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TechnoratiGeorge Mitchell's Drugs of Choice
The Mitchell Report on steroids is shaking the baseball world from cap to cleats. It names 86 players, and calls for a vast reformation of what is being called "the steroid era" in Major League Baseball. The 20-month, $20 million investigation has been accepted as gospel by the hoi polloi. Yet having slogged through the 400-page dirge, it's difficult to not agree with ESPN's Jayson Stark that the report contains "way too many instances of name- dropping ... with a blank check here or an address-book listing there, but no true corroboration anywhere." And yet this hearsay is being accepted as fact because of the reputation of the man behind the report: former Sen. George Mitchell.
As a fawning press corps mentions at every turn, this is an individual beyond reproach: the former Senate majority leader, former federal judge and "the man who brokered the Northern Ireland peace deal." Mitchell played to the hilt the role of "wise man" upon announcing his findings last Thursday, speaking with the gravity of an Anglican minister.
But before we collectively sanctify his findings as holy writ, perhaps we should also consider the man behind it. When not "saving baseball," Mitchell works as a D.C. lobbyist carrying water for Big Tobacco and other corporations that traffic in human misery. By shedding even a modest light on the company he keeps, a serious shadow is cast on not merely the messenger but the deeply flawed message.
Mitchell's sins are as lengthy as they are hidden. First, there is the senator's drug of choice: tobacco, a substance that has tagged more toes than any steroid. In 1997, Maureen Dowd wrote in the New York Times that his law firm Verner, Liipfert, Bernhard, McPherson and Hand "earned more than $10 million in fees in 1997 from the five largest tobacco companies." The work has continued, with big tobacco paying top dollar to make sure they can survive the class-action lawsuit settlements that threaten to bankrupt their industry.
As John Banzhaf, a law professor at George Washington University and executive director of the anti-tobacco group Action on Smoking and Health said to the Boston Globe, "Basically, the tobacco industry hired everybody who had any kind of entree or clout in Washington.... I can't think of any reason George Mitchell would agree to [represent big tobacco], except one obvious one: Someone's offering him a ton of money ... That is the surprising thing: So much of the rest of Mitchell's record is very good, upstanding, praiseworthy, above partisanship, but here it looks like he sold out like everybody else."
Mitchell also has a taste for toxic waste. General Electric hired Mitchell to stop the Environmental Protection Agency from forcing them to clean the spew they've emptied into the Hudson River. Over the course of decades, GE dumped polychlorinated biphenyl, or PCBs into the Hudson with devastating results for the wildlife, environment and people of New York state. The Clinton and Bush administrations both endorsed an EPA plan to make GE pay $450 million in clean-up costs. GE's response has been to spend millions on gold-plated lobbyists like Mitchell to hold them off.
But Mitchell does more than service tobacco and toxic waste barons. He has also worked for the chocolate industry. It sounds innocent enough. But Mitchell was hired to stop Congress from labeling candy that may have been picked by child or slave labor. The reports of abuse, confirmed by the Ivory Coast government, were so harrowing that Congress appeared ready to act. The Chocolate Manufacturers of America saw a PR nightmare and called Mitchell. As Susan Smith of the CMA said, "What better person to give us advice on how to bring different parties together and deal with cross-country issues and global issues?"
John Aloysius Farrell, in an analysis of Mitchell's chocolate child slave-labor advocacy, wrote in the Globe, "What the manufacturers paid for was the chance to wrap themselves and their deal in the aura of Mitchell's reputation.... Like the new owners of the Boston Red Sox (accused of being rapacious out-of-towners), or the embattled directors of the American Red Cross (said to have diverted funds for Sept. 11 victims to pad its bureaucracy), or the scandal-dogged members of the International Olympic Committee (found to be accepting favors from solicitous host cities), or Bill Clinton's legal defense team (well, you know), the chocolate industry paid a share of public penance by signing up Mitchell and leasing his rectitude."
We can now add to that list "Major League Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig." Mitchell has produced a report that names 86 players, but does not call one owner or member of upper management to task. In a report that excoriates a "steroid era" in the sport, there is no recommendation for Selig to resign. This shouldn't surprise because Mitchell is part of ownership, sitting on the board of the Boston Red Sox. The report seems more aimed to head off congressional action than deal with how and why steroids make their way into Major League muscles. The problem with the Mitchell Report - the reason why it is so deeply flawed - is the man himself. In the end, the flaws of the messenger have terribly disfigured to the message.
Dave Zirin is the author of the new book "Welcome to the Terrordome:" with an intro by Chuck D (Haymarket). You can receive his column Edge of Sports, every week by going here. Contact him at edgeofsports@gmail.com
11 Comments so far
Show AllOne thing that has bothered me is placing Human Growth Hormone in the same category as anabolic steroids.
HGH is in everyones body and is not dangerous if used moderately by fully grown adults. It is very helpful to injured and aging individuals.
Also anabolic steroids are not anywhere near as dangerous as they have been portrayed in the media. In the early days of athletes using steroids, they would use massive and often impure doses. today the doses are much less .
