Zika, drugs, and medals: The Rio Olympics thread

[Valmy]

I have this fear of traveling abroad and getting kidnapped for ransom so prefer to go to places where I could at least feasibly be mistaken for a local. Fortunately Brazil fits this profile.

When I was in France I always made sure I dressed like I was a Frenchman. This also had the fun side effect that people kept talking to me on the streets and asking me for directions. If it was a foreigner I would play along, French people would pick up I wasn't from there pretty fast. For some reason Americans would presume I couldn't speak English. 'Don't speak to him in English Maude those Frogs hate that shit'

[alfred russel]

I have this fear of traveling abroad and getting kidnapped for ransom so prefer to go to places where I could at least feasibly be mistaken for a local. Fortunately Brazil fits this profile.

When I was in France I always made sure I dressed like I was a Frenchman. This also had the fun side effect that people kept talking to me on the streets and asking me for directions. If it was a foreigner I would play along, French people would pick up I wasn't from there pretty fast. For some reason Americans would presume I couldn't speak English. 'Don't speak to him in English Maude those Frogs hate that shit'

I am a terrible tourist. I make no effort to blend in, but sometimes without any effort I do.   

Back in my more irresponsible days, before I gave up alcohol, I was in Italy, and got hammered. My buddy had even more to drink and got taken to the hospital with alcohol poisoning. I was making a scene in the hospital so they threw me out. I left the hospital, still hammered, not wanting to call it a day, so I just wandered around. I saw a cute girl in front of her apartment, so I went to talk to her. I speak less than 5 words in Italian, so I just spoke english. She started, "Oh, so you want to speak english? Okay," and we had a conversation. After 10 minutes of talking, I asked a question about Italy. She was like, "wait you aren't italian? I thought you were italian and just wanted to speak english for practice." 

Probably not the smartest young lady. Cute though.

[Jacob]

My takeaway from this Olympics is that I don't think I'm like to visit Brazil of my own volition (which I kind of already knew). I was sad yesterday though when I looked at the 10 most populous countries and thought that Japan is the only country (outside my home country) that I'd likely ever visit on personal choice.

You wouldn't visit China? Lots of greats stuff to see and experience there, and I don't get the feeling it's particularly dangerous or inconvenient for foreigners. I might be wrong.

No. Perhaps if they had a different gov't, I might consider it but I don't think I'd feel all that great visiting China.

So it's a philosophical/ political kind of thing?

[Razgovory]

I'm going to go against the grain here, and say that Brazilian reaction to the made up robbery is perfectly understandable.  That was a pretty damaging piece of lie for them, and who knows how much economic damage was done by all those safety precautions instituted in the wake of someone really famous having a gun "cocked" against his head?

BTW, is it just me, or did the whole thing reek of BS when Lochte talked about the gun being cocked?  Do guns ever get cocked in real life in such situations?  I imagine fake Brazilian police officers don't walk around with single action revolvers.

You can cock self-loading pistols.  When you pull back on the slide, it loads a round in the chamber and cocks the hammer.

[garbon]

My takeaway from this Olympics is that I don't think I'm like to visit Brazil of my own volition (which I kind of already knew). I was sad yesterday though when I looked at the 10 most populous countries and thought that Japan is the only country (outside my home country) that I'd likely ever visit on personal choice.

You wouldn't visit China? Lots of greats stuff to see and experience there, and I don't get the feeling it's particularly dangerous or inconvenient for foreigners. I might be wrong.

No. Perhaps if they had a different gov't, I might consider it but I don't think I'd feel all that great visiting China.

So it's a philosophical/ political kind of thing?

Yes.

[The Minsky Moment]

I'm going to go against the grain here, and say that Brazilian reaction to the made up robbery is perfectly understandable.  That was a pretty damaging piece of lie for them, and who knows how much economic damage was done by all those safety precautions instituted in the wake of someone really famous having a gun "cocked" against his head?

Yep. I agree. I think it's entirely understandable that they would have investigated it despite no-one officially reporting the crime. And as I say I imagine Brazilian police were not delicate in poorer neighbourhoods looking for thieves who've just disrupted the biggest show on earth and caused a lot of embarrassment. .

grumbler's right though - it's one thing to purse the investigation intensively, but pulling people off of airplanes for allegedly failing to make a police report of a non-existent occurrence was ridiculous. 

