Next thing, Congress is officially renaming it the Tour de Freedom

I do not normally read the sports sections in Slate, having no interest in American sports. I read just about everything else they put on the web, and I am sure their sport guys can write their stuff in a way that is both witty and informative, but I just don't see the need to be informed about it.

But somehow this old (july 26th) collage of quotes from international papers got sorted in the Sports section, where it caught my eye.

The link from Slate's homepage was called Sniping at America's superhero. And you've guessed it, it is bashing Europeans for being antiAmerican for bashing Lance Armstrong for being stronger than the European cyclists. I wrote about it earlier (here), debunking the same claim of antiAmericanism when it was made by a National Review wingnut. Apparently, this meme or script or talking point or what would you call it is gathering steam and the non-wingnut media are taking it up, as they are wont to do. And because Bob Somerby is busy with grander, more important items of untruth and spin I'll take it upon myself to rescue the Tour de France and the noble sport of cycling from those who would use Armstrong's achievements for unjust Europe-bashing.

Let's take a look at the Slate piece. Here it is in its entirety, only interrupted here and there for sparse comment on my part:

Tour De Lance
The international press snipes at America's superhero.
By Susan Daniels
Posted Monday, July 26, 2004, at 2:44 PM PT

Susan Daniels obviously is no cycling journalist or she would know that the Tour de Lance pun is, after six consecutive wins by Armstrong, an unforgivable cliche. In fact, had she given it half a thought, she could have deducted this without any prior knowledge of the subject. Luckily for her, she doesn't opinionate for she has discredited her opinion before she even starts writing. She might as well have started with "I KNOW NOTHING OF CYCLING I AM ONLY HERE TO GIVE YOU SOME QUOTES" as a title.

After Lance Armstrong's sixth Tour de France win on Sunday, he got a call from the president of the United States, who told him, "You're awesome." And while the European press largely agreed with that characterization, among the plaudits were plenty of sour grapes.

An editorial in Madrid's El Pais rehashed unsubstantiated rumors of drug use by Armstrong, remarking, "The triumph of Terminatour comes ... as questions are asked in various quarters if he won these six Tours cleanly or with the help of stimulants," and characterizing him as "arrogant, cold, machine-like."

Unfortunetaly, Susan Daniels fails to mention that while there is absolutely no proof of Armstrong having taken stimulants before or during this Tour de France, it is not as if there is absolutely no reason to be suspicious. The guy did test positive once (corticosteroids), and he has an EPO-guru as personal physician (although that may change if doctor Ferrari gets convicted for drug-peddling in Italy later this year).

He's characterized as "arrogant, cold, machine-like". I don't know if he is. But I am an avid cycling fan. Also, the weather in Amsterdam in July is often awful. I have watched lots and lots of stages of the Tour the last six years. And you know what? Armstrong comes across as arrogant, cold and machine-like. That doesn't mean that he is all that. It just means that he is no John Edwards, that it's unfair and unwise to judge people by how they come across on tv, but that journalists will do so anyway because they like to write nonsense about the inner-person of their subjects. They wrote the same stuff about Migual Indurain in the '90s for the very same reason.

And I understand that Susan Daniels has to rephrase the translations made by BBC monitoring for copyright reasons, but does she do an honest job? Here is the entire BBC bit (and I hope they don't sue me):

"Six times great," the Madrid daily El Pais pronounces under a photo of Mr Armstrong holding up as many fingers as his Tour wins.

But an editorial in the paper is critical of the Armstrong phenomenon.

"The triumph of Terminatour comes... as questions are asked in various quarters if he won these six Tours cleanly or with the help of stimulants," it says, although it stresses he has never tested positive.

Mr Armstrong stands accused of "being arrogant, cold, machine-like," the paper says, recalling the boos and insults to which he was subjected on this year's Pyrenean and Alpine legs of the Tour.

"But it would be unfair not to recognize his extraordinary quality and command, which from now on make him a sporting legend."

And she completely forgets to mention Le Figaro, because what it says on that same BBC-page doesn't fit the script:

"After three weeks of a supremacy that was never disputed... the American from US Postal has become a legend of the Tour," the Paris daily Le Figaro declares.

Some Lance-bashing, eh?

And in Switzerland, La Tribune de Geneve scorned Armstrong as haughty and described the U.S Postal Service team's effort as "a typically American business that scorns humanity." It went on to chide the cancer survivor: "Mankind is not fond of those who gorge themselves on success without suffering and without showing compassion for their fellows." (Translations from Spanish and French courtesy of BBC Monitoring.)

