lollol
2d ago
Uhmm, actually that's exactly the right comparison but instead of one player, imagine every player, and even the coaches too, over nearly a decade.
The rule in a nutshell is pretty simple: a club can only spend what it legitimately earns through ticket sales, TV rights, and legitimate commercial sponsorship, and the owner is not allowed to simply inject hundreds of millions of their own money to buy players if the club hasn't earned it.
Abu Dhabi (Clippers) pretty much had their airline Etihad Airways (their third party) sponsor MCFC with endorsements and sponsorship deals. And the emails showed that the best part is they recorded it down. They were explicit about how much money would Etihad Airways send over (about 10-12% year to year) and how much Abu Dhabi United Group (owner of MCFC) has to give Etihad Airways so that the money can then be sent to MCFC.
lollol
2d ago
There were plenty of similar things happening. The rules were created and strengthened throughout the years partly because of the drunken spending of Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich while he co-owned Chelsea. There were other teams that were found guilty as well after the rules are in place, most recently Everton and Nottingham Forest. The difference is that it was in the open and they weren't denying it but simply different interpretation of the rules. They also didn't fight the EPL every step of the way.
Manchester City in contrast had "sham contracts" and was found to deliberately mislead auditors:
An example given of the disguised funding scheme in action: plugging an unexpected shortfall in May 2013.
Less than a week before the end of that 2012-13 financial year the club knew they were £9.9m short of complying with Uefa's financial rules.
In a matter of days, without sponsors even being approached, a number of modified sponsor agreements were generated which increased recorded sponsorship fees to pay bonuses for events that had already taken place and to pay for a US tour.
The feared Uefa FFP shortfall was thus "plugged".
SourceL https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/articles/c65y51l3gzq4o#:~:text=An%20example,plugged%22%2E
lollol
2d ago
As ever, Roy Keane has an opinion on this
To provide some color for others, there is a bit of a grudge between Roy Keane and the father of Erling Haaland (foremost current star player of MCFC) which culminated in an infamous career-ending tackle to Haaland senior.
lollol
3d ago
Yes, this is a foundational question whether you're a neutral observer or the most hardcore of soccer fans when approaching this case. The actual sporting on the field is still pure and and there's no sporting cheating there. But there is no doubt these "bureaucratic violations" has effects on the field. Other clubs, in compliance with the rules, had to sell players, even important ones. MCFC driving up wages of players, forcing clubs to also up their own player wages, but since they're in compliance with the rules, MCFC obviously has an advantage. MCFC players and coaches can talk all they want about no actual sporting cheating occurred and current consensus is it's true their victories and losses on the field were earned. But in the universe where MCFC complied with the rules, no such team of players and coaches would have even existed to earn those victories and losses. The rules may not be right, but when everyone complied with it, at least the rules would be fair. By shirking the rules, MCFC definitively got an "unfair advantage", and that's why "financial doping" as a term was introduced.
Two different threads of thoughts not quite coalescing so stay with me for a bit.
Soccer and Cheating
Seismic news in the world of soccer (or football if you're an old-worlder) last Friday where news broke that Manchester City (MCFC) found guilty on almost all Premier League charges relating to financial breaches. On Tuesday, the Premier League released their official statement on Manchester FC, confirming the charges in very strong language (especially if you assume a team of extremely well paid British lawyers reviewed it).
For background, the Premier League (EPL) is highest level of the English professional soccer system, is the most watched in the world and by extension the most revenue, beating the second-in-line La Liga (the soccer league in Spain) by miles. Machester City FC would have been just another random soccer club sharing the same city as Manchester United, rotating in and out of the Premier League, until they were bought out by Sheikh Mansour in 2008. The fifth son of the Emir of Abu Dhabi (the largest, richest, most important emirate of the UAE), Sheikh Mansour is both rich and reasonably politically adept, he would be appointed the deputy prime minister of the UAE the following year in 2009, and then appointed second vice president in 2023.
Since the Sheikh bought MCFC, he pumped a boatload lot of money into it. The club signed top managers. Bought 1.243 billion pounds worth of players between 2009-2018. The club made multiple renovations to the stadium. And with all that money came a lot of success on the pitch itself. They've won the Premier League 8 times, they've won 4 FA Cup and 7 EFL Cup (domestic knockout tournaments parallel to the EPL). And to top it off in 2023, they won the European Champions League, being the second English club to ever completed a "continental treble". The first, btw, is Manchester United.
