The "No Shit Sherlock" File, Part Two: The Russians Are Coming...

Saw this a few days ago and am finally getting to posting it to the blog.

Putin's bitch gets his wish -- the Russians are allowed back in the Olympic Trump Transphobe Games.  Just in time for Los Angeles.

Do they have the guts to move the Trump Transphobe Games?

USA Today reports today that the World Anti-Drug Association wants to ban Donald Trump and several major US officials from the Trump Transphobe Games in Los Angeles.  (And possibly the Trump Cup this summer.)

Just before the Transphobe Winter Games, the Trump administration pulled all dues money from WADA with respect to the United States.

Though this battle between WADA and the US does encompass both parties, I think I can safely say that this is a defense of the drug-ladened athlete culture in the United States, up to and including Cocaine Jr.'s (Trump's son Donald Jr.) support of the Enhanced Games in Las Vegas later this year, where cash prizes will be awarded to mostly-drugged athletes.

(I have to say MOSTLY-drugged because there IS, actually, at least one drug-free swimmer who wants to try his luck against the steroid freaks.) 

We can only hope this is a first move to remove the Trump Transphobe Games from Los Angeles and the Trump Cup from the United States and Mexico (let Canada host the whole thing if it can!)... 

Sports and Politics: Why We Can't Stick To Sprots

Part of this, and only part of this, may be considered a breach on the boycott on the Transphobe Games, because a large part of this has come from Italy and several American Olympic athletes speaking out against Trump, ICE, and, basically, their place on the US Olympic Team.

Since this does raise to a larger question, however, I'll speak on it.

What finally motivated me on it was Karl Denninger's post on the subject on his White Right website The Market Ticker. 

His stand has a number of problems, not just with the Olympics, but I'll state the ones evident with the Olympics as they come up:

• Anyone who does not believe the Olympics specifically haven't been abjectly taken over by politics has their head so far in the sand, it's in proverbial China (that it went all the way through and came out the other side of the world).

This could go any of a number of different directions.

Anyone who lived through the Cold War had to know that the Olympic Games, and especially the National Dick-Waving Contest which is the top of the medal table, especially in the Summer Games, and doubly especially between the United States and the Soviet Union, was a national propaganda exercise as to the superiority of one or the other of the two systems.  (Though this has also occurred on a lesser extent with the Summer Games between the United States and China in more recent years.)

A prominent example can be given through the Miracle On Ice.  How much of the actual morale boost came from the fact that it was specifically the Russians that the US college boys defeated in Lake Placid?

We could also discuss the entire regime-led drug rigging of the Sochi Games, and the attempts by Russia to completely manipulate the home Games medal table using a state-sponsored doping ring which has partially led to the to-date permanent expulsion of Russia from the Olympic movement.

We could even decide to discuss the Transphobe Games themselves, since the movement to expel transgenders and anyone of Differences of Sexual Development in the different disciplines -- and eventually the IOC itself -- comes from the Donald Trump Movement in the United States.

• This extends beyond the Olympics, as has been evidenced even this week.

We could even, as Denninger notes, speak of the recent Bad Bunny Super Bowl halftime show, and the White Right-led controversies that they believe that an existential fraud has been committed as to how many people watched the game (Terrorist Point) and the halftime show.

People who've read this website basically know of a continuing political movement by the NFL (in some concert with the Federal government -- though, after last Sunday, there is some question as to just how much) to exert political propaganda into the presentation and into who wins and loses.

(Which makes it completely hypocritical that Boomer Esiason has come out in support of Donald Trump and ICE and in opposition to the Olympic athletes speaking up.)

• The entire existence of women's sports (Title IX) and it's end (see boycott post) is political. 

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I am of three different minds with respect to 2026 politics and the athletes speaking out.

1) This is the United States Olympic Team, so the argument can be made that it's athletes do need to be allegiant to the United States.

I have always believed that, by the Trump Olympics in 2028, a loyalty test to Trump will be required to be a member of the team.  I am doubly certain of that fact now.

2) Especially vis-a-vis the Olympics, politics and sport will forever be aligned.  A key component of politics is propaganda, and sports have always been used as propaganda instruments:  East, West, Nazi, etc.

3) There's a very real problem no one else is going to say.  Because of the nature of the United States Sexual Assault (Olympic/Paralympic) Committee and said political ties, every athlete on the Olympic Team is compromised -- as a function of being on the Olympic team.  

The United States has no place on the Olympic movement, as I've said before, because of the number of it's athletes which are on drugs (note that, just before the Transphobe Games started, Trump signed a bill withdrawing all dues-paying from the World Anti-Doping Agency, months before a Trump-family sponsored Enhanced (Steroid) Games event in Las Vegas), as well as the rampant sexual-assault screening of athletes to the team.

I applaud those that speak out against the Piece of the Ultimate Shit and ICE -- even though, in many countries (and soon to be here), that will be a death sentence to do so with that platform. 

The Transphobia Games: And this is no surprise whatsofuckingever...

Combining two recent threads...

Going through the Epstein Files, what do people see, but the head of Trumplympics Los Angeles Organizing Committee Casey Wasserman, in 2003 e-mails to Ghislaine Maxwell.

And Maxwell is still alive...  shockingly and for now.

And the head of the International Transphobia Committee, Kirsty Coventry, is having a sad over all the distractions the Trump influences (Epstein and ICE) are having over the Milan-Cortina Transphobia Games.

Awwwwwwwww...  Fuck off. 

The Blog Boycott of the 2026 Winter Transphobia Games

 So here we go again.

The two biggest sporting events of 2026, and, barring a tragic loss, this blog will have to boycott them both.

