Olympics and Other Strenuous Nonsense

OK, so the Olympics are coming up. I am very excited. I was a volunteer at the 2002 winter olympics, and it kinda got in my blood. Plus, America wins the medal count every time, so I have good reason to be optimistic.

The fact that the Olympics, or the 'Limpics' as I call them (Sometimes just 'Limpees' for short) are in China this go-round just makes things that much more interesting. By interesting I mean rant-worthy.

Cut to the rant: I am somewhat more familliar with the vagaries of communism than your average American. I happen to be married to a recovering communist. Due to this familiarity, I have come to learn that a communist government is a system that exists virtually exclusively to perpetuate itself, at the cost of its own people. Now, as I re-read what I just wrote, I realise that this could basically describe any political system, but communism perpetuates itself at an especially high cost to the prosperity and liberties of its people, and then keeps its people from complaining about the cost. In my book, a system that disallows dissidence is a weak system. The ability to abide dissent is proof of an internally strong, justified government.

What does this have to do with the Limpees? Well, China is trying to play its whole Two Systems foolery to the full-out extent. They invite the whole world to come and play, then they get angry when the world wants to play according to its own rules. You can't seriously invite American atheletes into China and expect them to stop thinking like Americans, can you?

Obviously, that is precisely what China is doing. Check out just this one story, for example: http://www.usatoday.com/sports/olympics/beijing/2008-08-06-cheek-visa-revoked_N.htm

For those of you too hurried or lazy to read the article, the gyst is this: Joey Cheek, a winter olympian, was going to go to China to support his warmer-climate-cohorts, but the Chinese denied him a visa. Why? Because he is a cofounder of the ideological group Team Darfur, which is a group of 100+ olympians who have declared their support for Darfur and, by extension, their opposition to the Sudanese government. Well, China doesn't like this, since they are buddy-buddy with Sudan (that's were they get their oil. Why does everyone go stupid for oil? Oil is the devil's blood, me thinks). So the Chinese government turns around and denies Joey a visa to even enter their country. Give me a break. If they would have just let him in he would not have made such a stink and would have likely gone mostly un-noticed, but now he is showing up in major publications, such as this blog and USA Today.

Anyway, I love what the US Olympic team turned around and did on the same day as Joey was denied his visa. They named Lopez Lomong the banner carrier, who himself is a Darfur refugee! Take THAT communist censorship! There is no way the Chinese would risk the embarassment (then again, they might. . .) of shipping our FLAG BEARER home, so this man, this living, breathing proof of the attrocities going on in Darfur, is going to be on billions of televisions as he walks beneath the Stars and Stripes in opening and closing ceremonies. I am laughing myself to the hiccups over here! I love poetic justice like this. Nowhere like the Olympics do countries get such an open stage to express themselves. It is completely sweet that China is not getting its way in trying to make this a non-issue. Bravo to the US Olympic team for picking a man who represents so well what America is (or should be) about - a place where people are free to pursue their dreams regardless of their background, and where they can speak their minds without fear of reprisals.

I predicted months ago that the Chinese Olympics would be fraught with protests, especially people protesting Chinese foreign policies like the annexation of Tibet and the friendly relationship with Sudan. With all of the world tuning in, how could the strong passions of so many people possibly NOT be expressed. I hope everything goes peacefully and that the games are a success, but I also hope they are a failure. I hope they are a failure for Communist China's attempt to invite the world to honor them, but in turn to dishonor the world by disallowing the world's oppinions.

Sorry, China. You can't have your cake and eat it, too.