Bumbling Mitt

What a week for Mitt Romney!  Sing to the tune of "Both Sides Now" by Judy Collins:

Olympic games, the Middle East,
I spoke my mind, I made my peace.
But no one thought I made much sense,
They said I made things tense.
And now old friends have turned away,
"You're losing ground" is what they say,
But something's lost and not much gained
In speaking every day.
I've tried to lead from both sides now
As corporate man and governor,
It's talking big that I recall,
I don't know how to lead at all.

Slouches, slugs, they don't work hard,
I told it straight to the old guard.
I said exactly what I meant
About the forty-seven percent.
But Mother Jones unearthed the clip,
And now I'm getting lots of lip
From folks on both the right and left
They all think I'm tone deaf.
I've looked at life from both sides now
From rich and rich and still somehow
It's life as privilege I recall
I really don't know life at all.

An Olympics Farewell

Sing to the tune of "Take Me Out to the Ball Game":

Take me to the Olympics,
Take me to the big games.
Find me a seat next to Will or Kate,
I don't care if I'm early or late.
Let me root, root, root for gymnastics,
Beach volleyball, track and field.
For it's one, two, three falls you're down
Here in London Town.

This American Life

To the extent that Olympic athletes represent defining features of their home countries, runner Bryshon Nellum's story highlights a tragic side of American culture: he was the victim of gun violence.  Walking home from a Halloween party as an undergraduate at the University of Southern California four years ago, he was targeted by two passersby in a car, who shot him in both legs.  Whether the shooting was premeditated or accidental is not clear, but gang vengeance was the motive.

Other countries have their shameful stories, too.  But ours is one that rolls along unaddressed, the elephant in the room.

Nellum's painful recovery and appearance at this year's Olympics attest to his faith, spirit, and determination--and perhaps these are American qualities, too.  How unfortunate that we can't make similar use of our nation's strengths to end this violent scourge.

On the Podium

There's something wistful about the summer Olympics, as we rediscover the athlete inside us.  After all, many of the sports comprise those of our childhood--running, jumping, swimming, diving, and gymnastics.  Maybe, just maybe, we say to ourselves, "With a little more practice, I could have been there."

A delusion, of course, but a fun one.  And maybe a necessary one.  For the years creep up and suddenly we're not so nimble.  No wonder the middle-aged hairdresser at the salon this weekend bragged that he could still turn a cartwheel.  No wonder I still try to do splits in the swimming pool.

Allow yourself the dream.  You're standing on the podium and the official places the medal around your neck.  "The Star-Spangled Banner," which usually irritates you with its images of war, instead warms your heart and you swell with pride.  America's best, that's you.

Go for the gold.

Call Me Maybe

If you haven't watched the YouTube video of Barack Obama spliced-singing "Call Me Maybe" (by Carly Rae Jepson), you must do so by clicking here.  Now--and it's worth it--click here to watch the US Olympic Swim Team lip-sync the same song.

Now imagine what fun it would be if Barack Obama and the swim team joined up to produce a music video at the White House.  It's just what the campaign needs.  Sure, Mitt Romney injected levity last week during his trip to England, but Obama could use some humor in the midst of this long summer full of depressing news.

Of course there's the downside that the song--with its emphasis on the word "maybe"--could suggest that the President has been too hesitant in his first term, a fair criticism no doubt.  But he could pull off the performance in such a way as to poke fun at himself and engage voters all across the country.

So call or email or tweet David Axelrod (or Jim Messina or David Plouffe or Julianna Smoot or Rufus Gifford) and tell them to lighten up.  It's time for the President--with the help of America's best swimmers--to go viral. 

This may be crazy, but call me maybe.

Mother Goose Mitt

Mitt Romney couldn't get it right this week in England.  He managed to question Britain's ability to host the Olympics, prompting Prime Minister David Cameron's priceless retort: "We are holding an Olympic Games in one of the busiest, most active, bustling cities anywhere in the world.  Of course it's easier if you hold an Olympic Games in the middle of nowhere" (i.e., Mitt Romney's Olympics in Salt Lake City).

The Mother Goose rhyme "Pussy cat, pussy cat" provides an apt springboard:

Romney cat, Romney cat, where have you been?
I've been to London to insult the Queen.
Romney cat, Romney cat, what did you do there?
I showed off my weakness in foreign affair.*

* Romney-speak for foreign affairs (see sport/sports).

On Millinery

So maybe we disagree about whether or not it was OK for Pippa Middleton to wear white at her sister's wedding (she looked great), and maybe we disagree about whether or not William should wear a wedding band (it's his business). But surely we can agree that the hats in London on Friday were fantastic. Check out this slideshow if you have any doubts--you'll see a sleek and elegant look we simply couldn't pull off.

The millinery on display put to rest the American stereotype of Brits as dowdy and frumpy, consumers of fish and chips. Kind of like the 2008 Olympics Opening Ceremonies put to rest the notion of a backwards China. Windows into other countries, these spectacles offer up another side of the countries we think we know. We're xenophobes at heart, and we need these shows from time to time to wake us up.

After all, if you look closely enough, you never know what you might find under someone else's hat.

Lies Upon Lies

When Georgian athlete Nodar Kumaritashvili crashed and died on the Olympics luge track last month, we were told by the International Luge Federation that the tragedy was the result of human error, not “deficiencies in the track.” This announcement came despite complaints about the track by other athletes prior to the accident and despite the subsequent moves to raise the walls where Kumaritashvili died and to change “the ice profile.”

How many of us really believed that Nodar Kumaritashvili was at fault that day? Sports commentators and bloggers around the world called out the lie, but there it hung in the air for all of us to pretend we believed.

The art of the lie has become so commonplace that it’s really no longer an art. We are lied to so much of the time that we now have the industry of fact checking, and many of us don’t think twice when we see an athlete denying obvious steroid use or a politician rewriting history.

With so much lying going on, it’s hard to know whom to believe. So we often end up believing the people we like or the ones we voted for. But this isn’t how a functioning society works. It didn’t work in junior high, why should it work now?

The trouble with lies is that, at best, they diminish the humanity in all of us. At worst, people die: the invented discovery of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq took more lives than we will ever know.

The family and friends of Nodar Kumaritashvili should not have had to suffer the International Luge Federation’s cruel insult; their grief was exacerbated by the agency’s cowardice.

Not surprising, really, for cowardice is what lies are all about.