The massive Olympic cock up

I was having a conversation with a friend on Farcebook about the Olympics the other day. We disagreed on several issues, simply because the person I was talking to came from London…

So far the Olympic “build up” has been a complete shambles, & the games haven’t even started yet. We’ve all cringed whilst watching the news carrying stories such as:

• The ticket selling fiasco.
• Still hundreds of thousands of tickets unsold.
• Airports without enough border control staff & god forbid, it’s emerged that many of those who are there haven’t been trained properly.
• Bus drivers threatening strike action. Train drivers looking pretty certain to be on strike from the Midlands to London.  
• Company sponsors such as Coke & McDonalds making a fortune in tax evasion. All things considered, when it comes to promoting health & vitality, they’re rather odd choices. I mean why not include “Lambert & Butler” or “Gordon’s Gin?”
• The big security sham, Mr Nick Buckles head of G4S [Good 4 Scamming] hang your head in shame.
• And it’s costing around twice (est. £18 billion), than was originally announced, (£9.3 billion). In other words much more than this once wonderful country can afford right now…

I watched an interview with one of the Olympic organisers on TV yesterday. When asked [quote] “If you’d known then, what you know now, would you still have gone ahead with it all?”

Definitive answer: “No.”

I don’t believe in bad omens. But after showing us they’d spent thousands testing the torch(es) in a lab, to stay lit in every different kind of weather condition known to man. (Including a plague of locusts). In the very first section of the relay it went out, & has done on a regular basis ever since…

Patriotism (& connected value for money) can work 2 ways:

• There’s those with their heads in the clouds, who might think perhaps other countries haven’t noticed the seriously flawed state of affairs. And that it’s going to be worth it in future revenue.
• There’s also those who see it for what it is, were hoping to feel patriotic, but can’t. And feel that future revenue from elsewhere will not match the cost, the shambles so far will have been enough to deter…

However, there are a few things to feel patriotic about:

• The soldiers they’ve drafted in to clear up the whole security mess. Although it’s very sad that 2 brigades will be made redundant afterwards, & that many have just come back from Afghan…
• Patriotism for the extra police being drafted in…
• And finally, patriotism for the Paralympics…

But all things considered, all athlete’s aside, that’s as far as it goes for me…

The government should have had their own officials over-seeing & managing everything all the way. Especially, CRUCIALLY, a private security firm! Does that really need spelling out…?

This is just the Olympics for goodness sake, not another war! Where are those extra soldiers, & police officers going to come from in the future when there’s fewer of them? Who’s going to fill that gap? Of course there’s always G4S, pushing “cut price contracts” by then…

Another observation: Mr Chameleon obviously realised the TA’s weren’t up to jumping in on Olympic security because they were available but he didn’t use them. These are the same TA’s he wants to send to Afghan on 6 month tours. What he hasn’t realised yet is that even if they’re trained properly, in these troubled financial times employers just won’t have it… But that’s his problem, of his own making…