All Intensive Purposes

Steroids go with, not against, the flow of American morality. There is no bedrock principle to dissuade people from using them. In his 2004 State of the Union address, President George W. Bush argued that steroid use "sends the wrong message that there are shortcuts to success". But really, that is nonsense in a society so quick to assimilate scientific advances. Children use calculators in school, adults have surgery as an alternative to dieting and the faith that medicine can painlessly fix problems that bedeviled our ancestors grows more ingrained every day. It does not seem coincidental that the most important ballplayer to have failed a steroid test is Rafael Palmeiro, best known to non-baseball fans as a pitch man for the erectile aid Viagra.

Christopher Caldwell, "Home truth amid the home runs," Financial Times 7 (March 18/19, 2006).