For the Love of Badminton!

Every Olympic Gamesis known for something. Previous games have been known for performance enhancing drug use, terrorist attacks, and even losing the keys to Olympic venues.

The London Olympics stand out because of a scandal in the highly competitive, engrossing, sport of badminton.

Three teams from Singapore, Indonesia, and China were dismissed from the Olympic Games for intentionally trying to lose their pool matches, in order to get easier matches in the next round of the tournament.

In the China case, losing would’ve separated their two teams, giving them an opportunity to win two medals instead of one.

I put this on the blog because it is an open question whether a government could condone such behavior.

There is unquestioned prestige in the winning of an Olympic gold medal.

For the athletes, there’s the added perk of fame and notoriety, particularly in some of these Southeast Asian countries. There have certainly been allegations of athletes in Communist countries doing everything to get ahead.

But isn’t the prospect of being caught, a far greater embarrassment than any potential gain?

Two Koreas Meet at The Pong Table

A notable event occurred at the Olympics last week when the North and South Korean ping pong teams met over the ping pong table.

The match won by South Korea is unlikely to have the same effect as the historical U.S.- China ping pong diplomacy during the 1970’s because the countries have grown further apart since the death of Kim Jong IL, though to be fair relations have never been spectacular in the years since one Korea, became two.

Not sure whether this speaks to the sad state of relations between the two Koreas, or the true glory of the Olympics that we can get a moment that probably won’t be repeated anytime soon.

 The two countries are far apart economically and socially and a series of weapons launches and military exercises would seem to indicate that the two sides will not be meeting for tea anytime soon.

It’s really quite sad that the two Koreas can only meet at the business end of a ping pong table.

Romney vs. Cameron: Olympic Smackdown

Mitt Romney ran the Salt Lake City Olympics in 2002 and is apparently an avid fan of the Olympics.

He raised the ire of our British friends recently when he questioned the readiness of the city of London to put on the Games. This prompted British Prime Minister David Cameron to quip “Of course it’s easier if you hold an Olympic Games in the middle of nowhere.”

It should be noted that since this incident the London Games have endured a badminton scandal and someone lost the keys to Wimbley Stadium. Not exactly sterling silver material.

The Olympics is a difficult event to secure, out of sheer size if nothing else. The challenges facing London and Salt Lake City are different, and I’m not sure that we can equalize the expieriances.

Call it draw between the Prime Minister and the Republican Nominee.

Olympic Security: The Private Contractor Uproar

British lawmakers are in a lather as a private security contractor who had previously promised some 10,000 bodies admitted they will only be able to provide roughly half of that amount. It’s another blow in a bad week for a country desperately trying to ensure security ahead of the Olympic Games.

To compensate, the British government has called up more troops from the various branches of the British armed forces. The government could’ve saved hours of time and aggravation by just doing this in the first place.

 What would compel a private security contractor to make such promises and then fail so dismally? Logically, one could argue that this was just another private contractor looking to make some easy $ off the government dole.

 Before accepting this simple explanation though, one must ask themselves “Why would a company want to look incompetent during the biggest sporting event in the world”? Such incompetence could destroy a company.

If I was a lawmaker in Brittan, I’d be wondering how many other contractors have promised something big for these Olympics, only to fail when the time comes.

Terror is okay in London

I was struck dumbfounded this weekend, when a report published in the Observer claimed that persons on the Terror Watch List were allowed to board airplanes with no questions asked. That should make those Olympic spectators feel real secure.

The enormous job of securing the Olympics has required the reliance on many part-time and temporary employees, who may lack the training and expertise of regular airport security personal.

That and the crush of spectators and athletes headed towards to the London Games creates a tremendous amount of pressure on screeners to get people through security as quickly and efficiently as possible.

The drawback is that the need for speed could allow criminals and terrorists to slip through the cracks of an over-stressed security system.

While security officials are urging the public not to worry, the mathematics of the problem favor the terrorists. If even one of the persons who boarded a plane in London commits an act of terrorism, than the counter-terror measures will be hailed as a disaster.

 Even if British officials are right, do we really want to be playing the hope card here? These people were obviously flagged for the terror watch list for some reason. It wasn’t because of their auto club membership.