Official Lance Armstrong Thread: Part 3 (Post-Confession)

[BroDeal]

I believe this is known as the PT Barnum legal gambit.

Sounds like the fiendishly cleaver Mike Tyson's defense where you say, "Those hos knew who I am so they knew what would happen."

 

[Ferminal]

So Lance testifying under oath that he never doped = USPS should have known?

 

[MarkvW]

http://www.usatoday.com/story/sport...e-armstrong-false-claims-act-defense/1947651/



Oh, that has gotta hurt the groupies. Lance is basically saying you had to be a fool to believe he was clean

This isn't like a one-time fraudulent scam that should have been discovered at a certain point in time. Lance and all of his lying and cheating teammates, managers, and gofers, continually made fraudulent representations in an ongoing attempt to hinder the discovery of their fraud. Equity is not going to let the USPS Conspiracy benefit from its lies.

SCA and the Times are excellent examples of the effectiveness of Lance's ability to suppress the truth. I'm sure that many other people who were browbeaten and threatened into submission will also be able to testify as to just how effective the USPS Conspiracy's truth-suppression efforts were. Kimmage might even fit.

Essentially Lance and his supporters set up an ongoing scheme that was designed to keep the lie alive until the statute of limitations expired. Equity exists just to make sure that deceptive sneaky schemes like that don't succeed.

 

[Scott SoCal]

http://www.usatoday.com/story/sport...e-armstrong-false-claims-act-defense/1947651/



Oh, that has gotta hurt the groupies. Lance is basically saying you had to be a fool to believe he was clean

Hombre de Subaru and Jeff Garvey must be feeling pretty idiotic nowadays.

 

[MarkvW]

So Lance testifying under oath that he never doped = USPS should have known?

More like Lance saying "I am an obvious liar, and any reasonable person should have known that I was lying every time that I said I never took drugs."

That argument would also mean that Nike knowingly sponsored a doper, then. Wouldn't it?

 

[thehog]

So Lance testifying under oath that he never doped = USPS should have known?

We will say there was enough information (about doping on the USPS team) to put you (the government) on notice, and you should have filed a false claim before," the person in Armstrong's camp says.

I like the defence. Should set a wonderful precedent. I married you but you should have know I would cheat in you.

 

[Scott SoCal]

So Lance testifying under oath that he never doped = USPS should have known?

Bingo. The Feds just have to show the SCA deposition.

Who lies under oath only to later say everybody should have known he was lying under oath?

Checkmate.

 

[D-Queued]

More like Lance saying "I am an obvious liar, and any reasonable person should have known that I was lying every time that I said I never took drugs."

That argument would also mean that Nike knowingly sponsored a doper, then. Wouldn't it?

I like.

And, I agree. Discussed before, but Nike has gone a long, long way away from Pre.

SCA and USPS may have been naive. Nike? Not.

Dave.

 

[D-Queued]

Bingo. The Feds just have to show the SCA deposition.

Who lies under oath only to later say everybody should have known he was lying under oath?

Checkmate.

Who, but a sociopath, lies under oath when these are the first questions:

16 Q. You understand that although we're in the
17 conference room of your lawyers, you are giving
18 testimony as if you are in a court of law. Do you
19 understand that?
20 A. Correct.
21 Q. And that penalties of perjury attach to this
22 deposition just like they would to a court of law
23 proceeding.
24 A. Of course.

Dave.

 

[sittingbison]

funny to reminisce that there was once a time when people who doubted Armstrong were in a VERY small minority. And that "time" was pretty much until last year when USADA charged Armstrong and his henchmen, and even then most people still refused to believe it.

 

[D-Queued]

http://www.usatoday.com/story/sport...e-armstrong-false-claims-act-defense/1947651/

Armstrong's legal team will argue the USPS knew or should have known about the doping issues long ago.

Oh, that has gotta hurt the groupies. Lance is basically saying you had to be a fool to believe he was clean

Not sure how to reconcile these statements from the SCA deposition with the Oprah admission and his new legal strategy:

8 Q. Okay. But I just want to make sure. It's
9 not that you don't remember whether that -- the
10 Indiana hospital room incident occurred. It
11 affirmatively did not take place.
12 A. No, it didn't. How could it have taken
13 place when I've never taken performance-enhancing
14 drugs?
15 Q. Okay.
16 A. How could that have happened?
17 Q. That was my point. You're not -- it's not
18 just simply you don't recall. Just --
19 A. How many times do I have to say it?
20 Q. I'm just trying to make sure your testimony
21 is clear.
22 A. Well, if it can't be any clearer than I've
23 never taken drugs, then incidents like that could
24 never have happened.
25 Q. Okay.

