America loves a scandal. From Monica Lewinsky hiding under the presidential desk to student body president Bryan Burkhardt frolicking around with his own stash of GSB money, we all like to hear how terrible everyone else is so we can feel better about ourselves.

That thirst to look down on others often stretches a little too far. And that is exactly what I think has happened with the Salt Lake City Olympics scandal.

If you haven’t been following these shenanigans, let me fill you in.

Salt Lake City was picked as the host for the 2002 Winter Olympics by the International Olympic Committee about three eons ago. Late last year, a story began to seep out that members of Salt Lake’s bid committee had given improper gifts to voting IOC members to influence their vote on where to place the games.

I know we’re starving for naughtiness in the news, but I don’t understand what the big deal is.

Who are the people objecting to this? Do they think the Olympics are anything but another big-time sports league?

The Olympics have been a huge corporate endeavor since the Cold War started. The TV contracts are big business, the bidding is big business and the advertising is big business. The IOC is just like any sports league, such as the NBA or the NFL, except that they only show up every other year for a couple weeks and then go hide at future Olympic sites and drink themselves silly.

In fact, I would argue that the IOC is even more heinous and corrupt than the NBA or NFL because they are grossly misrepresenting the product they’re trying to sell.

The NBA says, “I love this game,” not “They’re all just playing for the love,” because we all know that NBA players are just on the court because that happens to be the way they can rake in the most green.

If NBA players could make a living doing children’s birthday parties, I get the feeling Billy’s tenth would have been on national television.

But not the IOC. They sell the Olympics as pure, amateur and glowingly clean sporting events. They neglect to tell you that all of the actual amateurs that are competing have not turned pro only because there is no professional bobsled, luge, ballroom dancing or rhythmic gymnastics league.

So why is it so shocking when we find out that despite its advertising pitch, the IOC is just like the NBA or the NFL? If we found out that when the Lakers were courting Dennis Rodman last week they happened to buy him a feather-covered Ferrari and a cross-dressing prostitute would we be all that shocked? Of course not.

Then why be shocked when we find out that the Mormons slipped a little under the table to a few IOC voters? Is this all that wrong? You know if they were doing it in Utah, they had to be doing it elsewhere as well. All the other sites around the world were offering the best of their homelands.

Looking at it from that perspective, do you actually think that the IOC voters chose Salt Lake City as the 2002 Olympic site because they got showed the best time in Utah? All the bars close at 9:30 and I bet it’s pretty tough to get a stripper in the land of Brigham Young. I just don’t think you can have that great of a time on the corporate clock in Utah.

Maybe if they called Rodman and paid him to ship these guys off to Las Vegas, but I seriously doubt that happened.

And even if some of the voters really enjoyed the communion wine, how is that any different than looking at the facilities that have been built for the bid? When a city decides they want to host an Olympic event, they start building arenas and buildings left and right. Whoever pours the most money into their city to impress the IOC usually wins.

If some minuscule fraction of that money is used to wine, dine and line some pockets, who really cares? The bottom line is, you can’t move the Olympics now because it’s too late, you can’t ever truly end corruption among the powerful and the Winter Olympics are boring so who cares anyway.

So someone out there dig up some dirt on another prominent political figure so we can move on. I suggest Liddy Dole — that girl has wild written all over her face.

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David Roepke is a sophomore in journalism and mass communications. If you see him on campus, you know it’s the afternoon.