… to learn that there was a clenbuterol ring operating in Spain. Y’think they had a deli op’ running on the side? Specialty meats, that sort of thing?
• Late update: From such tiny acorns springs the mighty oak. I turned that pair of sentences into a mild rant at VeloNews.com. Think of it as rantish. Rantesque? Rant lite?
• Even later update: Somehow I overlooked this very good column from Paul Krugman. Thanks and a tip of the Mad Dog’s Very Serious Hat to Sandy Underpants at The Aristocrats.
Mad Blog Media 
They were selling the Clenbuterol to ranchers and amateur athletes at gyms. No professionals were harmed with the sale of this product.
Whoa! Did you see that!? A pig just flew by.
Or sheep.
Anyone catch this?
http://nyvelocity.com/content/features/2011/armstrong-sca-deposition-videos
Thanks for the link Khal – interesting stuff. The editing is a bit of shame as it would have been nice to see and hear the whole deposition, but it’s fascinating to watch him squirm, hem and haw his way through what we do see. Watching his face, I kept thinking of having to stand trial in front of my mother when I was a kid, after I had done something wrong. I’d stand there and lie through my teeth, trying to keep a straight face and protect myself from further wrath and pain – completely succeeding in my mind – and she’d just look at me, pause for a second and say: “Don’t you lie to me young man.” Dammit! How’d she know?
Mothers know. I recall the same discussions with my Mom. She would just look at me and say “you know, your eyes just strobe like little light bulbs when you are lying”. Of course after a few of those sessions, she wouldn’t have to even say anything–she would just make strobe-like motions with her hands and we would both crack up and I would ‘fess up.
Khal….thanks for posting the Pythons. That skit is my all time fav from the Flying Circus!!!
“You did say sheep, didn’t you?” “Jaar.”
Krugman is on my daily reading list. He does have a nasty habit of “making sense”.
Are the fans of BigTex now moving to Il Pistolero’s camp? When I read the comments calling anyone who isn’t buying the tainted meat story a….wait for it…..HATER, I fear my optimism about the juvenile vitriol level dropping with BigTex’ retirement is misplaced. I guess if cycling is truly the “new golf” we’re stuck with morons and Repuglicans (is that redundant?) for awhile longer, eh? Just bought airtix for our summer in Italy, between this crap and the organized stupidity in DC over taxes and the budget, mid-May can NOT come soon enough! We still have some places left on selected tours if anyone wants to join us — don’t forget, WE buy the vino!
I have friends and acquaintances who actually bought all of Lance’s books, Hamilton’s t-shirts, Floyd’s t-shirts AND book, and tell me the UCI and WADA are consciously attempting to destroy professional cycling. The cognitive dissonance is breathtaking.
As for your tour business, I’d be there in a heartbeat if I had ANY MONEY. Alas, I have the change from my couch. However, I will have a glass of Chianti Superiore 2007 from Castello di Monastero, make spaghetti alla puttanesca for dinner, cry a little, and think of Harry and Leather.
True believers have to have someone to worship, Larry. With TCWSNBN retired, trot out the New Icon of Persecution.
Gets old. I’m surprised O’G can even drag himself to his desk to write yet another Foaming Rant about this crap. But I have a deep understanding about the need to hold one’s nose, do one’s job, and pay the bills.
I must commend VN for continuing OG’s rants when so many of their readers seem to be these “don’t confuse me with any facts, my mind’s made up” types. Challenging people to THINK is tough, just ask my wife!
My wife spent twenty years in the academic trenches and then flicked it in. One’s forehead can only take so much pounding into the walls. Or, as she once said in utter exasperation to a class full of dense, unmotivated English 100 Freshmen, “if I water you, will you GROW”?