Rooting for the home team doesn't bother me. What I find objectionable is the media coverage. You don't get the best of the best, let alone any of the rest, you just get the best of the Americans. Coverage is not just focused on Amercian performers, to the exclusion of almost everyone else, it's obsessively fixated on the gold count. When an athlete gets a bronze medal, the first question he's most likely to be asked is be how he feels about losing the gold.

I can't recall the exact timeline, but I associate a decided change in media attitudes with the network shift that marked Dick Button's exit from the commentator's booth, because of a non-compete clause in his contract. The "new improved" model consisted of substituting soft-focus "human interest" athelete profiles (all conveniently taped in advance) for the real drama and coherent coverage of the actual competitions. There were suddenly countless events where the network didn't even bother to cover anyone but the American competitor at all. That's when I began to lose interest in the whole affair. It was like baseball stats without the baseball.

Second, as a devoted follower of more obscure sports - cycling, sailing, and skiing - I like the Olympics. Certainly all three have a bigger prize outside of the Olympic realm, and in fact, I really don't pay too much attention to Olympic cycling, yet the international competition enthralls me. Not only have most of the competitors faced off against one another, by in many instances, they were, and will be again, team-mates. Any bets on how many non-US citizens attend US schools?

The point being, it is in the spirit of the games that competitors represent their country - and with few exceptions they do it well - and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. Chances are that those admonishing nationalistic tendencies are only admonishing their own countrymen, and have a pre-existing self-loathing of their country.

I especially hate swimming and track and field--the only way racing in any form is interesting is if you have money riding on it--like at the horses.

Hell, the Olympics is so lame that even the horse events don't have betting!

I dig soccer in general, so I'll watch that. Luckily, most of the major pros are playing, so it will be a decent tourney (unlike, say, baseball).

I actually love watching badminton, but they never seem to show much of it.

But in general, with the baseball pennant races heating up, I'll be watching that this month.