The Winter Olympic Virus: Day 15, Part One, The Dark Aftermath Continues

• Somebody for Slate almost got it:  In stating the United States is an Olympics coward, Justin Peters quotes this Tweet from Tom Schad of USA Today for finally explaining why the Olympics is so fucked up:

So, if I understand correctly:

-- IOC said it has to follow CAS ruling
-- CAS criticized anti-doping agencies/flaw in rules
-- WADA blamed RUSADA for not fast-tracking sample
-- RUSADA cited COVID issues at Stockholm lab
-- Bach (and others) point finger at Valieva's entourage

— Tom Schad (@Tom_Schad) February 18, 2022

Let's go through this:

1. There is a grave misconception that the International Olympic Committee runs the Games.  It, at best, administers them on a full-event basis (the individual sports are, in fact, run by the individual world amateur sport sanctioning bodies (the IIHF for ice hockey, FIS for Alpine skiing, ISU for figure skating etc. and so forth) -- and, even then, under limited circumstances, as has now been demonstrated by the drug regime of the New Soviet Union/Putin's Russia for the last eight years running now.  It must follow at least some baseline law, with respect to international arbitration...
2. Which enters the only reason Russia is even allowed Olympic athletes in the first place, the Council for the Arbitration of Sport.  It is CLEAR, after Bach's extraordinary comments on Friday's press conference, that, if the IOC had THE final say, no Russian athletes would be allowed in the Olympic movement (not even as independents) -- AND that this would've been in force since RIO!
3. The Council for the Arbitration of Sports has nullified most of the penalties from the McLaren Report.  All but three of the Sochi medals have been restored.  All eligibility penalties past 2018 have been revoked (even for the two stripped medalists the CAS HAS let stand -- the third was done by the International Biathlon Union).  The procedure for the independent athletes from Russia from Rio (assuming drug-guilt and the athletes had to prove otherwise) AND the full-team track and field/athletics disqualification from the IAAF have also been nullified.
4. The final gavel-decision regarding medals IS the CAS.  Meaning that the Council for the Arbitration of Sport IS the final authority on the Olympic Games, vis-a-vis medals, drugs, competition, etc. and so forth.  The IOC must defer to them.
5. The CAS has basically told WADA to literally pound sand on international athlete-drug enforcement twice now with respect to the Russian drug/doping regime:  After the IOC tried to give proper penalty after the McLaren Report, and here.
6. ANYONE who doesn't believe this started at Vlad Putin and the Russian government is either a fool and idiot, or a pro-Russian troll, the likes of which are also operating under same.  Vlad Putin is old-school USSR.  He UNDERSTANDS, whether you like it or not on this side of the Atlantic, the propaganda power of world athletics, the Olympic Games in particular.  It's one of the reasons he attempted, no uncertain terms, the world's largest doping attempt to rig an Olympic Games since the fall of the Berlin Wall eight years ago on home soil.  And, because of that one and same CAS, he has, for the effective record, SUCCEEDED.
7. ANYONE who doesn't believe that sample was slow-balled to ensure it wouldn't get anywhere in time is a similar fool or Russian troll/agent.
8. And the people who are saying "She's underage!!" are yelling for the right premise, but the wrong reason:  You don't think Valieva hasn't been drugged since age...  ten?  eight??  six???  FIVE???  YOUNGER????  Putin knows the rules and he knows how to break them.  He knew he had the future of figure skating in his government/Olympic program, and knew he could win four gold medals with that girl by suppressing her growth and making her not unlike the Chinese gymnasts who attempted to appear at the Summer Beijing Games underage!
9. And HE KNEW that if Valieva did not reach the WADA age of consent with respect to drug doping, no one could realistically touch her, even IF she was found dirty.
10. RUSADA is fucking lying, full stop.
11. And Valieva's entourage is all but certainly some form of agents or agency of Putin's government.  Full stop there as well.

