the Black Power Salute: 16th October 1968, screenshot from Democracy Now

Reposted below are both parts of Democracy Now's exclusive interview with John Carlos and Dave Zirin, shedding new light and detail on the people and events around the Mexico 1968 Games, the student massacre, the Black Power Salute, Tommie Smith, Peter Norman, John Carlos, Avery Brundage...

Bizarrely, Transport Secretary Philip Hammond has had a go at Coca Cola, Olympic sponsors for 85 years, for deciding to bus their employees and guests to Stratford. Others have condemned them for breaking the 'Olympic Spirit'!

LOCOG published its 2010-11 annual report this week. Pages 69 & 70 (71 & 72 in the PDF) are the most fun, as Kevin Blowe pointed out:

Shock! Horror! Wenlock and Mandeville can't swim! Plainly for health and safety reasons they can't be allowed near the Aquatic Centre so instead Locog has come up with the wizard wheeze of giving them free swimming lessons in the Beano. LoCoe claimed 'This is a creative way to engage children in the Olympic and Paralympic values'.

The Pudding Mill White Elephant just won't lie down. CoeLtd is still hoping to bring the 2017 IAAF World Athletics Championships to London. But it all depends on there being an available stadium. After all it's hard to hold an Athletics Championships without one. LoCoe has his own IAAF ambitions with the next milestone in 2015 when he hopes to succeed to the top job. The loss of a stadium could prove terminal to those ambitions.

Neither Paxo on last night's Newsnight, nor John Humphreys on this morning's Radio 4 Today 'knew' there'd be a Westfield at Stratford. Apparently from within their BBC bubble Westfield is only that thing near to TV Centre at Wood Lane? Or perhaps they're being briefed? Whichever it was, both occasions provided a platform (again) for Tessa Jowell's lies on legacy claiming Stratford Westfield.

No telly so haven't seen it, but on Twitter @jennifermjones was rather caustic about Tier 1 sponsor BP's new Olympics greenwashing ad:

Oh my god. Just saw the London2012/BP advert. It is a f***ing oil company talking about blatantly greening a mega event.

As @PlatformLondon point out, BP do culture-washing too. The newly launched UK edition of HuffPo has a review, Hunt's Glass Slipper is Filling with Toxic Toes. As the title suggests it's not exactly flattering about the new Tessa, Jeremy *unt either.

But Reverend Billy is coming to cleanse them. And there was some guerilla ballet in Trafalgar Square too: BP White Swan

BP White Swan from You and I Films.

Along with Rio Tinto another well known and long standing friend of the Olympics and sponsor of London 2012 is Coca Cola, aka Killer Coke, which is being sued in the United States by trade unions acting on behalf of workers and trade unionists in Turkey, Colombia and Guatemala.

The British Olympic Association may have achieved a 'win win' result with 'real clarity' by backing down from its argument with LOCOG, but it has now taken a backhanded swipe at its Olympic enemies! The BOA has withdrawn from hosting the biannual meeting of the Association of National Olympic Committees (ANOC), which is usually held a few months before the Summer Olympics in the host city, justifying this by blaming its parlous financial situation. This follows on from the BOA's attempt to extract extra money from LOCOG, an argument rejected by the IOC. The biannual ANOC event coincides with the meeting of the IOC's executive committee. Now the BOA has used its failure to improve its financial position to prevent LOCOG showing off its preparations for the 2012 Games to the Olympic family and forced 'the family' to meet in Moscow rather than London!

The tourism disaster which is London 2012 is turning from a gale into a hurricane. Hotels, outraged by the price gouging being practised by LOCOG's partners Thomas Cook and CoSport, are withdrawing rooms from its preferential-rate scheme. A while back SCoeLtd blamed hotels for jacking up prices and threatening London's good name. However, hotels hit back accusing LOCOG and its partners of being behind the abominable inflation. At the heart of the matter is the undisclosed payment made by Thomas Cook and CoSport to LOCOG to become official resellers of these rooms. This kind of corruption lies at the heart of the Olympic system whereby a range of commercial organisations pay Organising Committees to gain monopolistic access to the Games. Price gouging was supposed to be outlawed at the 2012 Games. In reality it is central to the whole event.