Reality to Earth - Rule 40 prohibits an athlete from partaking in any promotions during the course of the Olympic Games . . . That's The Olympic Games, which is probably the largest promotional event anywhere on the planet.
Down in the pool, an American man-child who just happens to swim like Flipper and has taken home the most medals ever . . .
Read that again. Most. Medals. EVER.
There's a rumbling somewhere below the surface that in his off time during the Olympic games, Michael Phelps took part in a Louis Vuitton advertising campaign, having photos taken for a promotion to be released after the Olympics . . .
I don't mean to be picky, but read THAT again. To be released. AFTER. The Olympics.
And thanks to the fact someone LEAKED the photos during the game, UNOFFICIALLY, there's word they want to take back the medals which make Phelps the top Olympic gold-miner of all time owing to RULE 40, which is a NEW rule to help prevent anyone who hasn't bought in as an official sponsor to get a taste of the billions of dollars being passed around the table. (Is it serve from the right, pick up from the left? I'm always getting confused.)
Somewhere in between the dreams of Baron Pierre de Coubertin in creating an Olympic committee for the modern amateur games and today, more than a few cogs have been slipped in the administration of this event. It is rife with questionable bidding wars for sites, more promotional product tie-ins than one could reasonably shake a stick at, and professional athletes of every form finding a place to ply their individual trades.
Tennis, anyone? That's just an example, but check the starting line-up at the US Open and match it against the opening seedings for the Olympics competition. No one seemed to mind the star power there, did they?
It's always the athlete whose gone that extra mile in training to do his or her best who'll have someone throw the flag (or red card) in their face. Now the person, clean of any other possible infractions, they've practically anointed the best of the best for his work IN THE POOL, is possibly going to get his hand slapped for something which happened OUT OF THE POOL.
Once upon a time readers, there was a track and field athlete who was considered the greatest of his day. He won the decathlon and pentathlon in the same games, but because he played Carolina League Baseball for a pittance for a few summers, he was stripped of any medals and statuary he'd been given. This was in 1912, and the athlete was Jim Thorpe, who, as time passed, became one of the first members of an organization originally known as the APFA, which is now known as the NFL. In 1983, thirty years after he passed on, the medals were reinstated, (Despite the previous objections of those such as his former teammate and IOC President Avery Brundage) but the fact we're still discussing stripping an athlete of the medal he's won for non-sports related reasons a century after the fact shows there's still a massive hypocrisy involved in the structure and rulings of this so-called amateur event.
It's a sports competition. Let the fair play on the field decide who gets to keep their medals.(And for crying out loud, can I not be made to look at so much as the shadow of a synchronized swimmer or rhythm gymnast for the next four years? Just asking.)
Thursday, August 23, 2012
Friday, August 17, 2012
Looking Through the Glass
Reality to Earth - Falling off the horse is always easier than getting back on. Saddle up.
And welcome back to the dusty corners of a writer's mind in the midsummer of an election year. Let's see, what's sitting on the back burner?
- The donkeys and the elephants are in full swing, each trying to prove their hot mess is better than the other sides hot mess, with the donkeys' hot mess currently in charge of a hot potato he's dropped so many times it's mashed. (Guys . . . A Chicago politician? Really? And all this surprised you?)
- Major movie events have joined the ranks of 'Things Crazy People Interrupt With Obscene Violence", thanks to some red-hair-dyed nut case in Colorado. I'm not sure if gun control is the answer, because it's the illegal guns which cause too much of the violence and people have the right to protect themselves, but I do think when someone orders a veritable shitload of ammunition, maybe a red flag should be thrown up somewhere. How about it?
- Prices are rising in all areas, yet the Consumer Price Index, which for as long as I can remember had been dragged to the front page and held up like a dead mouse by a proud cat every time it went up on someone else's watch, goes virtually unspoken on the nightly news. (Here's a clue - It's up, but let's not tell all of those nasty old curmudgeons on Social Security, they might actually want some more of the money they paid into that insurance system back to make up for the changes.)
