The tragedy of Benghazi, where a U.S. ambassador and three other Americans were killed, seemed a cut-and-dried story in the days after a mob attacked the State Department's mission in eastern Libya. Today, the public knows that those early administration pronouncements were false.
They turned soccer stadiums into battlegrounds and then fought real wars.
Thousands danced in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Hundreds chanted in South Africa, carrying signs and candles. The Philippines held a 24-hour dance party. Scores of students in India gathered for a candlelight vigil.
At trials in Croatia and Turkey, police wiretaps revealed that those trying to fix soccer matches used elaborate codes to disguise what they were talking about. In Croatia, the code was based on food, women and cars; in Turkey, it was based on farming and construction terms.
Soccer player Mario Cizmek thought it would just be one match. Ease up and let the other team win, he told himself, then collect the payoff and start paying off your debts.
Soccer is falling under a cloud of suspicion as never before, sullied by a multibillion-dollar web of match-fixing that is corrupting increasingly larger parts of the world's most popular sport.
Mario Cizmek was convicted of rigging games in Croatia's first division in 2010. At his trial and in subsequent interviews with The Associated Press, he spoke about the "unwritten rules" of match-fixing:
The United States is one win away from advancing. Bob and Mike Bryan, the world's No. 1 ranked doubles team, will take on Brazil's Marcelo Melo and Bruno Soares on Saturday, followed by Sunday's reverse singles.
Lionel Messi's four-goal burst ensured that he and Barcelona returned to the top of the Associated Press Global Soccer rankings this week.
