This Day in African American History March 2

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1919 Science/Business/ Medicine		Associated Negro Press founded! *On this date in 1919, the Associated Negro Press (ANP), the first national news services for African-Americans, was established more...
	1962 Sports/Outdoors		Wilt scores 100 points! *On this date in 1962, Wilt Chamberlain set a National Basketball Association (NBA) scoring record of 100 points more...
	1901 Sports/Outdoors		A true power hitter, George Suttles! *George Suttles was born on this date in 1901 more...
	1888 Science/Business/ Medicine		One of the America's first black banks opens its doors! *The Savings Bank of the Grand Fountain United Order of the True Reformers (GFUOTR) was chartered by the Virginia legislature on this date in 1888 more...
	1955 Episode		Black woman jailed for bus seating incident! *On this date in 1955, 15-year-old Black teenager Claudette Colvin was arrested for refusing to move out of her seat for a white woman on a public bus in Montgomery, Alabama more...
	1957 Science/Business/ Medicine		A computers best friend, Dr. Mark Dean! *Mark Dean was born this date in 1957 more...
	2005 Episode		Congressional Gold Medal awarded to Jackie! *On This date in 2005, Jackie Robinson was posthumously awarded a Congressional Gold Medal more...

Politics of the Olympics

     Last Friday, about 1500 people protested the Olympics by marching through Vancouver. While some people had legit reasons to protest & protested peacefully, a few hundred decided to protest more violently by intimidating passers by & destroying property. Here's the video from the protest:

The Olympic Games

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    If you believe Republican conventional wisdom, it was Obama’s fault that Chicago lost its bid to host the summer Olympics games. However, there was so much more to the bid than just Obama, who really didn’t have much to do with it other than trying to make a speech about why America deserved to host.

     There is an excellent article by Bill Briggs from msnbc.com about Scott Blackmon, new CEO of the United States Olympic Committee http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35147038/ns/business-sports_biz/. In it, he talks about all of the missteps that the committee has taken over the years. Among the biggest mistake is the revenue sharing agreement that the committee has with the International Olympic Committee. Rather than me trying to explain it, I’ll let that part of the article fill you in:

“…..The revenue-sharing deal stems from a 1978 congressional decision that granted the USOC exclusive rights to market the Olympic rings. That act, in turn, forced the IOC to ink a pair of then-necessary — now-unpopular — marketing and TV rights deals with the USOC.
Under those contracts, the USOC is guaranteed 20 percent of all global Olympic sponsorship money and 12.75 percent of the worldwide Olympic TV rights fees. The rest of the 200-plus Olympic countries divided the remaining IOC funding.

The IOC has recently pushed the USOC to restructure that arrangement, though both sides have mutually agreed to shelve further talks until 2013. Still, one IOC member — Denis Oswald from Switzerland — pointed to the lopsided revenue shares as one reason Chicago’s 2016 bid was handily shot down by an IOC vote……”

     In short, the Chicago bid was doomed from the start due to old business deals & internal & external politics. What is unfortunate is that it doesn’t look like the United States will get another chance at an Olympics until the revenue sharing contract is ironed out.

     I highly encourage everyone to read this article. It goes into a lot of other problems that the committee has to deal with, many of them self inflicted. I wish Scott Blackmon much luck with rebuilding the prestige of the Olympic committee. Every 2 years, I look forward to watching our best athletes compete against the rest of the world. A strong committee will ensure a strong team.

State Department vs Chavez Over Golf

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State Department spokeman P.J. Crowley took the opportunity the other day to criticize Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez. Was it over human rights abuses? Nope. Was it for meddling in Columbia's affairs? Eh eh. It was over a golf comment. Seriously.


Chavez plans to close golf courses in Maracay and Caraballeda & said it was a rich man's sport. He also said it was a shame that in the middle of the city, there's a golf course with so much land lacking for buildings for the people & that if rich people wanted to play golf, they could build one outside the city. He also called golf a "bourgeous" sport.

Well, thems fighting words for P.J. Crowley. "As the Department of State's self-appointed ambassador-at-large for golf, I wish to protest the unwarranted attack by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez on the game of golf. Once again Mr. Chavez, one of the hemisphere's most divisive figures, finds himself out of bounds," Crowley said. "The suggestion by Mr. Chavez that golf, a truly global sport, is bourgeois is a mulligan."

It's so good to see that the State department has time to care about golf. What, with all of the world's problems out there, golf easily comes up in the top 3 things to deal with. I think it's right after worrying about the spread of global reality television & who Brittany, Lindsey, & Paris are doing (oooh..maybe each other!!). If Crowley's so bent out of shape over a golf comment that Chavez made (a comment that, I admit, I find myself agreeing with, unfortunately), I'd hate to see what he would've done to Mark Twain for his "golf is a good walk spoiled" comment. Crowley probably would've had him deported.

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• Hugo Chavez moves to close golf courses (telegraph.co.uk)
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• Hugo Chavez finds new enemy: golfers (ctv.ca)