An Inside View of the 1996 Olympics

by C. Richard Yarbrough

For more than three years while driving to work C. Richard Yarbrough, managing director of Communications for the Atlanta Committee for the Olympic Games, taped his thoughts on whatever current activity was taking place at the Atlanta Committee on the Olympic Games, and then, on the way home, he taped whatever had happened that day. The tapes included strategies on issues the ACOG was facing--the Centennial Park bombing, the gay rights battles in Cobb County, the state flag, the city of Atlanta, internal disputes, external problems, and the competing needs of local, state, federal, and international relations.

Yarbrough was responsible for governmental relations, both federal and state, and consequently had frequent personal contact with top members of the Clinton administration, including the president and vice-president, and with members of Congress. He became adept at dealing with congressional temper tantrums thrown by the likes of Newt Gingrich and John McCain. He had responsibility for worldwide media relations, press operations, and ancillary responsibility for security. As a senior staff member, he reported directly to Billy Payne, the ACOG’s CEO, and spent endless hours with him and other senior staff, dealing with a host of issues, complex and comical. And They Call Them Games: An Inside View of the 1996 Olympics is his story. It is a unique, no-punches-pulled, inside view of the Centennial Olympic Games in Atlanta, Georgia.

C. Richard Yarbrough served as managing director of Communications for the Atlanta Committee for the Olympic Games. He has had the singular honor of being the only non-attorney member of the State Ethics Commission, a post he has held for two four-year terms. Yarbrough also writes a syndicated column which appears in newspapers throughout Georgia.

Praise for And They Call Them Games

To many, including myself, the Olympic Games have become a huge sham
using gifted athletes to hide the corruption and moral indifference of
those who run them. And They Call Them Games by C. Richard Yarbrough is
a scathing record of the planning and celebration of the 1996 centennial
Olympic Games held in Atlanta. The games became famous for the bomb that
killed and injured visitors, and the fiasco behind the innocent man
accused of the crime.

Written by the chief public relations officer for the Atlanta Committee
for the Olympic Games is as unvarnished and honest as they come. It is
fascinating and chilling reading.

--Alan Caruba, Bookviews

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