I suspect they would issue a visa without an airline ticket but thinking back to the days of the Olympics they wanted everything but your first born as evidence that you were not going to be a ward of the state. I just did mine a couple of weeks ago and provided them copies of airline and hotel reservations - they gave me a 1-year multiple entry with no problem.

The average turn around for a visa at the Chinese embassy visa department is 4-days so if you use a visa service and they try to charge you more for fast processing they are dipping deep into your pockets . I used Washington Express Visa Service (http://www.washingtonexpressvisas.com) and had it back in my hands in less than 10 days from dropping it off with FedEx and there was no rush charges