A Stitch in Haste

Answer quickly — no thinking, no Googling:

Which city hosted the 1992 Winter Olympics? 1996 Summer? 1998 Winter? 2000 Summer? (Answers here.)

I doubt most readers could name more than one of those sites without racking their brains. Yet Mayor Bloomberg and others continue to presume that New York hosting the 2012 Olympics will somehow be an “event for the ages.” History suggests otherwise.

And can we please debunk once and for all this myth that the Olympics are a wealth-creator for host cities? Every recent Olympics ended up costing the host city’s taxpayers. In fact, the International Olympic Committee requires host cities to subsidize the event with taxpayer dollars.

But of course New York is indeed different — different in the sense that our Olympic debate has to be even more complicated than normal. Our debate has to include a football stadium, the Politics of the Pull and the Politics of the Warm Fuzzy Feeling.

The debate over whether the Jets should build a new stadium on the West Side of Manhattan is of course not a debate about that at all. That would reduce to a rather boring debate about a private entity building a private structure on private land. And that would be too easy (zoning and other use restriction laws notwithstanding).

No, this is really a debate about whether $600 million of taxpayer money should be subsidizing a private enterprise and whether a government entity — the Metropolitan Transportation Authority — should be offering a noncompetitive sweetheart deal to that same private enterprise.

Regardless, the whole debate is rapidly descending into a theater of the absurd, with the same tired nonsense being spewed by the same tired politicians. The center of the stupidity is, as I mentioned, the circular reasoning behind the bait-and-switch between the stadium and the 2012 Olympics. To put the illogic succinctly: “We need the stadium to get the Olympics, and we need the Olympics to get the stadium.” Meanwhile, the question of why we should want either in the first place is conveniently blanked out.

Here’s the latest feeble attempt to answer that important question. This time it’s a local hack politician on the City Council named David Yassky, in the New York Post:

First, hosting the 2012 Games would be of enormous benefit to New York City. It would fortify the city's place as capital of the world community, bring thousands of visitors and showcase the city to millions of potential tourists.
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Second, the mayor is almost certainly correct that the IOC will not select New York as host city unless full governmental approval for the stadium is in place before July.
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To keep our Olympic bid alive, the state should act now to assure the IOC that New York is ready, willing and able to follow through on its Olympic plan. But that does not mean the state needs to give its blanket approval for the stadium project. Instead, the state should approve the stadium conditional upon New York's designation as host city for the 2012 Games. We should tell the IOC: If you come, we will build it.

If New York is not designated as the Olympic host city, state leaders can then decide whether the stadium is a sound use of taxpayer funds based solely on the benefits of bringing the Jets back to New York and expanding the Javits Convention Center.

Some hasty stitches:

--As I mentioned above, it is a flat-out lie to assert that the Olympics will be an economic boon to the City. The Olympics are never profitable — taxpayers always get short-changed. The IOC requires it.

--Speaking of short-changed, am I the only New Yorker insulted by Yassky’s assertion that New York needs the Olympics to “sell itself”? The world doesn’t already know about New York City? Are we not already the “capital of the world community”? The world needs a two-week excuse to visit here? I think not. What New York City does need to help tourism is the elimination of its 13.625% + $2/night hotel tax. Or the permanent restoration of the clothing exemption to the 8.625% sales tax. Or the breaking of the who-knows-how-many theater unions that have driven the cost of a Broadway ticket to $100 and restricted the number of plays that can be run profitably. Abolishing the anti-private-property smoking ban in bars wouldn’t hurt either. And so on. It’s not what we offer that makes us uncompetitive as a tourist destination — it’s how much we charge for it.

--Another convenient blank-out is to confuse “the Jets should play in New York” with “the Jets should play in Manhattan.” They’re not the same thing. And funny that no one ever talks about the Giants playing in New York. Go figure.

--Fancy hypothetical distinctions between “blanket” approval and “conditional” approval conveniently evade what exactly is being approved — not construction of the stadium per se, but $600 million in taxpayer money to subsidize a private structure being sought by a private business. If the Jets wanted to build their stadium on their own land with their own money, then I would be the first and loudest supporter of the plan (cf., the nonsense about how New Yorkers, even those who are not fans, should be expected to pay a “rooting tax” for the privilege of having the Jets play in their city).

--Oh, and let’s not forget that other sneaky bait-and-switch regarding the Javits Convention Center — what does that have to do with anything? Are the Jets going to be playing there too? If not, then why are we talking about it?

The obfuscation of what is really a trivial question — "Why subsidize the New York Jets?" — with false promises (and threats) regarding the Olympics and sleight-of-hand regarding the Javits Center shows how untenable the stadium's supporters' position really is. Hopefully New Yorkers will see through this political fog and keep all the parties honest. Because so far, they've been anything but.

FULL DISCLOSURE: For what it’s worth, I should acknowledge that this local hack politician has a day job as a professor at my former law school. I never had a class with him and wouldn’t know him if I tripped over him. Still, law professor or no, local hack politician is as local hack politician does.