WASHINGTON, Oct 2 (Reuters) – U.S. President Barack Obama’s politically risky Olympics gamble failed to bring home the gold on Friday, with the Olympics committee’s refusal to grant the 2016 Summer Games to his hometown Chicago.
The president, whose even-tempered personality has earned him the nickname “No Drama Obama,” broke from that mold to make an overnight dash from Washington to Copenhagen to personally lobby for Chicago.Obama and his wife, Michelle, had taken their star power to the Danish capital to make Chicago’s case, ignoring the carping from Republican opponents who charged it was a bad time to go with foreign policy challenges in Iran and Afghanistan and the U.S. Congress bogged down in a domestic healthcare debate.
“I’m asking you to choose Chicago. I’m asking you to choose America,” Michelle Obama told committee members. The Republican National Committee chairman, Michael Steele, was unsparing in his criticism in a statement issued before the decision was announced and on a day when the U.S. jobless rate rose to 9.8 percent, a 26-year high.
“As President Obama travels to Copenhagen to bring the Summer Olympics to his hometown seven years from now, Americans back home are increasingly concerned they won’t have a job seven months from now as they see more and more of their neighbors and friends lose jobs today,” Steele said.
#78–chuck==this is America, we always give points for trying.
#79–Greg==I must strongly disagree. Fox doesn’t make you stupid. Truly, you do have to be stupid to begin with to watch it. Fox only keeps you uninformed.
Seems to me that making a pitch within 12 hours of the formal voting is making an effort way after the horse already left the barn? More effective would have been a continuous push starting 4 years ago?
I’ve read about the bribing/coercion of Olympic Organizers regarding the placement of games. Does seem some sort of rotation would be fair==first time ever for South America?–about time I would think.
Ted Turner tried valiantly to kill the Olympics with the America Based Freedom Games. Didn’t take.
It simply amazes me to read some of the commects regarding Obama and “his” choice of Chicago.. Chicago was a bid City Long befor u and I ever heard of Obama… and lastly I belive Tourblemaker said it right the firts time in post Number 2…
forgive me for reposting… his words..
Obama lost? I don’t much care for him, but it seems to me that Chicago… and ultimately the US lost. We all lost.
Then again assholes like to politicize every little thing these days with petty, childish partisan hackery. Such as this ignorant blog post.
The political discourse in this country has completely gone to shit, and at a time when we really need to work together to fix all the serious problems that we face.
Not to worry. He can always claim the trip was really to spend 2 minutes with the General.
It was very briefly revealed that a faction in Chicago exists, that doesn’t want the Olympics there. Their concern is that the games will be a taxpayer fiasco. And millions of dollars of their money will be used to pick up the cost of hosting the games. While the super rich will pocket the bulk of the profits, set aside for them, liability free. I fear the same thing, when I hear that NASCAR might be coming to my town. And that the politicians will hide the drain on tax dollars, for a time. At least until after the next election is over. So the Chicagoans may have dodged a bullet. And perhaps the rest of US taxpayers too. But poor Oprah won’t get to make any more millions, promoting the Olympics with her show or magazine. That may have been what cost them the IOC vote. They may not have responded well to being extorted by her media machine. “Give me tons of money, or I’ll poo poo your event.” I can’t think of why else Oprah would care about the Olympics coming to her town, except that she could make a buck off it.
[Establishment] State-Controlled Media Corruption Exposed in Real Time for All to See
[MSNBC Natalie]MORALES: Oh, it was crazy. We — in the press we were all standing there waiting to see if the president and first lady would even walk by us! But he kind of got stuck behind a wall as, uh, the IOC pretty much rushed him. Everybody seemed to really want their picture with the president, shaking hands; and of course the IOC voters trying to appear somewhat impartial but you could tell that they, too –
ANCHOR: (giggling)
MORALES: — felt the rock star power there that the president and first lady were exuding.
RUSH [Limbaugh]: The fraud is happening in real time. Media corruption is being exposed in real time. “They were rock stars! Oh, it was so great! It’s in the bag. It’s Chicago’s to lose, now that the president has spoken and the first lady made such a lasting impression!” Yeah, but what kind? And then, of course, my favorite is CNN’s Ed Henry. Just a half hour before the vote, “Michelle Obama steals the show in Copenhagen!” Never before has such fraud and corruption been so openly exposed in real time of the United States media.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: You know, like I always say, folks, and I’ve been saying it since the primaries, Obama cannot win in a fair vote. The only thing missing in that vote today was ACORN. If he had ACORN representation stuffing ballot boxes, registering fake IOC members, then maybe Chicago would have had a chance. But Obama couldn’t do that. He couldn’t get ACORN over there. See, Obama doesn’t debate people; he clears the field. But he couldn’t clear the field today. So I’m waiting for Gibbs and the White House daily press briefing. I want to hear Gibbs blame Copenhagen talk radio and the vast right-wing conspiracy in Scandinavia that destroyed this great chance for our wonderful president. I want to hear Carville and Begala and F. Chuck Todd all get together and say this is actually a smart move on the part of Obama, this clears the way for Chicago to get the Olympics in 2020. They’ll try to turn it into something positive. Oprah is so distraught she just ate Norway I’m told and that’s gotta be bad for Norway. Michelle (My Belle) in a funk, has ordered Air Force One to Paris for the whole week next week for shopping therapy. I’m wondering if Tony Rezko is still around. Did Rezko send Obama a dead fish in the mail to Chicago?
