I'MMA LET YOU FINISH
Frist
Sadly, most of the reason that Americans like the Olympics is it's just another chance to beat up on those little furriners...
Yessireebob, we'll put a boot in their ass, it's the American Way...
And the Greeks qualified ex officio, as the host country.
punchline: American team didn't qualify. -Atrios
Wow. That's kinda sad.
I saw some kids and their parents today at the Magic House here in St. Louis. They were wearing "America" T-shirts and hats and all the usual shit.
I don't hate America, but I'm more like the rest of the world in feeling uncomfortable with 1)promoting nationalism and 2)seeing other Americans promote it.
Especially NOW.
On NPR today, there was a report about how low-key Americans are playing it in Athens. They have to. And the crowd gave the American team members a fairly rousing applause.
Everybody play nice.
Ireland does this with the World Cup all the time.
Ireland does this with the World Cup all the time.
They're not the only ones. Jamaica qualified for the 1998 World Cup with a mainly English team. Italy had a long history of recruiting South Americans of Italian descent. Hell, we've done it: Tom Dooley, Earnie Stewart, etc.
Wow, we didn't qualify A BASEBALL TEAM?...the American Pasttime?
Ouch.
I blame Bush!!
Well as a Grek-American , I find this story funny, especially the punchline.
Um, excuuuuse me, but I believe they's suppos'd tuh be called "Grecians."
The US team (remember a large # of the best major league players are not from the US) was eliminated by the Mexican team as I recall a few months ago in the regional qualifying rounds.
Also of course this baseball season, unlike hockey, does not stop for the Olympics.
Still...
It seems that Alan "I am a fucking lunatic" Keyes has reiterated his support for revoking the right of a state's electorate to determine their US Senator.
Well that should finally confirm to Bud Selig what the rest of America has known.... Baseball is no longer "America's pass-time".
Angelos, Atrios, not Argyros. If you're going to pass yourself off as Greek, at least get with the programios.
Wow, we didn't qualify A BASEBALL TEAM?...the American Pasttime?
A family member is a recently retire MLB player. He was invited to tryout for this year's team. He politely declined.
From what I gather, USA Baseball is a disfunctional organization that can't even recruit second tier college players away from amateur summer leagues.
I wonder what would happen if MLB took a cue from the NBA and sent an All-Star team every four years? Nah.... they'd never give up the revenue.
I think you mean Peter Angelos, the owner of the Baltimore Orioles.
As the host nation, Greece automatically qualifies for every Olympic event, even the ones it doesn't traditionally play. Since there are only eleven millions Greeks, the Greek Olympic Committee went to its diaspora to fill out its roster.
For example, despite the fact that the Greeks are crazy insane soccer players and fans, they have no female professional league. As a result, the Greek Women's Soccer Team also has a lot of Greek-Americans.
I'm still not quite sure what the scandal would be here, though...
The US Olympic chess team is mostly Russian, so it evens out.
That Toby Kieth always looked a little French to me...
Atrios,
that's an almost wingnuttish approach of framing it. The "They would have been up-in-arms if..." argument, is an unprovable prediction, short of the event happening.
And the rightwing has not hesitated to brand us with the "they would have complained if X, but they don't because it's Y, so they're hypocrites."
This logic is especially faulty, when Y never happened. Let's call the hypocrites when they actualy are, not when we think they would have. We'll still be busy enough.
oops. angelos. fixed
Baseball is no longer "America's pass-time".
HEY! Take that back!
___
Peter Angelos, the owner of the Baltimore Orioles
And a bigtime Democratic donor, if I'm not mistaken, not unlike the otherwise eeeeeevil Bud [The Owener's Commish] Selig.
Owener's
Owners'.
['Scuse me, please.]
Another observation: this phenomenon of "citizenship-swapping" is actually fairly common in football/soccer circles, when superstars are induced to become citizens of a country eager to make said players part of their national team for competitions like the EuroCup and the World Cup. Slightly different than what's happened here for the Greek-American Olympians, granted, but in either case it's just not that big a deal.
You also forget that most wingnuts don't give a flying fig about sporting events that aren't 100% hermetically sealed off from the rest of the world (except for Canada) anyway...
