CLEVELAND, Ohio - The outlaw country of Russia, along with basking in praise from the current President of the United States for its "strong leader" and former spymaster Vladimir Putin, is again playing host to an international sports competition.

The 2018 World Cup in soccer should have been rescinded from the crooked country, even given a long history of bribery and corruption in FIFA, the world governing body, in selecting host nations.

The World Cup begins Thursday in Moscow when Russia plays Saudi Arabia.

The USA isn't blameless either

Soccer is bigger than the Olympics in much of the world, although not here in the home of the brave and of a United States Olympic committee that overlooked or hid for years sexual abuse of young women in the pursuit of gymnastics and swimming medals.

It was a horrific scandal in both sports, victimizing far more athletes than ever before in the country's growing history of sports sex abuse.

But Russia is thug country No. 1

Still, Russia was outside the pale. It pushed the envelope for terrorism abroad by a state government. Flex your biceps, Vladdy, you bare-chested strong man, you.

Great Britain charged that Russians poisoned an ex-spy with nerve gas in London and killed a Russian political dissident with the James Bond-like instrument of a poisoned umbrella tip on the city's Waterloo Bridge.

Also, of course, according to every credible U.S. intelligence agency, Russia manipulated Facebook and otherwise interfered in the 2016 Presidential election in favor of Donald Trump.

This would have been an act of war in the old days. The Russian republic is as ruthless as the old Soviet Union.

But it gets far better PR from the White House these days.

Sochi and South Korea

This is the same Russia whose athletes were forbidden to compete under the disgraced country's national flag for systematic doping conducted during the 2014 Winter Olympics by the Putin regime in the Black Sea city of Sochi.

Supposedly, the Russian national anthem was not to be used in South Korea at the 2018 Winter Olympics either. After winning the gold medal in hockey, the Russians sang it anyway.

They do whatever the hell they want to, and nobody does anything about it.

What could possibly go wrong?

In other news, the United States, Mexico and Canada will split host duties for the 2026 World Cup.

Which might be a tough logistical thing what with the promised big wall on the southern border of this country.

There's also a political clash between the leaders of the USA and Canada right now.

It's the biggest rift since the dustup on the track in Seoul in the 1988 Olympics between Canada's Jamaica-born Ben Johnson, DQ'd for doping after winning the 100 meters gold medal, and America's Carl Lewis, awarded the gold because, hey, so what if he failed drug tests in the Olympic Trials?

Probably that was because Ben's eyes were yellow from the all the steroids he ingested while Lewis' urine test did not blow out half the power grid in downtown Seoul.

Johnson is 56 now. I'm not sure about his ball skills in soccer.

But there was a time when Russia could have used him.