Sunday Morning Coffee
Loving the Olympics ... and some leftover politics musings
Is there anything better on the weekend than a languid Sunday morning with a mug of fresh, hot coffee, and the Sunday newspaper? These Sunday Morning Coffee posts are my occasional accompaniment to the Sunday paper. Just some topics I’ve been reading or thinking about, along with a few links to various other pieces that you may (or may not) find intriguing.
Loving the Olympics
Every two years, I seem to approach the newest Olympics with a bit of ambivalence, unsure if I’m ready to devote so many hours over two weeks to watching the Games. But then, before I know it, I find myself drawn in and captivated by the spectacle. A big reason why, I think, is the sheer wonder of watching the best athletes in the world perform feats that are simply impossible for the rest of mere humans.
Back when I was the age of the current Olympians, I was an OK distance runner. Not great by any means, but I could run a 5k in about 17 minutes, and 10 miles in under an hour. I rarely won races, but was often in the top 5% or so of all runners in the events I entered. So when I watch Olympians rip off a 5k in a bit over 13 minutes, it means they’re running more than a minute per mile faster than I ever could at my peak. Meaning, at a time when I was better than 90% or more of the runners I was competing against, these Olympians would still have been lapping me on the track in less than a mile!
So yeah, sometimes it helps to watch Olympians in an event in which you have some experience to realize just how unbelievably talented they really are. It reminds me of a passage in a Bill Bryson book, In a Sunburned Country, during which he spends a bit of time at the Sydney Olympics. After being slightly bored by a few events, Bryson slips in to watch some table tennis. He writes:
Here was something I not only understood but could positively identify with. I have played table tennis myself … Because I could so closely follow the play, I realized at once, with a jarring sense of awe, just how far beyond me these people were … I don’t mean beyond me now, when I am old and stout and slow and haven’t played in years. I mean beyond anything I could ever have been in my prime and in my wildest dreams … Then it occurred to me that precisely this level of attainment is what I had witnessed at the other events.
That, in a nutshell, is how I feel when I watch the distance runners. And then to realize that everyone at the Olympics, even the last place finishers, are at a skill level so far beyond anything that most of us could ever attain, well, it’s stunning to see.
One of the favorite videos I stumbled across during these Olympics was of Keely Hodgkinson, a British runner who won the women’s 800 meter race in Paris. Actually, it’s of some other fitness advocates who participated in a challenge to see how far they could last on a treadmill set to Hodgkinson’s 1:55 pace for the 800. See for yourself how far they got:
Yup, even these other pretty athletic individuals were left gasping in awe at her speed.
So what were some Olympic highlights? It’s different for everyone, and few things can top the legendary performances of athletes like Simone Biles or Katie Ledecky. Or of French swimmer Leon Marchand. Or the transcendent shooting ability of Stephen Curry. But here are a few of my other favorite Olympic stories:
It was fun to see the U.S. women’s soccer team, led by a new, younger generation of players, win the gold just a year after flaming out early in the World Cup. And it was incredible to watch the dominant forward trio of Mallory Swanson, Sophia Smith, and Trinity Rodman, who scored the 10 of the 12 U.S. goals in this Olympics and who have dubbed themselves the Triple Espresso.
The most dominant American track athlete has to be Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone, who is so far ahead of the rest of the world in the 400 meter hurdles it doesn’t seem real. The Ringer has a great piece on her.
Of course, Stephen Nedoroscik is also a cool story. The bespectacled nerd hero with a degree in electrical engineering and the ability to solve a Rubik’s cube in nine seconds just so happens to be one of the best in the world at the pommel horse in men’s gymnastics.
Speaking of smart athletes, how about Gabby Thomas? The women’s 200 meter champion with a Harvard degree in neurobiology and a Master’s in Public Health has a goal of running a hospital or a nonprofit some day.
Then there is the unique story of Kristen Faulkner, an Alaska native and another Harvard educated athlete, who only took up competitive cycling about six years ago. She pulled off one of the biggest upsets of the Games in the women’s 98-mile road race when she powered past three other cyclists about two miles from the finish.
As a running fan, I was happy to see Grant Fisher become the first American man ever to medal in both the 5000 and 10,000 meter races. And I was awe-struck by Cole Hocker’s late kick in the 1500 to win gold over the two pre-race favorites.
