Weekend Open Thread: Schedule the Paralympics FIRST!

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Impressive athletes! Best not dropped into a Covid explosion!  (Note: this is the best approximation I can make of Leroy Neiman’s style.) 

(Author’s Note: I have other irons in the fire right now, but this is more urgent and makes for a decent Open Thread.)

One can make a cogent case for going ahead with the Olympics in Japan this summer, although I have a Han Solo reaction to it.  Maybe one can even make a case for housing athletes two to a room, although it seems like a crazy plan to allow coronavirus variants to interbreed and come up with new world-changing novelties.  But there’s one thing that absolutely cannot be defended: having the Paralympics two weeks after the standard Olympic games, just in time to have one of those big “rebound” surges that have generally followed holidays.  Given that Paralympic athletes are likely to be more vulnerable to and less able to protect themselves from Covid-19, that’s insane.

The Olympic Games are scheduled — subject to the decisions of the International Olympic Committee — in Tokyo’s Olympic Stadium from Friday July 23, 2021 to Sunday Aug 8, 2021.  The Paralympics are scheduled from 24 August and 5 September.

That’s the worst possible time to have it even under an optimistic projection of what Covid will do.  Japan was almost largely spared from Covid in 2020, but it’s fertile ground for it now.  A John Hopkins report found that over 75% of Japan’s deaths from Covid-19 have come during the first five months of this year — third highest among all nations with at least 10,000 Covid deaths.

So already Covid has been blazing through almost virgin territory in Japan.  A big bump from the Olympic Games that starts to climb high just when the Paralympic Games are starting would be a disaster: one of those things that we look back at years from now and wonder how the hell we could have allowed it to happen.

One can imagine two solutions while allowing both games to go on in Tokyo and the main event to keep its date: either move the Paralympic games up or move them back — way back, like “until Japan gets over the Post-Olympic Covid-storm” back.

My guess is that the former might be possible.  It would be logistically difficult to move the Paralympics to July 6 to July 18 (or a little later if they don’t have to end on a Sunday), but not as big a problem as cancelling all sorts of events due to Covid cases.  Yes, some athletes and spectators may not be able to attend, but there are worse tragedies — and unfortunately some likely ones.  And if, instead, the Paralympics were put off until Sept. 21 through Oct 9 — or even as far as Oct. 19-31, giving Japan a month and a half to institute a quarantine strong enough to bring Covid-19 to a screaming halt —  well, Tokyo’s climate in September is the same as in July and that of October is the same as May.  It’s completely hospitable to a meet.  (November gets a bit cool.)  And, if need be,  my guess is that Greater Los Angeles from Santa Barbara to San Diego could put together a Paralympic Games in a month, though the events would likely be spread out a bit.

The IOC is being lobbied right now to squash the entire Olympic games for now.  I’m not going to weigh in on that, but there’s another benefit if moving the Paralympics ahead of the Olympics that I hesitate to state: it would smack of eugenics if its purpose were not to save Paralympians’ lives from a dire threat.  That is: having the Paralympics first will allow Tokyo to have a trial run, dress rehearsal for their Covid safety procedures.  If athletes and visitors start testing positive for Covid, not only would hospital beds be less full than a few weeks after the Olympics (allowing them better care), but it would make a compelling case for, for example, postponing the Olympics a while longer and/or bringing all Olympic athletes out a month early to quarantine “separately/together” for two weeks before returning to a final two weeks of training for those with negative tests.  (Again, if this strikes you as terrible running tests on these athletes for the benefit of able-bodied ones, then first that isn’t the intent at all, and second you must think that the Covid situation in Japan is so awful that the games should be cancelled until Japan’s waves subside, which is not what the athletes want.)

If this idea has any merit, there’s little time left before it becomes moot (if it isn’t already), so spread it far and wide.  If not (or actually either way), your comments are welcome.  Speaking of which: this is either your “a little early” or “extremely late” Weekend Open Thread, so talk about this or anything else you’d like within reasonable bounds of discretion.

P.S. two posts on the recent City Council meeting and one on some other Anaheimania are coming up, so don’t feel the need to break any news here that will fit in those posts.)


About Greg Diamond

Somewhat verbose attorney, semi-disabled and semi-retired, residing in northwest Brea. Occasionally ran for office against jerks who otherwise would have gonr unopposed. Got 45% of the vote against Bob Huff for State Senate in 2012; Josh Newman then won the seat in 2016. In 2014 became the first attorney to challenge OCDA Tony Rackauckas since 2002; Todd Spitzer then won that seat in 2018. Every time he's run against some rotten incumbent, the *next* person to challenge them wins! He's OK with that. Corrupt party hacks hate him. He's OK with that too. He does advise some local campaigns informally and (so far) without compensation. (If that last bit changes, he will declare the interest.) His daughter is a professional campaign treasurer. He doesn't usually know whom she and her firm represent. Whether they do so never influences his endorsements or coverage. (He does have his own strong opinions.) But when he does check campaign finance forms, he is often happily surprised to learn that good candidates he respects often DO hire her firm. (Maybe bad ones are scared off by his relationship with her, but they needn't be.)