Wingnuts think it's like eating Greek food in America. It's Greek-American but it tastes better here. Of course, it's all Greek to them.
So, they believe like George Bush, "When in Rome, do as the Greeks do."
punchline: American team didn't qualify.
-Atrios
Well, all our good players are kinda busy right now...
Toby Keith - never trust a guy with 2 first names. They flip-flop and state their name as Keith, Toby.
Let's see now - since nobody's bitching about something you are interested in, something you think is OK, you make up a complaint about an imaginary similar situation so you can use pejoratives like "wingnut shitstorm" and "hated-immigrant group of the month".
Do you not get it, how completely puerile that is?
Back in grade school that's what the snot-nosed bullies used to do - try to find a way to pick a fight over nothing. And then claim somebody else was at fault.
Atrios - I feel sorry for you pal.
But not as sorry as I'm going to feel when Bush crushes Kerry come November.
But that's OK, because we don't need to be fighting each other - remember, those Iranian nuclear centrifuges are spinning right now, 24 hours a day. The clock is ticking.
We have a war to fight, friends - a real one. With some fanatic ragheads who simply aren't going to quit - without some gentle persuasion from us. Call it tough love.
So let the athletes have a good time together however they want. I just hope the games are not disrupted in any way.
We have a war to fight, friends - a real one. With some fanatic ragheads who simply aren't going to quit - without some gentle persuasion from us. Call it tough love. - Zender
Ewwww. Now my monitor smells like ass.
zender,
point proven. thanks.
So we watched the NBC prime-time replay of the opening ceremonies and the parade of nations, which I always find really touching in ways I can't define. Anyway. What's with Bob Costas getting on Saudi Arabia (not like it wasn't true or anything)? I've never heard him say anything like that before. He usually chats about geography, history, past olympic greats, here's so and so, there's so and so, look at all the cameras, pretty outfits. For Saudi Arabia, he says the US learned a lot about Saudi Arabia in the days after 9/11, like about religious extremism and restriction of women's rights, you'll notice that there are no women in their 21-member delegation. And I said, this is Bob Costas? Good for Bob!
Peter Angelos is a dick. He fired Jon Miller. Jon Miller has a problem with his affection for George Will, but that does not excuse Peter Angelos, who is a dick, and who fired Miller. Go Greeks, anyway, after the Euro Cup and recent Olympic problems.
Angelos made his fortune as a union-aliied personal injury trial lawyer, Baltimore's Greek-American version of John Edwards' success story. He is indeed a big Dem contributor and has alliances and various ties with ATLA, and big-time tort barons such as Ron Motley (9/11 suit vs. Saudi Gov't, pioneer of asbestos litigation, tobacco litigator, SC political big wheel) labor unions, urban community activists, and other left-leaning organizations. So Atrios' mild tangent actually ties right back in to so many elements of today's national politix....an accidental glimpse into the Democratic "big tent"!
as another Greek-American and high school baseball player, I'm glad to see this mostly American Greek team in the Olympics.
The reason why this Greek-American team was so important, wasn't because Greece had a free qualifier in the sport. Its because Peter Angelos and many Greek-Americans know that Baseball can definitely catch on in Greece, if its properly initiated.
Prior to this year, the only baseball diamond in ALL of Greece was a dusty old field at a former US military outpost.
Now many Greeks citizens are exposed to the joys of baseball and hopefully many will start playing it, and by 2016, maybe Greece can throw out a competitive All-Greek born team.
That was the whole point of this. Not so Greece could have a team this year...
Angelos made his fortune as a union-aliied personal injury trial lawyer, Baltimore's Greek-American version of John Edwards' success story. He is indeed a big Dem contributor and has alliances and various ties with ATLA, and big-time tort barons such as Ron Motley (9/11 suit vs. Saudi Gov't, pioneer of asbestos litigation, tobacco litigator, SC political big wheel) labor unions, urban community activists, and other left-leaning organizations. So Atrios' mild tangent actually ties right back in to so many elements of today's national politix....an accidental glimpse into the Democratic "big tent"!
