Carter's stain, and 'bad decision' will never wash off

April 12 passed by without a lot of fuss but 40 years ago it was the date of one of the more lamentable decisions involving sport and politicians and which had significant implications for New Zealand sportspeople.

It was when the United States Olympic Committee (USOC) bowed to the wishes of American president Jimmy Carter and decided to boycott the 1980 Moscow Olympic Games.

That set in train a world-wide response boosted in New Zealand by the Prime Minister, Robert Muldoon, a man who only a couple of years earlier had got himself deeply offside with his American allies by describing Carter as 'a peanut farmer'. Months later, in a classic display of irony, Muldoon would allow the 1981 Springbok tour to take place.

Mike Moran, only in the first year into his job as chief spokesman for the USOC – a position he held for another 23 years – remembered that day in Colorado Springs for Thesportsexaminer.com.

He recalled the decision being made that would deny 200 Americans and many others around the world the right to be called Olympians.

The vote on the question of the boycott was passed 1704 to 697 and was a decision that almost put the USOC out of business.

Carter, who would be tipped out of office later in the year by Ronald Reagan, made his call on January 20. But on April 12, the USOC was addressed by Vice President Walter Mondale and the USOC treasurer William E. Simon, who also happened to be a former Secretary of the Treasury.

Following the USSR's invasion of Afghanistan in December 1979, Carter wanted the Olympics to be moved from Moscow to another venue or to be postponed or cancelled if the Soviet Union didn't withdraw its troops.

Mondale's contribution to the USOC meeting was to tell them: "History holds its breath for what is at stake is no less than the future security of the civilized world. If one nation can be subjugated by Soviet aggression, is any sovereign nation truly safe from that fate?... If the Soviet lunge toward the most strategic oil-rich spot on earth fails to unite us, what will?"

In today's world, Mondale's effort would be seen as a classic response to the 'Reds under the bed' Cold War that was even then beginning to peter out.

But Simon, supposedly representing the best interests of the Olympic sportsmen and women of the US said: "It is somewhat incredulous that a group of mature persons whom I consider to be among the most patriotic of Americans can seriously discuss defying the President of the United States on a national security issue."

Carter left no stone unturned to achieve his demand, a call which flew in the face of the International Olympic Committee charter that said all national Olympic committees should resist all pressures whether political, religious or economic. Even worse the USOC's constitution said no member could 'deny or threaten to deny any amateur athlete the opportunity to compete in the Olympic Games.'

So Carter pulled out the old national security line to pour the pressure on. Olympic sponsors were then heavied to not make key payments unless the USOC backed the boycott.

Top-ranked USOC officials were threatened with reductions in their service entitlements in retirement.

An event was organised on July 26, 1980, for the American athletes and at the end of a visit by Carter, who thanked them for their sacrifice, the athletes were given a special medal that had been paid for by the USOC. Those medals were in 2007 given Congressional gold medal status by Congress, the highest civilian award in the US.

Moran said some years later, the 1984 Olympic Greco-Roman gold medalist Jeff Blatnick, who had been one of the 1980 team members, found himself on an internal flight in the US and sharing the first-class cabin with Carter.

Blatnick told him: "As soon as the plane gets up in the air and levels off, he [Carter] gets up and starts saying hi to everybody. I say to the person next to me, 'I wonder how this is going to be?' He gets to me, I go, 'President Carter, I have met you before, I am an Olympian.' He looks at me and says, 'Were you on the 1980 hockey team?' I say, 'No sir, I 'm a wrestler, on the summer team.' He said, 'Oh, that was a bad decision, I'm sorry.'"

There was some karma, albeit less significant, for the Olympians, however. It had been scheduled that Carter would run a leg of the torch relay ahead of the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta near his home town of Plains, Georgia.

But a group of 1980 US Olympians approached Carter representatives and advised that if he was to touch an Olympic torch or wear official clothing, or even take part in the run, they would have a 'major retaliatory response'.

Carter found something else to do on the day concerned.

His presidency may forever be stained by the Iranian storming of the US Embassy in Teheran and the subsequent
hostage crisis, but his treatment of Olympic athletes won't be far behind.

The 'Key' to superannuation

Superannuation - What is it about National Governments and their inability to make decisions in the interests of the country when it comes to the basic issue of superannuation?

Prime Minister John Key has painted himself into a corner over his claim that the age of eligibility for superannuation, 65 years, will not change on his watch.

It is patently obvious that superior lifestyle has resulted in people living longer. In many instances that means people are capable of working longer. Of course, there are exceptions and there are people to whom working beyond 60 years is an issue.

But, generally, New Zealanders can expect that the majority of the population will be capable of working longer in the future – in many cases they will have to because the drain of young people offshore looking for work, a drain that the said Mr Key was going to stop when he was campaigning against Helen Clark and Labour in 2008, has reached epidemic proportions

It remains a frustration for this observer that in the leadership debates of that campaign the incumbent Clark did not challenge Key when he was blathering on about stopping the brain drain. All she had to do to end the argument was ask where Key had earned the money that allowed him to have the lifestyle he enjoyed? It certainly wasn't from years spent working his way up from the back benches in New Zealand.

But then again the fight was no longer in Clark – she had had enough it would seem.

However, it seems that in sticking to his claim over the eligibility age that Key is determined to avoid the back flip that George Bush the first suffered over his pre-election campaigning on 'No More Taxes'. A promise that was very quickly undone once he replaced Ronald Reagan in the White House.

Back in New Zealand the age of eligibility has become an issue for which the public may well be prepared to punish the government, which is plugging austerity in all other areas of the economy.

Let's not forget that it was Robert Muldoon who showed a flagrant disregard for the future by throwing out the compulsory superannuation scheme set up by Roger Douglas in the Kirk-Rowling Government of 1972-75.

Dancing Cossacks flashed across television screens, catching the eye of those nearing their retirement sufficiently to put Muldoon in power with his promise that he would close the scheme down and install a scheme that would mean once reaching the age of 60 people would be able to receive National's superannuation, even if they were still working! Let's not forget that – they were still able to receive the payout if they were still working.

It is little wonder that generation were known as 'The Greedies'.

In making that choice Muldoon sent New Zealand into permanent debt. There are two thoughts here: how much of the country's financial frustrations of the moment are a direct result of that decision and, more importantly, how much better off might New Zealand be had he not made that choice?

Muldoon trumpeted that the New Zealand Superannuation Scheme was going to result in the nationalisation of New Zealand's industries. It was going to be communism by stealth. The Greedies were sucked in lock, stock and Think Big.

In fact, and to their shame the Labour Government of the day did not make this point sufficiently, it was enshrined in law that the NZ Super Scheme would not be allowed to invest any more than 15 percent in any New Zealand company. 15 percent!!

That figure is important because Key and his Cabinet are asking that the New Zealand Superannuation Fund set up by Labour's Michael Cullen should invest up to 40 percent in New Zealand companies.

What would Muldoon make of that? If what he canned in 1975 was communism by stealth what does 40 percent investment represent?

Just as Muldoon's failure hamstrung a generation, so Key's foot-dragging is likely to do for the generations who follow those who move into retirement over the next 20-odd years.

It is only commonsense that a phased rise in the eligibility age be introduced as soon as possible.

So poll-driven has the Government become that there is a chance that Key will see the error of his ways and make a decision forthwith.

His highly unpopular austerity measures continue in other aspects so it defies belief that the one popular measure he could implement, and with exceptions for those whose work might qualify for a maintaining of retirement at 65, could elude him.

Failure to act leaves him facing the same sort of legacy his predecessor Muldoon enjoys for his greed for power at any cost.