Attention Major League Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig and MLB Players Association executive director Donald Fehr: Rep. Cliff Stearns, a Republican of Florida, is once again watching your industry very closely. Apparently Stearns doesn’t like the fact that MLB employees are not cooperating with a former Senate majority leader, George Mitchell, in his investigation of alleged steroid use among players. Stearns along with Illinois Democrat Bobby Rush sent a letter to Mitchell urging baseball employees to cooperate with the investigation.

“We sincerely hope that all relevant parties will work constructively to facilitate the completion of your investigation and your ongoing efforts to clean up the sport,” Stearns and Rush wrote last week.

Mitchell cannot force anyone to testify as he lacks subpoena power to force owners, players, and team personnel to talk to him. Apparently, Mitchell needs help from his old pals on Capitol Hill to get the information from baseball that he needs for his investigation and report.

“We appreciate your warning to team owners and concur with your recommendation for better cooperation with your independent investigation,” the congressmen continued.

Stearns has been down this road before.

In April 2005, Stearns’s committee had a bill ready to go, the Drug Free Sports Act, which would have required the random testing of every major league athlete at least once a year. Should an athlete have failed a test, that athlete would have gotten a two-year suspension for the first offense, and a lifetime ban for a second offense. Sports organizations that did not comply with the Drug Free Sports Act would face a $5 million fine for an initial offense and a $1 million-a-day fine for noncompliance thereafter.

Stearns’s bill was designed was not only to punish athletes and their employers but also to make an impression on young people who were either thinking about or actually taking federally banned substances. Members of Congress deemed athletes as universal role models, and that sports leagues, by not conducting constant drug testing for banned substances, are setting a bad example.

It was a bad bill and never came out of committee. Congress should not be dictating what workplace rules should be for a private industry nor should they single out only one group of laborers to work under their guidelines of drug testing for illegal substances.

Stearns must have forgotten that possession of anabolic steroids and similar drugs without a physician’s approval was made illegal by Congress in 1990 and that it’s a law-enforcement issue. If the usage of anabolic steroids and other performance-enhancing drugs is so widespread, then it should be given the same priority as cocaine and heroin.

Instead of drug testing, go after the suppliers and users.

The government has one case open in San Francisco involving BALCO and its role in possibly distributing illegal substances to numerous athletes, including players Barry Bonds and Jason Giambi. And the government has gotten Victor Conte, the founder and president of BALCO, in a plea bargain on one count of conspiracy to distribute steroids and a second count of laundering a portion of a check. Conte spent four months in prison and another four months on house arrest.

Conte ended up with this minimal term while Stearns wants not only to go after the athlete (with a long-term or lifetime suspension as punishment) but also his bosses with stiff financial penalties.

The government sent Dr. James Shortt to jail after he pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to distribute anabolic steroids and human growth hormones to a number of Carolina Panthers football players in 2003.

If the possession of anabolic steroids is illegal, why not enforce laws, instead of creating new ones that make private businesses responsible for law enforcement?

Also, why is Congress concentrating solely on professional sports leagues in its quest to educate youngsters about the health risks of using performance-enhancing drugs?

If congressional committees really want to go after steroid use among teenagers, Stearns and his colleagues should broaden their horizons. If they think it’s only athletes who are taking banned substances, they are wrong. American teenagers may be using steroids, ephedra, and other substances not because they want to hit a baseball farther, run a 100-yard dash in record time, or block better on the gridiron, but because they want to look good.

Teenagers have been bombarded with ads telling them to look good to attract members of the opposite sex. Just look at beer commercials, car commercials, magazines, movies, and TV shows aimed at young people. The good-looking people with the good bodies get the good-looking girls or guys.

Committees should be bringing in muscle, fitness, and other magazine editors along with advertising, TV, and movie executives and various image-makers to explain the messages they send to young people.

They should ask why young girls are taking steroids to control their weight. Some government and university studies contend that about 5% of high school girls and 7% of middle school girls admit trying anabolic steroids at least once, and usage has been rising steadily since 1991.

In June 2005, Stearns answered my criticisms. But the Florida Congressman did not address what impact that non-sports industries where people might be using illegal substances have on the people he wants to protect — children.

Stearns replied “steroids are the tools of the cheater. Not only do these performance-enhancing drugs undermine the legitimacy and integrity of all sports, they are illegal. Their use is a misdemeanor punishable with up to one year in jail. Distribution of steroids is a felony punishable by up to five years.

“Our elite athletes are role models for America’s youth, and these children see and hear what their heroes do. While some adults look the other way at obvious steroid use in professional sports, young athletes see steroids as a shortcut to improving their game.”

It is unclear what Rush and Stearns can do other than use their congressional positions as a bully pulpit to pressure people to cooperate with Mitchell. The difficulty they face is simple. No one in authority in terms of spending money on sports really cares about athletes using banned and illegal substances.

Since the BALCO story broke, politicians in New York, Minnesota, and Washington, D.C. have provided public funding either for building new baseball stadiums or for the industry’s infrastructure. MLB has signed huge TV deals with FOX and Time Warner’s Turner network along with Disney’s ESPN in the past year, and no one from the TV industry seems to care about putting money into the industry that Stearns thinks might be tainted. Corporations continue to buy luxury boxes and club seats; advertisers have not left baseball or football.

There is another problem with the Mitchell investigation that no one has addressed. What if Mitchell uncovers evidence of steroids and other banned substance usage? What kind of penalties can the industry impose on retired players, former team officials, and employees? What happens if people demand refunds for buying tickets to what they thought was a bona fide competition once they find out that the games featured cheaters? Other than a scholarly and possible legal report, just what is Mitchell’s investigation going to prove? Major League Baseball lacked integrity six years ago, nine years ago, 15 years ago?

There is a clear solution to the banned substance problem though. Arrest users at every level. That will grab people’s attention far more than any Drug Free Sports Act solely aimed at the 4,000 elite athletes playing sports in America.