Can we get a Boo for Bettini
If Cancellara is King then surely Bettini must be his boss. He must be eveyones boss if he gets away with what he has done in winning the World Road Championships amidst a furore regarding his refusal to sign an anti-doping charter.
Frankly I don’t care if he is clean or otherwise, his actions have made him implicitly guilty. By refusing to sign a charter which seeks to limit the use and performance enhancing drugs and impose greater sanctions on cheats, Bettini has alienated himself. Cycling has a well acknowledge problem it needs to clean upT, anyone who stands in the way of seeking a cleaner sport makes themself an enemy of cycling. Bettini’s actions are tantemount to a politician refusing to sign an anti-corruption charter or a nation refusing to accept new pollution limits. Who does that? Well to keep with that analogy the main oposition to the Kyoto protocol is the US - who are also the largest polluters. They oppose action to clean up because they are the worst offenders and it affects them most and the they have the most to lose financially.
So Bettini has alienated himself, his objection being the frankly ludicrous explanation that he is “unhappy with a clause forcing any rider given a doping ban of two years to pay a year’s salary, plus the standard fine“. In the same week that a top female cyclist admitted to using EPO since the age of 16, what are the public expected to think.
Bettini’s objection lies with the logic that if one cheats to make ones salary that they should not have to pay back that money when they are caught. If you lied to withhold money from the government you would pay huges fines as well as the money back, you could even go to jail. But if you lie, cheat and steal you shouldn’t have to incur any sanction - such is Bettini’s view.
As mature logic clearly does not trouble the man, all I can say is BOOOOOOO!
Posted 30.09.07