Government, Steroids & Baseball

In an article entitled Throwing Some Heat the House Government Reform Committee administered an 11-hour scolding to Major League Baseball due to steroid use and policy. Tom Davis, a republican from Virginia chairs the committee and says that the reprimands are far from over. President Bush in his 2004 State of the Union adress, adressed the matter of steroids in professional sports and pleaded for leagues to "get tough" on steroids for the sake of children who see drugs as the only way to compete at elite levels. While performance-enhancing drugs have always been an issue in elite sports, critics say that Major League Baseball has been especially bad about keeping them out. Organizations such as the National Football League and the U.S. Olympic teams have more rigrous tests and harsher sanctions. In Major League Baseball a player's first steriod offense gives them a 10-day suspension and their fourth offense is a year suspension, whereas in the NFL a player's first steroid offense is a quarter season suspension and an olympic athelete's first steroid offense is a two-year suspension. Are Major League Baseball's steroid policy in need of adjustment? Is this something that Major League Baseball could have fixed without government intervention? Is baseball and the new records being broken loosing validity?