The Olympic Games have long been criticized for being too political. And now comes President Barack Obama’s decision to campaign on behalf of Chicago bid to host the 2016 Games.

Alex Koppelman writes on Salon.com:

President Obama is going to Denmark this week to lobby on behalf of his adopted hometown’s bid to host the 2016 Summer Olympics. That means Chicago’s effort has become a target for the president’s opponents, including Drudge Report editor Matt Drudge.

As of this post, Drudge’s site is currently leading with one of his occasional exclusives. This one features a banner headine screaming, “Fox-TV Chicago ordered not to run anti-Olympics story.”

CNN’s Ed Hornick reports:

Critics say Obama is making a risky move, since key issues — ranging from Iran’s nuclear ambitions and health care reform in Congress to deteriorating conditions in Afghanistan — are pressing on the administration.

“I think it’s baffling that the president has time to travel to Copenhagen,” said Sen. Kit Bond, R-Missouri. “[Obama's] got a lot of responsibilities. His number one responsibility is to keep our country safe.”

USA Today’s Reid Cherner and Tom Weir offer their view:

The biggest presidential mistake regarding the Olympics came nearly 30 years ago, when Jimmy Carter ordered a U.S. boycott of the 1980 Moscow Olympics in protest of the Soviet Union’s invasion of Afghanistan.

Three decades later, Barack Obama is taking heat for going to Denmark, to lobby on behalf of Chicago’s bid to host the 2016 Olympics. Why? Because many people feel he should stay home and solve problems, like the one we have in Afghanistan.

That’s how far we haven’t come.

FoxNews.com offers:

But with the health care debate still brewing, with Iran stoking international concerns over its nuclear program and with a decision pending on how to deal with the rising violence in Afghanistan, the president will be leaving at a key time for his administration.

Rep. Pete Hoekstra of Michigan, the ranking Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, said Obama’s decision is a sign that the president needs to “establish some priorities” — the most pressing of which, he said, is the need to respond to Gen. Stanley McChrystal’s request for more U.S. troops in Afghanistan.

“The president can’t make everything a number one priority, because the end result will be that there is no priority,” Hoekstra said. “Nothing is a priority, because everything is a priority.”