Much fuss has been made about the extreme lengths China is going to manage the Olympic games. The lip-synching little girl, the fake firework footprints in the sky, the mild roughing up of an ITN reporter... hardly the stuff of scandal and probably not even infeasible at London 2012.
The real atrocity of these Games thus far has been China's blatant abuse of the deal cut with the IOC regarding authorised protests. Under pressure from the Olymic Committee and following much diplomatic negotiation, China set aside several zones in Beijing for 'legal' demonstrations.
Authorities have since then systematically and pre-emptively arrested anyone actually applying for a permit to protest there. In effect the IOC has set up a very useful trap to eliminate reformers. This makes a mockery of the agreement and is an embarrassment for the IOC, which continues to toe the line that everything is just rosy.
This article in yesterday's FT puts it well. The IOC really makes a strong case for being the world's most unreformed, undemocratic and unethical organisation. Decades of well-known corrupt practices (remember the systematic bribery for Salt Lake City?), plus this year's debacle of the poor Iraqi Olympic team, most of whom were callously barred from Beijing because of the 'political influence' on Iraq's Olympic Committee (which didn't seem to matter when Saddam's brutal son Uday Hussein was running it).
There is little hope of respite for China's arrested protesters, although some diplomatic pressure would help. The IOC should be ashamed.

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