soogar: You make some good points in your post. One point I definitely agree with you on is that the skating world didn't warm up to Tara, and I can pin the blame for that on two people: Her mother and her agent. Tara had an agent before she was ever famous, and her mother did everything possible to put her in the public eye, often annoying other skater's parents. I live in the Delaware Valley area and I can remember articles about her in the Philly papers way before her win at Nationals in 97, back in the days when she was training at U Del with the coach she had prior to Callaghan. In fact, the chapter in Christine Brennan's book about Tara's tantrums on ice that upset so many Tara fans (the description of her "frenzies") came from this time period. This IMO was a typical classic error by Tara's Mom and agent: Mom talked to Brennan (she is quoted in the chapter directly) about Tara's jumping obsession and then gets upset later when Brennan puts it in book in an unflattering manner which doesn't come out until after Tara wins the OGM and is a big star. I think the problem was that Mom was determined to give Tara her wish to become a star, and sometimes the eagerness to do so got in the way of forethought and real thinking about the consequences of some of their actions. Is one sense, Tara was the first (noticeable) pre-packaged skating star, with an agent and a publicity machine going prior to any real results. That was completely different from the way it was done before--usually the skater had to make a splash on the National/International scene first--either by a big win (Peggy and Dorothy at O's, Kristi at Nationals/Worlds) or by a unique set of skills or circumstances (Michelle becoming the alternate at 94 O's, Tonya's triple axel in 91) before the media noticed or they had a agent and the ball started rolling. Tara was packaged to be the next big thing from the age of 12 on, and I think that caused a lot of resentment with people. Was some of it jealousy? Sure, but I think a lot of it was just upset with a pushy publicity system that the skating world wasn't used to.
Michelle's reaction to her silver in 98 likely made a big splash because it was so different from what the media was used to seeing. I recall one reporter describing in his article that he had seen everything in sport, from Charles Barkely spitting on spectators, to various major league tantrums from team sports millionaires, and here was this young girl, who just suffered the biggest crushing defeat of her life, and she is asked to comment on her opponent and she smiles and says "I like you, Tara." Did it get overblown? Sure. But it was a heck of a change from the usual, especially after Nancy Kerrigan's bitterness (which I think was justified) over her loss in 1994.
The media can make or break an image, and in the long run, while she's had her share of criticism, Michelle fared better. Tara was a unique skater with a totally new way of making a name for herself, and then she left eligible skating seemingly as quickly as she came. Unfortunately, it was all new to everyone, and the media and the skating world didn't take to it as kindly as the Lipinski's would have liked.
Rgirl. Tone is so hard to interpret on the web. 
MUCHAS FELICIDADES, MAZAL TOV, ET AL!!!
And I wish all three happiness in whatever path each has chosen to walk.
