Patterico's Pontifications

8/12/2021

Republicans Introduce Vaccine Passport and Voter ID Harmonization Act

Filed under: General — Dana @ 12:33 pm



[guest post by Dana]

So, this is happening:

Republican lawmakers on Thursday introduced the Vaccine Passport and Voter ID Harmonization Act, legislation that would require states mandating vaccine passports to also mandate voter ID requirements.

The Daily Caller News Foundation first obtained the text of the bill, introduced by Kevin Cramer of North Dakota in the Senate and Nancy Mace of South Carolina in the House, “requiring states and local jurisdictions that institute vaccine passports to require voter identification in federal elections.”

“It makes no sense for Democrats to adamantly oppose commonsense Voter ID policies which protect the integrity of our elections,” Cramer said in a statement.

“If they’re comfortable making people show their private medical records to simply go to a restaurant, they should be fine having people prove they are who they say they are before they vote,” he continued. “Our legislation shines a light on their hypocrisy.”

Here’s Mace explaining why she believes the legislation is necessary:

Showing an ID is something we must do in everyday life. We need an ID when we get a job, cash our paychecks, rent an apartment, buy a car, buy alcohol or even cold medicine. States who mandate vaccine passports should be just as rigorous when it comes to something as important as protecting the right to vote. I am introducing legislation to require all states and local jurisdictions that institute vaccine passports to also require voter identification in ALL federal elections. It makes too much sense not to.

I’m pressed for time, and while I have a lot to say about this, I am forced to just drop it here for you to discuss.

–Dana

157 Responses to “Republicans Introduce Vaccine Passport and Voter ID Harmonization Act”

  1. Hi and bye!

    Dana (174549)

  2. Sounds reasonable. Full transparency.

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  3. This should be interesting. An adult citizen without, legal impediments, has both the right to vote (and NOT to vote!) and the right to accept, or refuse, medical care (assuming they also have no legal, or medical impediments), which includes vaccination. I would prefer an id that simply states both franchise standing and medical standing.

    I think it interesting that Democrats have no problem registering people to vote, but resist checking ID when voting. I think that if a citizen has a right to vote, then there should be no registration required, only proper ID. For those who argue that there are logistics that are addressed by a voter registration, then why wouldn’t the valid ID, which has an address on it, not be as usefull? Why can’t the info stated on a voter card, not be stated on the ID? Who cares if the ID might have to be larger? Put a chip in it!

    felipe (484255)

  4. republicans could go one better by prohibiting vaccine passports unless they’re enforced at the biden sh!tshow known as the southern border

    JF (e1156d)

  5. Well, see there, #3, that’s a whole bunch of jerbs lost at the County registrar, state board of elections, the chance at free donuts for bored septuagenarians etc.

    urbanleftbehind (4e5526)

  6. urbanleftbehind (4e5526) — 8/12/2021 @ 1:09 pm

    HEH! That’s a feature, not a bug, imho.

    felipe (484255)

  7. Given that no state has issued a state-wide vaccine mandate, this is pure theater.

    What happened to the “show me your papers” crowd?

    Rip Murdock (d2a2a8)

  8. @7 “states and local jurisdictions”

    nice try, rip

    JF (e1156d)

  9. @7 “states and local jurisdictions”

    nice try, rip

    JF (e1156d) — 8/12/2021 @ 1:18 pm

    Whatever. It is still theater, the bill will never get out of Senate Rules Committee.

    Rip Murdock (d2a2a8)

  10. I would prefer an id that simply states both franchise standing and medical standing.

    This “ID” may be a driver’s license or If a person is not a driver, then just a state issued Identification. We already have these and need not introduce a new card. We just add the information to them.

    felipe (484255)

  11. Thomas Massie
    @RepThomasMassie
    ·
    21m
    First CDC said

    vaccine “prevents all symptomatic infection and spread by 95%”

    then “reduces severity of symptoms and spread… some”

    then “reduces severe cases but not spread, so wear mask again!”

    if CDC no longer claims it reduces spread, how can anyone justify mandating it?

    https://twitter.com/RepThomasMassie

    BuDuh (7bca93)

  12. Chuck E. Cheese cards could also work.

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  13. Imagine you’re a normal person [work with me here]. The year is 2016. Rightly or wrongly, you believe most of what you see in the media. You believe polls are broadly reflective of public opinion. You believe doctors and scientists are trustworthy and independent. You’re a decent, reasonable person who follows the rules and trusts the authorities.

    Imagine your shock, then, when Brexit, which you were assured couldn’t happen because it was a fringe movement led by racists for racists, happens. The polls, which widely predicted it wouldn’t happen, were wrong. The experts and pundits who told you day after day that it wouldn’t happen were also wrong. “Oh well,” you say, “these things happen.”

    Imagine that soon after Brexit, Donald Trump is running for president. You are told by the most trustworthy media outlets that he is going to lose. Some experts say his opponent has a 99% chance of winning. Imagine waking up the morning after the election to discover that the pollsters, experts, and politicians you still trusted were wrong again. Now the racist monster who you were told would never get near the White House is the leader of the free world.

    “How did this happen?” you ask yourself. How could everyone I rely on for good information be so wrong? “It was the Russians,” they tell you. “The Russians did Brexit, and they got Trump elected too.” Imagine that for the next three years, day after day, the media and politicians you still trust keep you up to date on this story of Trump’s collusion with Russia. They tell you the how, when, where, and why: the dossiers, the whistleblowers, the peeing prostitutes. Imagine your desperation for things to somehow make sense again.

    Here comes the Mueller report. Hard evidence of foreign meddling in Brexit and the 2016 U.S. election is coming to set the world right again.

    Imagine your shock, then, when you discover that Brexit had little to do with foreign meddling, and Robert Mueller has very little to report about Trump and the Russians. The collusion story, which dominated your news intake for the better part of three years, slowly dies down. Then it’s gone. No one talks about it anymore. Imagine that bit by bit, you’re starting to feel that the events you were told would not and could not happen not only happened, but happened without some sort of malign interference. Instead, millions of your fellow citizens simply voted for them. In the American case, it turns out many of your fellow citizens who simply voted for Trump come from states that have been devastated by an opioid epidemic enabled by a corrupt system of incentives involving the Food and Drug Administration, doctors, and Big Pharma. (You might want to take note of this. It will come up again later.)

    Ha ha! read it all: https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/vaccines-konstantin-kisin

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  14. Right now, Texas, to take an obvious example, has reported about 54K deaths from COVID. But, if you look at the estimates from an “excess deaths” calculation, about 88K Texans had died of COVID, as of July 29th.

    It is good to see Cramer and Mace focusing on the important issues. /sarc

    (For the record, I favor voter IDs — and I know enough about the issue to recognize that they would do almost nothing to cut down on vote fraud.)

