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Originally Posted by iccky
On the Olympics, there was an editorial in the New York Times a few days back explaining why New York didn't need the Olympics. I can't find it now, but the gist of it was that the Olympics are valuable to highlight world cities that people might not otherwise think of. The Atlanta Olympics highlighted the success of the New South. Olympics in China and Greece will attempt to show that those nations have joined the modern world. More infamously, Hitler tried to use the Berlin Olympics to show that Germany had reemerged as a great power.
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This sounds like jingoistic nonesense. "New South"? Isn't that term just a little postbellum in nature? Greece and China joining the modern world?!! They're some of the oldest, most influential, most important civilizations in history. Maybe some American hack thinks like this, but the average educated world citizen knows that, thousands of years before the US even existed, both these cultures had profound influences on human development. The only comment I agree with is the one related to Berlin.
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New York doesn't need this boost. Everyone knows New York already as the capital of commerce, culture, in many ways the capital of the world. New York has nothing to gain by hosting the Olympics.
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New York the capital of culture? Capital of the world?!
Whilst I've always wanted to visit NYC, I'm a bit surprised to hear it described as "Capital of the World".
No where
needs the Olympics. But most cities like the idea of hosting it. Not everything has to have a mercenary motivation. Perhaps the committe want to host it because of the cultural, social and sporting benefits and kudos it will bring?
Mr Mephisto