Rick Perry & Ryan Lochte in "Dancing with the stars"

[marylander1940]

Yes, the trophy winner snagged a Trophy Playboy model.... I give it 1 year.

 

Maybe they're both dumb, you can build on that a nice relationship and live from a reality TV show....

 

Ps.: I shouldn't have said "maybe", we know at least he's dumb for sure.

[jjkrkwood]

Maybe they're both dumb, you can build on that a nice relationship and live from a reality TV show....

 

Ps.: I shouldn't have said "maybe", we know at least he's dumb for sure.

 

 

He may have made some BAD choices, but I would never venture to call an Olympic GOLD medal winner dumb.. He certainly has accomplished more than many of us... JEAH !

[marylander1940]

He may have made some BAD choices, but I would never venture to call an Olympic GOLD medal winner dumb.. He certainly has accomplished more than many of us... JEAH !

 

Being fast, agile, gorgeous, athletic, etc.... is not being smart.

 

The guy's dumb!

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XYBKCibnDYE

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fEdvRPkefN0

 

[+ stevenkesslar]

The guy's dumb!

 

Yeah. I wish I was that fucking stupid!

 

 

The interviewer's response was telling. He is slow-witted, cute, vulnerable, sincere. You gotta laugh, but you also gotta love him.

 

That DWTS package brought out the part of him that is most appealing. He may be a dumb dork but he's the kind of guy that trains his ass off and makes America look great. And his mother adores him, and he loves his Mom.

 

Honestly, to change the subject a little, I feel the same way about a lot of military guys I see interviewed. They come off as dumb as rocks, and I would not want some of them to get elected dogcatcher. But there is no question about their gung-ho sincerity and their basic values.

[escortrod]

Yeah. I wish I was that fucking stupid!

 

 

The interviewer's response was telling. He is slow-witted, cute, vulnerable, sincere. You gotta laugh, but you also gotta love him.

 

That DWTS package brought out the part of him that is most appealing. He may be a dumb dork but he's the kind of guy that trains his ass off and makes America look great. And his mother adores him, and he loves his Mom.

 

Honestly, to change the subject a little, I feel the same way about a lot of military guys I see interviewed. They come off as dumb as rocks, and I would not want some of them to get elected dogcatcher. But there is no question about their gung-ho sincerity and their basic values.

I think it's pretty reasonable to question Lochte's basic values after what he did in Rio.

[jjkrkwood]

I think it's pretty reasonable to question Lochte's basic values after what he did in Rio.

 

 

He was drunk and reckless and made a bad decision. Not the first person to do so, and wont be the last. We've ALL been there !

[escortrod]

He was drunk and reckless and made a bad decision. Not the first person to do so, and wont be the last. We've ALL been there !

I've never vandalised something, nor lied to the police. I don't think either should be so easily dismissed.

[+ stevenkesslar]

I think it's pretty reasonable to question Lochte's basic values after what he did in Rio.

 

Well, at the risk of getting this booted to the politics section, and making it way more serious than it deserves to be, here we go.

 

Lochte makes me think about Chris Kyle, aka American Sniper. That's a big stretch, since many would call Kyle a hero. I don't know that anybody views Olympic gold medal winners as heroes, even though they do end up on cereal boxes and make millions endorsing stuff. Lochte and Kyle both excelled at one thing and that one thing came to define them in a much bigger, very public way. With Lochte it was pools, with Kyle it was pistols. Both achieved things that required amazing skill and discipline. And the fact that they were very good at one thing doesn't make them the kind of people you want to put in charge of things.

 

 

 

I loved American Sniper. Clint Eastwood did a masterful job of bringing out the ambiguity of the situation we did a lot to create over in Iraq. He portrayed Kyle as both kind of a mess, and kind of a hero. Compared to Lochte, it's way easier to call Kyle the hero. But speaking of being really, really, really dumb - like super stupid, dumb as rocks, total fucking idiots - I'm very ambivalent about the fact that our country was idiotic enough to send people like him over to Iraq to kill men, women, and children, which the movie portrayed him doing, with great intent and skill. What does that say about our completely fucked up values? I'm way more ambivalent about whether Kyle is a "hero" for what he did in Iraq than I am about whether Lochte is a "hero" or a "role model" or "icon" because he broke records and won medals but also pissed over the ground at a gas station and tore down a sign because he was drunk.

 

The common thread to me in both stories is it is about values and redemption. Both stories give us the opportunity to question what our values are.

