🚨🗣️ Wayne Rooney: "Daylight robbery man, this is unacceptable. How is that offside when the ball clearly hit the head of Veiga! Saw Modric laugh and I said yeah the ref is a joke."
"Ronaldo and Roberto Martinez should know they don't deserve this win."
🚨Zlatan Ibrahimovic on VAR after Croatia’s last-minute equaliser vs Portugal was ruled out:*
This referees are doing everything possible for Ronaldo to win the world cup but they will say Messi is the FIFA boy , This ball was never an Offside because the ball didn't touch the Croatia player , This is pure daylight robbery.
"The referee and VAR have just erased what should have been one of the greatest moments of this World Cup.”
"Let’s be clear: if you’re going to cancel a goal in the 90th minute, the evidence has to be beyond doubt. I’ve watched the incident multiple times, from every angle, and I still don’t see anything conclusive enough to overturn it.”
"If you’re in that VAR room for minutes, pausing, zooming, drawing lines to a shoulder, a boot, a heel… it’s not clear and obvious. And if it’s not clear, the goal must stand. That’s the whole point of VAR.”
"The referee has allowed technology to become the main character. But fans don’t fill stadiums or stay up late to watch a screen. They come for football — for drama, for emotion, for moments you remember forever.”
"Croatia showed real fight. They dug in, they scored late, they thought they’d earned a dramatic equaliser to keep their dream alive. Then one decision ripped it away, and that decision will be argued about for years.”
"This is why confidence in VAR is collapsing. It’s no longer fixing obvious mistakes. It’s hunting millimeters that nobody in the stadium can see with their own eyes. That’s not what football is supposed to be.”
"I feel for those Croatian players more than anything. You celebrate, you believe your World Cup is back on, and then it’s gone in seconds. For me, the referee on the pitch and VAR in the booth both got it wrong.
🚨 Luka Modrić on Croatia’s controversial last-minute disallowed goal against Portugal:
🗣️ “This is football. Not a courtroom, not a lab where we freeze every frame and argue over centimetres.
Tonight we gave everything against a very good Portugal team. We were still fighting deep into stoppage time. The boys kept believing, kept pushing, and when that ball went in through Josko we thought we had it — equaliser, extra time, everything still possible.
Then VAR comes in and takes it away because of a touch earlier in the move. I respect the officials, I really do. But the rule is clear and obvious error. Was this one? These little things, these marginal calls where players are fighting for every inch… that’s football. That’s what defenders and attackers do every single day.
If we start ruling out goals like that in the last seconds because of a split-second touch or a shoulder or a toe, then what are we left with? The game loses its soul. The emotion, the chaos, the moments that make people fall in love with football — they get taken away by technology that was only supposed to fix the obvious mistakes.
We accept that sometimes the ball doesn’t go your way. We’ve done it our whole careers. But when the decision feels like it rewrites the last chapter of the match instead of just correcting something clear, it hurts. Not just us in the dressing room, but everyone who was watching and living every second with us.
Portugal deserved to go through, they’re a strong side and they showed it. But nights like this make you wonder where the game is heading. We play with our hearts, we fight until the whistle, and then one review decides everything.
That’s not protecting football anymore. That’s changing it into something else.”
Bookseller Lam Wing-kee's died of cancer at age 70. In 2015 he was disappeared by the CCP for selling books in #HongKong & held for 8mo. Upon release he spoke out about his abduction. In 2019 he fled to Taiwan where he reopened Causeway Bay Books. An HK hero, may he rest in peace
The Chinese government is extending its police state around the world
Recently passed ethnic unity rules give the CCP the 'legal right' to use transnational repression. Critics of the government will also be at risk if they pass thru China while traveling 🔗
From @WSJopinion: China’s “ethnic unity” law means repression without borders. To see where this leads, look at Tibet, where Beijing perfected its system of social control, writes Richard Gere.
https://t.co/yt2xkeHgZg
German Government presents sweeping reform package:
- scraps many corporate reporting requirements
- cuts job security
- cuts taxes for low and medium incomes while raising top income taxes
Asked about impact on China policy, Merz stressed Germany "must become more competitive" but will "defend itself" against unfair trade practices and rare earth dependencies.
“That is not unity. It is tyranny.” @CECCgov Co-Chair Chris Smith and Commissioner @RepMcGovern introduced a resolution condemning the #CCP ’s repression of ethnic and religious minorities and the so-called Law on the Promotion of #EthnicUnity and Progress.
Press Release https://t.co/3h7UcwgpBA
Highlight⬇️
Celebrate Independence Day with Freedom 250's "Salute to America" on the National Mall. Join President Donald J. Trump for a spectacular tribute to America's 250th anniversary.
National Mall, Washington, D.C.
Saturday, July 4, 2026
On July 4, 2026, we celebrate 250 years of American independence with a day built for the history books.
12:00 PM - Media Entry Opens
1:00 PM - Guest Entry Opens
1:15 PM - Military Flyover Demonstrations Begin
5:00 PM - Opening Programming Begins
7:00 PM - Salute to America Program Begins
9:45 PM - Remarks by President Donald J Trump
10:30 PM - Largest Fireworks Show in History
Guest entrance at 14th Street between Constitution and Independence.
Please review the full guidelines before joining us on the National Mall for Salute to America on July 4.
We can’t wait to see you there! 🇺🇸🎉🦅
> Be Jonny Kim
> Born to South Korean immigrants in Los Angeles
> Grows up in an intensely abusive household, constantly full of fear
> The night before he graduates high school, his father threatens the family with a gun
> Police arrive, a shootout happens, and his father is killed
> Decides he wants to protect people so he enlists in the Navy at 18
> Survives Hell Week and becomes a Navy SEAL
> Deploys to Iraq twice as a combat medic, sniper, and point man
> Completes over 100 combat operations under fire
> Earns a Silver Star and a Bronze Star for saving wounded comrades
> Watches his close friends die in battle and realizes he wants to heal people, not just fight
> Leaves active duty to get a degree in Mathematics from USD
> Auditions for medical school and gets accepted into Harvard
> Graduates from Harvard Medical School as an M.D. in 2016
> Starts his residency in emergency medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital
> Gets bored of being a regular doctor and applies to NASA
> Selected as 1 of only 12 candidates out of 18,300 applicants
> Becomes a NASA Astronaut in 2020
> Decides space isn't enough, so he joins Navy flight school to face his fear of flying
> Earns his wings as a fully certified military pilot and naval flight surgeon
> Launches into space on a rocket to the International Space Station
> Logs 245 days in orbit, traveling 104 million miles around the Earth before returning home
> Returns to Earth as a SEAL, a Harvard Doctor, an Aviator, and an Astronaut at just 41 years old
And Jonny Kim is still the most humble guy on the planet who makes everyone else's resume look blank.
Jonny Kim is badass.
Lam Wing-kee, owner of Causeway Bay books in Hong Kong and later Taipei has passed away from cancer at the age of 70. The bookstore he ran was well known for selling publications about Mainland China politicians and was illegally kidnapped and sent to China in 2015.
MOFA strongly condemns the PRC's implementation of its so-called Ethnic Unity & Progress Promotion Law. No PRC domestic law has any legal effect in #Taiwan🇹🇼. Taiwan will continue working with democracies to strengthen resilience & counter transnational repression.