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If you cannot answer whether trump lost the 2020 election, you are unfit for office.

Republicans: The threats are dire, but my tickets are non-refundable!

I did not have this on my fuck 2025 bingo card.

These days, even the boring Republicans are nuts.

The real work of an opposition party is to oppose.

Relentless negativity is not a sign that you are more realistic.

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Radicalized white males who support Trump are pitching a tent in the abyss.

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Narcissists are always shocked to discover other people have agency.

Prediction: the gop will rethink its strategy of boycotting future committees.

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Make the republican party small enough to drown in a bathtub.

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You are here: Home / Politics / America / In Case Anyone Was Wondering Why the Taliban Actually Were Able To Retake Afghanistan So Easily, It Is Because the Trump Administration Agreed the US Would Unconditionally Surrender To Them

In Case Anyone Was Wondering Why the Taliban Actually Were Able To Retake Afghanistan So Easily, It Is Because the Trump Administration Agreed the US Would Unconditionally Surrender To Them

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The title is not hyperbole. The agreement negotiated by Ambassador Khalilzad, the Special Representative for Afghan Reconstruction working under the direction of Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on the direct orders of then President Trump makes the Treaty of Versailles look like strategic genius.

The abject surrender is in part one and sections 2 and 3 of part 3. Part 2, which is the Taliban’s responsibilities as a result of the agreement, are not enforceable by the US once the US and its Coalition allies complete the withdrawal from Afghanistan and because of what the US agreed to in part 1: to never again threaten to use force, use force, or interfere in any way in Afghanistan.

What did the US agree to:

  1. Release of Taliban prisoners,
  2. Lifting of all sanctions,
  3. Complete withdrawal from Afghanistan,
  4. To never again threaten to use force, use force, or interfere in any way in Afghanistan
  5. To seek positive relations with the Taliban
  6. To establish economic reconciliation with the new post occupation Islamic government of Afghanistan

The key parts are in screen grabs below.

In Case Anyone Was Wondering Why the Taliban Actually Were Able To Retake Afghanistan So Easily, It Is Because the Trump Administration Agreed the US Would Unconditionally Surrender To Them In Case Anyone Was Wondering Why the Taliban Actually Were Able To Retake Afghanistan So Easily, It Is Because the Trump Administration Agreed the US Would Unconditionally Surrender To Them 1 In Case Anyone Was Wondering Why the Taliban Actually Were Able To Retake Afghanistan So Easily, It Is Because the Trump Administration Agreed the US Would Unconditionally Surrender To Them 2 In Case Anyone Was Wondering Why the Taliban Actually Were Able To Retake Afghanistan So Easily, It Is Because the Trump Administration Agreed the US Would Unconditionally Surrender To Them 3 In Case Anyone Was Wondering Why the Taliban Actually Were Able To Retake Afghanistan So Easily, It Is Because the Trump Administration Agreed the US Would Unconditionally Surrender To Them 4 In Case Anyone Was Wondering Why the Taliban Actually Were Able To Retake Afghanistan So Easily, It Is Because the Trump Administration Agreed the US Would Unconditionally Surrender To Them 5

In Case Anyone Was Wondering Why the Taliban Actually Were Able To Retake Afghanistan So Easily, It Is Because the Trump Administration Agreed the US Would Unconditionally Surrender To Them 6

It also DID NOT help that now former Afghan President Ghani issued a stand down order to the Afghan Security Forces before he fled the country, allegedly with millions of dollars:

Or that, as the Special Inspector General for Afghan Reconstruction (SIGAR) has now twice documented*,there never really were 300,000 members of the Afghan National Defense and Security Forces because a plurality to a majority of the Afghan soldiers and police officers on the payroll were no show jobs.

From SIGAR Audit 15-26AR*:

Despite 13 years and several billions of dollars in salary assistance to the Afghan government for the ANP, there is still no assurance that personnel and payroll data are accurate. Since 2006, U.S. government audit agencies have consistently found problems with the tracking and reporting of Afghan National Police (ANP) personnel and payroll data.

From SIGAR’s Audit of 30 OCT 2016:

In January 2015 SIGAR reported that more than $300 million in annual, U.S.-funded salary payments to the Afghan National Police were based on only partially verified or reconciled data, and that there was no assurances that personnel and payroll data were accurate. SIGAR found similar deficiencies during the course of the April 2015 audit of Afghan National Army personnel and payroll data. There are continuing reports of significant gaps between the assigned force strength of the ANDSF and the actual number of personnel serving.

Additionally, a number of the commanders in the ANDSF, both military and police, were either selling everything they could to the Taliban to pay their Soldiers and police officers who were not actually being paid, were embezzling the money, and/or took a payout from the Taliban not to fight.

We have four documentable, verifiable reasons for why the Taliban were able to so quickly and easily retake Afghanistan and not a single one of them was the result of something the Biden administration did.

  1. The Trump administration negotiated the US’s abject surrender to the Taliban
  2. Ghani issued a stand down order to the ANDSF before fleeing Afghanistan to save his own hide
  3. We paid to train, equip, and sustain a significant number of Afghan military and police personnel that didn’t exist anywhere except on the payroll
  4. Because Ghani’s government wasn’t paying its soldiers or police, or because its senior military and police leadership were stealing the funding, some Afghan military and police leaders and personnel cut deals with the Taliban not to fight in exchange for money

I think it is important to stipulate that reasons 3 and 4 – the no shows on the payroll and the misappropriation of salaries – began when George W Bush was president and then continued until last week when we began the final withdrawal.

It is also important to recognize that things did not go smoothly last week through this past Monday. It is also important to recognize that things are going smoothly now.

Finally, for more details on what the Tajiks in Panjir are doing, this is an excellent thread:

Open thread!

* For some reason SIGAR’s Audit 15-26AR now goes to a page not found link.

Reader Interactions

209Comments

  1. 1.

    Spanky

    Hmmmmm. I’m sure the text of the agreement will be on all the news channels. As will the accurate analysis.

    Now where’s that :rolleyes: gif?

  6. 6.

    germy

    For those who say the Afghan army did not fight and crumbled under pressure from the Taliban, let us listen to a soldier who is being disarmed under @ashrafghani order. He is crying and begging his commander saying: “My dear commander, I don’t give [my]weapon to Punjab

    So the Afghan army were proud warriors who were disarmed by Ghani but who also cut deals with the Taliban not to fight?  I’m trying to understand.

  8. 8.

    waspuppet

    If anyone doesn’t realize by now that Trump and his minions essentially admire the Taliban and want to be like them, I don’t know what to say anymore.

     

    Everything they accused Obama of being and thinking, Trump cheerfully, regularly, got on national TV and admitted to. The fact that he’s still considered a true-blue Real American is the clearest illustration of white privilege I can come up with.

  9. 9.

