Sometimes it's better to light a flamethrower than curse the darkness

I have no particular connection with Oakland, so it's been a little surprising how emotional I've gotten over the prospect of them losing their baseball team to greed and selfishness. (Even as I appreciate they got their baseball team due to owners' greed and selfishness in the first place! Minnesota only has a baseball team because it used to be owned by a big racist who didn't like playing in our nation's capital because he was so racist! (he literally said “I’ll tell you why we came to Minnesota. It was when I found out you only had 15,000 Blacks here”) but I didn't know that until a couple years ago, long after I was a fan of the team and so I feel bad for Oakland fans; there is no ethical consumption under MLB.)

But I read a Joe Sheehan piece today that explains it so well even friends who don't care about baseball can appreciate this. He contrasts the A's John Fisher with Peter Seidler, who owned the San Diego Padres, recently died, and has had warm things said about him in all quarters.

The biggest accomplishment of John Fisher’s life was the moment of his birth, to the co-founders of The Gap. He went to Phillips Exeter and Princeton and Stanford, and then became president of a family investment company. He bought a piece of the Giants with family money, and he later bought the A’s alongside Lew Wolff. The next dime he earns that isn’t in some way related to his surname will be his first. Gaining sole ownership of the A’s in 2016, Fisher proceeded to run the team down in an effort to extort a publicly-funded mallpark and real-estate boondoggle from Oakland. Having only gotten commitments for $425 million in funding and $500 million in reimbursements to that end, Fisher worked out a deal for less than half of that in Nevada. Thank goodness for rich parents.

It’s been a lot worse for me than for you.

The thing about great wealth is that it allows you to define your own life. The destitute, the poor, the great mass in the middle, even people of moderate or considerable success are all, to one degree or another, dependent upon others. I’ve made a nice little career, and the list people to whom I’m indebted runs deep into three figures. I’ve been knocked around by industry trends and bad luck and outright malice. I have not had complete control, and I doubt very many of you reading this have, either.

The wealthy, though, the .01%, they can chart their path as they wish, their deep reserves serving as both a battering ram to success and a cushion against failure. With the sort of wealth people like Seidler and Fisher are born into, you can do anything you want with your life, and in doing so, you can determine how people regard you. The people who own baseball teams are all in this group, and for any one of them to say to a fan “It’s been a lot worse for me than for you” isn’t just insulting, it’s barely human.

Peter Seidler and John Fisher were both born on third base. One decided to steal home, and the other decided to just steal.

And it turns out that even this vote -- as depressing as it is inevitable, from 29 rich guys/conglomerates to let one of their own make even more money -- doesn't make the team moving to Las Vegas a done deal. The fact that two of the three hurdles to it happening are thanks to a group called Schools Not Stadiums is indicative of which of those things I think tax money should pay for. Here's hoping.