Going against a US government request for all flags to be flown at half mast following the death of Nelson Mandela, the sheriff of Pickens, South Carolina, refused to do so over the courthouse/schoolroom/poolhall/brothel in his town, because Mandela ‘wasn’t American’.

So I’m thinking here a kind of Dukes of Hazzard kind of sheriff; white suit, ten gallon hat, bootlace tie, big belly and moustache. The kind’a sheriff who spends a lot of his spare time dressed in white robes burning crosses outside the homes of people who look just like Mandela.

I may be wrong. It may just be some ultra-nationalistic statement in which people other than Americans just don’t count. They’re good at that over there. Like the ‘World Series’ in which ‘the world’ (as we know it over here) aren’t invited to play.
Or it may be just that, like me, the sheriff is already bored with the non-stop, endless, repetitive obituaries, biographies and testimonies to the great man.

Even so, lower the bloody flag man, just pretend that even in South Carolina they can appreciate greatness. Even if its greatness somewhere even further away than Atlanta Georgia.

Meanwhile, there’s dirty work afoot in the world of football. So that’s really serious. I mean, executions in Iraq, nuclear bombs in Iran, trouble in North Korea are one thing, (or even three things), but football??? That’s really important.
And it seems that footballers have been compromising their normal high moral standards (gang rapes, shagging sisters-in-law, drunken brawls…) and getting involved in ‘match fixing’. Again. For far eastern gambling syndicates. Again. They should ban the entire Far East, the world would be a much better place.

So if Leyton Orient beat Manchester United, I could understand that odds would be high, that stakes would be big, that big money could be placed and won. But this wasn’t the case. This was ‘spot betting’. Betting on certain events. In really crappy, low level games.

A man was paid £70,000 for getting sent off in a game between Portsmouth and Oldham Athletic. Or maybe Tranmere Rovers; it doesn’t really matter at this point. 70 grand. So how much was the bet? And how much did the better win?? And how on earth did the bookie not realise something was a touch foul-smelling when some Chinaman (its always Chinamen, despite David Cameron’s visit) puts £250,000 on a man to get sent off in a game between teams the bookie’s probably never even heard of? Do rats not get smelled in the Far East?

Now more footballers are involved. And its pretty shameful. Though sadly, knowing the mentality and mind-set of most of the players of our ‘beautiful game’, its all too credible.

I bet they get off.

Happy tuesday

A xxx