    Jim Miller (edcec1)

  15. “Showing an ID is something we must do in everyday life. We need an ID when we get a job, cash our paychecks, rent an apartment, buy a car, buy alcohol or even cold medicine. States who mandate vaccine passports should be just as rigorous when it comes to something as important as protecting the right to vote. I am introducing legislation to require all states and local jurisdictions that institute vaccine passports to also require voter identification in ALL federal elections. It makes too much sense not to.”

    Do so love those ideological conservatives… they look so good in red before they shower in gasoline and light up a smoke.

    Comrades: back in the day, when chatting w/a few Marines in their bar atop the U.S. Embassy in Moscow, they let us know that in order for them to simply travel beyond a seven mile radius from the embassy compound – even within the Moscow city limits- they not only needed to have and show their IDs on demand– but were required to file for a ‘visa’ and produce it on demand– just to make those simple trips– even to a suburb. A genuine PITA.

    Yes, love them ideological conservative Righties; true blue Red, through and through.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  16. The CDC asserts this even though its own statistics show that Covid-19 is not much of a threat to schoolchildren. Its numbers show that more people under the age of 18 died of influenza during the 2018–19 flu season—a season of “moderate severity” that lasted eight months—than have died of Covid-19 across more than 18 months. What’s more, the CDC says that out of every 1,738 Covid-19-related deaths in the U.S. in 2020 and 2021, just one has involved someone under 18 years of age; and out of every 150 deaths of someone under 18 years of age, just one has been Covid-related.

    Yet the CDC declares that schoolchildren, who learn in part from communication conveyed through facial expressions, should nevertheless hide their faces—and so should their teachers.

    How did mask guidance change so profoundly? Did the medical research on the effectiveness of masks change—and in a remarkably short period of time—or just the guidance on wearing them?

    Since we are constantly told that the CDC and other public-health entities are basing their recommendations on science, it’s crucial to know what, specifically, has been found in various medical studies. Significant choices about how our republic should function cannot be made on the basis of science alone—they require judgment and the weighing of countless considerations—but they must be informed by knowledge of it.

    In truth, the CDC’s, U.K.’s, and WHO’s earlier guidance was much more consistent with the best medical research on masks’ effectiveness in preventing the spread of viruses. That research suggests that Americans’ many months of mask-wearing has likely provided little to no health benefit and might even have been counterproductive in preventing the spread of the novel coronavirus.

    https://www.city-journal.org/do-masks-work-a-review-of-the-evidence

    BuDuh (7bca93)

  17. > (For the record, I favor voter IDs — and I know enough about the issue to recognize that they would do almost nothing to cut down on vote fraud.)

    if you believe they would do almost nothing to cut down on vote fraud, why do you favor them?

    from what i see, this is a fight between those who (mostly wrongly) believe it will do something to prevent fraud and those who (mostly wrongly) believe it will do something to suppress voter turnout, both of whom are vehement in their beliefs.

    aphrael (4c4719)

  18. > How did mask guidance change so profoundly?

    the statistics for delta are different than for covid as a whole. Fatalities remain low, but *long covid* is a serious issue and infections are spreading through children rapidly. This is also why the APA is pushing for faster authorization of vaccinations for children.

    aphrael (4c4719)

  19. The masks perform better with delta?

    BuDuh (7bca93)

  20. Correction, Aug. 12, 2021: An earlier version of this story overstated the number of children who have been hospitalized in Texas recently with COVID-19. The story said over 5,800 children had been hospitalized during a seven-day period in August, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That number correctly referred to children hospitalized with COVID-19 since the pandemic began. In actuality, 783 children were admitted to Texas hospitals with COVID-19 between July 1 and Aug. 9 of this year.

    https://www.texastribune.org/2021/08/12/texas-rsv-covid-19-childrens-hospitals/

    Talk about a profound change!

    Holy cow, what a screwup.

    BuDuh (7bca93)

  21. #16 BuDuh – Since you are interested in the mask efficacy question, you’ll want to look at this tweet, and the survey paper it links to.

    From the Abstract:

    The science around the use of masks by the public to impede COVID-19 transmission is advancing rapidly. In this narrative review, we develop an analytical framework to examine mask usage, synthesizing the relevant literature to inform multiple areas: population impact, transmission characteristics, source control, wearer protection, sociological considerations, and implementation considerations. A primary route of transmission of COVID-19 is via respiratory particles, and it is known to be transmissible from presymptomatic, paucisymptomatic, and asymptomatic individuals. Reducing disease spread requires two things: limiting contacts of infected individuals via physical distancing and other measures and reducing the transmission probability per contact. The preponderance of evidence indicates that mask wearing reduces transmissibility per contact by reducing transmission of infected respiratory particles in both laboratory and clinical contexts. Public mask wearing is most effective at reducing spread of the virus when compliance is high.

    Note that the team thinks masks are more important in “source control”; masks do more to keep the wearers from infecting other people, than to protect the wearers.

    Jim Miller (edcec1)

  22. #17 “[I]f you believe they would do almost nothing to cut down on vote fraud, why do you favor them?”

    Because I think the small amount is worth while, and, more importantly, because I think requiring IDs would increase the confidence in our voting systems.

    Jim Miller (edcec1)

  23. I will try to find the time to compare the RCTs in your article to the ones outlined in my link, Jim. What strikes me as odd is that the CDC, as pointed out in my link, didn’t use any RCTs at all. If your study was convincing, why did they skip mentioning the RCTs they referenced?

    BuDuh (7bca93)

  24. voting rights
    if you don’t own land
    pound sand

    mg (8cbc69)

  25. Does the harmonization go both ways in this silly performative bill?

    Time123 (545f4b)

  26. 88 billion to train the Afghan Troops in 20 years. They collapse in a month. Nice job Generals.
    88 fricking billion……

    mg (8cbc69)

  27. 24.voting rights
    if you don’t own land
    pound sand

    The sentiment is Jefferson but the language is Adams. 😉

    “John, you’re a bore, We’ve heard this before, Now for God’s sake, John, sit down!” – Continental Congress Chorus, ‘1776’ 1972

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  28. #23 BuDuh – Dunno. But I can say that so far I have been unimpressed by the CDC’s performance during the COVID pandemic.

    Jim Miller (edcec1)

  29. 26.88 billion to train the Afghan Troops in 20 years. They collapse in a month. Nice job Generals. 88 fricking billion……

    On Uncle Sam’s credit card, no less. Buy or sell an Afghan War Bonds lately?? But ahhhhh, the sweet smell of Yankee Doodle Fertilizer: Reaganomics.