Dave.

 

[peterst6906]

Not sure how to reconcile these statements from the SCA deposition with the Oprah admission and his new legal strategy

Trying something new is better than sticking with the losing strategies he has agreed to of late.

It will still fail, but better than just doing the same thing over and over.

 

[D-Queued]

Trying something new is better than sticking with the losing strategies he has agreed to of late.

It will still fail, but better than just doing the same thing over and over.

Good point.

According to Einstein, insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.

So, we can conclude that Lance is not insane. Fanboys everywhere will rejoice.

He is just a simple sociopath then. Fully responsible for his actions and unable to successfully pursue an insanity defense.

Dave.

 

[frenchfry]

http://www.usatoday.com/story/sport...e-armstrong-false-claims-act-defense/1947651/



Oh, that has gotta hurt the groupies. Lance is basically saying you had to be a fool to believe he was clean

For maybe the first time, Armstrong and his paid thugs are simply stating an obvious truth.

 

[MarkvW]

Trying to imagine Tim Herman making the argument that "everybody should have known that Lance was a lying doper."

 

[TheEnoculator]

http://www.usatoday.com/story/sport...e-armstrong-false-claims-act-defense/1947651/



Oh, that has gotta hurt the groupies. Lance is basically saying you had to be a fool to believe he was clean

This is interesting. Usually when there are allegations of employees committing fraud, the employer, and it's been true since the dawn of time, will always conduct internal investigations to determine if the allegations are substantiated. This is not like lying to your aunt. A big organization is always equipped to protect itself from fraudulent behaviours, not by simply asking "did you do it? No? Alright then."

The big problem is, the government is crying foul now. But did they ever conduct internal investigations on Armstrong? If not, why not? Allegations had been rampant since at least 1999.

 

[sittingbison]

...The big problem is, the government is crying foul now. But did they ever conduct internal investigations on Armstrong? If not, why not? Allegations had been rampant since at least 1999.

The word "rampant" is not correct at all. A very small minority of enthusiasts has fought a long lonely war against a veritable horde of fanbois, the general public, the fourth estate and the governing bodies and race organisors. The occasional journo would write an article that either got sued or totally ignored by the authorities. The authorities themselves stated numerous times nothing was amiss. Armstrong said under oath nothing was amiss.

Care to remember the "never tested positive" arguments?

Its laughable that their strategy to keep his sorry ar$e out of jail and his filthy lucre largely intact has come down to suggesting everyone including the government should have known.

What did Tygart and the USADA reasoned decision say? Something along the lines of "This is the greatest fraud ever perpetrated in cycling" said fraud specifically intended to PREVENT knowledge of doping entering the public domain.

 

[TourOfSardinia]

According to Einstein, insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
...
Dave.

It's not rocket science but it is Quantum Mechanics!

 

[peterst6906]

Good point.

According to Einstein, insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.

So, we can conclude that Lance is not insane. Fanboys everywhere will rejoice.

He is just a simple sociopath then. Fully responsible for his actions and unable to successfully pursue an insanity defense.

Dave.

Yep pretty much.

 

[aphronesis]

This is interesting. Usually when there are allegations of employees committing fraud, the employer, and it's been true since the dawn of time, will always conduct internal investigations to determine if the allegations are substantiated. This is not like lying to your aunt. A big organization is always equipped to protect itself from fraudulent behaviours, not by simply asking "did you do it? No? Alright then."

The big problem is, the government is crying foul now. But did they ever conduct internal investigations on Armstrong? If not, why not? Allegations had been rampant since at least 1999.

Because it wasn't a priority for the government during those years. At a time when the US was more unpopular abroad--in thoroughgoing terms--than it had been for arguably decades, a US athlete cheating at and dominating a national foreign event all the while promoting all the so-called "virtues" of the "wholesome" and one-dimensional American dream/success story was not going to be someone that the US govt. was going to investigate. The more so that he was doing it in a secularized context during an obscene revival of Protestant sprituality.

