When a Nation Decides To Stop Sucking

Some folks have grumbled that the United States Winter Olympics team at Sochi hasn't done all that well, what with both the men's and women's ice hockey teams losing to Canada, the speed skaters being shut out (though, to be fair, the Dutch have been shutting out practically everyone in those events).  But the American effort at these Games has hardly been a failure.  In fact, take a look at this graphic:

These are the medal standings as of today (February 21) for the top fifteen nations competing, showing the United States first in the overall medal count and ranked fourth when the medals are broken down among colors.  Feel free to click on this chart for a better view.  Wow, we sure have won a lot of bronze medals!

Now, take a look, for comparative purposes, at this chart, courtesy of Wikipedia, showing how many medals American athletes won at the Calgary Winter Olympics in 1988 (again, click on it for a closer look):

  

Pathetic.  Six medals.  And Bonnie Blair, the only multiple medalist, won only two.  Note the absence of any skiing medals.  Or, for that matter, sledding medals.  Not even one medal in the two-man bobsled.  But then, our guys were never going to beat the gold medal-winning Soviet team of Vladimir Koslov and . . . Janis Kipurs. ;-)  The Russo-Latvian dynamic duo won one of 29 medals for the Soviet Union in 1988, eleven of them gold, not that far from post-Soviet Russia's count of 26 at Sochi so far.

So how did we Yanks go from zeroes to heroes in a quarter century and change?  Because this country, with something resembling support from the notoriously dysfunctional United States Olympic Committee,  made a concerted effort to improve the performances and collective prowess of our winter athletes and be more competitive in winter sports.  When we decided we were going to put a man on the moon, we did it.  When we decided we were going to help Ted Ligety win two skiing gold medals, we did that too.

So, what if Americans were to apply the same determination to improve other things about this country?  Imagine the improved health care, the fast passenger trains, and the progress on climate change and alternative fuels that we could have if we put the same efforts to all that as we do to developing winter athletes of international caliber.

Nah.  Sports is the only thing we Americans can get together on anymore.