Ante Kusurin

[Ante Kusurin @Ante_Kule]

@WhiteHouse Happy 250 America 🇺🇸

[MFA Croatia (MVEP) @MFA_Croatia]

🇭🇷🇺🇸 On the occasion of the 250th anniversary of the independence of the United States of America, Croatia extends its heartfelt congratulations to the American people!

Built on shared values, the enduring friendship, strategic partnership, and strong Allied bond between 🇭🇷 and 🇺🇸 within @NATO continue to grow from strength to strength.

As Allies and transatlantic partners, we are strengthening cooperation in defence, energy security, connectivity, trade, and investment. The recent Three Seas Initiative Summit in Dubrovnik reaffirmed our shared vision of prosperity and resilience.

Croatia looks forward to further advancing this valued partnership in the years ahead.

Happy 250th Birthday, United States of America! 🇺🇸

#US250

@StateDept @CroatiaInUSA @USAmbCroatia

[Ante Kusurin @Ante_Kule]

A friend’s breakdown of the Croatia-Portugal VAR decision is worth reading, and I agree with it in full. If this pattern continues, it reinforces a growing perception that success at the top level of football is shaped less by merit than by money and influence. @FIFAcom does not appear sufficiently committed to transparency or fairness in how these decisions are made and reviewed. At the highest level, outcomes are often decided by the smallest of margins — which is why officiating in these moments matters so much. The officials in this match made a call that ended @HNS_CFF’s run, and the reasoning behind it does not hold up to scrutiny.

The Croatia Call Might Be the Worst in Sports History

I’ve had a full day to sit with the Croatia call. I’ve watched the replays, gone through the rules, and measured it against the worst officiating disasters in sports.

My conclusion: that disallowed goal may be the worst call ever made. Not the most famous. Not the most argued-about. The worst.

Here’s why it differs from the usual suspects.

It isn’t Maradona’s Hand of God, where a referee missed a handball in real time, before video review existed. It isn’t Jim Joyce robbing Galarraga of a perfect game — brutal, but a split-second human error. It isn’t the Saints-Rams no-call, where everyone watching knew a flag belonged on the field. It isn’t Don Denkinger in the ’85 World Series.

Those were humans missing something fast and hard to see. This was the opposite.

The call on the field was a goal. Croatia had equalized in the final minutes, 2-2, headed for extra time. Then VAR stepped in — and instead of clean visual proof of a touch, instead of the ball’s path or spin actually changing, officials leaned on a faint “blip” from the chip inside the ball. That was the entire basis for reversal.

Watch it back. The trajectory doesn’t shift. The spin doesn’t shift. It sails past the defender’s head with no visible contact. Yet that blip was enough to rule a touch, which made the next Croatian player offside, which erased the goal, which ended Croatia’s tournament.

It gets worse. Even granting the faintest touch, that shouldn’t have ended the analysis. Under offside law, a defender who deliberately plays the ball can reset the offside phase. So the real question wasn’t just “did he touch it?” — it was “did the Portuguese defender deliberately play it afterward?” If he moved toward it, attacked it, got a genuine piece of it before the attacker entered the play, there’s a real case the phase should’ve reset. A stray deflection doesn’t reset offside. A deliberate play does. VAR needed to examine that too, not stop at a sensor reading and call it settled.

So the failure stacked in layers: a correct goal on the field, an alleged touch the video doesn’t clearly support, a sensor blip treated as proof, and a deliberate-play question never addressed — wiping out a stoppage-time equalizer.

This is what makes it worse than an ordinary blown call. VAR exists so referees don’t have to live with missing something huge in real time, with bad angles and bodies flying everywhere. That’s forgivable. But here, the on-field call was right. Review had every advantage — multiple angles, unlimited time, total control — and still overturned a goal on a sensor reading the footage doesn’t back up. A different category of failure entirely.

In a knockout game. On a goal that would’ve forced extra time. When the standard for overturning a call should be sky-high.

If the video doesn’t clearly show the touch, and the ball doesn’t react like it was touched, how do you erase a country’s World Cup on a sensor blip? And even allowing the faintest contact, how do you not fully examine whether the deliberate play should have reset offside?

VAR isn’t supposed to manufacture microscopic, unverifiable infractions. It shouldn’t take a goal off unless the error is unmistakable. This wasn’t unmistakable. It wasn’t obvious. And it changed everything.

[Bill Ackman @BillAckman]

The best evidence that @NYCMayor Mamdani has not held a job is the fact that he is sitting on the wrong side of the desk.

And listen to his words. On a day when we, and in particular, our leaders should be celebrating the 250 years of our nation’s history, he attacks us and what makes our country great.

Mamdani and the Democratic Socialists are grave threats to our present and our future.

