What's the difference between injecting anabolic steroids and injecting a $1,000,000 worth of illegal campaign funds? Governor Rick Perry will soon find out.

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What, you may wonder, do Governor Rick Perry and Barry Bonds have in common?  We all know that Barry Bonds injected anabolic steroids and that there is plausible evidence for this and that he has been indicted for lying about it and obstructing justice.  We all know that he will probably never play major league baseball again, and we know that the baseball with the asterisk will lie in the Cooperstown museum like a cockroach that died in a display case.  But what of Perry, that Bushite, feckless, executioner, pharmaceutical company sucking, toll-road planning, fence building, Republican governor of the sovereign State of Texas?

Many of you do not know that Perry accepted a million dollars worth of campaign contributions in the last weeks of his recent drive to be elected governor and that these contributions, laundered through the Republican Governor's Committee, were not reported as required by a law, which is at least as important as the major league's prohibition on performance enhancing drugs.

Injecting drugs to enhance one's performance and injecting funds into one's campaign are not trivial matters.  Major league sports are a special case in society—a showcase of talent and drive—where young and old alike can focus their attentions harmlessly but also profitably, for clearly the sports hero is worthy of emulation for his or her dedication to the sport and its rules.

Being Governor of Texas is no trivial matter either, despite what you may think about Texas and her people.  Texans are very much like people elsewhere, except that many of them count back four and five generations to German settlers who came at the behest of empressarios like Stephen F. Austin and thought they were creating a new country similar to the United States, a new country which would be neighbor to America, but also close to the new Mexican nation with its own European forebears.  Texans deserve what the citizens and fans of San Francisco and the world of major league baseball deserve—honest and forthright leaders.  Governor Rick Perry is neither.  He should be indicted for major campaign fraud against the people of Texas, and he should be removed from office forthwith before he can do any more harm to the children of Texas who thought they were supposed to look up to him.

JB

Authors Bio:

James R. Brett, Ph.D. taught Russian History before (and during) a long stint as an academic administrator in faculty research administration. His academic interests are the modern period of Russian History since Peter the Great, Chinese History, the history of science, and the history of ideas, including psychology and consciousness studies. He is retired and living on the Left Coast.