Brisbane, Australia, will soon be awarded the pleasure of hosting the virus that often leaves destruction and despair in its wake.
No, not COVID-19. The Olympics.
Brisbane has won the endorsement of the carrier of the virus, the International Olympic Committee, which pretty much means that they will officially be awarded the 2032 Summer Games when the gangsters meet next month.
“This unanimous decision by the Executive Board is a credit to the years of work carried out by Brisbane 2032, the Australian Olympic Committee, and their partners, to test every aspect of the project,” the IOC said in a statement.
There wasn’t exactly a vicious battle over the location of the 2032 Olympics.
There have been rejections of bids in past years to host the Games by citizens in Boston, Denver and Toronto, among other communities.
There aren’t that many Olympic disease deniers left in the world — unless you really want to count Istanbul. The IOC hasn’t been reduced to accepting an Olympic bid from Istanbul, one of the 2032 candidates — yet. But it’s coming.
That’s a big drop from Paris and Los Angeles, hosts of the 2024 and 2028 Summer Games. But those bids were awarded long before the disease was fully exposed in Tokyo, where the entire nation of Japan is being held hostage by the IOC.
The 2020 Olympics were scheduled to be held in Tokyo last summer, but the pandemic, of course, scuttled those plans. So they postponed it for this summer. However, COVID-19 is still frighteningly out of control in Japan, so much so that many people in the country would just as soon the event disappear, never to be held.
This is a remarkable concession, considering the costs already for Tokyo before the Games have even begun. Japanese officials claimed that the cost for the Games would be about $7.3 billion in 2013. That figure, according to a variety of studies, rose to about $25 billion — last year. The final costs, if the Games do take place next month, will be higher. Even if they don’t, it will be higher.
Nearly two-thirds of Japanese residents want the Games canceled. That’s not a surprise. Even without COVID-19, most residents in host communities don’t want the Games. But now Japanese government officials also are voicing similar sentiments as the Games draw closer.
And the ones often most responsible for shoving this farce down the throats of the average taxpayer have also called for the event to be, at the very least, postponed — the very sponsors of the event themselves, according to the Financial Times, who reported that 47 sponsors with $3 billion invested in the Games want them called off next month.
Last month, one of Japan’s biggest newspapers, Asahi Shimbun, called for the Olympics to be canceled. The newspaper is one of the sponsors for the Games.
But IOC gangsters have said too bad — they are in charge, and they say nothing is going to stop these Games. Not the Japanese people. Not the Japanese government. Nothing. When asked by reporters if there was anything that could stop the Games at this point, IOC Vice-President John Coates said, “No, there’s not.”
And NBC Universal, with a reportedly unprecedented 7,000 hours of programming scheduled, is in lockstep with the gangsters, no matter the costs, financially or human. Imagine the costs to the network with no games next month.
“I can’t postpone again,” Seiko Hashimoto, president of Japan’s organizing committee, told Nikkan Sports.
Like IOC spokesman Mark Adams said last month, “We won’t be guided by public opinion.”
IOC boss Thomas Bach has his own opinion, apparently. He canceled a trip to Japan last month because of the fear of COVID-19.
Ironically, Australia is one of the countries that declared it won’t be sending its athletes to these Games.
The planning and scheming for the Olympics often take place in the dark. The Brisbane City Council voted to host the Games and back the costs involved after a lengthy closed-door meeting, with no public and no media allowed. And budget details for communities hosting the Olympics are typically hidden from the public.
Brisbane should have known better. Their countrymen in Sydney lost money hosting the 2000 Olympics — an estimated $100 million — and those are considered one of the most successful games in recent memory.
They should have spoken to the businessmen interviewed in the Sydney newspapers during the Games who told stories about how they had lost money or even went bankrupt based on the investments they made on the promise of gold coming to the city when the Games began.
One of the many dark truths about the Olympics is generally, more people leave the host city than enter during these events. I remember at the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lakes City, where the mayor went on television begging people to come downtown to the restaurants that had invested in hopes of Olympic glory with additional help and expansion, only to find empty tables and chairs.
Sometimes, the costs left behind are so great that it wrecks the economy of a nation. See Greece in 2004 and Brazil in 2016.
There are children in Brisbane who will be taxpaying adults with their pockets picked by the time these 2032 Olympics come and go.
There will be businesses that haven’t even started up yet that will be bankrupted by promises of gold lining the city streets.
Tell me that the Olympics isn’t some sort of civic disease, spread by government officials and business leaders seeking to both line their pockets and put a gold medal next to their legacies, no matter the costs to people who pay for their vanities.
You can hear Thom Loverro on The Kevin Sheehan Show podcast.
• Thom Loverro can be reached at tloverro@washingtontimes.com.
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