If Whistler qualifies, this could be a tale of two cities. In Vancouver, at least, it looks as if people will be able to say, of the Winter Olympics, that it was the best of times, it was the worst of times.

And how the 16,500 police, armed forces and private security mercenaries -- with another 750 on standby in case swine flu decimates the ranks ---will police this extravaganza will do much to determine the balance.

God bless the athletes, and their coaches and trainers, their doctors and physiotherapists, their families and friends who have helped bring them to this crowning experience. But they've become little more than an excuse for the wider Olympian orgy that's coming.

The best of times, certainly, will be had by the political and corporate swells who'll be allowed into the restaurants and bars that are being taken over as private "hospitality venues" by national and state governments. Here they'll gorge themselves on ethnic dishes -- of which ground- up snouts and sphincters will be the wurst -- and sing patriotic drinking songs.

They might glance occasionally at the skaters and skiers on the giant TV screens provided, or they might not. Some of these swells who have "won" tickets to the events may even show up at the venues.

Other folks, though, don't expect to have a good time. And some are vowing to spoil it for those who do.

It's a bit strange that a manual designed originally for people demonstrating against the Vietnam War in 1968 has been updated as a guide for those who want to vent their spleen against the Games today.

People 40 years ago were protesting war and the waste of human life. Today, many are upset with the social distortion and fiscal profligacy that the coming Games are causing. Some Vancouver motorists seem to be objecting simply to the added inconvenience they'll face.

Still, our right to non-violent civil disobedience is a constitutional one and, as the author of the guide for anti-Olympic protesters, Vancouver lawyer Leo McGrady, has put it, we're seeing "the suspension of Charter rights for what is essentially a sporting event."

Vancouver has contracted to enforce an International Olympic Committee rule prohibiting any demonstration or "political, religious or racial propaganda ... in any Olympic sites, venues or other areas." McGrady says this is designed to prevent any demonstration visible to Olympic spectators or TV cameras.

And a combination of city bylaws impose what he says is "a very powerful ban on all traditional protest activities" -- signs, leaflets, congregations, chanting, megaphone use "or otherwise making loud noises" -- in 40 square blocks of downtown.

This week, with some 80 days before the Olympic machinery is put into gear, Vancouver councillors have scrapped one of those bylaws that human rights activists feared would send police on a rampage, destroying signs, tearing up banners and ripping off T-shirts offensive to the Olympics.

They've proposed a new bylaw applying only to commercial signs -- those deemed offensive to official sponsors, no doubt -- but that has yet to be drafted.

The guide warns bluntly that protesters committing an illegal act should expect to be arrested. It anticipates they are likely to encounter pepper spray, tear gas, Tasers and undercover cops or private security agents in masks egging them on as agents provocateurs.

It reports that the RCMP assistant commissioner in charge of security, Bud Mercer, "appeared to characterize all demonstrators as engaging in 'criminal protests' around the Olympics" when he appeared before Vancouver city council in July.

And watching how Mercer's troops comport themselves will be teams of busybodies in orange T-shirts with notebooks, cameras and tape machines, who have been taught in training camps to spot and record police abuses for legal action when all this is over.

We know that B.C.'s Office of the Police Complaints Commissioner can't investigate allegations of Mountie abuses. What about those against any of the municipal police seconded to the Games from other provinces? What if the soldiers or the private mercenaries run amok?

It's no fun cleaning up after a party. Especially after fisticuffs.