Olympic support is a joke

Let me say right at the top that I know that our athletes in Beijing are trying their best. I know that there are only tenth and hundredth of second between first and fourth. Don't tell me that I do not support the athletes - because I do.

What I do not support is the way Harpo's government and many governments before this one treat the whole idea of Olympic sports.

Let me lay one fact on the table that seems to have eluded the bright spots on the hill. THE OLYMPICS ARE NO LONGER AMATEUR! The notion of amateur Olympics disappeared years ago, but no one in Ottawa noticed... or cared.

Kobe Bryant is in Beijing playing the same game that he gets paid millions to play. Roger Federer and Williams sisters are playing the same tennis game that they earn millions playing outside of the Olympics. Australia gives scholarships to athletes to spend time at the Olympic training facilities in Melbourne. I visited the Melbourne site a few years back and witnessed kids as young as 8 or 10 bouncing and flipping on gymnastic mats.

China identifies kids at the age of four and trains them at government expense until they win Olympic Gold.

Canada gives up to $20,000 to a very select athletes and tells them... good luck. By a very few, I mean that the maximum stipend goes to less than 500 Canadians. Most get little or no financial support. Those same Canadian athlete then go to their local olympic size pool to practice. NOT! Ottawa, the nation's capital, has no facility like this. There is no inside track facility (and don't try to convince me about the joke at Lansdowne Park). So off the athletes go to seek facilities in foreign territories where $20,000 is the cost of rent.

According to Sport Canada, they spend $23 million to support 1,900 athletes (that works out to about #12,000 on average). But the Sport Canada budget is over $111 million. Where doe the rest of the money go? Could it be to support an entire building dedicated to the beauracracy of Canadian sport? How about international travel for non-athletes to warm desitination in the winter months to view "best practices"? How about just pissing it away?

There is an article labelled news in the current Barrhaven Independent, the organ of the less-than-independent Con-sniffer, Jeffery Morris, that quotes the Perfect PP as saying "Olympic Games reflect Canada's achievements". How right he is... Canada hasn't won a gold, silver or bronze medal; or even Miss Congeniality.

Maybe the person at the right should be made head of Sport Canada?