    “This letter’s post-marked Vietnam…”- SSgt., Barry Sadler, 1966

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  30. You get no argument from me on that one, Jim.

    BuDuh (7bca93)

  31. Off-topic: U.S. Asks Taliban to Spare Its Embassy in Coming Fight for Kabul

    The demand seeks to stave off an evacuation of the embassy by dangling aid to future Afghan governments.

    Isn’t this what the evil corporate lawyer does in the movies, when cornered by his victims?

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  32. Why stop there? Let’s add retinal pattern, fingerprint, DNA hash, nationality, citizenship and/or immigration status, blood type, HIV status, criminal history and current credit rating to the card. Lots of room on one of those chip thingies!

    We are so far down the statist road there is really no argument left against a comprehensive national ID.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  33. But I’d oppose a card that just targeted voting and Covid status. There are so many oxen to gore here it’s a target-rich environment. As for privacy, it’s really no more intrusive than what many people post on Facebook.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  34. What happened to the “show me your papers” crowd?

    Which ones? The ones who oppose voter ID with the same argument? I only object to it because it doesn’t go far enough. Pop everyone’s balloon.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  35. republican voting rights
    only the sophisticated vaccinated need apply

    mg (8cbc69)

  36. “Screw your freedom!”- Arnold Schwarzenegger, ex-GOP governor of California, actor and son of, Gustav Schwarzenegger, a registered Nazi.

    Screw your maid instead, Arnold: knocked up by your knockwurst.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  37. Heh. That’s some legislative trolling if I’ve ever seen it. I would enjoy watching Democrats try to explain why an ID for voting is wrong, while an ID to prove one vaccination is not.

    Hoi Polloi (998b37)

  38. @31. They’ll get a better deal from China.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  39. @31… and Nikes and Iphones…

    ‘ They’ve got us on the run… With guns… And knives… We’re running for our lives!” – Casino Royale, 1967

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  40. Pathetic posturing by pathetic losers.

    Or is that what they’re promising if they ever have the government again? Good luck with that plank, country cousins!

    nk (1d9030)

  41. 26.88 billion to train the Afghan Troops in 20 years. They collapse in a month. Nice job Generals.
    88 fricking billion……

    Wait ’til the audit is done on how much of that wasted billions was contracted to the Liz ad Dick Cheney Retirement Fund… aka Halliburton. 😉

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  42. Comrades, we lost nothing when the Republicans lost Congress and the White House. Nothing at all.

    nk (1d9030)

  43. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G1xuTJqZ20M

    Streamng soon to a Tee Vee set near you… the $100 billon production of: Evacuation II

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  44. 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

    dustin (9491b4)

  45. This is performative symbolic legislation, like when Charlie Rangell introduced a bill that would re-introduce the draft on the eve of the Iraq War. The GOP doesn’t really want vax passports like the Dems aren’t thrilled about voter ID.

    Paul Montagu (5de684)

  46. Just think if the U.S. hadn’t been in Afghanistan for the last 20 years… the Middle East would be unstable.

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  47. Q. Reporter: “Is the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan inevitable?”

    A. President Plagiarist: “No!”

    IDIOT.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  48. imagine if Biden had governed like he said he would, as a uniter for all Americans, and built up some capital with some measures that didn’t serve his partisan ends to maximum, then he spent that capital on measures like masks (a few months ago) and vaccines and maybe something we could all buy into.

    Instead, the vaccine is even more political today.

    Granted, the GOP on the national level is kinda a troll. They would shape up if they had to, and they would have to if Biden were governing to the center.

    The problem is partly that Biden delegated his whole presidency to ambitious partisans. An old guy like that should have nothing to live for but doing a great job and building a legacy, but ice cream just can’t bring back his youthful energy I guess.

    On just about everything, Biden’s quite a bad president. I know that kind of comment is an invitation for the people who made Biden possible to say they told us so, but no…. nevertrumpers told ya so in 2016. The dumbed down political system, dumb all over, brittle and useless all over, that was predictable in 2016.

    dustin (9491b4)

  49. not funny Col.
    but I’m lmao

    mg (8cbc69)

  50. @46. You’re watching Fox, Haiku. Cash in any Afghan War Bonds lately??

    ____

    U.S. COSTS TO DATE FOR THE WAR IN AFGHANISTAN, 2001-2021

    watson.brown.edu/costsofwar/files/cow/

    Since invading Afghanistan in 2001, the United States has spent $2.26 trillion on the war, which includes operations in both Afghanistan and Pakistan. Note that this total does not include funds that the United States government is obligated to spend on lifetime care for American veterans of this war, nor does it include future interest payments on money borrowed to fund the war.

    They’ll be serving creamed-chipped-Cheney on toast at military mess halls for the next 20 years.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  51. No, it’s not. Having said that, Fisher House is just one of several good ways to support our military folks.

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  52. @49. He plagarized that off a Tucka guest Fox comic, mg. But hey, plagiarism is in these days!

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  53. $2.26 trillion on the war is support enough. Piss on ’em.

    They couldn’t stop 18 guys w/$500,000 knocking down the WTC and any West Point professor, a visit to London’s Imperial War Museum. a chat w/a Soviet general or just watching the DVD of ‘Charlie Wilson’s War’ could have told the America’s five star-idiots tghat the neocon notion of an Afghanistan was doomed. They grow poppies, export heroin and herd sheep. They don’t want schools, an air force, cable TV of Starbucks. But they can have Liz Cheney to stake out on an ant hill any time.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  54. afghanistan going under
    booooshes blunder

    mg (8cbc69)

  55. Because I think the small amount is worth while, and, more importantly, because I think requiring IDs would increase the confidence in our voting systems.
    Jim Miller (edcec1) — 8/12/2021 @ 2:40 pm

    Yes, it would be a step in that direction.

    I only object to it because it doesn’t go far enough. Pop everyone’s balloon.
    Kevin M (ab1c11) — 8/12/2021 @ 4:01 pm

    That’s right. Such proposed legislation would be a fine needle.

    felipe (484255)

  56. 52… yes, lefty comedian Jimmy Dore… the funny guy that gets you lefties’ a-mincing…

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  57. Officious functionary: Can you identify yourself?
    nk: (Takes out pocket mirror, looks into it.) Yup. That’s me.
    Officious functionary: No, no, I mean you got any ID?
    nk: ‘Bout what?
    Officious functionary: ….
    nk: ….

    All these freedom-loving Americans who don’t want the guvmint telling them to wear masks and get vaccinated, but ain’t got no problem with making people get official government ID if they want to vote. Or get on a plane. Or into a courthouse. Yeah! Freedom, man!

    nk (1d9030)

  58. The Republicans would never accept the standard anti-forgery proofs of the vaccine passports as good enough for voter ID.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  59. @56. Grand Theft Trumpo. 😉

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  60. There you go…

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  61. Sammy, I’d laugh out loud if this law happened and a judge interpreted it as states that require voter id must also require vaccine passports. They’d hear me all the way to Macon.

    nk (1d9030)

  62. Democrats may be interested in vaccine passes but they are not particularly interested, if at all, in preventing forgery of those passes.

