Honesty?

What to do about those Houston Astros?  Hmmm......  Stealing signs using technology.  There seems to be an uproar which is out of proportion to, well, to everything.  Of course, I may be off base here.  (Pun intended.)  I don't know who first said it, "If you ain't cheatin', you ain't tryin'."  It's been ascribed to baseball and football players, NASCAR drivers, and even a WWF wrestler.

I don't subscribe to this, not in the least.  Cheating is one of the sins on my list of bad character criteria.  But the holier than thou rants from current players, media pundits, and even city councils (LA) ring hollow, very hollow.  Where were and are these players when their teammates use and used PEDs?  Did they speak up?  Did they turn in the offenders?  Should those teams and teammates who won rings forfeit those rings?  I know, I know......  "But that's different."  It's probably not possible to know what those writers who still vote to include the PED users in the Baseball Hall of Fame think of the sign stealing.  Do they condemn one, but overlook the other?

Perhaps different, perhaps not, but isn't any sign stealing dishonest?  After all, it's still called "stealing," right?  (For the record, when I played, I really didn't want anyone trying to steal and relay signs to me while I was hitting.)  So, what if the stealing is low-tech, such as using a telescope?  And don't managers, as soon as a traded players reach the locker rooms, ask what the players' previous teams' signs were?  You bet they do!

So, is it the use of "technology" itself?  Hasn't technology affected all aspects of sports?  Look at managers in the dugouts with their devices at the ready.  All that computer-generated data must provide some advantages.  What about all of the knowledge players now get from studies not at all available decades ago--strength training, diet, etc.?  Of course these are available to all players now, but they weren't then.  Should records set today not really be considered records?  After all, players today have advantages not available to players of the past.

(I'm only partly serious.)

I shook my head at hearing those Hollywood-types involved in the college admissions scandals are facing prison time.  C'mon.  Of course what they did was wrong, dishonest.  The Hollywood-types deserve punishment.  But what they did hardly rates a blip on the Richter Scale of crimes.  Fine them in proportion to their wealth; take good chunks from them.  Make them wear orange while they pick up papers from the freeways every weekend for a year or two.  Prison?  Give me a break.

Roger Stone?  I guess he was sentenced to 40 months in jail.  But weren't the original prosecutor requests for up to 9 years in prison?  Isn't even a sentence of 40 months excessive and inviting a pardon?  Maybe that's what they want.  This is a set-up and a Trump pardon will be met with "Aha!  We told you so!"  But I am not sure I know what they "told" us.  I wonder what those who approve of such sentences for Stone or the Hollywood-types of the admissions scandals think of jailing illegal aliens.

Wasn't one of Stone's offenses/crimes "lying to Congress?"  I don't understand this, not at all.  Why aren't politicians, especially members of Congress and Presidents, ever tried and convicted of lying to us?  I would submit that their lies (And does anyone deny Americans are told such lies quite often?) are far more injurious to us than Stone's lies were to them.  I know, I know......  "But that's different."  But if one is lying to liars, what's the big deal, let alone the crime?

And what about telling lies to get pieces of legislation passed, to prevent the appointment of someone opposed by others,  or to bring charges against a political opponent?  Why aren't those "crimes" prosecuted?  Isn't the integrity of our government and political system more crucial than the integrity of baseball?  I know, I know......