Posted on 05/27/2015 8:07:40 AM PDT by Biggirl
The major reason the U.S. has a shot at pulling it off, however, requires only a brief look at FIFA’s major corporate partners and sponsors, such as Coca-Cola, Budweiser, McDonald’s, and Visa. Guess what they all have in common?
Now that the US and Swiss legal authorities have filed their charges, there are already stories that other countries may jump in also filing legal charges against FIFA. If legal authorities in Germany and Brazil also file charges on behalf of their powerful national soccer federations, it could be “curtains” for the current upper management at FIFA—including Sepp Blatter.
Thanks!
Well, there is one guy from Britain. And none from America that I could tell. Last time I looked, the DOJ was an arm of the American government, not the government of the North and South America:
The U.S. Department of Justice said in a statement that two current FIFA vice presidents were among those arrested and indicted, Jeffrey Webb of the Cayman Islands and Eugenio Figueredo of Uruguay. The others are Eduardo Li of Costa Rica, Julio Rocha of Nicaragua, Costas Takkas of Britain, Rafael Esquivel of Venezuela and Jose Maria Marin of Brazil.
You're missing the point. Scratch the names and the sport involved. This is a huge bribery and wire fraud, organized crime scheme that's been going on for decades, and significant parts of the criminal activity have occurred in the US.
Substitute "Clinton Foundation" for "FIFA" and what is the difference?
As for the other issues, a lack of political will stops them from being investigated, not a time, money, and/or manpower issue.
Justice is supposed to be blind. Political will should not enter the equation, unless it is the Obama DOJ.
Which is the whole point, by the way. In the grand scheme of things FIFA is nothing to the average American, whereas the damage done by the domestic scandals can and will affect all of us, as the consequences roll out.
Soccer fans hate FIFA and most wish all these corrupt bastards would get the electric chair.
FIFA, IOC, NFL, MLB, NBA: you name the organization that is not corrupt where there is big money involved............
Indeed, you KNOW the Obama Administration is doing this because if they can connect the Clinton Foundation to that scandal at FIFA, the issues with that Foundation will reflect VERY badly on one Hillary Clinton.
One plays with balls...........
Interesting take on things, Ray.
+1
What? No Red Card?...........
There’s a price for Red Card—this is soccer, you know! ;)
Well, I figured I’d at least get a yellow.........
Not so much. I wanted to find out more about it and cable really isn't playing it up. It's not really a distraction either. FIFA and the Clinton Foundation are both involved in the Qatar cup bid. So publicity the FIFA scandal gets could help keep the Clintons in the limelight (if the media plays fair, which they don't usually do).
The only possible pay-off scheme for the NFL is how they make the decision over the Super Bowl location. There’s a presentation of sites and a committee sits down to pick site (several years ahead of time, if I remember correctly). There might be undue influence, but it’s marginal in comparison to the FIFA situation.
The World Cup is only held every four years....which translates into significant value. There’s roughly forty games held and you could have as many as five million guys show up to attend games...and they pay out tons of money for booze, hotels and travel. The locals of the picked country all get into a spending mode (mostly on t-shirts, more booze, and food). So tax revenue goes up for that one single year by a good bit.
Based on info in the last couple of hours....FIFA gave Bill Clinton’s foundation $50k to $100k for ‘something’. It would be curious what a soccer organization would want and how it would relate to a favor to be paid back later. Oddly, the Qatar World Cup committee also came and laid down some money with the Bill Clinton foundation. News suggest between $250k and $500k that moved to the foundation from the Qatar committee.
Oddly, the suggested charges don’t go to Qatar but the Brazil games and the ‘94’ games in the US.
I think a lot of this is simply money that got moved around and avoided taxes. The fact that FIFA keeps its headquarters in Switzerland, with Swiss residency required of the VIPs and thus quick access to secret bank accounts....it all leads to some illegal business in the end.
