All former FIFA-certified referees raise your hands.
🙋
That's right I used to both play & ref soccer. Now I mostly just mock it. Until they mess w/ Team USA.
This picture of the collision between Balogun & the B&H player looks awful, but it's complete garbage.
Wrong angle to see what really happened.
Balogun was closer to the ball and the B&H player came from his right AND behind initiating the contact. He caused his own suffering.
The ref got it right initially as a no call. They were both playing the ball. Even in a sport known for pitifully lame flopping sometimes two dudes just crash into each other and do some actual damage. Doesn't mean there was a foul.
The replay guy then saw an opportunity to take the Americans down a notch and the ref bought in and made an egregious red card ejection.
If any call was made it should have been against the B&H player who came from behind and out of the sight line of Balogun.
The outrage now is "How dare the Americans get this absurd attempt to weaken them overturned".
Taking a player out of a once in a lifetime game and tournament should be an exceedingly high bar. This was not.
The people pretending to care about the rules are really mad the Americans aren't getting screwed over. It's a common sentiment and all around the world hating Americans for being the Biggest, Baddest and Best is as much a national sport as Soccer Ball.
I've lived overseas for six years and traveled to several dozen countries. Furriners love to hate on us. I'm not saying it's all underserved, I'm just saying it's not new and it's everywhere.
I can't blame them, we're barely 250 years old and we have accomplished more than any country in history. We have invented more amazing things, freed more people from tyranny and lifted more people from poverty and that stings, especially for the Euros who think they own our history.
They do, the part that we left and left behind. The part we are making now they can only watch and be chafed about. Because they can't even come close.
So they were salivating at knocking a US star out of play on a BS call. Sorry Jacques Belgique, you're going to have to take on a full US squad. Good luck, I hope we make you cry some more in the game tonight.
The Balogun red card, and the controversy over the suspension of the disciplinary action -- if your are commenting , try to get the terms straight -- is unprecedented for one simple reason:
VAR has never been used in this manner in past WCs.
No foul was called on the play. A Video Assistant Referee looking at a televised replay "suggested" to the Center Referee that he should look at the video.
This is not too much different that the NFL establishing a video review center in New York where every play in every game is monitored and reviewed. It started in 2017, but it has expanded continually along with upgrading its equipment.
VAR was first brought to the Russia World Cup in 2018, but like anything new it was not used as widely as it is today. Same as happened in the NFL.
The VAR protocols have expanded from what they originally were, and VAR officials have much more training and experience with the technology now than ever before.
This is the first major controversy generated by VAR and a possible violation of the protocols - What to do?
No one is sure because the situation is not clearly addressed in the FIFA Code.
So a bunch of FIFA folk go behind closed doors and make a decision.
SOMEONE INVESTIGATE THIS MAN! After Florian Balogun got a red card last night, the Americans started looking into the ref that gave him the card.
And we found that Rafael Claus here has some skeletons in his closet 👀
@stoolpresidente It’s very easy to market yourself when you dont need to self sustain and are subsidized by another group, if they actually ran independently you would see a lot of changes for the better. Until then it will be the same old story
@LauraLoomer Now dont be so hard on him, He’s not wrong what they did in GAZA to those kidnapped Israelis is terrible, glad he can see the morality in that one issue. Good for him
Hey Bernie Sanders: Your entire movement is funded by oligarchs who channel tax-deductible charity donations into political expenditures in violation of the Internal Revenue Code. This is how it works:
Bingo!
Trump’s EO’s are ALREADY Constitutional.
He is researching, then writing EO’s to enforce the laws ALREADY on the books.
They have just never been fully enforced.
By writing an EO, Trump FORCES the enemy to file lawsuits, so that he can win at the Supreme Court and SOLIDIFY these laws “permanently.”
Trump is proving that he doesn’t need Congress to “codify” laws that ALREADY exist.
Guess what?
Same goes for the SAVE Act.
It’s ALREADY illegal for non-citizens to vote in federal elections.
Trump doesn’t need the Senate to pass the SAVE Act.
READ THAT AGAIN!
He has said for a long time, that he was going to do it by EO.
He said it back in February.
