I was reading an interesting article in The Economist about how hosting these mega sporting events are not good for the hosting country, particularly for the local area. Many white elephant construction projects go un-used and are poorly maintained afterwards. I think Tokyo may be able to buck that trend by actually putting many of these venues to good use after the games. But the article is also pretty damning in its criticism of the IOC for taking a larger and larger share of television revenues. Tokyo should probably try to negotiate better terms. I’d hate to see the Olympics devolve into showpiece spectacles for dictators.