And especially not when its senior officers were perpetuating all kinds of fraud. Self-reflection and scrutiny were not the orders of the day back then. All the more so if, as argued, he was generating revenue for an ailing federal institution and elsewhere besides. On a macro level it seems that many of the same elements that made it an expedient arrangement back then are the same ones allowing it to constrict back around him now.

Of course it wouldn't have hurt if hadn't consumed quite so much of his own self image along the way.

 

[RobbieCanuck]

This is interesting. Usually when there are allegations of employees committing fraud, the employer, and it's been true since the dawn of time, will always conduct internal investigations to determine if the allegations are substantiated. This is not like lying to your aunt. A big organization is always equipped to protect itself from fraudulent behaviours, not by simply asking "did you do it? No? Alright then."

The big problem is, the government is crying foul now. But did they ever conduct internal investigations on Armstrong? If not, why not? Allegations had been rampant since at least 1999.

The employer of the riders including LA was not the USPS, but rather Tailwind. USPS was just the sponsor. Having Tailwind investigate the team for doping is like asking the fox to investigate why the population of chickens in the coop is declining.

 

[spalco]

I know very little about US law, can someone please explain to me in simple terms how exactly the USPS conspiracy "defrauded" the US government? I'm not an Armstrong fan in any way, but on the surface I'm not really convinced by that argument. Didn't the US Postal Service profit from Armstrong's wins regardless of him doping or not? The publicity they got from those wins at the time doesn't just disappear now that it's proven it was all bull****, it was "real" while the contract existed.

I guess I must be missing something here, because clearly you all here, the media and Armstrong are taking this very seriously, but I don't really understand how his cheating was "fraud" on the US government. Certainly it was fraud on the sport and the fans, but his sponsors did very well from their association with him it seems to me.

 

[aphronesis]

I know very little about US law, can someone please explain to me in simple terms how exactly the USPS conspiracy "defrauded" the US government? I'm not an Armstrong fan in any way, but on the surface I'm not really convinced by that argument. Didn't the US Postal Service profit from Armstrong's wins regardless of him doping or not? The publicity they got from those wins at the time doesn't just disappear now that it's proven it was all bull****, it was "real" while the contract existed.

I guess I must be missing something here, because clearly you all here, the media and Armstrong are taking this very seriously, but I don't really understand how his cheating was "fraud" on the US government. Certainly it was fraud on the sport and the fans, but his sponsors did very well from their association with him it seems to me.

Because the money was not used according to the terms by which it was promised. The argument is that US federal funds were solicited under certain conditions and contractual promises that were not maintained.

The issue is adherence to the agreement by which sponsorship was given, not the results--however material and actual they may have been.

 

[blackcat]

I know very little about US law, can someone please explain to me in simple terms how exactly the USPS conspiracy "defrauded" the US government? I'm not an Armstrong fan in any way, but on the surface I'm not really convinced by that argument. Didn't the US Postal Service profit from Armstrong's wins regardless of him doping or not? The publicity they got from those wins at the time doesn't just disappear now that it's proven it was all bull****, it was "real" while the contract existed.

I guess I must be missing something here, because clearly you all here, the media and Armstrong are taking this very seriously, but I don't really understand how his cheating was "fraud" on the US government. Certainly it was fraud on the sport and the fans, but his sponsors did very well from their association with him it seems to me.

what about the inverse annuity in publicity terms that the United States Postal Service incurs with the association to "The Greatest Sporting Fraud in History".

As Betsy says, (ABS), "The Bernie Madoff of Sport".

 

[Dr. Maserati]

This is interesting. Usually when there are allegations of employees committing fraud, the employer, and it's been true since the dawn of time, will always conduct internal investigations to determine if the allegations are substantiated. This is not like lying to your aunt. A big organization is always equipped to protect itself from fraudulent behaviours, not by simply asking "did you do it? No? Alright then."

The big problem is, the government is crying foul now. But did they ever conduct internal investigations on Armstrong? If not, why not? Allegations had been rampant since at least 1999.

Good point.
The USPS should have asked independent entities like the UCI and USA Cycling should they have any concerns about continuing the sponsorship of the Lance and his buddies

What part of conspiracy do you need explained?