A World Class Creep

Lance Armstrong is a liar, but that’s hardly the extent of his sins.  He’s also a thief, a fraud, a serial cheat, a gutless bully and about the worst possible guy you can ever imagine a guy being.  While there seems to be a growing trend in the media at the moment to put Armstrong’s transgressions on some sort of sliding scale giving him a relative pass for some and railing against him for others, there’s no need for the exercise.  He’s a despicable being unworthy of anything more than completely fading from the national conscious and crawling back under the rock where he came from.

I’m not buying the current narrative that seems to excuse his cheating under the guise that everyone in bicycling did it.  Yea, everyone did it and they did it because the guy that was winning and kicking their asses was doing it and they knew it.  They were doing it to level a playing field that Armstrong deliberately tilted in his favor.  That doesn’t excuse their transgressions either but let’s face it the “everyone does it” defense is used because it works.  It also illustrates why even the now pedestrian charge of using performance enhancing drugs doesn’t seem to hardly raise an eyebrow these days.

But I will concede that if Armstrong merely took the drugs and kept to himself, sort of like Barry Bonds or Roger Clemens,  that would be bad enough but perhaps not world ending bad, especially these days.  But Armstrong was about so much more, so much hideously more.

In pursuit of perpetuating his continuing fraud on the world Armstrong deliberately went about trying to destroy everyone who got in his path, men, women and children, without a second thought to the damage he was doing.  Lives have been ruined by and because of Armstrong.  And all for what?  So he can go on Oprah Winfrey’s fledging, failing network, boost her profile and ratings, in what, some sort of redemption tour in a pathetic attempt to reclaim a competitive sports career?  Lance Armstrong perjured himself when he testified under oath to that which he now says isn’t true.  A statute of limitations on that crime may keep him from prosecution but the simple fact is that Lance Armstrong should be in jail.

The reaction thus far has been fairly interesting if not predictable to Armstrong’s confessional, particularly given how calculated it all was, though eventually I expect it will probably take the familiar arc that Armstrong is banking on: shock, disgust, forgiveness, celebration.  Here’s hoping that this is one cycle that breaks.

Armstrong had the first opportunity not to go down the path of performance enhancing drugs.  No one held a gun to his empty head and forced him to dope.  In fact it was more the other way around.  Armstrong held the careers and fates of others in his hands and pushed them to follow his illegal lead time and time again.

Having chosen to cheat, Armstrong then went at his craft fully vested in lying, cheating and stealing a thousand times over to his fans, his sponsors and anyone else with even a fleeting interest in bicycling.  When someone broke ranks, Armstrong got insular and combative in the most destructive way possible.  You could Google Armstrong’s reactions to the various claims made against him over the years by journalists, doping agencies and fellow riders and you’d end up with pages of denials.  And they weren’t denials by deflection, the sort of “everyone just wants to see someone who is successful, who beat the odds, fail” denials that really act as hedges in case the truth is ever discovered.  They were denials of absolute certainty built on taking the supposedly higher moral ground against those who would bear false witness to his greatness.  Lance Armstrong is a true sociopath, a sociopath of such historic proportions that he should be immortalized in the same way that Charles Ponzi is immortalized.  Now when athletes and their enablers cheat through drugs, deception, fraud, you name it, we should say they are pulling an Armstrong Scheme.

Ponzi may not even be the best comparator to the kind of long-term fraud that Armstrong engaged in.  A better one is probably Bernie Madoff.  The comparisons are eerily similar.  Both built empires off of modest talent originally that could never sustain the outsized and unattainable dreams they had for themselves.  So they both cut corners, small ones at first and then bigger ones along the way to keep the lie going and to keep the money flowing.  It wasn’t enough for either to simply build a small fortune for themselves by defrauding others while remaining off the radar screen.  They both had to live large, build bigger until eventually the energy and level of deception it took to maintain the fundamental lie collapsed by its own weight on their thick skulls and amoral souls.

But the American people are a gullible and forgiving sort.  There will be columns like this one trying their best to remind people of the seriousness of Armstrong’s crimes.  They won’t do much good.  Armstrong will face a mountain of legal trouble as those he’s wronged line up against him to reclaim all they lost by daring to confront one of the biggest liars, cheats and frauds in American history.  Yet as sure as I’m writing this is as sure as I am that eventually the pendulum will swing back in Armstrong’s direction.  His calculating, devious mind is counting on it and there’s no reason to bet against him on that. 

The U.S. Anti-Doping Agency did everyone a huge favor by spelling out in abject, crystal clear detail the extent of Armstrong’s cheating and yet it’s instructive to note how many people still came to Armstrong’s defense.  The most flagrant has been Sally Jenkins, a Washington Post columnist and a rider on the Armstrong gravy train as the co-author of two Armstrong books of lies, particularly when she wrote a mystifying defense of Armstrong just about a month ago.  

