This news is actually a couple weeks old, but seems to have slipped through the cracks. Chicago mayor Richard Daley wants to enhance his city’s bid for the 2016 Olympics by building a domed stadium, and he wants to provide justification for such a stadium by luring a second NFL team to the city.

A Chicago business exec who talked to Daley said, “He threw it out as one possibility. He’d love to have a second team in Chicago.”

The extent to which cities will stretch themselves for the sake of hosting the Olympics is staggering. His desire for a second NFL team is sparked not by the logic of its own merits, but as a means to sweeten the pot for the possibility of sixteen days of fun and games?

Chicago’s population could probably support a second NFL franchise, but consider all the major American franchises that share the same sport and city with another franchise (Yankees/Mets, White Sox/Cubs, Giants/Jets, Lakers/Clippers). The Mets and Jets were able to wrest a fanbase of their own from the Yankees and Giants, respectively, who had already been in New York for decades. How, though, could a new or transplanted NFL team hope to cut into the fan base of the storied Bears, who have been around for almost 90 years? I don’t know what Mayor Daley is smoking, but I don’t want any, because apparently it makes you come up with bad ideas!

First, we had Mayor Daley and the whole seventh-inning stretch alcohol ban. (Which, supposedly was enacted as to curb any incidents that will make us look bad in our bid for the Olympics. Fair enough. I can dig that.)

Now? State Senator James Meeks is using the high-profile venue of Wrigley Field to protest what he is saying is a gap in funding for wealthy and poor school districts and 6,000 are expected to attend and make a ring around the stadium. Daley ain’t having it.

“We waited 100 years for the Cubs to get in. You shouldn’t disturb them. I really believe that. They’ve been very helpful [by contributing to] a lot of programs. This is their day,” said Daley, a die-hard White Sox fan.

[ ... ]

Meeks cut short his weeklong opening week boycott of Chicago Public Schools after two days to get a meeting with Gov. Blagojevich on the subject. But he said he’s not about to call off the Wrigley protest.

“We’ve waited 100 years to have [school] funding reform. I’m surprised that the mayor . . . would put more emphasis on a game than on peoples’ lives. These kids are being miseducated. They’re killing each other. A game is not more important than the future of public school children,” Meeks said.

If this does go through, I’m just hoping this supposed ring they’re creating doesn’t extend outside of Clark, Addison, Waveland and Sheffield. A blogger needs to get off the El stop at Addison and get home to his couch so he can promptly re-open his laptop again and sit in front of the TV all evening.

Did I mention I’m single ladies?!

(Via Chicagoist.)

If you want to have the Olympics in your town, you have to have an Olympic Village. Have to. Otherwise, you’re just another American town with a spring dressed up in international patriotic flair, hoping that some inspection committee falls prey to your wiles.

Chicago, it would seem, wouldn’t have that hard a time getting a village somewhere. In fact, they had it all set up to build a $1.1 billion village where a soon-to-be-vacated hospital currently resides. It’s a good move because the property gets put to use and later used to benefit the city in terms of housing. Or possibly not.

But the deal apparently broke down when the owner of the property, Medline Industries, broke off talks with the city.

The original plan called for demolition and cleanup costs to come out of Medline’s pocket, at a cost of $20 million that the city characterized as a “charitable contribution.” In the proposed deal, Mayor Daley wanted to roll the dice that the depressed real estate market would come roaring back.

The $20 million was supposed to be enough to cover demolition, environmental cleanup and five years of interest payments on the loan at a rate of 5 percent. But costs to raze the 37-acre campus came back 60 percent higher, at $32 million. Chicago 2016 Chairman Pat Ryan tried to salvage the deal by renegotiating the purchase price, but Medline apparently wouldn’t budge.

Well, $20 million is a lot of money. So I can totally see Chicago’s logic behind deciding to force Medline into paying … oh, wait, NO I CAN’T. Clean it up for them, Chicago. Demolish it. Bring the Olympics to us, back to America, where they belong in the center of the universe.

Seriously though, Daley, stop worrying about booze sales down in Wrigleyville and lock this down.

So, earlier today, we touched on the city enacting a voluntary ordinance for Wrigleyville bars to stop selling alcohol after the seventh-inning stretch of a Cubs clincher. An understandable request, but also one that was well, sort of a pain for business owners and CUBS FANS WHO WANT TO GET DRUNK AND CHEER ON THEIR CUBBIES WHOOOO!

So, the business owners expressed a little angst. And Mayor Daley has shot right back with some incredibly awesome quotes:

“This is about the Cubs. This is about where they worked so hard all year to get to. This is not about a lot of fans and a lot of drinking. We don’t want to see any incident outside, because if there is, that whole area will be voted dry tomorrow. Those citizens will get together and say, ‘I’m gonna vote every precinct dry. I’ll even vote Cubs Field dry,” Daley said.

[ ... ]

“Then I’ll have someone buy their place tomorrow. It’s not gonna cost ’em any business. They made enough money all year. I’m sorry. We’re just talking about common sense. That’s all this is. Because I’ll tell you one thing — if that community sees something they don’t like, they will not have a bar. They will not have a liquor license. They will vote it completely dry,” the mayor said.

OK, first off: I’m not sure just because these bars aren’t following a voluntary ordinance, the community is going to go off and vote every bar in Wrigleyville dry. That would be pretty nearsighted considering, you know, it might result in quite the economic downturn for the neighborhood. (And plus, I wouldn’t be able to stumble a few blocks home from Central. This is what is of utmost importance here.)

Don’t forget to stay tuned for this saga’s next act, in which Eddie Vedder pens a protest song against the mayor. Should be fun!

Image via the Reader.