Now I have to admit that the Tribune de Geneve went totally out of line. But when you leave out the context, you are out of line as well.

This is about Armstrong winning a stage in the Tour after beating fellow escapee Andreas Kloeden in the end sprint. You have to understand, this escape was in the last of the serious mountain stages. It secured Armstrongs final victory. It would have been quite normal not to sprint and to let Kloeden win the stage. After all, unless you're Armstrong, winning a Tour de France stage is special. Stage winners can get higher starting money when after the Tour there are lots of (high paying but totally unimpressive) one day races. It keeps the team-sponsor happy, and it will reflect on future salary. One commentator said of Armstrong: "He took the bread and the crumbs". Armstrong was immediately nicknamed "the Cannibal", an honorary title because it used to belong to Eddie Merckx. And guess who was scorned in his time for taking both "the bread and the crumbs"? Right.

Liverpool's Daily Post reported that a poll conducted by a French newspaper "placed Armstrong behind only Formula One world champion Michael Schumacher and footballer Nicolas Anelka in a list of the most disliked sportsmen in France" and drily commented, "The reasons are unclear, but in the wake of the US-led war in Iraq, his nationality may be a factor."

WTF??? AntiAmericanism may be a factor in being more popular than a French football player and a Germand race driver? But wait... let's quote some more from that same article in Liverpool's Daily Post:

Then there might be the factor of the Tour becoming predictable.

Like Schumacher in his Ferrari over the course of the Formula One season, Armstrong is peerless for the three-and-a-half weeks of the arduous ride through France.

During some stages, Armstrong had to put up with spectators spitting in his direction, but he was mostly pleased with the reaction of the crowds who lined the route from start to finish - a complete distance of 3,391.1 kilometres.

"I'm not disappointed at all," said the champion. "I found that the French attitude was good throughout all three weeks."

So the editor came up with the hypothesis of antiAmericanism, but at least he had the decency to point towards a likely alternative: having one winner all the time is boring. European sports journalists have their own silly n scripts to adhere to. They hated Merckx and Indurain (and Schumacher) for winning too.

And what about the fans? Armstrong himself said the spectators were well behaved. Of course they weren't. But as Armstrong knows (and Susan Daniels doesn't) they can be an awful lot worse. Merckx never won six Tours because he was knocked off his bike by an angry fan. In the past, whole teams have had to give up because they were threatened. Cycling within inches of French fans while demoting the achievements of Anquetil and Hinault, and not getting knocked off your bike is an indication that this American has been treated better, not worse, than other non-French favorites of the past.

"Maybe it's not national but personal," speculated Alastair Campbell in the London Times. "[A]nti-Armstrongism, anti the fact that he keeps winning their game. They respect him. They admire the way he came back from cancer. They see in him a strong character who has devoted his life to their Tour. But Chirac's France wants French winners and, if it can't have them, other Europeans. But Americans? Non, merci."

This is utter bollocks. The French want French winners, yes. The Americans presumably are rooting for Armstrong, and the Germans for Ulrich. That is what it is all about and there is nothing wrong with it. Campbell seems to state that the French dislike losing to Americans more than they like losing to Germans or Danes or Spaniards. I cannot read his entire column (I could, but I don't think it is worth the money) but I doubt that he puts forward any information that backs his assertion. And what's with Chirac's France, anyway?

It also would be worth mentioning that the Times of London is no longer that paragon of journalism that it used to be. It is owned by right-wing smut-mogul Rupert Murdoch, of whom Wikipedia tells us:
Murdoch publications world-wide tend to adopt anti-French positions.

And Alistair Campbell used to be Tony Blairs spinmeister, the same one that had to resign after "sexing up" the British WMD-dossier. Excuse me, after not sexing it up. He was cleared by Lord Hutton. He actually suggested the wording of the dossier, but the Intelligence Services went along with it so it's all their fault that they caved in when the Prime Minister's right hand man came breathing down their necks. What he has to do with cycling is beyond me.

Do I think that there is widespread animosity towards Lance Armstrong among European sports fans and journalists? Kerry answer: yes and no. Sure, they don't like to see (or write about) races where one guy is so dominant that the winner is known in advance. They dislike Schumacher for the very same reason: it is no fun to watch. And they truly despised Eddie Merckx. But after retirement, people no longer watch your races, they look at your palmares. Eddie Merckx is now revered as the greatest cyclist that ever lived.

Has antiAmericanism much to do with it? No. Not one tenth as much as the reciting of script by uninvestigative journalists like Susan Daniels has to do with it.