# Chicago, Madrid, Rio, or Tokyo; who's gonna get the Olympics? **URL:** \ **Category:** The Game Room\ **Created:** [October 1, 2009, 9:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chicago-madrid-rio-or-tokyo-whos-gonna-get-the-olympics/512284 "2009-10-01T21:37:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2009, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chicago-madrid-rio-or-tokyo-whos-gonna-get-the-olympics/512284/21 "2009-10-02T15:30:08Z")
Tokyo is out, too. ---
**Author:** ![Henrichek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/5daacb/32.png) [@Henrichek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Henrichek)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2009, 3:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chicago-madrid-rio-or-tokyo-whos-gonna-get-the-olympics/512284/22 "2009-10-02T15:31:31Z")
Here’s a live feed of the event: [BBC News - Budget: BBC News special](http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/7926576.stm) ETA: aaand there the live feed is closed. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Lance\_Murdoch](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/47e85d/32.png) [@Captain\_Lance\_Murdoch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Lance_Murdoch)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2009, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chicago-madrid-rio-or-tokyo-whos-gonna-get-the-olympics/512284/23 "2009-10-02T15:40:08Z")
Wow, I wonder why Chicago finished last. ---
**Author:** ![Mullinator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c2a13f/32.png) [@Mullinator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mullinator)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2009, 3:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chicago-madrid-rio-or-tokyo-whos-gonna-get-the-olympics/512284/24 "2009-10-02T15:42:37Z")
Another live commentary feed which seems to be on going [http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/olympic\_games/8283061.stm](http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/olympic_games/8283061.stm) ---
**Author:** ![Henrichek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/5daacb/32.png) [@Henrichek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Henrichek)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2009, 3:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chicago-madrid-rio-or-tokyo-whos-gonna-get-the-olympics/512284/25 "2009-10-02T15:43:07Z")
> [@Captain\_Lance\_Murdoch](#): > > Wow, I wonder why Chicago finished last. It was Obama’s fault. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2009, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chicago-madrid-rio-or-tokyo-whos-gonna-get-the-olympics/512284/26 "2009-10-02T15:44:00Z")
I’m wondering if the voters were swayed by Samaranch’s appeal (“vote for Madrid because I’m going to die soon”). ---
**Author:** ![Duke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e8c25b/32.png) [@Duke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duke)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2009, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chicago-madrid-rio-or-tokyo-whos-gonna-get-the-olympics/512284/27 "2009-10-02T15:50:49Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > I’m wondering if the voters were swayed by Samaranch’s appeal (“vote for Madrid because I’m going to die soon”). Spain got the Barcelona Olympics because Samaranch wanted it. Now Spain might get another because he wants another one. Don’t get me wrong, I’d love to go to an Olympics in Madrid (and I might well do so with **tygre** , if the kids’ college doesn’t bankrupt us). But two Summer Games is a little much for the old man. ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2009, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chicago-madrid-rio-or-tokyo-whos-gonna-get-the-olympics/512284/28 "2009-10-02T16:04:24Z")
I think Chicago being first out shows that the US has a way to go to rebuild its reputation. Eight years of Bush were bad enough, but the teabaggers and towners and birthers and deathers make us look like we don’t deserve a bid and maybe we don’t. ---
**Author:** ![KSO](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/f07891/32.png) [@KSO](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KSO)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2009, 4:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chicago-madrid-rio-or-tokyo-whos-gonna-get-the-olympics/512284/29 "2009-10-02T16:05:38Z")
Bravo, BobLibDem, bravo! Of course this is all Dubya’s fault… :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Skammer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skammer/32/143_2.png) [@Skammer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skammer)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2009, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chicago-madrid-rio-or-tokyo-whos-gonna-get-the-olympics/512284/30 "2009-10-02T16:07:21Z")
I can’t imagine it going to Madrid so soon after Barcelona and on the heels of London. It’s gotta be Rio now. I’d love to know what pushed Chicago out in the first vote, though. ---
**Author:** ![ivylass](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/9de053/32.png) [@ivylass](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ivylass)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2009, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chicago-madrid-rio-or-tokyo-whos-gonna-get-the-olympics/512284/31 "2009-10-02T16:08:31Z")
My money’s on Rio. This is after I found out Chicago got the boot but I didn’t know about Tokyo. ---
