Guns or Soccer
Haitians lay hopes at Ronaldo's feet
In the four months since the former president Jean-Bertrand Aristide was forced to flee Haiti, only one foreign force has shown the potential to reunite the country - the Brazilian football team.I first saw this story in The Economist but forgot to link it until today. Simply put, I think this is a great idea. Given the choice between guns and soccer, I bet a lot of Haitians will choose soccer. I also like that the article (in the Guardian, no less) basically acknowledges that the Brazilian Soccer Team is more likely to bring stability to a country than UN forces. Maybe in America we should have like, a Super Bowl where to get in you have to turn in your bad attitude.
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The best that is hoped of the United Nations, whose soldiers recently arrived to replace the Americans, Canadians, French and Chileans, is that they manage to keep the pro-and anti-Aristide factions apart. But when the Brazilians play a friendly football match against Haiti in August, divisions will dissolve for at least 90 minutes. Brazilian troops, who make up a large part of the UN peacekeeping force, arrived last month bearing gifts of 1,000 footballs for Haitian children. The Brazilian president, Luiz Inacio "Lula" da Silva, plans to attend the game. But to get a ticket for the big match, each fan must turn in at least one gun.