;)
The Commentariat -- August 26, 2021
Marie: For the NINTH day, Reality Chex is not accepting comments, through no design or fault of my own. In desperation, I have come up with an interim plan to get around the problem, one that will mean only a little extra work for those of you who have something to say. Here are the easy instructions:
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3. Type your comment in the Comments box as usual. But at the end of the comment, sign it with your usual Reality Chex handle, because the name of the poster will say "See Above."
Special thanks to all of you who have gone to the trouble to comment under this somewhat cumbersome system.
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Late Morning/Afternoon Update:
Ivana Kottasová, et al., of CNN: "Twelve US service members and dozens of Afghans have been killed in two bombing attacks outside Kabul's airport, according to the Pentagon and Afghanistan's Ministry of Public Health.... An official with Afghanistan's Ministry of Public Health told CNN on Thursday that more than 60 people were dead and 140 wounded. Fifteen US service members were injured in addition to the 12 dead, said Gen. Frank McKenzie, Commander of US Central Command." ~~~
~~~ President Biden is scheduled to address the country at 5 pm ET.
From the NYT live updates: "At least two blasts rattled the area outside Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul on Thursday, the Pentagon confirmed, just hours after Western governments had warned of a security threat there. While the numbers of injured or dead were still unconfirmed, reporters at a nearby emergency room said that at least 30 people had been brought to the site, and the Pentagon said there were a number of casualties.... 'We can confirm that the explosion at the Abbey Gate was the result of a complex attack that resulted in a number of US & civilian casualties,' John Kirby, the Pentagon press secretary, said in a post on Twitter. 'We can also confirm at least one other explosion at or near the Baron Hotel, a short distance from Abbey Gate.'"
Barbara Starr, et al., of CNN: "An explosion was reported outside the Hamid Karzai International Airport on Thursday, according to two US officials. One official said there are injuries among Afghans, but there is no information yet on any US casualties. Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby confirmed there was an explosion outside of the airport. 'We can confirm an explosion outside Kabul airport. An explosion was reported outside the Hamid Karzai International Airport on Thursday, according to two US officials. Casualties are unclear at this time. We will provide additional details when we can,' he said in a tweet.
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The Washington Post's live updates of developments in Afghanistan Thursday are here: "The U.S. Embassy in Kabul warned Americans late Wednesday to avoid traveling to Kabul airport because of unspecified security threats, and advised citizens at three airport gates to 'leave immediately.' Australia and Britain also issued comparable warnings that Afghanistan was facing 'high threat' of a terrorist attack. Although officials did not provide more details, the Biden administration has previously warned that Islamic State poses a threat to the evacuation mission. The warnings come as NATO allies, including Poland and Belgium, ended their evacuation flights ahead of the Aug. 31 deadline for American troops to depart."
Lara Jakes & Michael Levenson of the New York Times: "At least 1,500 American citizens remain in Afghanistan with just days left before the scheduled U.S. withdrawal from the country, but officials on Wednesday acknowledged the reality that tens of thousands of Afghan allies and others at high risk of Taliban reprisals would be left behind. The sound of gunfire, and clouds of tear gas and black smoke, filled the air around the international airport in Kabul, the capital, as thousands of Afghans massed at the gates on Wednesday, desperate to escape ahead of the American military's final departure on Aug. 31.... As military and government charter flights took off every 45 minutes as part of an airlift, Biden administration officials said they had evacuated about 82,300 people since Aug. 14, the day before Kabul fell to the Taliban. Around 4,500 of them were American citizens, with 500 more expected to depart soon."
Lauren Leatherby & Larry Buchanan of the New York Times: "At least 250,000 Afghans who may be eligible for expedited American visas remain in Afghanistan, far too many for American forces to rescue before their deadline to leave next week, new estimates suggest.... These estimates are based on reports on Afghan employment published annually by the Department of Defense and analyzed by the Association of Wartime Allies, a group that advocates for Afghans affiliated with the U.S., and researchers at American University. Other estimates vary widely....."