For the record, I have no problem with this decision.  (This post is about the first of the two.)

In the upcoming days, the _cisgender_ youth of the world are being called to Milan and Cortina, Italy, to take part in the Transphobia Games -- err, the Games of the XXVth Winter Olympiad.

Transgenders and anyone of Differences of Sexual Development need not apply in any way, shape, or form -- thank the International Transphobia Committee and the likes of Sebastian Coe.

People are going to learn the hard way about the realities of just how far things can go, and the true and only purposes of cisgender women's sports.

They number two:

1) To invoke Dred Scott and then eventually murder every transgender person in the United States.

2) The sexual gratification of men, especially White men in the United States.

It is abjectly no coincidence of any kind where this got it's traction -- the reinstallation of the Orange Fatfuck as President of the United States (alternately, as Piece of the Ultimate Shit), whose greatest fear, apparently, is grabbing a woman by the pussy and getting a long surprise.

It is also abjectly no coincidence of any kind that this has germinated through the United States Sexual Assault Committee, otherwise known as the United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee.

* Diving
* Taekwondo
* Gymnastics
* Equestrian
* Swimming
* Track and Field
* Skiing and Snowboarding

A quick scan of the blog, pre-hiatus, shows these seven disciplines with coaches banned or up to and including the entire relevant sanctioning body put in court for no less than sexual trafficking of the athletes!

That's OK.  Trying to live the life you are, instead of the body you were born in, is apparently not.

So how many bigwigs with the USSAC or the corporate sponsors who are going to cream over every playing of the Star-Spangled Farce tried to get a piece and got a similar surprise?

Anyone?  Bueller??  Bueller???

Let's get right down to it.  I have friends in the transgender community.  They feel they are about to be rounded up by said Orange Piece of the Ultimate Shit.  This has made me angry enough, in part, to actually get a visit from the Secret Service middle-late last year.  The only reason I am still here is because they haven't been able to disprove my story or my understanding that I am not allowed to carry a gun after the Debbie Gibson incident.

It is at least one of those friends who has correctly ordered the boycott of the Olympic Games from even watching it here, much less anything else.  This will probably end up not unlike Sochi in that regard -- and the same can go for the Trump World Cup where The Sick Fuck is going to preside over (and, if anything is like what is indicated, rig for his own benefit) the FIFA 2026 World Cup.

And the reason is the rampant transphobia in the movement.

Oh, don't worry, conservative men of the world -- you get your way, the Olympics will go back to single-gender.  So will most other sports.

If you succeed in exterminating the transgenders, you will end up having to admit two things.

1) That women's sports only would then exist for the sexual gratification of men.  I forget the exact magazine, as just one of numerous examples, but, before the famous American-hosted FIFA Women's World Cup with Brandi Chastain, an article previewing the US Women's National Team had Chastain in it -- topless...  With two soccer balls in, shall we say, the strategic place.

2) That, once you remove all transgenderism from women's sport, every female sporting achievement will then go under suspicion, eventually rendering all women's sport about the same way the Canadian doctor told the Ben Johnson committee would happen to sprinting in track and field when he believed the 100 meter non-drugged human limit was 11 seconds, for men!  No one would watch.

I am reminded, as one example, of a youth swimmer in (if my memory serves) Utah.  I believe the girl was 14 when this happened.  She was far above and beyond the skill level of most of her competition, and people actively questioned whether she was female, even though it was clear she was cisgender female.

To actively eliminate all transgenderism from sport, on top of murdering all of them (which we know The Sick Fuck and his cult, including those within the IOC, want to have happen), you would them also have to require genetic testing of every female athlete, genital inspection (which will please the men doing the inspection to no particular end), AND an eventual limit to the amount of testosterone or strength hormone a female athlete could carry, even if cisgender.  (Which see the Williams sisters, who are still being blasted by many misogynistic bigots for supposedly being men.)

In short, the end of women's sports.

But if you listen to many of these White Right bigots, that's exactly the end they want.  Especially with the MAGA men, it is almost universal that the bigotry and transphobia are almost instantaneously followed with rampant misogyny.

Listen, fuckers, let me let you MAGA fucks in on some reality:

Everything that the transgender community is falsely accused of, I've also been accused of as a cisgender White man.  Yes, that includes trying to get in a women's locker room (the accusation finally got me banned completely off of a Wisconsin college campus, the 2025-26 Division III NCAA national football champion Wisconsin-River Falls -- the Gibson incident nullified my Wisconsin-Eau Claire degree of five years later and probably has me barred from that campus too).  That also includes false accusations of child molestation (including at least one that actually got a "Bear in the Air" against me in the city where I presently live).  

I could go on if you like.  But you're not willing to shoot me, why?  Because the only "crime" I committed was being an undesirable, rather than Powerful White Male Coach/Doctor/Sanctioning Body Piece Of Shit, etc.?

You're full of shit, so is the IOC.  And the price will be paid, sooner than later, because people are going to learn just how much female sporting achievement was done either by transgenders, persons of Differences of Sexual Development like Castor Semenya, or cisgender women and girls with enough testosterone to bring their achievements into question by the bigots and misogynists.

So boycott it is.

I'll get to another blog boycott of the Winter Olympics after Super Bowl ICE, but...

Reports are indicating that ICE is going to have a security unit at the Milan-Cortano Winter Olympics.

What, so you can beat the shit out of any female athlete not woman enough to satisfy you? 

Today's "Women's Sprots" hypocrisy:

Seen yesterday on MSN after another Katie Ledecky World Aquatics Championships rout:

Is Katie Ledecky transgender?

