This article says Blago's alleged crime is "irrelevant" in considering Chicago's bid.
Source(s):
http://www.chicagobreakingnews.com/2008/12/blagojevich-irrelevent-to-city-o...

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No way! I think it's nowhere near as big a deal as the China - Tibet deal, and they still got it.
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No. These things pass. I'll say that Olympics almost never pay off. Chicago (or any city in North America) would be well served by hosting a World's Fair.
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No way. While the world may want it elsewhere, they can't "take it away" on the basis of one man. For them to do so and name that as the chief reason won't be any different than saying that all of Chicago + Illinois are corrupt. While Corruption does come up in Chicago, it is generally far worse overseas.
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Depends, the IOC has been weighing political things more heavily now than in the past, but they still let China have it even with all the human rights violations. Frankly, I think it doesn't hurt Chicago because in the grand scheme of things, Blagojevich is a small player. If the president of the United States did something terrible, for example going to war with a country that didn't do anything(Iraq), then I could understand the IOC not wanting to give any city in the US the olympics. But that's all history, and we should get it back soon. Let's go Chicago!!
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chicago chances at 2016

LOS ANGELES -- Being the United States' candidate to host the Olympic Games isn't easy.

There was a long period -- from 1932 to 1984 -- when the Olympic Games was held in a lot of places, but not in the U.S. The multi-dimensional success of the 1984 Games in Los Angeles opened the big-money era in the Olympic movement, changing forever the nature of the way Olympic Games are organized.

Since then, Atlanta slipped past an overconfident Athens bid in 1990 to win the hosting rights for 1996 and no American city has been close after that. A U.S. bid for the summer Games was derailed for a while by the award of the 2002 Winter Games to Salt Lake City, which was reassuringly well organized after plenty of difficulties in Atlanta.

Then, New York was ousted in the second round of voting for the 2012 Games and Chicago is now up for 2016. Despite the confidence of some observers that Chicago is well-placed to win the 2016 host duties, in fact an American bid is continuously unpopular for multiple reasons and the technical quality of Chicago's plan ranked third in the applicant city round behind Tokyo and Madrid.

So what can Chicago do? Quite a bit, actually.

One important aspect to the Chicago candidature will be decided on Nov. 4 if Illinois Senator Barack Obama is elected President. He is, at present, quite popular in Europe, which also happens to have 48 of the current 108 members of the International Olympic Committee (44.4 percent). He will, of course, also draw interest from African members, currently with 17 members, 11 of whom are from sub-Saharan Africa. If he wins and makes a Tony Blair-like blitz of the IOC during its decisive meeting in Copenhagen, Denmark in October of 2009, he could help enormously.

Second and perhaps a necessary predecessor for Obama to be effective will be the resolution of the continuing fight over how much "Olympic money" the United States Olympic Committee receives from IOC revenues. Under a 1988 agreement, the USOC receives 12.75 percent of the U.S. television rights sale revenues for each Games and 20 percent of all IOC sponsorships and that accounts for about half of the American Olympic committee's funding during each quadrennial. Several International Sports Federation presidents are unhappy with that agreement and want the IOC to retain more of that money ... so that they can get it.

With the passing of the USOC chairmanship from the well-known Peter Ueberroth to the relatively little-known Larry Probst, Ueberroth is freed from his oversight responsibilities and can be delegated to try and come to an agreement. Ueberroth has said in the past that the U.S. could take less of a percentage if the total amount of revenue were larger, but as yet, the IOC has only come up with ways to spend money (the new Olympic Youth Games is an example) instead of making more money. This issue is going to have to be dealt with if Chicago is going to win the race to host in 2016.

Finally, the Chicago bid is going to have to be augmented to meet people's expectations of the United States. Regardless of the current financial turmoil -- for which the U.S. is being widely blamed -- the U.S. is seen as a rich country, but in Olympic circles, it rarely acts like it. Few world championships are held in the U.S. and the world track and field and world aquatics championships have never been held here. A meeting of the IOC has never been held in the U.S. other than those attached to a U.S.-hosted Olympic Games.

Moreover, the U.S. -- as a "rich" country -- is seen as a poor neighbor in the Americas. For 2016, the Chicago bid should be expanded to offer free pre-Games training camp facilities to teams wishing to come to the U.S. early. There are plenty of NCAA Division I universities not far from the Chicago area which could be used by such teams in southern Wisconsin, in the southern part of Illinois and in neighboring states such as Iowa, Missouri and Michigan. That kind of hospitality would go a long way in making IOC members feel that their teams would be welcomed. Elements of this concept have already been included in Tokyo's candidature.

In addition, the Chicago bid should create a U.S.-based training center for Western Hemisphere athletes to train in the Chicago area from 2012 to 2016 and receive free housing and coaching. By giving countries in Central and South America an opportunity to send some of their up-and-coming athletes to the U.S. to receive competent coaching and training is another way in which Americans can offer a helping hand to its closest neighbors and demonstrate that Americans are not all about money.

It's true that such programs would have plenty of critics in the U.S. who would like to have that money spent on developing American athletes. Why should we train athletes who would then come and beat us during the Games? Because unless this kind of support and hospitality is extended to countries who see the U.S. as simply a rich but stingy bully, the Games will not be held in Chicago in 2016, but in Madrid, Rio de Janeiro or Tokyo.

Rich Perelman has served as the U.S. national track and field team press officer and worked with five Olympic organizing committees beginning with the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles. He's also a board member of the Southern California Committee for the Olympic Games.

sources:

http://www.universalsports.com/ViewArticle.dbml?DB_OEM_ID=23000&ATCLID=1608614


Obama boosts Chicago’s Olympic chances
City makes case Friday to Europe’s IOC members

http://archives.chicagotribune.com/2008/nov/20/sports/chi-081120-chicago-olympics-obama
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G'day Carrie P,

Thank you for your question.

It certainly hasn't helped. It has been big news around the world. Google News has 53000 news stories related to it.

http://news.google.com.au/news?rlz=1C1GGLS_enAU306AU306&sourceid=chrome&um=1&tab=wn&nolr=1&hl=en&q=Rod+Blagojevich&btnG=Search+News

It has tarnished Obama's reputation as well to some extent and reminded people the world over of Illinois's reputation for political corruption.

The Olympics organisers are looking for political stability in the host city and related political entities (state and nation). This scandal is a very big black eye for Obama.

Regards
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Yes, many people think that Chicago and Illinois, in general is corrupt because of this scandal.

One FBI supervisor even said, "If it isn't the most corrupt state in the United States, it's one hell of a competitor."

Actually, Illinois is not even in the Top 5 of most corrupt states
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of course chicago has a great chance.I think Obama will win and this race
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