    Mary G

    Adam, do you want to say “I told you so?” That inspector general’s report was scathing and sounded just like you.

  10. 10.

    Jay C

    Thank you for this post, Adam: it’s nice to see that there ARE “receipts”, but depressing as f*ck to know that scarcely a word of this is likely to make into “mainstream” media coverage of the Afghanistan debacle: not as long as there are clicks to be generated raking over President Biden’s Administration…

    At least (so far) our “Retreat From Kabul” hasn’t turned out as badly as a previous one…

  11. 11.

    Spanky

    @germy: Yeah, it depends on who paid whom. Looks like the Afghan govt was hoarding all their cash and not paying army/police, and the Taliban was spreading cash around.

    I think this will eventually end up being seen as the best possible outcome of our clusterfuck as could be hoped. Especially since Trump’s greasy fingerprints are all over it.

  12. 12.

    zhena gogolia

    Could you please inhabit the body of Jake Tapper and go on national TV with this???

  13. 13.

    Lapassionara

    The Republicans are threatening a congressional investigation into Afghanistan.  Bring it on!  This agreement could not have been worse for the US if Putin had written it himself.

    As always, many thanks, Adam

  14. 14.

    piratedan

    @germy:  some from column A and some from column B… consider it a poo poo platter of failure items.

    I can understand the urgency of some in the military to protect those that they worked with and be anguished that all of those folks should have been first to have been spirited out before everything became critical and I am certain that there was a missed opportunity there to handle that better… Just that I also know that the State Department was hollowed out, you had to sweep out the rubbish, bring in the new folks, have them get up to speed. I don’t discount a certain sabotage and not sharing of agreements made that were never disclosed. The documents presented were almost certainly never presented in Congress.

    but even while doing so…. this was brokered when? did no one notice until now? did it get rabbit holed while we were on Impeachment 2 – Presidential Bugaloo?

    They want to lash out at Grandpa Joe and he will certainly allow them to vent their collective wrath but what Smilin’ Joe will not do is lie about the hand that he was dealt and the best of bad choices he had to make. I just wish that I could live in a context free world at times where none of my actions are ever remembered and that I am the only one with any agency, ever.

  15. 15.

    Mike in NC

    This reminds me of a guy I knew who spent his tour as a mess sergeant in the China-Burma-India theater of operations during World War Two. One day he was tasked with preparing a luncheon for General Stillwell and his staff.

    The general was impressed that a small remote facility in Burma could do such a good job, and he was told that the supply folks always ordered twice the amount of food than the actual number of personnel in the unit.

  16. 16.

    Hoodie

    Yep, the die was already cast and Biden ended up holding the bag.  When you look at it, this agreement is not that bad if you take into account that the ANA was essentially worthless and because it looks like the Taliban actually might be interested in remaining in touch with the outside world.  Thing is, Trump should been the one getting people out of Afghanistan we he knew he was going to sign this.  This is so typical of Republicans, make a mess and leave it for Democrats to clean up while all the time blaming them for cutting our losses – and counting on the idiots in the media to go along with that.  Bush did a similar thing to Obama.

    Trump had already drawn down US troops to 2500 in conjunction with this “deal,” and I imagine most of the materiel supporting them is long gone.  Reneging on this deal would have required putting a bunch more in country and resupplying them – basically a second invasion – and I doubt that Pakistan and the surrounding countries would have been very helpful in that.

    All these nitwits on CNN et al. act like it’s a trivial matter to get a bunch of people in or out of a landlocked country in the midst of civil war and with hostile or unstable neighbors.   Adam, how exposed are those Marines at the Kabul airport if the Taliban decides to get aggressive?  I know the Marines would inflict horrible casualties on the Taliban if they try something, but our folks are a long way from home and totally dependent on air transport in a world where just about anyone can get a shoulder-fired AA missile.  Would they be able to fight their way out of there?

  17. 17.

    Benw

    If only Afghanistan had some clever nickname that could’ve warned us what a  fucking stupid idea it was to invade

  19. 19.

    Old School

    So what was Trump’s plan if he would have won election? Blame all of the current events on Obama?

  22. 22.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    Good info Adam, It was clear something like this had to be going on the way Trump made his “blow up all the forts” comment.

  25. 25.

    David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch

    @Old School: ​
      First Dump would never have a plan as that would involve work. Second the media would have given him a free pass.

  26. 26.

    Ken

    @Lapassionara:This agreement could not have been worse for the US if Putin had written it himself.

    Funny you should mention that….

    (Just joking, as there’s no evidence for that. Yet.)

  27. 27.

    Hoodie

    @raven: Yeah, well they’re sitting in the middle of a city of several million civilians.  Not sure that’s an acceptable solution.

  28. 28.

    raven

    McCaffery just said “they couldn’t possibly overrun the airbase but they could stop the evacuation”

  29. 29.

    Adam L Silverman

    @germy: I just updated that tweet up top to provide the context of what Punjab is referencing:

  32. 32.

    WaterGirl

    @Benw: Maybe something really snappy, something that makes you think about death… hey, graveyards might work for that.  And maybe something that makes your own government seem important and powerful.  That one is tougher… kingdom, realm, world power.  No those don’t seem right.  How about empire?  I’m sure they could have figured something out that might have warned us.  Bastards!

  33. 33.

    Jeffro

    But…but…Adam, a LOT of people on Twitter told me President Biden is weak/got rolled/sold out Afghan women and girls/hates America/hates the troops/was a big poopy-head.

    You’re not suggesting they were wrong, are you?

  34. 34.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @germy:

    So the Afghan army were proud warriors who were disarmed by Ghani but who also cut deals with the Taliban not to fight? I’m trying to understand.

    Trump set Ghani and company up for blame for predicable disaster last year. Since Trump is an idiot, he telegraphed it, so Ghani cut his own deal with the Taliban to save himself. After all, he was already the villain so nothing to lose now.

  38. 38.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @Old School: So what was Trump’s plan if he would have won election? Blame all of the current events on Obama?

    Blame Ghani. Trump’s been doing that the past two days.

  40. 40.

    Brachiator

    @Adam L Silverman:

    The Trump administration negotiated the US’s abject surrender to the Taliban

    What would a non-abject surrender look like?

    My hatred of Trump knows no bounds. And God knows this fraud was incompetent.

    But a withdrawal from Afghanistan was necessary and inevitable. And the Taliban seemed to be the inevitable victors. The US could play at face saving, much as the British played at still being a world power when they returned Hong Kong to China.

    But I do not know what other options were available. The fall of Afghanistan is looking a lot like the fall of South Vietnam. I don’t know how things could have ended differently.

  43. 43.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Lapassionara: If the GOP takes the House, let alone the House and the Senate, the first two things they’re going to do is set up a Select Committee to investigate how the election was stolen and then impeach Biden.

