Blogging Tories Challenge: What’s The Waffle’s Sport?
Tim Powers’s question about the Waffle’s favourite sport is a perfectly legitimate one. After all, a favourite sport tells us quite a bit about somebody’s personality.
After all, Stephen Harper’s favourite sport is hockey; he’s made no secret of it. But when he talks about it, he does so more as a fan than as a practitioner; a typical hockey dad, you might say. Do we know anything similar about Ignatieff?
Is there any clue, for example, in the New York Times article that Iggy wrote, which was published this weekend?
Well, a couple of things are pretty obvious. First, we know that he’s not really paying any more than casual attention to the Olympics, because if you notice, he doesn’t name a sport or athlete to pay attention to. He mentions snowboarding and curling as examples of sports that use technology to advance, and speed skating to poke fun at Stephen Colbert. But he makes no mention of Jasey Jay Anderson or Caroline Calve or Nick Baumgartner (snowboarding athletes), Cheryl Bernard, Adam Enright or Kristie Moore (curling), or even Anastasia Bucksis or Mathieu Giroux (speed skating).
Second, the sports that he names tend to highlight individual skillsets. This is unlike hockey, pairs figure skating or bobsleigh, which requires a team effort. In Canada, we tend to pay more attention to hockey, because the NHL schedule affects who gets on the team, and figure skating, because of (a) the costumes and (b) the judging. But the Waffle is still in the habit of trying not to offend anyone, which makes both hockey and figure skating off-limits.
And then there’s this passage:
The question is how individual athletes in the Canadian men’s, women’s and Paralympic teams manage the pressure of all our pent-up national expectation. That is finally what makes the Games uniquely compelling. The real drama is not the battle between countries as much as each individual competitor’s battle with himself or herself. Nations can pitch the Olympics as a battle between nations, but the spectators know this is a very human, very individual drama.
Everyone recognizes this sort of writing. It’s what educated people do when they try to make themselves sound profound without actually saying anything and therefore proving their own ignorance. But his emphasis on “individual” and “drama” is quite suggestive.
Because which Olympic sport tends to emphasize both individualism and drama, for an educated man whose primary source of information is media?
Well . . . think Chariots of Fire. Think The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner.
Exactly. I’d suggest that the Waffle’s self-defining sport is running. After all, when it’s time to get out of town (or Oxford, or Harvard, or Toronto, or whatever), it’s a pretty good skill set to have. But perhaps you’d like a guess at it.
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February 7th, 2010 at 10:09
With an olympic snowboarder on his team, does he know anything about it or him.
I would think fencing would be his sport, by the way he lunges then backs off of whatever idea he has.
February 7th, 2010 at 10:12
What are the ‘sports’ in the Other category??
I voted for ‘thinking thoughts’.
February 7th, 2010 at 10:17
Iggy’s favorite sports? – non contact Chess, Shirts or Skins Bridge, Outdoor Dungeons and Dragons, Water Polo and full contact I spy with my little eye.
February 7th, 2010 at 10:43
Re Harper … the annual CPC calendar shows (for January) Harper and his son Ben, skating and playing hockey on Harrington Lake.
Iggy was once asked what he thought of the notion that, wrt strategy, “Harper is playing chess, while everyone else is playing checkers” ? Iggy jokingly replied that he doesn’t know how to play chess, but his son always beat him at checkers.
As to what sport Iggy is in to ? I’d say Donolo is working on that right now, complete with talking points !
February 7th, 2010 at 10:55
I would think wine tasting his his forte.
Half a bottle of hooch makes him feel HIS thought are important.
February 7th, 2010 at 11:56
What I want to know is, does he have “Private, for Profit, American Health Care Insurance?”
Not that theirs anything wrong with that! But it would still be interesting to know!
Or how about: How many, and which countries is he a citizen of?
It almost a given that he would of taken out citizenship in Britain isn’t it? He practically spent 30 years there, didn’t he! Why is their no interest it that question? It was a legitimate question when Dion was leader, even though he got it by being the son of a French citizen. GASP! Could the Toronto media be anti-French!!
Then there’s the US of A. We all heard his “us Americans” speech. Maybe he was telling the truth? Could it be another dirty little secret that the Toronto media don’t think we need to know? Just saying!
Last, but not least, would be the question of whether he applied for Hungarian citizenship when he married his current wife?
February 7th, 2010 at 12:01
Oh, and by the way Phanton.
You forgot the most obvious one in the above list.
It’s “Hide and Seek”
February 7th, 2010 at 12:04
- marathon book signing
- rhythmic eyebrow gymnastics
- shuffling the coalition deckchairs on the Titanic
February 7th, 2010 at 13:09
I don’t see why a politician has to have an interest in sports; I certainly don’t. I’d also go out on a limb and suggest that the more educated people in Canadian society are less likely to be sports fans. [And yes, I know that many on the right deride advanced education (and not always without reason). Ignatieff is an academic, and so we shouldn't expect him to have a close interest in sports.]
In any case, I’ve thought for years that in Canada, hockey is the opiate of the masses; in the decades of Vancouver’s doldrums, that amounted to a lot of wasted time on very bad opium indeed, and I’m not sorry I haven’t followed any sport since the first two years of my undergrad. Certainly, I would rather have a politician not waste hours of his day following a fantasy of overpaid Canadian millionaires fighting each other and spouting cliches for TV cameras–and doing all this largely in the United States.
What I’m saying is that this line of attack is too hyper-partisan; it may appeal to the sports fans in the Conservative base, but it won’t carry any weight with anyone else. Worse, this kind of criticism blunts the better criticisms that could be made.
February 7th, 2010 at 13:12
Sodoku? Checkers?
February 7th, 2010 at 14:11
His favourite sport is nitpicking.
February 7th, 2010 at 14:43
I like Mary T’s idea. Fencing is a perfect fit. I also think polo would have potential, either water or pony.
Btw, why is there always someone that must take everything so literally? Relax, relax……that is what following a sport does….allows for relaxation, pleasure and healthy distractions.
February 7th, 2010 at 18:48
With rigging the outcome as a necessity, it must be figure skating.
With the help of French and Russian judging Iffy could capture gold.
February 7th, 2010 at 20:21
Iggy and sports?
Thats an oxymoron.