World Cup Thread

I don’t know much about soccer but I do know a lot about the morality of nations, or more often, their disgusting immorality. Obviously Spain and Portugal are relitigating the Treaty of Tordesillas here. And really Portugal got screwed by the line on the map drawn by Pope Alexander IV since almost all of the Americas were west of it and the economic resources of what Portugal did get in Brazil weren’t great compared to the Spanish metal bonanzas in the Andes and in Mexico. Still, both nations were colonizing murderous scumbags. So who cares. Their other histories are too similar to care much. They were both fascist at the same time, they are both relatively cool now, they both have great food. Portugal has Jose Saramago but Spain has Pedro Almodovar, so they are equal on the top artist list too. And if Spain also has Rosalia, well, it’s a much bigger country and you can’t give it too much credit for having more international artists.

Meanwhile, Belgium and the U.S. is the Battle to Take Credit for Murdering Patrice Lumumba. Certainly Belgium’s history in the Congo is particularly revolting and genocidal and almost equals the evil that the United States has caused the world for existing. Not quite though. Both were involved with the murder of Lumumba, I’m sure a tie would be preferable here as both teams could unite over foreign adventurism and the assassination of democratic leaders who didn’t do the bidding of the CIA and Belgian capitalists. Alas, it’s too late in the tournament for ties. I guess whoever wins is most proud of its evil history.

Isn’t the World Cup fun?

…Oh by the way, if you can, read the New Yorker article on FIFA head Gianni Infantino. It really explains why he would do Trump’s bidding. See, where Sepp Blatter was venal and corrupt, for Infantino, power + money = goodness. So the natural order of things is to be the oligarch with all the other oligarchs like Trump and Putin and the Saudis. Thus the FIFA Peace Prize actually made sense in his twisted head and of course he’s going to do Trump’s bidding. Trump is more powerful and wealthier than whoever heads Belgium. And he keeps enough cash rolling into the federations around the world that no one is going to overlook their greed for principle. It’s really disturbing.