Thirty seven billion people will watch some or all of the 1998 World Cup tournament on television starting this week, we’re told. A decimal of a fraction of a milli-percent divided by pi of those will be residents of the United States, we suspect. Unless they change the name of this thing to the “3rd Rock From the Sun Cup,” this wonderful cultural sporting event that almost shuts down the economy in most countries for a month will continue to bounce off satellite dishes and past the summer reruns on U.S. distribution services. This event better suited for the Discovery Channel than the Disney sports-media conglomerate–more specifically, ABC and ESPN–is something that should take place the same year as presidential elections. That way the apathy could be measured simultaneously.
