Thread: Olympics

I bet Mayor Daley's relatives and other cronies are chomping at the bit to have this opportunity to milk some more tea money from the city!! They make Thai politicians look like angels

The Associated Press: Chicago still favored, with Rio next, for Olympics

COPENHAGEN — The tense and tight battle to host the 2016 Olympics sped toward its climax with Chicago, backed by President Barack Obama's star power, the bookmakers' favorite Thursday after a long, emotional and at times acrimonious campaign.
The stakes are huge for all four cities — Chicago, Rio de Janeiro, Tokyo, Madrid — and for the International Olympic Committee. It faces the choice of sending the games to uncharted territory in South America, appealing to those committee members who believe the Olympics should touch all corners of the globe, or opting in tough economic times for more familiar and perhaps more lucrative ground in Europe, the United States and Asia.
The winner gets the international prestige of staging the world's biggest sports extravaganza and billions of dollars in potential investment. The losers will rue what might have been.
According to British bookmakers, Chicago was pulling away in the last hours as the clear but not overwhelming favorite over Rio, with Madrid and Tokyo lagging.
"But don't forget that Paris was the favorite to beat London the last time," said Graham Sharpe, spokesman for betting agency William Hill. "The favorite doesn't always win."
Years of preparations and lobbying by the four candidates will come down to 30 minutes of voting by the IOC's members on Friday afternoon, when they will eliminate the city with the fewest votes in successive rounds of secret balloting until one city receives a majority.
The round-by-round system makes predicting a winner perilous, because the outcome depends on how members shift their votes after their favorite candidates are eliminated. If Madrid is ejected first, would its supporters swing behind Rio, Tokyo or Chicago, and by how much in each case? And if Tokyo goes out next, where will its backers go? The variables are such that any city could conceivably go out — even if Chicago and Rio have long been seen as the front-runners.
All four cities were making their final pushes for support.
Brazilian president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva insisted Rio is ready "body and soul" if picked and he borrowed Obama's catchphrase, saying: "We want to overcome and show the world that yes we can."
Japan's new prime minister, Yukio Hatoyama, was arriving belatedly to boost Tokyo's flagging bid. The Japanese city's bid team wasn't sure if Hatoyama would actually have time for the important process of meeting and lobbying IOC members — as Silva and first lady Michelle Obama have.
Obama will be joined Friday by her husband. President Obama is jetting in for a few hours to lend his charisma and appeal to Chicago's final presentation.
All four cities get 45 minutes to present their cases Friday before the vote, with follow-up questions. Some undecided IOC members are waiting to see how they perform before making their choice — adding further uncertainty to the outcome.

i are in denmark and follow it all at the news i will post here when there is news

Chicago doesn't get 2016 Olympics - Yahoo! News

Chicago doesn't get 2016 Olympics

Chicago and Tokyo have been rejected as sites for the 2016 Olympics. Rio de Janeiro and Madrid are the finalists. THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.
COPENHAGEN (AP) — Chicago, Tokyo, Rio de Janeiro and Madrid made final pitches to the International Olympic Committee to be selected later Friday as host of the 2016 Olympics, with President Barack Obama and Brazilian counterpart Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva pitting their star power against each other in emotional pushes for their cities.
Rio and Chicago's presentations were particularly impassioned. Obama and his wife Michelle both talked about their childhood, while Rio urged the IOC's members to be bold by taking the games to South America for the first time.
Tokyo presented itself as the best city for the athletes, safe and environmentally pioneering. Former IOC president Juan Antonio Samaranch made an unusual appeal for Madrid, reminding the IOC members as he asked for their vote that, at age 89, "I am very near the end of my time."
The 103 members will start voting electronically in a secret ballot at 5:10 p.m. (1510 GMT). The vote will take up to 30 minutes. Cities will be eliminated one-by-one until one secures a majority.
The cities' final presentations represented the finishing line after years of hard work, lobbying, planning and hopes. They had 45 minutes and follow-up questions to sway undecided IOC members, of which there were many after a long, close and at times acrimonious race.
Chicago presented first, with videos and speeches — capped by Obama's plea. Obama used his stature as a statesman and his own life story for impact, recounting how he was moved around as a child and "never really had roots" but in Chicago, "I finally found a home."
Obama held out the enticing prospect of a Chicago games helping to reconnect the United States with the world after the presidency of George W. Bush, pledging that the "full force of the White House" would be applied so "visitors from all around the world feel welcome and will come away with a sense of the incredible diversity of the American people."
"Over the last several years, sometimes that fundamental truth about the United States has been lost," Obama said. "One of the legacies, I think, of this Olympic Games in Chicago would be a restoration of that understanding of what the United States is all about and the United States' recognition of how we are linked to the world."
Rio played up the wow factor of its fabulous scenery, with computer-generated bird's eye images of how venues would be spread across the city, with sailing in the shadow of Sugar Loaf mountain and volleyball on Copacabana beach. The governor of the central bank said Brazil's economic vibrancy should reassure IOC members, and the head of Rio state played down concerns over security.
But Rio's hardest sell was that the IOC could ignore South America no longer.
"It is a time to address this imbalance," Silva said. "It is time to light the Olympic cauldron in a tropical country."
Rio bid president Carlos Nuzman, who is also an IOC member, added: "When you push the button today, you have the chance to inspire a new continent, make Olympic history."
Speaking for Tokyo, Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama pledged that the city "will show the world how a major metropolis can flourish without detriment to the environment."
Madrid portrayed itself as a low-risk option, saying that 77 percent of the needed infrastructure for the games was already in place.
"This is a sure candidacy," Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero said.
An uncomfortable moment for Chicago came when an IOC member from Pakistan, Syed Shahid Ali, noted that going through U.S. customs can be harrowing for foreigners.
Obama responded that he wanted a Chicago games to offer "a reminder that America at its best is open to the world."
His wife tugged at IOC members' heart strings by discussing her late father, who had multiple sclerosis. She recounted sitting on his lap, watching Olympians such as Carl Lewis and Nadia Comaneci compete, and how her father "taught me how to throw a ball and a mean right hook."
"My dad would have been so proud to witness these games in Chicago," she said.
The high drama will come when IOC president Jacques Rogge announces the name of the winner about an hour after the last votes are cast. He will break open a sealed envelope and declare which city has been awarded the games of the 31st Olympiad.
The winner gets huge prestige and billions of dollars in potential economic benefits, the losers just painful thoughts of what might have been.
Rogge doesn't vote and, as long as their cities haven't been eliminated, neither will members from Brazil, the United States, Spain and Japan. Three other members did not attend the session.
That left 95 voters in the first round, with more in subsequent rounds. In the event of a two-city tie in the early rounds, a runoff is held between the cities. If there is a tie in the final round, Rogge can vote or ask the IOC executive board to break the deadlock.
Ahead of the vote, only Tokyo seemed to have fallen out of the running. But otherwise, it was still too close to call between the beaches and bossa nova of Rio, the bustle and Lake Michigan waterfront of Chicago or the European elegance of Madrid.
Everyone had reason to be hopeful, none reason to be sure.