 

So I agree with what you said exactly as you worded it: it is reasonable to question Lochte's values. In fact, that's the point. I actually think it's good to question his values. Was he right to get drunk, urinate where he shouldn't, rip down a sign, and then lie about the fact that the crime committed was his own vandalism? No. Did that represent something about "Olympic values?" Absolutely not. If there's a lesson, Lochte represented what we don't want to be. In the same way as much as you can say that Kyle was a hero, Eastwood directed the film brilliantly, in a way that some people could focus on Kyle's heroism, and others - like me - could focus on the fact that this is exactly what we as a people don't want to be. It's fine with me that people like Chris Kyle are good at hunting and enjoy doing it, but IMHO we never should have sent him over to Iraq to hunt men, women, and children. It was utterly stupid, dumb as rocks, and utterly wrong.

 

The Olympics provide a platform for bringing out the best in people and promoting global cooperation. Ryan Lochte literally pissed all over that, and he deserved to become an example. DWTS is first and foremost just entertainment. But part of why I think it is so popular is that it tries to get under the surface of these people and what motivates them and what they value.

 

I think there is value in Lochte's story, and also in the end I think there is value in redemption. Kyle and him are mere mortals wrapped up in much bigger dramas than themselves, and there are people that think of both as heroes, and both as villains. Neither one strike me as the kind of people I'd want in charge of really important things. Meaning they are more like most of us - ordinary people in extraordinary situations. Whatever you think, the value is - to your point - their stories make us think about what we should try to be.

[jjkrkwood]

I've never vandalised something, nor lied to the police. I don't think either should be so easily dismissed.

 

We are not debating the degree of his misdemeanor here, merely agreeing he made a mistake. And if we really wanted to pick apart each persons digressions, I am sure we can find some in everyones closet that we don't agree with or approve of. You are you, and he is he, and I don't think its fair for you to hold him to YOUR standards, since we have not determined that you are the pillar of perfection. He has been judged by the appropriate parties, and we should leave it at that.

[escortrod]

We are not debating the degree of his misdemeanor here, merely agreeing he made a mistake. And if we really wanted to pick apart each persons digressions, I am sure we can find some in everyones closet that we don't agree with or approve of. You are you, and he is he, and I don't think its fair for you to hold him to YOUR standards, since we have not determined that you are the pillar of perfection. He has been judged by the appropriate parties, and we should leave it at that.

I would have thought that the only reasonable standards by which to judge somebody would be one's own. Moral relativism has never sat particularly well with me. More to the point, however, I was responding to the sentence "...there is no question about their gung-ho sincerity and their basic values". In that context I don't think my comment is unreasonable.

[jjkrkwood]

I would have thought that the only reasonable standards by which to judge somebody would be one's own. Moral relativism has never sat particularly well with me. More to the point, however, I was responding to the sentence "...there is no question about their gung-ho sincerity and their basic values". In that context I don't think my comment is unreasonable.

 

You are correct, it is not, however when ones senses are impaired basic values are usually "gone with the wind".... He seems to be remorseful and I am all about second chances, so I will put the boy back on my Christmas card list,

[+ stevenkesslar]

In that context I don't think my comment is unreasonable.

 

It's not, as I said. I threw out the bait and was actually hoping somebody would say what you did, so it would give me an opportunity to really grab the mic and blather.

 

Some of us are, in fact, very predictable.

 

Again, at the risk of weaponizing and politicizing this discussion, Obama deserves to be challenged about whether he has made the US "weaker," but to me he's a role model in at least one regard. If you can figure out nothing else in life, figure out that it's not bad to be ruled by this maxim, as a person and as a country: "Don't do stupid shit." Lochte and the Olympics and Kyle and Iraq prove those four words are much easier said than done.

 

Since I popped off, let me complete the thought with the other, more topical example I was thinking about: the Benghazi heroes. There is no question that what the private military contractors working for the CIA at the annex did was heroic. But there is a whole bunch of stuff that is manufactured about that story, including the idea that there were orders to "stand down." That's according to the House Republicans and their investigation into the matter:

 

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2016/jul/18/mark-geist/stand-down-story-ignores-critical-facts-about-effo/

 

Unlike with Lochte, we have no video evidence of what really happened. In fact, we have the opposite. We have a Hollywood movie that - unlike what Eastwood tried to do - tried to turn something ugly and complex into something very black and white and morally clear.

 

I'm just reiterating the same basic point. But it is so relevant to so many situations we find ourselves in today that I really hope we do think about this, and we do learn from our mistakes. People like Lochte and Kyle and the military contractors in Libya may be heroic or iconic or role models, in some ways, but it doesn't mean you can believe what they say, and it doesn't make them leaders. Part of the redemption that is to be had in their stories is not just for them. It's also for us - because we might just do better next time.

[escortrod]

It's not, as I said. I threw out the bait and was actually hoping somebody would say what you did, so it would give me an opportunity to really grab the mic and blather.

And I thought I had a lot of time on my hands...

[jjkrkwood]

Now if we are talking Kim Kardashian in Paris, that publicity whore setup the whole robbery thing and should be prosecuted / persecuted.... Bitch !