Wednesday, July 8, 2009
News / Chicagoland 2016 or bust
Posted by Whet Moser on Wed, Jul 8, 2009 at 3:18 PM
"Every other city would love to have this—when the federal government will spend billions of dollars on infrastructure and on security. Besides that, the national and global publicity we receive from the build-up all the way to 2016. This is the only economic engine."
[snip]
"People can discuss this, but this is the best economic engine we have going. I have nothing [else] up my sleeve."
Here's a graph from a 1999 GAO report on federal Olympics funding that breaks down where the fed money went for the 1996 Atlanta games:
Showing 1-2 of 2
Just in case anyone is about to fall for the Mayor's line: that money he's talking about is your tax dollars. He makes it sound like it's magic money which falls from the fed. In reality he's just picking everyone else's pocket in addition yours. Given that America will be several trillion dollars in debt and facing major issues with health care and retirees - I find his breezey attitude about blowing billions on a private sporting event (which is all the Olympics are) disgusting. It is nice the Mayor has dropped the mask and openly admits his scheme presumes a massive federal bailout, and all that talk about private funding and no cost to taxpayers was a brazen lie.
@whut? It's not a "bailout" every time the governemnt spends money. Despite your hyperbole about the mayor "dropping the mask" this has always been a well-understood part of the process when a US city gets the Olympics. Any US city that gets to host the Olympics gets Federal dollars, and with good reason: that city is representing our country to the world. There's been so much baloney flying around regarding this whole Olympic process, and most of it doesn't make much sense. Some people argue out of their own narrow set of interests and say "Why is Chicago spending money on X when it could be spending money on Y." Either you like the Olympics and you like the idea of bringing attention to the city you love and accept that it's going to cost money one way or another OR you don't. Everything else is hogwash.
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