Personally, I think it's ridiculous to classify someone's own living blood as a controlled substance. If Lance had been attacking onlookers during the race and taking some of theirs it'd be another matter.

Personally, I think it's ridiculous to classify someone's own living blood as a controlled substance. If Lance had been attacking onlookers during the race and taking some of theirs it'd be another matter.

Though it would make the Tour more interesting to watch.

Floyd Landis nd others have called for legalization of blood doping. Is it really that different than all the crazy biomechanics based traing that goes on now? Or the athletes who train extensively at high altitudes to get an oxygen boost when they race at sea level? Another step along, sure, but not like taking steroids. And stamping it out pushes people to ever more dangerous substances.

Plus it's seriously kind of neat. Science!

I'm actually kind of inclined to agree, or at least I'm definitely not inclined to see blood doping as being in the same class as steroids and the like. If anything, it's kind of the flip side of saying, "hey, dumbass, don't go and give blood the morning of a big event!"

Sports (the whole sports world, really) have a really big and maybe unresolvable tension between the myth of "we must remain Pure! and Untainted! and Noble!" (thanks, asshole Baron Coubertin) and the fact that taking every advantage you can isn't just a huge incentive, it's actually a duty (and just as much a part of the whole wacky code). And doping regulation is a giant mess; the cycling sponsors and baseball stars and other such guys with money are endlessly coming up with new stuff that isn't caught by any of the tests, and meanwhile, kids on a competitive level nobody actually cares about get smacked down for their asthma inhalers. Sigh.

Plenty of professional athletes have genetic abnormalities that enhance their performance. Just wait until genetic engineering can create those enhancements on demand....

Floyd Landis nd others have called for legalization of blood doping. Is it really that different than all the crazy biomechanics based traing that goes on now? Or the athletes who train extensively at high altitudes to get an oxygen boost when they race at sea level? Another step along, sure, but not like taking steroids. And stamping it out pushes people to ever more dangerous substances.

I don't know the ins and outs of it myself; the question I'd ask is, does it pose a significant health risk? If so, then I'm good with it being banned. If not, then I don't see a problem. (I think it raises blood pressure or such like. Whether dangerously so, I don't know.)

A republican on my friends list just posted about how the left wing believes any lie the liberal media throws at them--and that we should calm down because Romney isn't the conservative that everyone is claiming he is.

*facepalm* Not a word on the fact that his party calls Obama a secret Muslim Kenyan Marxist.

Timelies all!

Ah, the old "liberal media". Excuse me while I laugh bitterly.

Oh good LORD. My mother and I were supposed to go get our nails done this morning, but now she has to take my grandmother to the hospital, so I guess I'm going to get the mani-pedi, because we would pay for it regardless? That just doesn't feel right. And of course I missed her call by 5 minutes in the shower, and she doesn't have her cell phone on. OY.

I mean, it doesn't feel right that I'll be getting my nails done while they are taking my grandmother to the hospital, not that it doesn't feel right to have to pay if I cancel the appointment 45 minutes out, in case that wasn't clear.

What happened, Jesse?