The Swinging of My Pendulum

Monday, August 25th, 2008

I used to love me some Bill Clinton. No, really. I thought the man could do no wrong, even with the whole Monica mess. As far as I was concerned, his biggest mistake wasn’t sleeping around on Hillary, it was choosing a girl who couldn’t keep her trap shut. Not that I don’t value marriage and all that, mind you – but it was none of my damn business, or anyone else’s in America outside of Hillary and Chelsea Clinton.

But over the past few months, he – and his wife, of whom I have never been a fan – have really begun to Piss Me The F— Off.

I’m not going into the negative campaigning, although that was certainly when my about-face started. Started and finished, I should say, because I have long since decided that I am no longer a Clinton fan, of either gender. But I had hoped that now, with the Democratic party needing to move forward in unison, that the two of them would work towards making that happen, get behind the main dude and appear honest and complete in their support.

Instead, first, we have to lend her ass money for her campaign debt.

Uh, why? Why? I hated the way she campaigned so viciously against Obama and now my broke ass is supposed to finance her negativity? REWIND AND COME AGAIN?

And now, we have to have a roll call at the DNC, if you please, so that all of her bitter supporters who want to cry sexism the minute you point out anything wrong with the woman, can stand up and declare their love for her and their pointed lack of support for Obama – despite the fact that this is now supposed to be a moot point. And why do they need to go through this charade? To pay respect to her and all of her accomplishments. She needs to be “acknowledged”.

I mean, can you believe the hubris? If the tables were turned and Hillary was the (presumptive) nominee and Barack demanded to be paid some sort of homage, her supporters would be crowing about him being unable to back down because he is a man, and needing to have his ego stroked, and all other kinds of bullshit. But for Hillary, we must show that we respect her.

Well I don’t. I am a woman, and I would LOVE to see a woman in the White House. I find it amazing that it is even still a goal, when other supposedly less advanced or sophisticated countries, both to our south and to our east, have had female leaders. But as a thinking intelligent woman, I will not support someone in a bid for the White House just for having a vagina, just as I do not support Barack Obama merely because he and I share some ethnicity. I hate to say it – I really really do – but when the Republicans were slinging arrows at the Clintons and calling them, among other things, arrogant self-important people who would stop at nothing to keep control…well, I don’t agree with a lot of what the Republicans did and said, but I think they nailed some things on the head.

Here’s what I “acknowledge”: Hillary and Bill are poor losers. The only positive thing I can say about them is that at least they are showing their true colors – I’ve always been amazed at how politicians can be so negative one day and then get on someone’s bandwagon the next, but the Clintons ain’t doing it, oh no. Their mouths are moving but they’re not really saying the words. They assumed Black support while at the same time making snide racial references to Obama’s “fairytale” dream – and now that the fairytale has proceeded this far, they continue to demand some type of respect instead of graciously giving any. I wholeheartedly believe that she hasn’t really urged her supporters to get behind Obama. She might have said the words but her supporters – like me – don’t believe she means them, not for one second. And so they continue to rally behind her, all in the name of womanhood, a cause I firmly support but which is not the point RIGHT NOW.

They just don’t get that.

I will not support her EVER – and the lovefest I had for her husband is OVER. Show some grace – and I don’t mean female grace, I mean human grace – and I might think about it. But that’s not going to happen, unless it is long after we all bow down to Empress Hillary. And then it’s not grace, is it?
It’s just false modesty.

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Why I Am Done With the 2008 Olympics

Tuesday, August 19th, 2008

I love the Olympics. Love the Olympics. The spectacle of the opening ceremonies always gives me goosebumps, and for a few days, watching the people of hundreds of nations around the world compete in friendly camaraderie gives me hope that we can all just, in the infamous words of Rodney King, get along. Whenever the Summer Games roll around I am squarely in front of the tv, marveling at the feats that the human body can accomplish (with some regrets that I didn’t pursue that sort of dream myself…)

This year was no different. When NBC announced that we would be practically inundated with Olympic coverage I was gleeful. There could be no such thing as too much! I would have it on 24/7, right from the start. I would be using picture-in-picture, we’d be switching back and forth like mad, it was going to be another Olympic village in our house. We even allowed Punksin to stay up late to watch the opening ceremonies, with some part of me hoping she, too, would catch Olympic fever.

And so the Games began. And I watched.

And I watched.

And I watched.

And slowly but surely, the disgust set in.

In the beginning, I thought it was a wonderful thing that the world was cheering China on in its capacity as host country. Everyone was gracious, and properly wowed by the lengths China had gone to to ensure a great experience.

But the way with which people are speaking of China – and judging China – and showcasing China – has long moved past the gracious phase and gone far into sycophantic ass-kissing. Now, we are so far up China’s ass that there is no longer anything objective about our coverage of them in the games. And I have turned off my tv, not so much as a gesture of protest as much as a gesture of protection – it’s making me sick.

