VANCOUVER — This Olympic flame — a mop of fiery gold ribbon attached to a used toilet plunger — arrived downtown to wild cheers from a sign-waving crowd packed into a local community center.
There were emotional speeches blasting Olympic organizers for the $6 billion cost to stage the games and the obligatory song, a biting parody of the Canadian national anthem.
Just two years removed from perhaps the most restrictive Olympics in Beijing, where some aspiring demonstrators were jailed for even applying for required protest permits and access to the websites of some civil liberties organizations were blocked, Vancouver is offering a starkly different approach to free expression.
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