[Paleoguy]

One set of facilities should be built somewhere and used every four years. It is absurd that the olympics moves around constantly and requires this sort of expenditure.

[fourdeuce82d]

Given the antipathy toward this country from many greeks, and their support of lefty terrorists...I'm hoping for a nice big bowl of schadenfreude to come my way.

[cyborg]

I imagine that digging in Greece is turning up interesting artifacts. I wonder if that's another reason it's taking so long.

[BlazingArizona]

One of the odder sights of a viist to Athens is, on the freeway from the new airport to downtown, seeing exits for Sparta and Marathon.

[BlazingArizona]

One of the odder sights of a viist to Athens is, on the freeway from the new airport to downtown, seeing exits for Sparta and Marathon.

[JeeperFreeper]

You can just imagine what security is going to be like.

[GnuHere]

Purely anecdotal, but I was on a trip down under in 2002 and our tour guide, who spoke several languages, had previously worked as a translator at the Sydney Olympics and for the Brazilian soccer team at numerous world events. He was extremely pessimistic about the Greeks being able to pull this off, citing mainly the rampant corruption in the construction field and politics also, with bribes being the currency of choice.

Since then, it has been interesting to follow the progress, or lack thereof, to see if his dire predictions come true.

[nypokerface]

They had all this time and only have it half completed. There is no way they will get this done in time. The IOC better start looking at another location and fast.

[Servant of the 9]

In ancient times there were games every year. The olympic games, pythian games and the others were each held every 4 years.

We should inaugurate the Hegemonic Games two years out of sync with the Olympics at a permanent site. It would have to be at the edge of the Rockies to provide for winter sports, kayacking and so forth. There should be a permanent participants village and training facilities.

So9

[Paleo Conservative]

"Everybody knows that the Olympic stadium stands in an earthquake-prone zone," said Ms Kanelli. "Here we are talking about building a glass roof in that zone to protect people from the sun. Any tourist knows that with the summer temperatures in Athens that's an absolutely ridiculous idea."

Excellent terrorist magnet too.

[Rodney King]

Good. I think the Olympics are stupid anyway. Who cares? I sure don't.

[Captain Peter Blood]

This what happens when you have corrupt Socialists & Communists running the government. I read and article about a year ago that forcast the facilities would not be built on time and I thought then that would be the case.
Not enough security and too many greedy people trying to get a cut of the pie.
One of the main reasons I read was the labor force and difficulties getting enough workers, etc..
This is going to be one big screw up and there is going to be a lot of egg on the faces of Olympic officials.
I think possibly the Olympics are outmoded and too big to handle anymore. Well I guess we will see this summer.

[Cboldt]

Somebody is entitled to a big "told you so" on this one.

[chickenlips]

Bummer. I worked there for a short while and meet my wonderful wife there. Love the food, the culture and the scenery. The people treated us foreigners better than they treated each other, too. It will be a shame if they embarrass themselves with this.

But, having lived there a while I can see how it could happen. They are definitely caught between eastern and western thinking.

[dagnabbit]

Coming soon:

My Big Fat F***ed-up Olympics

[eleni121]

My contacts there tell me that there are thousands of workers being imported to work on the construction projects for the Olympics. Main problem: historical artifacts found literally daily and work must stop in order to determine whether the site can be developed. Second terrible planning. But, the Greeks will get this thing done although the Socialists need to go.

[Jhensy]

I used to love the Olympics, until it was utterly destroyed by the networks.

We'll see hours of Katie and Matt, be force-fed taped profiles of American athletes endlessly, endure MTV-like X-Games/hip-hop/musical/graphic montages, and sit through HOUR AFTER HOUR OF COMMERCIALS...

Just to see taped highlights of two participants in any given event -- the American, and the eventual winner from some other country.

Just SHUT UP AND SHOW THE EVENTS, AND I'LL WATCH!!!