Anyone who thinks that international sporting competition is not political should have a look at the history of Olympic boycotts.
Have you not read all of his replies here?
he’s a lawyer–he’s paid by the word. 
Ok, so it was tacky. I get that. But sedition etc? WTF? And, IMO, it would have never made the news etc, if the International CardPlaying Association for People Who Like Headaches with Their Socialization or whatever the governing body is called had just let it go.
Having been asked to defend/explain my country’s entire foreign policies to some Brits and others while in a guest in their country, I can feel for the woman–it’s not a pleasant sensation to be thought of as Evil Incarnate when all you want to is be dummy.
I think what most do not understand is that the U.S. Bridge federation sponsors these players to play in the Venice Cup (the women’s world championships.) All of them (or most, in any case) are professional bridge players and members of the American Contract bridge league. Both of these organizations have corporate sponsors who contribute to the support of the organizations and by extension to the livelihood of these same bridge players. These women were, in effect, at work, and since their employers do not take kindly to political speech at work they can be reprimanded. That being said, the reprimand being discussed is ridiculous. What would have been said if the Chinese team had made a pro-western sign? How courageous, etc. etc. This is all about money and only marginally about politics.
One reason why noone cares about bridge these days, when it was once the number one played card game in the country is that you have to be a Philadelphia lawyer to be able to follow all of the rules of the game itself. Now apparently you also have to be one to follow all of the rules of protocol.
I wanna triple pit here:
I Pit the asshole furriners who like to be cold towards Americans based on their dislike of our nation’s actions. These people make me want to go 100% PJ O’rourke on them (see the final bit from Holidays in Hell). So fuck you assholes - you make me WANT to act ugly American. You people are their playing bridge and you act like dickheads towards the nice ladies who just cleaned your clock? FUCK YOU! You might claim it is because you don’t like Bush, but we all know it is because the US team kicked your furrin ass.
I Pit the ladies who wimped out and, instead of bitching out the rude furriners, chose to put up a cheap ass sign at the last minute. It was pathetic, it accomplished nothing, and it makes you look stupid. Wearing a protest armband all week, a yellow ribbon, a peace sign - fine. Scrawling on a menu at the last minute in case you get booed? Cowardly.
I Pit the Bridge federation who made such a big deal out of this. The response could have been a much quieter, “We have reviewed our misconduct policy and have decided that if you are going under our banner, we ask that you leave politics out of it.” Instead, they have made this much bigger than it ever needed to be.
I Pit idiots who don’t know the meaning of Treason and Sedition (and I feel that I am forced to blame Ann Coulter for that I guess as she has cheapened the Treason accusation with her book title).
I Pit idiots who don’t understand Freedom of Speech, and that it is tied up with Freedom of Assocation. The Bridge crew can choose not to associate with these ladies if they like - that is their right. We can also lambast them for it as well, that is our right.
I Pit myself for never spending the time with my Grandparents and learning bridge.
Actually they don’t have to be asked that. The woman who wrote the sign has been a member of both organizations for 40 years. She knows how political and how conservative they both are. She knows that China for many years did not allow teams to participate, or its citizens to even play bridge for that matter. Political speech has always been anathema because the greater good, promoting bridge throughout the world, is the goal. As the captain of the team she knew better as did many of the team members ( a total of 6) only 4 of whom appear in the picture and one of those 4 apologized. It is not clear whether the other two participated in any way, but they seem to be being sanctioned as well. Basically, you have no right to embarrass any participating country, including your own.
Shit, BG, go ahead and blow all the secrets, what the heck? You gonna spill the beans about who really murdered Trotsky, too?
How, in a free and democratic society, is simply stating who you did or did not vote for embarassing your nation? It isn’t – unless that elected official is in fact an international embarassment, in which case the least of the problem is people speaking out.
You know what builds strong bodies twelve ways?
Reading the whole thread before posting.
If you overpromised your strength in diamonds when bidding and caused your partner to miss contract, you can be Evil Incarnate and dummy at the same time…
And you know that she knows *how? *Where has it been stated that she knew this? Where is it shown that she has been told this? They are a bunch of older ladies. They were exercising what they saw as a moment of levity. They don’t strike as me as Che Guevera types or air conditioning repairmen. My take is had they known they were going against well established rules, they wouldn’t have tried it.
Yet folks in this thread keep inferring that they KNEW. That they’d been TOLD. I’d just like to know where the fuck you are gaining this knowledge.
[nastyflashback]I used to play duplicate in a town where the fellow running the show would have fit right in as headmaster in Pink Floyd’s “The Wall”. It was amazing how after an evening with him in the room, I would come out more stressed than I had been when I went in. Paddle off a waterfall or climb a cliff? Good vertical stress relief. Play bridge with that SOB in the room? Need to go find a waterfall or cliff the next day. Needless to say, the sanctioned duplicate group shrank over a couple of years, and the social parties, including non-sanctioned duplicate, increased in popularity.[/nastyflashback]
Two things come to mind in this thread.
After I too wondered what bridge-related community service is (distributing packs of cards to disenfranchised youth? I suspect it’s ‘go play bridge with old people in nursing homes and don’t cheat’) I remembered a quote from a friend of mine – friend and a co-member of an organization with its own internal politics.
“Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. Imaginary power corrupts way out of proportion to actual power.”
Akin to the old comment about faculty meetings: “The battles are so big because the stakes are so small.”
“Ho ho”, she laughed ponderously.
Sorry, Brickster, but I don’t see much to laugh about re bridge, a “game” taken far too seriously by the participants and much too obscure for the rest of the blighted. Bridge to me means abstruse clues in old mystery novels–they only confuse me. But I’m just being snarky on principle. I have no real dog in this fight.
Don’t take your family problems out in public. You don’t like Bush, fine. You didn’t vote for him, fine. But don’t be an asshole in public about it, especially when you are representing the USA in a foreign country.
It’s called basic good manners, which most people seem to think are not important any more.
Speaking of that, Jill Levin, Jill Meyers, Debbie Rosenberg and Irina Levitina are almost as cool as Tommie Smith, John Carlos and Peter Norman. :smack:
Where’s that “Black power salute” smiley when ya need it?
“It is by the goodness of God that in our country we have those three unspeakably precious things: freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and the prudence never to practice either of them.”
Samuel Langhorne Clemens
CMC +fnord!
They are quite important. They are the gifts we give each other to enhance our mutual dignity. That is a good thing, no doubt. But what this conspiracy of scoundrels and nitwits is doing to my beloved country is far more important than “good manners” ever was, or ever will be.
52 pick-up?
And what conspiracy might that be? The one that the voices in your head tell you about?
Allow me to refer you to this site for a discussion about your so-called conspiracy.