JIM LINDGREN: “I have been surprised at some of the criticism of President Obama for going to Copenhagen to lobby for the Olympics. Few commentators bother noting that, had Obama NOT gone to Copenhagen, many would have been blamed him for Chicago’s losing its bid.”
UPDATE: For Larry Sabato, it’s not that he went, but that it was bungled:
Let me get this straight. The White House puts a new President’s prestige on the line, flies POTUS, the First Lady, and half of the administration to Europe to underline the importance of the gambit—and then Chicago finishes fourth—dead last—in the Olympics voting? Will anyone’s head roll for causing Obama this acute embarrassment on the international stage?
Political capital is a precious commodity. It is never to be wasted. That’s why many have been questioning whether Obama is making too many media appearances, lessening the importance of each one. And that’s why almost every observer will wonder how the White House got snookered into Olympics-gate—an unnecessary humiliation that will be on the permanent list of losses for this Presidency.
Yes, the White House political operation is supposed to protect a President from this sort of thing, but according to the New York Times they didn’t even understand the Olympic Committee’s “byzantine” politics.
ANOTHER UPDATE: More thoughts from Richard Fernandez. “Asking for freebies without showing the money is bad business etiquette and it ain’t funny. . . . And the world, strangely enough, expects America to act like America, not someone who aspires to be one of the boys. The lesson was cheap at the price.”
Meanwhile, Jim Treacher emails: “Obama just took the gold in the Men’s Political-Capital Toss.”
MORE: Inexperience:
There’s actually something worrisome about this whole Chicago fiasco, and it goes back to President Obama’s inexperience. Diplomacy 101 tells us that your head of state only shows up on the high-profile stage when a deal is complete. The lesson that most politicians learn well before they gain positions of power is that diplomacy is done by diplomats, professionals who work through all the negotiations and the hardball tactics and the carrot/stick combinations. The principals in the matter gather to discuss high-level topics and to smile for the cameras as the agreement is being signed. Heads of state do not conduct diplomacy, they ratify it, and surprises are entirely unwelcome at those summits and signing events (hence Reagan’s anger in Iceland.) . . . President Obama just got upstaged by an organization against whom no retaliation is acceptable, and he wants to meet with the Iranians next month? We are in deep, deep trouble.
Uh oh. And Ann Althouse goes to the video:
It’s all about failure, excusing failure, relishing failure, and pretending that it’s too mean to relish failure. (Like Dems wouldn’t have hooted with glee if Bush had gone all out trying to get the Olympics to come to Texas and gotten his comeuppance in the first round of voting.)
Here’s what I would like to talk about in all this: The First Lady and her husband made terrible presentations to the IOC! In retrospect, it makes complete sense that they got the boot in Round 1.
Video at the link.