The fine line in sports between the games and politics has been blurred for quite some time now. Corporate sponsors name arenas and spot jerseys with their logos. Athletes return the favor by promoting their clothes, drinking habits and vehicles of choice along with their talents. But all in all, the purest merger of competition and corporation are the Olympics. Wait a minute, what am I saying?

Five-Star Circus

Those wascally wascals at the International Olympic Committee have done it again. After hearing all the perspectives from five worldwide locales, the IOC decided on Friday to send the 2008 Summer Olympics to Beijing, China.

Beijing, the front runner during the whole selection process, waited eight years for the games. It lost out to Sydney for the 2000 event by two votes.

It also sits as the capital city of one of the few remaining old school communist governments in this day and age. As has been brought up on numerous occasions, China’s observance of human rights has been nothing less than horrific.

However, there is optimism in the wings with members of the IOC and even some Americans. They think that this opportunity for the world’s most populated country may lead to change for the better. Weeeellll, I wouldn’t say all that. But I do agree with their decision.

To deny China to showcase its history, status and culture at some point would be atrocious. Why not do it now rather than later?

The Republic has been shoved into the spotlight more and more for its natives dissentions from the Communist regime. Thinking about it, though, every country has its problems with government rule.

But while people in this country are lamenting the IOC for its recent decision, we only have to look to one of our own cities to know that the committee is trying to recoup.

The bribery scandal that came with the Salt Lake City winter games damaged the committee’s respectable name. They’ve been scrambling to repolish their image ever since, and I don’t feel that their choice on Friday hurt it at all.

The Olympic Committee’s job is to find the best location to showcase the world’s athletic talent, not determine a country’s politics or the demeanor of its actions. They did so in 1936 and 1980 when the games were held in Berlin and Moscow, respectively.

Now this doesn’t mean that I’m pro-Chinese or anti-American. Hopefully the fact that they are hosting the Olympics will make the Chinese government rethink their philosophies. A lot can happen in seven years, one way or the other.

But for two weeks, one of the world’s most enriched and historic cities will be shown in the glory of the Olympic Games, and the world will be better for it.

It’s All Just a Bunch of BCS

Last week, college football’s Bowl Championship Series committee changed some of the parameters for selecting teams in the quest for a national champion.

Two key computer indexes (the Dunkel and New York Times Indexes) will be replaced. There will also be less importance on margin of victory and more stress on the amount of quality wins for a team.

In other words, the formula for the BCS is just as confusing as before. There’s one thing that can be said for the this system, it brings more controversy to a controversial sport.

College football has always been susceptible to problems when choosing its national champ. With the BCS, the NCAA has more of a win-loss situation, with cold, hard facts replacing human judgement.

Can the BCS be the Mr. Fix-It that some claimed it to be a few short years ago? Flatly, no.

Will a bracket tournament format be the answer to all of our logistical nightmares? Hell no. That system would be great for deciding a champion, but terrible when deciding which teams are worthy of playing for it.

At least there is a national championship game for the present. Maybe Iowa State can get there when Cy goes bald or Lake Laverne is purified or something like that.

Absurd Predictions

A few weeks ago I predicted that a fairly unknown golfer would shock the world and win one of the most coveted prizes in all of golfdom, the U.S. Open. Little did I know that Retief Goosen would take the title instead of Toshi Izawa.

Well, at least I wasn’t too far off on describing the winner. Now if you tell me that you knew of this guy before his wire-to-wire win at Southern Hills, open your mouth for a soapwashing right now.

One thing I can take away from this prediction is the fact that my guy made the cut, contradictory to the belief of my editor.

Four weeks later, it’s time to dive back into the deck of clubs to pick a winner for this week’s British Open. Royal Lytham & St. Anne’s is this year’s venue for the oldest major in the sport. The last time the Open was held there, Tom Lehman won his first major.

This year, all I have to do is travel down the I-35 pipeline to find the champ. My pick is in honor of our beloved faculty supervisor here at the Daily. So who better to win in the wide open spaces of England than a man born in the expanses of Texas.

No, not Justin Leonard. I’m talking about Bob Estes.

OK, I don’t hear anyone out in the audience saying “Bob who?”. Actually, Estes should be fairly familiar to golf fans. He’s been in many tournaments, accumulating over 50 top-ten finishes in his 13-year career. The bad news is only two of those finishes are firsts.

He didn’t even get that second win until the St. Jude Classic five weeks ago. One thing might help him out, though. He should go into this tourney with some confidence. Estes has made the cut four times out of his five tries and had three top-25 finishes. Last year was his best result, tying for 20th place at St. Andrews.

Of course, everyone will probably be chasing Tiger, but don’t underestimate the will of a Texan. I mean, look what happened for `Dubba Dubba’ Bush.

Jonathan Lowe is a senior in meteorology in Kansas City, Mo.