He's a criminal. He has stolen people's livelihoods. There must be thousands of clean athletes scrabbling around on the bottom end of the employment structure because that's all that's possible, and he's taken away their career.
Nicole Cooke in The Guardian
This is the truth of the matter.
Armstrong says that cheating was the only option left to him if he wanted to succeed.
He should be shunned from society. He is a man with no sense of honour. His photos should be torn down. His memorabilia should be burned.
For the crimes he has committed to his community, in the pursuit of being a somebody, the appropriate penalty is to make him a nobody. He should feel shame for the rest of his life.
His "poor little Lance" routine is nothing but a spit in the face of those who were in the same situation and chose to not cheat.
"But I wanted so badly to win" is the same excuse my five year old niecews would use if they were to cheat at a game.
Winning is not the point of competition. Competition is about testing oneself. Lance Armstrong failed that test and Nicole Cooke has succeeded. That's what makes her the winner.
We should be paying more attention to the ones who played by the rules and were not rewarded. They deserve our respect, admiration and probably some compensation.