Stephen Wade
@StephenWadeAP
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Associated Press reporter/sports writer. “News is what someone wants suppressed. Everything else is advertising.” — Katharine Graham swade @ap .org
Tokyo. St. Louis. Ted Drewes.
Joined July 2011
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Tommy Edman and Lars Nootbaar, the two Cardinals in WBC, chat at Tokyo Dome. Edman playing for South Korea and Nootbaar for Japan.
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Rio's Olympic Park 6 months after games: Ghost town. Brazil spent about $12B on games. Now so broke can't pay police, teachers. Crime soars.
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First attempted shower in room at media village. No hot water and shower head fell off.
#RoadToRio
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Another view of Tokyo’s new Olympic pool. Cost: $530 million. Seating 15,000 at games time.
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Tiny press work room at Tokyo Dome. Smoking permitted. Booth. No door. Second-hand smoke all over. THIS IS A sports venue. Shame on Tokyo. So advanced. But this is bad.
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Klopp off base. Million words written about how Qatar, Russia picked. Press exposed the corruption. Blatter dethroned. FIFA, those w financial interests, those w political interests did no act. Infantino could have acted. He did zilch. This is FIFA’s event. Hold it responsible.
"You are all journalists YOU should have sent a message!"
Liverpool boss Jurgen Klopp didn't hold back when talking about the Qatar 2022 World Cup.
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6 Finally. Maybe firstly. Valieva is 15. The Olympics keep getting younger athletes involved, to draw youth attention, push ratings — drive revenue of course,etc. Don’t forget, IOC is a business. I believe a skateboard winner in Tokyo was 14. What protection do these kids have?
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And the view from above at Tokyo’s $500 million Olympic swimming venue.
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American Sha’Carri Richardson isn’t allowed to run 100 in Tokyo — she smoked some weed — but Russia can send 300 athletes to Tokyo Olympics despite Russia’s systematic state-backed doping system. Remember. Russia was to be barred from Olympics. But not really. IOC Hypocrisy.
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Insanity in Yokohama wAiting for Naomi Osaka to be presented as Nissan’s new spokeswoman. Crazy coverage.
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Pool side on Saturday at Tokyo’s new Olympic swimming venue.
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Protesters Sunday said “no” to Tokyo Olympics with virus surging in Japan and less than 2% vaccinated. This is NOT a typo. 2%. Hospitals jammed and Olympics will divert 10,000 health-care workers. One protester called games a “horrendous” event driven by commercial priorities.
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China says boycott violates Olympic spirit. What about the genocide, the crimes against humanity. Olympic spirit? The IOC said awarding Beijing 2008 Olympics could improve human rights. Did the opposite. So IOC awarded China Games again. How’s that working out?
#WhereIsPengShuai
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1 To understand the Olympics, understand this. The International Olympic Committee is a sports business. Like NFL, NBA, it lives off selling broadcast rights. This is source of almost 75% of income. Another 18% from sponsors. It has two major events: Summer and Winter Olympics.
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4 Bottom line. Tokyo Olympics cost Japan taxpayers $20-30 billion. IOC pays little, gets host country to foot bill, then sells TV rights at venues built with public money. IOC cashed in. NBC sells ads and profits. Japan pays almost all bills. Public money into private hands.
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1-6 Have we ever seen a bigger mess in recent Olympics? Kamila Valieva is allowed to compete this week in women’s final. But if she’s in the top three there’s no medal ceremony, per IOC edict. There also no ceremony for the team event won by Valieva and the Russians a week ago.
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How about this. The IOC defends 3-time Olympian Peng Shuai. IOC tells China the Winter Olympics can’t go on until she is free. IOC puts athletes ahead of billions in TV, sponsor income. IOC President Thomas Bach shows moral courage. What’s so tough about this?
#WhereIsPengShuai
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1/5 Japanese Olympic athletes begin vaccinations on Tuesday. But the Japanese Olympic Committee is severely limiting coverage. Obviously. Bad look. Healthy, robust young athletes jump to head of line. While almost no one else in Japan is vaccinated. We knew this would happen.
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On the road to Pyeongchang Olympics. Piste in the distance.
