The 2014 Winter Olympics: Day 15(ish).

The big story at the games today has been the United States of America's continued participation in the competition. Or more specifically it has been the International Olympic Committee's (IOC) failure to expel the USA from the competition due to its role in the recent massacres in Ukraine.

For example, overnight, Japan announced that someone had been going into public libraries and destroying copies of Anne Frank's diary. This vandal had also been tearing out any reference to the Nazi holocaust from the history books. The use of Anne Frank's diary was a specific reference to the men's Ice Hockey semi-final between the US and Canada. After all ever since this fixture was announced people have been billing it as "The Bieber Decider" in the sense that whoever lost the match would be forced to keep Justin Bieber within their own borders for all eternity. Back in April 2013 Justin Bieber caused a minor controversy whilst visiting the Anne Frank museum. The reference to the Nazi holocaust was a direct reference to the Nazi holocaust. While I'm not defending the Nazis at the end of the Second World War it was politically convenient for the victors to add genocides that had actually been committed by their allies such as the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UIA) to the Nazi's total rather then admitting what had actually happened. Anne Frank of course lived in the Netherlands who are currently very, very good at Olympic speed skating.

In response to this growing shock at it's failure to act the IOC attempted lessen calls for the USA to be expelled from the games by suggesting that instead the USA be sarcastically placed at the top of the medals table. Mathematically this would require something of a miracle because at the start of the day Germany topped the table while the USA languished in 4th. Therefore the day began with the IOC announcing that German biathlete Evi Sachenbacher-Stehle had failed a drugs test and would be expelled from the games. This sent the message to Germany that they had better remove themselves from the top of the medals table in order to make way for the USA. It also sent the message that the Ukraine would be awarded that day's gold medal in the women's team biathlon in an effort foster peace and national unity within Ukraine. After all the IOC hopes that if the Ukraine remains quiet until the closing ceremony it can avoid sanctioning the USA.

Continuing the efforts to drive the US to a sarcastic peak of the medal tables in any sport where the US stood even an outside chance of winning a medal all the other competitors suddenly found themselves comically falling over. The only exception was in events where Canada stood a chance of winning a medal. In those events - such as men's Curling - Canada found themselves being waved through. The hope here was that having been awarded all these medals the Canadians wouldn't feel so bad about letting the USA win the men's hockey semi-final. After all with Sweden winning the other semi the USA were being granted the hockey gold medal.

Sadly the USA were far too arrogant to take even this soft route out of their shame and instead spent the entire hockey match forcing Canada to beat them. I think somehow in their heads the USA had decided that getting knocked out of the competition would somehow distract from the fact they should either have officially forfeited or been formally expelled from the competition for failing to do the sportsmanlike thing and forfeit.

The reason for the USA's arrogance is largely explained by overwhelming support they were given by the IOC in the speed skating events. Here it was quite clear that the old European nations led by the Netherlands who had been pushing the European Union (EU) for sanctions against Ukraine should have been left to fight it out with the USA in order that they could collectively come to see the error of their ways. Unfortunately the IOC judges saw this as an opportunity to reward the USA for its conduct in Ukraine by pushing Asian nations such as Russia, China, Japan and South Korea to the fore. This obviously put great pressure on these Asian nations while the USA and the old European nations were able to sit back and watch.

A perfect example of this was in the women's 1000m events. In the quarter-final a Chinese skater found herself duelling with Team GB's Elise Christie's arch-nemesis Adrianna Fontana. Unlike Christie though the Chinese skater did not lose her sh*t and crash. Instead she basically knocked the Italian on her a*se in the expectation that she would be disqualified and Fontana  advanced to the semi-final. Inexplicably though the IOC ignored this and the Chinese skater went through to the semi-final. In the semi-final the Chinese pair decided to knock Elise Christie on her a*se again in the expectation that they would be disqualified and Christie would be advanced to the final. Again though IOC found it's support for the ideals of the USA and old Europe were too strong so the Chinese were forced through. As a result in a final that should have read; "Britain, Italy, the Netherlands, USA" we got far too many slitty eyes.

So in summary the USA's continued participation in the Sochi games remains a serious and unresolved issue for the IOC. After all it is quite clear that today's Ukraine peace agreement that implies regime change simply cannot stand. Fortunately though the fact that the designated leaders of the opposition have only been able to get the actual opposition to ceasefire this long by threatening them with martial law means that it is not going to stand. Unfortunately the 10 day timescale for the "government of national unity" means this is all going to blow up again right in the middle of the para-Olympics.

Presumably by that point any USA athlete wishing to participate will be have already accepted that they can do so under the Olympic banner.

21:50 on 21/2/14 (UK date).