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610 CKTB | The Mob Boss, The Bureaucrat, & The Canadians: How the G7 Strongarmed FIFA · Kvetch & Release

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Let Key has a take. Good morning, John leed Key,
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: Good morning, Gene. Well, we're going to talk about the
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: Ferris Wheel. No, I'm just kidding. No, I've had it
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: with the Ferris Wheel. We're going to Yeah, we're going
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: to talk a little bit a little more about FIFA. Now,
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: this is interesting. The World Cup is dominating the headlines.
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: The three host countries, Canada, Mexico and the United States
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: are out of it, but you know, countries like England
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: are in there and the English just I mean, soccer
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: isn't a sport, it's a it's a way of life.
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: But your claiming the G seven is hijacking FIFA, you're
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: looking at geopolitics. So what's the real sports being played here,
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: mister let.
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: Ke, Well, Gene, I can tell you it's not soccer
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: right now. It's high stakes geopolitical extortion and nuclear powers
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: are using FIFA right now like it's a stress ball.
• 0:51
  Speaker 2: For decades, FIFA is operated with the unearned confidence of
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: an autocratic superpower. You know, they strut around, They've got
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: a human rights record that is varable. They've got more
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: financial scandals than a post Soviet asset liquidation. It seems
• 1:05
  Speaker 2: like they franchised, white collar sleezed. I guess you can
• 1:08
  Speaker 2: catch my opinion about FIFA. They've built an entire empire
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: on this delusion that the world is in bold and
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: indebted to that. Excuse me, but the illusion is dead.
• 1:19
  Speaker 2: Now we have seen two nuclear armed heads of state.
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: Look the president of FIFA, Jiohnny and Fantino straight in
• 1:26
  Speaker 2: the eye and say, nice billion dollar tournament you got.
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: There be a shame of your Swiss bank accounts of operated.
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: Though, I mean, it's like a mob bus says that
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: it is.
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: I mean, we used to wonder who the referee was.
• 1:40
  Speaker 2: Now we know that the actual thing is being refereed
• 1:43
  Speaker 2: by diplomatic cables out of the Oval office in Downing Street.
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: Well, let's take a little bit of a retrospective. Look
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: here Belgium handed the US of victory and it was massive.
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: But let's talk about FIFA. Bully. This US striker Bulligan
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: got a straight red card by the rule book. However,
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: Donald Trump called up the president of FIFA. The president
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: of FIFA said article twenty seven, which allows FIFA to
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: suspend a suspension for up to a year. Donald Trump
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: gets on the phone. We know what happens next, mind you,
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: it does. I mean it's moot now because Belgium handed
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: of them there the loss on their rear end. It
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: was so big last night.
• 2:30
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, it turns out that you can strong
• 2:33
  Speaker 2: arm FIFA, but you can't strong arm your own defense.
• 2:36
  Speaker 2: So that's that's the problem that happened right there. But yeah,
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: Trump got on the phone with the president of FIFA
• 2:41
  Speaker 2: in Fentino. Now remember this is the same guy who
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: previously handed Trump a completely fake FIFA World Peace Prize.
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: I agree, just to stop him from throwing a temper
• 2:50
  Speaker 2: tantrum over not winning the actual Noble Peace Prize. And
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: so Trump gets on the phone and says, look, I
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: don't like the rule, and he's told okay, well we're
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: reviewing it. Then Trump goes into the Oval office and says, yeah,
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: I called him up on the phone. I said, I
• 3:04
  Speaker 2: don't know what the rules are, I don't like the rule,
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: and I think the rules should be changed. It was hilarious,
• 3:10
  Speaker 2: And then the rule did get changed. Belgium appealed it frantically.
• 3:15
  Speaker 2: That appeal was then dismissed and the game went on
• 3:18
  Speaker 2: and as you said, the US, they just got slacked
• 3:21
  Speaker 2: for one by Belgium. So yeah, Trump corrupted international sports
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: law for a guy who didn't even score a point.
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: And then there's the added irony, of course that that
• 3:31
  Speaker 2: guy is someone who has birthright citizenship, which Trump is
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: trying to get rid of. But yeah, we saw Trump
• 3:36
  Speaker 2: here treating his fake FIFA World Peace Prize like it
• 3:39
  Speaker 2: was a monopoly prize, like a get out a jail
• 3:42
  Speaker 2: free card or something with type powers. But the universe
• 3:45
  Speaker 2: delivered a masterclass in irony.
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: Now here's something I didn't know, and you informed me
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: of this yesterday. The British Prime Minister, Sir Kiir Starmer,
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: apparently he tried to play assistant coach. FIFA wanted to
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: move the England versus Mexico kickoff time because of an
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: incoming storm. England won that game, by the way, but
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: Downing Street, you're telling me, actually deployed actual British diplomats
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: to block it.
• 4:14
  Speaker 2: This was beautiful contrast here, Gene so Trump plays the
• 4:18
  Speaker 2: cartoon mafia don while UKPM Sir Cure Starmer played the
• 4:24
  Speaker 2: world's most aggressively stressed out bureaucrat. Downing Street was terrified
• 4:29
  Speaker 2: that moving the kickoff time would ruined England's chances for
• 4:34
  Speaker 2: altitude acclimatization. But Star Wars didn't threaten raids or anything
• 4:41
  Speaker 2: hard like that. He released something far more terrifying, weaponized
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: British administrative exhaustion. He deployed literal diplomat to drown them
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: in an ocean of legal eese subclauses, aggressively polite formatting.
