We've now established that Rush Limbaugh cannot own an NFL team given his "unacceptable" (read: conservative) political comments. What about sports figures, executives and commentators who offer their left-leaning political thoughts?
Many of us turn to the sports pages before the news section. For just a moment, we can put aside worries about the economy, Iraq, Afghanistan, ObamaCare, the "peril" of "global warming," government bailouts and the feds' borrowing and spending.
 In sports, we want to read or hear about who ran the fastest, scored the most points, defeated the opponent. In sports, there is an oasis -- until anti-GOP, anti-Bush, anti-conservative comments slap us.
National Basketball Association Commissioner David Stern was asked whether Kobe Bryant should continue to play while being prosecuted for rape. Stern responded: "Absolutely. We don't have a Patriot Act in the NBA. That means that you're innocent until proven guilty." What does the Patriot Act --passed to fight terrorism -- have to do with the presumption of innocence or guilt?
New York Times sports writer George Vecsey wrote about how the French handled the allegation that cyclist Lance Armstrong used performance-enhancing drugs. Vecsey wrote, "Personally, I think the French have linked Armstrong with George W. Bush, surely a disservice to the cyclist." Nice.
Stephen A. Smith -- the usually insightful and entertaining ESPN analyst -- in an appearance on Chris Matthews' MSNBC show, said, "(Republican former New York Mayor Rudolph) Giuliani is a dictator." Oh.
New York Times sports writer Harvey Araton, in an article about friction between two U.S. Olympic speedskaters, wrote, "At the root of the conflict is (one skater's) belief that (the other skater) has been attempting to swift boat him." You see, "Swift boating," to many liberals, has now become a synonym for "lying." Never mind that the real "Swift boaters" were ex-military men raising legitimate points about the military record of former Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry.
Bryant Gumbel, on his HBO "Real Sports" program, said that he wouldn't watch the Winter Olympics. Gumbel said, "Try not to laugh when someone says these are the world's greatest athletes, despite a paucity of blacks that makes the Winter Games look like a GOP convention." Gumbel, too, finds soccer boring because he knows "that in soccer they score about as often as Ann Coulter makes sense."
When then-Gov. and GOP vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin attended a hockey game in Philadelphia, The New York Times posted a story from a hockey blogger, who wrote, "Palin ... was greeted by resounding (almost deafening) boos from the Flyers crowd." Really? The Associated Press wrote: "The Alaska governor and self-described 'hockey mom' heard a few boos when she walked onto the ice, but that soon turned to polite applause. ... Palin waved to the crowd and smiled as she dropped the puck to applause and cheers." (Maybe Palin attended two different games.) At least the Times quickly pulled down and replaced its post with a more accurate version.
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