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"I thought the judge herself admitted there was pressure?"

She did. She admitted it to the French Skating Federation or whatever they are called. They announced, now they've taken it back.

If you ask me, it's nothing but a bunch of crooks using athletes to generate money.

And that in itself is enough to make me boycott the Olympics for the rest of my life. From now on, no more. It's ridiculous.

According to the guy on MSNBC what the AP story said was that the judge told the president of the association something which caused him to say in an interview with the AP that she was manipulated. According to his PR guy he was mistranslated but I haven't seen any "correct" translation. All of this evidence is very indirect. I've seen the "smoking gun" quote (can't give it to you off hand, sorry) and I'm not sure. Depending on the context it could mean a lot of things. He talks about bad people surrounding an honest but emotionally fragile person and exherting influence on her. But the quote didn't come out until after she left Salt Lake for home. It could as easily be talking about why she left as anything else (the thing that makes me lean in that direction is the emotionally fragile part. I don't see what that has to do with judging, I can see it as a good reason to leave town when everybody is saying you're a bad person. But that's my thought, not his, I don't put thoughts in other people's brains). Since the quote doesn't give any indication as to what question he was answering (and I haven't heard anybody giving it context, they just present it raw, "he said..." not even "he said about X...") I am unconvinced.

Note I've never ruled out collusion. But unlike others I'm also not ruling out legitimate.