Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

If you tweet it in all caps, that makes it true!

We still have time to mess this up!

Incompetence, fear, or corruption? why not all three?

This fight is for everything.

Thanks to your bullshit, we are now under siege.

Usually wrong but never in doubt

Shallow, uninformed, and lacking identity

Accountability, motherfuckers.

A snarling mass of vitriolic jackals

They love authoritarianism, but only when they get to be the authoritarians.

Nancy smash is sick of your bullshit.

Let’s delete this post and never speak of this again.

Schmidt just says fuck it, opens a tea shop.

American History and Black History Cannot Be Separated

They fucked up the fucking up of the fuckup!

Authoritarian republicans are opposed to freedom for the rest of us.

Putting aside our relentless self-interest because the moral imperative is crystal clear.

Black Jesus loves a paper trail.

A lot of Dems talk about what the media tells them to talk about. Not helpful.

And now I have baud making fun of me. this day can’t get worse.

If senate republicans had any shame, they’d die of it.

Republicans are radicals, not conservatives.

The cruelty is the point; the law be damned.

Come on, media. you have one job. start doing it.

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Reader Interactions

138Comments

  1. 1.

    craigie

    Awesome!
    “You ain’t important enough to get a microchip” is the most succinct refutation of that insane idea ever.

  8. 8.

    Ohio Mom

    I’m glad this TikTok has captions, though even so I have trouble keeping up — oldsterdom is creeping up on me.

    The first part reminds me of old Yiddish curses. The only one I remember off the top of my head is “May an onion grow in your stomach.”

  11. 11.

    Pamoya

    Wow. The message is on point and the delivery is straight fire. Someone give this man a record deal.

  12. 12.

    Fleeting Expletive

    @Ohio Mom: What’s that old Irish proverb/prayer?

    “May the Lord turn their wicked heart,

    or failing that, turn their ankle”

    I should look it up, as the sentiment always makes me chuckle.

  13. 13.

    TaMara (HFG)

    I can’t tell you how many times I watched this yesterday, it dragged me through the day. That and the husband dragging anti-vaxxers when his wife (with stage 4 cancer) was discharged early because they needed the bed because covidiots were filling up the hospital.

  15. 15.

    Johnny Gentle (famous crooner)

    I’m sorry to ask, but is it possible anyone would be willing to transcribe the video? I’d love to know what he hasto say but we’re not allowed to stream anything at work (even with the sound off).

  16. 16.

    zhena gogolia

    For those who were discussing Afghanistan earlier (thread):

    US policy in Afghanistan has been 20 yrs of bad decisions & bad execution in the face of an insoluble challenge. Our local allies were very flawed, our enemy was resolute & the last 3 US presidents have wanted out & knew what’s happening now would happen. But sure, it’s on Biden.— David Rothkopf (@djrothkopf) August 13, 2021

  17. 17.

    zhena gogolia

    Only one president has had the courage to do the right thing in Afghanistan. It is the same man who advised we do this in 2009 when he was Vice President. It takes courage because he knows that he will receive the critiques his opponents are heaping on him now.— David Rothkopf (@djrothkopf) August 13, 2021

  19. 19.

    Old School

    @Johnny Gentle (famous crooner):

    “What’s a conspiracy that you 1000% believe in?”

    “I don’t just the vaccine.”

    Got ’em. Now that all the anti vaxxers are here. Fuck you.

    (Raps)

    You the reason that we are stuck in the house.
    I hope your food is always cold at every restaurant you eat at.
    I hope that every show you do, The mic keep getting feedback.
    I hope you stub ya toe, And even though you put the lotion on, The second you outside you get an ashy fucking kneecap.
    I hope ya breath stick.
    And everybody that you hate is in ya messages telling you “Let’s link.”
    You ain’t the center of attention, intelligence ain’t ya specialty. I’m begging you desperately, JUST THINK.

    Please pull ya head out ya ass.
    You ain’t important enough to get a micro chip dawg.
    Please pull ya head out ya ass.
    Ya paranoia manifesting, Getting my folks sick dawg.
    Please pull ya head out ya ass.
    We tryna live.
    You ain’t giving the awesome perspective you tryna give.
    A couple Google searches’ll show you being foolish, I know you gotta be clueless for talking the way you did.
    Please pull ya head out ya ass.
    And go get the shot.

    That’s it. There’s nothing else to this.