We Are Not Amused. Paul Kane & Annie Linskey of the Washington Post: "House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) blasted two lawmakers who surreptitiously flew into Kabul without approval to examine conditions at the international airport where a massive airlift is underway to evacuate U.S. citizens, allies and vulnerable Afghans. '... there's a real concern about members being in the region,' Pelosi told reporters Wednesday at her weekly briefing. There was an 'opportunity cost' of protecting Reps. Seth Moulton (D-Mass.) and Peter Meijer (R-Mich.), she said. 'This is deadly serious. We do not want members to go.' The sentiment was echoed across the Biden administration Wednesday morning. 'The secretary [Lloyd Austin] would have appreciated the opportunity to have had a conversation before the visit took place,' said Department of Defense spokesman John Kirby during his briefing.... 'They certainly took time away from what we had been planning to do that day.'... Some of the harshest criticism came from one of the lawmakers' colleague on the House Armed Services Committee[.] 'Neither one of them should have their ass in Afghanistan right now. The Defense Department has enough to do without having to try to protect two members of Congress. Period,' said Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Ala.), the top Republican on the Armed Services panel." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~
~~~ Catie Edmondson of the New York Times: "In an interview, Mr. Moulton and Mr. Meijer defended their decision to travel into a dangerous and unpredictable situation and said they had walked away with important insights. They said the trip had changed their minds about Mr. Biden's Aug. 31 deadline for a full withdrawal, which they had previously urged the administration to extend. Given that there is little chance that all Americans and Afghan allies can be evacuated in the next two weeks, they said, a swift departure is the only way for the United States to ensure that the Taliban will cooperate in eventually getting those left behind to safety."
** Sí, Se Puede. Ben Smith of the New York Times: "A group of Afghans who worked for The New York Times, along with their families, touched down safely early Wednesday ... at Benito Juárez International Airport in Mexico City. The arrival of the 24 families was the latest stop in a harrowing escape from Kabul. And Mexico's role in the rescue of journalists from The Times and, if all goes as planned, The Wall Street Journal offers a disorienting glimpse of the state of the American government as two of the country's most powerful news organizations frantically sought help far from Washington. Mexican officials, unlike their counterparts in the United States, were able to cut through the red tape of their immigration system to quickly provide documents that, in turn, allowed the Afghans to fly from Kabul's embattled airport to Doha, Qatar. The documents promised that the Afghans would receive temporary humanitarian protection in Mexico while they explored further options in the United States or elsewhere." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
Gives New Meaning to "(In) Loco Parentis." Cameron Jenkins of the Hill: "Dozens of California students and parents are stranded in Afghanistan after taking a summer trip to the country. Mor than 20 students and 16 parents from the Cajon Valley Union School District in El Cajon, Calif., visited Afghanistan on summer vacation. Now they are among thousands of people who are waiting to leave the country amid the chaotic U.S. withdrawal that has caused political unrest across the nation, according to the Los Angeles Times." MB: This has to be the dumbest school vacation ever organized. Any school employees or board members who approved this trip should resign or be fired. Nitwits. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
** John Wagner of the Washington Post: "The House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 insurrection issued its first sweeping requests Wednesday for records from federal agencies pertaining to the attack on the Capitol and ... Donald Trump's efforts to subvert the election. In letters demanding materials from the National Archives and seven other agencies, Rep. Bennie G. Thompson (D-Miss.), the committee chairman, signaled that an expansive investigation is underway, touching not only on what happened Jan. 6 but also on matters such as 'the former President's knowledge of the election results and what he communicated to the American people about the election.' Thompson gave the agencies a two-week deadline to produce materials and asked Archivist of the United States David Ferriero to use his authority under federal regulations to swiftly address the request for records from the Trump White House.... The requests include information on 'communications within and among the White House and Executive Branch agencies during the leadup to January 6th and on that day,' as well as on issues further removed, such as 'attempts to place politically loyal personnel in senior positions across government after the election.'" The Huffington Post's story is here. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
Betsy Swan & Nicholas Wu of Politico: "Just a day before the Jan. 6 riot, the Secret Service warned the U.S. Capitol Police that their officers could face violence at the hands of supporters of ... Donald Trump, according to new documents.... The liberal-leaning government watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington obtained the documents through a Freedom of Information Act request and shared them with Politico.... The Secret Service's emails shed light on intelligence lapses by the Capitol Police previously highlighted by both the department's inspector general and a bipartisan report by Senate committees. Since then, the Hill's law enforcement agency has pledged reform and said it has made changes to ensure the effective sharing of intelligence."
