Posted on 10/03/2009 1:30:11 PM PDT by xtinct
For weeks, the United States Olympic Committee and the national sports governing bodies it oversees had settled into an uncomfortable truce. Despite a year of upheaval and conflict, the parties had agreed to set aside their differences in solidarity for Chicago’s bid to win the 2016 Summer Games.
The truce ended as quickly as Chicago was dispatched from the race won by Rio de Janeiro. In surprisingly frank terms, a number of influential people in American Olympic sports questioned the performance of the U.S.O.C.’s new management team and said its two top executives were ill-equipped to navigate the insular world of international sports.
Chicago’s last-place finish in the I.O.C. voting on Friday in Copenhagen was the latest blow in a year marked by the departure of major sponsors, layoffs at U.S.O.C. headquarters, controversy over the salary of the acting chief executive, and the failed plan for an Olympic television network.
“Before we think about putting forth another Olympic city for a Games possibility, we’ve got to deal with some outstanding issues that are not going to go away,” said Mike Plant, who serves on the U.S.O.C.’s 10-member board and traveled to Copenhagen as part of the Chicago delegation. “I think that certainly there will be some dialogue that’s going to take place in the next couple of weeks — or certainly in short order.”
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
You’re welcome. Thank you for your service,
they’ll blame MS PowerPoint if they have to.
A - The First Lady:
1. Unhidden cost of her US aircraft to and from Copenhagen?
2. Cost and detailed list of accompanying staff currently on the US payroll?
3. Cost of accompanying staffs' accommodations, food, refreshments, local travel (taxi), Official Transportation, etc. for First Lady's party?
4. Any additional aircraft for First Lady's party, for folks like family, press, dog, Secret Service?
5. Amount Opra is reimbursing the USA for her envolvement and that of her staff for #1 - #4, above?
6. Amount the Chicago Olympic Committee is reimbursing the USA for the First Lady's envolvement and that of her staff for #1 - #4, above?
B - POTUS
1. True and total unhidden cost of Air Force One for the trip to and from Copenhagen?
2. Cost and detailed list of accompanying staff currently on the US payroll?
3. Cost of accompanying staffs' accommodations, food, refreshments, local travel (taxi), Official Transportation, etc. for the POTUS's party?
4. Any additional aircraft for POTUS's party, for folks like family, press, dog, Secret Service?
5. Cost US picking for accompanying Press Corps, including travel, accomodations, food, refreshments, etc.?
6. Cost of flying the POTUS "big black car" and the accompanying Secret Service vehicles, drivers, fuel, staff accomodations, food and refreshments?
7. Amount the Chicago Olympic Committee is reimbursing the USA for the POUS's envolvement and that of his staff for #1 - #6, above?
C - Total net expense for "A" & "B" to the USA Tax Payers?
All I ask for a a true and honest (if that is not redundant!) of this "excercise" to the American Public. I'd be interested to also know who has personal vested interests in the possible favorable outcome for this adventure, specifically relating to the possible sale of real estate and other servicees should the Chicago Olympic Committee - 2016 be successful.
That's all I ask. Starting to think of the length of time a snow flake or many snow flakes can survive in Hell while I await the answer to the forgoing questions.
When will someone in the "main stream" news business address any of these questions and share the results with us.
Chicago was dispatched from the race won by Rio de Janeiro.The local garbage wrapper attributed this to (not in so many words) anti-American attitudes on the International Olympics committee. The fact is, there are those who hate the United States here and there, but the real reason for the decision is that there has never been a summer Olympics in South America. Not sure about winter Olympics, but I'm doubtin' it.
If only the IOC wasn’t racist, Chicago would’ve had the games.//sarc off
It's called "taking the bull by the horns"!
We are the government after all, aren't we as the people? /s
from 2005
http://www.letterfromthecapitol.com/letterfromthecapitol/2005/04/world_murder_ca.html
World Murder Capital?