Knew it!  She's too good -- she has to be!!!

Under the radar: Soft Russian/Belarussian DQ from Paris 2024?

It is an International Olympic Committee tradition to formally invite the youth of the world of every National Olympic Committee one year before an Olympic Games.

The IOC announced on Friday it will NOT extend the olive branch to the instigators of the war in Ukraine, so it appears, once again, Russia and Belarus will be disqualified, with the caveat of individual athlete participation case-by-case.

A third country has also been disqualified from the Games:  Guatemala, for governmental interference.

And here we go: The US Olympic Sexual Assault Movement Is Being Taken To Court.

At least three former members of the US Snowboarding team have taken the step of suing the US Sexual Assault Olympic and Paralympic Committee, as well as former coaches, the national snowboarding federation, and others for unspecified damages.

The charges include:

• Sexual harassment
• Sexual assault
• Sex TRAFFICKING (emphasis mine, because it all but basically admits the reason these people got chosen to the Olympic team!!!)
• Covering up such when investigations were demanded
• Other misconduct.

Rosey Fletcher, a 2006 bronze-medalist and three-time Olympian, alleges then-US Ski & Snowboarding Federation coach Peter Foley sexually assaulted her at a camp when she was 19, and then again at a post-race event at the Olympics.

Callan Chythlook-Sifsof, a 2010 Olympian, alleges her abuse started in 2005 at 16 at her first world junior championship event in Switzerland.

Erin O'Malley alleges twenty years of abuse and coverup, which started when she was 15.

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Is anyone surprised?  How many sports in the Olympic movement have been charged with using sex as a function of selection of female (and, in some cases, male) athletes?  I have at least six off the top of my head, and there are probably more I've reported on.

The only reason I don't come out and say "How else do you think you were chosen to represent the United States???" is that the blame probably, then, gets put the wrong direction.

Stay tuned.  We'll see if this goes anywhere.

I've Got To Find Some Witty Name Not To Disparage The Paralympians, Day One

• Almost appropo that the first American gold medal of the Paralympics was scored by a Ukranian born para-biathlete.
• Another Olympic vote of support for the Ukraine -- by former pole-vault world-record holder Sergey Bubka.
• The IPC has been forced to apologize to the hosts -- Andrew Parsons, in his Opening Ceremonies speech, broke protocol by calling Xi the "President of the Republic of China" -- rather than the People's Republic of China.
• The "Republic of China" is actually another name for Taiwan -- referred to in the Olympic circles as Chinese Taipei.
• Add Olympic boxing, wrestling, bobsled, and skeleton to the list of sports Russia and Belarus are now banned from.  How many, if any, are LEFT???   
• Sun Yang, a three-time Olympic gold medalist for China, now is banned until June of 2024 for drugs -- his final appeal to the CAS, denied.  (Of course, that's about a month before the Paris Games, so he's not out of that, per se.)

Medal Count:

• As if almost too appropo:  The Ukraine tops the medal table, winning three of the first twelve gold medals.
• The hosts are second, by winning two, and lead the total, eight medals to Ukraine's seven.
• The United States, which won both gold and total in Korea, surprisingly, only got the two medals in the women's sitting para-biathlon to almost start the day.

The Winter Olympic Virus AND Super Bowl Last Man Standing: An American Institution About To Die As The Legacy of Both?

Was thinking about this doing errands yesterday, and it kinda came to me regarding threads crossing both discussions of the Super Bowl and the Winter Olympics, both recently completed.

I know I've mentioned this before, but I do think this merits it's own post.

I want to present some numbers -- most of which I've already put on this blog, but it basically gives two different avenues to a same, and very disturbing, end.

Let's start with the Super Bowl.

There are two numbers I want you to take a look at, and to explain the difference here:  A show's rating is the number of television sets, as a raw percentage, turned on to that show.  A show's share, on the other hand, is the number of television sets which are actually on, as a net percentage, turned on to that show.

Nielsen ratings showed that the rating for Super Bowl LVI was 36.9 -- meaning 36.9% of all television sets in the country watched the game.  This is down 10 points in 10 years.  It was the lowest rating for any Super Bowl in the merger era -- and only the Second "AFL-NFL World Championship Game" (later graduated to Super Bowl II) and Super Bowl III have been lower.

But the even more disturbing number is when you look at the game's share on top of the rating.  Tied with Super Bowl 50, the 72 share the game received is actually the HIGHEST the game has received since Super Bowl XVI FORTY YEARS AGO.  And that meant that 72% of all television sets turned on in the country watched the Super Bowl.

Now, to Sports Media Watch and discussion of the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics ratings fiasco.

NBC announced, on the first Thursday, a day in which their ratings (and this was a GOOD NIGHT!) were down a third from the Korean Olympics four years ago, that they had effectively well over half of all viewers on national network broadcast television, claiming they had 2/3 more viewers .than the rest of the networks combined.

Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday of the second week were all less than half of the Pyeongchang total, none exceeding nine million -- Wednesday breaking the record with less than SEVEN million.

And when Valieva took the ice on Thursday, only just over 8.5 million watched, that being down over 40% from Pyeongchang.

NBC is on the hook for Paris, Milan-Cortina, Los Angeles, wherever the 2030 Winter Olympics are going to be held (TBD), and Brisbane.

For SEVEN AND THREE-QUARTERS BILLION DOLLARS.  And most of that money has not been spent yet!  They're only through Rio, Pyeongchang, Tokyo, and Beijing.

And, for those who need a reminder:  This may well be one of the reasons that NBC dropped it's main national sports network, NBC Sports Network, at the end of 2021.  NBC has also ceased operation of a separate, more Olympic-sports offseason, themed network.

