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Phillies at Mets
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Lynryd Skynyrd at Dodge Music Center
Penn State Has the Best Student Section in College Football
Sonic Youth. Old news by now, but ESPN the Mag named Penn State the best student section overall and most fun. Says Beno Cook, “If you aren’t impressesd with the White Out, you’re probably one of those people who thinks the moon landing was faked in a TV studio.” Well said. I’m proud to have been part of the greatest show in college football.
Gillette Castle
After a false start yesterday, I got out to Gillette Castle State Park today for an afternoon of sightseeing and hiking. It’s a pretty striking building architecturally and the history behind it is interesting as well. It looks over the Connecticut River, providing beautiful views and easy access to the water. There are a bunch of trails that take you down the hill to the river. All in all a nice afternoon, taking in some of Connecticut’s natural treasures. Check out my Flickr slideshow after the fold.
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Olympic Athletes are Coming to America
Friedman: Melting Pot Meets Great Wall. I think Thomas Friedman is my favorite writer because of the way he can recognize the world’s most serious problems and yet still find optimism. In this passage he observes something I’ve also caught onto while watching the Olympics.
Walking through the Olympic Village the other day, here’s what struck me most: the Russian team all looks Russian; the African team all looks African; the Chinese team all looks Chinese; and the American team looks like all of them.
This is especially true when you include the coaches. Liang Chow, the coach of the Iowa gymnast Shawn Johnson, was a popular co-caption of China’s national gymnastics team in the 1980s before he emigrated to West Des Moines. The U.S. women’s volleyball team was coached by a former Chinese player, Jenny Lang Ping, when it defeated China a few days ago.Lang, a national hero in China, led the Chinese team to a gold medal in the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics. It would be like Michael Jordan coaching China’s basketball team to a win over America.
The Associated Press reports that there are 33 foreign-born players on the U.S. Olympic team, including four Chinese-born table tennis players, a kayaker from Britain, seven members of the track-and-field team — as well as Lopez Lomong, one of the Lost Boys of Sudan’s civil war, who was resettled in the U.S. by Catholic Charities, and Leo Manzano, the son of an illegal immigrant Mexican laborer. He moved to the U.S. when he was 4 but didn’t gain citizenship until 2004.
It is amazing that with our Noah’s Ark of an Olympic team doing so well “that at the same time you have this rising call in America to restrict immigration,” said Robert Hormats, vice chairman of Goldman Sachs International. “Some people want to choke off the very thing that makes us strong and unique.”
I couldn’t agree more – more and more American ingenuity is coming from outside our borders. This is a good thing – the best and brightest from around the world want to build a life in our country. At the same time, the rest of the world is continuing to get better and brighter. So I would appreciate it Lou Dobbs and his crazies focused their attention not on closing our borders, but on raising the bar for our education system so American kids can compete in this new world. How many new schools could be built for the price of that border fence?
China Still Interfering with Journalists and Protestors
China well-versed in controlling flow of information. Lost amongst the amazing feats and sights of these Beijing games is a sad reality – China is still nowhere close to being a free and open society. In addition to the above reports of interfering with the press, there are also reports of the government arresting people who tried to apply to protest in Beijing. Just some of the lowlights:
In what the Guardian is calling “the clearest breach yet of the host nation’s promise of free media access during the Games,” Independent Television News journalist John Ray was detained as he attempted to cover a Free Tibet protest close to the main Olympic zone. Ray was dragged along the ground and forcibly restrained for about 20 minutes.
Virtually ignored in China, there was a great deal of attention paid in the U.S. press when President Bush attended church in Beijing. There has been little coverage anywhere that Hua Huiqi, the head of an unrecognized Protestant church, was arrested while on his way to the same church service that Bush attended.
The official Xinhua News Agency said all the applications were withdrawn, suspended or rejected. Rights groups and relatives have said some applicants were immediately taken away by security agents after applying to hold a rally, prompting critics to accuse officials of using the plan as a trap to draw potential protesters to their attention.