    The Democrats could counter the Republican trolls by trollishly proposing an amendment to the bill providing that, in any state that has voter ID, vaccine passports, and the documents that would be necessary to issue them in anyone’s name, be good enough ID for federal elections.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  63. 61.nk (1d9030) — 8/12/2021 @ 7:28 pm

    Sammy, I’d laugh out loud if this law happened and a judge interpreted it as states that require voter id must also require vaccine passports. They’d hear me all the way to Macon.

    The only thing is, the law goes the other way.

    But the fact that the proofs necessary to get a vaccine passport wouldn’t satisfy the Republicans clamoring for voter ID could be exploited.

    And the pro vaccine people don’t truly care if someone gets vaccinated more than allowed.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  64. nk (1d9030) — 8/12/2021 @ 6:59 pm

    Ha! Love it, nk. That said, it’s called “assent of the governed.” There will be points when that assent will be withheld. A law is only a operative if it is assented to. There is, I understand, a law, still on the books* (Boston?), that says it is lawful to kill a priest who wears his cassock (vestments) in public. No one assents to that law today.

    * I would be happy to be corrected.

    felipe (484255)

  65. The State Department spokesman is increasingly looking like Baghdad Bob.

    https://www.state.gov/briefings/department-press-briefing-august-10-2021

    …So that is what Ambassador Khalilzad is there to seek to advance and seek to support. He will press the Taliban to stop their military offensive and to negotiate a political settlement. We, again, know that is the only path to stability, to development in Afghanistan. We also know the opposite is true, that if this violence continues, if the Taliban continues down this path, we are likely to see a prolonged, protracted period of violence, of instability….

    https://www.state.gov/briefings/department-press-briefing-august-11-2021

    QUESTION: Tend to? No, no, not tend to. (Laughter.) I just don’t think and I don’t see how you can realistically think that it’s going to accomplish anything because it hasn’t in the past. And you say you reject the premise that you’re prepared to sit by and watch and do nothing. Well, what have you done over the course of the last couple weeks as these atrocities that you’ve talked about have mounted, as the Taliban has taken over more and more territory? What exactly has it been that you have done?

    You said that you weren’t going to sit – stand – sit back and do nothing.

    MR. PRICE: Yep, happy to —

    QUESTION: What have you done?

    MR. PRICE: Happy to reiterate much of what we’ve done, of course. We’ve spoken of our humanitarian assistance, which is directly relevant to the current and future conditions of the Afghan people, including its women and girls and Afghanistan’s minorities as well, just right now, just this week. And again, this is diplomacy, what we think has the potential to lead to a political settlement and a ceasefire. It is ongoing actively right now. There are several rounds of planned meetings this week. The first took place yesterday. There was another one today. There will be another one tomorrow, bringing together representatives from countries in the region and well beyond as well as from multilateral institutions —…

    …. MR PRICE: Okay. Well, Ambassador Khalilzad, in the context of all of this, will meet with each negotiating team separately, as we frequently do, to encourage them to engage productively in this process and, importantly, not to squander this opportunity, which may be an historic opportunity to end what is not —

    QUESTION: Wait. Squander this – what opportunity? What are you talking here about?

    MR PRICE: The opportunity —

    QUESTION: The opportunity that was brought about by you guys withdrawing —

    MR PRICE: The opportunity —

    QUESTION: — which has plunged the country – 65 percent of the country into chaos?

    MR PRICE: The opportunity of – the opportunity of the Afghan Government and the Taliban and the rest of the world, at least a large swath of the world, coming together. And let me remind you, it’s been less than a year since both the Afghan Government and the Taliban have been willing to talk, have been engaged in intra-Afghan dialogue. So we have an opportunity – we’ve had an – have had an opportunity in recent weeks and months that in many ways Afghanistan has not had over the course of 40 years….

    https://www.state.gov/briefings/department-press-briefing-august-12-2021/

    What this is not: This is not abandonment. This is not an evacuation. This is not the wholesale withdrawal. What this is is a reduction in the size of our civilian footprint. This is a drawdown of civilian Americans who will in many cases be able to perform their important functions elsewhere, whether that’s in the United States or elsewhere in the region.

    So the message shouldn’t be – the implications of this shouldn’t be outsized. I think all parties – the Afghan Government, the Taliban, our international partners with whom we have been in touch about this – need to understand that we intend to continue our diplomatic presence on the ground. At a more basic level, we intend to continue that enduring partnership with the people of Afghanistan and the Government of Afghanistan.

    So this shouldn’t be read as any sort of message to the Taliban. The message that the Taliban should be receiving is really the message that is emanating from Doha right now, from the United States, from the Qataris, from the litany of countries in the region and well beyond, and the international organizations that have been very clear and speaking with one voice that this rather large, broad, inclusive constellation of countries and important stakeholders will not recognize any entity that seeks to take Afghanistan by force. That’s the message the Taliban needs to be reading.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  66. China and Russia will probably recognize it.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  67. So we are in no way abandoning the people in Afghanistan. Far from it. We are going to continue doing everything we can, everything we can, to bring about an Afghanistan that – in which Afghans can enjoy safety, stability, security.

    Now, again, I’m not wearing rose-colored glasses. I’m not here to tell you that there aren’t significant challenges. That is very clear. It’s very clear from what we’re seeing. But our goal is, through diplomacy, through continuing support for the ANDSF, a force that far outnumbers the Taliban by a figure of more than 3 to 1, by most estimates —

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  68. ABDHUR RAHMAN, the Durani Chief, of him is the story told.
    His mercy fills the Khyber hills—his grace is manifold;
    He has taken toll of the North and the South—his glory reacheth far,
    And they tell the tale of his charity from Balkh to Kandahar.

    Abdhur Rahman, the Durani Chief, to the North and the South is sold.
    The North and the South shall open their mouth to a Ghilzai flag unrolled,
    When the big guns speak to the Khyber peak, and his dog-Heratis fly:
    Ye have heard the song—How long? How long? Wolves of the Abazai!

    Abdhur Rahman, the Durani Chief, holds hard by the South and the North;
    But the Ghilzai knows, ere the melting snows, when the swollen banks break forth,
    When the red-coats crawl to the sungar wall, and his Usbeg lances fail:
    Ye have heard the song—How long? How long? Wolves of the Zuka Kheyl!

