Final thoughts on the Olympics:
- America won the most medals, including the most gold medals. Wow, that's better than I expected, especially since Americans in general seem more lackadaisical about the Olympics than citizens of other countries.
It seems to me that the Olympics are unfair given that typically the largest and richest countries clean up the medal count........the Aussies being the rare exception although they are a rich country comparatively. Its too bad there isn't a way to handicap events but that would probably make the judging just that more confusing.
- Quite bizarre, that guy who attacked Lima, the Brazilian marathon runner. Now that's just wrong, a guy who's been training his whole life for a chance at gold, to be three miles away from winning it only to have it taken away by some loon who thinks the world is ending.
The guy needs to be put away! At least they gave Lima a special award.
- My wife is still P.O.'d about the Paul Hamm/Yang Tae Young controversy. That Canadian skating pair got a gold medal thanks to corrupt judging, but the Korean team was told their protest doesn't matter because it was filed too late. But according to Korea, they did raise the protest at the event, only to be told by officials to wait until afterwards to raise it. Guess Korea just can't get a break. But as for me, I agree with the view that a lot of judging mistakes happen throughout competition, and unless it's blatant (e.g. corruption), nothing should come of it.
I think Hamm should give back his gold and take the silver. His gold is forever tarnished as it stands now.
- I think NBC did an excellent job with their broadcast of the Olympics. They created enough interest in the athletes, most of whom I've never heard of until now. Plus they showed enough sports, and a nice variety of them for my tastes. The tape delay, of course, is getting obsolete because of the Internet, so maybe in the next Olympics NBC will finally do away with it and show events live.
How can they show them live? Most events in Greece took place in the early morning hours here. I don't know too many people who would get up at 2 AM to watch a swim meet.
- Didn't some agency predict a greater than 50% chance of a terrorist attack happening at the Olympics?
I don't know.
Does the downing of the two Russian jetliners count?
No.
- All in all, an excellent showing by Greece, a nation that just a few years ago was scrambling to have everything ready by now. Sure, they've got a mountain of debt to pay off, but given the success of the Olympics, I feel it was more than worth it for this small nation. Bob Costas speculated that no small nation will ever be entrusted with future Olympics, a prediction I hope will be proven false.
I hope so too but his point is well taken..........Greece is in hock up to their eyeballs over these games. I didn't realize this but Greece only has 10 million people..... smaller than metro LA. They are paying for the budget overage by taking the Greeks' next year income tax refunds and apparently issuing an IOU. Bizarre!
ted |