Now I must explain to you UEFA Financial Fair Play (FFP) and EPL Profit and Sustainability Rules (PSR)(though this has gotten many names and variations over the years). Though the common understanding might be that these rules are to prevent unfair economic advantage on the field, especially since "wages remain the best financial barometer of sporting performance", but actually the rules are meant to prevent clubs from taking on "excessive" debt based on yearly revenue and therefore risk going into bankruptcy. As an aside, for achieving competitive parity, the best example are the US sport leagues, where any team can theoretically win the championship. The charitable take on these rules are to prevent rich owners going on drunken spending sprees then leave the club with debt that cripples or kill the club long term. The uncharitable take is that the rules were created to protect the status quo where big clubs maintain their huge advantages (you will hear the term "red cartel" a lot to refer to the historically important and internationally known clubs Manchester United, Liverpool, and Arsenal). What's especially important to know is that many other clubs have been forced to extreme lengths to avoid these rules such as selling their players, selling their women's team. And if you're in breach, there are fines, embargo on registering full rosters, transfer bans, points deduction.
Between 2016 and 2018, a series of email leaks/hacks and followup news investigations pretty much shows MCFC has never complied with the rules, proactively and systematically engaged in what many consider "financial doping", and with an attitude perfectly summed up in a quote in one of the emails by an MCFC board member: "We can do what we want" (MCFC maintains that this quote is taken out of context). Europe soccer association (UEFA) had their own investigation and initially rule MCFC guilty in 2020, but was quickly overturned on appeal in by the Court of Arbitration for Sports due to essentially statute of limitations. The EPL has no such statute, but was considerably slower as unlike all previous case, MCFC fought every step of the way. The charges span 2009-2018, the investigation didn't conclude until 2023 when it referred its findings to an independent commission, the hearing spanned 3 months in 2024, and it took nearly another 2 years for us now to have a verdict for 114 guilty out of 115 charges. ‘sham contracts’, spending breaches and ‘disguised funding’. Sanctions have not been announced.
The UK Prime Minister had to chime in his concern (btw, his previous office was being the mayor of Greater Manchester)(UK and UAE has close relations). Fans of other clubs are outraged, especially ones that can point to direct monetary harm like losing players to MCFC or losing in the final, losing a spot to the Champions League. Since the EPL is actually the collection of the clubs, many observers note how the tenor of the EPL announcement indicates the emotions of the other owners aren't far off from their club fans. The coaches and players of other clubs are half-jokingly asking about getting their rightful cups and medals and therefore bonuses as well. MCFC released their own statement maintaining their innocence and will appeal "on the basis that the opinion [of the EPL] contains clear material errors, of law, principle and fact, and is unsafe." Etihad Airways (Abu Dhabi-based flagship airliner of the UAE and major sponsor of MCFC) warns of legal action against the EPL. Most MCFC coaches and players are communicating "wait and see until the process fully plays out, we trust the club". MCFC fans range in emotions, but most can at least argue on the immense benefit MCFC has had on Manchester.
Trade and Cheating
The emblematic example of this I can think of is China and its inclusion to the WTO in 2001. I am also not able to muster up the effort to write and collect links about this, but thankfully Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF) has a part 1 and part 2 on the "false promises" of China: "Nearly 20 years after joining the World Trade Organization, China remains woefully short of meeting a broad range of commitments and responsibilities, to the detriment of both its trading partners and the international economic system.".
Open Questions
What is the best way in which liberal-ish democracy-ish Western-aligned-ish polities should deal with its illiberal-ish totalitarian-ish non-Western-aligned-ish polities? What is the balance?
Is this just the gears of history turning oh so very slowly and that comeuppance will come due?
Personal conclusions
I'm glad I got away from those culture and societies and systems. I'm glad that even though the rich and the ruthless can fuck the small and the naive but at least in Western society there is a realistic way of fucking them back (even if it's hard, complex, slow, etc.). I feel a little guilty that I didn't stay and tried to make an impact or change something. I am reminded of the importance of the rule of law and norms and how this helps in interaction and not harming each other and redress grievances.
Edit 1
I think it was my fault for putting too much energy into the soccer section and making the other sections lopsided. But I really want to draw attention the open questions I have. The rules of the Western order is always breaking down but it seems there is thick molasses with which Western society and the leaders of society are reacting to the present situation of the day. Was the West naive about how a monarch from a monarchical society would not bend or break the rules on his own whims, or at least let his underlings do so? Was the West arrogant and greedy for the labor to think the Communist leadership would be convinced by the power of capitalism and liberal order and therefore would also acquiesce to the same rules and norms?
