MLB also depends on a 100-year-old antitrust exemption that lets it control its teams more than is allowed in pro football, basketball and hockey. The Chronicle reported:

A federal appeals court preserved Major League Baseball’s roadblock to the Oakland A’s proposed move to San Jose on Thursday, setting the stage for the South Bay city’s against-the-odds appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court to roll back the sport’s nearly century-old exemption from antitrust laws.

The high court first ruled in 1922 that laws restricting monopoly enterprises didn’t apply to big-league baseball, and reaffirmed that decision in 1953 and 1972, saying Congress had acquiesced by leaving the laws intact….

In Thursday’s ruling, the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco refused to reinstate a lawsuit by the city of San Jose against the major leagues that challenged the antitrust exemption. A federal judge had dismissed the core of the suit in 2013.

“Like Casey, San Jose has struck out here,” Chief Judge Alex Kozinski said in the 3-0 decision. “Only Congress and the Supreme Court are empowered to question continued vitality (of the 1972 ruling), and with it, the fate of baseball’s singular and historic exemption from the antitrust laws.”

On something like this, the U.S. Supreme court is unlikely to challenge Congress’ powers. After all, potentially Congress could repeal all anti-trust laws, making the whole thing moot.

But there’s more to it than is in the story or decision. A century ago, there were only two nationwide professional sports: baseball and boxing. College football was popular, but was amateurs. The NFL didn’t start until 1920 and the NBA until 1946.

The NHL started in 1917, but I remember as late as the late 1960s it consisted of just the “Original Six” teams, two Canadian: Montreal Canadiens, Toronto Maple Leafs, New York Rangers, Chicago Black Hawks, Boston Bruins and my hometown heroes, Gordie Howe’s Detroit Red Wings.

As to boxing a century ago, it was mostly local, and sporadic. So MLB was the only “national” pastime. Because of its influence, it got Congress to grant it the anti-trust exemption.

Is that the picture today? No, it’s entirely different. We not only have the four large major leagues, all of which compete in the fall during the World Series. And in May-June, MLB competes against the NFL and NBA playoffs.

We also have: movies, TV, the Internet, amusement parks, soccer, Arena Football and numerous other entertainments.

Assuming the Supreme Court even takes this up, that’s how it ought to rule.

If the court wants to go “activist” on major-league sports, it should rule taxpayer ripoff subsidies of stadiums is illegal under the “General Welfare” clause.

By John Seiler

Don’t talk to the police. And in testimony before a grand jury, take the Fifth Amendment against self-incrimination.

That’s the lesson we get from so many unjust prosecutions — really persecutions — of people famous and otherwise, from Martha Stewart to Barry Bonds.

Whether or not Bonds should have used performance-enhancing drugs should be a matter for himself, Major League Baseball and baseball fans — all private entities. It should be none of government’s business.

Yet government has gotten involved. It prosecuted Bonds and convicted him of “obstruction of justice,” supposedly for lying to a grand jury in 2003. The L.A. Times reports:

“Bonds was asked in the grand jury session whether his personal trainer had ever given him a substance that required a syringe to inject. In his response, Bonds rambled on about his childhood and his friendship with the trainer before finally telling the grand jury that he had not received an injectable substance.

“The grand jury eventually indicted Bonds, and he was tried in 2011 on three counts of perjury and one count of obstruction. The trial jury convicted him of obstruction of justice, based on that meandering answer, but it deadlocked on the perjury charges.”

See? He should have taken the Fifth.

The new development:

“SAN FRANCISCO — A federal appeals court wrestled Wednesday with whether to overturn slugger Barry Bonds‘ felony conviction for obstruction of justice.

“The three-judge panel of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals weighed whether Bonds broke the law by being evasive in a 52-word answer he gave a federal grand jury in 2003. The grand jury was investigating illegal distribution of performance-enhancing drugs….

“How the three-judge panel was leaning after Wednesday’s hearing was nearly as difficult to parse as Bonds’ answer. Judge Michael Daly Hawkins appeared troubled by the fact that Bonds eventually answered the grand jury query: ‘Can a grand jury witness obstruct justice by giving a series of evasive answers and then giving a direct answer that is not evasive?’ Hawkins asked.

“Assistant U.S. Atty. Merry Jean Chan, however, said Bond’s rambling response was intended to deceive. She argued that the obstruction conviction was not limited to those 52 words but reflected evasion throughout Bonds’ testimony.”

Actually, the whole prosecution/persecution of Bonds is a massive injustice worthy of the Soviet show trials of the 1930s. And remember that Bonds is not in prison only because he’s wealthy and can afford high-priced attorneys. If something like this happened to you or me, we’d be in some hellhole prison for years by now.

Let’s hope the 9th Circuit dumps this case in the Pacific Ocean. The U.S. “Justice” System has become a mockery of real justice and leaving Bonds alone would be a step toward restoring some sense of fairness.