Austria has its own « Lance Armstrong »

In March 2009, I wrote an entry on this blog trying to deal with the Austrian tradition of « Wegschauen » (look away). I focused on three stories at very different levels: the way the State wept of the Fritzl case avoiding any ground thoughts on how it could happen, the bank secrecy… and the way some Austrian officials dealt with doping. This last case calls today for an important update. Susanne Pumper (born 1970) was until 2008 one of the best long distance runners in the country. Lance Armstrong won seven times the Tour de France, Mrs Pumper’s best achievement was a second place at the 2005 European Indoor Championships (3000m). I ran with her in Vienna of the winter half marathons in March 2008 (organized by her track club, the LCC, probably the most well-known in Austria). At the arrival, she was submitted to a doping test. The test was positive and proved the presence of EPO in her blood. The reaction of her track club at this point was amazing enough to launch quite a few comments: Mrs Pumper got a promotion and was named in charge of the organization of the major LCC event, the Fall Marathon. At the same time, the trainer who ordered the doping test, Wilhelm Lilge, was fired, as well as his wife who also worked at the LCC. There were already many rumors in the case of Mrs Pumper and Lilge hoped to clean the image of his club by ordering a doping test, an idea which at the end did not bring the desired result. Six other female athletes from the LCC were to be convicted over doping, two Slovenians and four Austrians (Jolanda Ceplak , Helena Javornik, Lisa Hütthaler, Bettina Müller-Weissina, Stephanie Graf and more recently Eva Maria Gradwohl). 

Un antisémitisme digne de celui des années 30

« Les banques, le gouvernement, le peuple »

Très populaire auprès des jeunes, le chef de file de l’extrême droite autrichienne, Heinz-Christian Strache veille particulièrement à ce que son mur sous Facebook soit régulièrement actualisé. Il faut dire que Facebook reste très apprécié des ados et qu’en Autriche le droit de vote est à 16 ans. Ceci dit, certaines photos pourraient aussi plaire aux plus âgés, notamment ceux qui ont quelques souvenirs de la Seconde Guerre mondiale et de l’hebdomadaire nazi Der Stürmer. Après avoir posté quelques photos de vacances et avoir annoncé l’inauguration en grande pompe de la boutique de sa petite amie, M. Strache a jugé opportun d’illustrer son propos contre le Mécanisme européen de stabilité en publiant la caricature ci-contre. Le banquier est clairement dessiné comme la caricature nazie du juif et ses boutons de manchettes ne sont autres que des étoiles de David. Le secrétaire général du parti, Harald Vilimsky, a déclaré qu’il fallait vraiment souffrir « d’une sacrée imagination paranoïaque pour voir des étoiles de David dans ces boutons de manchettes brillants. Le parquet de Vienne a commencé à instruire l’affaire.