Styled as a thought piece meant to justify her own role in furthering Armstrong’s fraudulent narrative, Jenkins gave Armstrong a pass despite the mountains of evidence against him by hinting first of a hatchet job by the USADA in their pursuit of Armstrong (a high class way of parroting Armstrong’s charge that it was a witch hunt, proving as always that she and Iran’s Minister of Information had more in common than even she thought) as well as a more pointed indictment of the unfairness of drug testing in general (another favorite Armstrong target).  It was clear from the column, just as it’s been clear for years, that Jenkins was too seduced by Armstrong and all his hollow, grandiose statements about competing to see the fraud for what he was.  She was not a journalist in any sense of the word but a fan girl whose credibility and position was used by Armstrong to provide him the cover he needed to further his grand myth. To paraphrase Ms. Jenkins and her column, maybe I’m not mad at Sally Jenkins because I understand how even with all the professional advances a woman like Jenkins can make as a sports journalist a good looking man can usually get what he wants from her just by charming her with the words she wants to hear.

Jenkins and her school girl crush have forever ruined her credibility and for that she should be summarily fired by the Post.  If she had a shred of dignity, she’d resign before they have to make that choice but I suspect she too is so steeped in denial that she doesn’t realize how shameless she became in order to protect a criminal.  Jenkins won’t lose her job and she won’t resign but more to the point does anyone think that Armstrong cares about the fate of someone like Jenkins either way?  Armstrong has already proven he doesn’t care about anyone but Lance Armstrong because he’s as fully entrenched now in controlling the uncontrollable damage his crimes have caused as he was in perpetrating those crimes in the first place.

Another acolyte was Buzz Bissinger, the opinionated loudmouth writer of Friday Night Lights who wrote a fawning piece about Armstrong this past August for Newsweek.  Bissinger bought into the lies, something he now strongly regrets.  Writing for the Daily Beast on Monday, Bissinger now says he was conned by Armstrong and that virtually nothing Armstrong says to Oprah or anyone else should be believed.  Good for Bissinger for seeing the light.

There will be some handwringing certainly by Armstrong defenders as they try to contextualize him in much the same way that Joe Paterno defenders still fight tirelessly to contextualize him.  Armstrong and his Lance Armstrong Foundation (recently renamed the LiveStrong Foundation in order to distance itself from such a world class creep) certainly did some good in the world for cancer victims.  But let’s not forget that this good was furthered mostly by true believers in the Armstrong myth and not Armstrong himself.  Every step he took, every breath he uttered was built on lies and even though those lies pushed others to do good in his name they can never be seen as justifying his underlying deceptions.  Every action he took supposedly in the service of others was merely part of the scam, meant to deflect attention away from the shady, immoral and unethical way he built his narrative in the first place. 

Armstrong gets a pass on nothing.  He can and probably should ask God for forgiveness.  He just shouldn’t ask or expect it from anyone else.

More Needles, More Damage Done

There’s a burgeoning story about performance-enhancing drugs that no one is likely to much care about, but they should.

ESPN is reporting in great detail the case involving Anthony Galea, a Canadian doctor charged in U.S. federal court in Buffalo on Tuesday with drug smuggling and other related drug offenses. The story is big enough on its own, but it also has an interesting Cleveland connection.

Galea’s arrest is the result of an investigation that began last fall when his assistant, Mary Anne Catalano, his former executive assistant, was arrested at the U.S./Canadian border for trying to smuggle into this country a variety of performance-enhancing drugs. Catalano has become an informant, probably in an attempt to gain leniency, and has been a virtual treasure trove of information for the FBI.

According to the ESPN story, documents they obtained show that while Galea criss-crossed the country treating elite athletes with his own brand of voodoo and cocktails laced with human growth hormone, one of Galea’s most frequent stops was in Cleveland.

Galea allegedly was in Cleveland nearly a dozen times between July 22 and September 11 administering medical treatments of some sort to 11 different athletes never mind the fact that Galea isn’t even registered to practice medicine in this country.

Not surprisingly, this little gem of a story has eluded the notice of the local press. After all, there’s stories aplenty to write about D’Qwell Jackson and the fact that he isn’t attending mini-camp. It sometimes makes me wonder whether the local press has just given up on its own agonizingly slow death march toward extinction.

Because court documents don’t name the athletes allegedly treated by Galea, there’s no way to know at this point whether these athletes played for Cleveland teams or were just visiting. Likewise it’s not known at this point the sports they participated in though the timeline suggests that both baseball and football players were likely involved.

What is known though is that during this period, any number of Cleveland Indians’ players were either on the disabled list or nursing injuries, players like Grady Sizemore, Travis Hafner, Anthony Reyes, Aaron Laffey, Asdrubal Cabrera and Rafael Bentancourt, to name a few. That doesn’t mean any of them were treated inappropriately. It doesn’t mean that any of them were ever seen by Galea or that they even know him. But it does mean that it is now fair game to ask the question, just don’t wait for the Plain Dealer to do it.

Likewise with the Browns. Although the Browns had just entered training camp during this time period, there were a number of its players being treated for a variety of ailments. This included Robaire Smith, Jamal Lewis, Shaun Rogers, Ryan Tucker, Brodney Pool and Jerome Harrison, among others.

Again, it’s important to point out that none of these players have ever been linked with Galea or that no questions have been raised about the appropriateness of any of their treatments. But given Galea’s frequent visits to Cleveland during this period, raising the question is completely appropriate.