There is a quote that went around that is really funny and was certainly how I thought about Russia communists:
Lenin’s core of Bolsheviks, and the socialists like Trotsky who joined them, were many of them highly educated people, literate in multiple European languages, learned in the scholastic traditions of Marxism; and they preserved these attributes even as they murdered and lied and tortured and terrorized. They were social scientists who thought principle required them to behave like gangsters.
...
Stalin had been a gangster who really believed he was a social scientist. Khruschev was a gangster who hoped he was a social scientist. But the moment was drawing irresistibly closer when the idealism would rot away by one more degree, and the Soviet Union would be governed by gangsters who were only pretending to be social scientists.
But after listening to enough Stephen Kotkin, I think I was wrong. Lenin, Stalin, Kruschev, and so on, they really thought they were social scientists, they really believed in it, no hope about it, no pretending about it, they just all thought the previous guy was wrong. They were all delusional, maybe not collectively (heh), but certainly the system led them all to be deluded in the same way. And someone who grew up in and benefit from an absolute monarchy with tribal-autocratic rule would also care not for democratic rules and norms. He certainly never suffered enough consequences. Even now, the EPL makes it very clear that redacted redacted is not guilty and never authorized any of these dealings.
There has been much harm and mistakes with regards to America's policy of the Cold War. Vietnam is probably the canonical example where there were multiple opportunities for Ho Chi Minh to be funded by the US and not Russia. But one can say the containment policy is at least a theoretically sound solution to the tolerance of the intolerance paradox. Say what you will by the EU but they got it right that there are strong rules and requirements about levels of corruption and elections for even looking at admission of a new member.
lollol
5d ago
We should probably be cutting rates instead of raising them.
I do remember in the latest episode of the Moody's podcast, of the 3 economists, two preferred no-hike while one thought one-hike is ok.
lollol
8d ago
Yes, I agree, I am actually in favor of America enlarging. And taking territory is in the end just that: a grab, whether naked or underhand, nice or rude. But there is a smart way to go about it. It's about psyops campaigns, it's about increasing relationships with Greenland, it's about intentionally having military bases and then encouraging marriage between American servicemen/women with Greenlanders, etc. it's about letting Greenlanders themselves thinking: "being an American isn't so bad". You know what I think is the most successful accidental example of this? Kosovo. Saving a population from ethnic cleansing, unsurprisingly, is very popular and I bet there is a sizable number of Kosovars who pray to be an American.
And yes, the disappointment is in expending so much energy and effort to get a mere update on an existing deal. Treated fairly or not, he's supposed to get the best deal for America, I don't think this was the best deal for America.
lollol
8d ago
Can I ask if you have any particular sources you'd recommend for understanding China/Taiwan issues (or East Asian geopolitics in general)?
So I would often have podcasts in the background while I work and in terms of China I have CSIS excellent China Power and Pekingology most often in my rotation (so essentially whenever they post anything). Less frequently is The China-Global South Podcast but I do take a gander if the title sounds intriguing. Not China-specific but China is certainly a frequent topic on The Foreign Affairs Interview. Now the stuff I've listed so far comes from a more liberal cohort of academics and China observers. Though obviously it's a range. So in contrast I also listen to the stuff coming out of the more conservative Hoover Institute, which has their own China-focused podcast China Considered and I especially liked the biography of Xi Jinping's dad and essentially anything Steven Kotkin or Dan Wang has to say about China. I think conservatism has a certain increased level of pragmatism and paranoia, which befits something considered a struggle between civilizations. If I want more mundane news and, I just go to CNA, understanding that they are speaking from a Singaporean perspective. In terms of tech I think Asianometry and in terms of business I think ofStratechery. They're just covering different facets of the same thing, economic competition. I would listen to Sinocism more if they post more because he actually is a journalist.
As you can see, my information diet is very Western-coded, I don't think that changes any time soon unless I actually learn Chinese. I think the most important thing to understand is that we're not sitting in the Politburo listening in and watching Xi Jinping, and he certainly doesn't do press conferences the way Westerners do. So it's all vague and obscure on one side and it's all interpretation and conjectures from the Westerners. Even for Chinese speakers, Chinese academics, Chinese observers of China who live in China and have connections, they're also as often in the dark as the West.
