Olympic Fever

Now that the 2016 final cities are in place, there’s a lot of news about who’s got the best bid and what that all really means. In Chicago, it means try to figure out how to best Madrid and Tokyo. Chicago didn’t do that well in the first round, but that’s OK–all they were trying to is make the cut, which they did.

The hard part’s just beginning though. Chicago has some tangible problems with their bid –transportation issues, IOC questioning whether or not they’ve budgeted enough for construction costs–but they’ve also got a deficit in the intangibles, namely people who are known to the IOC. We don’t have a Sebastian Coe in charge. We don’t have a Vladimir Putin pushing our city . We may have Da Mayor , but apparently that doesn’t go too far in international competition.

We will, however, have a new president by the time the final city is chosen, and that may help or hurt Chicago’s chances. Will it be Obama, who’s bid friendly, or McCain, who’s ticked off the IOC before ? The choice is up to you.