China and Fake Singers

I think that the US and World media is starting to get a little desperate to make their point that China fakes things. The most recent example is that the cute little girl who sang during the opening ceremony was not really singing. It was actually a chubby little girl behind the curtains.

"So in a last-minute move demanded by one of China’s highest officials, the two were put together for the Olympic opening ceremony, with one lip-synching “Ode to the Motherland” over the other’s singing. The real singer, 7-year-old Yang Peiyi, with her chubby face and crooked baby teeth, wasn’t good looking enough for the ceremony, its chief music director told state-owned Beijing Radio."

Like the computer generated fireworks, I don't think that people should really care about this. I watched the Opening Ceremony and it was glaringly obvious that she wasn't singing. I could have cared less whose voice it was.

Here are some Chinese citizens' thoughts...

“The little girl is a magnificent singer,” Chen said. “She doesn’t deserve to be hidden.”

“The audience will understand that it’s in the national interest."

"The organizers really messed up on this one,” Luo Shaoyang, 34, a retail worker in Beijing, said Tuesday. “This is like a voiceover for a cartoon character. Why couldn’t they pick a kid who is both cute and a good singer? This damages the reputation of both kids for their future, especially the one lip-synching. Now everyone knows she’s a fraud, who cares if she’s cute?"

"They want the best-looking people to represent the face of China. I don’t blame the organizers for picking a prettier-looking kid over the not-so-pretty one,” said Xia Xiaotao, 30, an engineer."

So, I'm torn. It seems that China is really worried about portraying this (false)image of perfection to the world, yet as I mentioned before, they don't seem to care that they are fanning the "everything in China is fake" flames.

If I were to give advice, I would tell the world media to calm down and realize that we already know what China reputation is. Let it go. And China should stop trying so hard as well. It makes them look desperate for acceptance. You're a major world player, you're nowhere close to perfect (like all nations), so stop lying to yourselves.

China and Fake Fireworks

Not that China needed to do anything else to ensure the word "fake" is synonymous with the Chinese brand and one would think that the Olympics would be a stage somewhat separated from that image. You would think, but the Chinese would not. As if their amazing opening needed something extra, China decided to fake their fireworks for the viewers at home.

"London's Telegraph newspaper reports that some of the fireworks which appeared over Beijing during the television broadcast of the Olympic Opening Ceremony were actually computer generated. "

China actually did shoot the fireworks in question off at the ceremony, but the concerns over helicopter safety led to the "fake" computerized fireworks. I don't really think that this is a big deal, but China is showing very little concern for the main criticism directed at their government and country. Those being fake or dangerously low-quality products and freedom of speech and press.

It'll be interesting to see if these anti-Chinese protests will continue after the Games have ended or if China will be able to continue it's oppression relatively unfettered.

The Olympics vs. The Perfect 10

What a travesty!

From YahooNews,

"Four years after a series of scoring errors marred the competition at the Athens Olympics, fans who tune into gymnastics once every four years are in for a big shock Saturday. The perfect 10 is passe. Fifteens, 16s—maybe even a, gasp! 17—are all the rage."

Like Fahrenheit, I think it's more accurate, but I don't like that there is no offical perfect score. How do I gauge the creepiness of the Russian gymnasts?

"The FIG’s solution was an open-ended scoring system. Unlike the 10-point scale, where evaluations of artistry and difficulty had to be jammed together, each now gets its own space and, theoretically at least, there is no limit on how high a gymnast can go.

The first score, the difficulty mark, measures how hard the routine is. Starting from zero, the values of the 10 hardest tricks in a routine are added together. The harder the routine, the higher the difficulty score will be.

The second mark is for execution. Starting from 10—the FIG’s way of claiming the 10 still exists—deductions are taken for errors big (wobbles) and small (bobbles).

Olympic Focus

It will be pretty slow politically this week as the Olympics begin and Obama and Congress go on vacation. August is always the slowest political month. We are left with a solid 5-9 point Obama lead, no VP announcements and a series of upcoming ads during the Games. Obama had always planned on airing millions in ads, but McCain had to shore up the cash at the last second to combat his rivals airtime. I'll occasionally report what's happening, but as I said, it will be slow.

The Olympics are much more interesting at this point. We are already getting some pretty juicy repressive stories coming from China.

From the AP with a hat tip to One Free Korea,

The beating of two Japanese journalists by police in western China drew an official apology Tuesday, but Beijing also set new obstacles for news outlets wanting to report from Tiananmen Square in the latest sign of trouble for reporters covering the Olympics. [….]

In the latest restriction, the Beijing city government said on its Web site that Chinese and foreign journalists who want to report and film in Tiananmen “are advised to make advanced appointments by phone.” It said that will help ensure orderly newsgathering amid what are expected to be large crowds in the square on each day of the games, which start Friday.

Beijing’s thousands of taxicabs are being fitted with video cameras and satellite technology that transmits a live audio feed of what is being said in the cab back to a computer for monitoring and linguistic analysis, according to industry sources.

“It was about two or three months ago. All the taxis in our company had this fitted,” an employee at a major Beijing cab company said. “There is a screen which displays the exact location of the vehicle. The taxi is also able to send information back to us at the control station. All the taxis registered with us have had the modifications.”

Sounds like a blast! Permission to film and no trash talk in a taxi.

More and more Olympics to come!

China Wins?

Apparently, somebody thinks that China is going to top the US in medals in Beijing. Now, I'm not the type to wave my flag, but the Olympics gets me going and I hope we crush the Chinese on their own soil.

From Yahoo,

"China should win one more medal than the United States at the Beijing Olympics—88 to 87—and top the overall table for the first time, according to a survey released Monday by accounting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers."

My prediction: USA wins by 7 or more medals. However, if we do somehow lose to China, I will eat Chinese dog food for one whole meal and post the video of it here.