What’s sad and shameful is NBC hasn’t covered any of these events in its primetime coverage, instead holding up Mary Carillo’s video postcards as their vision of China. I have been drawn in by the spectacle and wonder of the Chinese culture as I’ve watched these Games too, but its important to remember we’re seeing China as their government wants them to see it. I hope at some point we can get a more objective reports from China.
Update: The New York Times has a story on one of the detained protesters this afternoon.
Boston
I spent some time in Boston this weekend enjoying the Freedom Trail and some of its historic pubs. I’ve updated this post with a Flickr gallery from my trip, below the fold.
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ESPN SportsTravel Passport and SportsCenter.com
SportsTravel Passport and SportsCenter.com. I’m a company man and these are two great time wasters to come out of ESPN this week. The travel passport is cool, you can submit and rank all the sporting events and stadiums you’ve ever been to. SportsCenter.com has info on all the anchors and many of your favorite commericals. Great stuff.
Update: And new search launched today too. Great things come in threes.
Revisiting Jesse Owens and the 1936 Berlin Games
ESPN is polling the wisdom of the crowds right now to find out who is the greatest Olympian of all time. I voted for Jesse Owens because as impressive as Michael Phelps’ achievements are, I love the story of an African American raining on Hitler’s parade with four Olympic gold medals at the Munich 1936 games. So I went over to the Wikipedia to read more about Owens’ achievements and discovered there was more to the story.
On the first day, Hitler shook hands only with the German victors and then left the stadium. Olympic committee officials then insisted Hitler greet each and every medalist or none at all. Hitler opted for the latter and skipped all further medal presentations. On reports that Hitler had deliberately avoided acknowledging his victories, and had refused to shake his hand, Owens recounted:
“When I passed the Chancellor he arose, waved his hand at me, and I waved back at him. I think the writers showed bad taste in criticizing the man of the hour in Germany.”
He also stated:
“Hitler didn’t snub me—it was FDR who snubbed me. The president didn’t even send me a telegram.”
Jesse Owens was never invited to the White House nor bestowed any honors by Presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt (FDR) or Harry S. Truman during their terms. In 1955, President Dwight D. Eisenhower acknowledged Owens’ accomplishments, naming him an “Ambassador of Sports.”
Wow. So while we love to remember Owens’ triumph over Nazi racism, we neglect to remember how racism continued to thrive in the United States. Owens gave up his amateur status after those Olympics in hopes of commercial opportunities that would never materialize for him. After years of financial troubles he became a goodwill ambassador for the U.S. He was criticized in 1968 for supporting the athletes who gave the black power salute and tried to convince Jimmy Carter not to boycott the Moscow games shortly before his death in 1980. He died of lung cancer – the Olympic sprinter had become a heavy smoker. Just another reminder that the truth is always more interesting than the legends.
Update: I also just found this nice piece from ESPN’s SportsCentury series on Jesse Owens.
Brendan Hansen Reflects on His Career After Beijing Loss
NY Times: Unforgiving Nature of Games Personified by Hansen. A nice feature on Brendan Hansen, a local Olympian who failed in his attempt for an individual medal in the 100m breaststroke last night. It also includes mentions of one of my favorite places in the world – Karakung Swim Club. Hansen makes a good point in reflecting on his career:
“In the United States, we raise the bar so high on ourselves,” Hansen said. Then, referring to Michael Phelps, he added, “Now to even be noticed, you’ve got to win eight gold medals… You don’t know how hard it is to get on the blocks and do what he’s doing.”
Hansen’s Olympic career is typically viewed as a disappointment, because he could never win an individual gold. However with 3 medals in Athens (gold, silver, and bronze), he was one of the top 20 medalists in those games. Back then I was cynical about Hansen and Phelps, taking a little pleasure when they both failed to reach their lofty expectations. This time around though I’m really into it – I was throwing things when Hansen lost and I was jumping up and down when Phelps’ 4×100 relay won. It’s been a great Olympics so far, hope it keeps up.