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: You want to hear something funny and pleasurable? This is CNN live, anchor Tony Harris covering the announcement that Chicago was eliminated from the Olympic race in the first round of voting.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=EuE60mq0r1Q&feature=player_embedded#
http://rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_100209/content/01125108.member.html
The explanation is simple. Say it out loud:
1. “We’re going to Chicago”
2. “We’re going to Rio”
The response to #1: meh.
The response to #2: Sweet!!.
Come on Yanks, after the Coke-a-Cola Olympics in Atlanta being such a farce, what else did you expect? Its great to see the Olympic Games going to a South American country for the first time. Carnival time is looking to be more fun than ever in 2016, just enjoy it!
#82 The Olympics are a political affaire. But that rant looks like a great improvement from someone ridding a short bus.
#84 Sure. I’m also sure you’d have written the same thing had the US won the bid… NOT!
#86 FTW
#72, qb,
“When did so many Americans become afraid to fail?”.
Well, sitting on the inside here, You come very close to the truth.
It is the right wing nuts, led by their
assholesleaders Boss Limpdick, Michael Steele,John Bonehead, and the FOX SPEWS organization. You see, they want America to fail. They promote America failing as that makes them look good.Right wing nuts don’t care about the middle class. They instead want the middle class to just fall in in lockstep. To wear a ring in their nose to be led around a little easier. To consume but not necessarily produce. Then tell them it is their own lazy fault they don’t work and thus don’t have health insurance or can’t pay their mortgage.
Their strength lays in America’s weakness.
You all are missing the significance. It’s not about Obama winning or not winning the Olympics.
If he hadn’t gone this wouldn’t be news. He attached himself politically to something he has no control over. It was a foolish political move.
Alfred1 channeling Rush Limbaugh: “Obama cannot win in a fair vote”.
George Will on the F word.
That’s the difference between a real conservative and a poser like Limbaugh.
#91 Limbaugh’s premise was Obama’s $800,000 payment to ACORN to stuff ballot boxes.
George Will made no reference to that or to Rush Limbaugh.
There doesn’t seem to be a real connection…care to explain what you saw we don’t see?
No offensive to Chicago, but Rio has a bit better views. Besides the construction will help the very poor Brazilians in ghettos that tourist don’t see. With Chicago politics it would have been a major screwup with graft going everywhere. Not that Brazilian politicians are above a bit of skimming.
>“When did so many Americans become afraid to fail?”.
Probably from listening to liberals opinions on whether there should be a surge in Iraq.
Eisenhower said the President shows up only after success is known.
I’ll give Obama credit for taking a chance. I just wish it was a chance at something I wanted.
I also hope he learns that his sweet talk isn’t as persuasive as he thinks.
#89 Didn’t I tell you to find new words? Are you gonna keep on beating that “wingnut” horse?
How many cats do you have?
#93 Help how? If anything, it would be a drop in the water for the Brazilian poor.
If that were true, the 5 world cups they won would have eliminated poverty there already.
If you think that Brazilians are less corrupt than the US, you’re quite naive.
#95 Good quote.
Thirteen years after the “Gold Mine” that the 1996 Olympics didn’t deliver for the average citizen in the Metro Atlanta area, I can say that the people of the Chicago area should breathe a sigh of relief that that they didn’t win the bid. A money pit for taxpayers, and trough to gorge at for the well connected.
Besides, there’ll be a shit load of pix of hawt Brazilian babes on the net. Chicago, not so much.
#92 Alfred1, you’re really that slow? Wow, I’m so sorry.
I’m pushing for President Obama to make a major speech praising The Flag, Motherhood and Apple Pie, just to see the right squirm.
Well we tried, and Obama gave it his best.
If Obama had not, the Republican House Negro Steele would have criticized him.
But Obama went, and the Republican House Negro Steele criticized him for going.
Its just that way with the Republican party, they believe themselves to be an opposition party regardless of whether it helps America or not, because their only concern is regaining power, not helping the country.