[Ed Anger]

I'm going to go against the grain here, and say that Brazilian reaction to the made up robbery is perfectly understandable.  That was a pretty damaging piece of lie for them, and who knows how much economic damage was done by all those safety precautions instituted in the wake of someone really famous having a gun "cocked" against his head?

BTW, is it just me, or did the whole thing reek of BS when Lochte talked about the gun being cocked?  Do guns ever get cocked in real life in such situations?  I imagine fake Brazilian police officers don't walk around with single action revolvers.

You can cock self-loading pistols.  When you pull back on the slide, it loads a round in the chamber and cocks the hammer.

Cal can't cock his weapon, since parts are missing.

MAH SLIDE

[grumbler]

I'm going to go against the grain here, and say that Brazilian reaction to the made up robbery is perfectly understandable.  That was a pretty damaging piece of lie for them, and who knows how much economic damage was done by all those safety precautions instituted in the wake of someone really famous having a gun "cocked" against his head?

Yep. I agree. I think it's entirely understandable that they would have investigated it despite no-one officially reporting the crime. And as I say I imagine Brazilian police were not delicate in poorer neighbourhoods looking for thieves who've just disrupted the biggest show on earth and caused a lot of embarrassment.

I disagree.  If the Brazilian police were thugs in poor neighborhoods, they were thugs.  No great surprise, but their thuggishness wasn't caused by the lack of candor or intelligence on the part of Lochte and company (who were, it turns out, robbed at gunpoint, but not the way they said they were robbed at gunpoint).  And, of course, the police have taken no such high-profile action in the case of the Australian swimmer who was, while the police were busily investigating the non-reported non-crime, robbed at gunpoint! 

Crime + nobody famous = inaction
Non-crime + somebody famous = all-out effort.

Pretty pathetic, and I don't know why everyone is letting the Brazilian authorities off the hook  The $10,000 ransom they are "negotiating" for the US swimmer doesn't seem to bother people much.

[grumbler]

grumbler's right though - it's one thing to purse the investigation intensively, but pulling people off of airplanes for allegedly failing to make a police report of a non-existent occurrence was ridiculous. 

We're seeing now that they pulled the swimmers off the plane so that they could collect ransoms for them.  I wonder if any of that money will ever make it into the state coffers?

[garbon]

The $10,000 ransom they are "negotiating" for the US swimmer doesn't seem to bother people much.

Well it bothered me!

[Berkut]

It certainly bothers me, I can't imagine how that can be justified.

On the other hand, I am not at all surpised at their over-reaction.

Claiming not just that you were robbed, but you were robbed by people pretending to be law enforcement officers, is a pretty direct attack on the integrity of the country. Now, it works because that integrity is pretty questionably to begin with, but I am not at all surprised at how sensitive they would be to what turns out to be a false accusation.

[garbon]

It certainly bothers me, I can't imagine how that can be justified.

On the other hand, I am not at all surpised at their over-reaction.

Claiming not just that you were robbed, but you were robbed by people pretending to be law enforcement officers, is a pretty direct attack on the integrity of the country. Now, it works because that integrity is pretty questionably to begin with, but I am not at all surprised at how sensitive they would be to what turns out to be a false accusation.

Yeah agreed on no surprise. Ultimately no one comes away looking good - with Brazil looking bad not because of the smear but because of the over reaction + extortion.

[DGuller]

I'm going to go against the grain here, and say that Brazilian reaction to the made up robbery is perfectly understandable.  That was a pretty damaging piece of lie for them, and who knows how much economic damage was done by all those safety precautions instituted in the wake of someone really famous having a gun "cocked" against his head?

BTW, is it just me, or did the whole thing reek of BS when Lochte talked about the gun being cocked?  Do guns ever get cocked in real life in such situations?  I imagine fake Brazilian police officers don't walk around with single action revolvers.

You can cock self-loading pistols.  When you pull back on the slide, it loads a round in the chamber and cocks the hammer.

Do people in Brazil really walk around with rounds unchambered?  Seems like a fatal mistake to me.

[alfred russel]

So some american swimmers, and Ryan Lochte in particular, are dumbasses prone to drink too much and stay out to late. And Brazilian authorities can be a bit heavy handed with a touch of banana republic flair to them.

Not seeing a significant news story in any of this.

[Malthus]

Claiming not just that you were robbed, but you were robbed by people pretending to be law enforcement officers, is a pretty direct attack on the integrity of the country.

And now real law enforcement officers got $10K out of them. 

'See what happens when you falsely claim to have been robbed by officials?'