I think the convention is really good so far. But I'm the base, I'm supposed to think that!

I wish I had seen some of the convention stuff last night, but it was worth missing it to see shrift!

With the various judging controversies at this Olympics, I was wondering last night about what the medal counts would be without these sports (I was also bored and waiting for dinner with Buffistas).

I eliminated sports that involve subjective judging (diving, equestrian dressage, gymnastics, synchronized swimming), or sports with more technical judging methods (boxing, taekwondo, wrestling) where judges have been called into question this Olympics.

I used the first 12 countries in both total medals and golds, giving a list of 13 countries. In total medals there was very little change in country standings; however there was a bit more shifting around if you only consider gold medals, with Russia losing the most standing.

Here are the results of my boredom:

Total Medals:
All Current Sports (Sports without Subjective Judging)

US, 110 (US, 93)
China, 100 (China, 61)
Russia, 72 (Russia, 47)
Great Britain, 47 (Australia, 44)
Australia, 46 (Great Britain, 42)
Germany, 41 (Germany, 33)
France, 40 (France, 32)
South Korea, 31 (South Korea, 24)
Italy, 28 (Italy, 23)
Ukraine, 27 (Ukraine, 17)
Japan, 25 (Japan, 16)
Cuba, 24 (Netherlands, 16)
Netherlands, 16 (Cuba, 14)

Gold Medals:
All Current Sports (Sports without Subjective Judging)

China, 51 (US, 33)
US, 36 (China, 29)
Russia, 23 (Great Britain, 18)
Great Britain, 19 (Germany, 15)
Germany, 16 (Australia, 13)
Australia, 14 (Russia, 12)
South Korea, 13 (South Korea, 9)
Japan, 9 (Japan, 7)
Italy, 8 (Netherlands, 7)
France, 7 (France, 6)
Netherlands, 7 (Italy, 6)
Ukraine, 7 (Ukraine, 6)
Cuba, 2 (Cuba, 1)

I also figured out medals for my ideal Olympics, which would have no baseball, badminton, basketball, beach volleyball, BMX, boxing, equestrian dressage (as a separate event), rhythmic gymnastics, soccer, softball, synchronized swimming, table tennis, tennis, trampoline, or water polo. This really didn't change the current standings all that much, mostly because these sports produce only one or two medal each.

Megan's Olympics, Total Medals:

US, 95
China, 72
Russia, 61
Great Britain, 44
Australia, 43
Germany, 36
France, 35
Italy, 25
South Korea, 24
Ukraine, 24
Japan, 23
Cuba, 15
Netherlands, 15

Megan's Olympics, Gold Medals

China, 40
US, 30
Great Britain, 18
Russia, 17
Germany, 15
Australia, 14
South Korea, 11
Japan, 8
Italy, 7
France, 6
Ukraine, 6
Netherlands, 6
Cuba, 2

Happy birthday, lisah!

Hil, what Israeli movie are you watching? (Grammar?)

And hey, I'm NEVER leaving home again. Crazy people outside, folks. Except for tomorrow. And the day after tomorrow. And so on. Sigh.

How come Jamaica doesn't rank in your Olympics, gold medal version, megan? Usain alone has more than Cuba.

Lord, I'm slow. Happy birthday, lisah!

This really didn't change the current standings all that much, mostly because these sports produce only one or two medal each.

That always bugs me. I mean, not to take a THING away from Phelps or any other swimmer, but you are up for a whole lot of medals there. There are plenty of sports where you've got just one shot. I'm sure if you had, say, ten individual decathlon medals along with the "all around" we have now Spitz's record could have been broken that way. Is it even possible for a non-swimmer to get that many medals in one Olympics? I suppose a male gymnast could.

Yeah, but it's essentially tossing my vote in the garbage.

I really don't understand the idea that voting for a candidate you genuinely support is a waste. Voting for a candidate you don't particularly like seems like a much bigger waste to me. I'd rather people not vote at all than do that, because I think that the "lesser evil" attitude is how we got here. Nobody's gonna put a radical candidate up there if they can get your vote anyway.

How come Jamaica doesn't rank in your Olympics, gold medal version, megan?

Hah! Sorry. I later looked back at I saw Jamaica just missed the cutoff and thought "ita's not going to be happy about that."

I took the top 12 in each ranking (total and golds), the only difference being Cuba on one list and The Netherlands on the other. I think Jamaica is 13th in golds.

It turned out to be a bit of a pain when I realized that Yahoo's country listings are missing a few events and I had to go and figure out what the missing medals were in.

Interesting Andrew Sullivan post on Obama and gay marriage (from 8/14/2007):

A reader wrote:

On February 19 this year I saw Obama speak at a fundraising event in San Francisco. There were about 80 people, at $2300 a person. He was asked about gay marriage (or "marriage equality" as I recall the questioner phrased it). In that small setting, without ever saying so outright, Obama made it very clear that his decision not to support gay marriage was political and not principled. In a perhaps anxious attempt to get us to understand his predicament, he drew an analogy.

He mentioned that under the miscegenation laws existed in the 1960s (before Loving v. Virginia in '67) his own mother and father could not have married in many states. And so he understood personally the importance of "marriage equality". But then he drew the audience's attention to the work of Martin Luther King Jr. in the early 1960s - those same years leading up to Loving v. Virginia - on issues such as voting rights, employment discrimination and education. He told us that he had asked himself many times, if he had been in King's position in 1963, would he have "leaned" on the issue of miscegenation -- or would he have postponed it? His answer of course was that he would have put it off -- even if it meant that his own parents' marriage would have remained illegal in many states. This pragmatic argument - coupled with a rueful mention of the mixing of the term "marriage" with religious traditions in many people's minds - was the best he could offer. In effect he was saying, I can't do this now - I can't even say anything more ... We have to wait.

Strangely, his tone was so personal and thoughtful that, from what I saw, he won the crowd to his side - at least in the moment. It helped that he finished his answer with a direct look at the questioner and then a scan of the audience as a whole, saying very clearly, "I will continue to listen to my gay and lesbian friends on this." It almost felt as if he was winking at us in some solemn way (I can't say it, but I am with you!).

I hope that's true.

Obama and Arendt on Marriage Equality

Good lord how I love Arendt.

But then he drew the audience's attention to the work of Martin Luther King Jr. in the early 1960s - those same years leading up to Loving v. Virginia - on issues such as voting rights, employment discrimination and education.

Er, is he aware that gay people already have the vote?

Because I see his point, but I'm really not sure what other issues he thinks are in line ahead of marriage on the gay rights front.