Tag Archives: Michael Phelps

Michael Phelps wins gold to “right the wrong” of USA missing out on a medal

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Minutes after winning the first of his 2016 gold medals, Michael Phelps interjected into an interview of his teammates “this [victory] was to right a wrong” referencing a loss in 2012 in which he was robbed of a medal apparently. Not because somebody cheated, or a bad call was made, but because Michael Phelps had willed a win that he didn’t then earn. Being “wronged” by not being given a medal. Doesnt that pretty much illustrate American Exceptionalism?! As if the US sports media was interested in explaining such a thing. Last minute decisions to let Michael Phelps intercede in further relay teams, for the sake of breaking medal hording records, as opposed to physical feats, comes at a price obviously to the other relay swimmers. We’ve heard about the hopes of would-be Olympians dashed by the boycotts of 1980 and 1984. Add the Phelps-first priority of 2016.

Oops. McDonalds shill Ryan Lochte says he ate sponsor’s food in Beijing, won fewer medals.

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Literally, Ryan Lochte scored his piece of silver at the 2012 London Games for endorsing McDonalds’ unolympian crap-food. But in London Lochte waited until after his competitive events to “go to McDonalds”. His fellow shill Michael Phelps added a vicarious, thus safer, third person endorsement, as one might exclaim “He’s going to Disneyland”. At the 2008 games in Beijing, Lochte purports to have eaten the official sponsor’s crap “for breakfast, lunch and dinner over 10 days” but came away with one less medal. Lochte didn’t see SUPERSIZE ME to know his fast food mythology has already been debunked.

Does Dope Fiend Michael Phelps stand alone?

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Do you think Michael Phelps should be suspended, and lose commercial endorsements, because a photograph surfaces of America’s winningest Olympic athlete with America’s most unfairly maligned recreational drug?

How antiseptic can corporate media expect to paint its role models? TV land can use cosmetics, hairspray and vivid primary colors to shut out the real world, but indignation about the image of a marijuana bong repudiates plenty of very ordinary sensibilities. It demonizes a broad cultural element that has been leading the charge, actually, against this nation’s disastrous “War on Drugs.”

Do we allow these intolerant, no doubt hypocritical, prudes to marginalize pot smokers? I’m just dumb enough to think it’s time to flood the web with our own bong snapshots!

Next the klieg-lit culture makers are going to insist their washed out features are natural and that it’s an aberration to have freckles.

102 Olympic medals for white swimmers

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Michael Phelps his poised to beat Mark Spitz’s record for medals won in a single Olympics. Does it say something that both are swimmers? Maybe there are too many swimming events? You don’t find 1/2 length, or 1/4 length fencing matches. You certainly don’t have shooting medley relays.

I can understand the merit of 50, 100, 200 and 400 meter distinctions. Relays also make team sorting events out of pretty plainly singular physical efforts. But do we need those variants at the international level which is often dominated by athlete superstars? If you want to have feel-good team events, perhaps relays could exclude the soloists.

How do you account for 34 swimming medal events out of a total of only 302 Olympic events. While baseball as an Olympic sport is being dropped? That’s two dozen athletes per team being offered no medal, while one swimmer gets a shot at eight.

No to mention that baseball has become dominated by athletes of color, while swimming as yet has not. It’s easier for our world neighbors to afford a bat and ball than swimming pools. Not to mention the leisure time necessary for the training. Whereas baseball is a social sport.

Is it amazing that America, home of the baseball World Series, played only among North American teams, doesn’t medal in the real world series? And how about our loss to Cuba? Even as both countries hold baseball to be the national sport, err, pastime, the match-up is still akin to a class AA school set upon single-room schoolhouse classification. We draw our athletes from a population 303 million, including the Cuban players who defect. Cuba’s talent comes from a pool of 11 million.