In my opinion the IOC was very generous in awarding the 2016 games to Brazil. With a 2.4-trillion-dollar economy Brazil has the potential to host a successful Olympic games but still the IOC has taken a bit of a risk on Rio.
The venues are behind schedule and both scandal and protest are nipping at their heels. Hence, I feel the 2020 Olympic Games should be held in a country with a robust economy and proven infrastructure.
The competing host cities, Istanbul, Turkey and Madrid, Spain are very fine countries but I am not impressed with size of their economies. Hosting the Olympic games is expensive. Though Turkey is an emerging nation it Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is still half that of Mexico. Spain which has a more affluent economy than Turkey has a GDP that is five-times smaller than the GDP of Japan.
I believe an established nation or a nation with the creativity and the economic wherewithal to host these games should receive the honor. I hope they choose Tokyo, Japan.
From France 24:
Istanbul, Madrid and Tokyo will all be sending high profile delegations to hand over their dossiers which have been painstakingly put together and will be hoping the details meet with the approval of the majority of the 100 plus IOC members when they vote in eight months' time.
With IOC members visits a thing of the past, since the reforms brought in following the Salt Lake City bribes for votes scandal, the dossier will be carefully studied before the all-important visit of the IOC Evaluation Commission, headed by IOC Vice-president Craig Reedie, to the three cities for four day visits in March.
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10 comments:
The Spanish economy is in a mess. I really doubt if the IOC will choose them. Then again, the Japanese economy has been in a funk for the past decade.
Yes, Japan has been in a funk since 1990 when they real estates bubble collapse; (much like our own real estate collapse in 2008), and sent the country into perpetual recession.
However, Japan is still nearly a 6-trillion dollar a year economy.
One could say out of the three countries that Japan is the "best dressed hobo in the train car."
By the way, the United states is the "best dressed hobo" in the train car just in front of them so please don't think I am impressed by our economy here in the states.
Here's a contrary opinion about risk and host city selection:
Choosing an economically challenged area may serve a greater good.
The IOC shares substantial revenue with the host organization. So a struggling nation can gain more from hosting the Olympics than a wealthy county. A country with low economic power can build facilities and infrastructure with low cost wages and materials, and benefit from revenues that are abnormally high for the area (advertising, ticket sales and inflated hotel rates). That can be an incredible boost to the area, and can serve a public good.
Of course, we learned in China that too often local vendors are excluded from conducting business by IOC agreements with multi-national corporations. Even so, many individuals were likely given jobs and opportunities that would not otherwise have been available to them.
As much as the U.S. enjoys sports events, hosting the Olympics is unlikely to be a life changing economic boon to the extent it is in developing countries.
Whatever the risks inherent in choosing Rio, the Olympics have for decades been money generating events and money solves alot of problems.
A thoughtful comment, almost as if you were an insider or someone who studies the games. This is a view I never considered.
Not an insider, but i do study the financial dealings of many non-profits. Things are often different than the public's perception. It is good to question the decision process and extravagant perks. The Audi deal mentioned in your newer post should be questioned, and may be nothing more than a deal for a new sponsor.
The public should question these things.
I often critique, but before doing so I try to see the big picture.
The big picture for me is their mission statement. Especially look at points 9-11.
I see conflict in this Audi deal.
As for the potential ad deal: of course, that is why Audi is sponsoring the IOC but the IOC is getting the luxury cars not the athletes.
So, here is a story for you. I am sitting in an swanky office at Disney Online in the late 90's and the creative director (CD) is talking about "Web 2.0" which is a concept that will dominate the coming decade. A co-artists asks, what's web 2.0? The CD replies, "the public produces all the content but we keep all the money."
That's how I view the Olympics as they are produced today. Passing economic opportunities down form the top is like shoveling fleas across a barn with a pitchfork.
I use to think that non-profits were suppose to be charities. They are mostly are not. All they are is simply a different tax structure to avoid paying taxes.
Your last statement is so true! You do a good job of promoting scrutiny. I wonder if any one is paying attention.
Thank you I am very flattered. As for scrutiny, Colorado Springs reads me or checks the blog out 2-12-times a day.
The readers comments are the most important pageview for them.
I use Google Analytics.
Wow. I'm shocked you'd admit your secrets. Do you know who I am?
I assume that some of those Colorado Springs readers may be USA Swimming. The questions are: Are they reading to learn how to cover their a!*$#, or to find out who they need to watch, or to find out if anyone knows anything to get them in trouble. Somehow I don't think they are reading to get ideas on what is important to people and how to improve.
I'd like to think they consider themselves under siege; but, they have weathered so many storms without change, so that may be optimistic thinking.
I do not know who you are and nor would I want to try to find out. I believe in privacy.
All I want to see are the cities and countries that visit.
I believe in anonymity especially if it is constructive. There are commercial ways to find out who visits a blog or site and I saw a link to one on "hacker news." This service charged $7.00 per page-view and the service captures your IP address and possibly an email address if they can match it up to a search history.
Right now you probably have 200-advertising cookies and 600-trackers following you around.
Get a plugin called "Ghostery" for your browser and you can turn all or some of them off. When I went to the Speedo site they stuck 4 of them in my browser. They are erased now. When I go to most I see no banner ads as a result. The pages load faster.
They have changed because of the blogs.
I will starting another blog soon that will be art related.
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