Daley Changes Tune On Olympics Funding Guarantee

Chicago Sun-Times:

Facing a credibility problem over his Olympics plans, Mayor Daley sought to assure taxpayers today that the games would not cost them any additional money -- despite his agreement to sign a host-city contract that could put them on the hook for losses.

Read the whole story: Chicago Sun-Times

Comments

[Chicago jo]

If he invalidates the LAZ contract he can make this happen.

[REGONE]

I wanted to ask my fellow bloggers, how would you handle the Olympics coming to Chicago? Some of the Olympic construction is tide into The Central Area Plan which is a planned 15.5 billion project? The Olympics would be a good proposition for Chicago, but wrong people leading the way. The spin and non-transparent back-room deals will ratchet up with billions on the table. Stay tuned!

[MovingtoNorway]

Check for your wallet after this guy is near you. Time for him and his corrupt clan to go away.

[stepintothelight]

We need a regime change here in Chicago. We need help. We promise to greet you as liberators!!!

[BigSurf]

I agree, we need a new mayor, plus there should be term limits for all politicians.
Daley pledged to the IOC he would sign the agreement without approval from the city council. His claim that he did not sign the agreement is skirting the issue.
Can they impeach him?

[Badfickle]

I would not trust daily to walk my dog much less run a city. I would like to know how much he's getting in kickbacks for STUP!D privatization moves he's done. Daley has assured Chicago will be hamstrung for revenue for 70 years.

[gallon]

Heard someplace that "the Daley administration goes back to the great fire, which
they probably started."

[driftglass]

Richiemandias

With apologies to Percy Shelley:

...And on the pedestal these words appear:
'My name is Richiemandias, Da Mare;
Look on my Olympics, Milwaukee, and despair!'.­..

Come see the rest at the Driftglass blog here: driftglass.blogspot.com/2009/06/daleymandias.html

[gallon]

favorite

[kortman23]

I hope we don't get the Olympics in Chicago. Da Mayor doesn't deserve it, and everyone with half a brain knows it will run WAY over budget and we will be left holding the bag. Daley doesn't care about us... he just does whatever he wants. The parking meter deal, the Children's Museum fiasco, ripping up Miegs Field, putting flower planters in the middle of the streets so you can't see oncoming traffic when you're trying to turn left... I could wear out my keyboard with all of the reason this man has got to go.

...and don't get me started on Todd Stroger!

[gavrielle]

Add in the millions being wasted on the Tunnel to Nowhere with funds being diverted from the system ratcheting up the cost of public transportation, and Daley and his out of town cronies have very nearly made Chicago unaffordable and unlivable for working class people.

Daley talks a good game, but the first decent Democratic candidate to oppose him is the Guy or Gal I'm voting for next. He's forgotten who put him where he is in favor of the prestige the wealthy elites have pretended to offer him to do their bidding . Honestly, if that man new what the old money rich say about him behind his back he'd blow a gasket. Even the new money rich think of him as their lap dog. If he wants to be remembered as a great man who did great things for his city, he needs to stop listening to the carpetbaggers and start listening to the middle class and poor.

Does he not realize that by throwing native Chicagoans to the wolves and forcing them out into the suburbs that he is undercutting his Democratic voting base?

[WhatTheHolyHeck]

Illusionists are terrific at misdirection. Daley, not so much.

Ignore what my right hand is signing! Lookit the pretty Olympic logo in my left hand!

[thrashertm]

Bread and circuses my friends, bread and circuses. Except unlike the Roman plutocracy that used these tactics to entertain and distract the masses, we all know that Daley and his cronies will just use the Olympics to further rape and plunder the public.

After the parking meter travesty and the 10.25% sales tax rate hike (highest in the country), enough is enough! Vote this bastard out of office!

[reader881]

I live in downstate Illinois. Daley wants the state to give up $250 million for this? Chicago gets the lion's share of the budget as it is, and we who live downstate get very little. I certainly hope the state funding does not come through, although of course it will. I guess more state parks will close, more road improvements downstate will not happen, more state services downstate will be cut. Typical.

[Tinsdale]

I guess it all depends on how Daley interprets the definition of "Signed.'

Mr. Daley's and Mr.Ryan's brow sweats and red-faced, blustering denials when confronted with uncomfortable facts are a gambler's "Tell" that there is something going on with the Olympics bid that they would rather not share with the public and press.

[MalakAlHaq]

Chicago the home of the 1967 COPS REUNION and where COPS get off for beating female bartenders senseless.

Oh yes, we need the Olympics like we need a hole in our heads.

But Daley, and Obama, will do anything in their power to bleed more money from us "The Taxpayers" to have their glory in the Sun.

And we thought Bush was bad!

[LeaderofMen]

Red herring. Conflating Daley with Obama is sick.

[47th]

Obama is a enthusiastic supporter of Daley.

[RanceSpergl]

Bush was much much worse than this. Don't be a fool. This is nothing compared to the travesty that is Bush.

[libmatters]

Track and field won't be easy in Chicago's 95° 95% humidity in the summer.

[mamala4]

Well it wasn't easy in Atlanta either.

[Garrett123]

The visible "air" in china wasn't so good.

[tonewheel]

Like today? It's 74 degrees and 40% humidity.

[gouge]

2nd most expensive city in the country- potholes that make the lunar landscape look smooth as a baby's bottom- no snow cleanup on sides streets and now, THE PARKING METER DISASTER-

DALEY'S LAST TERM IN OFFICE is this one.

[mamala4]

Let's hope so...he's bad news.

[LeaderofMen]

I will not vote for the man again. His two decades is over.

[suzonne]

couldn't have said it any better

[gouge]

The problem is finding someone decent to run......s­omeone not completely corrupt, with vision....­.Daley's legacy: Navy Pier -things like this-rather than thinking long term and creating a sophisticated event staging/cultural venue -a place to house what was once the top art fair in the world -Art Chicago, a place worthy of a world class city, we got the vulgarian, low-rent suburban epicenter/­kiddeeland from hell -thats out there now......w­hen you see Chicago having problems attracting conventions, tourists- I wonder why -

We need a new mayor, a smart mayor, who isn't bought and paid for before ever setting foot in office....­.someone with an intelligent adult vision for Chicago- someone will no doubt bring up Millennium Park -a step in the right direction -but do we really need that cheesy restaurant stuck in the middle of the place, owned by the mayors cronies? And where, is any art in evidence made by artists who have some relationship to Chicago? Must we as a great city always import our culture? Wouldn't a sign of our coming of age be, when we start looking here first?

[Badfickle]

Daley is a full blown id1ot.

[ByronD]

Any Chicagoan knows from experience - Daly's gonna do what he wants in the long run. If he wants the olympics, he'll do whatever he wants to get them.