    Abdhur Rahman, the Durani Chief, of him is the story told,
    He has opened his mouth to the North and the South, they have stuffed his mouth with gold.
    Ye know the truth of his tender ruth—and sweet his favours are:
    Ye have heard the song—How long? How long? from Balkh to Kandahar.

    — Rudyard Kipling, “The Ballad of the King’s Mercy” (abridged)

    nk (1d9030)

  69. #67

    3-1 but lacks courage and will

    steveg (ebe7c1)

  70. mg, channeling Colonel Haiku but not getting the number of syllables right, wrote:

    voting rights
    if you don’t own land
    pound sand

    And how many times have I pointed out here that we had much better government when the franchise was restricted to white male property owners? 🙂

    The libertarian, but not Libertarian, Dana (405d48)

  71. DCSCA quoted:

    “John, you’re a bore, We’ve heard this before, Now for God’s sake, John, sit down!” – Continental Congress Chorus, ‘1776’ 1972

    “I say vote yes, vote yes, vote for independency!” — Mr Adams

    “Will someone shut that man up?”

    “Never!”

    The libertarian, but not Libertarian, Dana (405d48)

  72. @71. Which comes full circle to mg’s post:

    voting rights
    if you don’t own land
    pound sand

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  73. Mr M wrote:

    Off-topic: U.S. Asks Taliban to Spare Its Embassy in Coming Fight for Kabul

    The demand seeks to stave off an evacuation of the embassy by dangling aid to future Afghan governments.

    Why should the Taliban ‘spare’ our embassy? They saw how President Carter knuckled under when the Iranian ‘students’ seized our embassy in Tehran, and held our people hostage for 444 days. If President Biden doesn’t send in the Marines, now, to protect and evacuate our people, Hostage Crisis 2.0 will be all on him.

    The libertarian, but not Libertarian, Dana (405d48)

  74. Mr Finkelman wrote:

    Sammy, I’d laugh out loud if this law happened and a judge interpreted it as states that require voter id must also require vaccine passports. They’d hear me all the way to Macon.

    The only thing is, the law goes the other way.

    But the fact that the proofs necessary to get a vaccine passport wouldn’t satisfy the Republicans clamoring for voter ID could be exploited.

    And the pro vaccine people don’t truly care if someone gets vaccinated more than allowed.

    Remember when the lovely Gina Raimondo Moffit, then Governess of Connecticut, ordered the Staatspolizei to stop all vehicles with New York license plates, ’cause NYC was a hotbed of COVID? Remember when Frau Moffit sent the Sturmabteilung door-to-door in coastal resort communities, to ask if anyone there had been to New York? Wir müssen Ihre Dokumente sehen! Vaccine passports are just another version of the same [insert slang term for feces here.

    The libertarian, but not Libertarian, Dana (405d48)

  75. “I’m proud of him. I’m proud of my son.” – President Plagiarist

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  76. America’s enemies know that the slogan “ending endless war” actually means unconditional surrender. That is what we are seeing in Afghanistan today. American weakness is dangerously provocative.

    Liz Cheney, 8/12/2021

    Paul Montagu (5de684)

  77. 76.America’s enemies know that the slogan “ending endless war” actually means unconditional surrender. That is what we are seeing in Afghanistan today. American weakness is dangerously provocative. —Liz Cheney, 8/12/2021

    Neocon bullsh!t. AKA: Creamed-Chipped-Cheney-On-Toast.

    How many Afghan War Bonds has she bought? Oh. Right. Stock in Halliburton is a better buy for you and Daddy Darth, eh dear?!

    Since invading Afghanistan in 2001, the United States has spent $2.26 trillion on the war, which includes operations in both Afghanistan and Pakistan. Note that this total does not include funds that the United States government is obligated to spend on lifetime care for American veterans of this war, nor does it include future interest payments on money borrowed to fund the war.

    For the tents to fold in just 90 days after two decades and trillions charged to Uncle Sam’s credit card speaks volumes to the stunning, spinning stupidity of anal right-wing Neocon ideology and American military brassholes pushing it when failing to learn what any savvy West Point professor, wise instructor at Britain’s Imperial War Museum, several well quilled Kipling pieces or a retired Soviet general could have taught them.

    A miserable land of sheep herders, rug weavers, poppy growers and heroin exporters for centuries with no interest in air conditioned schools, maintaining an air force or want a Starbucks and McDonald’s in the Kyber Pass has zero interest or incentive to fight for them. Roast mutton on a stick around the campfire makes for a contented towelhead. And the prime contractors pushed by the likes of Daughter Darth and Daddy Darth deserve serious scrutiny–an audit– to refund Uncle Sam for piss-poor service givn the speed of the collapse. How much of those trillions were contracted to the Cheney Family Retirement Fund – aka Halliburton- that should come out in that audit.

    This has been one of the stupidest wastes of blood and treasure since the British Empire and Soviet Empire failed there as well.

    Afghanistan is where empires go to die. Add America to the list- their century born December 7, 1941; peaked July 20, 1969; died September 11, 2001 -and buried in August, 2021 with the help of clean-skirted, war profiteering, neocon nutbags like the Cheneys.

    On deck, China. Even with basic geography a plus- watch them march into the glorious heroin hell as they spiral down the rabbit hole.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  78. Q. Reporter: “Is the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan inevitable?”

    A. President Plagiarist: “No!”

    Followup: “Will you resign if they do?”

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  79. On just about everything, Biden’s quite a bad president. I know that kind of comment is an invitation for the people who made Biden possible to say they told us so, but no…. nevertrumpers told ya so in 2016. The dumbed down political system, dumb all over, brittle and useless all over, that was predictable in 2016.

    Everything, absolutely everything bad that has happened bad, including Covid, is the fault of those who voted in primaries for Trump.

    The Chinese would never have tried this bioweapon attack if we had a strong Republican president instead of that buffoon.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  80. Hostage Crisis 2.0 will be all on him.

    I don’t think you realize who deep the MSM is invested in Biden and the Dems. Worse, Trump will probably decide to make the crisis all about Trump.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  81. The Taliban used to say “America has the watches, we have the time.” Yet again we see a disaster in the making not because we were defeated, but because we gave up. America only loses a war, when we choose to. Between Trump and Biden, they own this.

    While there is certainly much we can critique on this war, let’s discuss from the point of where we were when the decision to leave was made. At points we had over 100k US troops there, we were able to reduce to 2,500 because 300,000 Afghan troops were defending their nation. In fact dozens died every week defending it, but they needed one thing, America and NATO to have their back. That’s not unrealistic in a relatively young democracy. Over 80 percent of Afg people wanted the US to stay.

    They did not see us as an “occupying empire” but as a partner. We finally accomplished most of what we wanted to, they were defending themselves. But instead of continuing the mission of train and advise, we left. Because of campaign promises.