I'm from SEA but now im in the US.
What I want to add is that Ukraine and Russia is very illustrative, and the 2028 Taiwanese presidential election pretty much signals what is going to happen long term.
If the Taiwan nationalists wins then it's one step closer to dropping the "One China" policy, which slowly closes the door for long-term-non-military-compromised-political-arrangement, leaving only the door of military-action-violent-invasion. And if CCP still wants China, then we just have to look at Ukraine and Russia to see the end result of that. And to be fair, I don't think that is a bad thing in a poetic spiritual nationalistic sense. Just look at Ukraine and Russia: the Russia-friendly-former-Ukrainians had an easy option, move to the East and welcome the Russian troops, and the anti-Russians moved West and began hunkering. Ukraine, if it survives, truly become its own nation (and a national father figure in Zelensky) with this war. Same thing will be with Taiwan. If they can survive the Chinese invasion and pressure, they will truly become Taiwan.
Now if the "one china" or the pro-status-quo wins, then long-term-non-military-compromised-political-arrangement continues. The anti-CCP people should do what a bunch of smart Hong Kongers did and just leave, because what's left are people who don't care or are pro-CCP. It is the razor wire of being smart and dumb/incapable/unlucky that would stay and fight against the CCP if the rest of the population isn't truly going to fight. Ukraine is also illustrative here, it was because of the removal of Yanukovych (pro-Russia Ukrainian president) that finally prompted Putin to go annex Crimea, which then precipitated the current full invasion. So the reverse will be if there wasn't the removal of Yanukovych, Putin would have kept pressing on his then equivalent of the long-term-non-military-compromised-political-arrangement.
The problem of China-Taiwan probably has been game-theory-ed to death by all sides since the 70s.
lollol
9d ago
Could Trump do it by "asking nicely" - i.e. doing the same in secret rather than in public?
I disagree with this characterization of "asking nicely" as it constitutes only a portion of possible behavior that could have occurred. I think if Trump just goes normally in public, it would actually land pretty well, something like: "We're going to meet Denmark today, it's going to be great. Did you know they have the best rye bread, nobody knew that. Most importantly we're going to do some deals, the best deals, we want to even make some changes to this deal from the 50s, can you believe that? We want to protect Greenland, but the deal has to be fair and the deal isn't fair anymore so we're going to make some changes", and so on and so on.
There is such a large spectrum of what constitutes "asking nicely/rudely" here, both in terms of objectives (annex/control/buying of territory to update of some terms on a signed agreement from 1951) and way about doing it (secretly, publicly, one-on-one in private between leaders, in private between lower-level rungs, publicly on the agenda between leaders at a conference, etc.)
What's the point of aiming for the jugular if one would have been happy with just a 30% effort spar? Guys like that at the dojo just gets shunned and avoided if possible.
lollol
10d ago
We need the opposite as well, that AI feels pleasure. We need the equivalent of the rat keep pushing button for pleasure shocks instead of eating. At that point, I expect at the very least dorm-room philosophers to start seriously thinking about what it means to have actual Artificial Intelligence and how Meat Intelligence should interact with it.
lollol
10d ago
The European overreaction looks even more ridiculous now that a deal has in fact proven possible, because Trump, it turns out, is not immune to reason and compromise.
American People: What do we need mining equipment in Greenland for?
Trump: What do you mean what do we need mining equipment in Greenland for? Why in the hell do you think we just spent all that money on nuclear weapons? The whole purpose of nuclear weapons in the first place was to get the Danish nice and tipsy topside under our defensive umbrella so we can take 'em to a nice comfortable desk with pen and paper and, you know, they can't refuse giving us Greenland, because of the implication.
American People: Oh, uh... okay. You had me going there for the first part, the second half kinda threw me.
Trump: Well dude, dude, think about it: Denmark is out in the middle of a Hobbesian State of Nature with some dude she barely knows. You know, she looks around and what does she see? Nothin' but realist conception of international relations. "Ahh, there's nowhere for me to run. What am I gonna do, say 'no'?"
American People: Okay. That... that seems really dark.
Trump: Nah, no it's not dark. You're misunderstanding me, bro.
American People: I'm-I think I am.
Trump: Yeah, you are, because if Denmark said "no" then the answer obviously is "no"...
American People: No, right.
Trump: But the thing is Denmark's not gonna say "no", Denmark would never say "no" because of the implication.