Finally, the short video below is what the Olympics are really about. It shows Julien Alfred winning the women’s 100 meter race to become St. Lucia's first Olympic champion ever, and the ensuing celebration it set off on her island nation.
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The next Winter Olympics is in 2026 in Italy, and another Summer Olympics follows in 2028 in Los Angeles. I’m sure I’ll be watching.
More politics musings
Just a few random, leftover musings about politics …
Tim Walz comparisons
I’ve seen a few notes comparing Tim Walz, the Democrats’ new vice presidential candidate, to Hubert Humphrey and Walter Mondale, who happen to be two other vice presidents from Minnesota. Walz surely gives off some Happy Warrior vibes, and Humphrey was the quintessential Happy Warrior, but I think another comparison may be even more apt.
Walz’s manner actually reminds me more of two Midwestern presidents, Harry Truman and Dwight Eisenhower. I’m not suggesting Walz will ever be president, never mind on that level, but as a communicator he does have similarities to these products of Missouri and Kansas, who were known for their down to earth persona and genial speaking style.
Walz may be a liberal, but he’s not your stereotypical urban liberal. He’s a rural politician who exudes Midwestern sensibility. Which is another reason why I can’t understand the GOP attacks on him as a radical. These attacks just seem unlikely to stick.
Along these lines, check out this thread by Devin Bartolotta, who wrote about the time she was a young reporter covering then-Congressman Walz. One day, her car slid off the road into a snow-filled ditch as she was pulling up to a house where a press event was being held. The young reporter was mortified. But Walz, who saw this happen, ran out of the house, made sure she was OK, then worked with his staff to help pull her vehicle out of the snow. As a Congressman.
I’m telling you, Midwestern sensibility. You don’t have to agree with his politics, but he’s never going to translate as a radical.
Kamala Harris: 4A ballplayer, or much more?
I’ve said that Kamala Harris struck me as a 4A baseball player and I was worried about her ability to perform at the presidential level. But her performance in the past few weeks sure makes it look like she can, indeed, play at this level. With the caveat, of course, that we need to see her in a debate, or an interview or press conference with national reporters, to know for sure.
So what gives? Why does she now seem like such a better candidate than she did in 2020? I don’t know if anyone really understands why, but I do love this tweet from James Medlock who makes a similar point about Harris as a presidential candidate. He writes:
Kamala Harris is like a high ceiling prospect that just never really put the results together and then languished on the bench for years, but an injury replacement puts them in the lineup and sudden they're hitting .330 and you wonder why you weren't playing them all this time.
That’s it, exactly! A high ceiling prospect who never put it together, but suddenly gets a new chance and hits it out of the park. We’ll see if it continues through the fall. But she is sure proving a lot of people wrong so far.
Karma for the Trump campaign?
If it’s not karma, it’s at least a good bit of irony. The Trump campaign has said that its campaign was hacked and some of its internal documents were stolen, possibly by Iranian hackers.
The campaign is calling it an illegal effort to “interfere with the 2024 election and sow chaos throughout our Democratic process.” A spokesman also warned the media not to reprint any Trump campaign documents or else they would be “doing the bidding of America’s enemies.”
Hmm, sort of like when Russian hackers broke into Democratic accounts and released a trove of Hillary Clinton emails to Wikileaks, which were then printed in media outlets across the U.S. late in the 2016 campaign? The emails weren’t especially damaging and were probably more embarrassing than anything, but I do remember lots of conservatives arguing then that it didn’t matter how the information was acquired, as long as it was factual.
We also had Trump at the time practically begging Russia to find some of Clinton’s emails. And, naturally, these particular emails were released to the media by Wikileaks on the very same day the Access Hollywood tape broke, a tape that caused a firestorm of controversy for Trump and made famous the phrase “grab ‘em by the pussy.” It was eventually discovered that Trump ally Roger Stone personally directed Wikileaks to release the emails at that time to distract the media from the Trump story.
So, sure, an argument can at least be made that internal documents which are acquired illegally should perhaps not be made public. But that argument can’t be made with a straight face by anyone involved with the Trump campaign.
Have a good week!
That’s all I have for now. More will be on the way in a few days. Until then, have a good week!
1) loved Olivia Reeves in women’s weightlifting 👏
2) Tom Brady wasn’t a crowd favorite when he was sent in for Bledsoe🤷🏻♀️
Good compilation of thoughts, Bob. Thank you!