    Please pull ya head out ya ass.
    Or stay in the house.

  20. 20.

    DB11

    @zhena gogolia: There’s a good article today in the Atlantic “What We Got Wrong in Afghanistan” written by a U.S. Army colonel who was responsible for training security forces in Iraq and Afghanistan.

    By his accounting there’s plenty of blame to go around – 20 year’s worth:

    “We didn’t fight a 20-year war in Afghanistan; we fought 20 incoherent wars, one year at a time, without a sense of direction. The U.S. military can and should be blamed for the collapse of security forces in Afghanistan—I hold us responsible. The current collapse keeps me up at night. In the military, the main effort gets the best resources and the best talent available. For more than 20 years, no matter what was reported, what we read in the headlines, efforts to build and train large-scale conventional security forces in Afghanistan and Iraq have mostly been an aimless, ham-fisted acronym soup of trial and error that never became the true main effort, and we are to blame for that.”

    The whole article is worth reading: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/08/how-america-failed-afghanistan/619740/

  21. 21.

    Ohio Mom

    @Fleeting Expletive: I guess every culture has its curses, Yiddish is just the one I grew up with.

    Zhena gogolia @16:
    There was an editorial in this morning’s NYT that I skipped that seemed to be about the horrible mistake Biden was making by having us leave Afghanistan, no one will ever trust us again.

    To which I say, for anyone who still trusting us, better now than never to realize the only reason to put up with us is that we are the proverbial 800 pound gorilla. There’s a long line of places we’ve screwed over, the newest ones will fit right behind the Kurds.

  22. 22.

    emmyelle

    I just sent this to Emmy Jr., who is an enthusiastic Tik Tok user. She loved it, and sent it to her friends.

    By the way, I have decided that I am pretty sure I am going to get COVID. I know that sounds defeatist, and I hope I am wrong. I’m not likely to get it at work, because we have an indoor mask mandate (that none of wanted, because we actually dropped it for a brief and blissful six weeks this summer, but we all accept), weekly testing, and now a vaccine mandate. I probably won’t get it in the grocery store because I wear a mask, don’t spend too much time in the store, and live in MA where a lot of people are masking and vaccinated.

    I’ll probably get it in a restaurant, even though I don’t go that often, or a baseball game, even though I don’t go that often, or in some other setting like a small gathering. I may get it at an airport or plane when I take Emmy Jr on college visits.  I’d love to go to a concert, but I won’t. I’d love to take a luxurious vacation, but I won’t. Hell, I’d love to go to my professional conference this year but I won’t because a) I’m positive it will go virtual (yes, another f*cking Zoom conference) and b) even if it weren’t I wouldn’t go. But I’m tired of not going to restaurants, I’m tired of not taking the train to Boston for a day of shopping, dining, wandering. I’m tired of not seeing my sister and my brother and mother and my aunts. We are all vaccinated, but similarly all tired of not doing stuff and even though none of us are getting back to our pre-COVID activities, we are fucking done with the way we lived for a goddam year.

    So, we are probably going to get COVID. I just hope that it happens at a time when my immune system is up to the task, before it is discovered that we need boosters, or after said boosters are administered. And I hope that when my kid gets it, it does not make her heart condition worse.

    I really hate the people who are responsible for this.

  24. 24.

    Just Chuck

    Here’s a conspiracy I believe in: That Fox News is out to rip apart the social fabric of the country.

  25. 25.

    Ken

    @Old School:

    Please pull ya head out ya ass.
    Or stay in the house.

    Although if they must leave the house, keeping their head in their ass would be an acceptable substitute for a mask.

  26. 26.

    Ixnay

    @Fleeting Expletive: the one I know is sung. May those who love us love us, and those who don’t love us, may God turn their hearts. If not may he turn their ankles so we may know them by their limping.

  27. 27.

    Brantl

    @Ohio Mom:  Truth is, without spending a hell of a lot of money to put Afghanistan right (rebuild their infrastructure, park schools for girls in every town, go root out the Taliban in Afghani and Pakistani countrysides, etc.) there was no way we could have done right be Afghanistan. We never should have gone. Strategically bombed Al Quaida, if we had Afghani permission? Sure, go in there full fledged, with no freaking plan? HELL, NO.

  28. 28.

    JustRuss

    @Ohio Mom:

    There was an editorial in this morning’s NYT that I skipped that seemed to be about the horrible mistake Biden was making by having us leave Afghanistan, no one will ever trust us again.