Angelos made his fortune as a union-aliied personal injury trial lawyer, Baltimore's Greek-American version of John Edwards' success story. He is indeed a big Dem contributor and has alliances and various ties with ATLA, and big-time tort barons such as Ron Motley (9/11 suit vs. Saudi Gov't, pioneer of asbestos litigation, tobacco litigator, SC political big wheel) labor unions, urban community activists, and other left-leaning organizations. So Atrios' mild tangent actually ties right back in to so many elements of today's national politix....an accidental glimpse into the Democratic "big tent"!
Imagine if all-star pitcher Froggy LeFrog (fictional) was playing baseball for the French, or I'Ran Ir aynean, center for the boston celtics, was starting for the iranian baskebtall team.
that's the point.
I have no problem with it, as i said.
Italy has been playing baseball for a while, but they still do the dual-passport trick for Italian-American ballplayers. Let's remember, though, Greece and Italy are both friends of ours, now if the French pulled that kind of shit...
I thought the Olympics should have been in Athens in '96, for the centennial of the modern games. We would have avoided all that Richard Jewell and Eric Rudolph stuff, at the very least.
I used to like to watch the Olympics on television--I've never had the scratch, or the opportunity, to see the games in person--but I've gotten turned off by the tricks the network designated has adopted in covering them. The eternal yack-yack about some athlete in the event, and how he or she overcame adversity to compete, instead of showing the damned event itself. Also, the all-American, all the time coverage: I'm all for rooting for the American athletes, within reason, but not so that they barely acknowledge that anybody from any other country is even there.
Come to think of it, it's the same way the networks cover the conventions, lots of blab, and very little of the actual event.
why do you have to be a wingnut to think that dual citizenship is unamerican? the rightwingers are the ones who think the immigrants *aren't* american, and every time us citizens go to play for another country - and against the US - (as an extreme case) it weakens the argument that they *are* american.
I think the dual citizenship (Israeli-US) of plenty of the neocons is unamerican. And very undesirable.
Atrios den xseri tipota. Vlakias les vre. Na graphes kati pou xeris. And now back to the show.
why do you have to be a wingnut to think that dual citizenship is unamerican? the rightwingers are the ones who think the immigrants *aren't* american, and every time us citizens go to play for another country - and against the US - (as an extreme case) it weakens the argument that they *are* american.
I think the dual citizenship (Israeli-US) of plenty of the neocons is unamerican. And very undesirable.
With some fanatic ragheads
Whoopsie-daisy!
I find it odd, but not surprising in the least, that both the U.S's basketball and baseball teams all sucked ass under the Bush presidency?
The moral fiber of the country decays.
The tolerance and open mindedness of the country erodes.
The people descend into goose stepping redkneck thugs.
The rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer.
CEO crime running rampant.
Our taxdollars wasted on corny captialism.
A vice president who works for his corporate masters rather than the people who chose not to elect him.
And now our basketball and baseball teams are getting beaten by socialist french and italian teams.
What's next?
MYOB'
.
Well I don't approve but I don't care either so I guess we're all even.
Y'know, watching the pure spectacle of the Opening Ceremonies tonight (when I wasn't wishing to hell that Bob Costas and Katie Couric would just shut the fuck up), something of the ideals of the event hit me. Here is a truly world event and, for once, one in which the US was not allowed to dominate. At least not yet, and at least if you didn't listen to the yammering bullshit coming from our NBC commentators. (When will they figure out that using "SAP" to turn off the blahblahblah will actually be a consumer draw?)
But -- Australia (the team I'm rooting for) got a huge ovation, tiny countries with only a few or a single athlete got their time on the field just like everyone else, and the grand finale was entirely Greek. And while I'm not a sports fan, I was getting a bit verklempt as the flame was carried back home to light the cauldron again.
That said, though, one thing did strike me. It isn't just the Greek baseball team. More than a few times, Bob and Katie would mouth off to note that such-and-such top athlete from (Cameroon, Costa Rica, Djibouti, fill in the blank) played for (fill in American sports team here.) And I kind of felt ambivalent about that. On the one hand, it was nice to see people not born in America winding up in our narrow-minded, xenophobic spotlight. On the other hand, something about the cultural imperialism of it all annoyed me, as if a kid in Africa couldn't be a good athlete unless he managed to go to an American university.
