News from Chicago

We're back from Chongqing! More on that later.

Sad to see - before I went to bed today, it was announced that Chicago was eliminated from the 2016 Olympic games. Considering that it is possible that we will be living in Chicago in 2016, I was interested in where the games would end up. Alas, it was not meant to be.

I flipped on Fox News to see their take on Chicago’s elimination – only to be subjected to a tirade on how Obama had “lowered” the office of the president as a result of his trip to Copenhagen. They didn’t seem to mind that the heads of state of Spain, Japan, and Brazil were also in attendance…apparently America is far more important than these nations and we so our president should not waste his time with the likes of them.

In the days before this announcement, I saw one critique of Chicago’s bid that caught my attention. This week, a Chicago public school honor student from the south side was killed during a gang beating. He was from outside the neighborhood, and was targeted by the gang after he refused to join. Student deaths have been a problem for the last couple years, and the timing of this event suggests that there are many concerns for the city other than staging an international sporting event. Certainly the games would benefit Chicago politicians and rich developers – but would it help others in the city? Maybe not. We’ll have to wait at least another four years to find out.

-alan