It is deplorable to witness the depths to which the U.S. Olympic Committee (USOC) will descend to please the Chinese government and its Olympic organizers.
One day after China revoked former Olympic speedskater Joey Cheek's visa, obviously for his role in founding Team Darfur, an organization which seeks to call attention to China's role in the conflict in Darfur, the USOC forced four Olympic cyclists to beg China for forgiveness for embarrassing the Chinese by wearing pollution-cutting masks when they arrived in Beijing... A city that by any measure ranks among the world's worst for clean air.
The USOC, the Bush Administration, and corporate America's tacit complicity in China's repression of human rights at home and abroad as well as its blatant disregard for the environment will make it difficult for this patriotic sports fan to watch these Olympic Games.
The true shame is not on the four cyclists who were merely trying to protect their health prior to competing for Olympic fame and fortune, but rather on those who have tarnished the Olympic ideal by kowtowing to the malevolent Chinese Olympic organizers and the country's duplicitous government leadership.
