[DeltAlum]

Several thoughts and comments:

I now live in the only city/state to ever turn down the Olympics after having been awarded them.

Security is going to be expensive and scary.

Don't know for absolute sure that Rudey is right, but I have never understood how they figure out how much financial benefit something like this is going to bring to a community. My suspicion is that they take a SWAG (Swingin' Wild A$$ Guess). Methinks Rudey may speak the truth.

He is definitely right about one thing -- there are important political reasons to have them. Plus, there's a huge amount of TV prestiege and money involved.

A huge part of the expense is building new infrastructure, which may or may not be of benefit to the community afterwards. Things like the LA Coliseum have certainly paid for themselves, but I don't know about other things. Maybe the games should be played in the same place every time. Build the stadiums, etc. once and move on.

The reason for the games being in Athens this year is that it is some big anniversary (I forget which) of the beginning of the "Olympic Games of the Modern Era." Nice idea, but it appears that the Greek Government is WAY behind on construction, etc. They may well be in over their heads.

Finally, I've worked (televised) some Olympics, and the atmosphere is unlike anything else I've been to. I'd hate to see them go. But, they need to be streamlined somehow so that the expenditure isn't so out of hand.