  44. 44.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    Richard Hanania @RichardHanania 29m
    Milley and Austin press conference right now. They’re saying the Taliban is allowing people with visas, documentation, etc. to leave. The media keeps giving them hypotheticals, bringing up unconfirmed reports, basically begging them to start fighting again. This is instructive.

  45. 45.

    Mart

    Surprised the old Chicago machine model failed, “personnel that didn’t exist anywhere except on the payroll”

  49. 49.

    Chat Noir

    Thank you, Adam, for this post. You always help me understand this complex foreign policy stuff better!

  51. 51.

    germy

    I asked our bartender in Iceland if there are any homeless people here & he laughed at me:

    “homeless? We have 1 or 2 beggars downtown, but nobody is homeless – our government would never allow people to suffer like that – that’s an American thing”

    — William LeGate (@williamlegate) August 18, 2021

  52. 52.

    sab

    So do we actually have a functionnibg  national security/ military affairs/ foreign policy press at all tgese days? They couldn’t have surmised this back before May1?

  53. 53.

    Another Scott

    Thanks for this.

    ZK is actually competent, so I think he knew what he was doing and wouldn’t completely tie the US’s hands.  The diplomatic language seems to me to be much, much grayer than your summary.  It sounds to me like the US committed to starting the process of talking about sanctions and so forth, depending on how the in-country negotiations go.  I don’t think Biden would have been talking about (in so many words) making the rubble bounce if the Taliban interfered with the present US withdrawal if the agreement language was as cut-and-dried.

    We’ll see.

    Thanks again.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  54. 54.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Old School: There was no Trump plan. His plan was the same magical thinking all of his other plans were: reality would conform to Trump’s wishes and if it failed to do so, he’d claim it did anyway.

  56. 56.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Ksmiami: I have a face for radio and a voice for newsprint and the inability to spell correctly for someone that should basically just go do something else…

  58. 58.

    Mary G

    @Adam L Silverman: America’s loss. I don’t mean you alone in the sense that you should’ve been hired and would’ve saved us all. You know the value of going out into the community to talk to the locals. We need a lot of people who think your way. Seems they instead hired people who would tell them what they wanted to hear instead of the facts on the ground and this supposedly unanticipated surrender is what happened.

  59. 59.

    Mike in NC

    When the proverbial dust settles, let’s hope there is no more mention of Pompeo’s political ambitions.

  60. 60.

    Adam L Silverman

    @sab: They’ve been looking to either find or create a scandal for Biden. They’re determined to make sure this is it.

  63. 63.

    Mary G

    T, but I love it when people close to the top are arrested and get a chancre to spill the beans to save themselves:

    NEW: Ken Kurson, former editor-in-chief of the New York Observer and associate of Jared Kushner has been hit was cyberstalking related charges by Manhattan D.A. Cy Vance. Vance says in part, “we will not accept presidential pardons as get-out-of-jail-free cards."— Tom Winter (@Tom_Winter) August 18, 2021

  64. 64.

    germy

    @Adam L Silverman:

    I understood the context, it just seemed like we’re being fed two narratives that contradict each other.

    1. Proud brave soldiers “don’t take my gun I want to fight the Taliban”
    2. “I made a deal not to fight the Taliban”
  65. 65.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Mary G: SIGAR is a solid department. The Special IG has been an excellent public servant on this. My best guess is that since my previous civil service work had been at the most senior rank below senior executive status, it was determined that I was too senior for the position. Which didn’t matter to me, but seems to be a big deal for the people doing the hiring.

  66. 66.

    catclub

    @Spanky: and the Taliban was spreading cash around.

     

    Thanks the Pakistani ISI and the Saudis (our allies, right? for that.

    also opium.

  67. 67.

    germy

    @Mary G:

    He was spying on his wife, according to the story.  I’m not sure if he’d have to spill any beans on Kushner in defense of this crime.

  70. 70.

    Gravenstone

    @germy: Gonna be honest, the first sentence was reading like a DougJ Pitchbot parody of Friedman and his eternal taxi driver sources.

  72. 72.

    Fake Irishman

    @Hoodie:

    why would the Taliban want to interfere? Their enemy is leaving in a hurry and evacuating tens of thousands of their domestic opponents. It costs them nothing to wait a few days or weeks. They could probably overwhelm the Marine defenders, but at the cost of taking horrific casualties, inviting a lot of US air strikes and really closing the door to any goodwill they have in the world or the population which they have built up by taking over peacefully.

    Raw military might in a situation is t always most important or relevant consideration.

  73. 73.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @germy: Money is cheaper than blood. Plus we want Afghanistan to be terrorist free and vaguely involved in the 21st Century. The Taliban might just do that if they know there is more were that came from.

  74. 74.

    Splitting Image

    @MontyTheClipArtMongoose: 

    Another victory for President Deals*!

    *Kevin Drum’s coinage for Trump.

    How about “Friar Art of the Deals”?

    “Friar Don of the Hashes” also would also work, but it’s outdated since he got kicked off of twitter.

  75. 75.

    Medicine Man

    It chaps my hide that the chattering masses will call the decision to finally withdraw “cowardly” while the cowardice of forever kicking this can down the road remains uncommented on.

  77. 77.

    bluehill

    “Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan which is not recognized by the United States as a state … ”

    I’m guessing that the actual state of Afghanistan would have liked to have some input on this deal.

  81. 81.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @Geminid: Exactly, I was consider this. I know there are a lot of ex-Taliban in the US because I worked with one so they’ve been exposed to the wider world now.  It’s probably crossed their minds in the last twenty years that playing nice gets them nice things and being the shock troops of the Pakistani Jihad only get them dead.

  82. 82.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    BREAKING NEWS: Pro-Trump Republican Senator Ron Johnson, who helped incite Trump’s insurrection, announces that he’s probably going to step down in 2022, saying, “I don’t feel like my time has been successful.” RT IF YOU AGREE THAT HE’S BEEN A WORTHLESS SENATOR AND SHOULD QUIT!— Occupy Democrats (@OccupyDemocrats) August 18, 2021

  83. 83.

    Hoodie

    @Brachiator: Nah, it’s a terrible deal executed very badly.  If Trump was intent on doing that deal, he’s the one to blame if our “Afghan partners” get left behind because he made no plan to move people out who would be put at risk by this deal before he signed it and started withdrawing forces.   The fact that they were basically surrendering the country to the Taliban meant that they knew the Afghan government and army were a sham; otherwise, they would have included Ghani in the negotiations.  This kind of deal is pretty much worthless because there’s essentially no termination clause unless you really believe the Taliban wants stuff like international recognition; there’s almost nothing to hold the other party to comply once you’ve committed, which he did by drawing down our forces.  It’s just like his idiotic “negotiations” with Kim Jong Un, which meant nothing without having another party like China involved to make it work.   About the only leverage we have now is the several billion we’ve frozen in international accounts.  Hope that’s sufficient, but the Saudis or some other bad actor could render that useless. And that’s not even getting into whether the Taliban is even stable enough to fulfill this deal.  It’s a bunch of warlords, any one of which could go rogue at any time.

