Chicago can learn a lot from loss of 2016
Who the heck do you think you are you, Rio, Tokyo, Madrid? To shoot us like a cannon out of the first round?
We are Chicago.
City of broad shoulders with a chip perched on at least one of them.
If we were going to lose the 2016 Summer Games, it should not be like a drop-kick out of the international Olympic stadium.
I speak (to borrow from Chicago political commentator Don Rose) as an "agnostic." Not for the Games or against them. A native possessing fierce civic pride and yet, a reporter with some idea of how things really work in this town.
When Chicago lost the 2016 Olympic bid Friday, just seconds after the first vote, I gasped. My heart overtook my head.
Then again, the beauty of Friday morning in Copenhagen had been watching our heady, coolly intellectual president finally leading with his heart, risking that he might not come home with the gold but putting himself on the line anyway.
He did the right thing the right way.
May Obama find the same bold path on health-care reform.
Meanwhile, Mayor Richard M. Daley gave the best, most authentic speech of his career Friday morning. As he invoked the name of the late, great Chicago Olympian Ralph Metcalfe, a man who moved on to become a Chicago congressman and later broke politically break with Daley's own mayor-father, who could help noting how a new generation improves on the last?
May Daley bring the same passion home with him to find a creative way short of the Olympics to transform Washington Park and the killing fields of Chicago's poor neighborhoods into something stronger and safer.
May the Chicago City Council, which demanded the Chicago 2016 committee offer more accountability, never be mute again. Or ever again send a fox like Finance Chairman Ed Burke to guard its fiscal chickens. Or try to prevent the Freedom of Information Act from being used as an available tool on behalf of government transparency.
To the Chicago 2016 committee members, kudos for your discipline, dedication and talent.
Pat Ryan, Lori Healey, Doug Arnot and others on the leadership team deserve praise for their pursuit of this dream. Embracing a little more sunshine on the process next time around would help.
As for my world of the media, time for us to do a better job of distinguishing boosterism from reporting. I know Daley and I disagree on this. In his gracious expression of disappointment at Chicago's Olympic loss, he spoke wistfully about the enthusiasm of Rio's reporters.
"I've been to Rio and have been interviewed by press there, and every time, their reporters say, 'Thank you, very much. But we are a much better city.' I respect that strong emphasis on the press, that they were supporters. It was overwhelming. This is not to criticize you, but they say ours is the best city. They are really behind the city."
Reporters in Chicago are behind their city too. But asking hard questions, demanding genuine answers on the money and contracts, is how to really stand for what matters in a community.
Now it's time to turn the page.
Rio, go dance your samba. You earned the celebration.
Chicago, my hometown, go sing the blues.
But not for very long.
Olympic bids be damned, we are a world class city.
And will learn from the loss.