Monday, September 14, 2009

BCS: SHOULD THE US CONGRESS GET INVOLVED IN THE BCS DEBATE?

For at least the second time, the United States (US) Congress meddled in the Bowl Championship Series (BCS). Senator Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) called for an anti-trust hearing. This sparked a sideline debate on whether Congress should take the time and the tax dollars to address this issue. Personally, I don’t have a problem with Congress giving attention to the BCS for two reasons.

  1. Congress is made up of elected officials. They are put there by the people to represent the interests of the people. The US electorate is very interested in college football and the BCS.
  2. A lot of tax payer money is used on college football and the BCS. They deserve to have some of the tax dollars generated by the multi-billion dollar industry used to regulate the sport.

Since Congress is not spending an inordinate amount of time or requesting huge appropriations for BCS issues, we should not fuss about what happened this summer.

6 comments:

  1. I see your point about how tax dollars are already being used to help fund College Football and the BCS, and thus Congress should get to regulate it in some ways, but I don't agree. Both regulating and funding college sports has nothing to do with the "common good" which what the government is supposed to be using it's resources on. I think the government should stop funding the BCS with any tax dollars, and should leave it alone. If "we the people" want to change things about the BCS, then we need to take action to make it change, not Congress.

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  2. Amen, Neal.

    In my view, what Congress should and shouldn't do is enumerated in the Constitution. Regulating college football isn't one of those things. Since most legislation usually ends up being a special-interest giveaway, I have a hard time seeing how America will be better off with Congress dictating how the college football national championship is determined.

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  4. Let me clarify, because I agree with you. To my knowledge, the government does not give money to the BCS. The BCS generates tax dollars, so the governments is getting money from the BCS. I would oppose any government handouts to the BCS. I also agree that the government should limit its influence on the BCS. I did not like the tone that the congressmen took. They were special interest oriented--playoffs. I did not then nor do I want now to see a playoff, but I feel there are great inequalities in the BCS that may not be removed without government intervention. I even emailed all the senators involved in that judicial subcommittee that did the anti-trust hearings telling them not to force one specific outcome, but I think the government has the right to treat the BCS like any other business and rule if they are out of line, but to say a playoff is the only way to solve that is the government overstepping its bounds.

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  5. Who currently controls and makes decisions for BCS?

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  6. Cordelle, welcome to the blog. The decisions in the BCS are made by the Commissioners for the 11 college football conferences, plus a representative for Notre Dame. The conference commissioners get input and direction from the University presidents within their conferences. Some, if not all, BCS decisions require a unanimous decision (that is why the Rose Bowl is still a Pac-10 vs. Big 10 match up, those two conferences won't budge). As for the bowl game match ups, each bowl has its own selection committee and they choose from the eligible teams based on the BCS formula. If you have other BCS questions, you can go to BCSfootball.org

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