Let’s also not forget that during this time period the Indians had home series against Detroit, Minnesota, Texas, Anaheim, Seattle and Kansas City. Given Galea’s geographic location, Toronto, and its easy access to Cleveland it could very well be that Galea was seeing players from these teams instead. It would be interesting to know which injured players from these teams were traveling with them from this time period but I doubt you can get anyone from the Plain Dealer interested in investigating that, either.

None of this is good news for sports fans in any of these cities, but as I said at the outset, most won’t see it that way, including the “established” media, save ESPN. Stories about performance enhancing drugs are nearly as common as stories about LeBron James’ free agent status. At some point people just tune them out.

But it is important because it goes directly to the integrity of each sport. When some players are being fed illegal drugs in order to enhance performance, the product on the field is fraudulent. The competition is no longer between teams with the best players but teams with the best enhanced players. That’s why the story breaking now, again by ESPN, regarding Floyd Landis’ years-too-late admission that he was a serial drug cheat, is eye-opening. For too long the French have been accused of being on a witch hunt and yet they were right all along.

The Galea story isn’t good news either for the commissioners of Major League Baseball and the National Football League. Once again their sports are tainted by another drug scandal, just emphasizing the point that whatever they think they’re doing to clean up their sports isn’t working as well as they’d like to believe.

Particularly shameful in this regard is the legacy of Major League Baseball. Under Commissioner Bud Selig, the league has become mostly a joke when it comes to drugs. I’ve seen several revisionists lately take their hand at trying to position Selig as perhaps the greatest commissioner baseball has ever seen. But every time I read one of these works of fiction they always seem to gloss over how weak-kneed Selig was in the war on drugs, particularly when faced with union opposition.

It was only the threat of Congressional action that got Selig really moving and even then the sport still has a weaker drug testing program than any other sport. Again that’s attributable to Selig’s almost abject unwillingness to back up tough talk with tough action. He’s never shown much of a willingness to take on a misguided union on these issues. Improvements have come at a glacial pace and been merely incremental.

Football has a slightly better story to tell, but only slightly. It embraced more stringent drug testing and harsher penalties well ahead of baseball. The problem, though, is that it hasn’t seemed to deter players hell bent on gaining an illegal advantage. Meanwhile, most seem to just shrug it off.

Consider, for example, that just a few weeks ago, Brian Cushing, the rookie linebacker from the Houston Texans, was revealed as a drug cheat. Cushing had won the Associated Press defensive rookie of the year award with 39 of 50 possible votes. That was before his positive test was known. Last week, in an unprecedented move, the Associated Press ordered a re-vote on its award and Cushing won again, although with far less votes.

The fact that Cushing won again feeds the perception that too many sportswriters are athlete-wannabees that help foster a permissive drug culture inside the locker room because taking a tough stance might not get them the access to the players that they think they need.

But perhaps even more farcical was the handwringing from some of those same sportswriters about a re-vote even taking place. To them, the unprecedented nature of the re-vote was a far more serious issue than the fact that Cushing’s performance was artificially enhanced. Talk about misplaced priorities from your working press.

That really is what underscores the entire issue here. The local beat reporters for both the Indians and the Browns haven’t even bothered with this story despite its Cleveland connection. If you can’t get the working press that covers these athletes on a daily basis to give a damn and be an agent for pushing real reform, what chance does the average fan have? It was this working press, both locally and nationally, that ignored the raging use of PEDs in baseball for years and now are repeating the same mistake by still rewarding known drug users like Cushing for performing at a level he might not otherwise have achieved without the PEDs.

Meanwhile, it’s not just football and baseball that are at the center of the storm involving Galea. It’s worth remembering that another one of Galea’s high profile clients is none other than Tiger Woods. When Woods made his now infamous mostly-wooden apology for being a serial cheater on his wife and family he did save real emotion in that well-rehearsed speech when he denied, without being asked, that treatments he received by Galea involved illegal drugs. Translation: It’s one thing to cheat on your wife, another on your sport.

Court documents seem to suggest that Woods is “Athlete D” administered to in July in Orlando with the so-called plasma rich platelet treatment. According to reports, this involves a process by which blood is taken from the athlete, the platelets are separated from the red blood cells with a centrifuge and then injected back into the athlete to accelerate healing.

It all sounds a little Battlestar Galactica but not illegal, except perhaps for the fact that it was done by someone not licensed to do so, someone like Galea. Whether Woods is a cheat depends on how you come out on the question of whether or not it’s cheating to have a legal treatment administered illegally. We know what Woods thinks but his judgment isn’t exactly unbiased. Of course the same goes for another of sports’ shadier characters, Alex Rodriguez, also a patient of Galea.

Eventually this story will go away. Galea will likely plead guilty to some sort of crime or two and the athletes involved aren’t likely to suffer either way. It’s funny. In this country a young person can be permanently rendered ineligible for federal financial aid for college if he or she is convicted of even minor drug possession charges. Meanwhile professional athletes, many the same age as these same college kids, find that even far more dangerous drug use on their part ends up being merely a minor speed bump on their way to backing up a Brinks truck to the owner’s suite.