THE PAGE TURNS

February 5, 2026February 6, 2026

The Unholy Alliance of Sport & Audience, Olympic Version

Ironic caption that, given that the photo isn’t of people watching, but cameras watching. Are they interfering or are they essential to the audience? Where does the athlete fit in this alliance?

The only thing worse than the networks’ coverage of the Olympic Games would be if the TV networks didn’t cover the Games. We could play a drinking game: name all the things you hate about NBC (or the BBC or ….)’s coverage of the Olympics. You’d be plastered before the athletes started marching into the stadium.

The packaged, preselected narrative ruins the live experience as TV aims for the most photogenic, the most “American-looking,” the most-likely winners, and ignores most everyone else. The nightly entertainment package is full of insipid chatter by the hosts, incessant shots of family members, content-less interviews with athletes who aren’t competing, and not enough competition to show the competition. And don’t get me started on the idiotic obsession with the medal count. So much to dislike about the way the entertainment media “crafts” narratives about the sports, so much that interferes with the sports, themselves.

In fact, I was planning on a good ol’ fashioned rant about the lousy media as the Opening Ceremonies approached, but I started thinking about the history of the Games. The media changes the Games because the media curates the Games, with its intrusive format controlling the content as that guy McLuhan would say. But is it THAT different today than before?

As much as we prefer our athletes to be unsullied by the watchers, we might think about how their performance has always been about both the audience and purveyors. We want to watch; they want to compete. The media is in the middle. The media has changed the game, but it always has been doing that, from the time of the ancient Greeks to the 1896 reboot to the introduction of television to the drones and ubiquitous cameras. AI will introduce some other ruination and perversion, but…same as it ever was. There’s always been an unholy alliance between the athlete, the audience, and the curator.

The Temple of Hera is still visible at Olympia, as is the entrance to the stadia, the gymnasium, and the alcove where the Olympic torch is lit. Kajmeister photo.

January 28, 2026January 28, 2026

Nordic! Alpine! Extreme! Look Back and Forward to Milano-Cortina

Author’s Note: Some of my musings below were shared before Beijing and Sochi, but I’m recycling a bit because it’s good for the planet.

The original International Sports Week! later to be called Winter Olympics I. Photo from wikimedia.

The XXV Winter Games start next week! Opening Ceremonies are Friday, although preliminary heats in Mixed Doubles Curling start on Wednesday. Most of America’s curling athletes come from Minnesota, including Team USA’s mixed doubles team, and Minnesota could use some extra cheering right now, so get in there! Fun Fact: All of Team USA’s Mixed Doubles athletes are named Cory (Cory and Korey)… those long winter nights must just fly by. How can you not watch a team where people have the same name? Mixed Doubles Curling is to Curling what Rugby Sevens is to regular Rugby—half the people but the same size of the field.

Since I brought it up, let’s just look at what we can expect in Mixed Doubles. You may recall that the plucky team from Italy surprised the favored Norwegians with the first ever curling medal for Italy in Beijing 2022. That same pair went 9-0 to win last year’s world championships, and the female half of the team, Stefania Constantini, hails from…wait for it Cortina! Guess where the Curling stadium is… Cortina! The Mixed Doubles Italian gold-winning pair will also be the flagbearers for Italy in Cortina. So you can think of Constantini and Mosaner as the Simone Biles of Mixed Doubles Curling: the ones to beat. Boy, the Cory/Korey’s are going to have an uphill battle against that powerhouse Italian team.

I hear you scoffing, my friends, but you have to remember one of the Kajmeister Olympic Rules: All sports are interesting if you know the rules and the backstory of those competing. Curling started at the Games back in 1924—more on that shortly. But let’s briefly recall how these winter games all got started.

January 20, 2026January 20, 2026

Vision

1963 March on Washington speaker podium. Photo by Warren Leffler.

There was anxiety in Washington the day before the 1963 March on Washington. They were so worried, they closed the liquor stores. The opening line of the New York Times article spoke rather fearfully of the “vanguard” of tens of thousands of people, who had begun arriving on the roads and filling the bus and train stations. The largest marches up until that time had been only around 30-40,000 people, and it was pretty clear this would be bigger. Organizers hoped for 100,000. Martin Luther King was last on a long list of speakers.

The concern was unfounded. There was no violence, no major counter-protest (a small group of Nazis was quickly dispatched), little untoward behavior by police or protesters. People showed up en masse but marched as planned, gathered as planned, and patiently listened to speakers as planned. Their patience was rewarded: it was the largest protest march on Washington in history at the time, estimated at 250-300,000. And they heard one of the greatest orations ever delivered.

The Gathering

There had been marches to Washington before, protesting wages, unemployment, and civil rights. Five thousand walked in D.C. at the 1922 “Silent March” on Washington to urge passage of the Dyer anti-lynching bill. But few years later in 1925, the KKK brought 30,000 racists into Washington, one of the largest marches of its time. People came to Washington to protest multiple times during the Great Depression, looking for help and answers.

During the FDR administration, the idea of a march by Blacks to protest discrimination in jobs and the military was advanced repeatedly among leaders of civil rights organization. At the time, marches often helped to pressure Congress, but leaders weren’t sure that the “Court and Congress” strategy was all that effective for Blacks. Plessy vs. Ferguson, the Supreme Court decreeing “separate but equal” facilities were acceptable was only a few decades old in 1933.

The organizers of the 1963 march began planning in December 1961, after Kennedy was elected but in no hurry to champion civil rights. The courts had outlawed some types of segregation in the 1950s, but armed guards still had to accompany children to school. Mass marches and nonviolent demonstrations across many places had been effective, but organizers sensed it was a time to push for more. Kennedy and many in his party supported civil rights in concept, but he urged the organizers not to march. Civil rights was on the list, but low priority. He was working on a bill, people should be patient. Civil rights always are a “distraction” to those who don’t need it.