(Jane Mingay/AP)First off, Congratulations to London and the UK on landing the 2012 Olympics. Second, thoughts and prayers go out to the folks in London and the UK because of the attacks on their subway system.
Now, before anyone gets on the "anti-American" vote thing, New York killed its own bid because it couldn't secure financing for a stadium. Also, a lot of New Yorkers (as in folks in New York City) didn't want the Olympics either because of the potential traffic nightmares, which is understandable when you're in a city that's not exactly built for cars.
Seriously, think about the North American cities since 1984 that have held or are scheduled to host an Olympics: Los Angeles, Calgary, Atlanta, Salt Lake, Vancouver. All those cities are spread out over a large area, and building venues would not have completely re-made the face of the city like it would New York City. Not only that, those cities do not require you to grease 50 palms just to build the weightlifting venue
As for the other cities, as much as this seems like a good opportunity to bash the French, I kinda feel sorry for them because their economy's in the tank and they really could have used the shot in the arm.
Madrid is a nice city, and Spain has hosted a World Cup and Olympics before, but it's not built for cars either and they have a lot of nice buildings that they can't really knock down. Plus, there's that pesky ETA problem. (not that I don't like Basque people, it's just that there's better ways of going about it. If the Olympics had known about Eric Rudolph, Athens probably would have gotten the Games years earlier than it did.)
Moscow would have been OK. The thought of an American Olympic team making good to the folks of Moscow 32 years after Jimmy Carter ruined the chances of a generation of athletes by boycotting the last Moscow Olympics (which didn't solve anything in Afghanistan and just led to the Russians and East Germans returning the favor 4 years later) would have been nice. Problem is, their internal corruption problem is worse than NYC's, and they would have had just as tough a time getting things approved.
While we're talking Olympics, Why not have a Texas city put in a bid for 2016? Why not Dallas? Why not Houston? Why not a joint bid from San Antonio and Austin? Come on Texas, step up to the plate, get organized, and let's land one of these things.
Oh my God, Kenny Apologized! You B@#$%rd!
Frankly, I was a bit disgusted at Kenny Rogers' scripted apology yesterday, and I'm one of the people who thinks the Rangers are the real bad guys in this mess.
Rogers just really mishandled this situation right from the get-go.
He didn't like the fake stories the Rangers were putting out about them, and the Dallas media wasn't happy with the fact that one of the teams' hardest workers was being accused of being a jake by management when it didn't match what Rogers was doing for the Rangers. Rogers wouldn't have merited an All-Star berth if he had not worked hard, and most of the Dallas media knew it.
Plus, the Dallas media has been aware for some time that the release of Ryan Drese has created a lot of tension in between the Rangers front office and the players. Add to that the fact that many reporters have complained about John Hart's aloofness and lack of availability, and the media could have been an ally for Kenny Rogers.
If he had gone to the media and told them that the Rangers front office was leaking false reports about them, and that the report about the motive behind the hand injury was false, they would have listened, and they probably would have called for Hart's head
Instead, Rogers turned a potential ally into an enemy when he shoved the cameraman. Then he compounded his media mistake with that fake apology yesterday.
So now, instead of focusing about how Rangers' management is making Kenny Rogers' life hell, how they screwed up with Ryan Drese, and how Mark Texiera, Michael Young, and Hank Blalock are all going to walk because of John Hart's mismanagement of this team, we're talking about how Rogers punched a cameraman and how he doesn't deserve to be in the All-Star game.
Tomorrow: Meanwhile, the other Texas team is coming together.
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