{"id":7193,"date":"2018-04-20T09:45:04","date_gmt":"2018-04-20T07:45:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.desertsun.co.uk\/blog\/?p=7193"},"modified":"2018-04-20T09:47:53","modified_gmt":"2018-04-20T07:47:53","slug":"fair-weather-friends","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.desertsun.co.uk\/blog\/7193\/","title":{"rendered":"Fair Weather Friends"},"content":{"rendered":"

From the BBC<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\n

Lance Armstrong has agreed to pay $5m (\u00a33.5m) to the US government to settle a long-running lawsuit that could have cost him $100m (\u00a371m) in damages.<\/p>\n

The American, 46, was accused of fraud by cheating while riding for the publicly funded US Postal Service team.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I was aware that Lance Armstrong was facing a colossal lawsuit from the federal government, but didn’t know the details. I always assumed it was because sports doping is seen as a criminal matter in the US, which it generally isn’t elsewhere. Then I listened to the Joe Rogan podcast<\/a> with Armstrong and found out it was for different reasons. As the BBC says:<\/p>\n

The US Postal Service team ran from 1996 to 2004, with Armstrong winning seven Tour titles between 1999 and 2005.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So the reason the federal government is suing Armstrong is because the US Postal Service sponsored his team when he was doping. Now sure, there’s a case to answer but because it’s the federal government, well:<\/p>\n

The team were paid about $32m (\u00a323m) between 2000 and 2004, with the government potentially able to pursue ‘treble’ damages under the lawsuit, resulting in the $100m figure.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I suspect the reason why the case has been settled at “only” $5m is because, as Armstrong’s legal team always claimed, this is about damages and (according to the podcast) no less than 3 studies were carried out demonstrating that the US Postal Service benefited enormously from the publicity surrounding Armstrong’s victories (which was the whole point). I doubt the US Postal Service suffered any noticeable monetary or reputational loss when, 8 years after his last win and 9 since they stopped sponsoring Tour de France teams, it transpired their talisman was doping. I strongly suspect the $5m is symbolic, a chance for a few individuals in the federal government to advance up the career ladder and show the public they disapprove of cheating. Armstrong made the point that the reason cycling has been hit so hard is because the sport has no lobbyists in Washington DC working on their behalf, unlike banks for example.<\/p>\n

The lesson here is never, ever do business with the government in any form unless you have protection in place, like a Russian krysha<\/em>. If things go sour, and someone is looking to make a name for himself*, you could find the full force of the state bearing down on you, making up the rules as they go along.<\/p>\n

*Ask Martha Stewart about that.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From the BBC: Lance Armstrong has agreed to pay $5m (\u00a33.5m) to the US government to settle a long-running lawsuit that could have cost him $100m (\u00a371m) in damages. The American, 46, was accused of fraud by cheating while riding … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5,44],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.desertsun.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7193"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.desertsun.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.desertsun.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.desertsun.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.desertsun.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7193"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/www.desertsun.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7193\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7199,"href":"http:\/\/www.desertsun.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7193\/revisions\/7199"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.desertsun.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7193"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.desertsun.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7193"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.desertsun.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7193"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}