  84. 84.

    Geminid

    @Medicine Man: The reaction of the chattering class is maddening. But I think that in the end, most Americans will back President Biden in this matter, and that counts for a lot more.

  85. 85.

    germy

    @bluehill:

    Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan is what the Taliban calls itself.  I don’t think the U.S. has ever officially recognized it.

  87. 87.

    Another Scott

    Meanwhile, …

    Apparently an internet rando rightfully called Clay Higgins (@RepClayHiggins) a traitor and Higgins challenged him to a physical fight.

    The rando accepted. Digging for more.

    — Tom Hardly (@HardlyRealTom) August 18, 2021

    Are DeSantis and Abbott and all the rest going to let Higgins steal the MAGA limelight like this?? They should challenge their randos to a naked mud wrasslin’ match!!1

    (via Popehat)

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  89. 89.

    Hoodie

    @Adam L Silverman: Did Ghani make a deal or just bug out?  The order to the ANA was his way of saying “hey, don’t die for this, it ain’t worth it. By the way, I’m going to Dubai with $170 mil, good luck.”

  91. 91.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @Hoodie: The real flaw in the deal was The Trump admin made it clear they considered our Afghani allies scum and there would be no refugee for them in the US like with the South Vietnamese after the Vietnam War. See Miller’s tweets the past few days. At that point it was The Devil take the hindmost as far is the Afghani allies were concern.

  92. 92.

    Adam L Silverman

    @bluehill: Very much so. Ghani spent a year very publicly trying to get Trump and Pompeo to include him. They ignored him and/or told him to pound sand.

  93. 93.

    Adam L Silverman

    @schrodingers_cat: Pakistan is running the Taliban. The person to follow on this is my friend C. Christine Fair, PhD who is a professor at Georgetown and knows far more about this than I do.

  95. 95.

    germy

    @Adam L Silverman:

    BTW: This is the narrative that Pakistan fosters to secure its continued access to the international dole AND to protect its nuclear assets and terrorists with which it coerces the United States. It’s a self-licking lollipop. PS: Pakistan won’t fail.

    — (((Christine Fair))) (@CChristineFair) August 18, 2021

  97. 97.

    Hoodie

    @Enhanced Voting Techniques: Absolutely.  This is why Trump is such a twisted sicko.  He could have convinced his mouthbreather base to accept them, just like he could have gotten them to line up for vaccines and wear masks and thereby probably waltz to re-election.  But there’s just something profoundly sick about him, a will to fail.  He wants death and destruction even more than he wants power.

  101. 101.

    Pappenheimer

    @Spanky:

     

    @Mart: Used to be standard unethical practice for colonels in the 17th C to get paid for more men than were actually in their mercenary regiment (back then nearly all regiments were “mercenary”. The problem came when you had to show up for battle with half your listed strength or worse.

  102. 102.

    catclub

    @Hoodie: But there’s just something profoundly sick about him[Trump], a will to fail. He wants death and destruction even more than he wants power.

     

    I think you’ve got something there.

  104. 104.

    Geminid

    @piratedan: I believe the basic framework of trump’s fraudulent peace deal was brokered and announced in February 2020. I noticed it, but this was just one story in a heavy flood of news.

    And Americans basically care little about what goes in foreign countries near and far. A good example of this was when there was a post here on Afghanistan this winter (it might have been when trump announced the May 1 deadline for American troops to leave). When I read the post, I thought to myself, “…hmm. I haven’t though much about Afghanistan in quite a while, much less checked out reporting from there…” Then I started reading the comments, and saw that I was not the only one.

  107. 107.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @Hoodie: The mask refusal is a loyalty test, typical narcissist thing.

    With the Afghani Allies that’s just naked racism. Trump probably scheming to screw the Taliban over too because they are little brown people who are no match for Trump’s big white brain.

  110. 110.

    Geminid

    @Adam L Silverman: It seems like trump was focused on pulling out of Afghanistan in a way he was not focused on many other policies. Do you think trump was acting under direct orders from Putin in this matter?

  111. 111.

    Jeffro

    @Hoodie:But there’s just something profoundly sick about him, a will to fail.  He wants death and destruction even more than he wants power.

    The death and destruction are byproducts of him being so profoundly ignorant, childish, lazy, and corrupt.  I mean, he was told it was a highly contagious airborne disease back in January of 2020(!)  Yet he – good Christian that he is – wanted all of his followers back in their pews, singing their hearts out, after just a few weeks of lockdown so that he could please his base and try to improve his re-re-election prospects.  He held all those super-spreader rallies in the summer and fall of 2020 with the same intent.  Death and destruction followed…but it’s because he’s ignorant, childish, lazy, and corrupt.

  113. 113.

    Geminid

    @schrodingers_cat: Pakistan’s support of the Taliban is carried out by the ISI, the powerful military security service. The current Pakistani government of Imran Khan may not have much say in the operations of the ISI, which itself is semi-autonomous within the military. I think no civilian political leader has the power to bring Pakistan’s ISI to heel.

  114. 114.

    germy

    @Jeffro:

    https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/opinion/columnists/iowa-view/2020/11/19/trump-after-losing-adheres-norman-vincent-peale-positive-thinking/6341449002/
    Trump’s refusal to concede fits perfectly with the positive-thinking philosophy he learned from Norman Vincent Peale
    Acknowledging defeat would repudiate the core message of “The Power of Positive Thinking” while dishonoring the legacies of Fred Trump and the famous author and preacher he and his son so admired.

  116. 116.

    Peale

    I would be so bad at this kind of graft and corruption. Not that I’m claiming to be exemplarly honest. But I just don’t understand not paying the actual people with guns. Just taking it all. Look, I could see myself reporting that I need payroll funds for 600 troops when I only had 15 or 20. And I could see myself skimming all of it. Except the troops themselves would get paid. I’d think I’d want them on my side at some point. So I’d be greedy and corrupt in the system, but not THAT greedy and corrupt. I’d find myself living in Qatar or Bahrain after the inevitable fall because I couldn’t afford Dubai. And I’d be jealous of those who were living larger, sure. But still, I’d pay the guys with guns.

  117. 117.

    Fraud Guy

    Is it possible for me to try to negotiate a diplomatic deal with Trump? Asking for a friend/dictator/terrorist organization…

  118. 118.

    Kay

    southpaw
    @nycsouthpaw
    ·37m
    Has anyone written an article that explains who the reportedly many thousands of US passport holders scattered around Afghanistan are and why they didn’t respond to months of embassy security alerts urging them to depart?

    I think it’s a fair question.

  119. 119.

