Letters to the Editor
gooutside_andplay
Published Letters: 3
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all or none
[Read the article: High on the Tour de Dope]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]cyclists, like all competitive athletes, demand only a level playing field. If doping is allowed and all cyclists can dope, the playing field is level and the games can begin.
If doping is not allowed and enforcement is comprehensive and vigorous, the playing field is, again, level and competition can play-out.
It is in the middle ground where doping is stated as illegal but enforcement is spotty and symbolic, that problems arise - for fans, the press and most of all the competitors. This is true in cycling, in baseball, in all competitive events.
Thus, in my mind, this year's Tour marks the beginning of a new Tour and a new approach to professional cycling. Clearly the sport was in the "middle ground" for quite some time - saying one thing and doing another. Doping was rampant, governing bodies were ineffective and any smart, strong competitor knew he had only to avoid detection to excel and succeed. It was left to the press - always looking for conflict to entertain - to point out the discrepencies between what was officially stated and the reality of the peleton.
If the sport can succeed at making it's words manifest in enforcement - and this year's Tour gives me great hope for exactly that - the playing field will be level and the athletes will perform in ways that gain our continued admiration and awe.
I have greater faith in cycling's ability to manage itself out of the "middle ground" than I do for baseball, football or any other "mainstream" sport.
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Wrong audience
[Read the article: Bush "envious" of U.S. troops in Afghanistan]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]One thing a combat soldier learns very, very quickly is there is no romance, no glory, no feelings of accomplishment in war. There is, however, lots of grief, pain, fear and loss.
That those who send our children to war, have this shallow an understanding of war explains why we do it over and over.
George picked exactly the wrong audience for this happy horseshit of his. Not much romance in PTSD.
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They were very, very good for me
[Read the article: Through a bong, darkly]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]The 60's marked my coming of age. I was a student, then a worker, then an infantry soldier in a war, then a father, then an anti-war activist. I was also exposed to a host of some of the most powerful drugs imaginable.
All of this made me the man I am today, and I am both proud of who I am yet becoming, and thankful that I was lucky enough to mature in this time of great permissiveness - that I was socially supported in finding my own way.
Diff'rent strokes for diff'rent folks.