The Synthetic Olympics

Chinese Manipulation
In the world capital of counterfeit, is it a surprise to anyone that the sweet little adorable, Lin Miaoke, who performed "Ode to the Motherland" was lip-syncing? For the sake of a totally flawless image for the world to see, who'd be surprised that the totalitarian autocracy would manipulate adorable little children?

The Beijing organization's music director stated, "The audience will understand that it's in the national interest." The real voice was that Tang Peiyi, age 9, hardly a deformed hair-lip, would certainly be seen as cute and adorable to most, but like many children that age too young for orthodontistry had a crooked set of choppers. The Brits conquered the world with bad teeth!!

The regime's spokesperson went on to indicate: "The national interest requires that the girl should have good looks and a good grasp of the song and look good on screen," ..."Lin Miaoke was the best in this. And Yang Peiyi's voice was the most outstanding." As such, let the commies graft their cutest looking little girl with their cutest sounding little girl. Somehow there’s an embedded totalitarian message imbedded in this behavior. How do you suppose the Red Chinese, the butcher of Tiananmen Square define “national interest?” Lying, rough-housing the public, and manipulating children are all okay things to do in serving them….

The ultimate hypocrisy of Communist movements through the ages, that could never be more apparent than the way the oligarchy in Beijing, is the constant use of “peoples’” and “workers” name things that reflect the actions of tyrants not involvement by the population at large. Following the path from its origins in the writings of Karl Marx and Frederich Engels through the Communist seizure of power under the articulation of a Communist state as defined by Vladmir Lenin crossing the border into China as Mao Tse ETung created the initial Chinese articulation of Communism controlling the world’s largest population, the Communist tyrants have named social institutions, government buildings, and the names of countries and territories themselves as “Peoples” or “Workers” this-that-or-the-other-thing. As such, the Maoist Chinese nation became, “The Peoples’ Republic of China,” from there they create things like “The Peoples’ University of ( _________),” “Workers’ Stadium,” whatever. The ultimate irony is the Communist philosophy is supposed to be liberating a beleaguered and oppressed working class the victims of private ownership and the criminal bourgeoisie. It’s really the People who own the means of production but until all bourgeois values are vanquished, an era of the dictatorship of the Proletariat is a necessary part of post-revolutionary society. The end of the line was supposed to be some kind of worker’s utopia. Somehow, none of these social experiments get past the dictatorship part. However, it’s what the dictators do next that’s most fascinating. Most of the communist dictatorships from the 20th century have fallen. There is nothing truly Marxist or even Maoist about “The Peoples’ Republic of China.” What exists today is a government which manipulates communist rhetoric for the people they oppress while they enjoy essentially the utopia for the oligarch. The wealth and fortune amassed by the highest levels of power in Red China is impossible to calculate but easy to observe. Without free market forces or democratic government safeguards, they’ve amassed centralized wealth beyond comprehension. Thus the television viewers all around the world are like Dorothy, Straw Man, Tin Man, and the Cowardly Lion in the court of the Wizard of Oz. We see the smoke and mirrors image not the puny little man behind the curtain. The national interest is to assure the man behind the curtain remains forever out of sight to be free to find new and better ways to oppress its people and deceive the rest to further its influence and iron grip on power.

The little girl singer switcheroo is but a small picture of the big picture mindful that it echoes other things in today’s “infotainment” world where digital enhancement, Photoshop doctored pictures, to collagen and Botox injections, it’s getting harder and harder to tell what is real in the first place. Perhaps it's as much Hollywood as it is Communism. After all, haven't we seen and heard some of our musical stars lipsync to a prerecorded audio track when performing our National Anthem? In fact bringing home to the Olympics, Luciano Pavarotti, mouthed to a prerecorded performance of the aria, Leone Magiera. Still, this communist behavior seems so exploitive especially since it involves children.

American Commercialism Running Wild
The Ralph Lauren outfits worn by the U.S. athletes in the “Parade of Nations” was almost as inappropriate a representation of the United States as the “cute girl crisis” was for the Red Chinese.

First, how could anyone miss the gigantic Polo horseman logo on the right side of the navy blue blazers our contestants wore? It was much more notable than the US Olympic emblem on the opposite side.

The whole outfit, so blatantly chic, looked much more like something from Fifth Avenue or Rodeo Drive and not Main Street. From across the heartlands, deep in the heart of Dixie, the gyms and pools of suburban sprawl, to urban basketball courts, the American Olympians come from real America, not the world of high fashion New York and Los Angeles. The costumes that look so metro-sexual on the male athletes and upscale trendy on the females seems so incongruous for our homespun finest. What’s with the stark white excessively European looking headwear? Navy blue blazers are American classics, but not these! How about starting with something the whole world understands as American, baseball caps! From there, maybe properly color coordinated golf shirts and cotton slacks, nothing too fancy, but something that would look just as appropriate American on statuesque basketball stars and sweet little cupcake gymnasts

Given the Olympic Games are the ultimate media circus with NBC, the network most closely aligned with Hollywood and a far distant 4th place among the four major networks, it’s not surprising that the coverage often looks more like a Hollywood awards program or Big Apple beauty pageant while NBC surely would have the least problem playing willing enablers to the Communists. When it gets down to the play-by-play level, there’s not much NBC can screw up. The greatest fear is biased anti-American judges, but things have been pretty quiet on that front so far.