Posted on 10/02/2009 10:05:18 AM PDT by La Lydia
With the stunning news that Olympic officials had swiftly rejected Chicago as host the 2016 Olympics, despite a personal, last-minute appeal from President Obama, the White House was left Friday with the immediate and difficult challenge of explaining what happened. Did the president falter by making remarks that were emotional and personal, rather than giving specifics about his adopted home town? Is the defeat a sign that Obama's global popularity has begun to wane? White House advisers -- many of them Chicago natives, with a personal stake in the bid -- rushed into the back recesses of the West Wing to digest the outcome, and then emerged, looking glum, to comment.
"Obviously, it was disappointing," senior adviser David Axelrod said on CNN from the North Lawn of the White House... Axelrod blamed the internal machinations of the International Olympic Committee for the rejection. He argued that the bid by Madrid was led by a former president of the IOC, who was calling in years' worth of favors, and that Rio de Janeiro, trying to become the first South American host, had a strong case as well. The IOC ended up choosing Rio to host the 2016 Summer Games.
"I don't view this as a repudiation of the president or the first lady," he said. "I think there are politics everywhere, and there were politics inside that room..."
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
LOL! Sweet..... ;)
Pleas don’t insult the carps...............
The leftist IOC diss the leftist President and the leftist press covers it up.
Ha! That was my first thought too. Glen Beck and Faux News sabotaged the efforts of this great man.
Despite the President and first lady’s best efforts, they were beat by an unqualified underdog with a pitch of fairness and “our turn”; the voters will have to live with their decision and when the problems of voting for the worst candidate manifest, they can thank themselves.
Ironic that Obama now knows exactly how McCain feels.
So, the irony of selecting the novel candidate, for example the least qualified, but certainly the BLACKEST candidate, for President is invisible to this crew in this situation.
I have always thought that the euro-weenies hate us in general, but a little less when there is a Dem in the white house. Now that Obama is in the white house, they don’t care about him like they did when he was campaigning...
I wonder if anyone will say that Chicago lost because Obama is black??? Or is that just reserved for domestic failures..
Nice to see him personally rejected and to see Brazil burdened with the Olympics.
On a non partisan front, Chicago was a lousy choice imo to choose to stage an Olmypics. Only happened because of the Obama’s. I’m not even certain New York City would be a good choice. Seems it would be better to choice a host city that has a good sized population but isn’t as congested. Wide open spaces preferable. LA seemed to be a good site. Texas would have made sense but they wouldn’t dare choose the state of G.W.B.
LOL. If true, that why did Madrid lose also?
Excuses are like a$$holes, David. Everybody has one.
Obama flew out to fix the bid, and back to the White House where he hid.
Mmmm...Mmmm...Mmmm.
““I don’t view this as a repudiation of the president or the first lady,””
Now, it’s a slap in the face. a reminder that Zero and Oprah are NOT in any way important on the world stage.
If a$$holes could fly, the Whitehouse would be an airport.
For a guy like Obama, whose only serious weapon is his alleged personal magnetism, that lesson goes double at least.
This whole business of the President of the United States -- and his wife -- making a personal project out of selling Chicago's bid ... it is not only highly unusual and tawdry, it's also a ridiculous waste of prestige.
Prestige is not something you can replace if you spend it on stupid efforts, and if you lose on something stupid, your prestige really takes a hit.
A good chief of staff would have duct-taped both POTUS and the First Lady to the floor, rather than let them run off on a goose chase like this one.
They're just worried about what they're gonna do when all those post-dated checks they wrote against their anticipated kickbacks start to bounce.
I can hear Olbermann now - “The IOC’s filled with right-wing Republicans who were just itching to humiliate President Obama. We’ve boycotted Glen Beck and Fox News - now it’s the Olympics turn to feel the wrath of progressives.”
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