Trump's Lawyers Disciplined, Ordered to Go to Law School. Rosalind Helderman of the Washington Post: "A federal judge in Michigan has ordered that Sidney Powell, L. Lin Wood and seven other attorneys who filed a lawsuit seeking to overturn the state's 2020 presidential election be disciplined, calling the suit 'a historic and profound abuse of the judicial process.' In a scathing 110-page opinion, Federal District Judge Linda V. Parker wrote that the lawyers had made assertions in court that were not backed by evidence and had failed to do the due diligence required by legal rules before alleging mass fraud in the Michigan vote. 'This case was never about fraud,' she wrote. 'It was about undermining the People's faith in our democracy and debasing the judicial process to do so.' She ordered the lawyers to pay the attorney's fees for their opponents in the case -- the city of Detroit and the state of Michigan. She also wrote that she will require them to attend legal education classes. And she referred the group to the Michigan Attorney Grievance Commission, as well as attorney disciplinary committees in the states where each attorney is licensed, which could initiate proceedings that could result in the lawyer's being disbarred.&" Law & Crime's report is here.
Look, when President Trump was president, you didn't see crisis after crisis. You just didn't see it. I shudder to think about what Covid would have been like under Joe Biden. -- Kayleigh McInany, who must have been on mind-altering drugs while press secretary to the Former Guy, on Fox "News" Tuesday
Tom Jackman of the Washington Post: "Sirhan B. Sirhan, convicted of the 1968 assassination of Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, will face a California parole board for the 16th time Friday in a prison outside San Diego. But unlike the first 15 times, no prosecutor will stand to oppose the release of Sirhan, who is now 77. Sirhan was arrested at the scene of Kennedy's shooting in Los Angeles on June 5, 1968, convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to death for the assassination of a U.S. senator who appeared headed for the Democratic presidential nomination. The assassination, along with that of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. two months earlier, created a turning point in American history with the sudden elimination of the charismatic leaders of the American civil rights movement and the Democratic Party." MB: I don't think any political assassin should get out of jail. Ever. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
The Pandemic, Ctd.
The New York Times' live updates of Covid-19 developments Thursday are here. The Washington Post's live Covid-19 updates Thursday are here: "There are more than 100,000 people hospitalized with covid-19 in the United States, a level not seen since Jan. 30 -- when coronavirus vaccines were not widely available -- as the country grapples with the delta variant's spread. Hospitalizations are highest across the South, where every state in the region has a higher portion of its population currently hospitalized with covid-19 than the national level, according to a Washington Post database. More than 17,000 people are currently hospitalized with covid-19 in Florida, which has the most hospitalizations for covid-19 of any state in the country, followed by Texas, which has more than 14,000."
Leslie Josephs of CNBC: "Delta Air Lines CEO Ed Bastian notified employees Wednesday that they will face $200 monthly increases on their health insurance premiums starting Nov. 1 if they aren't vaccinated against Covid-19, citing steep costs to cover employees who are hospitalized with the virus. Unvaccinated employees will face other restrictions, including indoor masking effective immediately and weekly Covid-19 tests starting Sept. 12, the Atlanta-based airline said in announcing new Covid policies for employees." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
** Arkansas. Kim Bellware of the Washington Post: "The Washington County Detention Center in Fayetteville ... and its health-care provider [-- Karas Health Care--] are facing criticisms of 'medical experimentation' because the jail's medical staff has been treating covid-19 patients with ivermectin, a drug commonly used for deworming livestock.... [County Sheriff Tim] Helder told the Press-Democrat that he has known since July that jail detainees were being treated with ivermectin, and he praised Karas as a health-care partner.... The Post viewed screenshots of [Karas owner Dr. Robert] Karas's since-deleted Facebook posts in which he touts the use of ivermectin and indicates that more than 350 people at the jail had been given the drug, allegedly to no ill effect."
New York. Marina Villeneuve of the AP: "Delivering another blow to what's left of former Gov. Andrew Cuomo's legacy, New York's new governor acknowledged on her first day in office that the state has had nearly 12,000 more deaths from COVID-19 than Cuomo told the public. 'The public deserves a clear, honest picture of what's happening. And that's whether it's good or bad, they need to know the truth. And that's how we restore confidence,' Gov. Kathy Hochul said on NPR. In its first daily update on the outbreak Tuesday evening, Hochul';s office reported that nearly 55,400 people have died of the coronavirus in New York based on death certificate data submitted to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That's up from about 43,400 that Cuomo reported to the public as of Monday, his last day in office." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
Florida. Dan Levin of the New York Times: "More people in Florida are catching the coronavirus, being hospitalized and dying of Covid-19 now than at any previous point in the pandemic, underscoring the perils of limiting public health measures as the Delta variant rips through the state. This week, 227 virus deaths were being reported each day in Florida, on average, as of Tuesday, a record for the state and by far the most in the United States right now. The average for new known cases reached 23,314 a day on the weekend, 30 percent higher than the state's previous peak in January, according to a New York Times database.... And hospitalizations in Florida have almost tripled in the past month..., stretching many hospitals to the breaking point.... Even as cases continue to surge, with more than 17,200 people hospitalized with the virus across Florida, Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican, has held firm on banning vaccine and mask mandates." ~~~
~~~ "Bodies Stacked to the Ceiling." Michelle Meredith of WESH Orlando: "At West Side Crematory in Winter Garden, they're overwhelmed with the remains of people that need to be cremated. There's an influx of bodies like they've never seen, worse than the first wave of COVID-19. The area where bodies are stored prior to being cremated is stacked to the ceiling. The staff is working day and night to honor the dead. WESH 2 called 20 funeral homes and crematories and many were too busy to be part of our story."