    I was very critical of Trump abandoning the Kurds, and I am very critical of Biden abandoning Afghanistan. Not to mention the utter lack of planning for evacuating those who helped us. This is a shame, and a stain on us. Sadly future generations will pay a price when we inevitably go to war again and try to convince people to stand with us. This wasn’t an “endless war” any more than is Kosovo, Korea or Japan. But it is a victim of politics, and a tragic one at that. God forgive us.

    –Adam Kinzinger, 8/12/2021

    This is a massive mistake because there are no “good” Taliban and they’ve not disassociated from al Qaeda or the Islamic State. All we can expect from them is barbarity and a terrorist safe haven, which is exactly what we were trying to prevent. Instead of deploying 3,000 troops to kill Taliban, Biden is using them to facilitate our cut-and-run.

    Paul Montagu (5de684)

  82. ‘blah, blah, blah…–Adam Kinzinger, 8/12/2021’

    Neocon bullsh!ter, junior league.

    ‘This is a massive mistake because there are no “good” Taliban and they’ve not disassociated from al Qaeda or the Islamic State. All we can expect from them is barbarity and a terrorist safe haven, which is exactly what we were trying to prevent. Instead of deploying 3,000 troops to kill Taliban, Biden is using them to facilitate our cut-and-run.’

    More Creamed-Chipped-Cheney-On-Toast. After 20 years and $2-plus trillion dollars, aren’t you full of it, yet?

    This is the “massive mistake”: any savvy West Point professor, instructor at Britain’s Imperial War Museum, several well quilled Kipling pieces or a retired Soviet general could have shown Neocon weenies how this would metastasize into one of the stupidest wastes of blood and treasure since the British Empire and Soviet Empire failed there.

    Afghanistan is where empires go to die. Add America to the list thanks to the MIC’s Pentagon brassholes and clean-skirted, war profiteering, neocons ideologues and wackjobs like the Cheneys. Credit card wars are best fought in America — by direct mail.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  83. This wasn’t an “endless war” any more than is Kosovo, Korea or Japan.

    Is Kinzinger really this stupid????

    K,K & J ain’t Muttonland. France wasn’t Muttonland. Britain wasn’t Muttonland.
    Normandy isn’t the Kyber Pass, Tokyo ain’t Kandahar and Seoul sure as hell ain’t a Kabul.

    But Afghanistan is your Vietnam, kid. Except taxes paid for Vietnam along w/ program cuts, not put on Uncle Sam’s credit card. And when it comes to the world wars- like w/’Japan’… or any of the Axis powers:

    ‘The $25 bonds became the most publicized and most popular, selling for $18.75 and maturing over a ten-year period to pay the bondholder $25. Beginning in 1942, these bonds—which eventually became better known as “War Bonds”—could be purchased on an installment plan through payroll deductions at the work place.’

    Bought or sold any Afghan War Bonds lately kid?

    Nope. So STFU, Adam.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  84. Want to start a pool when kabul falls and is renamed bin ladin city? Anyone remember what happened on april 30 1975?

    asset (c1f76b)

  85. buhbye saigon

    mg (8cbc69)

  86. Of course a politician like Adam Kinzinger would think that Afghanistan should have a system like ours where people like him run things. But why would the Afghanis, or the Vietnamese for that matter, want people like him to run things?

    nk (1d9030)

  87. mg (8cbc69) — 8/13/2021 @ 3:05 am

    thanks for the link, mg!

    felipe (484255)

  88. While there is certainly much we can critique on this war, let’s discuss from the point of where we were when the decision to leave was made.

    Oh no, Adam, let’s start with the first part. What exactly do you think about this war deserves critique, especially in context of your argument that we continue to treat Afghanistan like an American colony?

    Factory Working Orphan (2775f0)

  89. The Chinese would never have tried this bioweapon attack if we had a strong Republican president instead of that buffoon.

    Kevin M (ab1c11) — 8/12/2021 @ 10:56 pm

    This is tinfoil hat stuff.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  90. Mr M wrote:

    Hostage Crisis 2.0 will be all on him.

    I don’t think you realize who deep the MSM is invested in Biden and the Dems. Worse, Trump will probably decide to make the crisis all about Trump.

    Of course I recognize how invested the credentialed media are in President Biden, and it may be even more than people think; they absolutely loved the notion of a black, female Vice President, but it hasn’t taken them, and the corporations which pay them, long to realize what a huge disaster Kamala Emhoff would be as President.

    But the non-credentialed media are growing every day, while newspapers, at the least, are not-so-slowly dying. The left want to censor the uncontrolled media, because they can see all of the buffoonery and incompetence of the Biden Administration being exposed, but they really can’t keep it quiet. If there is a Hostage Crisis 2.0, there won’t be just a few people closing news broadcasts with, “That’s the way it is, on Day 235 of America Held Hostage,” but uncounted thousands.

    The libertarian, but not Libertarian, Dana (405d48)

  91. Mr Kinzinger wrote:

    While there is certainly much we can critique on this war, let’s discuss from the point of where we were when the decision to leave was made. At points we had over 100k US troops there, we were able to reduce to 2,500 because 300,000 Afghan troops were defending their nation. In fact dozens died every week defending it, but they needed one thing, America and NATO to have their back. That’s not unrealistic in a relatively young democracy. Over 80 percent of Afg people wanted the US to stay.

    I’ve said it before, to the disgust of many people: the only way that wars are won is by killing people and destroying the ability of the survivors to continue the fight. If we are not willing to do that, we shouldn’t fight wars at all.

    The Soviets were certainly more brutal than we have been, but even their efforts to kill all of the Afghan rebels failed, and the Soviets pulled out.

    The only way we could have ‘won’ in Afghanistan would have been to kill or maim all of their fighting aged men, and enough of their boys growing into fighting age that those surviving would have been cowed into emasculation. We didn’t do that in Afghanistan, in Iraq, in Vietnam or even in Korea; the last time we were willing to let all Hell rain down from the skies, and not care who we killed, was during World War II.

    The Taliban have won because we were not willing to do what it would have taken to defeat them.

    An old college professor of mine used to say, about the Viet Cong, they were more willing to die for their country than we were willing to keep on killing them. He was absolutely right.

    The libertarian, but not Libertarian, Dana (405d48)

  92. A commenter who is an asset to this site wrote:

    Want to start a pool when kabul falls and is renamed bin ladin city? Anyone remember what happened on april 30 1975?

    Kabul will fall soon, perhaps within a week, but it won’t be renamed Bin Laden City. Osama bin Laden was an Arab, and the Afghanis are not Arabs; the Taliban would never rename it for someone who is not an Afghan.