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So now let's do a degree of further number-digging on the Super Bowl, and then we can come to our thesis:

A scant ten years ago, for Super Bowl XLVI, the game drew a 47 rating and a 71 share.  If you do the math, that indicates about two-thirds of American television sets were turned on to SOMETHING during the Super Bowl.

Now:  With that 37 rating and a 72 share, it's about half.

And, even with the Winter Olympics ratings cratering, they still are well over 60% of all the of the network TV watchers.

To me, that indicates two ominous legacies:

First, the way sports has been delivered to you in the past and present is about to end.

And all you have to do at that point is look at three things:

1. The dissolution of NBCSN and the melding of it's Olympic coverage into a literal 24/7 network on NBCUniversal's major cable network, USA.  This means the end of at least the THIRD and probably final attempt at a subsidiary NBCU sports network.  (Versus, Outdoor Life Network)
2. A 16% drop, in ten years, of how many people are even watching television for the Super Bowl, plus, even with drops of about half the viewers of broadcast television for the Olympics, both parts, it's about the only game in town for broadcast television when it does air...
3. And the money involved.

And then you look at the increasing move in television contracts to Over The Top streaming outlets like Peacock (an increased presence in the 2022 Games, and a large home of much of NBCU's Premier League contract) and Amazon Prime Video (which will be the home of the NFL Thursday contract), as well as Free Ad-Supported Television streaming outlets like Pluto, IMDb TV, Roku, and Netflix for binging various series under the various ownerships, and there's a second situation coming over the horizon...

Is the decades-long existence of the national broadcast television network about to end completely?  

I can't see how NBCUniversal is going to be able to continue to pump out a good $4,000,000,000 or more for the remainder of the Olympic contract if American viewers have ceased to care, no matter the nation's position on the medal table?

I think the continued existence of NBC, as a broadcast television network at all, could well be in danger.  And then you look at the fact that the most-watched television program of the last almost 20 years has either been American Idol when it meant something to America on FOX, or the NFL Sunday night game on NBC, that does not portend well to the current model of American national broadcast television, except maybe for public-service machinations.

And cable is not immune.  ESPN has been bleeding money for years -- I can't see them surviving much longer.

As I say on a number of subjects, stay tuned -- that is, if there's going to be anything to stay tuned to.

The Winter Olympic Virus, The Final Medal Count

It is 2:21 PM on Sunday as I begin to type this in Beijing, China.

Finland has just upset the Illegal Russian Team by a score of 2-1 to win the men's hockey gold medal in the 2022 Winter Olympics.

That is the final of the 109 medal events.

So we can now take a look at the final medals table for these Games.

#1 in medal table and total:  Norway with 16 gold, 8 silver and 13 bronze.

• As has been noted for a couple days, Norway has won both gold and total, and a new Winter Olympic record of 16 gold medals highlight their 37 total medals.  (Old Winter record:  14, Norway 2018, Germany 2018, Canada 2010.  Current total record:  39, Norway 2018)
• 21 medals, including 11 gold, in biathlon and cross-country skiing.
• Two more gold than 2018, two fewer total.
• However, even with the record gold haul, predictions by both Gracenote and Sports Illustrated may have this a disappointing Games for the table champions.  SI had a prediction of 17 gold and 40 overall.  Gracenote went as far as a staggering 21 gold and 44 overall!

#2 in medal table, #3 in total:  Germany with 12 gold, 10 silver, 5 bronze.

• Germany finish a full ten medals behind Norway, and one of the main reasons why is the completely lopsided nature of their medals table.
• They won every sliding event except the women's monobob, seven of the nine total medals in the bobsled otherwise, and a stunning 16 of their 27 medals on the sliding course.
• Two fewer golds and four fewer medals than 2018.
• The 12 golds matched their SI prediction and beat Gracenote's by one.
• The 27 total, however, was two fewer than SI thought and three fewer than Gracenote.

#3 in the medal table and #11 in the total, the hosts from China who had only 15 medals, but NINE gold.

• Pretty much what a regime would want to do with somewhat limited winter resources and talent in their case.
• Six more medals than 2018, where they only struck gold once.
• China, before hosting these Games, had only secured 13 Winter Olympic gold medals.
• Five of the nine golds were in X-Games events.
• SI had China pegged for only five golds, but they didn't make the 17 total that SI predicted.  Gracenote had them down for six gold and 13 total, so even under that degree of a successful Games, they did even better than that!

#4 in the medal table and #5 in the total, the USA -- who broke a three-way tie at 8 golds with 10 silvers, with 7 bronzes giving them 25.

• Still one gold fewer than 2018, but the total count increased by two.
• But if you account for the predictions, the USA can hold it's head high, especially after Schiffrin leaves the Games with a complete zero:  SI had them for only 5 golds (with 13 silvers), but they didn't meet the 27 total predicted.  Gracenote had them for 7 gold and an evenly-split 22 total -- so that is a good result.
• There will probably be much consternation among conservative Americans for Eileen Gu, one of two high-profile American-born athletes who chose, at one point or another, to compete instead for China.  Gu won three medals in freestyle skiing, two golds and a silver.
• Their 4th place on the table was the same as the last two Games.  Even with 25 medals, their fifth place in the total is the worst showing for the Americans since Nagano.
• Ten X-Games event medals highlight the total.
• If the team figure-skating result is reversed, they will pass China for #3 on the table with the ninth gold, and nine silvers to China's four.

#5 on the table, and beating Netherlands by a single bronze medal (third in the women's curling) to get there, Sweden, with 8 gold, 5 silver, 5 bronze for 18 total.

