I Heard it Downtown

Like a lot of guys, I used to collect baseball cards when I was a kid. I had shoeboxes full of ‘em, all neatly placed in little plastic sleeves, categorized by team, waiting to be showed off or traded with some of the other neighborhood kids. My dad helped fuel my habit, but purchasing bulk packs of some of the older Topps sets from 1988 or 1989 that nobody seemed to want (which would unfortunately also contain the bubble gum from 1988. Turns out gum becomes inedible after a decade. Who woulda thought?). I dabbled in basketball and football cards, but baseball cards were always my passion. I heard rumors that they made cards for even more obscure sports, like NASCAR, but to a purist like me, that bordered on sacrilege.

So imagine my reaction when I discovered that Topps, the company that brought me so much joy as a 10 year old sports fan, is now coming out with a line of Barack Obama trading cards. http://tinyurl.com/94w83g

My first thought was that this had to be some kind of joke, like those awful commercials the NCAA puts out, with kids swapping trading cards of “Student Athletes” (A Mike Greene Rookie card? No way, the dude dominates the chemistry lab! Thanks NCAA. Thanks to your commercial, I’m convinced that you want to put the student in student athlete first. I was worried there for a second). Are politician trading cards the way of the future? Will my children open up a pack to find a Bill Clinton rookie card, which a picture of him making his first copies? Or perhaps Joe Biden, grabbing his first cup of coffee for his congressman? Perhaps they’ll be so lucky to find a rare Dick Cheney rookie card, where he’s shooting another rival intern in the head with a BB gun.

Maybe Politician trading cards will help give a spark to Fantasy Congress, a game similar to fantasy baseball, only now it’s only played by the terminally single in American University dorm rooms. (ohh snap Zach Space broke up a filibuster this week. That’s worth like 40 fantasy points). Will we have Matthew Berry breaking down the California 14th congressional district on ESPN? Is that what you want America??

This trend worries me. Look, I like Barack Obama a lot. I voted for him. I did a little campaigning for him….but even I am becoming slightly unnerved by this recent baseball card development. The guy hasn’t even been sworn it yet, and we’re already putting his face on trading cards? There aren’t a whole lot of things more American than baseball cards, and the day that we start selling packs of Politician cards right alongside them…well, that’s a little too much Change for even this political junkie.