Chicago Indymedia has been painted invisible by Google! We'll soon find out how much effect this has on local and national policy. It might be like the Jimmy Stewart character in "It's a Wonderful Life" who is allowed to watch the fate his home town would suffer if he had never lived.

After reading about Obama's plan to visit Copenhagen during the final week of of deliberation by the IOC, I tried to find some of the Chicago IMC coverage I read earlier this year. When I searched "Olympics Chicago Indymedia" none of the hits were from chicago.indymedia.org. Several were from Portland IMC, making oblique references to the issues and I eventually found the story I remembered at indymedia.us:
"Chicago Opposition to 2016 Olympics Bid Ramps Up"

Even if you search by that headline you will not get the Chicago IMC website in google - you'll get the copy posted at indymedia.us.

When I noticed this with 2 of my recent stories about federal lawsuits against police in Illinois, I was a bit disappointed to see that topix.net was getting the story listed, but it does provide a link to the original. My personal blog did better in Google than the IMC.

UCIMC had this problem about a year ago, but things have changed. I posted - "Chicagoan files civil rights suit against the City of Galesburg" to both Chicago and UCIMC and to one of my own sites - try searching the headline in Google. (excuse me while I try right now) Thus far it's only found at UCIMC. My blog will eventually be listed, but Chicago will not, unless something changes. I would volunteer to help with this, but I assume you have someone up there on tap to address the problem.

Meanwhile, local opposition to Chicago's olympic bid is being suppressed in the media. I am not a fan of Drudge, but he claims that WFLD was approached by the Olympic Committee and when they asked the station to put a lid on coverage of the opposition,the station manager buckled, and changed his mind about replaying prior coverage of the opposition.

So, with the opposition seemingly silent we have a president with a history as a grass roots community organizer in Chicago - who heads to Copenhagen in spite of the grass roots outcry against this Billion Dollar Outrage.

If Chicago's plans were at all like those of Japan - where a "Green Olympics" is on the table, I might feel a bit different. But the Chicago project will leave expensive scars on the neighborhoods involved, including a stadium to be butted up against a bird sanctuary!

So is it a Wonderful Life? Get with Google, guys, and get the word out.

Both Yahoo! and msn Bing do recognize Chcago IMC, so all is not lost but I'm sure you agree that we must advance the cause of Independent Media to the FULLEST EXTENT POSSIBLE.

David Roknich,
Galesburg, Illinois

http://galesburg411.com
http://cityofgalesburg.us