American People: ...Now you've said that word "implication" a couple of times. Wha-what implication?
Trump: The implication that things might go wrong for Denmark if they refuses to give me Greenland. Now, not that things are gonna go wrong for Denmark but Denmark's thinkin' that it will.
American People: But it sounds like Denmark doesn't wanna give Greenland to you...
Trump: Why aren't you understanding this? Den-Denmark doesn't know if it wants to give Greenland to me. That's not the issue...
American People: Are you gonna invade them?
Trump: I'm not gonna invade Denmark! Why would I ever invade Denmark? I feel like you're not getting this at all!
American People: I'm not getting it.
Trump: Goddamn.
[notices Europe staring at them]
Trump: Well don't you look at me like that, you certainly wouldn't be in any danger.
American People: So they are in danger!
Trump: No one's in any danger!
lollol
10d ago
It never occurred to you to say that there's been a misunderstanding
Here are my defenses for the Europeans:
- Trump 1 was a completely new chaotic element on the world stage.
- They didn't know that Trump just needs something to be able to announce a win, but doesn't actually need anything substantial. They clearly learnt about that now.
- This chaotic element is also the President of the United States, and when he doesn't rule out military action, they just prepare for the worst and treat his words seriously as it is backed with nuclear weapons at his disposal.
Moreover it's still not clear to me why proposing a sale is even ridiculous in the first place
It's not ridiculous, the problem was that it got leaked and made public before the pre-alignment/coalition-building or exploration of the solution space could have been done.
They could have said that a sale wasn't possible but another deal would be
Let's say I have farmland in a faraway state, you already have some farming equipment put there based on a deal I made with you a long time ago. Then you come and say "I want to own that land", and I say "Farm is not for sale. It’s an absurd discussion. That’s where the conversation ends.", why is it then my job to tell you "but another deal could be made"? I also don't see much ridicule here, I think it's more of the outrage of someone thinking they're being bullied (cause you were flashing the bazooka on your truck) and lashing out.
lollol
11d ago
Hmmm, I think this is not the same thing, the drama has always been about Trump and the US meaningfully control/annex Greenland, that's very different from what the US is getting in the end. I'm actually quite in favor with the deal. The US helps a proto-independent entity (Greenland) gains one extra incremental step in legitimacy from its colonial powers (Denmark). The old deal is old and yes the language needs updating.
But in motte-and-bailey language: In the first term, Trump went the "soft way" to get the bailey (control/annex/make territory of Greenland). The liberal elites of America might have laughed at Trump but both Greenland and Denmark was already wary about it at the time and says no. In the second term, Trump went the "hard way" to get the bailey. Liberal elites weren't laughing this time, and Greenland and Denmark just went ahead with preparing for an invasion.
Currently, actually getting the bailey was too hard (no political will, Iran preoccupying, Denmark and Greenland clearly are willing to fight and make it hard), so what we get is the motte: a renewal/update to the existing deal and make explicit things that were implicit (because it was the cold war and no Russian or Chinese company would ever have invested in Greenland).
Critics are saying Trump went "hard" and in the end he got the motte when he could have just went "soft" and everyone would be happier and stayed friendly. The summary is that Trump seems to have traded a lot of soft power for a relatively small win.
So I've been listening to some LSAT tutor podcasts lately. On the LSAT, there is a section for "Logical Reasoning", where some questions can be of type "flaw" where the tester has to find the fatal flaw in the reasoning of the passage. One tip/trick the tutor mentions is imagine your worst political enemy and pretend that the argument is being spoken by them, for some people, the flaws will start jumping out. I think you can use that trick to quickly think of how this proposal is flawed. I can think of the following:
- "SAHP" is one term, "welfare leeches" is another.
- The fund this comes from was supposed to support working parents, so this change is actually harming them (reduced allocation, longer wait time, etc.). Some families are already supported, the ones who enter the labor force as well.
- This move is a Presidential executive overreach of what was statutorily allocated by Congress for working parents, this would be illegal. Right or wrong, change the law to get it going. Principles are only worth something when it's hard.