**Author:** ![ivylass](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/9de053/32.png) [@ivylass](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ivylass)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2009, 4:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chicago-madrid-rio-or-tokyo-whos-gonna-get-the-olympics/512284/32 "2009-10-02T16:10:12Z")
> [@BobLibDem](#): > > I think Chicago being first out shows that the US has a way to go to rebuild its reputation. Eight years of Bush were bad enough, but the teabaggers and towners and birthers and deathers make us look like we don’t deserve a bid and maybe we don’t. Yeah, the fact that half the city didn’t want the Olympics, there’s not enough infrastructure, and the YouTube videos of beatings in the street had NOTHING to do with the decision. Jeez, dude, give the partisanship a rest and expand your thinking. ---
**Author:** ![Lantern](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/d26b3c/32.png) [@Lantern](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lantern)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2009, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chicago-madrid-rio-or-tokyo-whos-gonna-get-the-olympics/512284/33 "2009-10-02T16:13:24Z")
Yes it’s got to be Rio. And that is probably the best choice given that South America has never got the Olympics before. I admit that having an Olympics in Obama’s home city during possibly the last year of his presidency would have been cool and I half-suspected that he would be able to pull it off but it’s not to be. I wonder if there will be a political fall-out from Chicago’s failure after Obama’s high-profile intervention. Beck,Limbaugh et al will probably have a good couple of days with it but then it will likely blow over. ---
**Author:** ![Tom\_Scud](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f08c70/32.png) [@Tom\_Scud](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Scud)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2009, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chicago-madrid-rio-or-tokyo-whos-gonna-get-the-olympics/512284/34 "2009-10-02T16:15:13Z")
Well, for whatever reason, thank God and the IOC that Chicago will be spared. ---
**Author:** ![Eva\_Luna](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e495f1/32.png) [@Eva\_Luna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eva_Luna)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2009, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chicago-madrid-rio-or-tokyo-whos-gonna-get-the-olympics/512284/35 "2009-10-02T16:15:30Z")
Thank goodness Chicago didn’t get it. It would have been a nightmare. (Although if we had, I would have been glad to rent out wherever we are living in 2016 at some inflated rate and finance a vacation elsewhere during the Games. Like maybe Rio.) ETA: near-simulpost with **Tom Scud!** Glad to see we’re on the same page. ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2009, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chicago-madrid-rio-or-tokyo-whos-gonna-get-the-olympics/512284/36 "2009-10-02T16:16:05Z")
> [@ivylass](#): > > Yeah, the fact that half the city didn’t want the Olympics, there’s not enough infrastructure, and the YouTube videos of beatings in the street had NOTHING to do with the decision. > > Jeez, dude, give the partisanship a rest and expand your thinking. Nah. We looked like first rate clowns to the rest of the world during August, if not outright racists. ---
**Author:** ![Tim\_R.Mortiss](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tim_r.mortiss/32/142_2.png) [@Tim\_R.Mortiss](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tim_R.Mortiss)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2009, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chicago-madrid-rio-or-tokyo-whos-gonna-get-the-olympics/512284/37 "2009-10-02T16:27:04Z")
> [@Tom\_Scud](#): > > Well, for whatever reason, thank God and the IOC that Chicago will be spared. Exactly. Count me as another Chicagoan who is glad the mess is going elsewhere. As for losing in the first round, Cubs fans are used to that…TRM ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2009, 4:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chicago-madrid-rio-or-tokyo-whos-gonna-get-the-olympics/512284/38 "2009-10-02T16:50:53Z")
And Rio de Janeiro it is. Congratulations to Brazil! ---
**Author:** ![strqwert44](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a87d85/32.png) [@strqwert44](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/strqwert44)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2009, 4:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chicago-madrid-rio-or-tokyo-whos-gonna-get-the-olympics/512284/39 "2009-10-02T16:52:35Z")
**Wow, I wonder why Chicago finished last.** The US-VISIT, post-9/11 entry changes (e.g. fingerprinting, greater scrutiny when getting a visa) haven’t helped the US. there also is some unhappiness among non-US IOC members that the US Olympic Committee gets a disproportionate amount of the TV revenue for the games. [http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/03/sports/03olympics.html?\_r=1&hp?hp](http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/03/sports/03olympics.html?_r=1&hp?hp) In the official question-and-answer session following the Chicago presentation, Syed Shahid Ali, an I.O.C. member from Pakistan, asked the toughest question. He wondered how smooth it would be for foreigners to enter the United States for the Games because doing so can sometimes, he said, be “a rather harrowing experience.” ---
**Author:** ![Henrichek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/5daacb/32.png) [@Henrichek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Henrichek)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2009, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chicago-madrid-rio-or-tokyo-whos-gonna-get-the-olympics/512284/40 "2009-10-02T16:53:45Z")
Excellent choice. It’s nice to see some spread to the host locations. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chicago-madrid-rio-or-tokyo-whos-gonna-get-the-olympics/512284.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chicago-madrid-rio-or-tokyo-whos-gonna-get-the-olympics/512284.md?page=3)