Needless to say, Iraq has had a tough time of late. The country is a mess politically, economically, culturally, etc., etc., etc. The list could literally go on forever. So naturally, one way the country might find some way to forget about these problems for a day or two would be to see their 7 Olympic athletes compete in the Olympics. And maybe, just maybe, watching these athletes represent Iraq at the Games might make some Iraqis realize that their is hope for their country.

But you can forget about that now. The International Olympic Committee, which I've railed against pretty much forever, decided today to ban Iraq from taking part at this summer's Beijing Games.

Their reason for doing this? The move stems from an Iraqi government decision in May to suspend Iraq's elected Olympic Committee and form a temporary committee to handle its duties. The Iraqi government thought the original committee had not been operating properly - it held meetings without quorums and had officials serving in one-year posts for more than five years - and as a result undermined the sporting movement in Iraq.

Nothing unreasonable there, except here's the problem. Under the IOC charter, all committees must be free of political influence. And since Iraq made an attempt to fix their Olympic committee through political appointment, they got banned.

You've got to be kidding me. So the IOC would have been all right with a totally corrupt Iraq Olympic Committee - which the original one was - because it was free of political influence?

What a travesty.

The IOC, which seems to continually operate in some kind of dream world, apparently forgets - or chooses to ignore - that no Olympic Committee is free of political influence. How do they think countries get the Olympics in the first place? Of course there's political posturing, political connections, and other poltical shenanigans involved in getting the Olympics to come to your town.

Chicago's been trying like hell to get the Olympics for 2016. You think Mayor Daley would like some friends in his corner on the US Olympic Committee vouching for Chicago to the IOC? I do. And I'm sure he does have a few people in that position, since Daley has political connections all over the US.

Does that count as political influence? You're damn right it does.

It's especially discouraging to see the IOC ban a country that was actually trying to do the right thing. That may be the biggest the slap in the face.

And while I feel bad for Iraq, I feel terrible for the 7 athletes - two rowers, two sprinters, one archer, one weightlifter and one judo competitor. They've been training for years in a war torn country where they've literally put their lives on the line to achieve the Olympic dream.

And now it's all gone.

If the IOC actually had any heart, they'd look past this ridiculous rule and let Iraq compete. But hey, the IOC has it's own politics to worry about. Like how much money can we screw the next city that wants to host the Olympics out of by having them build everything from scratch that'll never be used again.

Way to be IOC, way to be.