Rio de Janeiro’s name means River of January, and the city is known to its cariocas as “Marvelous City.” But a Washington Times piece today makes clear that Murderous City is a more appropriate title. A staggering 80 to 95 people a day are killed in Rio, mostly by drug gang shootouts in the favela slums that ring the city. This translates in round figures to 29,000 to 35,000 annually. Rio is a city of 10 million, roughly 25% more than inhabit New York City. Thus for NYC a comparable murder toll range would be 23,000 to 28,000; the 2004 NYC figure was under 600. Put another way, Rio has some 40 to 50 times NYC’s per capita murder rate, with a 300 to 350 murders per 100,000 rate. (The per capita number of 55 per 100,000 given in the WT article for Rio is clearly wrong—someone misplaced a decimal point.) One final frame of reference: With a US population of about 300 million, 30 times Rio’s total, multiply the annual Rio murder range by 30 to get an equivalent murder total for the US: the range would be, in round figures, 850,000 to 1.1 million!!!! See a problem here?
It's obvious, Karto. The USOC headquarters are in Colorado Springs, you know. Home of Focus on the Family, you know, and only gave Obama 39%, you know.
But I thought it was all Bush’s fault? This story flies in the face of that early claim.
By comparison to the ostammers, the Clintons were a class act, and that’s a hilarious notion!
I keep wondering why SO many black Americans are intent on being the center of attention and bringing so much focus to themselves. You see it in stores, schools, movie theaters, work, sports games, everywhere - black Americans doing whatever it takes to always make a spectacle of themselves in some way. Not all of them do this, by any means, but a very sizable and noticeable number - far more than whites who outnumber them in the population about 6:1.
Ostentatious displays of wealth and power are SO tasteless.
Ostammer and Her Neandethalness remind me more and more of the Beverly Hillbillies - or maybe George Jefferson, lol.
Obama only has one definite path now, full steam ahead with more leftism. He sees how well it's working for the MSM. /sarcasm
This is the first rock solid proof that not only doesn't Obama have a clue, he can't even buy one.
In a nutshell (and buried in the last paragraph) ...
DeFrantz said criticism of the U.S.O.C. missed the larger point: that Rio de Janeiro was destined to win. “It was all about going to a different part of the world,” she said.
Exactly. If the NYT knew this, the white house should have known it also. Likewise Obama knew, or should have known, the political landscape of the IOC and the gamble he was taking. Yet after losing the bid Gibbs said, "I don't understand IOC politics." Axelrod told CNN, "I think that there are politics everywhere, and there are politics inside that room."
Getting the Olympic bid required what Obama is best at: politics and campaigning. During the campaign last fall Obama didn't make errors in political judgment like this. Now, everyone should be questioning his judgment in pursuing, not only the Olympics, but his hell bent dash for socialized medicine. Can Obama and his advisers not see the peril in ignoring the political landscape--56% disapproval of health care reform--while holding to the belief that Obama's (supposed) ability to win people over will make everything OK?
And another thing. If the US had been the bad actor on the world stage for all of Michelle's life (until a year ago), how did we manage to win Olympic bids for Lake Placid in 1980, LA in 1984, Atlanta in 1996, and Salt Lake City in 2002? Replacing an imagined national arrogance with the certain personal arrogance of the Obama's is a sure loser. The rest of the world sees it and so should all Americans.
Welcome to Obama's Amerika.
Ping. That must be it. The World’s President is finding out the world can be a cruel place. What did The Dear Leader think, I wonder? That he and “we’ll take no prisoners Michelle” would by their mere presense make it a fait accompli for a Chicago Olympics?
There is no way the Europeans would support a US Olympics this year. Their too busy trying to create the “One Europe” thing. Anyway, from what I’ve read about how the IOC selects Olympic cities, that decision had already been made before the Copenhagen meeting. Onada and his crowd were shown up to be the ideological amateurs they are.
Good post, vamoose. Not to mention making the final four for 2016 on GWB's watch, in 2008.
Sounds like the 0 team got took, too, by the Chicago bid squad. The locals told 0 (and the media) that they were front-runners; 0 team apparently didn't do much if any verification, and blindly walked into 4th place.
Or why Obama thought the Olympic committee was interested in why he chose to live in Chicago, or that Chicago was excited to sit and watch Obama win the Presidency.
In his entire speech, he spent one sentence mentioning Chicago’s success in international events, and one of them was the worlds fair that was, like, a generation ago.
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