My favorite Olympic moment
OK, these Games have been a TV nightmare and are threatening to be historically bad in terms of ratings.
There are a slew of reasons for it, and everyone can have a favorite.
But this morning, at least in this portion of the column, I’m focusing on the positive, and gang, I have a new favorite Olympic athlete.
Meet Tamyra Mensah-Stock, who became only the second American female wrestler ever to take gold and the first Black female wrestler to do it.
Her story is filled with the type of feel-good, made-for-TV-movie moments that make it dusty when you watch. (Or as my daughter asks, “Daddy, are your eyes sweating?”)
She lost her father, who died in a car crash coming home from one of her wrestling meets. She won the U.S. Olympic trials before the 2016 Rio Games, but did not get to go because the U.S. had not qualified in her weight class, so she went to Rio anyway to work as a training partner for those that qualified in other weight classes.
Then she arrived in Tokyo and killed tails and took names.
And best yet, amid all the distractions and discussions, the protests and, at times, self-serving protagonists, the controversy and the COVID-19 conversation, Mensah-Stock won gold and afterward shared a love for her country that was awe-inspiring.
Amid tears and sobs, she touched all the buttons and hit all the feels – from family, to goals, to being an example for all female competitors and patriotism.
“It feels amazing. I love representing the US. I freaking love living there. I am so happy I get to represent U-S-A!,” is how she ended her interview.
Way to go, champ.
(Side note: Kind of disappointing that in the write-ups on NBC and NPR her patriotic quotes were not used.)
Hey, a new segment idea
Yep, Cameron Sexton, the Tennessee speaker of the House is today’s Champ Kind winner of the “Sit the next few plays out” award. (Side note: This needs to be a weekly thing, and it needs to be sponsored by Champy’s. Hey, get me someone from advertising on the blower.)
So, Cam, “Take it easy, Champ. Why don’t you stop talking for a while.”
Sexton’s erroneous position has very little to do with COVID-19 in the big picture. Well, everything these days has something to do with COVID-19, so that’s not entirely true, and man, we’ve made COVID-19 three times more deadly and damaging – on both sides – by politicizing this thing, and that’s on all sides.
In the big picture of political discourse, this asinine request from Speaker Sexton is the peak of hypocrisy and would be downright laughable if it was not so disappointing. And detrimental.
Thanks to the excellent work of TFP aces Andy Sher and Elizabeth Fite, we learn that Sexton wants Gov. Bill Lee to demand that local school systems adhere to statewide COVID-19 policies and shun mask mandates or vaccination segregation.
Hmm, I wonder how Sexton would feel if President Joe Biden demanded that states adhere to a nationwide policy. I bet, right after having a litter of kittens, Sexton would rail against the federal overreach of trying to treat such a small cluster with a massive net.
And he would be so right. Which makes him so wrong on this one, regardless of the letter after the elected person’s name.
And standing on a party line is not the answer – in fact, Sexton’s contemporary in the state Senate has nailed this one. From the story: “But Lt. Gov. Randy McNally, the Republican Senate speaker, said Tuesday that while he is “firmly against a statewide mask mandate, I trust locally elected school boards to do what is necessary to keep their students healthy and their doors open. While I would have to see the specific proposal, I have always been in favor of school choice, pandemic or no pandemic.”
Issuing blanket edicts because of that party line is not the answer, be it from the federal level or even the state level, because Crossville – Sexton’s district – is way different than Chattanooga, which is way different than Clarksville, which is way different than Cordova. Address alliteration aside, you get the idea.
Which echoes back to Sexton’s hypocrisy. You have to fight this thing by ZIP codes rather than zippy one-liners, and do it as locally focused as possible.