I vote for Rio.

Yes it's about time a South American city won it, but it'll probably go to the States again. Hope I'm wrong.

Originally Posted by Fuzzy Bob

but it'll probably go to the States again. Hope I'm wrong.

People living in the streets and highest unemployment in 30 years and the highest ever US debt, and the Head Khun is over sucking something to get it into his home city..

London is having the next games and I don't think it will benefit Londoners

I would say that it will cost Brasil too much considering the type of economy they have

They don't have an economy cept sugar cane and women with big tits.

PS. and crime..

Chicago eliminated after fist round of voting!

Originally Posted by Fuzzy Bob

Chicago eliminated after first round of voting!

And such impassioned speechs from the Obamas. *smirk*

Tokyo eliminated.

whoever gets it, good luck

I have worked in Brasil before and it is a great country, with an economy that is slowly recovering from the years of US/CIA influence

but having the olympics is a bad idea

Rio....!!!...excellent

I'm sure Coca Cola will get their nose in just as much

I hope it's Rio.
That is the first of many losses to come for Obama. The whole world doesn't love him after all. *sob*

I hope the US does not get it again. Rio deserves a chance and it is a much maligned place that could do with a boost.

Live: 2016 Olympic Games vote - Chicago and Tokyo out

Live: 2016 Olympic Games vote - Chicago and Tokyo out - Times Online

I'm relieved Chicago didn't get it. Much more important things to be thinking about at the moment (inside the US). Priorities seem a bit strange. Spend several days in Denmark lobbying to host the Olympics, and only meet with Gen. McChrystal for 40 minutes? Figuring out WTF the US is going to do in Afghanistan in the coming years is much more important to me (and I would say many more Americans and Brits, etc.) than trying to get the Olympics.

Rio de Janeiro has won the race to host the 2016 Olympics, beating Madrid in the final round of voting.


Members of International Olympic Committee (IOC) in Copenhagen


It will be the first time that the Games will be held in South America.
Earlier, Chicago and Tokyo were both eliminated in the race.
The US city went out in the first round of voting in Copenhagen, while the Japanese city was eliminated in the second round.
Chicago's early exit had been a major shock for Chicago, as it was considered one of the bookies' favourites.
President Barack Obama had flown to Denmark to push for the US bid.
He and his wife, first lady Michelle Obama, had made personal appeals on behalf of their hometown.
Chicago had sent a huge delegation of former Olympic athletes, business leaders and politicians to lobby for the Games.
Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva had \said: "I honestly believe it is Brazil's time.
"Among the top 10 economies of the world, Brazil is the only country that has not hosted the Olympic and Paralympics Games."
Senior Australian IOC member Kevan Gosper suggested Asian voters may have banded together for Tokyo in the first round, at Chicago's expense.
"I'm shocked," Mr Gosper said. "The whole thing doesn't make sense other than there has been a stupid bloc vote."

Chicago And Tokyo Knocked Out Of Race To Host 2016 Olympics | World News | Sky News