Christine Lagarde and I

I am not sure what I think about Christine Lagarde, the Director General of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), but she evidently like my ideas:

It took Lagarde four years, but she has now joined me and supports my suggestion that the Olympic Games should be moved to a permanent home in Greece.

Here’s what Lagarde said: http://greece.greekreporter.com/2016/07/01/surprise-from-lagarde-let-the-olympic-games-come-home-to-athens-permanently/

And here is what I wrote in 2012: http://davidranan.blogspot.co.uk/2012/03/move-games-to-greece.html

Putin's Closet

We had Putin the diver, Putin the hunter, Putin the judo champion and now it is Putin the children’s savior.

According to press reports, Putin warned homosexuals to stay away from children. That is if they do not want to be subjected to harassment at the Winter Olympics in Sochi.

Russia is in safe hands: sweet uncle Putin is protecting its children. And yet, it is probably a good idea to keep one’s children away from Putin. Who knows what his next fad will be. 

Move the Games to Greece

The Olympic games were created in the 8^th century BC in Greece, where they were held until the end of the fourth century AD. The games were revived at the end of the 19^th century and are now held in a different country every four years.

Every four years another city spends horrendous and ever-increasing amounts of money to build stadia, Olympic villages and facilities that are way too big for the host countries to use after the games are over. Host countries regularly overspend, squander moneys and create unnecessary chaos in the host cities.

New York is the permanent home of the UN and its General Assembly, Davos annually hosts the World Economic Forum. Why not make Greece the permanent home of the games?

By moving the games back to Greece, we would not only save billions spent on unnecessary facilities, we would also inject a much-needed investment into Greece. Building state of the art Olympic facilities would create jobs and help to bring down Greece’s very high unemployment. (More than fifty per-cent unemployment in the 15-24 year-olds).

This would be money much better spent than the billions of Euros sunk into worthless Greek bonds. Moreover, it would also boost Greece’s self-esteem and give the country its pride back.

Sending the Games back to Greece is a win-win strategy. The only losers would be the members of the International Olympic Committee that decides where games are held. They would be out of work. Now that brings a smile to my face.