The baby men of Washington and Madrid

“Old fools become children again.”

William Shakespeare

Real Madrid won the Copa del Rey . Real Madrid won the Ballon d'Or. Or so history would say if it weren't for the fact that everything is rigged against Madrid, the victim of a systematic conspiracy of evil forces that refuse to accept that, by divine order, they must win everything, always.

Following the example of the other White House, the one in Madrid has a habit of saying: if I don't win, I don't play; if I lose, there was cheating . Just like the richest country in the world, the richest football club in the world is a victim of abuse.

The United States is a victim of a deceitful Europe; Real Madrid is a victim of a deceitful UEFA. The United States is a victim of the internal Deep State ; Real Madrid is a victim of the Spanish Football Federation. The United States is a victim of a corrupt judicial system; Real Madrid is a victim of the referees.

The United States, understood, of course, as the personification of a man, just like Real Madrid. In both autocracies, the concept of power of King Louis XIV of France, "L'État c'est moi" (the State is me), rules.

Louis XIV, they say, had a sense of lordship. No one would accuse the monarchs of the United States and Madrid of having it today. Both of them , 78-year-old baby men, they behave as if they were six months old. They have whims and tantrums if they don't get what they want. They cry and cry and never stop crying.

Remembering the Trumpian spirit of the great José Mourinho, Madrid hit rock bottom last week.

Some of us thought Real Madrid had abandoned all pretense of being a classy club when it refused to send a delegation to the Ballon d'Or ceremony . You'll recall that the reason was that they learned the award was going to a Spanish player, from Real Madrid. But not from Real Madrid, like the Brazilian Vinícius, the one Real Madrid's absolute monarch had designated as the rightful winner.

But that wasn't the worst of it, it turns out. Recalling the Trump-like spirit of the great José Mourinho, Real Madrid hit rock bottom last week when it threatened not to play in the Copa del Rey final (another king) because it didn't like the referee appointed by the sinister Federation to officiate the match. In the style of Attack Ads , the television commercials used in the United States to attack rival politicians, Real Madrid TV aired a mini-documentary to catalog the perfidy of Ricardo de Burgos Bengoetxea.

"With the Basque referee," the followers of the monarch of the Real Madrid court explained, "Real Madrid has only a 64% winning rate. Barcelona , ​​on the other hand, has an 81% winning rate, an incredible difference..." Yes. An argument as brilliant as it is devastating. But the Federation reacted not with the proper submission, but rather had the audacity to publicly express outrage and insist that the Basque referee was still the chosen one.

Then what happened, happened, although it didn't match the anticipated script. The referee awarded a penalty to Barcelona, ​​but VAR disallowed it . Shortly before, German defender Antonio Rüdiger had made a tackle on Barça 's Ferran Torres that was clearly a penalty, but both the Basque and the VARistas looked the other way. It didn't affect the final result because Barça scored four minutes from the end of extra time, 3-2, and the story was over.

Rüdiger, who was withdrawn due to discomfort, should have stayed quietly on the sidelines , grateful that the defeat wasn't his fault. But he went berserk for some unknown reason. Perhaps a foul against a Barça player that the Basque referee saw, but Rüdiger and some of his teammates chose to watch as compelling evidence of the veracity of the Real Madrid TV mini-documentary.

Read also Rüdiger went crazy for some unknown reason; the German did something never seen before on a football field.

The German did something never seen before on a football pitch. He broke a bag of ice stuck to his knee and threw a piece of rock-like water in the direction of the villain, whose winning percentage, given to Barça, was just a minute away from adding a couple more points.

Unusually, and as a perfect culmination to this story about the curious parallels between the two White Houses, it was the soccer equivalent of the assault on the Capitol on Three Kings' Day in 2021, the one mounted by the MAGA hordes, enraged by what they considered to be the lie of the then-recent election results. Will there be a pardon for Rüdiger? It would be a terrible injustice if not, wouldn't it, baby man?