     

    Sure, cuz invading and occupying a country for 20 years builds so much trust.

  29. 29.

    Jay C

    @Ohio Mom:

    Yeah, I read that NYT Op-Ed too, and I noticed a couple of things about it:

    1. It’s author Fred Kagan, is a honcho at the American Enterprise Institute, so neocon apologist.
    2. It was full of the tritest sort of “conventional wisdom” about American “influence”, “power” and “trust” – which, AFAICT, no one really cares about much any more.
    3. Kagan is so intent on slagging Pres. Biden, he has to mealy-mouth and pussyfoot around the fact that the Afghanistan withdrawal plan was basically Trump’s (which was one of TFG’s few campaign issues he at least tried to follow through on).
    4. Kagan (like most RW critics now spouting off about Afghanistan) utterly misses the main point: i.e. why the hell 20 years of “unflagging Western support” haven’t been able to keep a non-Taliban government in power in that hellhole country.

    No wonder the Times didn’t have comments on this column…..

  32. 32.

    Fair Economist

    @emmyelle: I think with sensible precautions like the ones you talked about the chance of catching COVID can be kept pretty low. Maybe it will still be likely to catch it a few times over a lifetime but a trip to Boston won’t doom you.

    However, until Delta is under control, I’m not going to take my mask off inside except in all vaccinated groups. That’s going to limit my ability to eat at restaurants but there’s often outside seating and it’s not *that* important anyway. Buy even inside dining does not seem to be doom, just a higher risk than I think is worth it.

  33. 33.

    Ohio Mom

    @emmyelle: co-signed.

    Maybe we’ll both get lucky and asymptomatic cases. I hear your worry about your daughter though.

    To everyone else: Apologize for not making it clear that the sorry excuse for an argument about Biden’s withdrawal from Afghanistan was an op-ed by a rightwinger.

  34. 34.

    GoBlueInOak

    @craigie: There is a former combat medic with PTSD who is now a standup comic who has a pretty funny, nerdy TikTok account who thoroughly roasted this moronic conspiracy theory about microchips in the vaccine by going off about how in combat the troops are all wired with GPS devices & they only seem to work half the time, and one time a platoon got shelled by another platoon because the GPS devices were malfunctioning.   And if the US armed forces can’t get full sized GPS devices to work on their combat troops, what makes anyone thing they can shrink them down to microscopic size just to track Chet’s movements at the produce section in Whole Foods.

  35. 35.

    A Ghost to Most

    Matt and Trey of South Park fame have announced a deal to buy Casa Bonita, the kitschy Mexican restaurant featured in at least one South Park episode. This should be fun.

  36. 36.

    leeleeFL

    The Atlantic article was on point and I am in full agreement with the author.

    Rothkopf is the BOMB!

    Kagan can eat a bag of salted dicks.  He should share with the rest of his shitty family.

  37. 37.

    PST

    You ain’t important enough to get a micro chip, dawg.

    I heard this as, “You ain’t important enough to get a microchip dog,” which seemed like a non sequitur, but it really made me want a microchip dog and wonder where I could buy one.

  38. 38.

    Bluegirlfromwyo

    @A Ghost to Most: I may have to go back once Trey and Matt complete their purchase. Birthday trips to Casa Bonita were a staple of my SE Wyoming childhood. The food was horrible to anything resembling an adult palate, but those cliffdivers sure entertained the 5-to-10 year old set.

  39. 39.

    Brachiator

    @DB11:

    The U.S. military can and should be blamed for the collapse of security forces in Afghanistan—I hold us responsible.

    It really didn’t matter what the US did.

  40. 40.

    topclimber

    @Brantl: Did you ever see the Tom Hank’s movie Charlie Wilson’s War? It argues that the big mistake was walking away from the Afghanis right after they took down the Soviet-supported regime. I don’t think they were talking about occupation, more like a smart diplomatic approach. Oh wait, we are talking about the Reagan era.

    Like with climate change, there are tipping points in terms of our diplomacy where the benefit of the correct action far outweighs that of inaction.

  41. 41.

    Catherine D.

    @Brantl: I vividly remember screaming at the TV when the Afghanistan invasion was announced. It started with “never fight a land war in Asia”  and moved onto “won’t work – ask the Greeks, the Romans, the Brits, the Russians!”

  42. 42.

