Shut Up and Ski

Nothing stops athletes from speaking their mind about political issues whenever or wherever they like. Doing it at the Olympics is, at best, in poor form and, at worst, unpatriotic.

Skier Hunter Hess took the bait in Milan, or more likely, couldn't wait to preen for the foreign press, noting that he had "mixed emotions" representing his country. "It's a little hard," he said. "There's obviously a lot going on that I'm not the biggest fan of, and I think a lot of people aren't." And just because he's wearing the flag, Hess went on, "doesn't mean I represent everything that's going on in the U.S."

Who's happy with everything that goes on in their country? Not a single thinking person, that's who. Olympic athletes go to the games to transcend these differences and represent national ideals and aspirations, not whine about political parties that happen to be in charge. U.S. athletes shouldn't be stooges for foreigners. Go off on politics when you get home.

Of course, not one American in Beijing in 2022 was asked what they thought about the Biden administration's online censorship. Not that we should have wanted to hear about that, either. And not one French, Swedish, Danish or German athlete will ever be asked if they feel qualms about representing countries that deport illegal immigrants.

The subtext of the queries in Milan, and Hess' answer, rests on an assumption that something especially nefarious is going on in the United States, which deserves rebuke; something worse, apparently, than goes on in any other country participating in the games.

This outlook, as anyone who understands anything about the world knows, is lunacy. China, incidentally, sent a delegation of 286 people to the Winter Olympics in Milan. One of them is freestyle skier Eileen Gu, who, Google's AI — apparently translating text from the original Chicom propaganda — tells me "is competing in the 2026 Winter Olympics in Milan-Cortina, aiming to inspire a new generation of Chinese skiers, specifically girls, while balancing her Chinese heritage and American upbringing."

The only notable "heritage" of the one-party communist state, which doesn't represent the will of the Chinese people, is that it's in contention for being the most murderous regime in history. Yet the media's effusive coverage of Gu's performance, poise and overall decency is something to behold. Reuters ran a three-person bylined piece of Gu discussing her "rediscovering joy in skiing, navigating rising competition and reframing her relationship with fear." Gu, in an interview with the official Olympic site, "talks pressure, the haters, and inspiring young girls after a life-changing Beijing 2022."

The Chinese government also reportedly spent around $6.64 million on Gu and fellow U.S.-born athlete Zhu Yi. So that's a perk, for sure.

Couldn't Gu, worth somewhere north of $23 million, inspire Chinese girls in the United States rather than under the flag of a tyranny? Or how about representing Taiwan? Americans with dual citizenship who are unable to make the United States squads will occasionally compete for other nations. Even then, they rarely join tyrannies and geopolitical foes. It's one thing to buy cheap stuff from communist China and quite another to wear its flag.

Anyway, Gu is in no position to lecture anyone about decency.

As others have pointed out, reporters, deeply concerned about the ability of Americans to represent their flawed nation, have yet to ask Gu about the plight of Hong Kong democracy activist Jimmy Lai, recently sentenced to 20 years for exercising his right to free expression. There has been nothing on the 50 or so journalists being held in prison. Gu has criticized Trump, but offers nothing but praise for a regime that throws women into concentration camps where they are systemically raped and used as forced labor?

Maybe Hess can think about that the next time he's ripping the United States abroad.

(COMMENT, BELOW)

