Next up in Congress: A Britney investigation?

Next up in Congress: A Britney investigation?

Sacramento Bee: It’s far from summertime, but the livin’ seemed to be easy in Congress last week.

The economy is teetering on the verge of recession. Families across the country are losing their homes. The law governing domestic spying is about to expire. The federal deficit is ballooning. The CIA has destroyed tapes of possibly illegal interrogations.

But such trivial matters can wait. Let’s talk about sports!

In the House of Representatives, Rep. Henry Waxman’s Oversight Committee spent four hours on Wednesday probing the pressing matter of whether pitcher Roger Clemens had used steroids. That question apparently is of such moment that it fractured the committee along partisan lines, with Democrats badgering Clemens and Republicans hounding Brian McNamee, his accuser and former trainer.

Calling all Patriots

Over in the Senate, Sen. Arlen Specter, the ranking Republican on the august Judiciary Committee, was outraged at the destruction of videotape evidence — not the tapes of CIA interrogations, but tapes of a New York Jets practice made by the New England Patriots.

A case can be made that steroid use by professional athletes is important enough to warrant a congressional investigation — although it’s hard to believe that it’s more important than the other matters at hand. And in fact by the end of the week, Waxman was calling the hearing a mistake.

But it’s hard to see any legitimate reason why a high-profile senator such as Specter should waste time on the question of one football team taping another’s practices.

Both instances sound like exercises in avoiding real work and tough decisions. On Capitol Hill as in bars across the land, it seems, sports offer an escape from the dull cares of the day.