The World Cup has started.  Before it started, there has been controversies regarding Qatar hosting the competition.  Western media have accused Qatar of bribing to be the host.  This, of course, has been debated over 12 years.  But add human rights issues, including the bad treatment of foreign workers, and you have critics and defenders of the country going at each other.  The head of FIFA said that given Western countries' human rights record in the past, they have no right to complain about others.  He was then being criticized for "what aboutism".  In other words, defending someone by accusing others of doing the same in the past.  So here is my take.

Regarding bribes, I think it is pretty well-known that money and favors are exchanged in deciding the host of every major sporting event.  Salt Lake City was accused of that in securing the Winter Olympics.  Even if no money directly changed hands, there are always direct or indirect favors secured for the votes.  Members of the committee to decide the host are wined and dined at every candidate city.  They are all rich people with perhaps business deals in the backburner.  Qatar, I am sure bribed.  But the whole system was installed by Western powers with most of the powerful positions controlled by Western countries.  So the Western media should attack those people and countries, not candidate cities who are only playing the game the way it was set up.

Qatar was not the only host country in a major sports events who was accused of human rights abuses.  But it is the only country I think of that is actually created by Western powers, especially the UK.  It was an UK "protectorate" until 1971 when it was given independence.  Basically, the British and Americans chose a monarch that was on their side and promised free flow of oil.  The UK set up the government for Qatar.  The Western powers all know that this government is not democratic nor would it uphold human rights.  But they did not care.  Even today, they get more angry with the decrease production of oil from OPEC than their human rights abuse.  It is like the police letting the mafia run the city and is benefitting from that arrangement and yet pretend to be shocked that the mafia is extorting money!  This is not about "what aboutism", but about hypocrisy.

 Almost all midterm election results are in.  I think by now everybody knows that the Democrats are retaining the Senate while the Republicans are likely to win the House with a slim majority.  The results are much better than the Democrats expected.  So here are some winners and losers from Tuesday.

The biggest loser is Trump.  His endorsed candidates, most of them deniers of the 2020 election results, lost in most cases in competitive states.  These candidates, most of them incompetent, may have been the reason that the GOP lost the Senate again and did much worse than expected in the House.  This shows again the Trump is bad for the Republicans.  But that was obvious even in 2020 and many still followed him.  Will this finally convince the GOP to get rid of Trump?

The big winner was Ron DeSantis who is also one of the reason that Trump is a big loser.  DeSantis did not pledge allegiance to Trump and won big.  His victory margin was impressive and may make him the front runner for the GOP in 2024.

Mitch McConnell is a loser.  Even though not his fault, by not winning the Senate, many in the Republican party want to oust him as minority leader.  I don't like McConnell but he has done a great job serving GOP interests in the Senate and it would be a mistake for them to oust him.

Kevin McCarthy was a winner and a loser.  He most likely will become Speaker.  But he will not have the majority he needs to push his agenda through without the Tea party extremists.  So his hands are tied and he may have to seek compromise with the Democrats to pass relatively moderate agenda.  But if he compromises with the Democrats, he will likely to have his leadership position challenged by the extremists in his party.  He may even lose his leadership position.  But given McConnell and McCarthy are both spineless, I don't feel sorry for either one.

One who did not lose but may lose influence is Joe Manchin.  If Warnock beats Walker in the runoff, the Democrats will have an extra vote in the Senate and may not need to kowtow to Manchin in many issues.  He may lose his position as the most powerful man in the Senate.

A possible winner is our democracy.  By defeating most election result deniers and not having much controversies in this election, hopefully our democracy is more stable than any time since Trump was elected in 2016.