    Villago Delenda Est

    This was posted a couple of times over on Wonkette yesterday.  You’re not wrong, John, this needs to go viral!

  46. 46.

    rikyrah

    I just looked at the title, and thought it was the guy whose wife has cancer that was kicked out of the hospital because it was overrun with COVID patients. That guys rant is RIGHTEOUS. If you can find that one Cole, please post it.

    But, this one is good too. I love the video.

  49. 49.

    Old School

    @rikyrah:

    I just looked at the title, and thought it was the guy whose wife has cancer that was kicked out of the hospital because it was overrun with COVID patients. That guys rant is RIGHTEOUS. If you can find that one Cole, please post it.

    Mistermix posted that one yesterday, but I agree that’s it is worth watching for those who missed it.

  53. 53.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    So I got this piece of stupidity a few minutes ago.

    Keep in mind that the state and federal judges in the area served by the federal courts in the Eastern District of Kentucky are drawn from their communities and are thus afflicted with the same general level of stupid I attribute to the region.  We here in Louisville aren’t that much better, but I haven’t gotten a similar feel from the bankruptcy court over here.

    UNITED STATES BANKRUPTCY COURT EASTERN DISTRICT OF KENTUCKY

    CLERK’S NOTICE RE: RESUMPTION OF ON-SITE
    HEARINGS

    The United States Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky will resume in-person, on-site hearings for all matters scheduled on or after September 1, 2021. Members of the bar, parties to cases, and the public are advised of the following guidelines:

    1. Each participant and person in attendance must wear a mask that covers their nose and mouth. Masks may be lowered if necessary while addressing the court. The judges, pursuant to prevailing guidance, strongly encourage anyone not fully vaccinated to get vaccinated as soon as possible.
    2. The parties shall present from their locations at counsel table or from the podium, at the direction of the presiding judge.
    3. While strict social distancing will not be enforced, parties should distance themselves from others to the extent practical. A party may request other accommodations related to COVID-19 for good cause and upon reasonable notice.
    4. If, as a hearing approaches, any participant experiences COVID-19 symptoms or has a positive test, or has a known exposure to COVID-19, counsel shall promptly alert the courtroom deputy.
    5. For hearings held in courthouse space shared with the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky, members of the bar and other participants are encouraged to make themselves aware of the prevailing guidelines in those spaces.

    /s/ Nathan W. Lee Clerk of Court August 9, 2021

    These instructions are insane. Literally insane.

  54. 54.

    Bruce K in ATH-GR

    I got the impression that the Afghan war was doomed the moment W and company decided they wanted to invade Iraq. That sapped the forces available to run down Bin Laden and properly take down the Taliban, and squandered the moral capital we had when the Taliban were openly harboring the people who masterminded 9/11. After that point, American involvement in Afghanistan was always going to end up like this, with the only questions being how much time and how much blood would be spent before bowing to the inevitable.

  55. 55.

    debbie

    @zhena gogolia:

    It shouldn’t even be on America. Afghanistan was gifted 20 years and a trillion dollars and achieved very little. They chose to look the other way as the vultures swooped in for their grift and theft; they chose to sit back with the expectation that others would do all the work for them. What’s happening now is horrendous, but not one person in the many interviews I’ve listened to on NPR and BBC have taken any personal responsibility at all. Not one.

  59. 59.

    Ken

    On reflection, neither the gentlman in the top video nor the one WaterGirl posted at #51 appear to respect people who choose not to get the vaccine. I thought we were supposed understand their concerns and feelings; or at least, I read a lot of quotes from Very Serious People advocating that.

  61. 61.

    Chetan Murthy

    Since nobody’s mentioned it so far:  this Kagan character is not just a right-wing nutter; he’s also a warmonger.  His bro Robert Kagan was a signatory to the Project For a New American Century document — the one  that argued for the US to bestride the global militarily, crushing all in our path.  Madness.  He’s always been a bloodthirsty nutter, never saw a country of poor brown people he didn’t wanna squash into the dirt.

    Blood-drenched hands and maw, that guy.  I can well imagine he wants us to stick around in Afghanistan: he needs more souls to feed his insatiable hunger.

  64. 64.

    persistentillusion

    @A Ghost to Most: ​
     Casa Bonita was nuts before; animatronic gorillas and rainforest thunder storms, anyone? I can’t imagine what it will be like after. I also imagine that they will continue to serve absolutely the worst Mexican food in CO.

