Chicago eliminated in first round of voting for 2016 Olympics

Being reported by multiple websites.

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Besides Oprah and Mayor Daley, I don't know one person in Chicago who thought getting the games would have been a good idea.

As I read more about it, it seems that the first round of voting is very risky. For some reason, reps tend to vote for their own continent, regardless of whom they ultimately intend to vote for.

At the end of the day, it seems like many Chicagoans were against this, and the protests certainly didn't help them any.

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Rio has a lot of sentiment because the Olympics have never been held in South America.

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I'm very surprised it was eliminated in the first round.

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“Some of what the I.O.C. considers has nothing to do with the strength of the bids themselves,” said Frank Lavin, the former U.S. ambassador to Singapore, who worked on New York City’s failed bid to host the 2012 Games.

“A lot of it is political and that encompasses different levels: international politics, personalities, internal I.O.C. politics,” he said.


Ya think?


Chicago loses bid - NY Times

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Ouch! I know many didn't want it, but it would have been great for Chicago/America. Plus not so bad for the Democratic Party, it would have been in (hopefully) Obama's second term right before the DNC. Oh, well.
Glad Rio did win, if not Chicago.

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It's disgusting the way the GOP is cheering for this as a "Defeat for Obama, Victory for the GOP."

But why the hell did he have to go to Copenhagen?

If he doesn't have time to fight to overturn DOMA and DADT, where the hell did he find time to to go to Copenhagen to lobby for Chicago!

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Isn't it sad that the United States is still paying for the asinine policies of the Bush Administration?

Rumor has it that the travel visa situation, had much more impact on decision making than anything Obama could or could not do.

It is also see that Obama did not abandon his hometown. The double standards of the GOP, who apparently hate anything related to Obama, regardless of whether it would help this country, is pretty astounding.

If he had not gone, and they had failed, the GOP would have blamed him as well. So, Roxy, sorry. Other heads of state went to lobby for the games. I am glad he tried to get billions of dollars of investments for one of our major cities.

PJ - I hear that it is in motion (at least for DADT).

It really would be interesting to see how Obama would have handled a US similar to the one Bush inherited. Oh, and he has kept us safe longer than Bush had. Just for the record.

I have to disagree, Boy from Ohio, that the Olympics would have been great for Chicago. There's no indication that this city would handle bringing that in any way that was more ethical or productive than they usually are. And no matter WHAT anyone says, it would wind up having the taxpayers pay the brunt of it, not to mention the destruction of parks and neighborhoods, mostly on the (disenfranchised) South Side.