Mitchell Report: President Bush Set to Return as MLB Commissioner

Special to The Bleacher Report

Washington, December 23, 2007 – Major League Baseball is reportedly nearing completion of a pact to bring George W. Bush back to the game as its commissioner, beginning on April 1 of next year.

“After the Black Sox scandal in 1919, baseball brought in no-compromise Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis to clean up the game”, a source close to the talks said. “The President knows the game from when he ran the Texas Rangers, and who better to clean up baseball after the steroids scandal?”

Bush was Managing General Partner of the Texas Rangers from 1989 through late 1994, when he became Governor of Texas. According to ESPN, before running for Governor, he apparently expressed interest in the baseball commissioner’s job that had been recently vacated by Fay Vincent.

“Baseball is vital to the American way of life,” Bush is reported to have told advisors. “Now that we’ve virtually won the war in Iraq, it’s time to clean up the game and put the bad guys where even the Supreme Court can’t reach them,” he is supposed to have said.

On December 13^th, former Senator George Mitchell released his report on the use of steroids and growth hormone in baseball. The Mitchell Report recommended a number of provisions for cleaning up the game, as well as clemency for players. His report placed blame for the scandal on the players, their union, as well as the commissioner and owners. Current baseball commissioner Bud Selig has been quoted as saying that he would consider whether to punish players “on a case by case basis”.

That stance has apparently not been well-received by organized groups of Republicans in baseball, who see the world in much more black and white terms. They have apparently been leading the movement to bring Bush back into the game.

Moderate Republicans reportedly support the plan, since they believe it may increase their chances of retaining the White House in November of 2008. And, apparently, a number of baseball Democrats also support the move, since it would take Bush out of the White House once and for all.