A Floyd Landis stream of consciousness

Let down by another hero. It's looking increasingly likely--though by no means certain--that Floyd Landis will get busted for testosterone doping and stripped of his Tour de France title. (Yahoo)

I feel a little bit like I did when the Monica Lewinsky scandal broke. For context, I really idolized Bill Clinton during his first term, despite NAFTA and the health plan failure and so forth. (In high school my backpack sported a button with his photo and the slogan,"Democrat Women Stand By Their Man," which I had picked up at the Tennessee Democratic Party's booth at the Appalachian Regional Fair in 1992. Really wish I still had that awesome button.)

Anyway, when the Lewinsky/perjury allegations surfaced, I was pissed. Not exactly surprised or suddenly disillusioned, but pissed, the way you might be pissed at your little brother for doing something stupid, like egging the neighbors' house and getting caught. It's like, "You jackass. It's bad enough you did it. But to do it and then sign your name in spray paint on the driveway--that's just idiotic."

And that is somewhat how I feel about Landis right now...I mean, sure, "everyone dopes." But you shoot up testosterone during the Tour? And then make sure to win the stage so you'll definitely get tested? C'mon, man.

As a side note on the Clinton thing, I would later find it oddly prophetic that Paul Simon's "You Can Call Me Al" was chosen as a Clinton-Gore theme song during the 1992 campaign season. Consider the following verse.

Who'll be my role-model?
Now that my role-model is ....
Gone ...... gone,
He ducked back down the alley
With some... roly-poly, little bat-faced girl.
All along .... along ....
There were incidents and accidents,
There were hints and allegations .....