  66. 66.

    Ksmiami

    @Brachiator: exactly it’s always about us isn’t it… maybe there’s no history of Democratic rule in Afghanistan, maybe they like Taliban rule. There’s nothing we could have done to alter this outcome short of full occupation, war with nuclear Pakistan and 51st statehood. Enough

  67. 67.

    Cermet

    If anyone saw the map of what the government vs taliban each controlled last year (no amerikan ground forces) the war was over then. This is just a mop up exercise by the taliban picking up the cites they ignored. Afghanistan fell under (t)Rump once he (ok, he was absolutely correct) had all ground forces withdraw to their main camps.

    I’d hope the taliban can move some forces into Florida and help us, if we ask real nice … .

  68. 68.

    Steeplejack

    @Chetan Murthy:

    And their father, Donald, was another raging neocon nutter. I was checking on Wikipedia and was surprised to see that he died last Friday. I didn’t see that in the news. He was 89, living in a retirement home in D.C.

    @nycsouthpaw on Frederick’s Times editorial:

    It’s fucking amazing that we still have to go to the Kagan family for these takes.

    Like certain British lords’ families have been doing the coronation for six hundred years, I have no doubt some Kagan will come forth in 45 years to say we must maintain our multi-decade military occupation of Vanuatu even if the island has sunk entirely beneath the sea.

    @Mal_A_Clypse:

    I guarantee you could get at least one Kagan to write about the vital strategic importance of our bases in Freedonia.

  69. 69.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @sab:

    You just know that the bit about “you MAY lower your mask when addressing the court” is going to be the general practice as that little inclusion is seen as an encouragement about conduct.

    You also know that the part about showing cause for COVID accommodation will involve statements of need being very sternly and strictly scrutinized.

    “X died because he attended a London KY Motion for Stay Relief to Allow Creditor to Repossess Vehicle” is something that would be really ugly on a headstone.

  70. 70.

    JMG

    Once about 6-7 years ago I was reading an Economist article about street crime in Barcelona (Europe is going to hell has been a staple of the publication since the 19th century). One prominent victim of a snatch/mugging cited was the Afghan ambassador to Spain, who was robbed of his $20K Rolex. That’s where our money went. Not for schools for girls, not for building an army, but for nice watches for the officials of the “government” we installed.

  71. 71.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @Cermet:

    When you occupy an area where the hostile inhabitants have food but nothing else to lose except their lives, they’re going to kill occupiers and retake the region.  They simply do not care about the destruction of homes and possessions that had little value.

    This has been what Afghanistan always was.  This is also the lesson of the Central Highlands and Mekong Delta in Vietnam, the lesson of Haiti, the lesson that Israel is going to learn in Gaza.

  73. 73.

    Steeplejack

    On an open-thready note, I just happened to see that the English Premier League is starting the season today, with newly promoted Brentford hosting Arsenal at 3:00 p.m. EDT. I’ll tune in (NBC Sports) and see if I can regain some of the enthusiasm that COVID killed the last season and a half.

    Sky Sports has a good website for all things EPL (and other leagues). Seven matches tomorrow and two on Sunday.

  74. 74.

    Gin & Tonic

    @debbie: About two years ago I worked my way through Steve Coll’s Directorate S, a very dense but extremely well-sourced book about Afghanistan and about Pakistan’s malign influence.

    The ISI is getting exactly what it wants here, IMO.

  75. 75.

    PsiFighter37

    Suppose I need to find out what the younger people these days are up to and download TikTok at some point. Ugh.

  77. 77.

    L85NJGT

    There is an article of faith that if Congress hadn’t cut off military aid to South Vietnam, they could have air powered their way to victory in ‘75. This is based on a bad read of the ‘73 NVA offensive, and all that Stallone retcon bullshit.

  80. 80.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @L85NJGT:

    I’m just trying to figure out the mental calculus that it took to decide to keep committing troops and resources despite the fact that:

    1) Ho Chi Minh’s uprising was more nationalist than communist and had the broad approval of the predominant Buddhist faith;

    2) Ho Chi Minh and his leadership cadre were wildly loved in the more heavily populated industrial north because of the successful ouster of the French, and could count on indefinite continued support;

    3) Outside of Saigon and DaNang, about 60% of the rural population liked Ho Chi Minh and his leadership cadre due to the ouster of the French, with about another 20-30% not really caring one way or another;

    4) Saigon residents didn’t really love their regime; and

    5) People in the South had relatives north of the DMZ.