• One more gold, four more total for a good Games for Sweden.
• A fairly well-balanced program, with the 8 golds among six different disciplines.
• However, SI had them for two more golds and four more medals.  Gracenote, by contrast, had them for one fewer gold and only one more medal.

#6 on the table, #9 in the total, the third nation with eight golds, is the Netherlands, 5 silver and 4 bronze for 17 total.

• You've heard this song and dance before:  Of the 17 medals, between short-track and long-track, only one, a bronze in women's skeleton, was not a speedskating medal.
• Matched their gold total from four years ago, but the total dropped by three.
• SI had them for two more golds and three more total.  Gracenote:  The three less total matched SI, but Gracenote got the 8 golds right.

#7 on the table, #6 on total.  Austria, seven gold with Switzerland, but seven silver and four bronze for 18.

• Two more gold and four more medals than 2018.
• Seven Alpine skiing medals, but a fairly diversified portfolio of medals for the country.
• SI had them with two fewer total medals, but with only three gold, so Austria's seven is a great Games under that measure.  Gracenote not only also only had Austria for three gold, but Austria beat their total projection by three.
• One of the better performances per expectation in these Games.

#8 on the table, tied for #12 on total.  Switzerland.  7 gold, 2 silver, 5 bronze for 14 total.

• Two more gold and one less total than 2018.
• SI:  Six gold and 13 total predicted.  So they beat each of those by one.  Gracenote:  Six gold, but they had the total all the way to 21!
• Five golds and nine medals on the Alpine slopes, the rest in the X-Games events.

#9 on the table, but all the way at #2 in the total:  The Illegal Team from the Russian Olympic Committee.  Six gold, but twelve silver and fourteen bronze.  32 total.

• The 12 silvers were the most in the Games, two more than the USA and Germany.
• The 14 bronzes were also tops, tied with Canada.
• Sixteen Nordic medals (four gold) and six figure-skating medals (the other two gold) highlight the total.
• Four more gold and FIFTEEN MORE TOTAL than the OAR total from four years ago.
• The ROC got two more total than SI predicted, but the gold total was about half of what SI predicted (11)  The 32 was also two more than what Gracenote predicted, but Gracenote had them for 10 gold.
• We'll see how much of this actually stands.

#10 on the table, tied for #12 in total.  France, 5 gold, 7 silver, 2 bronze for 14.

• Same number of gold, one fewer total than 2018.
• SI had them doing far better:  8 gold (only got 5) and 21 total (only got 14).  Gracenote:  4 gold and 19.  So France is probably going to have some disappointment heading into Paris.
• Seven biathlon medals and three golds highlight the Games for the French.

#11 on the table, #4 in total, Canada.  One more medal than the USA with 26, but only four gold, along with eight silver and 14 bronze.

• Seven fewer golds and three fewer medals than 2018.
• SI had them for six gold and 23 total (two fewer gold, three more total).  Gracenote:  Six gold, 22 total.  So it's kinda half-empty, half-full for the neighbors to the north.
• 20 medals between speed-skating and X-Games.

#12 on the table, #6 in total, Japan.  Three gold, six silver, nine bronze, 18 total.

• One fewer gold, but that bronze total led them to five more medals than 2018.
• SI had their gold and silver totals flipped for their prediction, the 18 total was on the number.  Gracenote had the gold total right, but one more silver only than they actually got.

Five nations got two gold medals, the top of those on the table (#13) was #9 in the total -- the next hosts, Italy.

• One fewer gold than the three they got in 2018.  But they only got 10 medals in Korea, 17 here!
• Seven speedskating medals and four Alpine medals led the way.
• SI had them for 3 gold but only 10 in the total.  So SI had the same 3-4-3 they got in Pyeongchang.  Gracenote:  Got the two gold right, Italy gor four more in the total.

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• No other nation got more than 10 medals.
• The only maiden broken in these Winter Games is New Zealand's gold medal maiden, and they did it twice!
• The only podium sweep was Germany's in the two-man bobsled.
• Four athletes won five medals apiece at these Games.

1. Johannes Thingnes Boe from Norway is the individual champion, with four biathlon golds and one bronze.
2. The Illegal Russian Team's Alexander Bolshunov headed the cross-country charge for the ROC, three golds, a silver, and a bronze.
3. Marte Olsbu Roeiseland of Norway was the women's champion of these Games, the only woman to get five medals, also in biathlon, 2 gold, 2 silver, and a bronze.
4. Quentin Fillon Maillet of France, biathlon, 2 gold and 3 silver.

• Five athletes:  Two Dutch speedskaters (one long-track, one short-track), another Norwegian biathlete, a Norwegian cross-county skier, and a Japanese speed-skater, won three medals.
• No American won more than 2 medals at these Games.  Six Americans won 2, three of them members of that figure-skating team situation.
• 23 nations won gold medals at the Beijing Winter Games.  One more than in both 2018 and 2014.
• The final medals table consisted of 29 nations.  One fewer than Korea, three more than Sochi.

The Winter Olympic Virus: Day The Last

• Yes, somehow, we've survived another one -- and each one more shocking we survived it than the last.
• At least two American Olympians are coming home to a lawsuit!  Heavy Young Heathens have sued everybody for Alexa Knierim and Brandon Frazier using the song "House of the Rising Sun" for their short program.  And when I say everybody, about the only three relevant entities not sued are the IOC, the Beijing venue, and the audience!  US Figure Skating, NBC, the pair, and the USOPC have been sued for copyright infringement.
• And the CAS has (correctly) said no to any team figure-skating ceremony in Beijing.
• IOC President Thomas Bach and Chinese President Xi Jinping met multiple times during the Games.  Not sure why this is a story, even with Xi being a tyrant and all...  
• Two athletes will be COVID-isolated past the end of the Games.
• Another political row:  Chinese Taipei wants sanctions against one of it's speedskaters for apparently wearing a mainland China suit in practice.

