I found this open letter printed in the Georgia Straight, a local left wing free paper here in Vancouver, a couple of weeks ago. Now, don’t get me wrong, even though politically, I’m pretty conservative, I love the Straight for the voice it gives to those who aren’t usually heard.
That said, sometimes there’s a reason those voices aren’t heard. From the article:
We would also recommend that you ask staff to consider if potential penalties involved with Vancouver withdrawing from hosting the 2010 Games outweigh the looming costs to the City for security and other Olympic costs.
This is marginal thinking at best. Pull out of the games? Are you nuts? Imagine the lawsuits from every business owner who decided to move to Vancouver, from every condo owner who bought here, from all the investors in the various Olympic venues, not to mention the costs of all the infrastructure projects begun here in the last four years.
Publishing an open letter by nut cases like this damages the reputation of the Georgia Straight and marginalizes voices that might have genuine, well-thought out issues about the Games (whatever they might be). Most frighteningly, there appears to be some people with medium-sized reputations who signed that letter. Come on, people, try reading what you signed!