Posted on 01/18/2013 4:52:21 AM PST by LD Jackson
For today's post, I want to depart from the normal news and political chatter we normally discuss and focus on something that I believe is travesty, both in America and across the world. For decades, Lance Armstrong has been the epitome of toughness and grit in the world of sports. He managed to beat cancer, no small feat there, and then came back to win the Tour de France seven years running. He was heralded as a superstar and he became a millionaire because of his victories and the resulting endorsements. All of this took place amidst accusations of doping.
As everyone is sure to know by know, Lance Armstrong has admitted to Oprah Winfrey that he has been guilty of doping for about 20 years. Never mind that he has denied it throughout his career, he's admitting it now. It seems it is the worst-kept secret of the sports world, but the only people who seemed to care were the organizations that oversee the sport of cycling. The fans didn't seem to mind and maybe that's what kept Lance Armstrong going. Maybe he was doing it for the fans? Not a chance! He was really doing it for the money and fame and once he got a taste, he was addicted.
The most troubling part of this entire story is the attitude Lance Armstrong has about what he has done. Fox News has a portion of the interview on their website. I thought it was very telling in what it shared.
"At the time it did not feel wrong?" Winfrey asked."No," Armstrong replied. "Scary."
"Did you feel bad about it?" she pressed him.
"No," he said. "Even scarier."
"Did you feel in any way that you were cheating?"
"No," Armstrong paused. "Scariest."
"I went and looked up the definition of cheat," he added a moment later. "And the definition is to gain an advantage on a rival or foe. I didn't view it that way. I viewed it as a level playing field."
You will have to forgive me if I sound a bit skeptical about Lance Armstrong and his admission of guilt. I have no insider knowledge of the affair, but I get the sense he is sorry he was found out, not sorry he cheated. Just a thought, but why is he confessing to Oprah Winfrey, instead of to the organizations he has lied to for 20 years? I wonder if he doesn't still have a leg in this game and is trying to work it all to his advantage? Why the title of this post, A Lesson In the Futility of Sports Royalty? I can't tell you how many people I know who absolutely idolize the players of our most popular sports. When Adrian Peterson was playing for the Oklahoma Sooners, he was already being heralded as one of the greatest running backs to ever play the game of football. That heralding is even louder after his remarkable comeback after having his knee surgically repaired. I am not trying to take away from his ability or desire to win, but he is still just a man who is being paid millions of dollars to carry an oblong ball up and down a 100 yard field of grass or artificial turf. He is also the man who proclaimed NFL players should be likened to slaves.
Lance Armstrong is a perfect example of how futile it is to lift up a player of any sport. No matter what sport, or if they are a man or a woman, they are still human, just like you and I. Lance Armstrong is a man who cheated at the sport he was involved in. Nothing more and nothing less. Our society should recognize that and realize the mistake so many of us make by acting as if these players are royalty.
Hmmm, that sounds like some of the politicians we have in Washington. Maybe this should also be applied to them.
Thx for your attention to this matter.
The fact of the matter is that Armstrong ran an on-going criminal enterprise.
Armstrong has dishonored humanity with his behavior. We have young men braving booby traps and enemy bullets in Afghanistan and this jerk goes on national television to try and explain away his cheating. Hey Lance, pull a two year tour with the Infantry in Afghanistan and I’ll forgive you for being a greedy cheat.
It has been said that the hardest thing to do in sports is to hit a baseball with a wooden bat. Even the best ever, Ted Williams for example, could only do it at best 40% of the time he was at the plate. He was not on steroids either.
Once again proving Robert Heinlein was one of the great sages of the past century.
I could care less whether people on FR think professional cycling is a stupid sport or not, some would say shooting a gun at a piece of paper is stupid too. We have freedom (barely) to choose our forms of recreation and make our own decisions about that. What is a shame is that the US Postal Service wasted millions of our dollars sponsoring this guy, and that is just wrong, whether it was Armstrong or NASCAR.
