A man who might be more hated than Apolo Ohno?

If that were even possible (I'm just kidding... the Apolo Ohno thing is a rivalry, and there was a strong "We wuz robbed!" vibe during the 2002 Olympics, but hate is an awfully strong word).

Anyway, it seems one of South Korea's former short-track stars has decided the best way to get into the Olympics is to bypass the uber-talented group of skaters on the Korea Republic team by joining another country. Yeah, passport and all.

Ahn Hyunsoo has decided to obtain Russian citizenship in the hopes of bringing the gold to the host nation's team during the 2014 Winter Olympiad at Sochi.

Yeah, that Sochi, the one that beat out South Korea's Pyongchang for hosting rights, four years after Vancouver had barely beaten out South Korea. Yeah, that Sochi, the summer resort that's uncomfortably close to some very angry separatists who occasionally resort to terrorism.

With that still fresh in SoKos' minds (all grievances since 1592 are fresh in SoKos' minds, except those committed by China and North Korea — I kid! I kid!), imagine how popular Mr Ahn will be if he beats out South Korean skaters who are still South Koreans, and brings home gold for the Russians.

Expect Apolo Ohno to smirk. More than usual.

...

Vancouver hero

If you read my site regularly, you know that rioters piss me off (and I'm making the distinction between legitimate protesters and those who seek to cause violence and damage to others' property, especially when the victims have nothing to do with the cause of the riot).

So in the wake of the Vancouver riots following the Stanley Cup (you're supposed to riot when your team wins... idiots), I thought I would post something about one of the heroes of the riots who stood his ground and risked serious bodily injury to stop rioters from torching a car.



His name is Bert Easterbrook, a pro-marijuana advocate, and he deserves a lot of credit in my book. One takes some serious risks when they try to the right thing, and the blood on his face at the end of the YouTube video proves it.

This stands in sharp contrast with the likes of, say, Alicia Price, the sweet-looking suburbanite who was one of the people lighting cars on fire.

Or, for that matter, Nathan Kotylak, who was also caught on camera. Seriously, did these people not think there would be loads of people snapping their picture and making these public? I'm not supportive of any vigilantism against these people and especially their families, and I question the wisdom of online "public shaming" (what is the threshold of evidence or, for that matter, what level of "crime" deserves such treatment?), but the rioters should have expected that something like this could happen.