    MisterForkbeard

    @Mary G: Nice of him to be this straightforward when there’s no chance of presidential pardons.

    Where was this 3 years ago?

  121. 121.

    trollhattan

    @germy:

    Least surprising response imaginable. While the typical Afghan city dweller is very different from those twenty years ago, the Taliban have not changed nearly as much.

  123. 123.

    Hoodie

    @Jeffro: I think it’s more that he’s sadistic, he wants to hurt people, including his own supporters.  He’s not a success unless someone else suffers.  Hence all that rhetoric about being “tough.”  It’s always someone else who suffers from the toughness (“I hate to do this, but it has to be done”).  I think a lot of people who worship Trump basically hate themselves. I think Trump probably hates himself, too.

  125. 125.

    Bill Arnold

    @germy:
    Skimmed the pieces of hers that she linked in that thread; was a bit dismayed about the parts belittling concerns about the security of Pakistani nuclear weapons vs hostile takeover. That the Pakistani government stokes fears of such should be largely orthogonal to proper assessments of actual risks related to command and control(including physical security) of such weapons. IMO, perhaps driven a bit by living under the threat of thermonuclear war for decades, and knowing a bit about the physical destructive power of such weapons.
    This longer piece, though, has (room for) more nuance. A good read, and rabbit holes of refs to explore.
    Pakistan’s Nuclear Program: Laying the Groundwork for Impunity (C. Christine Fair, November 21, 2016)

  126. 126.

    Captain C

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    The media keeps giving them hypotheticals, bringing up unconfirmed reports, basically begging them to start fighting again. This is instructive.

    You know, there’s probably a good and lucrative reality show to be made featuring chickenhawk let’s-you-and-him-fight “reporters” being sent either as-is or with minimal training and armaments to fight the stupid fights in which they seem to want others to suffer and die unnecessarily.  Part of the proceeds to be sent to help victims of their previous cheerled wars.

  127. 127.

    Another Scott

    ICYMI, Stephen Robinson at Wonkette on some of the unvaccinated:

    Vaccine resisters are loud and annoying. We’ve heard their wacky, medically unsound reasons for refusing to receive the perfectly safe COVID-19 vaccine, and it’s hard to have sympathy for them, as their obstinance threatens a return to what passes for normalcy in this country.

    However, there are Americans who would like to get vaccinated but haven’t because they can’t fit it into their schedules. The initial response is annoyance: How do you not find time to take a life-saving vaccine? But let’s dig deeper into what’s happening.

    According to a Kaiser Family Foundation survey of 1,888 adults conducted in June, about two out of 10 unvaccinated employees said they’d be more likely to get vaccinated if they received paid time off. This isn’t just for the jab itself, which can take about 30 minutes tops if there’s no wait. In some states, there’s a longer wait for Spice Girls reunion tour tickets. No, the desired time off is also for recovery from possible side effects, which can include tiredness, headaches, muscle pain, chills, fever, and nausea. Those are harder to manage if your job is in any way physically demanding or customer-facing.

    […]

    The Washington Post reports:

    That includes people like Zachary Livingston, the manager of a Subway in the Denver area.

    The 40-year-old said he has been working 60-plus-hour weeks for months — with no bump in pay to his approximately $35,000 a year salary — to cover gaps in the store’s schedule as it has struggled to find workers. He’d like to get vaccinated, and believes everyone should get the jab, but said he hasn’t had the time or mental space to do it.

    “By the time I’m out of work, it’s time to go to bed,” he said.
    You reportedly need to earn at least $62,938 a year, or about $30 an hour, to “comfortably rent” a median one-bedroom apartment in Denver. It doesn’t seem like $35,000 a year is even enough for “uncomfortable” rent payments, as it’s almost $20,000 less than the living wage in Colorado. Businesses have whined they can’t find workers willing to accept their crap wages because of the government largesse, but this hasn’t inspired them to treat the employees they do have dramatically better.

    […]

    More at the link.

    We can make it easier for people to get vaccinated, and harder to say no. We should be doing all those things.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  128. 128.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Geminid: No. Part of his long standing since the 1980s belief that everyone was playing the US for suckers. He’d campaigned on getting out of Afghanistan and planned to do it no matter what. Mattis and McMaster and Esper and Bolton held him off for a bit. But once they were gone, this was always going to happen.

  129. 129.

    Mary G

    Adam L Silverman:

    @schrodingers_cat:

    Just read Dr. Fair’s piece “The Biggest American Fuck Ups That Screwed Afghanistan” on Yahoo. As the title suggests, she pulls no punches:

    The Taliban killed so many members of the Afghan National Defense and Security forces in 2016 that the American and Afghan governments decided to keep casualty figures a secret for fear of further eviscerating their morale.

    Rightly so, many Americans are asking whether it was all worth it. But the truth is, this war was unwinnable from the get-go. Here’s why.
    Pakistan was always the problem.

    She’s got as many links as Adam puts in his pieces. The whole thing is shocking. She says American money came in like a firehose, so much they didn’t know what to do with it all, so they made up shit programs and pocketed the money. Both Americans and Afghans were stealing. It’s shocking and I wish I thought bringing it all to light will result in real change.

  130. 130.

    Robert Sneddon

    @David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch: ​
      A trans-Afghanistan OIL pipeline was the supposed reason why the US went into Afghanistan in the first place in 2002 (see DailyKos postings of the time). Twenty years on there is no trans-Afghanistan oil pipeline, and indeed there never will be.

    Since the original invasion and military occupation the world has transitioned to gas as the primary fossil fuel displacing oil. For many of the same reasons there will be no trans-Afghanistan gas pipeline, any more than there will be ‘rare earth’ mines or gold mines or lithium mines or diamonds or oil and gas production in Afghanistan. Instead there will be people with glossy prospectuses in their pockets and their eyes on your wallet.

  131. 131.

    Captain C

    @Dorothy A. Winsor:

    “I don’t feel like my time has been successful.”

    I never thought I’d agree with Senator Ivanson (R-Moscow and Covdiotland*), but I’d have to say he hit this one right on the nose, albeit probably not for the reasons he’d claim.

  134. 134.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Mary G: IDK she retweets approvingly some Modi chamchas of dubious reputation as well. IMHO Afghanistan was already lost when W started his Iraq misadventure

    She is promoting the hashtag #Sanction Pakistan, but was it realistic for the US to take on Pakistan directly? I mean I am no general but I have seen the map of Afghanistan and its nearest neighbors

    And her uncouth Hindi via Google translate using casteist slurs was just gross

  135. 135.

