the 60 minutes piece tonight!

[Lucky]

It is starting right now and will be the second piece to air! WATCH IT EVERYONE!!!

[Dustin]

I just finished watching it. I loved how the interviewer asked Cinquanta about the bank worker and Cinquanta responded "I can respond very easily... I don't want to". I think he knows what he should do but doesn't want to do it. :roll:

Overall, I think it was very good. I really enjoyed the Canadian judge's views.

[Lucky]

It was very interesting, but did not give any new information. There should be rule changes, especially the judging, but also on how long a skater can use the same program. The Cinquanta interview was the best part of the news peice! :lol:

[blades]

8)

i was a little disappointed...but overall...it was an o.k. segment...

remember that this is for the general public...not simply skate nuts like us...

as for speedy...he made a used car salesman look honest by comparison!!!...i mean...i mean!!!...he made david dore look like a smooth talker!!!...amazing that the other powers that be still let the man speak in public....

btw...speaking of skate NUTS...look at the thread over at fsw...some really loco (and clueless) replies there...

[loveskating]

I'm probably "clueless" but I believe there are two blocs, and both are functioning...and I think the system has to be changed to keep the functioning of both to a minimum so that the skaters can be judge fairly.

I don't think 60 Minutes presented Senft fairly...they did not check their facts or distorted the facts or lied, she lied about what happened, when it happened, etc. so that poisoned the whole thing for me...

[blades]

8)

o.k...i'll bite...wha'd she lie about

[blades]

8)

figures...after several days...no one has the answer...

so bloody easy to accuse someone...much harder to back it up with facts...

think ms. senft told the truth...just that some people have trouble handling it...

[blue111moon]

60 Minutes chose to present Senft's suspension as being solely caused by her "whistle-blowing." What they neglected to mention and I think what loveskating refers to as "lies" are the facts that she waited to report this dealmaking until months after it occured and only when she herself was being investigated for biased judging. Not to mention the fact that taping conversations without the other party's knowledge is illegal in most countries.

In short, she has her own ax to grind with the ISU AND the Canadian Federation who did nothing to help her. That makes her commentary suspect in my view.

[blades]

8)

though i've stood right next to her on a couple of occasions, i've never actually met ms. senft...however, we have several mutual friends...

next time i'm up in the vancouver area, i'll ask a few questions about this...

from what i've heard in the past though, most everyone there thinks that she did the right thing and, that the powers that be at skate canada demonstrated that their spines were made of jello...

[loveskating]

Yes, Blue111moon...that along with the fact Senft recorded Balkov mid competition; additionally, it bothers me personally that the transcript of the entire tape has never been published. In a court of law, the entire tape must be provided, in this case, the entire conversation -- and furthermore, the tape must be brand new, and proof that no tampering was done is also required -- and that is after law enforcement has gotten permission from the court to tape someone based on really serious probable cause...as you are right, it is a violation of privacy to tape record someone without court permission except in very narrowly defined circumstances. Also, the outcome had nothing to do with the "conversation" in that competition.

To Blades: as for accusations, it seems to me that ALL the accusations are coming from one direction and one direction only, with the exception of a few days at the end of the 2002 Olympics. All the claims of "wuz robbed" are coming from Western skaters, and this pre-dates the end of the Soviet Union and the entry of lots of East European countries as entities.

However, when one looks at the actual quality of the skating, there are very great skaters on BOTH sides as to blocs...there have been numerous podium and gold victories by North American and "western" skaters in all the time being discussed...how the heck do you account for that? (Brasseur & Eisler; Kurt Browning; Boitano, Orser, Kerrigan, Harding, Ito, Kwan, Torvil & Dean, Eldredge, Galindo, Candeloro, Bonaly, Wylie, Sato, Meno & Sand, and more). Were they all products of the evil empire bloc? :x

Additionally, the "witchhunting" quality of all this bothers me greatly...the mere assumption that someone is guilty is never enough for an American...there has to be proof, and lots of it.

Also, I am not calling for ANYTHING to be done to anyone, including Ms. Senft! It is you who are calling for the ruination of many people's lives, and the ruination of entire federations in figure skating, which includes the skaters in those federations! What has just occurred is the ruination and public humiliation on a world scale of Le Gougne and Didier! It is you who call for the destruction of Cinquanta -- no one else has been destroyed or humiliated in front of the whole world! Please, lets do get this straight.