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Lobby of 5-star, $500 per night hotel — The Okura — headquarters for IOC. Members get min. $450 per diem, 1st-class flights, etc. Official cost of Olympics $15.4B, likely much more. All but $6.7B public money. All sunk costs. Cash gone that might have been used for schools, etc
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1 Toyota won’t be airing any Olympic-themed advertisements on Japanese television during the Tokyo Games despite being one of the IOC’s top corporate sponsors.
The extraordinary decision by the country’s top automaker underlines how polarizing the Games have become in Japan.
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Another view of this beautiful Rugby World Cup venue in Kamaishi, Japan. 1,000 died here in the earthquake and tsunami in 2011. Note the dam at end of video built to hold back another tsunami. Great day here for this area: Uruguay vs. Fiji.
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Rio's Olympic Park a year after: arenas shut, no shade, no food, few people. No planning after spending billions. Tokyo must not repeat.
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There will be 18,000 beds at Athletes Village for Tokyo Olympics—all made of cardboard frames. Organizers say will support 200 kilos, or 440 pounds. Olympics open July 24.
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Rio Olympic Village. Housed 10,000 Olympians 6 months ago. Shut. Developer can't sell units. Nearby the poor live in shantytown. Priorities?
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1 The IOC is making these Olympics take place because it must get something on TV and collect billions in broadcast rights money. End of story. In a “no money” world they would be canceled. Now we are going through incredible gyrations to make Olympics happen for TV.
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Why is IOC President Thomas Bach prioritizing the importance of a few hundred Russian athletes for a 2-week Olympics in Paris ahead of 40 million Ukrainians under deadly bombing from Russia? Priorities?
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Excellent point. If the Tokyo Olympics are “safe and secure,” why do athletes have to sign waivers to release IOC, etc. of responsibility for whatever may befall them?
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1 In case you missed non-stop news about Olympics coming out of Japan. First, Japan audit bureau says delayed Tokyo 2020 Olympics cost 20% more than organizers and government said. Report also details host of other hidden costs. First, Organizers did not divulge true costs.
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1-6 I tried again to ask IOC President Thomas Bach about the internment of Uyghur Muslims in China. I tried last week in a small gathering and was told Bach was taking only Tokyo questions. This time it was in Bach’s big Olympics presser. Here is the question I delivered to Bach.
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1-4 “Maybe listen for a moment, eh.” This is IOC President Thomas Bach speaking to me after I asked a question, he disputed the premise of the question, and when I challenged, he offered this condescending retort. It is the IOC that does not listen and wants to control agenda.
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The number of COVID-19 cases reported in Tokyo totaled 4,058 Saturday. That is a daily for Tokyo. Right in the middle of Olympics. IOC President Thomas Bach has said this has nothing to do with Olympics. This is, however, exactly what Japanese medical community said would happen.
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The Rio Shower Saga in media village. Water leaking from light fixture. Plumber knocks down wall.
#RoadToRio
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1-5 IOC seems deaf, imperious, no care about public opinion. No care for Japanese public. IOC president will attend a party on Sunday given by Japanese. Bach says he’s going because “guest.” Says all COVID protocols to be followed. “We are just the guests.” Not really the point.
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Prime Minister Suga. “Infections are expanding in the Tokyo and western metropolitan areas at an enormous speed that we have never experienced before.” By mere coincidence, Olympics are here. IOC says Olympics nothing to do with spike. But this exactly what scientists feared.
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1/3 Mark these words. No matter what happens with Tokyo Olympics, it will be spun by IOC, NBC TV, Japanese media, Suga government, organizers, Tokyo Governor, as a grand success. Just holding it will be enough. Nationalism will prevail. Public will focus on medal totals.
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Dr. Marcelo Patricio gets condom--1 of 450,000 for Rio Olympics--from Athletes Village vending machine.
#RoadToRio
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1/8People keep asking why the Tokyo Olympics are apparently opening in the middle of a pandemic. Money. Money. Money. Estimates suggest International Olympic Committee could lose $3B-$4B in broadcast rights income. Selling broadcast rights almost 75% of IOC income. Sponsors 18%.
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1-6 I wrote this week about the redevelopment project at Meiji Gaien that will lead to demolition of historic Jingu Stadium.
