Xplora wrote:Which in common pub language is "soft/weak/gutless"
Sure, it's all legal stuff, and that's fair enough, but you don't go public with all this stuff if you don't have the ability to actually put your money where your mouth is.....the legal process occurs in the public space, and if you cannot bring all the evidence into the public space with you when you make an accusation against a famous figure (using weasel words like cases pending etc) then you should keep that accusation to yourself. Resolve your cases, then
.....not very nice bit removed (be nice).... 
Using pub language about this sort of stuff is a bit like the pub language that says all cyclists are lycra hoons who should be paying rego. It can simply be shorthand for not knowing what is going on, for not having done research, and not giving people the respect one expects for oneself.
People could probably complain about your profession or trade with pub language too, but that may just be because they don't know how it works. I bet I don't know everything about what you do for a living so why should you or I know exactly how USADA should operate and why they work like that?
My degree is in this area, I did a thesis on the laws applying to sporting bodies and I have worked as a regulator and investigator for years and yet it would take me ages to work out whether USADA was really operating correctly, so with respect I can't see how it can be so easy for someone from the outside to waltz into a pub and say "I'm an expert on US administrative law and I know incontrovertibly that USADA are crap." Anyone who could do that would be earning a fortune at the bar.
Running a regulatory body and an investigation is a complex exercise in which many conflicting factors have to be balanced. You have to encourage people to give evidence, but also give people the chance to rebut it. You have to be able to dig deep into lives without destroying them. This is NOT easy and to be honest it gets a bit frustrating when people who have never done it show such contempt for those who do. As in any job, there are problems that people on the outside do not know about and there are reasons why things are done the way they are, although as in any job human factors do come into play and there are mistakes - which is why there are avenues such as arbitration which Lance has decided not to take.
Many legal matters are
not fought out in the public space. NDAs etc are very common. Even when an regulator releases a decision or a court comes to a decision they do not release every bit of evidence to the public. I have seen pics of bodies doing things, or bits of bodies, that were used as evidence that you would not want on the front page of your paper, believe me.
"Case pending" is not a weazel word, it is a statement of the fact that a case is coming up. What is the alternative to ASADA saying things like "case pending"?
Exactly what do you want a body such as ASADA to say when they are preparing a case and the press asks for info, if they do not use such "weazel words"?
Do you want them to say "we refuse to confirm or deny that we are contemplating a case" or something similar? Surely that is more "weazelly" than "case pending". Or do you want them to lie to the public? These things do tend to get a lot more public in America, but that seems to go both ways.
Armstrong's side has made many attacks on witnesses, as any quick Google shows, and therefore USADA's claim that they are protecting witnesses doesn't seem to be unreasonable.