    Mullah Omar City, perhaps?

    The libertarian, but not Libertarian, Dana (405d48)

  93. Our Windy City barrister wrote:

    Of course a politician like Adam Kinzinger would think that Afghanistan should have a system like ours where people like him run things. But why would the Afghanis, or the Vietnamese for that matter, want people like him to run things?

    We have naïvely assumed that, since Western democracy is the best system ever, that all non-Westerners would aspire to it. But even the Germans rejected Western democracy, back in 1933, happily accepting a dictatorship which promised — and delivered — economic restoration and national pride.

    We were only able to impose democracy on Germany and Japan because we had killed all of the opponents of it, and all of the strong men who could have otherwise seized power in a war-defeated country. Western democracy works, in the liberal West, because it grew, slowly, as part of our culture, in Great Britain and France and the United States. Where, in the cultures heavily influenced by Islam, would you ever expect to see democracy truly take root?

    The libertarian, but not Libertarian, Dana (405d48)

  94. the Germans rejected Western democracy, back in 1933,

    If the Germans of 1933 watched any fifteen minutes of any House or Senate hearing, right now, they’d reject it again. 😉

    nk (1d9030)

  95. voting rights
    if you don’t own land
    pound sand

    When Aaron Burr took control of 10-year old Tammany Hall in 1799 and made it into a political machine, he arranged for men to buy a tiny piece of land in order to be able to vote.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  96. 84.

    Want to start a pool when kabul falls

    I think the Taliban will wait and see if all the Americans get out. If the United States looks like it want to keep a small footprint there, they’ll try to chase it out. AS for date: How does September 11th look to you?

    and is renamed bin ladin city?

    It won’t be renamed because it is mostly “modern” movements that are into doing that, and if it were to be renamed it wouldn’t be renamed after bin Laden, because the Taliban do not like to be associated with him publicly n the wrong places.

    Anyone remember what happened on april 30 1975?

    Biden does, for one. That’s why he’s keeping control of the civilian airport until all Americans and British and other allies (some of whom are also sending troops) are out. The Taliban remember Benghazi and how right after that, the Obama-Biden Administration pulled alll Americans out of Benghazi. They would know about it from Qatar.

    One thing Biden did was make employees of media corporations also eligible for asylum, but they’ll have to make their own way out. I think some Americans will try to maneuver to stay there a little loner in order to help their associates get out, and not get killed, because they know nobody will keep the airport open for those people.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  97. The Germans did nor reject democracy in 1933, but they had a bad constitution.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  98. I don’t believe anyone had the expectation that Afghanistan would someday morph into a Scandinavian democracy, only that it would lift itself out of the 8th century and get to a 13th century level.
    We were holding the place together with a few thousand troops and aid money. We hadn’t lost a soldier there since February 2020, so we had found a way to do it with a small footprint and targeted strikes, without a serious hit to our defense budget.
    It’s as if Biden learned nothing from his previous cut-and-run, back when his boss declared that we “won” in Iraq and opened the door to an overrun by the Islamic State.

    Paul Montagu (5de684)

  99. The libertarian, but not Libertarian, Dana (405d48) — 8/13/2021 @ 5:29 am

    An old college professor of mine used to say, about the Viet Cong, they were more willing to die for their country than we were willing to keep on killing them. He was absolutely right.

    The Vietcong were finished by 1969. It was the North Vietnamese army. And Nixon won the war in December 1972, but we were so tired out that Henry Kissinger didn’t realize that once the North Vietnamese were willing to sue for peace, they’d agree to almost anything, not just our minimum demands.

    Interesting point that has been made: The United States has diplomatic relations with Vietnam now and even had the Navy visit a port – but Cuba remains a pariah state. A lot of history goes into what happens.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  100. Trump supported this debacle, but Biden fully owns this situation and his hypocrisy.

    The Joe Biden who promised to put human rights at the center of his foreign policy is the same Joe Biden now stubbornly paving the way for the world’s cruelest human-rights abusers to re-establish their regime in Afghanistan.

    Biden had promised us that he would restore the soul of America, but words are cheap. As the remaining U.S. troops have left Afghanistan, Afghan provinces have been falling to the Taliban like dominos. Men of the Afghan military are reportedly being executed. Women and young girls are being forced into marriage and sex slavery. And the same Biden administration that prides itself on its concern for social justice, racial justice, gender justice, and LGBT pride is going to stand by and watch girls’ schools shut down, ethnic cleansing against Shi’ite Hazaras, and homosexuals stoned to death.

    Paul Montagu (5de684)

  101. 99. Paul Montagu (5de684) — 8/13/2021 @ 6:53 am

    We were holding the place together with a few thousand troops and aid money.

    And air power and tactical bombing. The ground troops weren’t even in combat. More may get killed now in the evacuation depending on what the Taliban decide to do.

    It’s clear that without a U.S. commitment or without the United States believing the Afghan givernment will survive, at least in Kabul, nobody else will either.

    We hadn’t lost a soldier there since February 2020, so we had found a way to do it with a small footprint and targeted strikes, without a serious hit to our defense budget.

    Right. But some people bought into stupid arguments.

    Now an ongoing war is not a good situation, but it;s beter than some other things.

    It’s as if Biden learned nothing from his previous cut-and-run, back when his boss declared that we “won” in Iraq and opened the door to an overrun by the Islamic State.

    They looked at the balance of forces and said that the Afghan army was more superior to its opposition than South Vietnam had been.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  102. Kabul will fall before the end of August.

    Dementia Joe Biden is… The Man Who Would be Klinger

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  103. Paul Montagu (5de684) — 8/13/2021 @ 7:01 am

    Joe Biden now stubbornly paving the way for the world’s cruelest human-rights abusers to re-establish their regime in Afghanistan.

    I think he;s still in denial about that but you can see the skeptical questions at the State Department briefings.

    In spite of his denial, he is also, or has also consented, to planning for a worse case scenario – that is not actually the worst case scenario.

    is going to stand by and watch girls’ schools shut down, ethnic cleansing against Shi’ite Hazaras, and homosexuals stoned to death.

    No, they are engaged in high speed diplomacy.

    The only diplomacy that could work is publicly threatening massive sanctions against Pakistan should the Taliban take over all of Afghanistan.

    In addition to all the other things, in one place at least, stores were burnt – I think with people in them. There are door to door executions of civilians. They probably would like to execute anyone tot likely to accept their rule – and they’d rather kill them then let them become refugees because that could turn world opinion against them and make some sort of re-intervention more likely.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  104. 103. Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 8/13/2021 @ 7:03 am

    Kabul will fall before the end of August.

