Pound Attacks Landis and USADA

Interesting article at cyclingnews.com
http://www.cyclingnews.com/news.php?id=news/2006/aug06/aug14news3 where Dick Pound is said to "out-rant the hacks."

Also some comments from Bobby Julich on the same page...

 

Pound is starting to sound like an out-of-control district attorney, like the guy in Durham, NC, who's running for office and using the Duke lacrosse case for publicity.

 

I like what BJ says.


As for Pound, isn't "Nazi Frogmen" a little bit of a paradox or oxymoron?

 

I thought that was kind of funny myself. Maybe Pound needs to submit to a dope test. (Or his parents, for naming him that)

 

Looks like most pros might want to live/train in Africa (or Antactica).

 

Pound is saying the right things. The only hypocrite is Tim "American biased" Maloney.

 

Wouldn't work... Pound would just send his Nazi frogmen to hunt them down.

 

I'm very much in favour of getting rid of doping from cycling and other sports, but I must say I end up wondering what Dick Pound's other motives are. I'm sure he wants to rid sport of performance enhancing drugs. I don't doubt that.

But I can't help feeling there is more to it. Something about power - wanting more of it for WADA and less for national agencies or sporting agencies.

Something about personal aggrandisment also. For example, the tougher the stance he appears to take the more power he is likely to have within the IOC. The more inflence he personally then has within political circles etc. I don't know. I may be being unfair on him. But there just seems to be something of the zealot about him, which makes me feel uneasy.

 

Then you should enjoy this article! You will find that you are not unfair at all. I happen to think Floyd did it, but that doesn't make this guy less of an ass...

The Difficulty of Watching Pound Throw His Weight Around

By Sally JenkinsFriday, August 13, 2004; Page D10

ATHENS

That phony careerist and human necktie Dick Pound should promptly remove himself from public life and quit trying to enlarge his reputation by wrecking the reputations of others. But unfortunately it appears we will have to shove him forcibly from the Olympic stage while he is still grabbing at the free shrimp from the VIP buffet.

For all those who haven't heard his officious and highly prejudiced bellowing, Pound is the head of the World Anti-Doping Agency. He's the guy who's supposed to oversee a body devoted to the ethical competition of the Olympics. And yet Pound commits an ethical violation almost every time he opens his mouth, and expresses another self-serving, sorehead and headline-seeking opinion. He's the biggest scandal here

It is plainly unethical and prejudicial for a head of WADA to make pronouncements about an ongoing and supposedly confidential investigation such as BALCO, and the guilt or innocence of those involved. And yet there was Pound on the eve of the Opening Ceremonies, accusing USA Track and Field of being "largely responsible" for doping and again attacking Marion Jones by name.

Jones has been his favorite punching bag for months, despite the fact that evidence against her is less than persuasive and she has not been formally accused of anything. "If she's innocent, she comes here and that's fine," Pound said Thursday. "And if she's not and comes here and has made all those statements, it's going to be a dark and deep hole into which she goes. It would be a shame."

Pound loves to suggest that Jones is guilty until proven guilty, because she hangs around with the wrong people, meaning her husbands and boyfriends. Now, that's funny coming from him. Dick Pound has spent his entire adult life hanging around with one of the dirtiest and most corrupt organizations on the earth: the International Olympic Committee.

Who exactly is Dick Pound? He was an Olympic swimmer for Canada in 1960 and he has been a relentless ladder climber ever since. For many years he was the right hand of that man beloved of Generalissimo Francisco Franco, former IOC president Juan Antonio Samaranch. He helped deliver the Olympics to NBC for an entire generation, and he was Samaranch's handpicked successor. But he became increasingly unpopular in the IOC because of his role as an ethics officer, and Jacques Rogge instead replaced Samaranch. In other words, Pound is a permanently marginalized (and possibly embittered) guy who was passed up.

Ever since then, Pound has been trying to become important in the Olympics again, and his chief way of doing this is to style himself the savior of purity in the Games, by accusing anyone and everyone of doping and corruption, whether there is proper evidence or not. Pound's attack on the USATF was the sort of baseless and distorted crack that has become typical of him, issued to satisfy his craving for attention. There's no doubt that USATF has had its problems. But USATF has nothing to do with drug testing or enforcement. That is the job of the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency, as Pound well knows, since he oversees USADA as head of WADA. "Mr. Pound is well known for his colorful remarks," USATF spokeswoman Jill Greer said in response to his remarks. "I would hope that as head of the World Anti-Doping Agency he would not prejudge any athlete." But that's all Pound does -- judge.

Pound has become known as the bullying head of an organization of controversial legal standards. The family of banned Australian cyclist Mark French has complained that even Saddam Hussein received better legal treatment. Among Pound's remarks and insinuations: Anyone who takes exception to his methods or those of WADA is either a guilty athlete, or part of their team. "Everyone else thinks we're doing exactly the right thing," Pound told the Canadian Press.

No, actually, they don't. Jon Drummond said during the U.S. trials, "Find out about Dick Pound and why he's coming down so hard on the United States. He's the WADA chair, he's the big man on campus. The athletes are doing what they're supposed to do. Dick sits in his office and passes out accusations."

Why is Pound beating up on the U.S. track federation, when it doesn't even control American drug testing? Why is he screaming?

