of nany state outrages keeps us amused.

|6.30.05 @ 11:00AM|#

Tony Kornheiser (!) just read a listener email on his radio show that suggested the need for a libertarian to run against Davis. Serendipity or momentum?

|6.30.05 @ 12:25PM|#

worm:

I think that Davis's district is more in Fairfax County than in the City of Alexandria--lots of highly affluent suburbanites who suck off of the government tit as lobbyists, upper-level bureaucrats, and big-firm insider lawyers. He's the perfect representative for them. And since that's the exact demographic the Nationals are getting, he's probably shrewd to get involved. I don't think a libertarian would do well in that district.

The City of Alexandria is mostly represented by Jim Moran, but that's a whole 'nuther story.