Wading into an issue

At the intersection of sports and politics is where Larry Hogan and I both resided last night.

I’ll start with Hogan, who reacted to the news about the U.S. Patent Office cancelling some older Redskins trademarks in this manner:

Larry Hogan slammed today’s decision by the US Patent and Trademark Office to cancel several of the Washington Redskins’ trademarks. The GOP gubernatorial frontrunner is a native of Landover in Prince George’s County, home to the 82-year-old National Football League franchise.

According to Hogan, “Whether you’re a fan of the Redskins, the Ravens, or God forbid, the Cowboys; today’s unprecedented action by the US Patent and Trademark Office should offend anyone concerned about Constitutional limits on government power and free speech. This matter should be decided upon by the Redskins and their fans without the politically-motivated interference of pandering state and federal politicians,” Hogan said.

As I found out by reading this piece from ESPN, though, we’ve been down this road before. And the trademarks affected are ones the team registered between 1967 and 1990 – the current logo is not one. I agree with Hogan on the sentiment, and I suppose it may pick up the Redskin vote to some extent.

I was more offended by this Tweet from my alma mater, noted at the end of the ESPN piece:

We went through this whole controversy a few years after I graduated, but the difference is that Miami University actually interacts with the Miami tribe – yes, there is a Miami Indian tribe, which mainly resides in Oklahoma but is native to the region encompassing southwest Ohio. During my time there we had “Chief Miami,” a mascot who would do a native-based dance in full regalia and lead the football team out on horseback. I still think the name change was a gutless bend to political correctness, but it is what it is.

As for the gubernatorial race, I suppose Hogan’s coming out in opposition to the name change is better than David Craig’s baseball realignment plan. (Me? I would make the NFL more geographically logical, but that’s a topic for another day. For the most part I like the divisions, although I HATE interleague play and the designated hitter.)

The real sport for both those guys has its league championship next Tuesday.