    Mary G

    @Adam L Silverman: She doesn’t mince words, that’s for sure. I love the “No rubes” in her Twitter bio, and this exchange is awesome:

    This lady is still harping on to their failed miserable and bizarre campaign. Christine Fair has lost it completely! https://t.co/mO3DjNanK5— S M Tabish Tariq ?? ?? (@SMTabishTariq) August 18, 2021

    Her response, in Urdu,

    یہ بدقسمتی ہے کہ آپ کا سر آپ کی گدی میں پھنس گیا ہے۔ شاید کوئی سرجن اسے ہٹا سکے؟ عظیم کتا آپ کو اس مصیبت سے نکلنے میں مڈ کرے۔ https://t.co/kl9QCYrcdC— (((Christine Fair))) (@CChristineFair) August 18, 2021

    translated by Google:

    It is unfortunate that your head is stuck in your ass. Maybe a surgeon can remove it? May the great dog help you out of this trouble.

  136. 136.

    Geminid

    @Adam L Silverman: Well, diengagement from foreign commitments was certainly part of trump’s brand. Ever since I saw the pictures of trump and Putin after their Helsinki meeting, though, I’ve just assumed that trump follows orders on matters like this.

  139. 139.

    David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch

    @trollhattan: ​
      Not much different than the torch carriers who killed a woman in Charlottesville for protesting a statute of a traitor.

  146. 146.

    zhena gogolia

    New rule: If you’re going to claim to be an authority on obvious global problems, you must also offer detailed solutions.— Josh Campbell (@joshscampbell) August 15, 2021

  147. 147.

    Another Scott

    @schrodingers_cat: Thanks for that thread, and the reminder.  It’s an interesting read.

    […]

    If Pakistan tried to establish “strategic depth” & control Afghanistan, it fell victim to its own folly & was controlled by the very menace it created. 32/

    That was my non-expert opinion as well. There may have been a time when the ISI could have “controlled” the Afghan Taliban, but I suspect those days are long, long gone. There’s certainly an alignment of some interests, but not control.

    Wikipedia – Deobandi has more.

    Thanks again.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  148. 148.

    Ruckus

    @Hoodie:

    a will to fail

    He doesn’t have a will to fail, he just does not have the chops to not fail or even just brake even. He could have just taken the money he inherited and the money he stole from his siblings and invested it reasonably and he’d be worth a lot, dramatically more than he is. He could have lived a life of utter ease but he had to be the idiotic prick he was raised to be. And it’s cost him billions, and cost the world and US politics massively.

  149. 149.

    MomSense

    It is infuriating that the media coverage has been so pathetic.  I have to step away from social media for awhile because there are too many people who are shocked shocked shocked and outraged (!!!!!!!!!) about what is happening in Afghanistan. NONE of them said BOOO about this until now.  It’s like their whole raison d’etre is just to shit on Democrats.
    Also too my friend from my former life (only recently reconnected with) who was best man at my wedding and defected from the Soviet Union because of what he experienced as an officer in the military in Afghanistan has become a white supremacist and is saying the most fucked up bullshit about Biden and Afghanistan.  I was this close to having a public rant on his Instagram post but decided it would only bring sadness.
    Did he forget everything he experienced and said about being in Afghanistan?
    All of these people who have been ignoring Afghanistan for decades are suddenly so fucking concerned.  I’m so done.  So GD DONE.

    Also my dear friend who actually spent time in Afghanistan and Pakistan (she works for the UN) has been stationed in Kenya doing child protection for the past 10 years, but apparently may be back in Afghanistan now.  I’m worrying about her and all my emails have gone unanswered.
    On days like this I really miss kick boxing.  I would very much benefit from punching and kicking things tonight.

  150. 150.

    Just Chuck

    JFC, if the Taliban knew Trump better, they probably could have extracted reparations as part of the deal.  T just rolls over and shows his belly to anyone who displays strength.  Fucking pathetic.  Glad we’re out tho.

  152. 152.

    Brachiator

    @Another Scott:

    There may have been a time when the ISI could have “controlled” the Afghan Taliban, but I suspect those days are long, long gone.

    I doubt that there was ever a time when the ISI could have controlled the Afghan Taliban. Similarly, even though the US has cultivated Pakistan as an ally since its independence, we have never “controlled” the government despite assertions of some pundits that we were the puppet masters.

  153. 153.

    MomSense

    @Brachiator:

    The ISI was funding and training ‘militants’ in Afghanistan going back to 1979. They got on the Taliban elevator on the ground floor.

  155. 155.

    Another Scott

    @Adam L Silverman: “Part” is key.

    TFG played most sides of most issues.  It was all mouth noises for him.

    ¿Por qué no los dos?

    Anything to get him what he wanted for himself at that moment is what he did.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  156. 156.

    debbie

    @Spanky:

    Hell, I’d be happy if it were entered into the Senate investigation records. You just know the GQP is poised to turn this into Benghazi Part the Second.

  161. 161.

    Another Scott

    We’ve joked about the mRNA vaccines giving us super powers… ScienceMag:

    Almost 20 years before SARS-CoV-2, a related and even more lethal coronavirus sowed panic, killing nearly 10% of the 8000 people who became infected. But the 2003 outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) may have left some survivors with a gift. Former SARS patients who have been vaccinated against COVID-19 appear able to fend off all variants of SARS-CoV-2 in circulation, as well as ones that may soon emerge, a new study suggests. Their formidable antibodies may even protect against coronaviruses in other species that have yet to make the jump into humans—and may hold clues to how to make a so-called pancoronavirus vaccine that could forestall future outbreaks.

    A team led by emerging disease specialist Linfa Wang from Duke-NUS Medical School in Singapore identified eight SARS survivors who recently received two shots of a messenger RNA COVID-19 vaccine. In the test tube, antibodies sieved from their blood potently “neutralized” an early strain of SARS-CoV-2 as well as SARS-CoV, the virus that caused SARS, Wang and colleagues report today in The New England Journal of Medicine. The team further found these neutralizing antibodies worked well against the Alpha, Beta, and Delta variants of SARS-CoV-2 and stymied five related coronaviruses found in bats and pangolins that potentially could infect humans.

    This study’s demonstration of broad spectrum immunity against sarbecoviruses—a subset of coronaviruses that includes the causes of SARS and COVID-19—is “amazing and very good news,” says Priyamvada Acharya, a structural biologist at Duke University who works on pancoronavirus vaccine research and was not involved in the new study. “This paper provides a proof of principle that a pansarbecovirus vaccine is possible.” It also marks an important step toward a long-term hope—a vaccine that works against all coronaviruses—several researchers trying to develop this dreamed of protection say.

    […]

    (Emphasis added.)

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  162. 162.

    Brachiator

    @MomSense:

    The ISI was funding and training ‘militants’ in Afghanistan going back to 1979. They got on the Taliban elevator on the ground floor.

    Yes, I know. And as I noted, the US has given aid and assistance to Pakistan for decades. And yet, our supposed influence has never been particularly strong.

    And you might even say that some of our funding of Pakistan ended up in the hands of militants in Afghanistan. And some of that money ended up in the hands of anti-government militants in the territorial regions of Pakistan.

