Did anyone else catch one of the female MSNBC Olympic Commentator (either Tamryn or Jenna, not Tiki) make this comment (i’m paraphrasing here, but the gist is the same):

“[blah blah equestrian blah blah blah]… The New Zealand horses are treated especially well, some people have even said they are treated better then most Chinese people…”

I have been trying to find a youtube video of this. Leave a comment if you heard this as well.

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This is only partially related to the Olympics.

From the Wall Street Journal, Want More Growth in China? Have Faith. The subject of the article is a Mr. Peter Zhao, a Communist Party member and adviser to the Chinese Central Committee. He sees the strength of the US economy growing out of a strong moral fiber.

Mr. Zhao began formulating his ideas during a 2002 trip to the U.S. “In the U.S., the spires of churches are more numerous than China’s banks and rice shops. On a street near Harvard Square,” Mr. Zhao recalls, “I once stood and looked about me, only to find that in three different directions there were three churches.” The trip seems to have made a personal as well as an intellectual impression. Shortly after returning home, Mr. Zhao became a Christian himself.

Mr. Zhao’s argument goes beyond the need for common values. He claims that Christianity produces greater wealth than other religions or no religion. His view is partly historical — the wealthiest societies are those that are traditionally Christian, either Catholic or Protestant. He says that Christianity provides three elements necessary for economic growth: motivation — those who work for God rather than for pleasure, money or status don’t tire of being productive; a moral framework that makes for less exploitation and less corruption; and a mandate to care for the poor and disenfranchised.

A few points:

1. I would guess that if you ask most Americans, they would not list “working for god” as one of their major motivations. I can however see how religion helps people to work, in a “light at the end of the tunnel” sort of way.
2. The Industrial Revolution was one of the most exploitative and corrupt periods in American history concerning workers in this highly religious country of ours.
3. I believe tax breaks also help motivate people to contribute to the poor and disenfranchised.
4. All that Mr. Zhao says implies that there can be no morals without religion.

I may be a little cynical in my responses, but while these arguments can be made (There Will Be Blood: Religion and Capitalism in America) I find the reasoning that Mr. Zhao provides is bogus. He also doesn’t stop to question if it is a positive thing…

Oh, and the Relationship to the Olympics, from the beginning of the article:

Are the Olympics good for democracy? Many South Koreans credit the 1988 Games with helping to bring about the country’s transition from the military dictatorships that followed the Korean War to its modern democratic government. It is not an unreasonable idea. As the citizens of an unfree country are exposed to millions of foreign visitors, unruly media and the tenets of liberty — or so the argument goes — they begin to imagine a different future for themselves. Alas, it seems from the media coverage that the Olympics in China have, if anything, led to more restrictions on citizens, not fewer. Perhaps it is only internal pressure, not external forces, that can lead China to undergo a similar transformation.

We shall see…

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The New York Times reviewed a mostly forgotten piece of Olympic history in the article Phone Call From China Transformed ’84 Games:

The call he will never forget came for Peter Ueberroth in the middle of the night on May 12, 1984, over a crackling phone line from Beijing. It carried the news he believed would determine the fate of the Olympics, not just the Games he was working to organize in Los Angeles that summer but all the ones beyond.

At the other end of the line was Charles Lee, the man he had sent to persuade the Chinese to send their team to the Olympics for the first time. Ueberroth, the leader of the Los Angeles organizing committee, was asking China to defy a Soviet Union-led boycott that was announced four days earlier. The Soviets said the boycott would keep 100 countries away from the ’84 Games. If the Soviets succeeded, Ueberroth said flatly, “we were done.”

Salvation came when Lee called and told Ueberroth, “They’re coming.”

China went on to win 15 goldmedals, 8 silver medals and 9 bronze medals, for a total of 32 medals. And according to Wikipedia, “The first gold medal to be awarded at the Los Angeles Olympics was also the first-ever medal to be won by an athlete from China when Xu Haifeng won the 50 m Pistol event”

Related Links
Nike China 1984 Olympics Event
1984 Summer Olympics
China and the Olympic Movement

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In one of the stranger stories that I have seen surrounding the Beijing games Japan wants lepers to be able to attend Olympics. This is one of the issues that China and Japan will discuss when they have talks on human rights in Beijing next week, and Japan will say that there is no medical basis for this ban.

The organizing committee of the Beijing Olympic Games revealed a guideline June 2 declaring anyone who suffers from leprosy, mental illness, sexually transmitted disease, open pulmonary tuberculosis and those who may commit terrorist acts cannot come to China during the event from Aug. 8 to Aug. 24.

Earlier this month, a Japanese group created by academics and citizens to eliminate prejudice and discrimination against leprosy sufferers asked the Chinese Embassy in Tokyo to abolish the ban on leprosy sufferers.

According to the above guidelines, someone with AIDS also wouldn’t be able to go to the games?

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You would think since China has intellectual property problems, and wants the Beijing Olympics to go well, that they would try not to violate any intellectual property laws in conjunction with the Olympics, and especially not on the official website. But apparently the Olympic Website Features Pirated Video Games. From the Sydney Morning Herald:

The operators of the official Beijing 2008 Olympic Games website have removed an online flash game after a graphics designer said it was a rip-off of a game he had made two years earlier.

Detailed examples of the original game and examples taken from the Olympic website can be seen at the game designer’s blog The Pencil Farm

Two other games on the site also appear to be taken from flash game site Orisinal.

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Being stranded between apartments and jobs, in a month long limbo really, and being forced to watch what television is being shown in the house, I have had to see a lot of the Today show lately. For those not in the United States, the Today show is shown on NBC and is one of those insipid morning shows that every major network here has, and contain some of the most banal, inoffensive drivel that is on all of television. But every day this show has featured a “China Rising” segment, featuring USA Olympic hopefuls, and talking heads in Beijing saying how important the Olympics is to the soul of the Chinese people or some other such nonsense.

In all seriousness, one thing that I was looking forward to when getting back home was not having to face, day after day, coverage of the 2008 Olympics games. Do they realize that nothing will be happening until next year. But it is inescapable, I will have to hear about this until September 2008.

Please, can the Olympics be over so we can all move on to other news about China?

And you should vote for Jenn’s “Year of the Pig” photo. It is super good.

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