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US newspapers offered various takes Saturday on Chicago's spectacular Olympic flameout, but when it came to President Barack Obama's last-minute lobbying bid, the message was loud and clear: What was he thinking? Obama joined his wife Michelle in Copenhagen Thursday just hours before the International Olympic Committee voted out Chicago in the first round, eventually awarding the Games to Rio de Janeiro in a landslide. The White House was quick to downplay suggestions that the snub was a repudiation of Obama himself, and insisted the presidential dash to the Danish capital was "absolutely" the right decision, despite a host of...

An anonymous reader writes "Yesterday, Chicago lost its bid for the 2016 Olympics (which went to Rio de Janiero instead), and it's looking very likely that US border procedures were one of the main factors which knocked Chicago out of the race: 'Among the toughest questions posed to the Chicago bid team this week in Copenhagen was one that raised the issue of what kind of welcome foreigners would get from airport officials when they arrived in this country to attend the Games. Syed Shahid Ali, an I.O.C. member from Pakistan, in the question-and-answer session following Chicago's official presentation, pointed...

Jennifer Rubin - 10.02.2009 - 12:04 PM Obama received a nasty rebuff and a stern reminder that the rest of the world doesn’t necessarily care what he thinks. Chicago is out of the Olympics bidding process–in the first round. Why did Obama invest so much personal capital and time for this?

Barack "Hessayin" Obama lied repeatedly throughout the campaign and has not stopped as president. And now, even Michelle "Never Been Proud of My Country" Obama is joining him at the liar's rostrum. Our favorite watchdog Michelle Malkin caught this little lie in The First Lady's Olympics pleading. Some of my best memories are sitting on my dad’s lap, cheering on Olga and Nadia, Carl Lewis, and others for their brilliance and perfection. LIAR! If Michelle Obama was sitting on her father's lap watching Carl Lewis perform in the Olympics she would have been a grown woman because Lewis was first...

Before first lady Michelle Obama set off for this Danish capital to lead the charge for Chicago's valiant -- but ultimately unsuccessful -- bid for the 2016 Olympics, she joked that the last-minute lobbying effort would be "a battle." "We're going to win," Obama said. "Take no prisoners." At a G-20 dinner in Pittsburgh, she teased Brazil's first lady, Marisa Leticia da Silva, that when the time came for the last-ditch arguments for the Olympic and Paralympic Games coming to Chicago -- over competitors Rio de Janeiro, Tokyo and Madrid -- the "gloves are off." Back in September, that all...

It's hard out there for a first lady of the United States. Take it from travel-weary Michelle Obama. On Tuesday night, she boarded a luxury 757 for Copenhagen. Think of the stairs she had to climb. Oh, the agony of the feet! Upon arrival, Mrs. O, her "chit-chat buddy," Chicago-based talk-show queen Oprah Winfrey, and Chicago powerbroker/interest-conflicted real estate mogul/senior White House adviser Valerie Jarrett immediately embarked on a grueling, grip-and-grin campaign to secure the Olympics for their hometown. Our smile muscles ache in sympathy. You will be comforted to know that the gracious FLOTUS feels your pain for her...

A stunned media was left speechless when President Barack Obama’s personal sales pitch on behalf of Chicago’s bid to host the 2016 Summer Games failed to sway the International Olympic Committee (IOC). Of the four contending bids, Chicago’s was the first to be rejected—giving it a last place finish in the event. MSNBC’s Ed Schultz called the outcome “fishy.” “When the most persuasive man on the planet can’t sell a bunch of Eurostiffs on the benefits of a great city like Chicago, something ugly and obscene is going on,” Schultz opined. “One can only wonder if the racism fomented by...

This just doesn't get old. If you heard the CNN news anchor in shock, this is just more icing in the cake. VIDEO HERE At first, the audience is too stupid and too quick to hear what the European Olympic guy with the accent is saying. They here 'Chicago' and they start cheering and going: "Weeee Ohhhhh!" Then someone with a clue elbows the collective audience, and they realize they lost. Then, it gets even better. They blame Bush, the Iraq War, and anyone else for the US being "unpopular" in the world, and keep wondering out loud why Obama...