Even OUTSIDE the legal ability for Russian athletes to fly their flag and anthem, massive governmental interference with the Olympic movement vis-a-vis a state sponsored drug regime in the country CONTINUES.

There is one, but one, and only one penalty:  Full disqualification, RETROACTIVE TO RIO.  All of it.

I have said repeatedly, with respect to the United States Sexual Assault Committee (the "USOPC"), that the USA should be thrown out of the movement as well.  But if we can't deal with this blatant of a fully-extended middle finger to the entire process with Russia, a decade or more in going in THIS iteration and 6-7 years after being EXPOSED AS SUCH in the McLaren Report, how in fucking Hell are we going to deal with the Games' major financial backstop and the sexual-assault and sexual-harassment nature of the selection of many female athletes (and probably more than a few of the men as well -- see some of the track stories which have come out...)?

THAT is the cowardice, and it's not the United States'.  It's that Council for the Arbitration of Sport.  In fact, if there's a non-Russia nation who does NOT want this enforced, it's the USA -- because if we ever do get to the point that the IOC grows a spine, the USA is next and deservedly so!!!

So let's see what Peters' premise is on what the USA COULD do, much less should:

You have one problem with Thomas Bach, Mr. Peters.  You claim the buck should stop with him -- the thing is, it is my belief, especially with the IOC prepared to effectively void two different skating competitions in this program, that Bach and the IOC, given the choice, WOULD expel all Russians from the Olympic movement if the CAS would allow it -- WHICH THEY WON'T.   

He does not have the final authority, as much as that might surprise you.

Peters appears to wish to pressure the USA to depart the Olympic movement voluntarily, using that as a final threat to force the IOC's hand.  He cites the diplomatic boycotts as a full abrogation of leadership -- and he's somewhat correct, redoubled by the rise of the Omicron variant of COVID in the last 6-8 weeks.  We shouldn't be there, and neither should anyone else.

Right now, however, Joe Biden appears to recognize the United States is neither the "greatest country in the world" nor it's most powerful -- and he's right on both ends, if he does so recognize.  China's got us beat on at least one of those fronts, and it's for THAT reason we're at these Games.

Then he goes into the Sha'Carri Richardson whataboutism.

Here's the problem, Mr. Peters, and maybe I need to spell this out for you:

The Council for the Arbitration of Sport has ALL BUT LEGALIZED state-sponsored government-backed doping of Olympic athletes as propaganda instruments of said state and government.

Richardson in her marijuana use , and all American athletes in their doping for decades now, have been doing it wrong!  It's like Sports Bribery in the United States under Mayer vs. Belichick, New England Patriots, and NFL:  It is illegal for an athlete to take a bribe to throw a game on an independent basis.  It is LEGAL for a sports league to demand such throwing of a game.  (And what we may find out eventually in the Brian Flores situation is either where the line is drawn or where the two conjoin.)

If the United States of America had such a state-sponsored Olympic doping regime, it would probably be declared legal under this Council for the Arbitration of Sport.  If you wish to declare cowardice, in any form, by the USA, have the nerve to pull THIS card -- because it's about the only card you can pull vis-a-vis American cowardice.

And AGAIN, I point to the rampant epidemic where many, if not most, of the female athletes chosen to represent the United States in the Games in any capacity have been one or more of sexually assaulted, sexually harassed, or raped outright AS A CONDITION FOR THEIR SELECTION TO THE SQUAD.

The United States is in NO POSITION to exact morality in the manner you state, Mr. Peters -- short of leaving the movement entirely and voluntarily.  

So stop.  Just stop.

• Word late-Friday evening US time:  Kamila Valieva has returned to home soil, to cheering fans in Moscow.
• I'm not exactly sure WHY, but at least the US has appealed for some sort of team-event medals ceremony in Beijing, even though there's no assurance as to what medals they'd get at the end of all of this.  I'd figure they'd refuse, 1972 basketball style!