Planet Earth Rankdown (Round 7)

[Haschel Cedricson]

As an American, it is my God-given right to barge in where I'm not invited. As such, /in.

[Haschel Cedricson]

195. Guinea-Bissau

"Uh-oh, registration closes tonight and we haven't done anything yet!"

Remember when Facebook first allowed people to change their profile URL? All of the smart people jumped on the chance to change their URL to their own name as soon as possible, and the Johnny-Come-Lately's who shared the same name were forced to do stupid things like append characters or the year they were born, like "JohnSmith9" or "JohnSmith86".

Well, Guinea-Bissau is the national version of that. They overslept on Country Name Signup Day, and when they got to the party they discovered that Guinea was already taken. Other nations were in the same boat, but they came up with much better solutions, like "Equatorial Guinea" or "Papua New Guinea". But Guinea-Bissau wasn't creative enough to do these things, so they just added the name of their capital. Seriously, imagine if Mexico was called "The United States of America-Mexico City". That's what Guinea-Bissau did.

[Haschel Cedricson]

All these Andorra cuts are gonna make it hard to keep up the spreadsheet.

[Haschel Cedricson]

Thanks Monaco.

[Haschel Cedricson]

Call me Ryan Seacrest, because I'm about to present an



Look, I get why San Marino doesn't get a ton of respect. Its failure to achieve the highest level of victory is admittedly a black stain on its record, especially considering all the talent San Marino was surrounded with. If we were halfway through this Rankdown I probably wouldn't bat an eye.

But the second round of cuts? Really?

Really

really?

Look at the stats. A "Very High" rating on the Human Development Index. A 96% literacy rate. A budget surplus and no national debt. A QB rating of 86.4. And most impressive of all, San Marino led the 1972 Miami Dolphins to an undefeated regular season, a record that would not be tied until the New England Patriots went 18-1.

[Haschel Cedricson]

A nation that holds almost every relevant record on Monday Night Football does not deserve to be a second-round cut.

[Haschel Cedricson]

It deserves to be in the top half of this game for sure. 16 and 0! That's an incredible feat.

[Haschel Cedricson]

183. Nauru

Much like a lot of the previous cuts, Nauru is a tiny, tiny nation. Unlike the previous cuts, though, Nauru isn't just aggressively boring. Nauru is an actively shitty country.

They first sold all of their bird poop, then sold all of their soul by letting Australia pay them to serve as a holding cell for refugees. Frankly Nauru doesn't deserve to be in this Rankdown as an independent nation anyway; they are basically a part of Australia.

In summation, fuck Nauru.

[Haschel Cedricson]

#176:

Andorra

San Marino

"Kim Jong-Un CRUSH stupid American football coach!"

an artistic rendition of the Kim's revenge

Boo to this.

[Haschel Cedricson]

175. Ukraine

"I'm not beaten yet. I still have armies in the Ukraine."

Haha, the Ukraine. Do you know what the Ukraine is? It's a sitting duck. A road apple, scummers. The Ukraine is weak. It's feeble. I think it's time to put the hurt on the Ukraine.

[Haschel Cedricson]

MOAR CUTS

[Haschel Cedricson]

165. Suriname

Whenever I think of Latin America, I think of countries like Mexico, Cuba, Argentina, Venezuela. I do not think of Suriname. Suriname is so bad at being a Latin American country, they don't even speak Spanish or Portuguese. Instead they speak some sort of bizarre bastardized language derived from German that is full of extra Js and doubled letters. I don't know how any person speaking such a weird language can be cool, and a country full of people speaking that language is even less cool.

[Haschel Cedricson]

160. El Salvador

I understand that this cut might be a little controversial, but we are five rounds into this and it's time to start cutting nations that aren't living up to their potential. El Salvador is an OKAY country, and objectively it probably deserves to make it a few more rounds. But El Salvador came into the world literally promising us all that it was The Savior. They were so cocksure that they would be the salvation of the world they even named their capital Holy Savior. That's a tall promise, and I think we can all agree that El Salvador has come nowhere near living up to it. El Salvador should really be called "James the Lesser" at best, or whatever the Spanish version of that is. El Salvador talks a big game, but ultimately fails to deliver and therefore Round 5 is as far as they will ultimately go.

Also, it would be easy to nickname their military the Salvation Army and fuck the Salvation Army.

[Haschel Cedricson]

145. Turkmenistan

I didn't really WANT to cut Turkmenistan here. But Rory has kind of forced my hand by cutting Kyrgyzstan. Kyrgyzstan may have a weird spelling, but it plays an important role in quizzes on Sporcle. But now that it's gone, what other of the former SSR stans deserve to stay in the game?

Kazakhstan has a rich cultural history and a famous inaccurate documentary about it. Uzbekistan has the capital of Tashkent, which was the fourth-largest city in the USSR, a shit ton of cotton production, and the distinction of being doubly-landlocked. Tajikistan has the second-largest flagpole in the world. What does Turkmenistan have?

Not much. Mostly corruption and carpets. They built an Olympic Stadium in Ashgabat, but they not only will never host the Olympics, but have yet to even have a single athlete win a medal! Tajikistan has four medals! There was a nifty-looking monument, but they gave it the boring name of the "Arch of Neutrality". And that was too exciting for them so they took it down!

Anyway, when more interesting Soviet Socialist Republics like Kyrgyzstan are getting cut, it's time to say goodbye to Turkmenistan.

[Haschel Cedricson]

The more I read about Niyazov, if anything we waited too long to cut Turkmenistan. Dude was just as crazy as the Kims.

[Haschel Cedricson]

Also, my only regret about idoling San Marino is that there's no lasting protection and it got cut again almost immediately.

[Haschel Cedricson]

Okay, everybody will need to use the next 29 cuts on Nicaragua as well or it will still be on the list.

[Haschel Cedricson]

I had a joke about Myanmar but apparently it was already cut. :-/