Citius Altius Fortius

Lee, Davey and Citizen-Seth are doing fine

Boa noite @DannyelBrazil I had some great times in Brazil - the Games, the city of Rio, visiting you any your wife and the fur kids! You and Pat are amazing people, who made me feel home in Sao Vicente! I am very fine, @yoshi- I live in Vienna now with a partner and a pug!

Well, I watched all Opening ceremonies from Sarajevo 1984 until yesterday - and I have to say I was kind of disappointed. The whole show made me very aware that these Games are not Olympics like we are used to know, but substitute Games... There were some nice ideas for the segments - like the pictograms segment, but like Olympic2004 has already said it - after the first five you got it and it became boring to watch the last 45 ones... The film crew was "nice" as well, but somehow it didn't fit in the flow of the show... There was just one segment which I really enjoyed: I liked it, how the logo was formed in the centre of the "crowd" of athletes. Naomi Osaka looked more like she just came from the dentist than that she was chosen to lit the Olympic Flame...

I esteem the Icelandic group as marketing stunt...

I agree with you - there is no "winner" right a way - it will become very intense - it can happen that we will see a surprise (that a song will win, which nobody has in mind to win) like in 2011. My two pennies about ESC 2019: My TOP FIVE: Italy Portugal Poland Russia Cyprus

Well, the EU is telling the U.K. for two years “no single market à la carte”, what is the result of “Chequers” a single market à la carte... Won’t take long that it will be denied by the EU...

That's an interesting read indeed... I wonder if the Tories split in several parties - Brexit is such a contrary issue that I doubt that a party can be home of Remainers and Brexiteers... There is a split running through the UK, which split neighbours, families, colleagues, etc. etc. - and even through the parts of the UK - I wouldn't be astonished if the UK will face a bad state crisis...

Well, I wonder which option May will choose and will have to enforce in "Chequers": - SM, CU and ECJ — no border for Northern Ireland - FTA on goods but not on services - Northern Ireland stays in the single-market and customs union — hard border in the Irish Sea - "No Deal" (Hard land border for Northern Ireland - break of GFA)

I am glad that the football World Cup comes back to North America, but I hope DT isn't reelected in 2020 - I would feel strange when a WC takes place when one host country built a wall to another host country to keep another hosting nation out of its territory...

Germany didn't play well at this World Cup - the Mannschaft didn't deserve to reach the last 16... Congratulations to México and SVERIGE One of my sweepstake reached the next ROUND - COME ONE SWEDEN!!!

Looking forward to learn where the matches are played...

Looking forward to my second team...

Ohh I got Peru

I am in also...

I had been in Lisbon for Eurovision and it was FAB - it was really an amazing event! I am looking forward to Israel next year!

I liked the Opening Ceremony, but it didn't give me shivers down my spine due excitement - there were some nice visual things, but e.g. the Samsung cell-phone segment was a kind of low-point for me... My highlights of the opening ceremony were the shirtless athlete from Tonga and the drone Olympic Rings...

The flag bearers of the opening ceremonies are known - you can find them on wikipedia and everywhere else, but I am interested in the flag bearers of the closing ceremonies as well. Does anybody have a source where you can find the flag bearers of the closing ceremony as well? Of course I am most interested in the flag bearers of Germany, Federal Republic of Germany, GDR, Saarland and Unified German Team most. Here are the German flag bearers of the closing ceremony, which I found: 2016 - Sebastian Brendel 2014 - Felix Loch 2012 - Kristof Wilke 2010 - Magdalena Neuner 2008 - Katrin Wagner-Augustin 2006 - Claudia Pechstein 2004 - Kathrin Boron 2002 - Georg Hackl 2000 - Heike Drechsler 1998 - Gunda Niemann 1996 - Birgit Fischer 1994 - Claudia Pechstein 1992 (W) - Antje Misersky I miss all flag bearers from 1908-1992 (summer)... Who is able to help?

What do you think how a Norwegian or a Swiss would react when they read that? I believe that it doesn't be restricted on the EU only - the UK placed itself into a corner in Europe -and in the world...

I recommend to read this article - that is exactly what I meant with UK being a third country for the EU - the EU will treat the UK like any other third country. The UK-government will have to choose among the offers by the EU. It will become interesting to see how the UK is able to stick to the "Good Friday Agreement"... POLITICO - EU to UK: You're not special

I agree on that, but I fear that a trade deal won't be able before March 2019 - it will take many years - the hard Breiteres haven't realised yet that they have illusions...

I am just in a hurry - therefore a very short remark... In Germany we have a combination of both systems (FPTP and PR) - its called MMP - we have two votes at general elections: the first vote is according FPTP and the second vote is according PR. The second vote is the more important one since it decides the balance in the parliament and allows that all votes are represented in parliament (except the votes for parties with lower than 5% of all votes).

It would be great if you can create such relationship, but that means that both sides have to make concessions, which is very unlikely since the Brexiteers have already made clear in the Brexit referendum campaign that they want to have the cake and eat it. A majority voted in the referendum that they want to leave the EU - at the moment is a "war" in the UK, what that really means - they can stay in the single market and in the custom union, but has to obey its rules (what they don't want). They don't want to be like Norway, since Norway obeys the rules also (and it is furthermore unlikely that Norway accepts UK in the EFTA). The EU just says we don't want to speak about the future until the divorce isn't handled which is very normal - you can built up a future, when the past isn't settled... You mentioned Ireland and the UK - it is tragic for the people on the island Ireland, but I think also that the people in England and Wales didn't think a minute about what the result of a "leave" vote will mean for Ireland and the UK.

For me is it a contradiction to say on one hand that there is a democratic deficit in the EU and on the other hand to say we don't want greater democracy at the EU level? You can't call it deficit when you don't want to change that... I read a lot of discussions about Brexit related issues on the comment pages of British newspaper in this last year and I got the impression that we use the same word "democracy", but mean something different: e.g. FTPT is in my point of view not really democratic, since the MPs require different number of votes to get into parliament, which means that votes of the people have a different value in the different constituencies... It showed me that you have to go more into the details when you are talking about democracy...

... “fair” is very subjective - how does the UK wanted to be treated? I ask that question since UK can call the "eat the cake and have it" approach as "fair" - which isn't fair at all in my pov. When we talk about fairness we have to talk about that fairness works only when it works both ways... The UK shouldn’t believe that the Europeans didn’t recognise that they were blamed for every little problem in the UK (and I mean the citizens of the EU living in the UK - we don't blame the UK-citizens, who live here (or we don't call them immigrants) for every problem in our countries) or that the EU-institutions were linked with totalitarianism, which is just nonsense... (the EU structures didn't fall from the heaven - the UK had every opportunity to veto it - but didn’t do it - the same is valid for every EU-rule). Norway didn’t enter the EU due a referendum - in the meantime Norway and the EU found an agreement (to which the UK agreed also). That might happen with the UK and EU as well, but the EU will treat the UK like Norway - it has to be fair... The Norwegian seem to be happy with the agreement - why should the EU differ between the UK and Norway? It was clear before the referendum in June 2016 that the EU will treat a third country like any other third country - why should the UK be treated differently? In my point of view the UK decided in an advisory referendum to leave the political and economical structures of Europe - the previous parliament said it will take it as mandatory - it must had been clear for everybody in the UK that this will have a huge impact on everybody’s life in the UK.

I wonder what the EU should do that this feeling isn't building up in the UK? The UK voted to become a third country for the EU - this will have consequences - the EU is 'just' the bearer of bad news and therefore much easier to blame than to look onto the source.