The Tribune

By Charlie Harper 

America woke up yesterday morning with a couple of new things to contemplate and, perhaps, to celebrate. Paris and Philadelphia were the settings.

In Paris, the US Olympic team was extending its overall lead in medals won and records set, holding off challenges from China, France and Australia in various competitions to continue what seems like an inevitable march toward supremacy in these games.

In a competition always marked by stupendous feats by athletes who have been training for decades to compete in a matter of minutes or even seconds, American gymnast Simone Biles and swimmer Katie Ledecky reaffirmed their true greatness.

Biles, whose stunningly infectious smile lights up a gymnasium or a television screen with equal brilliance, reasserted her dominance in a sport where calamitous, crippling, even fatal injuries seem to lurk at every twist and turn of floor and aerial exercises that always astound spectators and viewers.

And Ledecky, motorboating her way to new triumphs in the pool, clearly has the natural talent and resolute determination to continue to be the dominant force in swimming events that have sustained America’s Olympic success for many decades.

The host French team is making its nation proud. And there are many other individual stories that fascinate even the casual sports fan. The Olympic Games is the sum of so many compelling, fascinating stories of young men and women from all over the world.

Television coverage of the Games has long focused on these “human interest” accounts of participants’ dedication and determination in overcoming many obstacles, all while they as teenagers and young adults suddenly dominate our TV screens.

Their grace and achievements are always inspiring.

But even as Olympians hardly old enough to vote were winning and losing with grace and dignity, a group of older Americans were reminding us of what athletic achievement can also mean.

The 2024 US men’s Olympic basketball team was neither assembled nor as celebrated as was the famous 1992 “Dream Team” that featured the following list of legends: Charles Barkley; Larry Bird; Clyde Drexler; Patrick Ewing; Magic Johnson; Michael Jordan; Christian Laettner; Karl Malone; Chris Mullin; Scottie Pippen; David Robinson, and John Stockton.

Pause for a second and look over this roster again. If you have followed basketball or studied the history of the game, that list speaks for itself. It is simply peerless.

That 1992 United States men’s Olympic basketball team was the first American Olympic team to feature active professional players from the NBA. The team has often been described as the greatest sports team ever assembled.

That team was collectively inducted into the US Olympic Hall of Fame in 2009; the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 2010, and the Hall of Fame of the International Basketball Federation in 2017. The Naismith Hall of Fame called the team “the greatest collection of basketball talent on the planet.” In addition to the team recognition, 11 of the 12 players and three of the coaches have also been inducted individually into the Naismith Hall of Fame.

The 2024 US Olympic basketball team has advanced with ease to this afternoon’s semifinal match against Serbia and three-time NBA MVP Nicola Jokic, winning its first four matches by an average of 25 points. They should claim the Americans’ fifth straight gold medal this weekend, likely over a strong German team.

This US team of today is led by three current stars whose addition to the 1992 roster might fill out the list of all-time hoops stars for many fans.

39-year-old LeBron James leads the way. He is joined by Kevin Durant and Steph Curry. But while the Dream Team was really a collection of perennial all-stars, this squad has been perhaps more thoughtfully assembled.

It includes complementary players who may not be the most celebrated current stars, but whose presence adds defense, rebounding or other components vital to basketball success.

Also, truly great contemporary NBA stars like two-time league MVP Giannis Antetokounmpo of Greece aren’t Americans. If he were from the US, Giannis would certainly have been added to the American roster. Same for Jokic and others. Lots of legitimate hoops superstars now hail from outside the US.

Some are from The Bahamas. You know who they are.

When all is said and done and the Olympic gold medal is awarded this year, people may say that this American men’s basketball team is a better “team” than their 1992 forebears.

Focus on Philadelphia

In Philadelphia, meanwhile, America’s other great competitive sport of politics got a needed jolt of adrenaline from a relatively unlikely source: The endless fields of southwestern Minnesota.

A burly, bespectacled, uncelebrated, balding, largely unknown white man who is the current governor of Minnesota was introduced to the nation at a raucous rally held on the Temple University campus in Philadelphia’s inner city.

Most Americans had never heard of Tim Walz less than a month ago. He certainly doesn’t have movie star looks. But if you live in the American Midwest that begins just west of Cleveland and stretches all the way to the abundant plains of eastern Colorado over 1,250 miles away to the west, Walz looks, talks and feels like the guy you see in the diner or the feed store down the street.

Walz doesn’t look much like a fighter. But that’s who he will be over the next 90 days of the American presidential election campaign.

Following up on his characterization of Trump and Vance as simply “weird” that put him in the national spotlight recently, Walz came out swinging in Philadelphia on Tuesday evening. Describing himself as an “aw, shucks” Midwestern hunter and former schoolteacher, Walz took aim at the elitism of Trump and Vance.

As a longtime Minnesota National Guard enlisted man, Walz hinted at future attacks on noted military draft dodger Trump. He also mocked Vance’s highly privileged recent life experiences in Silicon Valley and as a literary darling who betrayed his own humble origins.

It isn’t necessarily clear that such attacks will score points with voters. In 2004, legitimate Vietnam war hero John Kerry thought his military service would be a campaign benefit while opponent George W Bush ducked Vietnam danger with a relatively cushy Texas Air National Guard rotation. But by the time the Republicans were done with him, Kerry had become someone who faked his own achievements.

So while Walz’ lengthy military service, including an overseas assignment, might seem like a plus to presidential candidate Kamala Harris, the GOP might find a way to turn honor into dishonor. They have done it before.

In the generally glowing liberal aftermath of the Walz announcement, the New York Times wrote that “Tim Walz is going to bring big Midwestern dad energy to the presidential campaign. Harris picked him to run as her vice president for one reason above all others: His biography and his demeanor make him a familiar figure for voters who might not be attracted to a Black and South Asian woman from California.”

According to numerous other reports, there was another key factor in Harris’ crucial decision. In interviews with her, Walz reportedly adopted a thoroughly supportive attitude. “I will do whatever you need me to do,” he reportedly promised.

While others like Pennsylvania governor Josh Shapiro angled for what issues they might be given to run with and gain individual prominence, Walz painted a self-portrait of support and, essentially, obedience to Harris’ wishes and policy direction.

Walz is widely described as a former small-town high school football coach and social science teacher who hunts and fishes. He often wears a camouflage hat while campaigning and speaks with an accent peculiar to the Upper Midwest and easily recognizable as such.

“He brings with him a vast understanding of the Midwest,” Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota told a reporter this week. “This will be a vice president who has stood in deer stands in the middle of 10-degree weather and has fished across Minnesota’s 10,000 lakes.”

Kerry’s disastrous defeat to Bush 20 years ago is unfortunately hardly the only example of Democrats’ inability to separate their own predilections from those of a majority of American voters. Harris will expect Midwesterner Walz to deliver at least Michigan and Wisconsin. Maybe he will. But it’s at least as likely that if she is to win these critical states plus Pennsylvania, she’ll have to do it herself.