Strike 1: Age rules that don’t get enforced. I am a mother. And long before becoming a mother, I was a woman. And I can tell you with 100% confidence that there is no way that those Chinese gymnasts that everyone is murmuring about – the ones Marta Karolyi called little babies – are 16. Absolutely not. 13, 14, maybe. But definitely not 16. And the fact that the IOC refuses to investigate this when anyone with a hormone in their body could see that these girls haven’t accumulated too many hormones of their own, is very unfair to other competitors. No, this is not just bitterness because we lost gold. The Chinese girls were clearly better (on the all-around) – but why do we have rules if they will be skirted and no one will pursue it? It makes the whole thing sickening to watch – and watching the despair and resignation on the faces of American athletes who have been preparing for these games for years is sickening too.

Strike 2: Do we have to see China competing every single time the camera is on? The funny thing is, I have been one of those people who, in the past, thought that our media could do a better job of showing another country once in a while. While all the rednecks immediately point out that we’re in Amerika and should be rooting for Ameri-kins, I like to think that our particular brand of diversity should allow us to at least look at some of the other countries once in a while – after all, there’s no other country in the world that is so uniquely multi-culti – no matter what’s on, somewhere someone here is cheering. But this year’s coverage has not been a sudden appreciation of America’s Chinese population. This is more about showing China how much we love them, how they’ve been welcomed into the “club”. If there isn’t a US competitor immediately available to show, we default to the Chinese. And the only boon there is that there is ample visual evidence of China’s willingness to cheat – the gymnasts are the most-spoken of cheating possibility, but not at all the only one.

Then take the case of the men’s 100m, typically used to qualify the fastest man in the world. This year, that would be Usain Bolt, a Jamaican runner who breezed through his heats and the final as though he was running to the store for a loaf of bread. This guy clearly can go even faster, but right now, he doesn’t have to. But he broke the world record twice this year, which is normally a pretty damn big deal. This year, though, after some scant media coverage that didn’t do justice to the feat this man performed, the story went to the Chinese runner that everyone was buzzing about. Mind you, he didn’t even run – after cramping up in the starting blocks, he walked away. But that became a story in itself. Who cares about world records when you can talk about a non-event?

Strike 3: The judging. In gymnastics, Alicia Sacramone performs a vault that, while not sparkling in its difficulty, is well-executed. She gets a score. Up comes a Chinese gymnast, who tries for a vault that is much harder. She doesn’t nail it – there are several errors and she lands on her knees, for God’s sake. Who gets the higher score? The Chinese gymnast. Because even although she screwed up, it was a harder vault; in other words, the difficulty made the difference, even though she royally screwed it up.

Okay, so with that logic in place, fast forward to the individual gold medal tie between Nastia Liukin and He Kexin for their uneven bar routines. Apparently both perfect, the tiebreaker goes to – can you guess? – He!! Why? Because when there is a tie, it is apparently broken by using the scores for execution, and the one with more scores close to the perfect 10 gets the win. Or some similarly retarded formula.

Wow. So in one event, the judging defaults to difficulty, which of course gives the Chinese gymnast the win. And then later, when a tie happens, they use execution scores. Which, by the way, means another gold for China.

I saw boxing matches where the boxer opposing the Chinese competitor made solid connections – and his score went nowhere. Mind you, it’s pretty simple: you make a hit, you get a point, there’s no style or flair points. And the guy was hitting the Chinese boxer constantly but no points were being awarded. It was so blatantly unfair.  Lest you, like me bemoan the lack of consistency, be assured that there is consistency.   China is going to win no matter what.  If that’s not consistent I don’t know what is.

Strike 4: The IOC’s repeated refusal to more closely investigate anything that could even remotely lead to China’s cheating. It’s almost as though they very deliberately don’t want China to lose face – we all know how shaming that is is Asian cultures. But shouldn’t holding your head high come about because you’ve played by the rules? Why do other athletes have to walk away confused and disappointed in order to allow China to hold their heads high?

I hate using the word conspiracy, since the first word most people associate with it is paranoia.  But there are times when the word is warranted, and while I don’t think there have been any signed memos or handshakes with blood oaths, something is going on here.  It’s all just a little too pointedly not pointed, if you catch my meaning.

And so, I’m pretty much done. The Chinese did a wonderful job of hosting, but their spectacular performance has been permanently marred by shady tactics – the pursuit of perfection isn’t true. And the media has assisted them, with coverage that is so skewed as to be sponsored by the state-run Chinese media. I’m all for supporting the host country, but I didn’t see this level of ass-kissing in Barcelona, or Sydney. And I don’t see why we are doing it now.  Did China pledge to come out of Tibet or something?

The Olympics, for me, is usually like an eclipse – beautiful, breathtaking, and all too short in duration. But this year, I’ll be glad when it’s done. I’ve had enough.

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