[Patriot2929 @Patriot2929x]

Portugal vs Croatia

The decision to disallow Joško Gvardiol’s late equalizer for Croatia against Portugal relies on a fundamentally flawed and contradictory interpretation of the rules of football. The official ruling states that a microscopic sensor spike inside the ball registered a touch from Igor Matanović, constituting a "pass" that put Mario Pašalić offside. This logic falls apart under intense scrutiny when evaluating intent, physics, and the game's established precedents.

1. Completely Clean Initial Onside Positioning

First and foremost, when Ivan Perišić initiated the original ball into the box, every single Croatian player was in a completely legal, onside position. The entire sequence built toward a legitimate scoring play. Stripping away a critical goal based on a microscopic, invisible inflection point later in the sequence violates the spirit of fair play.

2. Contradictory Logic Regarding Intent

The VAR interpretation relies on a paradox. The officials claim that the touch from Portugal defender Renato Veiga was "irrelevant" and a mere deflection because he was not the intended recipient and was oblivious to the ball hitting his back. Yet, they simultaneously label Igor Matanović's headbutt attempt as a "pass" to Mario Pašalić. Matanović was clearly making a direct attempt on goal, not trying to pass. If the referee rules that a player's deliberate intent does not matter for Matanović, they cannot logically turn around and use a lack of intent to excuse Veiga.

3. The Precedent of Defender Liability and the "Block"

Ruling that Renato Veiga's touch was irrelevant directly contradicts basic football rules regarding defensive liability. Consider an identical physical scenario on the pitch: an attacker fires a shot or cross full force at a defender who has his back turned and has no idea the ball is coming. If that ball hits the oblivious defender's back and goes out of bounds over the goal line, the attacking team is awarded a corner kick. The defender is held fully liable for the touch simply by taking up space on the field.

Veiga did not stand in the 18-yard box by happenstance; he placed himself there deliberately to block the path to the net and take up critical space. If the microchip dictates that Matanović's goal attempt counts as a conscious play on the ball, then Veiga's body placement must be counted as a defensive block.

4. A Loose Ball Interception, Not a Pass

Because Matanović's action was a clear attempt to score, the resulting collision with Veiga’s back was a physical block that completely disrupted the ball's original speed and trajectory. Once the ball deflected off a defender who was actively acting as a human shield, the phase of play changed. Mario Pašalić did not receive a calculated, deliberate pass from his teammate; he intercepted a loose ball resulting directly from a defender’s physical block. Therefore, no offside offense occurred, and Joško Gvardiol’s goal should have stood.

#croatia #portugal @FOXSports
@barstoolsports
#fifa #portugalvscroatia
@FIFAWorldCup

[Marc Andreessen 🇺🇸 @pmarca]

Who is John Galt?

[End Wokeness @EndWokeness]

Not your father's Democratic Party

[Jonathan Choe @choeshow]

I know the singing of the national anthem before the World Cup match triggered a lot of Seattle libs. Good.

[Barstool Sports @barstoolsports]

BATURINA WITH A BEAUT TO BRING THINGS LEVEL

[JD Vance @JDVance]

Trump won we don’t have to do this anymore

[U.S. Senator John Fetterman @SenFettermanPA]

The world’s greatest soldiers have come from one place for the last 251 years:

The United States of America.

Happy Birthday, @USArmy! 🇺🇸

[End Wokeness @EndWokeness]

White House, June 2024 vs June 2026:

[Marc Andreessen 🇺🇸 @pmarca]

USA!

[J Stewart @triffic_stuff_]

🔥 Jeremy Clarkson had a fiery clash with BBC’s Victoria Derbyshire at the farmers’ protest against Reeves’ inheritance tax raid on family farms.

Victoria went straight for the gotcha:

“So it’s not about you, it’s not about your farm and the fact you bought a farm to avoid inheritance tax?”

Clarkson, visibly stunned:

“Classic BBC there, classic. The ‘fact’ that I bought a farm to avoid inheritance tax? The ‘fact’?”

Victoria doubled down: “You told The Sunday Times in 2021 that’s why you bought it?”

Clarkson, laughing in disbelief:

“These people… BBC. Let’s start from the beginning. I wanted to shoot. That’s even worse to the BBC. Which comes with the benefit of not having to pay inheritance tax.”

He pointed out the tax isn’t even an issue for him personally as he can simply put the farm in a trust, but he’s standing with ordinary family farms that will be hammered.

After sparring over the real numbers affected, Clarkson urged the government to U-turn.

Victoria: “And get the money from where?”

Clarkson: “Walk into any of the offices around here and if you don’t understand what somebody’s job is, fire them.” 😂

Classic Clarkson.

[Marc Andreessen 🇺🇸 @pmarca]

They’re so mad.

[Elon Musk @elonmusk]

Video made with Grok Imagine

[Marc Andreessen 🇺🇸 @pmarca]

First in a 10,000-part Atlantic “Actually…” series.

[Elon Musk @elonmusk]

The level of fraud here is mind-blowing

[Elon Musk @elonmusk]

Even 2010 tbh