{"id":3184,"date":"2013-12-03T15:32:57","date_gmt":"2013-12-03T15:32:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/crankpunk.com\/?p=3184"},"modified":"2013-12-04T05:07:25","modified_gmt":"2013-12-04T05:07:25","slug":"tell-me-lies-lance-sweet-little-lies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/crankpunk.com\/ja\/2013\/12\/03\/tell-me-lies-lance-sweet-little-lies\/","title":{"rendered":"tell me lies, Lance, sweet little lies"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
\"this<\/a>
this guy needs no introduction<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/blockquote>\n

By Betsy Andreu<\/em><\/p>\n

As long as Lance is on his reconciliation tour, I think it’s only appropriate the tour should\u00a0have\u00a0its own\u00a0theme song. I’m thinking of Fleetwood Mac’s “Tell me Lies”. Maybe not sweet little lies or just<\/i> “one big lie” but a continuation of lies.<\/p>\n

In a desperate attempt to do whatever he can to mitigate the damage he’s done to himself with a lifetime ban competing in sports at an elite level, Lance is reaching out to whomever will listen to him. He wants to show how very sorry he is for decimating people like me, Frankie, Greg LeMond, Mike Anderson, David Walsh, Emma,\u00a0JV, Travis and USADA\u00a0that he\u00a0has only reached out to his former\u00a0soigneur\u00a0Emma\u00a0 – over wine and\u00a0with cameras rolling just to show how sorry he really is.<\/p>\n

And what about the rest of us?<\/p>\n

Lance’s reconciliation tour, aka the I-really-want-to-compete-at-an-elite-level-again tour, is nothing more than a charade to back up his call for a version of a\u00a0Truth and Reconciliation Committee that will exonerate him. I really didn’t get the gist of it until I talked to Joe Harris, a consultant who has applied the principles of truth and reconciliation in business, and co-authored a “roadmap” for repairing pro cycling with Steve Maxwell, an economist and contributor to VeloNews.<\/p>\n

He explained that\u00a0a truth and reconciliation process, when done correctly, is never run by the agency who will\u00a0itself be investigated. In this case, the UCI.\u00a0 Just as\u00a0MLB hired the independent investigator George Mitchell, so cycling must do the same. There must be complete autonomy from the UCI, who would have to divest all of the oversight to an independent person. Without this independence, the committee could be swayed by personal agendas, and testimony could be filtered so that certain people get preferential treatment, even if they don’t deserve it.<\/p>\n

Where would this\u00a0person come from?\u00a0 An agency well\u00a0versed in transitional law\u00a0such as the\u00a0International Center for Transitional\u00a0Justice in South Africa, New York University Law School’s Justice in Transition, or the Carter\u00a0Foundation\u00a0could recommend\u00a0a legal scholar who would focus on the societal healing and international rebuilding\u00a0of the immense damage caused to the sport by\u00a0such corruption. As Joe so eloquently explained to me, I agree with this premise. We certainly can’t afford to have another farcical Vrijman Report. Joe and Steve’s website www.theouterline.com<\/a> explains it far better than I can even begin\u00a0to.\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

What I don’t understand, however,\u00a0is why Lance needs a TRC in order to tell the truth. Nothing is preventing him from meeting with the fine folks at USADA. He declined to go\u00a0under oath for The London Sunday Times and Acceptance Insurance, yet, he can still do so with SCA and the U.S. government. He’ll have the freedom to tell all; his\u00a0testimony under oath is protected as long as he’s not lying.\u00a0 No brainer, right?<\/p>\n

Lance would have you think that it’s all the UCI’s fault. I won’t argue that they’re at fault but where’s Lance’s culpability here? \u00a0Who helped him collude with the UCI? I guarantee you, he didn’t do it on his own. A TRC unchecked with no accountability can do more harm than good.\u00a0\u00a0Under oath,\u00a0Lance is held accountable.<\/p>\n

Nothing changes if nothing changes. Nothing has changed with Lance. He is still desperately trying to control the narrative. The problem for him is not many are listening. I know firsthand he is trying hard to sully me and Frankie not to mention Travis, Greg, JV, and his most recent target, Alex Gibney. Funny thing is he’s going off the record\u00a0 hoping that by merely telling the lie the seed is planted. After all, it worked before. I can’t tell you how many people told me they thought I was crazy thanks to lance.\u00a0 Look at the damage done to Greg’s reputation from people who still tout him as nuts. What about Travis and\u00a0usada’s famous witch hunt?<\/p>\n

After Emma and Lance’s very public meeting, so many contacted me asking if I was next. Would I meet with him? Sure why not? As long as Travis Tygart is present and Lance is bound under oath why wouldn’t I? I actually invite him to meet with me. You think he’ll agree to those terms? I’ll stick with water or coffee and no cameras to film it by the way.<\/p>\n

After Oprah, I was willing to give him a chance; I wanted\u00a0there to be a reconciliation. I wanted nothing more than to put this behind me, use it as a cautionary tale and forge ahead touting clean sport\u00a0especially for kids whether it be through USADA’s truesport.org<\/a> initiative or via\u00a0the media.<\/p>\n

Let’s face it, Lance’s\u00a0childhood\u00a0was awful; the child within was never healed. It doesn’t excuse the monster of the person he\u00a0became but it damn\u00a0well\u00a0helps to explain it. I was being told\u00a0he was using me, Frankie didn’t hold back on that opinion. I didn’t want to listen.\u00a0 After all,\u00a0Lance said he was sorry. I felt it was only fair that I give him a chance to prove that he meant it.<\/p>\n

That conversation before Oprah,\u00a0he told me he wanted to meet with\u00a0me and Frankie\u00a0face to face. He told me he’d done a lot of bad things to a lot of good people. Healing and forgiving is a process. For Lance, telling the truth or learning to tell the truth was part of that process. After Oprah, we sporadically kept in touch.\u00a0 Days turned into weeks, weeks turned into months. I was slowly beginning the painful realization that his talk was cheap.<\/p>\n