  163. 163.

    debbie

    @Adam L Silverman:

    Wish I could remember his name, but last night the BBC interviewed a member/representative of the government who implied Pakistan was totally separate from the Taliban.

  168. 168.

    dimmsdale

    @dimmsdale: “records” s/b “reco” and I meant it AS I TYPED IT, dammit. Automatic spell check s/b banned–it costs me way more time un-correcting its “corrections” than it saves me. (petty rant over, thanks for the column, Adam!!)

  170. 170.

    Brachiator

    @Robert Sneddon:

     A trans-Afghanistan OIL pipeline was the supposed reason why the US went into Afghanistan in the first place in 2002 (see DailyKos postings of the time). Twenty years on there is no trans-Afghanistan oil pipeline, and indeed there never will be.

    Was this nonsense really going around?

    It reminds me of the supposedly wise cynics who insisted that the US was in Vietnam for the oil.

  172. 172.

    wjs

    President Biden might end up being the first Democrat in my lifetime who is “allowed” to conduct real foreign policy.

    Anyone who thinks that President Obama would have gotten away with pulling out US troops from both Iraq and Afghanistan in a similar way is dreaming. The media, the generals, and the foreign policy establishment worked overtime to thwart him. We’re seeing the neocon establishment in full meltdown. Pardon me if I celebrate at their expense.

    Biden was right. How are we going to spend the Peace Dividend?

  173. 173.

    OGLiberal

    @Kay:  I have no idea personally but I’m sure some are humanitarian workers who were willing to take the risks while others were Blackwater type folks raking in the dough. My guess is that most were of the latter group.

  175. 175.

    MomSense

    @wjs: 
    There was no possibility of exiting Afghanistan while Bin Laden was free. Also too there was the whole Petreaus coup in the wings.

  176. 176.

    David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch

    @Brachiator: ​
     

    Was this nonsense really going around?

    It’s a major part of “Fahrenheit 911”

    Moore concludes that the invasion of Afghanistan had more to do with ousting the Taliban over the pipeline than finding Osama bin Laden or punishing the Taliban for harboring him. The new Afghan government signed the pipeline deal in December of 2002, but it has yet to be constructed.

  177. 177.

    Brachiator

    @MomSense:

    The Bush Administration just handed out cash to Pakistan like candy with no accountability.

    US aid to Pakistan has come from every American administration since Pakistan’s founding. From Wiki

    Since 1948–2016, the United States has provided nearly US$78.3 billion (adjusted to 2016 value of dollar) to Pakistan in grants annually in forms of military aid. Of these aid and funds arrangement, Pakistan was obligated to spend these monetary funds by purchasing American goods, food, and other services.

    Short and oversimplified. India insisted on being non-aligned. US foreign policy hands heard this as being pro-commie and so foolishly sought to cultivate a relationship with Pakistan to check any potential Soviet or Chinese communist overtures in the region.

    Bush was part of a long tradition of foreign policy short-sightedness.

  178. 178.

    OGLiberal

    @David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch: I think the primary reason for going to Afghanistan was because we had to appear to be doing something in the wake of 9/11.  But we had no plan to capture/eliminate Bin Laden and his folks and we let them pretty easily slide into Pakistan where they lived – and some still live – for years…so the whole “stopping Al Qaeda” was kind of BS.  Also, prime the pump for the big prize – Iraq.  That actually may have been the primary reason, with Afghanistan giving Bush tough guy cred and approval ratings high enough to sell the Iraq farce to US voters, among whom were more than enough Democrats.  Afghanistan was always a side show and we were never going to go all in there because we needed to play nice with Pakistan so they wouldn’t find an excuse to have a full blown war with India.

    Graveyard of Empires…history taught many powers absolutely nothing when it came to Afghanistan.

  180. 180.

    Kay

    @OGLiberal:

    who were willing to take the risks

    Well, “willing to take the risks” or confident someone else would get them out of there. If it’s people providing crucial services that’s one thing but if they ignored the warnings for other reasons or no reason at all I don’t know that they can complain that it’s difficult to get out of there. That was the risk they took.

  182. 182.

    Medicine Man

    The terms of that agreement are remarkably servile. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a bigger fake tough guy than Trump. It’s astonishing.

  183. 183.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Brachiator:

    The colonial rule, partition and its aftermath was tragic and in some ways the subcontinent is still living with that PTSD. Whether it is the Deoband Islam or the Sangh’s idea of Santana Dharma both were reactions to colonial rule. A return to an era of supposed purity which never existed except in the fevered imaginations of the reactionaries.

  184. 184.

    Another Scott

    Meanwhile, …

    Our bill, the Choose Medicare Act, would create Medicare Part E, allowing employers and the public the option to choose Medicare, one the most popular and successful health care delivery programs in history. This would get more Americans covered and make the nation healthier. https://t.co/hysoXsmtef

    — Rep. Don Beyer (@RepDonBeyer) August 18, 2021

    BenefitsPro:

    […]

    The Choose Medicare Act creates a new Medicare program — Medicare Part E — available to every individual who is not already eligible for Medicare or Medicaid.

    “Medicare Part E would be self-sustaining, fully paid for by premiums, and offered on all state and federal exchanges, giving people the ability to use the existing Affordable Care Act subsidies to help pay for it,” the lawmakers said.

    Additionally, employers could choose to select Medicare Part E rather than private insurance to provide affordable and reliable health care to their employees.

    Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn. and Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., introduced the Choose Medicare Act, S. 1180, in the Senate earlier this year.

    “While the Affordable Care Act has made great strides in securing affordable, comprehensive, and quality health care for millions of Americans, there are still far too many people who have fell through the cracks, particularly those in communities of color and underserved regions of our country,” Gomez said in a statement.

    Added Beyer: “Simply put, our bill would give all Americans access to Medicare, one the most popular and successful health care delivery programs in history. Allowing employers and the general public the option to choose Medicare would fill many of the gaps in our health care system, get more people covered, and make the nation healthier.”

    Key features of the Choose Medicare Act include:

    * Opens Medicare to employers of all sizes without requiring replacement of employment-based health insurance.
    * Addresses the discrepancy between consumer protections in the individual and group markets by extending the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) rating requirements to all markets, to end discrimination based on preexisting conditions.
    * Establishes an out-of-pocket maximum in traditional Medicare.
    * Increases the generosity of premium tax credits and extends eligibility to middle-income earners.
    * Directs Medicare to negotiate prescription drug prices.
    * Allows the HHS secretary to block excessive private insurance rates.
    * Extends traditional Medicare protections on balance billing or surprise bills to Part E plans.

    Good, good. Incremental progress is the way forward. Forward!!

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  185. 185.

    Brachiator

    @schrodingers_cat:

    The colonial rule, partition and its aftermath was tragic and in some ways the subcontinent is still living with that PTSD.