Furthermore, you are asking me to believe Senft up against my own eyes as to the SKATING -- IMHO, Grishuk & Platov, Krylova and Ovsiannikov could skate CIRCLES around anyone else in the field after Torvil and Dean and Maya and Zulin went pro...therefore, its hard for me to believe Ms. Senft as I agree basically with the marks.

Additionally, IMHO, Anissina & Piezerat were quite clearly the best in the field and deserved all their medals after G&P and K&O were out....

[blades]

8)

had a chance to check this out last night...

turns out that senft had reported earlier transgressions to the isu only to be rebuffed...(very long story...)

she was told that she had no proof, etc...big line of b.s....

sooo....at nagano, knowing that since this stuff was going on all the time and that the olys was too big for there to be no attempt at a fix...she brought along her tape recorder and waited...sure enough, it happened again and she was ready...she then turned over the proof (your "illegal" tape of the phone call)...

in other words people...what y'all have heard about is simply a "sound bite" from the full story...

senft didn't lie...and...in fact...had been trying to get the isu to do something for some time...

meanwhile...the spinless leaders of skate canada (then the cfsa) hung her out to dry (thank you david dore and betty b...)

another case of the "whistle blower" getting screwed...same old same old...

[blades]

8)

btw...skating lover...perhaps you should get some new glasses...the standard issue isu rose coloured ones aren't doing ya much good...

[blue111moon]

That still doesn't explain Senft's past judging record, which is also what got her suspended.

Blades, you have one side of the story. Obviously, loveskating and I have heard another. I suspect that the truth lies somewhere in between the two.

The point is that 60 minutes presented only one side of the judging controversy. They went into this story with one assumption - "skating judging at the SLC Olympics was rigged" - and then used only the sources that would prove their point. There was no investigation on their part, they didn't try to find out the truth or cast any more light on the subject. They just handed the public the same hue-and-cry sensationalism that the media upchucked endlessly during the Olympics, with the same cast of characters.

About the only thing that interview did for me was convince me that the French judge is a flake and doesn't deserve to be on a panel at a pony show. The French Federation is obviously a mess and Cinquanta is just as obviously in over his head and being pressured by the IOC and the media way more than poor Marie ever was. Hopefully, cooler heads will prevail at the coming ISU meeting in June.

Nothing in this world ever gets done without some degree of politic being involved. Why should skating be any different?

[loveskating]

I agree, Blue111moon, Cinquanta is in over his head...

Whatever one thinks of all of this, the SMART thing for Cinquanta to have done at SLC would have been to have the hearing, as demanded by the IOC/Roggue, and at it to exonerate Le Gougne and Didier, and let the IOC and the American Media know at the following press conference in no uncertain terms that S&P did not win, ridicule any view to the contrary and counter-attack like mad, with arrogance, even. Its called "throwing it back into their lap".

In the aftermath, a smart cookie would wholesale fire and/or render ineffective via assignments etc. as many of the participants to the contrary as possible, and try to do so down through the federations, by supporting the opposition and not even deny it, outraged at the attempt to destroy a high ranking judge and two federations just because of a close call in skating.

Instead, Cinquanta provided Stapleford, Lavoie et al. with everything they wanted and needed at that point...and now they have gotten yet more, they removed Didier, the head of a federation, from the top down (neither of them will ever "come back" IMHO), and now are preparing public opinion to go after Cinquanta himself!

Instead, now Brennan (quite clearly the spokesman for Stapleford, et al.) writes that if the USFSA et al. does not get "everything they want" they should pull out of the ISU and said in her latest article, "If you didn't like what went on at SLC, you ain't seen nothing yet".

Cinquanta should either get a backbone and mobilize a majority and put a stop to this, or just resign in retirement or something and spare us all the spectacle of his ruination via similar means, and I suspect its too late for the former.

As for Le Gogune, well, she is indeed fragile. I'm sure it was a nightmare for her, but if she had a lick of sense, she would at a minimum have called up a lawyer instantly and refused to go into that meeting without one.

Certainly, if ANYONE in any responsible position shows up at any ISU competition without a lawyer in future, they are nuts...and that probably goes for the top skaters, as well.

[michele]

blades - but if you look at Senft's Nagano ordinals (I can provide links if you'd like to see for yourself) she ends up placing G&P first, K&O second, B&K third, L&A fourth and A&P fifth, just as Balkov said on the tape!!! Contrary to what 60 Minutes said, she *did* vote that way. So even if it was just coincidence, can you really blame the ISU for suspending her as well as Balkov?