October 02 A PR Nightmare for the Obamas [Victor Davis Hanson] One can understand an American president’s lobbying for an American city to obtain the Olympics, but the blitz by the Obamas proved a PR nightmare. Let us count the ways: 1) Obama’s brand is trans-nationalism and an “America is not exceptional” multiculturalism. According to his worldview, it makes sense that a South American country — especially a powerful, ascendant country such as Brazil — should at last have its turn at hosting the Olympics. It did not seem consistent that a politician who had reached out to the Castros,...

What vexes me is CNN's constant drumbeat of reports on Chicago crime - and specifically two teen murders - in the very week before the vote and leading right up to the day of the IOC vote. It seemed like CNN was trying to influence the vote to me, even mentioning the Olympics in their segments on the Chicago crime problem. Moreover, CNN failed to mention the crime issue in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Rio has a huge drug and crime problem called "critical" and puts it in direct competition if not worse than Chicago. With all this why no...

WE'RE N0. 4! As I stood with the shell-shocked citizens in Daley Center Plaza before noon Friday, the sickly orange fountain bubbling like toxic waste before us on this gray, miserable day, I halfway expected that cheer to break out.

President Obama says he's glad he went to Copenhagen to make a bid for the Olympics, but conservatives say the high-profile failure has exposed the limits of Obama's popularity abroad, Politico reports. Some conservatives are even celebrating Chicago's loss. Below, Richard Wolffe on what went wrong.

Here is video from yesterday of a hilarious Glenn Beck segment in which he mocks and destroys the Obamas' effort to bring the Olympics to Chicago. We know now it failed, but Beck's humor about Michelle Obama's "sacrifice" in going to Copenhagen, and his description of what it would have brought to Chicago had they gotten the Olympics, is just priceless! NOTE: As ridiculous as the Obamas have looked to us in trying to get the Olympic Games to Chicago, I'm sure they looked equally ridiculous to the committee that made the decision.

The selection of Rio de Janeiro over Chicago for the 2016 Olympics was an embarrassment for President Barack Obama, whose appearance before the International Olympic Committee was the first by a U.S. president. The widespread perception was that he wouldn't have decided to go unless Chicago was virtually assured of a win. Some critics pointed fingers at Chicago Mayor Richard Daley for failing to accurately tally Chicago's support before putting the president's credibility on the line. Others noted the role of Ms. Jarrett, the administration's liaison with the business community. Ms. Jarrett, former vice-chairman of the Chicago bid committee, directed...

Could these people be any more predictable? There’s nothing they won’t blame on Bush. Even Obama’s failure to sell himself to the corrupt IOC is Bush’s fault. As if his emotional, heartfelt, energetic appeal should have been enough to win over the world, if not for that evil cowboy in Texas. Olympic swimmer Rowdy Gaines called it a hangover from the past eight years. Um, I think he may be right about the hangover, but it’s from the past eight months! Roland Burris said Obama failed because Bush tarnished America’s image so badly even The One couldn’t undo the damage....

This is a tad humiliating for the president, but his embarrassment will be short-lived, especially if he demonstrates some good humor about it.

When Michelle Obama said her going to Copenhagen on behalf of Chicago's olympic bid was a sacrifice, I thought her glamorous lifestyle and attire made a mockery of that statement. Her clothes have become ever more glamorous, even ostentatious, making some of her former controversial statements seem ludicrous.

Rowdy Gaines, NBC swimming commentator, was asked why by ESPN news why Chicago lost the bid in the first round. Replied Gaines, "I looked at the bid, it had everything needed, it was the best bid. Maybe it was political. Maybe there's still a hangover from the last eight years. I don't know."....obama's loyal disciples continue to drown in their delusions....

As the US president flew home from Copenhagen, his unsuccessful attempt to convince the International Olympic Committee to choose his adopted home city was widely seen as a blow to his credibility. Joined by his wife, Mr Obama gave an impassioned presentation – the first by a US president on behalf of a city bidding for the games – in which he hailed Chicago as "the most American of American cities". There had been widespread expectations in the US that the president's star power would prove all-conquering, so there was shock when Chicago was the first city to be eliminated....

Game over, home team lost: the U.S. won just 18 votes in the first round of IOC voting, and was knocked out in the first round. And suddenly the president was being pummeled by the right for a frivolous use of political capital—especially in the Weekly Standard, which not only blasted Obama for his failure, but anticipated that the mainstream press corps would not take the defeat seriously. “The media is faced with three facts as a result of Obama’s embarrassing failure in Copenhagen. 1) The failure itself. 2) The incompetence. 3) The lack of persuasive ability. There’s nothing ideological...