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4 All is fallout from the state-run doping scandal in 2014 in Sochi, Russia. That was eight years ago. Lost in the wake is fact that the US and Japan, which finished behind Russia in team event, will get no ceremony for their medals or athletes. IOC tries to act like a bystander.
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5 This is the IOC’s event. It has supreme authority over the Olympics when it chooses to exercise it. But when there are problems, it deflects to all those acronyms: WADA, ITA, IFs, CAS, NOCs. Reminds of Abbott and Costello routine “Who’s on First?”
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2 Valieva is the favorite to win. She is clearly the world’s best. How did this happen? She took a doping test on Dec. 25 when she won the national championship. The sample was tested in Stockholm — Russia has no accredited lab. The failed test was not reported until Feb. 7-8.
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1/2 Note how IOC, Japanese organizer are silent about critical comments this week from Emperor Naruhito on the risks of holding Olympics. Note. One, he almost never speaks on issues like this. Two, he did NOT have to say a word, but he did. Embarrassment for IOC head Thomas Bach.
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If Peng Shuai were safe, she would not show it by speaking on a video screen to IOC President Bach. Were she outside China, free and unafraid, she’d hold a presser. Take questions. Maybe hire a lawyer. File a court case. Huddle with WTA CEO Steve Simon. Chat with WTA players.
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IOC President Thomas Bach has warned athletes against political protests in Tokyo. An athletes’ reply rejecting Bach view.
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1/4Despite the contortions to hold Tokyo Olympics. The rules. The tests. The threats. GPS monitoring. Bubbles. One thing unchanged. The IOC will lodge in Tokyo’s best five-star hotel. IOC per diems from $450 to $900. Everyone has to sacrifice, IOC President Thomas Bach has said.
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Not making it up. Open sewer -- stench included -- 50 meters from Rio Olympic athletes village.
#RoadToRio
10 days.
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Surreal. Less than 5 months from Tokyo Olympics. Major crisis with virus. Threat of postponement. Two leaders of organizing committee speak only in Japanese. One English question translated. Treated presser like a local council meeting. Thanks goodness I have Japanese speaker.
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This would have been the closing day of the Tokyo 2020 Olympics. All over. Went so fast. Beautiful, sunny day. Temperatures in 32C/90F range. Hope to see you on July 23, 2021. Really, have no idea if Olympics can happen in midst of pandemic. 15,400 Olympic and Paralympic athletes
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1 IOC President Bach meets press, but handlers only allow questions about Tokyo. Nothing about Beijing 2022 and boycott threats. Control very heavy. I asked about billions in costs. He stopped me and said those are “wrong” parameters to judge. He obviously doesn’t pay taxes here.
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Japan Olympic Museum closed because of virus state of emergency. Next door. Olympic gift shop open. Guess no virus threat here.
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Big picture. 23 Chinese swimmers — not 1, or 3, or even 5. The number is enormous, 23 tested positive. 3 won Tokyo Olympic gold, cheating others out of a fair chance. And WADA didn’t challenge China’s explanation, saying banned drug got into everyone’s food. Implausible and ugly.
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IOC says spike in virus has nothing to do with Olympics. False. People are out more. Celebrating Japan medals. More circulation on trains. In bars. Olympics over in 10 days. IOC will be gone. Japan cleans up mess, pays billion-dollar bills. IOC pays little, profits, and leaves.
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1-7 Explainer on Olympic corruption. This time Tokyo. Japanese prosecutors Friday raided office of Japanese ad firm Dentsu. Dentsu runs Japan; powerful with tentacles everywhere. Dentsu helped land Olympics for Tokyo in 2013. Investigators believe they bribed IOC members.
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4 IOC has not-for-profit status in Switzerland. It says it distributes 90% of income back to sports bodies, who then dole out. Just finished a new headquarters at cost of $150 million. About 40% of all IOC income is from US network NBC. IOC and NBC in reality operate as partners.
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Amazing. Toyota won’t be airing any Olympic-themed advertisements on Japanese television during the Tokyo Games despite being one of the IOC’s top corporate sponsors. The extraordinary decision by the country’s top automaker underlines how polarizing the Games have become.
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The vast emptiness of the Athletes Village from last year's Olympics. Shuttered. 3,600 apartments. Reports say 7 percent sold.
