PRETTY FACE, cute smile, angelic voice ... nine-year-old Lin Miaoke had everything it takes to win over the world for China when she sang solo in front of billions at the Beijing Olympics opening ceremony. Except, as we all now know, the angelic voice. That belonged to another girl - Yang Peiyi - who, it seems, was not deemed bonnie enough to be seen in public being, as she is, somewhat challenged in the dental department.

Beijing Games spokesman Sun Weide last week defended the decision to swap the plain child for the more photogenic one: "The artistic directors just picked the best voice and the best performer."

Games executive vice-president Wang Wei said this was done to achieve "the most theatrical effect".

Apparently the swap was decided on after a senior Communist official went along to a rehearsal.

To make a bad PR situation worse, the International Olympic Committee defended the recasting of the young singers. IOC Games executive director Gilbert Felli said: "That is a casting issue that we have in every performance."

He did concede, however, that organisers should have come clean in the first place. "It is clear for me that the right information has to be given to the people," said Felli. He did not make clear if the right information was always the truth, but let's not quibble.

Cue much gnashing of straight, gleaming, Western teeth and acres of column inches devoted to the lengths to which China will go to make the Games appear flawless. The word "appear" is key. Amid reports of fake fireworks, fake crowds, fake housing and fake climate control, the West has sat back and tut-tutted self-righteously at the sinister machinations of the manipulative motherland, the ode to which was so beautifully rendered by two young girls who were soon transformed into the most terrifying tools of propaganda.

But can I be so bold as to suggest that there are worse things attributable to China than a bit of lip-synching?

When was such entertainment ever real? Seven years in the planning and the eyes of billions trained on the spectacle, it's hardly an earth-shattering revelation that the Chinese authorities were willing to tweak things so as to pull off the perfect performance. It's all about saving face and hiding your shame, after all.

Meanwhile, those paragons of verity in the West should reflect a little on who the original kings of spin were and where they come from. Think fake teeth, fake boobs, fake names, fake tans. Was the world aghast when Linda Gray helped out Anne Bancroft in the leg department on the publicity poster for the 1967 film The Graduate? Was any part of Cher ever real? Then we got Tony Blair, who arrived at Number 10 to take up his job in May 1997 to the cheers of hundreds of flag-waving Labour activists bussed in for the occasion. His mate George W Bush always appears before crowds previously hand-picked.

Now China's playing catch-up. The official fans at the Olympic events have been trained in the art of cheerleading and only slim, attractive women get to present medals. It has yet to be confirmed that their legs are their own.

Of course, it's right to keep a critical eye on the Olympic hosts. But spare us the hypocrisy. It's enough to give anybody that synching feeling.