April 13th: A Political Day
Apr. 13th, 2008 03:38 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dewlineIt seems to have been a day for political thought of one sort or another. Certainly, my travels downtown this morning and afternoon are evidence enough of this trend.
Consider: this morning, I went down to Library and Archives Canada to wish the organizers of the Spring 2008 edition of the Writers Festival my best, and decide at the last minute to take in the opening event: a talk delivered by and held with Samantha Power, author and until recently, part of the advisory team of Sen. Obama's Presidential election campaign. Representing the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation news division was Lucy van Oldenbarnevald, currently the Ottawa News at Six anchor for "Mothercorp".
Professor Power was there to speak of a new book of hers, discussing one of the key players of much of the UN's peacekeeping operations of thirty years ending with his death in Iraq in 2003: Chasing the Flame: Sergio Vieira de Mello and the Fight to Save the World. The gaffe that led to her resignation came up, she didn't hold back in blaming herself for it, and the discussion went on to cover Vieira de Mello's work across the world from the Balkans to East Timor...the Obama campaign in general...and the role of the United States in the future of the World.
After this, lunch. En route from LAC to the Rideau Centre, I spotted some evidence of ongoing disagreement and...let's call it polarisation of another sort, not unlike what Professor Power spoke of.
Yep, the Beijing Olympics/Tibetan Rights mess came to Wellington Street in general and Parliament Hill in particular.
I have to admit that I find something Wrong in the demands of the pro-mainland China camp that we not mix politics and sports. A quick study of Olympic history, whether you take it back to 1894 or all the way back to ancient Greece will repay you with the truth that politics and sports are joined at the hip here. The existence of the Olympic Games is itself a political act, specifically a way for nations to try to one-up each other without resorting to full-blown warfare. Based on that research, I don't believe there's ever been a time when the two realms were not locked together at the heart of the Games.
So I consider the demand that sport and politics not be mixed from anyone to be a call to be blind to truth and history. To be blind to truth in history.,.
We can certainly debate some of the other points claimed by both sides at length. That debate is going on anyway.
But don't ask me to blind myself to reality.
Please.
Consider: this morning, I went down to Library and Archives Canada to wish the organizers of the Spring 2008 edition of the Writers Festival my best, and decide at the last minute to take in the opening event: a talk delivered by and held with Samantha Power, author and until recently, part of the advisory team of Sen. Obama's Presidential election campaign. Representing the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation news division was Lucy van Oldenbarnevald, currently the Ottawa News at Six anchor for "Mothercorp".
Professor Power was there to speak of a new book of hers, discussing one of the key players of much of the UN's peacekeeping operations of thirty years ending with his death in Iraq in 2003: Chasing the Flame: Sergio Vieira de Mello and the Fight to Save the World. The gaffe that led to her resignation came up, she didn't hold back in blaming herself for it, and the discussion went on to cover Vieira de Mello's work across the world from the Balkans to East Timor...the Obama campaign in general...and the role of the United States in the future of the World.
After this, lunch. En route from LAC to the Rideau Centre, I spotted some evidence of ongoing disagreement and...let's call it polarisation of another sort, not unlike what Professor Power spoke of.
Yep, the Beijing Olympics/Tibetan Rights mess came to Wellington Street in general and Parliament Hill in particular.
I have to admit that I find something Wrong in the demands of the pro-mainland China camp that we not mix politics and sports. A quick study of Olympic history, whether you take it back to 1894 or all the way back to ancient Greece will repay you with the truth that politics and sports are joined at the hip here. The existence of the Olympic Games is itself a political act, specifically a way for nations to try to one-up each other without resorting to full-blown warfare. Based on that research, I don't believe there's ever been a time when the two realms were not locked together at the heart of the Games.
So I consider the demand that sport and politics not be mixed from anyone to be a call to be blind to truth and history. To be blind to truth in history.,.
We can certainly debate some of the other points claimed by both sides at length. That debate is going on anyway.
But don't ask me to blind myself to reality.
Please.