South Dakota. How Could This Have Happened? Ben Kesslen & Joe Murphy of NBC News: "Two weeks after the annual motorcycle rally in Sturgis, South Dakota, reported Covid infections in the state have risen nearly sixfold. South Dakota counted 3,819 new cases in the past two weeks, including seven deaths, up from 644 cases in the 14 days preceding it. That makes it the state with the largest percent increase in Covid cases in the past two weeks.... Gov. Kristi Noem, a Republican, has been firm in keeping South Dakota open throughout the pandemic, shunning mask mandates, criticizing public health officials like Dr. Anthony Fauci, and insisting on holding mass gatherings against CDC recommendations."
Beyond the Beltway
Florida. Mike Baker & Michael LaForgia of the New York Times: Aggressive developers of the luxury condomiumum complex built in 1980 in Surfside, Florida, one tower of which collapsed this year causing extensive loss of life, threatened the small town with lawsuits & bullied the town commissioners & building department. "The development team ... had a dubious record. The architect had been disciplined previously for designing a building with a sign structure that later collapsed in a hurricane. The structural engineer had run into trouble on an earlier project, too, when he signed off on a parking garage with steel reinforcement that was later found to be dangerously insufficient. The early 1980s was a freewheeling period for construction in the Miami area, known at the time for its uneven enforcement of regulations, but the Champlain Towers project stood apart -- both for the tumult that occurred on the job site and the brazenness of the developers behind the project."
Michigan. Neil MacFarquhar of the New York Times: "The only defendant to plead guilty to taking part in a plot to kidnap Gov. Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan was sentenced on Wednesday to six years and three months in prison. Ty G. Garbin, 25, an airplane mechanic, was the first defendant to be sentenced for what prosecutors have described as an extremist plot driven by anger at the governor's efforts to slow the spread of the coronavirus. The 14 men arrested in October face charges in federal and state courts in one of the most significant domestic terrorism plots ever to come to trial in the United States. The defendants, many of them members of an antigovernment paramilitary group in Michigan called the Wolverine Watchmen, coalesced around protests against Covid-19 lockdown measures. After initially weighing storming the State Capitol in Lansing, they decided to abduct Governor Whitmer from her vacation home, according to prosecutors. Their efforts were seen as a precursor to the violence unleashed at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6." The AP's story is here.
New York. Luis Ferré-Sadurní & Jeffery Mays of the New York Times: "Gov. Kathy C. Hochul has chosen Brian A. Benjamin, a Democratic state senator from Harlem, to be her lieutenant governor, the second highest-ranking position in New York State, according to a person familiar with the decision. Ms. Hochul, a Democrat from Western New York who was sworn in as the state's first female governor on Tuesday, is expected to announce the appointment later this week. The selection of Mr. Benjamin, who is Black, underscored Ms. Hochul's attempt to diversify her ticket as she mounts her first campaign for governor next year, choosing a potential running mate who could help broaden her appeal in the voter-heavy New York City region." MB: Or maybe she likes the guy and is comfortable working with him. Not everything is transactional, even in politics. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
South Dakota. He Killed a Man, Fled the Scene, and Is Still Attorney General. Stephen Groves of the AP: "South Dakota Attorney General Jason Ravnsborg will avoid a trial and take a plea deal on misdemeanor traffic charges in a crash last year in which he hit and killed a man who was walking along a rural highway, a prosecutor said Wednesday. Beadle County State's Attorney Michael Moore, who is one of two prosecutors on the case..., declined to discuss further details of the arrangement. The plea will be entered Thursday, when Ravnsborg's trial was scheduled to begin, he said. Moore said a judge's order that bars state officials from discussing details of the investigation prevented him from disclosing more.... The charges don't affect the Republican's qualification to hold the office of attorney general in South Dakota, but lawmakers from his own party have called for him to step down and pushed for the Legislature to impeach him." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
Way Beyond
Andrew Kramer of the New York Times: "In an interview with The New York Times, his first with a news organization since his arrest in January, [Russian dissident Aleksei] Navalny talked about his life in prison, about why Russia has cracked down so hard on the opposition and dissidents, and about his conviction that 'Putin's regime,' as he calls it, is doomed to collapse." Excerpts of the interview are here.
