Why Spygate is Important

Washington Post political reporter Paul Kane hosted an interactive chat with readers today. While the thrust of the questions centered on the demise of the Republican party, several questions came up about Spygate given Kane's encouragement of Arlen Specter's role in the evolving scandal.

Kane eloquently articulated why the scandal, cover up and Specter's intervention are so important and worthy of congressional attention.

Should probably ask Wilbon: But you said: "Compel the NFL to conduct at least a semi-legitimate investigation into the New England Patriots cheating scheme that helped them produce three Super Bowls." Seriously, you think that's a significant part of why they won three Super Bowls? And that they are the only team spying on signals from other teams? I think the NFL is hoping this goes away so it doesn't blow the cover off a systemic issue that could smear the whole league, not just the Patriots.

Paul Kane: Arlen Specter is a hero to all NFL fans who want answers to this scandal. I'm speaking here solely as a fan of the single most important sports and cultural league in America. Why do 100 million people watch the Super Bowl? Because we love the National Football League more than any other sports, cultural or societal organization in America.

As of now, there has not been a single scintilla of evidence produced that any other team participated in any form of cheating in the manner of the Patriots. There have been whispers other teams did it, but not a shred of evidence put forward. Tonight, on HBO, a former Patriots worker will explain the amazingly complex organization wide effort to steal opposing team's signals -- using multiple cameramen, then folks in an editing room who spliced the film together, then pulling in backup players to study the film along with assistant coaches, then positioning those backup players right next to the assistant coaches so, once they stole the signals during games, the backup players could immediately tell the offensive coordinator, who would then radio into the Patriots quarterback what play the defense was going to run against them.

So, my question to you is, do you think this didn't help the Patriots? Come on, buddy. You think they went to all this trouble -- probably employing a dozen or more people in this scheme -- they went to all this trouble and it didn't give them a "competitive advantage"?

Go Arlen.


Indianapolis: Do you truly believe that, given the shape this country is in, what we need is a congressional investigation of the NFL?

Paul Kane: I believe that this country's in bad shape and that it's up to the president and congressional leaders to sit down and work those things out.

But, listen, there are 435 members of the House, 100 senators, and there are almost 50 different committees combined in the two chambers. Not all of them are supposed to deal with war and energy and home mortgages. If not for the heroic work of Henry Waxman and Tom Davis exposing Major League Baseball's duplicity in the steroids scandal, we'd all still have our heads in the sand applauding Barry Bonds as he strokes his 800th home run.

I'm sure people wondered just what the heck young Bobby Kennedy was doing when, as a Senate counsel, he helped lead an investigation into the mob in the 1950s as really big things were happening around the globe (Soviets marching into Hungary, the beginnings of the space race, the Castro takeover of Cuba). Why would a Senate committee then bothered to explore a little corruption in a few corners of a few cities? Because it was there, it was rotting to its core and someone needed to do something.

That's what Tom Davis and Henry Waxman did with steroids, and that's what Specter is trying to do with the Patriots.