Exile on Clark is not a political blog. We're here to (hopefully) entertain you, not bore you with our political positions. So first of all, this is not a political rant per se, although it may briefly mention a political position. Secondly, this post is going to involve soccer, so if you hate soccer, feel free to stop reading right now. (Furthermore, I have no problem if you legitimately hate soccer. Not everyone can like every sport. I personally hate basketball, both college and NBA.) I won't blame you. I'm not here to shove soccer down anyone's throat, but I have to toss my two cents in.

Last week, Glenn Beck said this about the Beautiful Game: "I don't get the baseball thing, but the soccer thing, I hate it so much-probably because the rest of the world likes it so much, and they riot over it, and continually try to jam it down our throat . . . It doesn't matter how you sell it to us. It doesn't matter how many celebrities you get. It doesn't matter how many bars open early. It doesn't matter how many beer commercials they run. We don't want the World Cup, we don't like the World Cup, we don't like soccer, we want nothing to do with it. You can package it any way-you can spend all kinds of money. You can force it on our television sets. We will not enjoy the World Cup."

He later went on to compare the popularity of soccer to Barack Obama's policies, but I won't go into that on this site. My biggest problem with the Beckster is his use of the royal "we" in his little tirade, intimating that he speaks for all Americans in his hatred for soccer. As I mentioned above, I dislike the NBA and basketball, but I would never assume to speak for the rest of the country on the matter. If you read further into Becks's rant, it's implied that to like soccer is somehow UnAmerican and by liking soccer, you're embracing socialism. All those years that I played the sport and little did I know I was being indoctrinated!

Glenn, if you don't like soccer, that's fine. But don't presume to include me, an American, in your little piss and moan session. Judging by the ratings thus far, there's a lot of people who feel the way that I do about the sport. How dare you question me or anyone else in this country based merely on whether we enjoy a fucking team sport? It sounds to me like you're disparaging my "Americanness". For your information, my first exposure to soccer was on an American airbase in West Germany. Most of the soccer I played during my childhood years was with the other children of servicemen and women and never once, did we feel like we were playing a "European" sport that was destroying the fabric of America. You seriously need to get a grip on reality.

As for jamming soccer down your throat . . . the World Cup takes place every four years and like it or not, happens to be one of the premier sporting events in the world. ESPN has chosen to broadcast the games. Much like FOX does with your crappy show, they promote the events they choose to broadcast in order to boost ratings. By boosting ratings, they increase the chance of selling ad space to sponsors (and stay with me here) in order to make money. Sounds suspiciously like capitalism to me, but what the fuck do I know? I'm apparently not a Real American™. ESPN and FIFA attempt to package the game to better appeal to American sports fans in order to reach a wider market. Nobody's jamming it down your throat any more than the NFL jams the Super Bowl or MLB jams the All-Star Game down America's throat every year. It's a business, jackass. I thought you believed in business?

Another thing that irks me is that right now, America has a team of athletes competing in the World Cup. For how long, who knows? But just like Olympians, these athletes are competing for their country. They represent you, Glenn Beck, and me, on the world stage. Hate the sport if you want. If by some crazy, impossible chance Landon Donovan and company manage to win this thing (now who's crazy, huh?), are you going to berate them for their "socialist agenda"?

And in closing, you don't "get the whole baseball thing"? Jesus Christ. If you can't figure the whole baseball thing out, do us all a favor and stay home with your tinfoil hat on. You shouldn't be operating heavy machinery or broadcasting your thoughts to millions every day.