Remember a couple of months ago when it seemed the whole world was up in arms over the Pairs Figure Skating scandal at the Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City?

The Canadian pair, Jamie Sale and David Pelletier, skated an emotional, artistic, virtually flawless routine. The Russian pair, Elena Berezhnaya and Anton Sikharalidze skated an emotional artistic but flawed routine.

But five judges placed the Russians ahead of the Canadians in the final scoring.

At the time, many of us expected that the whole issue would just blow over and be forgotten in a few weeks. That’s pretty much what has happened before in similar rhubarbs.

But this time it will be different. This time the powers-that-be in the International Skating Union still are talking about it. This past week, they held two days of hearings to gather evidence that will be considered by the ISU at its June meeting.

They pretty much has decided that someone’s head will roll, but whose and how far still is in question.

You may remember that French Judge Marie-Heine Le Gougne was at the center of the storm in February. She had said the preceding November that a French Ice sports federation official, Didier Gailaguet, had asked her to vote for the Russian pair in exchange for support of the French Ice Dancing team.

Le Gougne later denied the story, as did Gailhaguet.

Vicki Michaelis, writing in USA Today, says that some ISU members want to suspend the entire French skating federation as the Soviets were in 1978. U.S. skating judge, Bob Horne, sort of put things in perspective, according to Michaelis, when he said that no one really knows where the problem is.

Horen continued that if the problem is a corrupt judge, get rid of her/him, but that if the system is corrupt, it needs to be fixed and one judge should not be the scapegoat.

According to Michaelis, the Associated Press reported an interesting development this week. The AP said that referee Ron Pfenning and judge Jon Jackson, both Americans, asked the ISU to disqualify American councilmember Claire Ferguson from the hearings.

They claim that Ferguson already has made up her mind and favors only light punishment, if any, for Le Gougne and Gailhaguet.

Gailhaguet was quoted as saying that he is the target of a plot by the British and North Americans and warned that he would not be done in by what he called “Anglo-Saxon lobbying”.

Now there’s an interesting term. It brings to mind images of political intrigue involving not only Angles and Saxons, but also Jutes, Celts and Picts. Except they seldom used politics, favoring instead swords and clubs, if I remember my high school history.

Who said figure skating isn’t exciting?