Story popped up a couple days ago about US pairs figure skater Timothy LeDuc.  

• They became the first-ever non-binary Winter Games athlete when they took the ice with their partner Ashley Cain-Gribble.
• The pair finished eighth in the pairs competition.  The other United States pair was the pair representing the team in the team competition.
• Outsports has reported 36 LGBTQ+ athletes at these Games.
• Seven members of the gold-medal Canadian women's hockey team are on the list.
• A member of the American silver-medal women's hockey team is also on the list.
• Brittany Bowe, the 500m women's Olympic champion, is also out.
• Olympic women's 1500m champion Ireen Wust is also on the list.
• As is Bruce Mouat of the silver-medal winning Great Britain curling team.
• There may be more, and apologies for missing any others.

---

And with the strains of "Auld Lang Syne" in the National Stadium, the Games of the XXIVth Winter Olympiad have closed with the end of the Closing Ceremony.

The youth of the winter world have been called to Cortina and Milan, Italy in four years time -- four years I fear will change the world forever -- for the XXVth Winter Olympiad.

I would be remiss if I did not thank the gentlemen from the Inside the Games website once again for their tireless work, tireless work which has come at a cost this time, with the entire Valieva situation almost crashing down upon them.

I don't know and do not believe I will be around for Paris 2024.  If I am, I'll be here, hopefully, to chronicle that farce as well.

The Winter Olympic Virus, Day 15, Part Two: Everything Else (???)

• You know, when I called these posts "The Winter Olympic Virus", this was simply a play on COVID!  And "The Five-Ringed Circus" was a blog label long before these Games.  I could not have DREAMED of how appropriate, given the events of the Games, those two labels would be on these Beijing Games.
• Elena Meyers Taylor, denied the chance to carry the USA flag at the Opening Ceremony due to COVID, will carry it instead at the Closing Ceremony on Sunday.
• I'd normally put this in a Daily, because it (at best) is only somewhat-tangentially to the Games, but, President Biden:  Putin made the choice a long time ago to invade the Ukraine.  That could've been a motivation for some of his chicanery as far back as Pyeongchang.  The problem with doing it in the next 7 days is he's got to get his propaganda interests/athletes home first!  If he doesn't, he could risk his entire Olympic team getting blown out of the sky over China or Russia.  Patience, Padawan...   
• The end-of-Games IOC Session starts today -- and, DAMN, should this be interesting, given events in Beijing, and perhaps beyond!!  
• Nah, it really wasn't, I guess...
• The next IOC Session, an off-Games session, will be held in Mumbai, India, as a push is made for a full Olympics to be hosted in the Indian subcontinent.
• The head of the Badminton World Federation, Poul Erik-Hoyer, is stepping down from the IOC -- states personal reasons, but is fighting Parkinson's Disease.
• Juan Antonio Samranch is back as a vice president of the IOC, after his post aiding in the execution of these Beijing Winter Games.
• Yeich Pur Biel is the first refugee to be elected as a member of the International Olympic Committee.  He fled South Sudan and competed in the first Refugee Olympic Team in Rio.  With the advent of that team, the IOC changed it's charter to allow for non-national-affiliated members, with this (not necessarily Biel, but a Refugee Olympic member) probably in mind.
• There will be a fifth medal event held tomorrow -- the mixed-team parallel Alpine skiing event has been postponed to tomorrow.  But if the event is to be held at all, IT MUST BE HELD TOMORROW.  So they have to pray for at least good enough weather to get it in.   
• And, speaking of events where desperation is setting it as to whether they will be allowed held at all:  The marathon cross-country men's event is postponed later in today AND it's distance has been almost HALVED to 28 km.  And that one probably can't go to tomorrow -- they have the women's similar marathon -- which would now actually be a longer-distance event than the men at 30km!   

Medal Count, one day left:

• Norway has won the gold and total.  15 gold, 35 total.
• Norway has both records now, as they bested the USA total in Vancouver by two in Pyeongchang to get to 39.  The 15 golds is a new record.
• Table is NOR 15 golds, GER 11 (including every sliding gold except the women's monobob -- they 1-2'd the women's 2-woman yesterday and one of the greatest bobsledders of all time is looking for a similar feat in the 4-man finale on the last day), China is now 3rd with 9 as the Chinese 4-time world champions won the pairs figure skating over two Russian pairs -- the top FIVE pairs in the event were either Chinese or Russian), USA, NED, and SWE with 8 each (USA has the silver tiebreaker over the other two 9-5, and the Netherlands and Sweden are tied at 8-5-4 as of the moment -- USA is 8-9-7).  
• Sweden may be in the process of breaking that tie late on Day 15 -- they're in the bronze-medal women's curling match and leading by one point.
• Total:  NOR 35, Illegal Russian Team 31, CAN 25, GER and USA 24 each.
• Great Britain, in losing the gold-medal men's curling match to Sweden, is now the 29th nation on the medal table.  Some of the Russian trolls extolling the virtues of their drug regime on Inside the Games have confused me for a Brit, because ITG is a British site!   

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!   

The Winter Olympic Virus, Day 14: Part Two: The Rest of It (???)

