The BBC reported today (link to article) that Obama has urged President Bush against attending the opening ceremonies of the Beijing Olympics during his Asian tour. I see a problem with this. Maybe I am too young to remember accurately, but where were the protests against United States imperialism during the Atlanta Olympics? Like Dr. Martin Luther King Jr said, America is the world’s leading agitator of violence. The United States supports theocratic governments and dictatorships around the world, such as Uzbekistan, which our current administration has hailed as one of the hallmarks of capitalist success.
The same people who protest China are the same people who embraced the Atlanta Olympics. The people who protest the Beijing Olympics will never criticize the United States for sending military aid to Israel to slaughter Palestinians. No one will protest against the United States supporting Indonesia with military aid during the slaughters in East Timor.
Mr. Obama himself has no room to criticize Bush Jr for attending the opening ceremonies of the Olympics. Recently, Obama spoke to AIPAC (full transcript here). He has ignored the war crimes of Israel, and has shown his full support for Israel. He has shown that he has no interest in keeping troops out of the Middle East. Obama brought up threats from Syria, and from Israel’s “great threat”, Iran. He is continuing the lies of Iran’s nuclear weapons program, and has stated that he has the military at his disposal. He spoke of troop withdrawal from Iraq, only to prepare them for the real enemy and real supporter of Al-Queda, Iran.
It sounds to me that we need to focus on United States imperialism, not the Olympics.