Pound was vice president of the IOC and a representative of the Canadian delegation in 1988 when his countryman, Ben Johnson, was stripped of his gold medal for testing positive for steroid use. Pound was a public defender of Johnson's, arguing that he was essentially innocent, had been manipulated into taking an illegal drug unwittingly. "I'm certain he didn't know," Pound said. "I don't think he has the faintest idea what it's all about." He also said that Johnson had a "guilty body" but not the guilty intent that would have convicted him in a court of law. Johnson later confessed he had used steroids since 1981.

God forbid an American should defend a U.S. track athlete to WADA in such terms. As it happens, the United States has made strides against doping in track. The Olympic lab under the direction of the devoted and hard-working Don Catlin has made critical progress in identifying several designer drugs. What has Dick Pound ever done, except excuse Ben Johnson? As far as I can tell, Pound has committed exactly one act of any substance as the head of WADA: He moved the organization to Montreal, conveniently for him and, perhaps, his business pals. Is that an unfair accusation? Well.

Pound is also an author. He has a book out, called "Inside the Olympics." More properly, it should be entitled, "Big Events in Small Minds." Quill and Quire, a Canadian review of books, had this to say about Pound and his book: "Readers looking for the definitive exposé of Olympic greed, avarice, and scandal will be disappointed. . . .Pound occasionally comes across as supercilious and hypocritical. He pontificates about the scourge of fixed judging in figure skating and the injustice of hopped-up athletes who win medals, but fails to connect those scandals to the same morally bankrupt, win-at-all-costs attitudes that had infected the bidding process leading up to the Salt Lake scandal."

I detest Pound on principle as a hypocrite who attacks the easiest and most vulnerable targets he can find for the sake of his own advancement. He should be summarily dislodged from his job for betraying his chief responsibility as the head of WADA, to be measured and fair. Personally, I find him utterly devoid of any real Olympic spirit or spirit of justice. The Romans believed that the enforcement of an absolutely just law, without any regard for possible exceptions, resulted in absolute injustice. Or as Martin Luther King put it, "an injustice anywhere is an injustice everywhere."

We should all question, rightly, what's going on in Olympic sports and how best to make the Games fair, untainted and equitable for all competitors. But there is one person we most assuredly should not listen to, Dick Pound. He is neither fair, nor equitable, nor untainted.

 

Thanks ! I did indeed enjoy it.

The background on his career within the IOC was interesting - I wasn't aware of it, but it does reinforce my views on his motives a bit.

 

Remove the "oxy" and you've got it!

 

Quote:
In Pound's column, he says the answer to the issue of doping in cycling, "lies in the formula established by the World Anti-Doping Agency". Working with governments on "all five continents", it would appear that Pound sees a greatly enhanced role for WADA and its signatory agencies in the future; one where the scientific specialists acquire the power of law enforcement agencies.

Breaking News:


The government of Antarctica has mandated a "Shoot to Kill" policy for the continents scientific specialists and test labs across the continent and would like the other four continents to follow suit.
The president of Antarctica stated in a news conference today. "This is a warning to all professional cyclists and track and field athletes who have the notion to compete in Antarctica. Doping will not be tolerated on this continent."

 

And here he is:

 

Bobbie's comments where a 9.5 on a scale of 10 and everyone knows, there are no 10's.

Maybe he wanted to say; Quasi Frogman ?

lw

 

LOL! Very good Ullefan.


lw

 

Here Pound attacks the NHL!

http://www.cbc.ca/story/sports/national/2005/11/24/Sports/dick_pound051124.html

Sound Familar?

 

To clarify Ben Johnson and his coach Charlie Francis (who later went on to coach Marion Jones) admitted to using steroids from 1980 however they have always claimed that they were set up at the 88 Olympics by the Americans who wanted Carl Lewis to win. (insert coke and Nike). This is what made Pound and others mad. What made them madder was the US Athletic federation suppressed the positive tests by there own athletes at the US trials for the 88 Games. Florence-Griffith Joyner who could barely make an Olympic or World Championship final in years previous ran 10.49 at the US trails and her body looked like umm, err, a man ! Do you know who fast that is for a women ? Women these days barely break 11 seconds, Jones in her "alleged" doped days only got to around 10.70...(side note: Florence-Griffith Joyner died at 38 of a heart seizure)……… to be honest Pound is an overactor but he has got a point. The US have an appalling record when it comes to doping and its sporting federations have protected its athletes by surpressing positive tests and not investigating doping cases. You can sort of see his point. The US needs to clean up its act like every other country has including those of the former Soviet Socialist republics.... I think he just needs to find a better way of doing it. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dAvBonP6J0w)

 

I think it is unprofessional and biased for Pound to single out individual sportsmen or countries, it is unethical and stupid besides.

As to whether T Maloney is biased, he slams today in cyclingnews.com the US Junior track team for not getting any medals at the Worlds, and pumps up the Aussies and Brits. Well, I repeat, the word coming back from junior track worlds was that the leading riders, if not most, were juiced to the max, PERIOD. Not the US kids who cant even spell E-P-O.

Where is he on the Austrian Nordic ski team scandal at the Olympics after multiple warnings about their trainer? Has he singled out that country after multiple repeated violations.

I think if you look at cycling you will find far more cyclists positive from other countries than the USA and Floyd's case hasnt even been set for review or findings yet. I think FLoyd is the only American cyclist to be positive in the pro peloton, no?