Sepp Blatter is delivering deranged quotes until the bitter end

“I will always be a president," disgraced former FIFA overlord Sepp Blatter tells the world's most famous newspaper on the eve of the vote to replace him. 

No, Sepp -- that's not how this works. That's not how any of this works. 

The man who once declared himself "president of everybody" is delivering characteristically deranged quotes right up until the bitter end. 

The New York Times sat down with Blatter, currently serving a six-year ban from the game, just before the FIFA election that will decide his replacement on Friday. The resulting piece reads like an exit interview of sorts -- and is full of classic Blatter blather. 

“Every day is a fiesta,” Blatter tells the Times. “I am a happy man. Sometimes sad, yes. But I am a happy man.”

Blatter's FIFA legacy is one of corruption, cronyism and general moral ickiness, sometimes with tragic human consequences. The World Cup and global soccer have also experienced tremendous growth since he was elected FIFA president in 1998. 

But a May raid by the U.S. Justice Department upon FIFA officials at a Swiss hotel catalyzed a period of tremendous change in the powerful soccer organization -- one that's still playing out. Blatter was banned from the game for eight years, reduced to six this year, and is now the subject of a Swiss criminal investigation. 

Blatter, bizarrely, appears to take credit for shepherding soccer's maturation into a game so beloved worldwide that even terrorists give it a free pass. 

Or something like that. Try to follow along here.

Coordinated attacks by ISIS in Paris last November devastated the global community, and included three suicide bombers blowing themselves up outside the Stade de France during a match between France and Germany. 

The bombers are believed to have had hopes of entering the venue, but Blatter makes sure to remind the Times that all the night's events "were only outside the stadium." 

“So far, all these outlaw groups, they have never attacked football because they know and they feel that football is for everybody," Blatter says, apparently adopting the role of ISIS spokesman. “And no footballers have been killed while playing. I think football is something that puts people together that gives them hope.”

'No footballers killed while playing' is a pretty low bar to set for oneself. But Blatter is widely known for making up his own rules. 

Blatter also tells the Times he's been spending time playing Caribbean drums of some sort and that "the catering is amazing" at American baseball stadiums. 

Go read the whole story for a trip further inside the mind of a megalomaniac.