All Drug laws should be repealed.
How can you be free if you cannot put in and take out of your body what you want.
The problem of fairness in sports is another matter.
I'm not much of a sports fan, so the steroid scandals don't particularly interest me.
But I can't pass up a chance to applaud Zirin's assessment of George Mitchell. I always wonder how certain people acquire the classification, or reputation, for being Serious Sober Statesmen who are supposedly paragons of intellect, probity, and virtue. It's not a partisan thing-- James A. Baker, the Bush Crime Family consigliari, is in this group.
So is John Danforth, that pillar of rectitude who sponsored the dreadful Clarence Thomas' nomination to the Supreme Court.
Zirin's article supports my abiding cynical belief that these Sterling Reputations are just another form of marketing, or "branding" as it's now called. Somehow these heroes fool enough people enough of the time-- especially the corporate media infotainwhores, who are programmed to gush enthusiastically over the rich & powerful-- to make the Senior Tour as long as they can stand before the cameras and act impressive.
Handsome is as handsome does, I say.
steroids are not discussed in football, I notice during games, players pull their pants down a little and get a shot- nobody is saying anything about that- just baseball. This seems odd, any input on that?
Ignore public advertising of prescription drugs. Ignore drug laws out of touch with reality vis-avis harm to society. Ignore a drug war that has been a form of social control rather than preventing harm. Ignore the fact that George Mitchell Key Starr's firm made boucou bucks from Big Tobacco.
Ignore that the American food industry produces the least wholesome food of any industrialized country, contributing to obesity, diabetes, cancer, coronary and other major health problems.
The use of steroids in sports is part and parcel of America. I don't like it, but the wormy apple doesn't fall far from the tree.
I thought cheating and taking drugs WAS the US National Pastime?
I love to read Dave Zirin's articles and listen to his commentaries on Pacifica/KPFK from time to time. He is to sports what Howard Zinn is to history. He opens the doors to an examination of class and race and power in sports and identifies the microcosm of sports to the macrocosm of society. What happens in sports and what is revealed is very relevant to what happens in the larger society of the U.S. Congratulations, Dave. I wish you the best and "hope" your articles find the light of the larger community of journalism. The MSM, as usual, misses the rest of the story. I am waiting to hear Roger Clemmons' full disclosure of his "participation" in steroid/HGH use. Will he sue and will he be heard?
peace,
st john
I'd like to see mandatory steroid use for all obscenely paid athletes. For the kind of mega loot they make it seems we should have a better show. Well we're on the subject of drugs and money, how's 'bout mandatory psychedelics for the owners and other CEO's. Let's make a deal, let's make this a real "for tommorow you may fly or die." event, covered by a MSM with opium dens in every newsroom tent(Russshhhh Limbaugh would love it), and hey can't stop there; full spectrum drug cocktails as a rite of passage in and out for all Bushco administration asses. Stop the pain, drop out now for every split tongued orator astride the cash cow. Both hands full of dope and money; cool to watch and oh so funny.
Maybe Mitchell should start servicing the steroid manufacturers.
The owners could have saved a lot of money by just reading Canseco's book. He seems to be the only one who told the truth upfront.
I found this article very interesting and enlightening. I also found very interesting the fact that President George W. Bush, in his comments about the Mitchell Report, only mentioned steroids (which he said had "sullied" the game). Why no mention of Human Growth Hormone (HGH)? This is only wild speculation, maybe, but I have to wonder if future historians will be looking at the possible psychological effects of HGH on the presidency of GWB.
Might just be me, but have not the president's head, hands and ears grown while he has been in office? (BTW, I have to wonder if, due to an out-of-balance weight-lifting regimen, GWB can no longer fully straighten his arms.) We do know Texas has been perhaps the leading state when it comes to prescribing HGH.
So, in addition to examining George Mitchell's apparently tainted lobbying record, perhaps someone in the Washington press corps should ask our indignant president if he has ever taken HGH. Just, you know, for the record.
I really have a hard time thinking that this whole steroid thing is just a smokescreen to keep the American people from asking just why their gov't is so completely corrupt and out of balance. It is nothing more than a complete waste of time and money when there are things going on in gov't that will bring the very institution crashing down around us.
Why can't they spend any time looking into why the Vice President is a crook, for instance? Why not look into the wiretapping of American citizens both before and after 9-11? Why not look into the outing of a CIA agent? Why not look into the whole Abramoff situation? Why not look into (Fill in your favorite issue here)? THESE are the things that really matter, not this damned baseball crap. This is a non issue as far as I am concerned, and to concerned Americans everywhere.
The fact that Mitchell is up to his butt in corruption doesn't surprise me at all. In these times of "money equals speech" and "corporations are just people" crap, money is the be all and end all of everything, and that means corruption. I saw this coming when Reagan put us on this "greed is good" attitude, and it's all come true. Funny how a miserable musician could see that, but no one else seems to have been able to.