It's been 14 years since Salt Lake City won the 2002 Winter Olympics and 11 years since the investigation into Salt Lake's tactics resulted in 50 new rules for bidding cities, including the elimination of visits to bid cities by IOC voting delegates.

So if reforms were instituted and sanity was restored, just one question:

Why have each of the four cities bidding for the 2016 summer Olympics outspent Salt Lake's bid budget by more than five to one?

In 1995 Salt Lake spent $6.3 million to get the Olympics.

Adjusted for inflation, $6.3 million equates to $9.1 million in today's dollars.

And yet, Chicago, Rio, Tokyo and Madrid — one of which will be awarded the 2016 summer Games in a vote today in Copenhagen — have each spent $50 million or more on their respective bids.

And on what?

Salt Lake's budget had to not only cover expenses for meeting IOC delegates here and abroad, but also the costs of those infamous university scholarships for IOC relatives — none of which is allowed any more.

That must be some multimedia presentation they're going to give today in Denmark.

Chicago — America's choice for 2016 — had already spent $48 million on its bid by Aug. 19. By the time the final accounting is in, factoring in expenses of President Barack Obama's visit to Copenhagen, no one will be surprised if Chicago spends the entire $77 million it raised through private donations.

That would be 12 times what Salt Lake spent just 14 years ago.

Clearly, the more the Olympic bidding process changes, the more it spins out of control.

Obama's visit is the first by a U.S. president to an IOC vote in history. He'll be joined by the king of Spain, the president of Brazil and the prime minister of Japan.

Yesterday it was scholarships and salt water taffy; today it's one-on-ones with heads of state.

Obama's charisma is expected to greatly help Chicago's cause, particularly with the 16 votes up for grabs from Africa.

In 1995, Salt Lake got almost all the African votes. Much of the success was attributed to charismatic lobbying by Utah businessman Bennie Smith, an African-American. (And OK, those scholarships might have also had something to do with it.)

The African votes helped Salt Lake get 54 votes out of 92 possible in the first round of voting. The majority total resulted in a rare opening-round victory.

For America today, it could be deja vu all over again. Obama's appearance might make the difference.

In a just and equitable world, however, Chicago wouldn't get the 2016 Games. Rio de Janeiro would. That's because no city in Central America or South America has ever hosted an Olympics.

America, on the other hand, has hosted the Olympics eight times, counting winter and summer. Japan has had the Games three times and Spain held the summer Olympics as recently as 1992.

It remains to be seen who will prevail in today's vote in Copenhagen. But whoever it is, Salt Lake can say it spent a lot less per vote. Heck, we bought them for a fifth of what these guys are paying.

Lee Benson's column runs Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Sunday. Please send e-mail to benson@desnews.com.