News Lede
CNBC: "Initial claims for unemployment insurance were little changed over the past week, hovering around Covid pandemic-era lows as the jobs market shows further signs of healing. First-time filings totaled 353,000 for the week ended Aug. 21, a slight increase from the previous week's 349,000, the Labor Department reported Thursday.... A separate economic reading showed that gross domestic product increased at a 6.6% annualized pace in the second quarter, according to the second estimate Thursday from the Commerce Department."
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Reader Comments (5)
Navalny, now there's a man. He's being simultaneously checked into the boards, kneecapped, and crackback blocked and I haven't seen him take their shit yet. Democrats and supporters of democracy need to look outside their own borders for inspiring stories.
Citizen625
As Trump’s foot soldiers in his war on the United States continue to be investigated, arrested, arraigned, and brought before judges for appropriate punishment (none of it nearly harsh enough for me so far), the Führer is still fat and free from shackles or the slightest form of punishment, free to continue his war on democracy, truth, and the rule of law.
Everyday we read about murderers who are sentenced to life in prison or death. I heard yesterday that Fatty’s fellow racist and killer, Dylann Roof, was slapped down by an appeals court as he tried to get his death sentence overturned. The court indicated that crimes of that nature demanded the harshest penalty a society could muster.
Good.
But what about someone whose depraved indifference to life condemned over half a million people to death? And for what? So he could look tough and get re-elected?? Should such a vicious, depraved criminal not also suffer the harshest penalty a society can muster?
I guess not. There are more lies to tell, more bodies to bury, more rounds of golf to cheat on.
Depravity indeed.
Forgot to sign that last one.
Akhilleus
“Crises? We never had no stinkin’ crises” sez Kayleigh McInsaney, about the Trump Disaster, a four year maelstrom of fuckups, incompetence, cupidity, stupidity, and crises like you read about.
By her reckoning the Orange Menace did a bang up job “handling” the coronavirus crisis (I thought there weren’t any…). Hmmm…600,000 dead is a great job? What would she characterize as a bad job? 10,000,000 dead? 600,000 dead is kind of a strange metric for “great job” status.
But since she wants to play Hypothetical Hinky-dinky, let’s consider how Trump would have handled the end game in Afghanistan. He already emptied the prisons of Taliban terrorists. Heckuva job, Taliban Don. I’m guessing he’d be making a deal with the Taliban for a Trump Tower in Kabul, maybe a casino or two, and some Trump hotels. Oh, and evacuation would be based on loyalty to Trump and size of bank account along with proof of future fealty.
Yeah. I’m sure it would have been the usual Fatty rodeo and clown car revue. And when the shit exploded, he’d blame it all on Obama and Nancy Pelosi.
And Krazy Kayleigh would declare everything a stunning success.
Were these people grown in a Petri dish of stupid?
Akhilleus
This morning’s Klein is very much worth a read.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/26/opinion/afghanistan-us-withdrawal.html
And my comment:
Will join the crowd (hard on a sometime contrarian) and pile on the praise, Mr. Klein, but you deserve it. One of the best foreign policy examinations and prescriptions I have ever read. So clear-eyed, it's heart-breaking in its honesty.
But the lament of "will we ever learn?" threaded throughout the column deserves more attention. Why do we do these silly things at such a high price in dollars, blood and reputation over and over again?
Others here have provided some of the answers. Some have said it's all about the money, and as always, much of it is. When profit is a nation's first and last commandment, as it is ours, we can expect little else.
Some have blamed national hubris. Fair enough. Following last century's WW triumphs and the economic dominance we achieved in their wake, no doubt we did get so puffed up with pride that we learned little from all the harsh lessons presented to us in Vietnam's classroom.
But there's something else at work here, too, that I’ve never been sure what to call. Like many, I don't know if it's ignorance or stupidity.
In spite of over 600,000 deaths and thousands more dying by the day, we have millions here at home refusing the vaccinations that would save them and/or holding street corner demonstrations against wearing masks.
And we have self-interested political leaders who take advantage of whatever madness moves these millions to self-destruction.
Why should our foreign policy not suffer from the same disease?
BTW, Akhilleus, I somehow knew that post was yours without the ID.
Ken Winkes (Just so you know)