be it the Super Bowl, Olympics, etc aren't about fans or teams. It's about who greases the most palms and who allows the tax payers of the locales to get fleeced the most for the corporate sponsors. FIFA is a multi billion dollar entity but it is the working class of the cities and countries who will pay the security, infrastructure, lost productivity, and cleanup cost. To top it all off they will be priced out of even attending the event they are footing the bill for. Say what you will about Baseball and the NBA, the playoffs and World Series/Championship, locations are based on the merits of the team, not who pays the most and has the most luxury suites to wine and dine fat cats.

Sad, but true.

The 2015 FIFAgate scandal was a good, recent reminder of the very dynamic you were so vividly illustrating.

You might recall that Obama's last AG, Loretta Lynch, was vigorously prosecuting the case - until....

Hopefully 2030 will be the third time.

Plus, we've got 2026 to look forward to - right here at home.

And Messi - who now lives in Miami - has walked earlier plans to retire from World Cup action after '22 (although he would play for Argentina).

That seems like it will be hard on the players.

They put in for it mainly because 2030 is the centennial of the first World Cup - played in Uruguay in 1930.

But because Uruguay is so small (it's Latin America's least populous, at 3.5 m), the original idea was to share hosting duties with neighboring Argentina - with whom they have much in common.

But then, around 2018, Trump's pal Macri triggered a massive foreign debt crisis - known locally as the "Macrisis."

It would now be that much more difficult for Argentina to spend the billions needed to upgrade their stadia (most of them, from the '70s), airport terminals and such - at least to meet the monumental demands of today's World Cups.

So Chile was added to the bid - to share the cost, as it were.

But then Paraguay - an impoverished, notoriously corrupt backwater - insisted on being added. They're a member of the Mercosur common market and home to the Conmebol football federation HQ, so the others couldn't refuse (even Bolivia wanted in at one point).

It had become - pardon my French - a cluster fuck.

Ultimately, FIFA decided that none of them could meet the gazillions needed to host a modern, über-glitzy World Cup - but as a consolation, they were allowed to host the first three games.

I would've kept Chile on, and nixed Paraguay (which, again, was kept on because the Conmebol HQ is there).

If you do go to Paraguay - as they say - don't drink the water.