But the troubling part is this -- if any of those kids from other countries who made good here win medals, it'll just be an excuse for the US to gloat about the wins. And, largely because of our asinine administration, I am really hoping that we don't even grab all that many bronze medals. Nothing would warm my heart more than to see other countries dominate this year -- and, ye trolls, before you jump on the out of context statement as proof that all liberals are commie pinko faggot atheist (two out of four ain't bad) America haters, look at it this way. There are 220 countries in the Olympics. 86 have never won any medals at all. America has won a buttload. For our government's behavior in the world over the last 3 1/2 years, we deserve to win none.
We really are Germany, 1936, except that we're not hosting -- and I hope to hell some other country gives us a Carl Lewis to bitch slap us back into the humility that this country had previously been known for.
Go Thorpedo. Michael Phelps can go hump a lane line, for all I care.
And, also of note -- for the second time, North and South Korea marched onto the field together, as The Koreas. Sometimes, the people have far more wisdom than their governments. Hell, usually, the people have far more wisdom than their governments.
May the American peoples' wisdom show this November as we kick the Shrub back to Crawford and the Dick back to hell.
Dammit. Didn't have my ID on in this browser, so I have to take credit. That anonymous rant ending with sending Dick back to hell was me...
People shouldn't get upset at the US for not qualifying in baseball--it is completely a by-product of a ridiculous Olympic qualifying system and European bias.
Yes, the US major leaguers weren't there, but neither were the Domincan major leaguers nor Canadian nor Mexican, etc. The US did put together a pretty good team of college kids and minor leaguers though.
But the IOC, in its infinite European bias, decided that Europe got three baseball teams in the Olympics (four, if you count the host country Greece) and that North America and the Carribbean got a grand total of two. Of course that is insane. The two North American spots were decided by a round-robin tournament followed by the top four teams playing a single elimination tournament for the two spots.
The US cruised in the round robin, winning every game. They got the top seed in the elimination bracket, drawing Mexico. Mexico had a hot pitcher who shut down the US team and Mexico won 2-1 on a home run in the 9th.
Of course it is silly to decide baseball results on a single elimination tournament, with individual pitchers having so much of an effect on single games, but that's the way the IOC wants it because none of them understand how the game is even played. And topping that off with North America getting two teams to Europe's four, you can see what a joke Olympic baseball is.
The good news is that either next year or (more likely) in 2006, MLB is going to be running a real World Cup with all of the major leaguers. The US may lose that one to the Domincan Republic or Japan, but at least it will lose it fairly.
We can't compete in baseball and we're losing our edge in basketball. It's pretty clear that it's time to invent another new sport so we can stomp everybody else for a few decades. Libertyball, anyone?
Re the dual citizenship issue, some of the players may already have had it, like it or not. Here's the relevant bit from the Greek government's web site http://www.greece.gr/USEFUL_INFO.../military.htm):
Any male with a Greek father (and, since 1983, a Greek mother) have Greek citizenship by law, and must therefore be registered in the Males Roll of the Municipalities or Community Councils of Greece.
But with citizenship come responsibilities! From the same site:
1. All Greek males, from January 1st of their 20th year until December 31st of their 50th year, are obliged to serve in the Greek armed forces.
The US State Department notes (http://travel.state.gov/travel/greece.html):
If remaining in Greece for more than the 90-day period permitted for tourism or business, men of Greek descent may be prevented from leaving Greece until they complete their military obligations.
I think the maximum stay is now six months, but, still, I suspect these guys aren't going to be taking a junior year abroad to see the homeland.
If remaining in Greece for more than the 90-day period permitted for tourism or business, men of Greek descent may be prevented from leaving Greece until they complete their military obligations.
The article specifically states that the Greek government has waived military service obligations for the Olympic baseballers. This is, of course, arguably unfair to other Greek-Americans (or Greek-Australians, etc.) who are eligible for Greek citizenship.
Atrios, I got you beat.
The ENTIRE Puerto Rican Olympic Delegation is formed by US citizens! How's that for divided loyalties? (j/k, btw)
Lay off Toby Keith, the guy's alright. And remember, the "boot in your ass" song wasn't about Iraq.
A couple of things:
Another person behind it was State department spokesman and Clinton's ambassador to Greece Nicholas Burns.
