Panel spins its wheels

Re “Panel strips Landis of his Tour de France title,” Sept. 21

When people study the first part of this century, I anticipate they will find one dominant characteristic: beyond the abuse of power, the active pursuit -- usually successful for a time -- to spin an event to achieve their goal, even when it makes no sense. This was seen in the decision by an arbitration panel to strip Floyd Landis of his Tour de France title even though the arbiters admitted that the testing procedures and results were not completely reliable.

To admit that they did not prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that Landis took any legal or illegal substance would be for the power elite to admit their incompetence, and how could governing bodies do that?

Peter Melczer

Beverly Hills