• 4:55
  Speaker 2: They didn't have to punch them in the face. They
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: subjected them to so much civil service paperwork that und
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: toubtedly the highly paid attorneys at FIFA probably just thought,
• 5:03
  Speaker 2: you know what, just give it to them. I can't
• 5:05
  Speaker 2: read another four hundred pages on deometric pressure. They micromanaged
• 5:09
  Speaker 2: Mountain air gene. The Trump is yielding a baseball bat
• 5:12
  Speaker 2: and Starmer's yielding a clipboard. FIFA cowered from both, but
• 5:16
  Speaker 2: the Starmer version was boring, bureaucratic, and breathtaking lee British.
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: You know the other thing I forgot to mention in
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: the US loss to Belgium last night, there are a
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: lot of people in the United States complaining that the
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: lights in the stadium were too bright for the American players,
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: and I'm not making that up. Hey, Hey, John, you know,
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: FIFA really loves to rule with an iron fist. You know,
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: they act really, really tough, but you know what you're
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: telling me what I've been seeing for about the last
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: week or so. When the G seven calls, they turn
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: into j E lo.
• 5:59
  Speaker 2: Yeah, no kidding. I mean it's the ultimate textbook bully
• 6:02
  Speaker 2: that we've seen FIFA being before. They're so extraordinarily brave
• 6:06
  Speaker 2: when they're punching down, right, we know how they operate,
• 6:10
  Speaker 2: but they act like supreme global leaders when they can
• 6:14
  Speaker 2: bully smaller nations or threatened municipal stadiums over beer logos
• 6:18
  Speaker 2: or allowing too many people in the free zones or
• 6:21
  Speaker 2: not free zones, depending on what you want to look
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: at them as they think they get to run the
• 6:25
  Speaker 2: world because nations beg to host the circus that they
• 6:27
  Speaker 2: put on. But the second that they faced actual pushback
• 6:30
  Speaker 2: from actual governments that controlled nuclear arsenals and global reserve currencies, Yeah,
• 6:35
  Speaker 2: they folded like a cheap lawn chair. They liquefied like jello.
• 6:38
  Speaker 2: As you said, they realized that their multi billion dollar
• 6:41
  Speaker 2: grift doesn't work without what sovereign democratic nations provide. Stadiums,
• 6:46
  Speaker 2: municipal policing, corporate sponsors, audiences that are captive with money
• 6:52
  Speaker 2: that they can spend. I mean, look, they're a parasite
• 6:54
  Speaker 2: that forgot that they need the host. Sovereign nations finally
• 6:57
  Speaker 2: remember that they hold the cards. And it turns out
• 6:59
  Speaker 2: that FIFA, as iron Fist, is actually just a damp
• 7:02
  Speaker 2: mitten at the end of the day when someone decides
• 7:05
  Speaker 2: to step in and challenge them.
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: Yeah, well, interestingly enough, Well, the US president is trying
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: to fix red cards and the British Prime minister is
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: trying to take care of the atmosphere here in Canada.
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: Montreal said no to FIFA because they would have had
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: to have canceled the f one Race in Montreal, which
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: has a great tradition, and also the Montreal Jazz Festival.
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: The stadiums in Canada and in all World Cup stadiums,
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: they had to cover up their sponsors. That's why nobody
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: called it the Bmo Stadium during FIFA except me. You
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: had to call it Toronto Stadium. So I'm kind of
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: looking back. Did Canada have any geo political opposition or
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: strong points or were we just Canada? Did we just
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: sit back and say I'm sorry, Gin, could.
• 7:57
  Speaker 2: You even imagine a Canadian prime They're interfering in a
• 8:01
  Speaker 2: way like Starmar or trumped it. No, I mean it
• 8:04
  Speaker 2: violates our foundational programming. If a Canadian player got a
• 8:08
  Speaker 2: red card, our government would probably issue a formal apology
• 8:11
  Speaker 2: to the ref for the inconvenience that have caused. I mean,
• 8:14
  Speaker 2: we're the kind of people that if you step on
• 8:16
  Speaker 2: our toes, we apologize to you. So while our closest
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: allies are aggressively hijacking the tournament and rewriting bylaws over lunch,
• 8:24
  Speaker 2: we're just you know, the kids sitting desperately quiet in
• 8:27
  Speaker 2: the corner, hoping that the cool kids might notice us
• 8:30
  Speaker 2: after we cleaned up the room. I mean, we're at
• 8:33
  Speaker 2: the high school party, just happy to be there while
• 8:35
  Speaker 2: not being included in what's going on. But look, that's
• 8:38
  Speaker 2: the masterclass and passive aggressiveness that Canada is. We can
• 8:42
  Speaker 2: sit there quiet and double check the rules and the
• 8:44
  Speaker 2: regulatory compliance and make sure everything is going proper, happy
• 8:47
  Speaker 2: to be there. But if we do truly get pushed
• 8:50
  Speaker 2: to the brink, we might compose a highly diplomatic, fiercely
• 8:54
  Speaker 2: polite letter to Zurich asking for permission to table an inquiry.
• 8:58
  Speaker 2: Gene God forbid, we cause a scene.
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: Another great take, Thank you, thank you Litkey. He's a take.
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: There he goes John Litkey. He'll be back later on
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: this week. I love his takes.