If the point is to support fertility rates, the 9k should be per kid, not per family. If a family has a kid, they already qualify for the $9k. The second kid calculation does not take that $9k into account because it doesn't move the needle.Also, the type of people who would be moved to have a kid for the $9k is not the type you want to have kids.
edit1: I striked points 4 and 5 because as it turns out the $9k might just be an average and is not just a one time payment based on how the Child Care and Development Fund currently works.
lollol
25d ago
As information about the OpenAI Hugging Face incident gets weirder and breaks into mainstream media, I began telling people around me that it feels like the beginning of those scifi/apocalyptic movies where there are talking heads on the news that everyone glazes over (cue: Shaun of the Dead). As @ebrso linked, OpenAI is claiming to have a solved a Millennium problem. I'll argue 99% of the people in the world wouldn't understand what this means. Though I suppose that is typical of scientific and academic progress. Though I think the more important thing is to realize how fast all these changes and progress and innovation is coming. Will we all become like the protagonist in Her, where we're occupied by human-scale problems, hugely important to us, but kinda misses the bigger point? (though I guess that's all we are in front of an uncaring universe).
lollol
30d ago
If Lindsay Clancy has actually started to say stuff like "I killed my kids, please kill me, I deserve the death sentence", I think it will be easy to say "yeah she's got mental problems".
lollol
1mo ago
Unfortunately not enough details to infer, I can see different reasons why the door was locked from the nefarious/conspiratorial to the innocent/accidental. For whatever reason, the Vietnamese-American woman didn't raise a fuss at the time and just found a different spot to sleep. She also isn't suing for any kind of conspiracy but just the rapist. Personally, I'm inclined to believe if she's willing to bring justice to the rapist but not anyone else (though she still could) then the chances of a conspiracy goes down. But who knows.
lollol
1mo ago
I've once booked a house at a resort with classmates (4 guys 4 girls) before and just found random rooms and couches to sleep on when others took "my spot" for the night. She also decided to go to a resort with these people so there must have be some level of trust there. They stayed up late and one could easily think "oh they must have absentmindedly locked it, let's not disturb people sleeping/hooking up/etc., there are other places to sleep anyway".
lollol
1mo ago
I'm sure you must have seen this recent-ish article https://www.gqmiddleeast.com/article/syrian-nightlife-parties-dance-floors-of-damascus
From what I know of party-goers/ravers, there is no way there isn't a party at least every weekend that the underground would know. Also I bet it's going to be instagram where you can truly find the cool parties.
lollol
1mo ago
Just random Vietnamese news that broke out into the international news circuit:
A Vietnamese-American 24 year old came back to Vietnam for a banking internship and was raped by a Vietnamese from a rich and politically connected family. Typical SEA corruption/incompetence/cynicism shenanigans occur with the Vietnamese police and even the US embassy. Fortunately, this American citizen's dad is also rich and politically connected to ....Ted Cruz. The perpetrator has been arrested. I expect the VN government will throw the book at him to calm this slight diplomatic incident.
An 18 year old girl was ran over in a traffic accident by former vice chairman of the foreign affairs committee in the National Assembly. It is incredibly high profile and there are worries of protests from the younger generation that draws comparison to Nepal/Indonesia. I personally don't think it will matter in the long run.
Vietnam defended ASEAN Championship for soccer in the most bizarre manner where Thailand scored all 4 goals of the match, 2 goals and 2 own goals. I just wanted to linked this picture of Infantino reacting to the scoreline because the second own goal was scored in the last minute of extra time. Truly great stuff.
lollol
1mo ago
I finally saw it and uhhh, it's kinda of a bad ad. Like why is it so creepy? I feel like I don't want buy that driver. Isn't there a quote like "good marketing is selling the product, great marketing is selling how it feels to have the product". I think the general feeling for owning sporting goods should be badass, cool, exhilarating, inspiring, motivating, maybe even competitive etc. Not whatever that was. I then did an exercise of how I would feel if it was a man that was shoved, also kinda creepy and machismo violence. It wasn't a warning out of friendliness or protectiveness, but just feels threatening. Either way, I don't think that was a good ad.
I went and find the bud light trans ad. It's just kinda cringe? Reminds me of the celebrities in Covid doing the Imagine song.
I mentioned it in the following passage:
So you're exactly right, most people thought the rules are about "maintaining competitive balance", this might be true but it's only secondary importance to "maintaining the club's long term financial solvency". If the club is a money pit, that is the club's problem is true, but usually this means the livelihood and finances of local communities that these soccer clubs are from. In a way, we can have the other example and think about how the Chinese are just smarter and work harder so even though they're communist they're better at capitalism and therefore those industrial heartlands deserve to die, and I think many people would reconsider that calculation now.
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