• The second-biggest controversy of these Games is two American women, both born in the United States, but both choosing (an adult by renunciation, and a minor by some other means) to compete for China.
• Born, and according to the Olympic website, still residenced in San Francisco, Eileen Gu had renounced her American citizenship and decided to ski for China (through the birthplace of her mother) in the freestyle skiing events.
• As a result, China has two golds and a silver from her that the USA would get had Gu not renounced.  Gu has been completely slammed in the US social media, as one might expect (and happened to the minor figure-skater who was also born here and chose to skate for China!), but Gu will ski out of these Games probably the biggest positive story of the Games, and probably the biggest positive story for the hosts, who now stand fourth on the table on silver tiebreak to the USA!
• Sports-fixing expert Brian Tuohy, through ESPN's David Purdum, notes that more people bet on the women's bobsled competition which followed the Super Bowl than any other Olympic event at PointsBet -- for the reason Tuohy suggests:  They lost money on the Super Bowl and tried to get it back!

Medal Count through two weeks:

• Any chance the Russians had at catching the Norwegians for the total was gone the moment the final biathlon mass start events yielded four Norwegian medals, including their fifteenth gold.
• That fifteenth gold is a new Winter Olympics record.  Old record was 14, held three ways:  Canada (Vancouver 2010), Norway (Pyeongchang 2018), and Germany (Pyeongchang 2018).
• So Norway will win the gold medal total, Germany is second with 10.  USA and the Chinese hosts have 8 apiece, the Netherlands, Sweden, and Switzerland have 7 apiece.
• Total:  Norway will win that too, they have 34 now to Russia's 27.  Canada is third with 24, Germany with 22, USA with 21.
• In the 11 biathlon events of these Games, the Norwegians won 14 of the 33 medals, including six gold..
• Russia has actually bested the Norwegians in one of their best events -- cross-country skiing.  Nine medals to six.
• 21 gold medal countries, 28 overall.  
• The only maiden of any kind broken is the gold medal maiden for New Zealand with Zoi Sadowski-Synnott in the snowboard slopestyle championship.
• Eight medal events tomorrow, four on Sunday.

The Winter Olympic Virus, Day 14, Part One: The Dark Post-Mortem Begins

Most of this material is from Inside the Games:

• Images of Kamila Valieva bawling after her falls have a lot of people condemning those who put her in that position.
• One Russian figure-skating star has written a letter urging Valieva not to quit the sport.  I'm verklempt.  For what she has been put through, she has no place in sport -- and the only technical "fault" of her own is it's her body that's been drugged and pushed, etc.  That said, last night had to be a devastating result for her, as well as Mother Russia.  It's one thing to drug an athlete where the only criteria is speed and/or power.  In a sport, however, where one false move and there goes the gold medal when you hit the ground... 
• The American and Japanese skaters from the team competition will receive Olympic torches from the IOC, as we await the CAS to fully weave it's way through this mess.
• It appears as if the Olympic silver medalist, Alexandra Truskova, has RETIRED ON THE SPOT because of the whole debacle:

What was also possible to hear in the broadcast:

Trusova: “I will never go on the ice again in my life! I hate this sport, I hate it! You can't do it this way! You can't do it this way! Everyone has a gold medal, but not me. You knew everything!"#figureskating #Beijing2022

— FS Gossips (@fs_gossips) February 17, 2022

• An opinion slamming all of us:  (Forgetting, of course, that the only way to prevent something like this is not having Russia in the movement at all -- Valieva is a minor and underage, but it's the RUSSIAN POWERS AROUND HER committing the abuse for gold and propaganda...)  

Child abuse under the guise of Olympic Sport An entire Olympic Movement and the IOC stood by and allowed a 15 year old child to be physically ,mentally and emotionally abused and publicly humiliated . Hatred and or Fear of Russia was more important that child welfare . No shame

— Brian Anthony Courtenay Lewis (@briaclew) February 17, 2022

• (And, for what it's worth, Mr. Lewis, blame the CAS more than the IOC -- if the CAS hadn't stepped in on the McLaren Report, Russia probably isn't even IN the Olympic movement, AND -- at minimum, Valieva never skates in the individual competition.)   
• The CAS has annihilated the anti-doping community in their full verdict allowing Valieva to complete, and completely ignores the all-but-certain means WHY the situation was so delayed in the first place.
• And WADA has condemned the CAS for what it calls "rewriting the code" regarding doping.  You mean legalizing it, under the right circumstances and parameters, do you not, WADA?
• IOC President Thomas Bach has condemned the Russian regime and Olympic Committee for placing such stress on Valieva that she finally cracked last night.  He also has little confidence it's going to get any better for her.
• And the Russian Deputy Prime Minister has condemned Bach for his comments.  No surprise, given the abject contempt the Russians have for the IOC and everything it stands for.
• Bach points out that the moment Valieva fell, the entire entourage (and probably her Russian dopers) gave her the fucking cold shoulder.  Oh gee, what a motherfucking shock.  It may take an appeal from the likes of that one ex-skater to keep her from Siberia.  At FIFTEEN!  And I'm NOT joking!!!   
• Bach had to deal with controversies and problems with the Beijing Games for at least a half a solid hour of today's (Friday Beijing time) press conference.

The Winter Olympic Virus, Day 13

• Getting to the back end of all this...
• Valentyna Kaminska of the Ukraine is the second failed doping test other than the Russian figure skaters of these Games.

Medal Count entering Day 13:

• Norway tops the table with 13 golds, Germany has 10, USA 8, the hosts 7.  (With the understanding that the current stated results of the team figure-skating competition are now as provisional as tonight's women's finals.)
• Total:  Norway 28, Illegal Russian Team 24, Germany 20.  (Same caveat.)
• The ROC is throwing a fit.  Duh. 
• If you want to know why Valieva has been allowed to skate, it's only the longest lines and biggest tickets of the entire Games.