FLASHBACK:
http://m.mlssoccer.com/news/article/whos-who-201822-world-cup-bid-presentations
Who’s who at 2018/’22 World Cup bid presentations
December 1, 2010
Michael Lewis
Special to MLSsoccer.com
ZÜRICH,
Switzerland — Scratch one major leader from making an appearance and giving an
11th-hour plea for his country to host the World Cup.
Russian
Prime Minister Vladimir Putin announced Wednesday that he will not travel here
for Thursday’s decision, which had to deal a blow to his country’s hopes of
staging the World Cup in 2018.
Putin
said that Russia had faced “unscrupulous competition” in its bid to
host the Cup.
“I
would have liked to have gone myself but in these conditions I have decided not
to travel … so that they can make a decision without any pressure from the
outside,” Putin reportedly told ministers in Moscow.
First
Deputy Prime Minister Igor Shuvalov will attend the ceremony, Putin said.
The
Russians are vying for the 2018 competition along with England, Spain/Portugal
and Netherlands/Belgium.
Many
of the candidates will bring in their big guns for their final presentations.
The 2022 candidates – the US, Australia, Japan, Korea and Qatar – will state
their case Wednesday, while the 2018 quartet will present on Thursday.
[inline_node:322879]President
Bill Clinton, the honorary chairman of the USA Bid Committee, was flying here
for Wednesday’s 30-minute presentation.
US
Attorney General Eric Holder was a late addition, to show that the US
government would support the World Cup. The US’ legal risk has been
considered a weak point of its bid, according to FIFA inspection reports.
Several
countries are bringing in their big guns for their final pleas.
Prince
William and Prime Minister David Cameron head the English delegation. Los
Angeles Galaxy and England international midfielder David Beckham also will
speak.
Portugal
Prime Minister José Sócrates and Spain’s José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero will help
state the case of their country’s joint bid.
Korea
had Prime Minister Kim Hwang-Shik and the Emir of Qatar, Sheikh Hamad bin
Khalifa al-Thani, led his delegation.
For
the Netherlands-Belgium joint bid, both prime ministers – the Belgians’ Yves
Leterme and the Netherlands’ Mark Rutte, also with the help of Ruud Gullit and Johan
Cruyff.
Australia
brought in Quentin Bryce, the governor-general of the Commonwealth of
Australia, along with supermodel Elle MacPherson.
Japan
did not have a government leader – Kan Suzuki, its minister in charge of sports
is its highest ranking official here – although SONY chairman and CEO Howard
Stringer led its delegation.
Of
the nine candidates for the 2018 and 2022 World Cups, the US, Japan and
Russia were the only countries without a head of state representing their
respective nations. Whether that will hinder those countries’ bids remains to
be seen.
US
Soccer president Sunil Gulati has said in the past that the presence of
President Obama at the announcement for the 2016 Summer Games did not help
Chicago’s bid. In fact, Chicago was embarrassingly eliminated in the first
round of voting.
Hours
before the US made its final presentation to FIFA, this was the US list of
presenters:
President
Clinton; Gulati, chairman of the USA Bid Committee; Carlos Cordeiro, vice
chairman of the Bid Committee; Don Garber, MLS Commissioner; Landon Donovan,
US men’s national team player; David Downs, executive director of the Bid Committee; actor Morgan Freeman; Holder, US attorney general; and Mia Hamm, Bid Committee board
member and two-time FIFA women’s world player of the year.
Also, just noted that a US sports-wear company is discussed as part of the bribe process with the Brazilian national team (150-million mentioned as the profit from the deal), so I think there’s a bit more to the whole thing and will become complicated in a court to explain.
Saw a few minutes ago that the Swiss authorities want the head guy of FIFA to come in next week to answer some questions. Tax avoidance might be something they are curious about and where these guys got their money and how they held it.
My dream right now is that they not only topple the entire FIFA “leadership”, but that the marketing/broadcasting/merchandising companies involved provide a way to link this to the IOC.
Oh, pleasepleasepleasepleaseplease....
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