Immigration Policy Ctr: U.S. lost Olympic Games bid due to "anti-visitor policy", "broken immigration system"

Today's "Tie Every Current Event to Your Agenda No Matter How Tenuously" award goes to the Immigration Policy Center, which blames the failure of the U.S. to bring the Olympics home to Chicago on our immigration policies (link). Per a press release:

"A litany of voices have been warning for years that the U.S. is slowly adopting an anti-visitor policy that is harming business, higher education and families... Stories in the press and report after report have all highlighted how our broken immigration system is hampering our nation's ability to attract the best and the brightest and stay competitive with other nations around the world."

1. There indeed has been some sort of tightening of visa requirements in order to reduce the possibility of terrorists jetting in, however, any idea that Obama wouldn't have made sure that as many people as possible could travel to Chicago is absurd.
2. The system is broken canard and the rest aren't usually used for issues relating to tourism but for actual immigrants (and illegal aliens); the IPC is repurposing it for their argument (such as it is) or just has it as a macro.

UPDATE: This story has also spread to other supporters of massive/illegal immigration, and it appears to have started at least in the MSM with Michelle Higgins of the New York Times with this oft-quoted passage (link):

Syed Shahid Ali, an I.O.C. member from Pakistan, in the question-and-answer session following Chicago’s official presentation, pointed out that entering the United States can be "a rather harrowing experience."

The story has also been re-transmitted by Andrea Nill of ThinkProgress (thinkprogress.org/2009/10/02/chicago-olympics-bush).

Fri, 10/02/2009 - 15:45 · · Importance: 4