More news:

• A spokesperson for Beijing 2022 blasted the world media and claimed Taiwan was already part of mainland China, a flashpoint for years between the Chinese Communist Party and the rest of the world.
• Martin Fourcade and the President of the world cycling federation, the UCI, David Lappartient, have been elected to the International Olympic Committee Athletes' Commission.
• To what should've been no one's surprise at the end of the women's hockey tournament, Canada beat the USA 3-2.  Canada was clearly the best team in the tournament.
• VALIEVA FALLS!  The other two Russians, and by a wide margin, win gold and silver in the women's figure skating.  Anna Shcherbakova wins the gold medal, Alexandra Trusova wins silver, Kaori Sakomoto of Japan wins bronze -- and by the caveats the IOC put into the competition, those results SHOULD, barring more Russian doping coming out, stand now.  Valieva finishes fourth.  Cue the Russian trolls.   
• Valieva blew the triple axel and the quad toe loop, and STILL, with two blown elements, had the fifth highest free skate score.  The other two Russians were 20 points better than the rest of the field.  I think you can figure out why.   
• The reported mood inside the arena is shock and silence -- and it is already being referred to by Inside the Games reporters as a controversial and infamous moment in the history of the Winter Games.  Look out, we may be JUST getting started!  If I'm the Inside the Games staff, I get out of Beijing NOW, closing-IOC Session notwithstanding. 

Medal Count coming out of Day 13:

• Norway adds another, now has 14 to lead the gold medal table.  Germany 10.  USA 8.  Sweden joins China with 7.
• Total:  Norway 29, Illegal Russian Team 26, Germany 22, USA 21, Canada 20.
• 21 nations have won gold medals at these Games.
• The medal table now contains 28 nations.
• Of the 109 events in the Games, only 17 now remain.

The Winter Olympic Virus: Day 12

• In what has to be the LEAST surprising news of the entire Games, Kamila Valieva won last night's short program by over two points.  The top six consist of three Russians, two Japanese, and a Korean.  Russia is favored to sweep the women's event on Thursday.
• A Finnish skater won the drug wildcard spot awarded by the IOC into the free skate.
• Jarl Magnus Reiber has to be heartbroken today -- leading the Nordic Combined large hill competition by 45 seconds, he somehow went the wrong way on the cross-country course.  As a result, fellow Norwegian Jorgen Graabak won the gold medal.

Olympic TV ratings Friday and forward, per Sports Media Watch.  (All comparisons are to Pyeonchang coverage):

• Friday:  4.6 rating, 8.57 million viewers.  -51% ratings, -48% viewers.
• Saturday:  4.4 rating, 8.24 million viewers.  -46% ratings, -43% viewers.
• And now to show the power of the Super Bowl.  One of the most prime spots for any television program is the first program after the post-game coverage of the Super Bowl.  This year, because of the unique quirk that the Olympics and Super Bowl were on NBC, the primetime coverage for Sunday was that prime spot.
• As a result, the small primetime coverage window drew a 9.8 rating and 21.28 million viewers, which were increases on Pyeongchang, obviously.
• In what probably is the most shocking number from Sunday:  USA Network actually drew a rating for the portion of it's 24/7 (yes, with the lack of NBC Sports Network, USA Network is showing either live or reran coverage of the Games all day every day until the cauldron goes out next Sunday!) coverage during the Super Bowl, an 0.52 rating and just over 900,000 viewers.

Other news and thoughts:

• To give you the current sorry state of the US Alpine skiing program:  There are 88 scheduled runners in today's men's slalom competition.  The United States has the same number as vaunted Alpine nations like Puerto Rico, Pakistan, San Marino, East Timor, Lebanon, Cyprus, Hong Kong, Thailand, the Philippines and all the other nations which took only ONE such skier.
• It is official.  The IOC will *NOT* recognize Kamila Valieva as an Olympic medalist -- if the Russian finishes in the top three, the results of the entire competition will be declared "provisional", awaiting a full trial on the full merits of the case, probably before WADA, and then the CAS.  I've heard a number of people criticize the IOC -- it's not the IOC, and probably never was, back to the McLaren Report.  It's the CAS you have to worry about.   

The Winter Olympic Virus: Day 11

• I just want these Games to be cancelled now.  It's clear this whole thing is going to eventually blow up.  If not somehow on the ice or whatever, the Russian trolls are going to get it done.
• I've had to deal with quite a number of those the last several days (and wondering what non-zero number of them have taken to the States in support of Drumpf).
• Valieva is now saying her grandfather's medication (probably for a heart condition) tripped the positive.  Failing to answer at least two questions:  Why, as a world-level athlete who HAS TO KNOW you are being tested for drugs at almost all times, are you taking anything that isn't either legal or a therapeutic exception?  Secondly, why are you taking THAT medication at all???    
• Yeah, I think it's fucking bullshit, and I think it's coming from upstairs, if you know what I'm saying.  A lot of the people defending Valieva as underage don't get the problem that this makes that problem WORSE.     
• To give you how ridiculous it is that this ruling holds from the CAS, the IOC has made an additional provision -- if Valieva finishes in the top 24 of the short program (Hint:  She Will), a 25th skater will be advanced into the free skate as well.

Medal Table:

• Norway pretty much clinched the #1 spot for the Games with three golds today so far, making 12.  Germany has 8, USA 7, Austria, the Netherlands, and the hosts from China 6 each.  The 2-man bobsled is left, so Germany will have 9 by the end of the night.