Kwan Is Gone

Kwan is gone. Michelle Kwan quit her quest to earn a gold medal in women's figure skating due to her groin injury. Just as Creedence Clearwater Revival never had a number one hit single, and just as Adlai Stevenson II never became President, so Michelle Kwan has to console herself with being one of history's also-rans. Well, maybe not. People who say "You don't win a silver medal, you lose the gold" obviously never won a silver medal. And Kwan has one.

Then again, Michelle only has the silver medal from the 1998 Winter Olympics because those damn judges at the White Ring arena in Nagano, Japan, were so taken with that insufferable pixie Tara Lipinski! Kwan was the victim of a vast White Ring conspiracy. :-(

Inspirational Olympic story of the day: Kristina Smigun of Estonia, a former Soviet republic, won a gold medal in cross-country skiing, the first woman to win Winter Olympic gold for an independent Estonia.