2010 Olympic Security

It was supposed to cost $150 million to provide security at the 2010 Winter Olympic Games in Vancouver. Compared to other security budgets at previous games, this did not seem like enough so for the last few years the price tag was disputed until finally the Vancouver Olympic Committee admitted that the cost would, indeed, be higher. The figure of one billion was bandied about but you knew that the outrage at that amount would be very great and so did the committee. I believe they reasoned that dropping the figure by $100 million would be acceptable after having thrown around the larger figure for so long. So now the official number is $900 million. Whew, we say, what a bargain.
This is an outrageous amount of money to spend to protect us all from something that "might' happen. Here is my idea, but don't spread it around or it will not work: We declare that we are spending $900 million on security and that it will mostly be on surveillance, hidden cameras, plain clothes police, un-marked security vehicles etc. Then we put out a few more uniformed police and security guards than normal, but forget about all that other stuff. Just knowing it is there will be a huge deterrent to the terrorists, right? We save all that money and nothing bad will happen, not that it would have happened regardless.
The ultimate weapon will be the threat of punishment for anyone causing any kind of problem during the games. It could be an un-supervised bob-sled ride or a downhill giant slalom race wearing only a pair of jockey shorts. There really are many ways a perpetrator can be punished in the cold winter of Whistler.
*Photo above is not mine but is a great shot of Whistler Village, the hub of the games in 2010.