Marco Werman

@NTarnopolsky Remembering. I’m very sorry, Noga.

🇦🇷On a July 15 fifty years ago today, five members of our Tarnopolsky family were taken from their homes in acts of excruciating brutality, and made to disappear before their murder in a flight of death, never to be found.

@ShaneRyanHere @RamInNews 1. Totally agree. 2. Disappointing that the Fox commentators were barely touching on this if at all. 3. The bad mojo of the red card episode feels very similar to the pall cast by Trump attending Knicks-Spurs game 3.

People will think I'm crazy for this take, but I'm a big believer in the psychological impact of narratives on teams. Yes, Belgium looked so much better tonight and we looked lost. But this team had a boatload of good vibes behind them, and in the last 48 hours that vanished, and replacing it was a story of implicit political corruption that turned them into the bad guys, or at least the beneficiary of the corruption. You can't tell me that doesn't put pressure on the team, change the vibe, and take a psychological toll that impacted what happened on the field. American fans, serious and casual, should be pissed at this interference. We overturned a red card and our reward was losing what made this team so much fun until now.

@docrussjackson Just pointing out that one outlet was on this story, and we noted the US-Belgium connection to Lumumba’s assassination @TheWorld back in January: theworld.org/segments/2026/…

Nilatpal Basu posted this on FB: At the #WorldCup on Tuesday — a man in a red suit stood completely still for 90 minutes in the stands. Then he covered his mouth and pointed a gun to his head. FIFA’s cameras cut away immediately. His name is Michel Kuka Mboladinga — known as “Lumumba Vea,” which means “Lumumba Lives.” For more than a decade he has stood motionless at every DR Congo match — suit and tie, arm raised — as a living tribute to Patrice Lumumba, the first Prime Minister of an independent Congo. Patrice Lumumba gave a stunning Independence Day speech on June 30, 1960 — standing before King Baudouin of Belgium — excoriating Belgian colonialism. Malcolm X called him “the greatest Black man who ever walked the African continent.” Six months after independence, Belgian officers and soldiers captured Lumumba, tortured him, and executed him by firing squad. His body was dismembered and dissolved in acid. The only known remnant was a gold tooth kept by the Belgian officer responsible for 39 years until his death. That is what Lumumba Vea stands in tribute to. Every single match. In a suit. Motionless. For 90 minutes. On Tuesday against Colombia — he added something new. He covered his mouth and mimicked a gun to his head. A silent, devastating protest against the world’s silence over eastern DR Congo — one of the globe’s most severe yet least-covered humanitarian crises, which has displaced millions and claimed countless lives through violence and massacres. Lumumba Vea went viral this week — covered by USA Today, the Wall Street Journal, Reuters, ESPN, Sports Illustrated, CNN and the BBC. Every outlet explained the Patrice Lumumba connection. Not one mentioned the link between Lumumba’s CIA-backed assassination, the Western strategy to destabilize an independent Congo, and the current humanitarian catastrophe in eastern DRC today. That connection is not a footnote. It is the entire story. The same Western powers that assassinated Lumumba in 1961 — because he wanted Congo’s mineral wealth to benefit Congolese people — have spent 65 years ensuring the DRC remains destabilized, its cobalt and coltan flowing to Western technology companies while its people are massacred in the east. FIFA cut the cameras. The mainstream media covered the gesture without the history. And a man in a red suit stood in the stands and said — without words — what the world refuses to hear. Lumumba Lives.

Extraordinary reading but no longer surprising. nytimes.com/interactive/20…

If you ever doubt how magical this world is, one day you will decide to go to a World Cup watch party in Oakland that you found online to root for a country where you spent two years trying to coax English out of the mouths of Cape Verdean teenagers. 1/7

Wat to go, Ghana! What a terrific match! #worldcup #ghana

GHANA!

DRC equalizes with Portugal just as halftime hits! #WorldCup #DRC

You used to be able to stick up some rabbit ears and watch sports. Now you have to compete with this isht. directv.com/insider/news/s…

Let me get this straight. Howard Lutnick, Trump’s Commerce Secretary, got caught lying about his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein. Democrats grilled him about it and finally got him to agree to testify before the House Oversight Committee. Four weeks later, Lutnick wrote a $5 million check to the super PAC that funds House Republicans, including members who sit on that committee. Then he showed up for a closed-door interview where, despite pushback from Democrats, no cameras or recordings were allowed. This is the most corrupt administration in American history and it’s not even close. nytimes.com/2026/05/22/us/…

@MapsAfrican @AfricaFirsts This is so generalized that it’s wrong. Take a country like Togo. Smart sociologists see it as 80% Christian, 20% Muslim and 100% animist. It’s more complex than north of the Sahara is green and south is yellow.

Africa's Religious Divide

@NickKristof @peterson__scott @SangerNYT Treason? Then what?

President Trump unloading on @SangerNYT reflects a combination of anxiety, insecurity and desperation about the Iran war. David is the dean of national security reporters: experienced, meticulous and fair. Blaming the messenger underscores that the reality itself is pretty bad.

💥The definitive, complete report on Hamas' sexual crimes has finally come out– and the Israeli government has nothing to do with it. Zero. It was again a privilege to discuss such tough issues with the top-notch @MarcoWerman & @JoyHackel on @TheWorld. theworld.org/segments/2026/…

Wow, Wendy Sherman - Deputy Secretary of State in the Biden administration - admits that what happened in Gaza was "a genocide": x.com/clashreport/st… So you now have senior officials from the very administration that armed and enabled it calling it a genocide - and probably saying so because they know they'll face zero consequences for it. Heck, she'll probably even be praised as "courageous" for admitting her administration helped kill tens of thousands of children...

I literally had to go see this for myself. Sure enough. Apple Maps has removed almost every town in Lebanon from the map while keeping every podunk town in Israel and Syria clearly marked.

Hotlines for US soldiers thinking of leaving the armed forces as "conscientious objectors" are being overwhelmed. Almost all the calls mention the bombing of the girls' school in Iran that killed more than 100 school children. npr.org/2026/04/10/nx-…

Exclusive: Russia is providing Iran with targeting information to attack American forces in the Middle East, the first indication that another major U.S. adversary is participating — even indirectly — in the war. wapo.st/4sxlWTW

US immigration officials picked up a blind Rohingya refugee last week in Buffalo, NY. Then, realizing they had no basis to deport him, they released him five miles from his home. He needed a walking stick and died trying to make his way back to his house: investigativepost.org/2026/02/25/bli…

Some background theguardian.com/sport/2026/feb…

This was a great personal conversation about Rev. Jackson’s global reach. theworld.org/stories/2026/0…