Previously:
• 02/06/26 Don't Cry for The Washington Post, It Helped Destroy Media
• 01/30/26 Price Controls Won't Work Any Better for Republicans Than It Does Dems
• 01/16/26 The Left's Silence on Iran Is NOT Hypocrisy
• 12/26/25: For JD Vance, Free Speech Only Means His Friends Can't Be Criticized
• 12/12/25: The Left Doesn't Believe in the Constitutional Order
• 12/07/25: War Powers Are Dead
• 11/27/25: MTG Embodies the Inanity of Populism
• 11/14/25: Gaslighting Americans is latest Dem Disaster
• 11/11/25: Trump's Filibuster Nuke Would Hand Dems the Keys To Remake America
• 11/04/25: Let's Talk About the Real Genocide of Christians in Africa
• 10/16/25: Obamacare Is a Massive Failure. The GOP Shouldn't Bail It Out
• 10/10/25: Why Aren't 'Ceasefire Now!' Activists Celebrating Trump's Gaza Peace Deal?
• 09/12/25: Israel's Strike on Qatar Should Have Happened Years Ago
• 09/05/25: An Open Letter to My Esteemed Colleagues at the International Association of Genocide Scholars
• 08/29/25: The President Doesn't Get to Dictate How We Express Ourselves
• 08/22/25: Is Socialism as Popular as the Media Think?
• 08/15/25: Save the Little Sisters of the Poor!
• 08/08/25: RFK Jr.'s War on Vaccines and Public Health Continues
• 08/01/25: Europe's Recognition of 'Palestine' Is a Cynical Joke
• 07/18/25: Legacy Media Still Covering for Biden
• 06/27/25: Trump Learned the Lessons of Iraq
• 05/30/25: We Have No Constitutional or Moral Duty to Subsidize Harvard
• 05/30/25: Welcome to the Intifada, America
• 05/16/25: Scapegoating Biden Isn't Going to Solve the Dems' Problems
• 05/09/25: The Pulitzer Prizes Have Become a Sad Joke
• 05/05/25: How Do You Do, Fellow White People? Tim Walz Says Hello!
• 04/25/25: Ketanji Brown Jackson Makes a Powerful Argument for School Choice
• 04/18/25: If Everyone Is an Expert, No One Is
• 03/31/25: The Left's Imaginary COVID 'Reckoning'
• 03/21/25: Sorry, Conspiracy Theorists -- Lee Harvey Oswald Acted Alone
• 03/03/25: Mitch McConnell: A GOP Hall of Famer?
• 02/21/25: RFK's Dangerous Autism Lie
• 02/14/25: It's Time to End the EV Racket
• 02/07/25: If You Really Support Immigration, Stop Excusing Chaos
• 02/03/25: Trump's Gaza Proposal Makes Complete Sense
• 01/24/25: How Biden's Pardons Normalize Abuse of Power
• 01/17/25: Israel Makes a Deal With the Actual Devil
• 01/13/25: Why Javier Milei Matters
• 12/20/24: The Obama Doctrine Is Dead
• 12/13/24: It's time for a national conversation about left-wing violence
• 12/09/24: It's time for a national conversation about left-wing violence
• 11/08/24: Don't Trash the Constitution to Dunk on the Libs
• 11/08/24: This 'liberation' will NOT be reported
• 11/01/24: HARRIS Is the Bigger Threat to the Constitutional Order
• 09/20/24: Fact checked! Harris Is the Extremist
• 07/13/24: Explain Yourself, Kamala Harris!
• 07/05/24: How Biden's Mental Decline Went From 'Misinformation' to Fact in a Week
• 04/12/24: Biden Is Now Chasing the 'Death to America' Voter
• 03/15/24: Turns Out Biden Lied About Hur, Beau, And Why He Pilfered Classified Docs
• 02/09/24: Why Biden Is Threatening to Veto Aid to Israel
• 02/09/23: Electric Cars Are a Scam
• 06/30/23: Americans Have Never Been Less Threatened by 'Extreme Weather'
• 03/03/23: Questioning Biden's Ukraine Policy Doesn't Make You an 'Isolationist'
• 01/20/23: No ribbons? Don't hide behind religion!
• 01/13/23: On Classified Documents, Joe Biden Is Out of Excuses
• 04/29/22: Biden's Ministry of Truth
• 04/08/22: The Most Radical Abortion Law in the Nation
• 04/01/22: Recuse Yourself, Joe Biden
• 03/25/22: No, School Boards Are Not 'Banning Books'
• 03/11/22: Let Them Drive Teslas
• 01/28/22: It's Not Government's Job to 'Root Out' Misinformation
• 01/14/22: Biden's Big Elections Lie
• 01/07/22: Schumer's Ugly 'Voting Rights' Gamble
• 12/24/21:AOC's Grasp on American Governance Is a 'Farce'
• 12/17/21: Dems Pivot from Build Back Better to Useless Extremism
• 11/19/21: Reckoning' Over Steele Dossier?
• 10/15/21: The Biden White House Will Pay for Playing Inflation Games
• 09/24/21: The most demonstrable political scandal still ignored
• 09/17/21: Sorry, AOC, The Rich Already Pay Their Fair Share
• 09/02/21: Why Isn't Biden to Blame for COVID-19 Deaths?
• 08/06/21: Biden's Unprecedented Attack on the Constitution
• 07/30/21: Jan. 6 Was Deplorable. It Was NOT a Coup
• 06/21/21: The Myth of Republican Obstructionism
• 05/21/21: What Does Putin Have on Biden?
• 04/16/21: Kristen Clarke Is Unfit to Be in Government
• 03/26/21: No to DC Statehood is far from GOP being reflexive
• 03/22/21: Biden Prepares to Strip College Students of Due Process Rights The Hypocrisy of the Filibuster Busters
• 03/12/21: Biden Prepares to Strip College Students of Due Process Rights
• 03/05/21: AOC's Terrible Minimum Wage Argument
• 02/12/21: The Dem Party Is Radicalizing against the Constitution
• 02/05/21: What NOT to Do with Marjorie Taylor Greene
• 01/15/21: Free Speech Is a Value Not Just a Right
• 12/31/20: It Can't Get Any Worse Than 2020. Here's a 2021 Political Wish List
• 10/26/20: Wanted: An Honest Debate about the Death Penalty
• 10/26/20: These are the questions 'Big Guy' Biden must be forced to answer about Hunter's emails
• 09/11/20: The Dems' Dangerous Delegitimization of the Election
• 08/28/20: Biden Is Underperforming Hillary in Battleground States
• 08/14/20: Kamala Harris, Imaginary Centrist
• 07/24/20: Who you calling a fascist?
• 07/17/20: Speech Police have finally gone too far
• 07/03/20: 'But Gorsuch' Is Still Trump's Best Argument
• 06/22/20: Welcome to America's Cultural Revolution
• 06/12/20: The color of my skin is not an indictment of my morality, nor does it strip me of my agency
• 06/05/20: What this son of immigrants knows about bulding bussinesses --- and the dismay of destruction
• 05/28/20: The Folly of Twitter's Fact-Check
• 05/22/20: Dems Warning Trump Will Reject Election Results Should Look in the Mirror
• 05/15/20: Obamagate Is NOT a Conspiracy Theory
• 05/08/20: Really, Joe --- due process is the opposite of justice?