“President Trump on Friday indicated he will issue an executive order seeking to require voters to present proof of citizenship if the Senate does not pass the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) America Act, which passed in the House this week.
“There will be Voter I.D. for the Midterm Elections, whether approved by Congress or not!” Trump wrote on Truth Social around 4:30 p.m. EST. “Also, the People of our Country are insisting on Citizenship, and No Mail-In Ballots, with exceptions for Military, Disability, Illness, or Travel.”
“He followed up with a second post 30 minutes later floating an executive order.”
“This is an issue that must be fought, and must be fought, NOW!” Trump wrote in a lengthy post on Truth Social. “If we can’t get it through Congress, there are Legal reasons why this SCAM is not permitted. I will be presenting them shortly, in the form of an Executive Order.”
https://t.co/UEtI5Q4ET9
Have you noticed that Trump recently demanded that the SAVE Act be attached to the FISA renewal?
Why?
FOCUSING the people.
And just yesterday, he went to the Senate and demanded that they pass the SAVE Act now.
Why?
More FOCUSING the people on this issue.
Enjoy the SHOW.
That confrontation between Trump and the republicans in the Senate was “purposeful.”
It got national media attention.
Then what happened?
Surprise!
The Senate just went on “vacation.”
Do you think Trump wasn’t expecting that?
“The table is now set.”
Trump has no choice.
Right?😁
Guess what’s incoming?
An EO to FORCE every state to uphold the SAVE Act for the upcoming federal elections.
A lawsuit will soon follow and once again, Trump will have baited the enemy insurgency into taking the fight to the Supreme Court, where Trump ALREADY knows he’s going to win.
A Supreme Court ruling upholding photo ID and citizenship requirement to vote in federal elections, will then be “set in stone.”
A permanent PRECEDENT.
And here’s what almost everyone is missing:
Most people think that unless the Senate passes the SAVE Act, then the next president can just reverse it, because it’s only an Executive Order.
Wrong.
Trump isn’t writing a new law.
It’s ALREADY unconstitutional for illegals, dead people and non citizens to vote in federal elections.
Trump will just be “declaring” through EXECUTIVE ORDER, that he is now enforcing the law ALREADY on the books and the Supreme Court will then “declare” that his EO is Constitutional.
Do you understand how important that is?
Any president trying to reverse Trump’s EO on the SAVE Act, will lose in court because their EO will be deemed “unconstitutional.”
There’s a huge difference between an Executive Order by a president, that is changing “policy, rules, regulations or initiatives” ……and an Executive Order by a president, that is enforcing and protecting the Constitutional rights of American citizens.
Midterms are ALREADY safe.
Power back to the people.
The enemy has actually walked right into a trap.
All of these Supreme Court rulings “upholding” Trump’s EO’s as Constitutional, makes it much harder for ANY future president or Congress to reverse them.
Checkmate!
Thank you for playing.
USAID funneled $53 million to EcoHealth Alliance, which funded coronavirus gain-of-function research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.
That research likely created COVID-19.
Millions died.
Trillions were lost.
Lives were destroyed.
USAID has a history of being a CIA-front organization.
Former USAID Director John Gilligan admitted the agency was "infiltrated from top to bottom with CIA people," explaining that operatives were embedded throughout USAID's overseas activities.
In 2013, a State Department cable published by WikiLeaks described USAID's strategy in Venezuela as "penetrating Chavez's political base," "dividing Chavismo," and "isolating Chavez internationally."
In 2014, the Associated Press revealed that USAID secretly funded a Twitter-like platform in Cuba designed to build political opposition.
From 2009 to 2019, USAID partnered with EcoHealth Alliance on the PREDICT program, identifying 1,200 new viruses, training 5,000 people, and expanding dozens of research laboratories worldwide.
Then COVID emerged at one of those labs.
In 2022, former EcoHealth Alliance Vice President Andrew Huff alleged that Peter Daszak had ties to the CIA.
In 2023, a CIA whistleblower alleged that agency officials offered incentives to analysts to support a natural-origin assessment and downplay evidence pointing to a lab leak.
The CIA covered up the lab origin of COVID-19 because USAID funding was central to the creation of COVID-19.