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Bad week for IOC. Trifecta. Nuzman gets 30 years for bribing other IOC members to pick Rio for 2016 Olympics. Apart, IOC works with China propaganda machinery in case of Peng Shuai and sexual abuse allegation. Add Beijing Olympics and alleged crimes against humanity. IOC silence.
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3 By that time she’d already led Russia to the team medal in Beijing on Feb. 7. Why the long delay? Who’s responsible? Again it is Russia, which technically is not competing here. Russia is competing under the name of ROC — Russian Olympic Committee — a dodge approved by the IOC.
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I wish Los Angeles would focus on its massive homeless population instead of Olympics. Priorities.
Cities around the world are lined up for the Summer Games. Don’t delude yourself. And after LA28 the line is gonna get even longer bc LA is v likely gonna make so much money and transform so much if everything else
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Another Rio Olympic "White Elephant." Juventude Arena in shuttered Deodoro Park. Cost about $35m. This in a state that's bankrupt.
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7 Japan must save face. Billions already spent that might have been better spent elsewhere. Too late now, and pandemic keeps meter running. Finally. China host to 2022 Winter Olympics. Japan does not want to fail and cede stage to Beijing. IOC also understands these geopolitics.
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3 Forgotten is the IOC vote-buying scandal that landed games in Tokyo in the first place. Same for Rio. Officially $15.4 billion spent on Tokyo — at least 70% public money. How many schools, hospitals, roads sacrificed for two-week Olympics. Politicians. Where are the priorities?
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1 Three months to go until Olympics. Tokyo and Osaka under emergency orders. Medical community in Japan and opposition lawmakers raising more objections. Prime Minister Suga was asked Friday about Olympics in presser. Suga said IOC decides on Olympics and “they have decided.”
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Tokyo reports 714 new cases vs. 619 last Wednesday. NHK says highest since May 26. 11th straight day cases are higher than they were 7 days previous. Good bet that these Olympics will be held during state of emergency. Recall. IOC VP John Coates said SOE would not stop games.
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Naomi Osaka asks
#WhereIsPengShuai
No answer from China. Silence from International Olympic Committee. Peng is a three-time Olympian 2008, 2012, 2016.
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Paris 2024 Olympics announces it will use 45,000 volunteers. Just a reminder. Volunteers are typically not paid. This save organizers and IOC millions. Do the math. Almost everyone else gets paid. IOC members get per diems of $450-900. IOC has billons and squeezes labor. No fair.
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If Peng were “fine,” she would NOT go on a video call with Thomas Bach to say so. Absurd. If she were “fine” she could leave China, talk to a lawyer about her abuse case, call reporters and tell her story. Bach is a lawyer. He knows this is not a person speaking freely. Shame.
#ThomasBach
is now expressly using
#CCP
human rights discourse to defend the
#IOC
's (non) action re
#PengShuai
. Bach's "very human and person-centred approach to her situation" is merely the singular version of the CCP's "people-centered approach" to human rights."
#NoBeijing2022
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Kamaishi says “thank you” for the support after the March 11, 2011 earthquake and tsunami.
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Kengo Kuma’s beautiful stadium is behind barricades. Not just the stadium, but the roads around are sealed, as are businesses that border stadium. Militarized zone, really. Shame for a city that is usually so accessible.
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Did this story two years ago. Shows how IOC uses unpaid volunteers while sponsors and TV make billions on backs of free labor. Worth a think and read.
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1/7 If you think the Tokyo Olympics are polemical, wait for the Beijing Winter Olympics — opening just 6 months after Tokyo ends. The International Olympic Committee has put 3,000 winter athletes in a horrible spot: compete and be complicit in crimes against humanity in Xinjiang.
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The $1.5B, massive Rio Olympics Athletes Village as seen from outside the gates.
#RoadToRio
6 days to go.
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The Rio Olympic Athletes' Village. Empty. Private real estate deal. Developer must be happy having low-interest, government-backed loans.
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1 Quick thread. Others have mentioned. These Tokyo Olympic test events going on this week have felt very stealth. Held during Golden Week. Tokyo staff all taking deserved time off. Little updates on events. Suddenly in diving, 225 athletes from 46 countries get into Japan.