Armstrong has disgraced himself, and proven the thesis of this article, that “royalty” in sports nearly always has clay feet. Or does that never happen in basketball, football (either kind) or shall we add, even golf?
What I find truly tedious is how anyone [esp. public figures are ‘heroic’ for ‘beating’ cancer - please. Credit where credit is due first to God, then maybe the medical community although even they belittle the best ‘medicine’ money can buy imho - CHIROPRACTIC- it’s really all about getting the DNA and nervous system messages to function fully and properly.
Nothing against MDs, drugs and surgeries but the first and best method of healing, the straightening or ‘unkinking’ the subluxations in the spine, is truly the best and the way God intended for most healing to occur in our bodies. The famous folks are often just endorsing those with the deepest pockets who ‘rub’ each other backs and ‘grease’ each others palms.
If future developments don’t vindicate my statements, I fully expect to see the real truths in these stories revealed to us in Heaven. Then again Heaven may just be so great that all the memories of this world would just be a passing fading sigh of the ultimate relief.
Lance Armstrong still won against all other blood transfusion arteests so bully for him, and hopefully he can be a part of the solution.
My only real problem with him is that he lied over and over again.
My understanding of Armstrong’s mea culpa is that he’s negotiating for participation in triathlons and marathons.
Excellent.
Excerpt:
Lance Armstrong confession a convenient truth, says WADA
Reuters, DNA, January 18, 2013
The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) was left unimpressed by Lance Armstrong’s doping confessions in a television interview, calling the disgraced cyclist’s confession a convenient truth. Armstrong, already stripped of his seven Tour de France titles, revealed his dark secrets to talk show host Oprah Winfrey on Thursday with more revelations expected to follow on Friday in part two of the interview.
As the sporting world digested Armstrong’s admission that all seven of his Tour victories were fuelled by performance-enhancing drugs, WADA officials were left unmoved by the American’s answers or Winfrey’s questioning. “It seemed to us it was more of a convenient truth than a full display of what went on and that is really what we would ask him to do,” WADA director general David Howman told Reuters on Friday.
“First, it displays that talking to a talk show host is not a very effective way of getting the full information out because a talk show host doesn’t have the full story. “I think there were a lot of words put into his mouth, that’s not the way you get full information. “The tough questions have to be asked at some stage if they are going to be answered there may be some benefit.”
Both WADA and the United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA), who conducted the exhaustive investigation that resulted in Armstrong’s lifetime ban, have challenged the 41-year-old to come forward and and tell what he knows about the widespread doping in his sport under oath. According to media reports Armstrong is hoping to trade some insider knowledge of doping in cycling for a reduction of his lifetime ban that would allow him to resume competition in athletic events that adhere to the World Anti-Doping Code.
More here:
http://www.dnaindia.com/sport/report_lance-armstrong-confession-a-convenient-truth-says-wada_1790279
In a more perfect world Okrah would have taped the interview, described it to the press and the public and shelved it, instead of giving the cheater a nationwide platform!
hard to find a good youtube interview yet of Lance & Okra. Please post if you find a good one...
hard to find a good youtube interview yet of Lance & Okra. Please post if you find a good one...
No, his crime was character assassination and lawsuits against people who indicated he’d doped. Friends, colleagues, their spouses. At one point in the interview when discussing the horrible things he’d said about a colleague’s wife he jokes that at least he never called her fat. THAT’S the crime will keep him sunk.
“Both WADA and the United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA), who conducted the exhaustive investigation that resulted in Armstrong’s lifetime ban, have challenged the 41-year-old to come forward and and tell what he knows about the widespread doping in his sport under oath”
Just astounding, both these agencies still denying culpability, and knowledge, and wanting Mr Armstrong to be the sacrificial lamb and testify under oath so their banning can be seen as having teeth, since most if not all of the testimony against him is hearsay. If they ever get off their focus on Lance Armstrong they might just have a chance at reviving their credibility. In the mean time I save lots of time not watching Le Tour.
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