Dodging an Olympian sized bullet

Folks in DMV can breath easy.  Boston was selected as the American city to be put forward to the International Olympic Committee to host the 2024 summer Olympics, besting LA, San Francisco, and DC.

This is good news for many reasons!

1.  Hipsters and athletes don't mix.  Yes, they are both skinny, but only one is emaciated.   

2.  Politicians and athletes don't mix well either.  The doughy unhealthy look is popular in Congress.  Congress is all about that base, no treble.   

3.  Ok, both groups do like to drink.  But one will be off the sauce at game time.  

4.  Metro can't handle 4 inches of snow.  The Olympics would destroy it.

5.  The Olympics does not have a 'hot air bloviating' contest.  The area's pompous asses would have taken their balls and stomped off home when they found that out.    

6.   The Swiss crooksInternational Olympic Committee will get their public assistance checks from someone else's tax base.   

7.  The endless chatter about how much the DC2024 team cares about lining their pocketsDC will stop. 

8.  Dan Snyder won't have yet another way to make money on a losing team. 

9.  Traffic will remain in Dante's first circle of hell instead of descending into the ninth circle, where the millions of people all fleeing hurricanes at the same time live.      

10.  More time to focus on the antics of Kirby DeLauter, Kirby DeLauter, Kirby DeLauter! 

Olympian Delusions--DC Style

My new favorite phrase is 'you can't make this sh*t up.'

Why?  Because it always seems to be true. You'd think I wouldn't be surprised by now.  But I am, over and over again.  Some part of me clearly wants to believe people are rational.  But, in reality, few of us are.  Especially the rich.  They aren't just irrational, they are exuberantly irrational.    

Case in point, the local millionaires trying to bring the 2024 summer olympics to DC. 

The Washington Post just uploaded a glowing profile of the movers and shakers behind this deal. See my earlier blog post about them here. 

I won't bore you with fawning portraits painted of the individuals behind the group.  Suffice it to say here that two things caught my eye, and both of them demonstrate the folly of the rich.

1.  The Washington 2024 crowd wants Olympic facilities to be built on city land!  That's right, let's use city land to build stuff for other people, because clearly DC doesn't have any pressing things to spend money on.  I mean, yes, there is that old hospital housing hundreds of homeless families, but move along now, nothing to see here.  Yes, it is true, we need to build some affordable housing, but isn't that what PG County is for? 

2.  The Olympics would be good for DC's reputation on the world stage.  House of Cards make us look bad, they say.  Especially to the Chinese.  And, we simply can't have that.  Whip up some distractions ya'll!   

May I suggest instead that there's an easier way to fix this.  Pull out your capes delusional Olympians, get your wigs brushed out, call in your back up singers, and put Gloria Gaynor's 'I'm coming out' on the sound system.  Then have yourselves a big ole drag party.  You'd do all of us less harm that way.  

DC2024--A Rogue's Gallery of Supporters?

It is official--DC is under consideration to host the 2024 Summer Olympics.  There's even a webpage chronicling the effort. 

What a bad idea.  A bad idea on so many levels.  There will be multiple posts about this folly to come in the weeks ahead.  For now, let's just focus on who is supporting the bid.  If some of these 'civic-minded' folks have something to gain, it should give us pause.

When I looked at the DC2024 webpage 'boosting' the bid, one pattern was brick-through-the-window obvious.  Major league sports are behind the venture.  Specifically, Ted Leonis (who owns the Washington Capitals, the Vizards, and the Mystics), Mark D. Lerner (who owns the Nationals), and Paul Tagliabue (a former NFL commissioner).  The only major players missing are Dan Snyder and the DC United's Owners.  Given Snyder's level of toxicity, Tagliabue is most likely the NFL's stand in.  And, DC United is still focused on trying to get a stadium, meaning it doesn't (yet) have a dog in this fight.    

I know, at this point, some of you are unhappy with the direction this here tirade is going:

• "Paws off! I'm going to marry Ovi, and for that to happen, he needs to live here" 
• "Ladies Love Cool Mystics!" 
• "Natitude!" 
• "If George Will supports the Nats, then so do I!"  

Ok, just kidding on the last one.  Will's prolix (and tedious) fandom is reason enough to start rooting for, gasp, the Braves.  (I'd say the Orioles, but O's fans are far too loyal to have dropped their team when a newer stadium opened up closer to home--major props to them). 

But, I digress.  The role of Major Leagues sports give me a stop-me-in-my-tracks-can-I-get-off-this-train level of pause. 

Leonis and Lerner both have something to gain from having the Olympics in the city.  They respectively own and lease  the Verizon Center and National's Park.  And, though a successful Olympic bid would likely require building some new facilities, both venues are new enough to get some use (and as a result, to generate fees for their current lease holders).  The baseball stadium also has a view and looks great in photographs taken from the other side of the river.   

Although Leonis has been a fairly good corporate citizen, it would be hard to put Lerner in that category.  He's basically tried to shift the costs for his team onto the city since he first started negotiating for the stadium nearly 10 years ago.   

It started when he demanded the city pay for the full costs of his stadium.  Apparently, the owners of major league franchises are a lot like the former Governor and First Lady of Virginia--they think someone else should pick up the tab.  Since then, Lerner's been late on his rent to the city, and gotten fussy about paying the metro system to keep the system open for games that go late (even though the city will reimburse him if the ridership is high enough).

In my mind, these guys have too much vested interest in an Olympic bid to be viewed as reputable voices on behalf of the city or metro area.

Public investment should be for public, not private gain, and should be substantial rather than ephemeral.