- In sports - Part 1 - An Olympics has come and gone with the usual mix of feel good stories, overt over-marketing and accusations of cheating. BMX biking is in while baseball and softball are out, synchronized swimming is just as silly as ever, but on the plus side, gymnasts are looking more like athletes and less like candidates for 'Toddlers and Tiaras'.
- In sports - Part 2 - The NBA had one of the ugliest partial seasons you'd ever want to see, with games stacked end to end following a labor mess which could have been avoided, and the NHL, which had possibly one of the better season and post-seasons in recent memory, is about to do them one better by crashing a part or their whole 2013-14 season because the job they did seven years ago doesn't allow them to keep losing franchises in cities which can't support them. (Note to the commissioner - Shutting the doors four times in one term isn't anyone's idea of how to do your job properly. Figure it out or resign.)
- I'd still rather watch USA Network than NBC. Someone out there doesn't get it.
- Nice pictures from Loch Ness. Still doesn't tell us what's down there, but the unidentified swimming object in the new pictures is a lot nicer looking than the unidentifiable swimming object in the last pictures.
- On a personal note - It should take less than two years to decide 'yes' or 'no' on publishing a book, shouldn't it? Just venting, kids . . . The Business of Writing is less fun than the process of creation. By a lot.
Now that we've gotten some housecleaning out of the way, the next trick is to look over the field and see which target deserves a good harpooning. Maybe I'll add an unidentifiable picture of it.
And welcome back to the dusty corners of a writer's mind in the midsummer of an election year. Let's see, what's sitting on the back burner?
- The donkeys and the elephants are in full swing, each trying to prove their hot mess is better than the other sides hot mess, with the donkeys' hot mess currently in charge of a hot potato he's dropped so many times it's mashed. (Guys . . . A Chicago politician? Really? And all this surprised you?)
- Major movie events have joined the ranks of 'Things Crazy People Interrupt With Obscene Violence", thanks to some red-hair-dyed nut case in Colorado. I'm not sure if gun control is the answer, because it's the illegal guns which cause too much of the violence and people have the right to protect themselves, but I do think when someone orders a veritable shitload of ammunition, maybe a red flag should be thrown up somewhere. How about it?
- Prices are rising in all areas, yet the Consumer Price Index, which for as long as I can remember had been dragged to the front page and held up like a dead mouse by a proud cat every time it went up on someone else's watch, goes virtually unspoken on the nightly news. (Here's a clue - It's up, but let's not tell all of those nasty old curmudgeons on Social Security, they might actually want some more of the money they paid into that insurance system back to make up for the changes.)
- In sports - Part 1 - An Olympics has come and gone with the usual mix of feel good stories, overt over-marketing and accusations of cheating. BMX biking is in while baseball and softball are out, synchronized swimming is just as silly as ever, but on the plus side, gymnasts are looking more like athletes and less like candidates for 'Toddlers and Tiaras'.
- In sports - Part 2 - The NBA had one of the ugliest partial seasons you'd ever want to see, with games stacked end to end following a labor mess which could have been avoided, and the NHL, which had possibly one of the better season and post-seasons in recent memory, is about to do them one better by crashing a part or their whole 2013-14 season because the job they did seven years ago doesn't allow them to keep losing franchises in cities which can't support them. (Note to the commissioner - Shutting the doors four times in one term isn't anyone's idea of how to do your job properly. Figure it out or resign.)
- I'd still rather watch USA Network than NBC. Someone out there doesn't get it.
- Nice pictures from Loch Ness. Still doesn't tell us what's down there, but the unidentified swimming object in the new pictures is a lot nicer looking than the unidentifiable swimming object in the last pictures.
- On a personal note - It should take less than two years to decide 'yes' or 'no' on publishing a book, shouldn't it? Just venting, kids . . . The Business of Writing is less fun than the process of creation. By a lot.
Now that we've gotten some housecleaning out of the way, the next trick is to look over the field and see which target deserves a good harpooning. Maybe I'll add an unidentifiable picture of it.
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