Roger Clemens was going to play if the team qualified. When it didn't he signed up with Houston and now he's 12-4. Not bad for 42.
The joke a few World Cups back was: what do Englishmen, Welshmen and Scotsmen have in common? They all play for the Irish national team. But seriously, countries get to decide who they want to be citizens. Ireland and Greece are small countries that have lost a lot of people to emigration, so they have liberal citizenship rules. With EU rules, citizenship in one country allows you to live in work in pretty much any other EU country.
"punchline: American team didn't qualify"
Technically, neither did the Greeks. The home team gets an automatic berth. So there was going to be a Greek team no matter what Peter Angelos did.
And the Greek baseball team was hardly the first instance where a joint citizenship was used to qualify for the Olympics.
A real journalist who did the minimum of legwork would have known that, Duncan; another case where the traditional media kicks the bloggers' butts.
I have on occasion suffered indigestion from eating Greek food. I've been a bit suspicious of the "Grecians" ever since... ;=)
I can't wait for Greece v. Cuba (August 16th)! Too bad it doesn't look like NBC will be covering the match-up. The only preliminary baseball game on the grid right now is Cuba v. Japan...
Stupid network executives.
Atrios,
You're pulling this out of your ass. This has been going on for years, and nobody has ever made a stink out of it.
You're putting words in other people's mouths, instead of criticising all the rubbish that actually *does* come from that part of the political spectrum.
Why make an issue out of something that isn't, and shouldn't be, an issue at all?
PS, Rumsfeld holds a German passport..
Didn't qualify in baseball?
Say it ain't so!
olympic baseball? i thought it was about athletes?
If it was still 1988, we WOULD be hearing the usual howls of rage. (Remember "Dukakis was raised by Lesbians"?)
There are certain advantages, of course, gained by Americans of European descent checking whether they're entitled to dual citizenship. A friend of mine, New York born and bred, found out that her Italian grandfather hadn't actually disclaimed his citizenship, entitling her to an Italian -- or, more importantly, an EU -- passport.
(Sporting qualification is a lot looser, though, than citizenship requirements. The most blatant example, I think, is in rugby, where all manner of southern hemisphere players -- Aussies, Kiwis, South Africans -- have ended up 'qualifying' for northern hemisphere teams.)
One reason for the recruitment of Greek-Americans for certain events this time around is that, as host nation, the Greeks got a free pass into events that require pre-Olympic qualifying. That means either developing teams from scratch for sports that simply aren't played in Greece or electing not to compete.
I suspect that it won't be so easy for Chinese-Americans to do the same in 2008 -- although I did see that Del Harris is in charge of the Chinese basketball team this time round... I wonder if the Freepers have noticed that?
As for the complaints about Olympic baseball being biased against the US schedule and system? Well, since it was only added to the roster to keep the US and a few SE Asian countries happy (a demonstration sport in 1988, I think?) it's up to those countries to deal with the system. The soccer tournament, for instance, is completely unrepresentative of what's going on in the main national leagues, but that doesn't make it worth watching on its own terms.
i cant believe this is even a topic of conversation... no wonder the right is kicking our collective ass
everything hotspock said about peter angelos is true, but he neglected to mention that angelos is a piss poor team owner.
Zender, it is called a 'thought experiment' and sometimes they can be enlightening.
If we're going to talk politics and the Olympic Games, how about something real:
One of Iran's best hopes for an Olympic medal will not be taking part in the Games after he refused to compete against an Israeli athlete.
?
A lot of you people are having a hard time seperating politics from individual and team competition. You're rooting against our American kids because of some foreign policy.
To hell with you.
Has American Olympic athleticism ever not been about politics?
I wish there was an equivalent of C-span for watching the Olympics. I've only watched the opening ceremonies and then an hour or so tonight and I'm already so sick of Bob Costas and ten million commercials. And the commercials they run during the O's are always so damn smarmy and sentimental, they make the old Kodak Moment ads look tart and ironic.
Jeez. Who wants to put up a few zillion for an S-span network? All sports, no commentary, no commercials? Yeah! I'll be a customer!
The late former major leaguer Lou "The Nervous Greek" Skizas would be proud.
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