Absurdity, Allegory and China

From Networks Fight Shorter Olympic Leash in the NYT:

One I.O.C. commissioner, speaking on condition of anonymity to avoid further complicating the situation, said matter-of-factly that Chinese officials had “put a tourniquet” on the Olympics.

“Had the I.O.C., and those vested with the decision to award the host city contract, known seven years ago that there would be severe restrictions on people being able to enter China simply to watch the Olympics, or that live broadcasting from Tiananmen Square would essentially be banned, or that reporters would be corralled at the whim of local security, then I seriously doubt whether Beijing would have been awarded the Olympics,” the commissioner said.

That these issues are still being dealt with as the main event bears down upon us - and ‘bear down’ is the proper verb - speaks to the bumbling incompetence of the IOC. That they could not have foreseen in 2001 that the situation could possibly look as it does today tells us more about them than it does about China.

No matter how this whole thing ends up shaking down, it’s a pretty safe bet that the IOC, at the very least, will be rewriting their rule book, though what they should be doing is figuring out how to dismantle the organization, since they’ve proven that they cannot be trusted as they blunder about like Instamatic tourists in the seething middle of world politics. If they thought hookers and bag men in Mormon country buried them with bad press, they haven’t even seen buried yet. Wait until they try to explain this one away to the very people - the press - whom they’ve set up for the biggest fleecing. And when it comes to last words, we all know who will have it.

Poor Jacques. He should have spent more time boning up on history. Or the movies. If he had, he would have learned that what Beijing is on the middle of is the latest state-of-the-art-and techno-supported fear-of regime-change imperial clampdown, just like in the movies, where everyone’s watching everyone else to see if somewhere a crack appears, and, if it does, trying to figure which side would be best to come down on. This is the historic moment that all Chinese leaderships brace for. This is the truth behind the history of Mandates, as far back as you want to go. And it’s full of tension, as it always is. Any perception of weakness can be taken as a sign to move by … ? Well, I have no idea. It’s just a movie. Maybe Richard Gere at the head of an army of silk-scarved Caucasian Buddhists in sporty Fiats, intent on swooping down on Beijing, but instead, stuck in traffic on the 117^th Ring Road, somewhere west of Datong. It’s a fiction, but believable enough, as, in fact, they all are. And it’s really not too hard to swallow once you realize that the IOC gave the Olympics to Beijing without substantive and effective checks concerning very serious issues that needed to be addressed, and now, billions (and billions and buckets of billions) of dollars later, the show’s about to open. And nobody’s very happy. And Richard Gere just pulled over, somewhere west of Datong, looking for a juice bar that’ll serve smugly smiling white guys.

I think I might be on to something here. I’ve already got a working title.