Saturday, August 2, 2008

Olympic Thoughts

I've been reading heaps of articles re Beijing pollution; that factories are being shut down, people unemployed so as to get cleaner air for the games. Isn't it beyond belief that the Chinese gov't. didn't, when they won the bid for the Games, spend some of those Olympic building dollars on scrubbers/pollution controls for those factories and to add stringent emission standards for cars? Why was that Olympic Int'l. Committee so very short-sighted not to insist on pollution control...where were the athlete's committes? the IOC has always kept its head in the sand re human rights. and quotes political correctness as a defense.
What a missed opportunity to combat the pollution in this country, caused by their awakening to the capitalist, entreprenurial world. When the games are finished, the plants will return to operation, and the local population will suffer the respiratory ills rampant in our early Industrial Revolution, and we'll all suffer their contribution to global warming. I was in China 10 years ago, before the automobile and factory explosions, when bicycles still ruled the roads, and yet, returned home w. a very resistant respiratory infection. I hope our athletes wear their masks, even in the opening ceremonies as protest as well as health.

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