    Yep. Excellent point.

    As always, I appreciate your insights.

  187. 187.

    Robert Sneddon

    @Brachiator: ​
      The supposed deal was that Iraqi oil would transit the pacified plains of Afghanistan via pipeline before reaching Pakistan on its way to oil terminals on the Indian Ocean coast. I think there was some amount of Underpants Gnomes thinking going on with Step 3: Profit! blinding any would-be investors to the necessary precursor of Step 2: ??????. The Afghanistan gas pipeline idea is the same thing, twenty years later.

  188. 188.

    Steeplejack

    @Another Scott:

    Don Beyer is our representative—the fightin’ Eighth!—and I’m proud of him, but every time these proposals come up (from anyone) I vaguely remember reading that experts think Medicaid would actually be better, except that it has an icky, downmarket vibe. Am I imagining things? Maybe this is a question for Mayhew.

  190. 190.

    LibraryGuy

    So when General Milley (sp?) says there was no way to know this army would disappear in 11 days, he’s either 72-hour hold delusional or a complete, bald-faced liar?

     

    Hmm.

  191. 191.

    Another Scott

    @Steeplejack: I think it’s an “art of the possible” thing.

    IIRC, the federal government pays much/most of Medicaid costs (especially when the ACA is involved).  Medicare is substantially funded by dedicated payroll taxes and enrollee fees.

    One of the things they cite as a benefit of their plan is that it’s fully paid for…

    But it’s always good to get Mayhew’s input on these things!

    Thanks.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  193. 193.

    dimmsdale

    @Steeplejack: thanks for pointing that out. (I guess you mean here on the site?) I meant across ALL my platforms, where somehow the “correction” that needs to be changed back to what I wrote, eludes my attention until it’s too late to fix. (as in this case) Comparatively trivial problem in light of the seriousness of the thread, to be sure. But thanks.

  195. 195.

    Another Scott

    @dimmsdale: Autocorrect is a setting in your browser and maybe your software keyboard.

    E.g. In Chrome on Winders:

    Customize (3 button vertical menu) -> Settings -> Appearance -> Advanced

    Turn off the Spell check in the Language section.

    HTH!

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  197. 197.

    Brachiator

    @MontyTheClipArtMongoose:

    the spratley islands have always been there

    Yes

    Because of a lack of exploratory drilling, there are no proven oil reserve estimates for the Spratly or Paracel Islands, and no commercial oil or gas has been discovered there. … The most optimistic western estimates place total oil resources (not proved reserves) in the Spratly Islands at 1-2 billion barrels.

    Maybe some natural gas, but the big bad capitalists could not find a way to exploit it, and now they can’t because they have no control of the area.

  198. 198.

    bnateAZ

    @Hoodie: My wife loves Wolf, Anderson and Cuomo, God help me. Watching CNN just repackage GOP talking points on this crisis is infuriating. How they are covering the evacuation is gross and exploitative too. Like we can wave a wand and boom, hundreds thousands of Afghans we don’t know can get out, all with the right papers in hand or on file..

    Though, Biden’s interview with George S. was not a great look and I don’t believe Biden is truly telling us the truth: that this was a shit sandwich the country would need to eat and get it over with…

  199. 199.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @Robert Sneddon: China wants a pipeline from the Middle East as part of their Silk Road and so they can bypass the Indian Navy.  China has been frustrated with their infrastructure projects in Pakistan which never seem to quite pan out due to corruption.

  200. 200.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @bnateAZ: My wife loves Wolf, Anderson and Cuomo, God help me.

    The problem is a nut shell. CNN and company are reality TV, about the news. Like that female CNN reporter who was wandering among the Taliban. Yes, it was quite dramatic, but it wasn’t news.

  202. 202.

    Darkrose

    @Another Scott: Unless there’s a provision to expand Medicare staffing, I’m seeing disaster. Anyone whose ever had to interact with Medicare knows they’re understaffed, and their service times are…not good. I also wonder how many people understand that Medicare is multiple systems in a trench coat–including Medicare Advantage, parts A-D, and probably some others that I’m forgetting.

  204. 204.

    YY_Sima Qian

    @Enhanced Voting Techniques: I think China is much more interested in the mineral wealths of Afghanistan, & potential infrastructure construction contracts. A pipeline through Pakistan (not that one is being build) is already troublesome enough, due to Pakistani corruption/incompetence, poor ability to take on additional debt to build infrastructure, and vulnerability to sabotage by separatists in Baluchistan & the Pakistani Taliban. A pipeline through Afghanistan is a pipe dream, unless the place establishes a track record of stability. Otherwise the project would quickly become hostage for ransom by any number of local warlords.

    China is no longer interested giving out multi-billion dollar loans to underdeveloped countries to build mega infrastructure projects, when the prospects for loan repayment have become much more uncertain (even before COVID). That is clear from Chinese loan data to Africa & Latin America since 2019. The focus of Belt & Road is shift to digital infrastructure, & collaboration in education & health care, with shorter term revenue streams that can start servicing debt much more quickly.

  205. 205.

    YY_Sima Qian

    We should be realistic about the prospects of the Tajik centered resistance at Panjshir. They can probably hold the stronghold, just like in the 80s & 90s, but they will not be able to roll back the Taliban regardless the amount of external support. Unless, of course, the Taliban regime somehow collapses. Even then, the Pashtuns would not allow the Tajiks to dominate in the aftermath.

  206. 206.

    sab

    @Darkrose: Very good points. I am relieved to be on medicare after 15 years in the wilderness of private individual insurance, but medicare is not perfect.

    I am on traditional medicare, because it is national, and when I have medical issues they are sudden. I could be anywhere. I want to be (sort of) covered. Big network. My husband is on medicare advantage, because great local network that fits his needs.

    Our medical needs are different.

    Yikes, I sound like Mayhew Anderson without the expertise.

  207. 207.

    vasiliy

    Blaming the stinking mess in Afghanistan on Biden is like blaming the school janitor for the shit on the bathroom floor.

  208. 208.

    Another Scott

    @Darkrose: Thanks for this.

    Beyer is my rep and is a very sharp cookie.  I’m sure he understands the issues, but it depends on Congress actually passing sensible legislation.

    TBH, I’m not expecting this to pass soon.  But it’s good to start the process and start the conversation.  Biden has been increasing staffing in lots of agencies that have been hollowed-out and overworked, but it takes time.

    Something like this passing a Democratic congress in 2025 isn’t impossible if we start working on it now.

    Thanks.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  209. 209.

    wuzzat

    @germy:

    Video games and bad scifi not withstanding, armies aren’t hive minds.  Some soldiers are true believers who don’t want to betray the cause, some saw the writing on the wall and cut deals, and most probably fall somewhere in the middle and are just trying to get by without screwing over their families and/or getting killed.

Comments are closed.