coming soon enough.
]]>Spanish cyclist Maria Isabel Moreno has become the first athlete to fail a drugs test at the Beijing Olympics.
Moreno, who was entered for the women’s road race and individual time trial, tested positive for the endurance-boosting drug EPO.
Wow.
That was just absolutely awesome. The US mens 4×100m free (with Michael Phelps) came back from nearly a full body length in the last leg of the relay to outstretch the French swimmer by mere inches. The last split time by Jason Lezak was 46.06 seconds, a new record split for any relay in swimming.
France takes the medal for Foot in Mouth with their comments earlier in the week
“The Americans? We’re going to smash them. That’s what we came here for.”
They lost by .08 seconds.
See you in 2012.
Just an awesome race to watch. Check out the video on NBCOlympics.com
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What is certain to be considered a major escalation in the fighting, Russian ground forces are reportedly attacking the Georgian city of Gori well outside the disputed South Ossetian region. While technically South Ossetia is recognized by the entire world as part of Georgia, the crossing of that border into Georgia proper is going to have major repercussions for the Russians and has started to change the tone of questions to ‘when is Russia going to stop fighting in response to Georgia’s invasion of S. Ossetia?’ to something along the lines of ‘just what are the Russians *really* up to?’ The latter line of questioning is going to have an impact in Soviet Russian – Western relations for many years to come.
Meanwhile, Georgian forces in Iraq have been landing in Tiblisi and some questions are being raised on how exactly they got there (and whether US air power played a role).
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The story of Lin Hao has made headlines around the world as his cute face and smile captured the hearts of many around the world. But today we learned the whole event almost didn’t happen as security guards, unaware of his role in the parade, refused to admit him to the stadium. As people grew more and more nervous about him not arriving, finally a senior official had to go out and physically drag him in past security.
Lin is a second-grader at the Yuzixi Primary School in Yingxiu Town, Wenchuan County. Wenchuan was the epicenter of a devastating earthquake on May 12 that killed over 69,000 people. Lin is credited with keeping the spirits up of his trapped classmates by singing songs and after he was freed he went back into the rubble to help rescue two of his fellow students.
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Calls to China last night were met with a bit of disbelief on the receiving end. Seems the murder of an American tourist at the Olympics was not exactly front page news in China. It wasn’t even news. We were met by surprised comments by more than a few folks.
Today CCTV International service finally acknowledge that there was a killing in Beijing. I didn’t get the whole translation but it looks like it is finally out in the public in China (CCTV-4 broadcasts Internationally and domestically in China).
President Bush raised the issue with his Chinese colleague Hu Jintao and praise the police for their quick response. The motive for the murder remains a mystery.
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An early leader for the Pierre de Coubertin medal for sportsmanship is a pair of shooters, one from Russia and one from Georgia, who shared the medal platform today in the Womens’ 10m air pistol. Georgia’s Nino Salukvadze and Russia’s Natalia Paderina, former teammates on the USSR team, collected the bronze and silver today respectively, but took a moment to appeal for peace in the trouble South Ossetia area.
“I am very nervous today. It’s very difficult for my people,” said the Georgian.
“If the world were to draw any lessons from what I did there would never be any wars.
“We live in the 21st Century, after all,” she said, wiping tears from her eyes as she put her pistol down after her final shot of the event.
“We shouldn’t really stoop so low to wage wars against each other.”
One of the more famous arches in Arches National Park in Utah came crumbling down earlier this week. The sandstone Wall Arch which has been photgraphed countless times was found in pieces by Park service officials. The arch’s opening beneath the span was 71-feet wide and 33-1/2 feet high. It ranked 12th in size among the over 2,000 known arches in the park.
Now before you go blaming global warming, or motocross bikers, or stupid teenagers, it’s worth noting this is a natural event. From the NPS press release:
]]>All arches are but temporary features and all will eventually succumb to the forces of gravity and erosion. While the geologic forces that created the arches are still very much underway, in human terms it’s rare to observe such dramatic changes.
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Georgian Interior Ministry spokesman have announced they will be removing Georgian forces from South Ossetia. Russia now has nearly 10,000 troops in South Ossetia (which had a pre-battle population of 70,000) and the Russian Black Sea fleet is positioning itself off the Georgian coast for a naval blockade.
Meanwhile, strategic thinkers are starting to question the response by Russia. The use of ballistic missiles and strategic bombers seems disproportionate to an attack on peacekeepers, and some are questioning whether these attacks are designed to destabilize the Georgian government, or at least keep them out of NATO.
One other side effect of the attack is a more unified Western ‘view’ on Russia and the fact they may not be a ‘partner’ in the future. French, UK and other European allies share the US view that Russia may have burnt some bridges with their overresponse to this crisis.
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Russia continues to pour troops into South Ossetia and has reportedly stepped up the bombing of Georgia, targeting not just military locations but economic assets such as ports and pipelines. Meanwhile the world has been sending ambassadors and whatnot demanding that Russia pullback, but the Russian government is starting to ask the big question–why?
Russia will win militarily, through sheer numbers if not military ability. While it may be a much longer fight than just this weekend (despite what Russian bloggers think) the overall political climate in Russia is now asking the question ‘maybe we should redraw the maps.’
With a veto at the UN, don’t expect ‘blue helmets’ to be replacing the Russian ‘peacekeepers’ in South Ossetia anytime soon. Putin is calling the Georgian attack ‘Genocide’ which is a pretty loaded word designed to stir up a range of emotions around the world, though many around the world take everything Putin says with a grain of salt. It’s pretty clear that most of the world isn’t going to be rushing to the Russian side on this matter, but it’s also pretty clear that that doesn’t really matter.
What happens next is anyones guess. Militarily we could see guerilla-like fighting for years. Economically it’s unlikely we’ll see any sort of sanctions or anything more than a slap on the wrist (i.e. visa troubles for Russian leaders, etc). Russia might find itself kicked out of the G-8 regardless of who wins the American presidential election in a few months, but it’s doubtful many Russians would really care.
How much of a ‘resurgence’ in the Russian military is ‘real’ (readiness / training / resupply) and how much was for ’show’ (i.e. long range bomber flights of little significant value) over the last few years of Putin’s tenure will soon become apparent. Should the Roki tunnel (where South Ossetia gets much of its money) be blown up by some errant missile, resupply of Russian forces would become a bit more difficult.
We’ll see what happens next.
p.s. for additional updates from the Russian point of view you can use TASS’s English language website. It is updated more frequently than Russia Today’s website. For the Georgian side you can check the Civil.ge website.
UPDATES:
* Head of the Russian 58th Army injured in attack.
* Georgia claims to retake South Ossetian capital, destroying 40 Russian tanks.
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