Yes, it's fair to allow the "world's games" to be hosted by a continent where they've never been played, and yes, Chicago's detractors (many home-town) made way too much noise. Yes, the constant chatter about Chicago graft reminded a few of the Salt Lake City problems. But in the right wing echo chamber there has been absolutely no discussion of the real reason why Chicago was dumped on the first round of voting. That would simply bring up bad memories.
Take a long jump and discuss with me the message a Pakistani representative gave President Obama right before the vote.
In our "see no evil, hear no evil" society, it's not politically correct to talk about the reasons that reasonably neutral folks around the planet think we are xenophobic and unfriendly. But here it is in a nutshell: Our post-9/11 visa policies. The simple fact is that many countries feared that their athletes and important visitors might have great difficulty clearing the US visa hurdles.
We've been ignoring headlines like this (from BBC, 2008):
The US is to tighten visa restrictions to allow it to screen all short-term visitors from Japan and Western Europe. US Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said visitors to the US who do not need visas will be required to register with the government online. The security regulation, set to begin next year, will require visitors to register three days before they visit.
The new policies have caused inordinate delays and severe problems for many meetings of professionals planned for the U.S. Even the prestigious National Academy of Sciences has been maintaining a database of problems:
Are you a scientist traveling to the U.S.?
Has your visa case been delayed more
than 21 days? If you're willing to share this information, please submit a questionnaire.
And the Academy's official statementbegins this way:
As representatives of organizations of U.S. higher education, science, and engineering, we have been deeply concerned about the significant increase in delays experienced earlier this year by many international students, scholars, and scientists who have applied for visas to study, conduct research, or attend conferences in this country
From Pakistan, India and China there have been further expressions of concern particularly about tightening of H1B visas:
... calling for Indian consumers to boycott the goods of 14 U.S. multinationals... "If these policies hurt Indians abroad, then we have to take steps to hurt American companies in India," he says. "The reaction must be strong, or else who knows if the legally resident Indians in the U.S. are one day thrown out."
Is it any wonder that the world is leary of our Welcome mat? The note about Pakistan's explanation of its vote was only mentioned in passing on one station, because the right wing noise machine was more focused on diminishing Obama's stature. But the fact is, this is another part of our current administration's inheritance from the Bush administration (although their failure to take firm steps to reverse the policies before the bid might show them, again, to be a bit naive.)