The Olympics are a giant exercise in sports socialism—or crony capitalism, if you prefer—where the profits are privatized and the costs socialized. The games never pay for themselves because they are designed not to. That’s because the International Olympic Committee (an opaque “nongovernmental” bureaucracy made up of fat cats from various countries) pockets most of the revenue from sponsorships and media rights (allegedly to promote global sports), requiring the host country to pay the bulk of the costs. Among the very few times the games haven’t left a city swimming in red ink was after the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, when voters, having learned from Montreal’s experience, barred the use of public funds, forcing the IOC to use existing facilities and pick up most of the tab for new ones.
This is from Shikha Dalmia at Reason. (Hat tip Professor Mark Perry)
Politicized activities are frequently characterized by guilt, envy, anger, finger pointing, victimization, divisiveness and covetism.
The astonishing record breaking feat by China’s 16 year old lady swimmer, Ye Shiwen, who even bested the 50 meter free style record of male American swimmer Ryan Lochte in the men’s race triggered swirl of rumors about “doping” which she vehemently denies.
Even without proof, such controversies reveal of the intolerance of the establishment of the unorthodox, where they would instead resort to mudslinging or rumor mongering.
As Professor Kling recently wrote
Politics channels the base emotion of hatred. A lot of political actions derive from hatred of the other.
Such antagonistic controversies only highlights the socialism of sports via the Olympics.
P.S. I was bogged down by the day long power outage (localized earth hour) yesterday so I wasn’t able to do much posting.
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