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Asian-style toilet still in use in Tokyo Olympic main press center. Just FYI.
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Not pictured. Protesters disrupted flame lighting to highlight crimes against humanity in China and alleged genocide in Xinjiang that targets millions of Uyghur Muslims.
🔥✨Today, with just over 100 days to go until the Olympic Winter Games
#Beijing2022
, the Olympic
#flame
was successfully lit in Greece. ️✈️The flame has started its journey! Let's review the Olympic flame lighting through these stunning photos. 📸📸
#Beijing2022
#Olympics
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5 All the contortions to hold Tokyo are driven by TV, like most sports businesses. Before all the commercialization, these Olympics would have simply been canceled. That is not possible now. To disguise this fact, IOC says the games are needed for the athletes. For global good.
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The two-story dining facility at Tokyo Olympic Village. No self-serve this time. Food handled only by cooks and servers. Anti-virus film on handles of refrigerators loaded soft drinks.
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Taxpayers foot bill. Billions so IOC can have Games, and so IOC can generate billions — $7.6 billion last four-year cycle. WHO pays? French public. WHO benefits? IOC, advertisers, TV, sponsors. Athletes get virtually ZERO. ZERO. IOC also had gall to use unpaid labor — volunteers.
French military to contribute 15,000 soldiers to massive security operation for Paris Olympics (from
@AP
)
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Haruki Murakami pleads for keeping Tokyo park and baseball stadium that inspired his writing (from
@AP
)
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1/3Seiko Hashimoto was asked at presser today how much money organizing committee will lose by having no fans. She basically said she didn’t know. She does, of course. Organizers were looking for $800 million from ticket sales. Now they will get almost zero.
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4 Olympics are fine idea. But look at cost-benefit. IOC pays for relatively little. Athletes have no union and lack leverage. Look at upcoming Beijing Winter Olympics. China committing genocide and IOC going there anyway. Again, Olympics are run off moral high ground by the cash.
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#WhereIsPengShuai
IOC President Bach says she fine. He, of course as a member of the International Olympic Committee on the eve of the Beijing Olympics, is a neutral party.
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1/4 Tough day for IOC President Thomas Bach on Tuesday as he addressed Tokyo Olympic officials. Bach tripped over his words while addressing his Japanese hosts, referring to the “Chinese people” rather than “Japanese people” as he spoke.
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Searching around Rio's empty Maracana stadium for the Olympic Rings. Found 'em.
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Tokyo trying to save thousands of trees at Jingu Gaien from real estate developers Mitsui Fudosan, Tokyo Gov. Yuriko Koike, and Meiji Jingu religious body. At question: who has say over this public space? Must everything have a price?
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ICYMI: Inside Tokyo’s Olympic swim venue. Seats 15,000. Cost is $530 million. Complete in February. Diving pool at far end.
#Tokyo2020
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I’m sorry. Color me cynical. China is offering — and IOC accepting — vaccines to Olympians and Paralympians. Meanwhile, China has interned 1 million Muslim Uyghurs in camps. IOC President Thomas Bach will not even utter the word “Uyghur.” Vaccines in trade for deadly silence.
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Many Japanese feel this way.
"The Olympics is the last thing we should be having in the middle of the
#COVID19
pandemic...The Olympics...must be stopped."
-Dr.
@aokima33
of Japan Women's Medical Association 医師・公益社団法人日本女医会理 HT
@waka__chang
@tkatsumi06j
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1-5 The back-room attempt by politicians, real estate developer, and the land owner to remake the Jingu Gaien park into a large commercial space is a case study in the subversion of the public policy making process in Tokyo and Japan. The conflicts of interest stain everything.
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The pianist I had to be told is Hiromi Uehara. First gold medal of the Olympics. Spectacular.
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2 No Olympics. Little income. For this reason, it needs the Tokyo Olympics to happen, even if just for TV with zero fans. The cost for pulling this off falls almost entirely on Japan. The official cost for Tokyo Olympics is $15.4. Estimates suggest it might be twice that.
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This is the ground view from the street in front of Tokyo’s National Stadium. Looks like armed camp for Tokyo Olympics. Massive fence. Roads blocked. Businesses isolated. And very ugly. Contrast with the beauty of Kengo Kuma’s design — green and human scaled.
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