    I mean, by what sort of idiocy do you think American troops are going to change that, particularly when each new Saigon government was worse than the last?

  81. 81.

    StringOnAStick

    @topclimber: Speaking of tipping points, we watched “Kiss the Soil” on Netflix last night and if you’re feeling hopeless about climate change, you owe it to your mental health to watch this movie.  Changing how we do agriculture will sequester an enormous amount of carbon, and how we do it now is adding a huge carbon burden.  A solution that doesn’t require geo engineering or CO2 injection solutions.

  82. 82.

    Yutsano

    @WaterGirl:  Same. I already know the Chinese have my personal information, but I don’t need to feed them more material in real time. I’m just hoping none of this comes back to hurt people.

  83. 83.

    JoyceH

    On another open-thready note – Ana Navarro last night on CNN reported that she had recently been to the White House and that Ivanka’s old office is now assigned to Julie Rodriguez, who is Cesar Chavez’s granddaughter. For some reason, that cheered me up enormously.

  87. 87.

    westyny

    @Jay C: I had breakfast with Kagan at Chautauqua in 2003 (long story, but it’s that kind of place).  I argued this very point to him, that a two front war was such classically bad strategy that to initiate it was effectively insane.  He was oblivious and clearly felt I had no standing.  He deserves to be hounded by the furies for the rest of his life.

  89. 89.

    Amir Khalid

    @Ksmiami:

    Trust me: nobody likes Taliban rule, except Taliban rulers. They’re not winning hearts and minds over there, you know; they just have the biggest and best fighting force around, and what they’re doing is conquering Afghanistan by military force.

    Only Afghans can save Afghanistan from the Taliban. It takes a hell of a lot more than winning all the shooting matches, as Adam would remind us. If they are not a cohesive enough nation, if they don’t have the will to get their own nation standing up and take on that fight, no outside army and no other nation can do it for them.

  91. 91.

    Chetan Murthy

    @Gin & Tonic:

    The ISI is getting exactly what it wants here, IMO.

    And we *paid* them good hard cash, for a lot of that.  I don’t know which client is the most treacherous: Pakistan or KSA.

  93. 93.

    Mike in NC

    Waiting to see who the first Republican will be to demand we invade and “liberate” Iran.

  96. 96.

    Chetan Murthy

    @Ohio Mom: The colonel in Full Metal Jacket had thoughts on this:

    inside every [epithet for a Vietnamese person] there is an American a capitalist trying to get out.

    He neglected to mention that we’re the ones keeping them from doing so, and if we’d just get out of their damn way, we could all be pals.

  99. 99.

    Quiltingfool

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: Ok, I was just thinking about Vietnam and Ho Chi Min today!  I was doing some reading re Vietnam – at the end of WWI, Ho Chi Min travelled to France to attempt a meeting with Woodrow Wilson, who was there negotiating the Treaty of Versailles (hope I got that right).  He wanted the US to help the Vietnamese people become self governing – which meant removing French rule.  Wilson didn’t meet with him, and we know that no help was extended.  We also know Wilson was a racist (not gonna help any non-white), but the timing of the request may have been awkward.  France had some major problems to deal with, and losing a colony wasn’t something they were going to go for.

    So, I think Ho Chi Min went with folks who promised aid – the Chinese Communists.  Fast forward 50 years and then the US did decide to get involved with disastrous results.

    I don’t know much about Afghanistan, but I did know no invading army conquered them; as to why we stuck around?  Well, I’ve read that country has rich deposits of lithium – and the US tends to pay attention if there is something of value to gain.

  100. 100.

    Ohio Mom

    @Steeplejack:
    Thanks. Ohio Dad especially enjoyed the hide-and-seek mis-title.

    I never before noticed the convention of having generals pointing in their portraits. Now I will never see another such painting without thinking of toilets.

  101. 101.

    Quiltingfool

    On the topic of masks:  I had to do the shopping today (ugh) and I wore a mask to WalMart.  I was in the toothpaste aisle with another lady who was masked.  Another masked lady started down the aisle, stopped and said, “ I just want to thank you both for wearing a mask!”  I and the other lady made comments that we were doing so because we care about others.   That was nice.

  102. 102.

