Daley has big shoes to fill for 2016 Olympics

August 22, 2008 Southwest News-Herald - City & Suburban

Daley Has Big Shoes To Fill for 2016 Olympics

By RAY HANANIA

Mayor Daley was easy to spot in his pink hat at the Beijing Olympics, but I bet he was green with envy at watching the opening ceremonies, wondering to himself how in the heck can he surpass the bar set by China?

Simply put, the opening ceremonies were phenomenal. Even though the impressive image of “giant footprints” formed by fireworks walking across Beijing to the Olympics “Nest” stadium were faked, everything else was unbelievable.

The Chinese Government brought 2008 people to beat drums in an opening count down, with glow-in-the-dark drum sticks, in a ceremony putting all past Super Bowl halftime shows to shame. The programs that followed tapped a Chinese Army of 22,000 additional performers.

The stadium seats 91,000, which was larger than the populations of at least two countries that competed. The “Nest” was wrapped with a huge “TV screen” displaying a stunning array of high definition images.

The center field had a floor that went from graphic animation to three-dimensional formations using blocks replicating ocean waves — not by computer control but through the intricate coordination of individual people who moved each block up and down in precise synchronization.

A Chinese athlete “walked” sideways around the stadium’s screen to light a spectacular and huge Olympic torch.

But all I could think of was what was going through Mayor Daley’s mind as he watched the 90 minute spectacle unfold?

My first thought was that dictatorships like China can tapped forced labor to do what it wants on a whim. It doesn’t need to go hat-in-hand to a legislature to beg for money to cover outrageous opening price tags some placed at $200 million, not including the billion spent on building the Olympic Village.

Chinese dictator “President” Hu Jintao reportedly didn’t like one set of costumes among the 15,000 costumes used, and, three days before the opening ceremony, ordered all new ones with lights that created a synchronized visual masterpiece.

So what might Daley do for the opening of the 2016 Chicago Olympics, if it happens?

Well, for one, the Chicago Machine is not dead, and there are more than 38,000 employees at City Hall who can be tapped at any time to create the worker force Daley needs to make his ideas a reality.

It’s a cinch he’ll have at least 2016 people to start with, just counting ghost-payrollers who never show up for anything at City Hall except their checks.

The performers can wear easy-to-fashion felon stripe uniforms with electronic ankle monitors from the County Jail, with dim amber street lights balanced on their heads that will need to be replaced every 15 minutes.

ComEd can shut electricity throughout Cook County — and blame it on a storm — redirecting it to the Chicago Olympic Stadium, that instead of built to look like a “nest,” can replicate in the finest detail a white envelop stuffed with cash.

What will the 2016 opening drummers use for their opening number? Garbage can lids painted in a glow-in-the-dark street corner blue camera lights tapping to the tune of the themes from “The Godfather” or “Jaws.”

If the stadium crowd doesn’t applaud, Daley can Denver Boot every car in the parking lot. By 2016, you won’t need any parking tickets to get the Boot.

Daley can just order it on a whim.

Oh. I wasn’t talking about Richie Daley being mayor. He’ll retire. The mayor of Chicago in 2016 will probably be his son, Patrick.

All hail Emperor Daley.

end

A Gold Medal Olympic Vacation Competition

August 29, 2008 Southwest News-Herald - City & Suburban

A Gold Medal Olympic Vacation Competition

By RAY HANANIA

The competition for the Gold Medal was Olympic. Not in Beijing, but on the beaches of Punta Cana, where I spent a week researching Cuban cigars and teaching my son the basics of how to survive in the real world.

Every morning, I would get to the beach at 6:30 in a fierce race with teams representing Russia, China, Italy, France and Spain and a field of 130 others. There were only 10 perfect palm tree covered “cabanas” on the beach, and you had to get there early to claim one.

What’s the point of going to a beautiful paradise beach if you are going to schelp in at 11 and plop down on a towel in the sand?

I can report that I’ve won the competition every morning. Boo-rah for the American team! Well, I guess I’m considered about as American as Yao Ming. (OK. He’s an exception, a Chinese-born athlete who plays for the Houston Rockets basketball team. In the Olympics, he plays for China.) Did you ever notice that when mentioning American athletes of certain ethnic and racial backgrounds, they always mention their race but never the ethnicity of “Americans” like Michael Phelps?

Anyway, back to my own Olympic Gold Medal competition in Punta Cana at the Bavara Princess Beach.

There’s an art to securing lounge chairs and a cabana. It’s the same no matter where you go in the Caribbean, except that the world has changed. Dramatically. It used to be that places like this were filled with arrogant and obnoxious American tourists.

Well, that’s changed. Today, the resorts in the Caribbean are filled with Europeans, Russians and Asians enjoying the fact that President Bush screwed up our economy with the stupid Iraq war. (OK, that’s my last political reference. Just kidding.) Our dollar is worth less than a “peso” and I don’t care what Central American country you visit. It buys nothing.

But I wouldn’t let that deter me. I rushed out, research in hand, and made my way in a 3,600-foot dash for the beach. And every morning, beat the Russian by a nose (that’s where being Arab comes in handy, I guess). And the French, the Chinese and the guy with the full body tatoo.

They were right behind me and there was no courtesy “good mornings” or “hellos.” In any language. We were all there for one purpose. Keep our wives from screaming at us when we didn’t get the best spots.

There is an art to saving seats. You reserve them at 6:30 a.m. and don’t get back until around 11 after breakfast so you have a lot of faith that despite the tourists (any ethnicity), they will be there when you return.

You keep the towels from the day before and lay them on the lounge chair, stretched out and tucked in the niche in the back of the head rest and push that down to “lock it in.” 50 Points!

Then, you put a book you’ve either already read and don’t care if it’s stolen, or one no one will touch. I had Chelsea Handler’s book (Chelsea Lately) and made sure the cover faced out every morning. (Actually, Chelsea’s book is hilarious but none of the foreigners could figure out who she was, so it was a safe bet not to get stolen.) 25.35 points.

Then, to play to the sympathy of the crowd, I put my son’s little sand buckets and shovels on the chair. 19.15 points.

Boo-Rah.

This happened every morning like clockwork, and as I said, representing the American team, WE WON. 94.5 points. (If I can add right.)

No one said hi. Mainly because we couldn’t speak anyone else’s language, I think. But still. The first morning I tried and said, “Isn’t it like a vacation? Your wife makes you run out at 6:30 to grab a lounge chair, too?” And the guy walking fast next to me — 25 mph — just grunted with a Spanish accent. That’s when I knew the competition was real.

And all of the men sat out there looking at each other. Until exactly 7:22 a.m. when the tall, blond haired Swedish woman jogged past.

Topless.

Slowly.

Priceless!

end

Chicago Mayor Daley hopes for inspiration from Chinese Olympics trip

Click comic strip to view larger image
Ray Hanania's World Comic Strip
August 2, 2008
Mayor Daley hopes to find inspiration during his visit to Beijing, China for the Olympics next week.
Go to http://professivecomicstrips.blogspot.com/ to view more comics