For NASCAR, Stewart's remarks aren't all negative (cont'd)

In that kind of environment, true objectivity can be difficult to obtain. But there's a chasm between calls that are questionable and the manipulation of events, and it's as wide as the infield at Talladega Superspeedway.

In NASCAR, secrets are impossible to keep. Anybody with the proper credentials can watch inspection or walk into the NASCAR hauler to view confiscated parts. At some tracks, race control is next to the press box, with only a glass partition separating the two. Everybody talks. Everybody knows who's dating who, whose kid is battling an illness, who's building a new house. The garage is an open forum populated by hundreds of voices. You mean to claim that we know whose marriage is in trouble, but we don't know that the sport is fixed?

Stewart's arrival not what he expected

Stewart arrived at Talladega and immediately met with NASCAR officials to discuss his behavior and criticism of officials. In the end, the former champion was fined $10,000 and put on probation for the rest of the year.

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But the black helicopter crowd sees none of that. They see the sport through the eyes of television, whose cameras often struggle to find the piece of debris that causes the caution that hurts a driver's chances of winning the race. And then more conspiracy theories are born, and the vicious cycle perpetuates itself.

NASCAR isn't alone here. The NBA has a similar problem with people believing that officials make calls in the playoffs that favor the bigger-market teams, and that commissioner David Stern even rigged the 1985 draft lottery so the New York Knicks could choose Patrick Ewing at No. 1. One columnist for ESPN.com, a respected national Web site whose parent company is a league television partner, even wrote a piece speculating as to how Stern pulled it off. Thankfully, NASCAR's press corps has yet to begin hypothesizing in print on how Dale Jr. might have gotten the "special" restrictor plate.

The NBA fines players who publicly question whether officials are favoring one team. Although Stewart was fined $10,000 for skipping media duties after his runner-up finish last week at Phoenix, he wasn't hit with a penalty for his remarks on the radio program. And that's a good thing. Because his comments, however ill-founded, have forced everyone to speak openly about an issue that's only been whispered about for years.

Openness dispels myth. It shines light in shadowy corners. In their closed-door meeting on Friday, NASCAR's brass probably told Stewart in no uncertain terms that undermining the sport's credibility could land him back in the Indy Racing League. But on the way out the door, they should have given their two-time champion a pat on the back. Because he gave the sanctioning body a chance to indirectly return fire at all those conspiracy theorists watching from their living rooms, who can now go back to claiming that the Apollo moon landing was a hoax.