    Ksmiami

    @Quiltingfool: interesting anecdote from the John Barry book about the 1918 pandemic; Wilson started suffering from symptoms of the influenza around the Versailles treaty meetings and had he been healthy, it could have turned out a lot different

  106. 106.

    Ksmiami

    @Amir Khalid: that’s my point though; nothing we can do to fix this short of full metal imperial war efforts – it’s tragic for innocent citizens esp girls but we are barely hanging onto Democracy here let alone being able to impose it over there

  107. 107.

    Nelle

    @Ksmiami: We are quite reluctant that we can’t fix everything.  After all, we’re the Mighty, God-chosen America.  We don’t make mistakes.  We don’t fail.  Ever.

  109. 109.

    Steeplejack

    @Steeplejack:

    Green shoots of enthusiasm. There is a real crowd of real people at the Brentford-Arsenal match (in London). It makes a difference to the vibe. Not masked, not socially distanced, from the crowd shots I’ve seen, so you wouldn’t catch me there on a bet, but I feel relatively safe here in the cozy confines of Threadkill Lane.

    It will be interesting to see if the EPL matches contribute to a COVID spike.

  113. 113.

    debbie

    @Steeplejack:

    “Pull my finger.” ?????

    I joined a few FB art history groups thinking it would be a good break from politics. The comments are Twitter-worthy. I really need to relearn just looking at the pictures and moving on.

  114. 114.

    Betty

    Richard Holbrooke, former ambassador to Afghanistan, explained in 2010 that a military victory was not possible. His last words were to get out. No one wanted to take the blame for “losing Afghanistan” as if we ever had it to lose.

  115. 115.

    Chief Oshkosh

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: Well, the first item on your list, that HCM was more of a nationalist than a communist, was simply not understood by a bunch of people whose power and paychecks depended on there always being a communist threat somewhere in the world.

    What is so bitterly disappointing is that HCM wanted to his country to become independent from the French and form a government patterned on the US model. He got turned down by that racist fuck Wilson and the rest of the racist fucks running Yurp after the end of WWI. We did the same goddamned thing with the overthrow of Mosaddegh in Iran 1953. And we’ve done the same goddamned thing through most of Central and South America over the decades. All for oil and bananas.

  116. 116.

    hueyplong

    @Steeplejack: Both the reinstatement and the release of Trump’s healthcare plan, with his tax returns to follow as soon as that meddlesome audit is complete.

  117. 117.

    Ksmiami

    @Nelle: A little humility would go a long way… honestly the way to convert people has always been more cultural anyway. Coke and Disney are more effective long term than military hardware.

  119. 119.

    libarbarian

    Darius and his pals assassinated Bardiya/Smerdis and made up the story about Gaumata.

  121. 121.

    Steeplejack

    Reverberations continue from Mike Lindell’s cyber conference. Thread:

    This is just bizarre. Even in stories published yesterday, Mesa Country, CO Clerk Tina Peters is just described as suspected in the leak of “logins” to the election system, with no mention of the STOLEN DRIVE OF DATA they unveiled at PillowCon.
    https://t.co/ggi3q8mdHB

    — Julian Sanchez (@normative) August 13, 2021

    She then flew to Mike Lindell’s conference on his private jet so she could be present while QAnon crackpot Ron Watkins fumbled through the drives she’d helped them steal on a livestream.

  122. 122.

    Just Chuck

    @Quiltingfool: The Umayyid Caliphate pretty well conquered the region that included Afghanistan (Bactria), more or less converted it from a Buddhist region to Islamic. Nobody’s been able to hold on to it since though.

  123. 123.

    Amir Khalid

    @Ksmiami:

    nothing we can do to fix this short of full metal imperial war efforts –

    Someone on The X-Files once rebuked the Cigarette-Smoking Man thus: “My God, do you think this is a problem you can solve with enough bullets?” The Taliban are not such a problem. A “successful” US war that wiped them out wouldn’t really fix the situation. Some other group would rise up, who would be a useful partner in mischief to ISI or another regional player. And I doubt the US has the will, the resources, or the credibility to put together and execute a huge Marshall Plan-style project for Afghanistan.

  125. 125.

    Yutsano

    @Just Chuck: The Mongols say, “O hai der!” They held that region for over 100 years before everything fell apart for them.

    @Amir Khalid:  We need to stop all military aid to Pakistan until they get the ISI to stop supporting the Taliban. It unfortunately won’t happen as the US wants a counterbalance to China for influence there. It would also help our relationship with India although that is problematic now too. I don’t know a good solution here except to boycott anyone supporting the Taliban.

  127. 127.

    Woodrow/asim

    @Yutsano: I don’t know a good solution here except to boycott anyone supporting the Taliban.

    It’s OK to not know how to solve a thing, and say it. Although I’m not from the region, I’ve tried to pay a lot of attention to it, historically and otherwise, and lost good friends in the process.
    I know enough to say, with some confidence, that a boycott of everyone supporting the Taliban is unrealistic. At a bare minimum, we’d need to be a lot more self-sufficient to ensure such an act didn’t create massive ripple effects in our economy.
    And that’s aside from a bigger issue — the West need to figure out healthier ways to engage these regions and their key groups, then repeated sticks and cash-as-carrots to oft-problematic leadership. Someone mentioned we don’t have the will for a Marshall Plan, and I’d add we also are struggling to have the right to implement such a thing, esp. as we barely know how to engage the myriad groups and people living there when we don’t have guns at the ready.
    I don’t know how to solve all the above. I do know, from decades of engagement, it’s a real and serious problem, and like the vaccine stunt that got us Bin Laden, our “good” intentions oft screw us over, years and decades later.
    We gotta stop that cycle, y’all.​

  129. 129.

    JoyceH

    @Ksmiami: ​
     

    interesting anecdote from the John Barry book about the 1918 pandemic; Wilson started suffering from symptoms of the influenza around the Versailles treaty meetings and had he been healthy, it could have turned out a lot different

    And it’s probable that he had the Spanish Flu equivalent of ‘long COVID’ for the rest of his life.

  131. 131.

    Johnny Gentle (famous crooner)

    Thank you, Old School! Sorry it took me a while to check back on this.

  133. 133.

    Chris

    What’s a conspiracy theory that you 100% believe in?

    That Donald Trump directed a coup to overturn the 2020 election and have himself illegally maintained in office.

    That Donald Trump colluded with the Russian government to interfere with the 2016 election, and that the FBI happily went along with it.

    That George Bush lied the country into a war of aggression with a body count in the hundreds of thousands so he could have a couple good election cycles and his donors could have no-bid contracts.

    That Ronald Reagan sold arms to the Iranian regime in order to raise funds to support terrorism in Central America.

    That Ronald Reagan supported cocaine trafficking in the U.S. to raise funds for those same terrorists and kicked off the eighties crack epidemic in the process.

    … you know, all things that are pretty much as irrefutable as “Germany invaded Poland in 1939,” but that Official Washington proclaims to be “conspiracy theories.”

  134. 134.

    Ksmiami

    @Amir Khalid: but that’s my point- committing to genocide to “take over” is outside the scope of engagement and not what us policy should ever aspire to. Afghanistan will be Afghanistan. 20 years of blood and treasure wasted

  136. 136.

    KrackenJack

    @Yutsano:

    The Mongols say, “O hai der!” They held that region for over 100 years before everything fell apart for them.

    Who knew the Mongols had that in common with Norwegian bachelor farmers? BJ is a continuing education. :)

  137. 137.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:

    1) Ho Chi Minh’s uprising was more nationalist than communist and had the broad approval of the predominant Buddhist faith;

    2) Ho Chi Minh and his leadership cadre were wildly loved in the more heavily populated industrial north because of the successful ouster of the French, and could count on indefinite continued support;

    3) Outside of Saigon and DaNang, about 60% of the rural population liked Ho Chi Minh and his leadership cadre due to the ouster of the French, with about another 20-30% not really caring one way or another;

    4) Saigon residents didn’t really love their regime; and

    5) People in the South had relatives north of the DMZ.

    Something something Domino Theory something. Made everything clear.

    Hell, look at how “commie” is still a catch-all on the right wing for all things bad, while at the same time cozying up to KGB officers like Putin.

  138. 138.

    evodevo

    @DB11: Yep…When the people you are training are facing a Catch 22 situation at every level and every turn, and an implacable fanatic enemy, there’s no way out…it would have required a complete do-over of Afghanistan, from bottom to top, and would have required years and many, many billions, and it probably would still have failed, because the Taliban could hide out in Pakistan unmolested to wait us out……like I have said many times, we would have to have out-Nazied the Nazis to succeed, or followed the strategy of the Assyrians or Bablylonians…and that’s just not us…

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