    Any attempt to do so would keep U.S. troops there longer, and so would any hostage crisis.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  105. A Racial Reckoning For The.Democrats

    Vermont Democrat Party chair Bruce Olsson published a commentary recently proclaiming yet again that Republicans are “racist.” This is particularly rich since the Democrat party is the oldest and most enduring racist political party in history, and its racism continues to this day. Here are the facts:

    The Democrat Party was founded in 1828. Its first national party platform, ratified during the 1840 Presidential election, stated: “ that all efforts by abolitionists or others, made to induce congress to interfere with questions of slavery… are calculated to lead to the most alarming and dangerous consequences, and that all such efforts have an inevitable tendency to diminish the happiness of the people… and ought not to be countenanced by any friend to our political institutions.”

    The message was clear: the Democrat Party did not consider Black Americans to be “people” deserving of “happiness.”

    That same language was in every national Democrat party platform for the next 16 years.

    Democrat party leaders acted on their racist principles, committing high treason against their country and their fellow Americans between 1861-1865 in order to preserve the system of Black human bondage.

    In 1868, the Democrat Party platform urged amnesty for the traitors who, during the Civil War, killed hundreds of thousands of Americans for the purpose of preserving slavery. The platform also called for “the abolition of the Freedmen’s Bureau; and all political instrumentalities designed to secure negro supremacy”:

    In 1904, seventy-six years after its founding, the Democrat party’s platform complained about the Republican platform:

    “The race question has brought countless woes to this country. The calm wisdom of the American people should see to it that it brings no more.

    To revive the dead and hateful race and sectional animosities in any part of our common country means confusion, distraction of business, and the reopening of wounds now happily healed. We therefore deprecate and condemn the Bourbon-like selfish, and narrow spirit of the recent Republican Convention at Chicago which sought to kindle anew the embers of racial and sectional strife, and we appeal from it to the sober common sense and patriotic spirit of the American people.”

    The Republican party’s “hateful” rhetoric in their party platform that the Democrats condemned? Here it is:

    “We demand equal justice for all men, without regard to race or color; we declare once more, and without reservation, for the enforcement in letter and spirit of the Thirteenth, Fourteenth and Fifteenth amendments to the Constitution which were designed for the protection and advancement of the negro, and we condemn all devices that have for their real aim his disfranchisement for reasons of color alone, as unfair, un-American and repugnant to the Supreme law of the land.”

    Throughout most of the 20th century, Democrats condoned or excused policies of apartheid and disenfranchisement of Black Americans. Senate Democrats successfully filibustered a Republican led anti-lynching bill in 1934, and a Republican-led effort to ban the poll tax in 1940. At the time, the poll tax was so effective in the American South that only 3% of Black Americans were registered to vote there. Elected Democrats fought tooth and nail against anti-racist legislation, filibustering the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and engaging in so-called “massive resistance” against school integration into the early 1970s. A century and half of racist policies vigorously supported by Democrat party leaders — no other political party in history comes close.

    https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2021/08/a_racial_reckoning_for_the_democrats.html

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  106. my pleasure, felipe.

    mg (8cbc69)

  107. A deal like that of Columbia with the FARC (which has to be Biden;s best hope) is not in the cards, unless Pakistan and China and Russia force it.

    The Taliban are either not interested in settling down and banking their money or can count on Pakistan to launder it for them, They would have been long ago, had Pakistan not conspired to kill all Taliban wishing to cash in their chips.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  108. Afghanistan was always about applying active resistance to jihadis and those that support them. Like a bug infestation, make it costly for them to creep out of their holes.

    Just because something is persistent and hard doesn’t mean you give up. Take inner city crime….it’s always going to be there, but is the answer to get rid of the police? Of course not, that just reduces the cost of committing crime and you get more of it. In Afghanistan, we don’t want terrorists to operate with impunity….recruiting, training, planning. So it’s in our interest to assist the fledgling Afghani government and its raw army to oppose the Taliban. Our biggest contributions are intelligence, air power, training, and special forces support. Now much of that is either gone or somewhere over the horizon….and more expensive to deploy.

    Our casualties have been remarkably low over the past 5 years…we’re not hemorrhaging money or people. Nothing was compelling this exit except political expediency and a made up timeline. When our previous allies are massacred and instability breeds new terrorist strongholds, we’ll know who to point the finger at…..

    AJ_Liberty (a4ff25)

  109. “Last year when politicians and pundits were praising Cuomo, many of them knew the kind of person he was.

    Imagine all of the monsters who are hiding in plain sight, not yet exposed, while their powerful colleagues praise and work with them.

    —- Spike Cohen

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  110. @106 and what happened after 1965?

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  111. “I believe them [Biden accusers] and I respect them being able to tell their story and having the courage to do it.”

    —- Kamala Harris

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  112. Tell your Timey Tale!

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  113. Or consult the opinions of Daniel Moynihan…

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  114. Women and young girls are being forced into marriage and sex slavery. And the same Biden administration that prides itself on its concern for social justice, racial justice, gender justice, and LGBT pride is going to stand by and watch girls’ schools shut down, ethnic cleansing against Shi’ite Hazaras, and homosexuals stoned to death.

    The opium-dealing pederasts we allied ourselves with were doing those same things before the Taliban, and they didn’t stop while we were there. Read this story: https://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/30/us/green-beret-who-beat-up-afghan-officer-for-raping-boy-can-stay-in-army.html

    The Taliban initially gained acceptance among the general population by hanging rapists from their tank gun barrels.

    I think that Bulwark article is just made up propaganda by a propagandist.

    nk (1d9030)

  115. And since I’m in a disputatious mood, Germany was brought out of the Middle Ages by Martin Luther and Japan by Commodore Perry. Eisenhower, Zhukov and MacArthur just cured their temporary bouts of Fascist fever. There’s no analogy to Afghanistan.

    nk (1d9030)

  116. What can be done with a people who – when told man has walked on the Moon – look to the sky, hold up thumb and forefinger about two inches apart signifying the size of the Moon in the sky and say that’s not possible, the Moon is too small for a man to walk on.

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  117. diGenova, Toensing and Andy McCarthy couldn’t be reached for comment…

    Power concedes nothing without demand. We too often underestimate the power we have as regular American citizens by marching, by protesting, by raising our voices. That’s a really important part of the thing that I’m leading, The National Democratic Redistricting Committee. We have a big advocacy campaign to get American citizens involved in this fight. If we make our voices known if we demand the kind of change, the fair change we’re seeking, I think it will help in the process.”

    Raising the consciousness of people by demonstrating, by getting arrested, by doing the things that ending segregation. If you asked people back in the 1950s, do you think marching, demonstrating will bring down a system of American apartheid? You probably would have said, no, that won’t happen. We shouldn’t lose faith right now. We shouldn’t lose faith. Citizens can make a change. Citizens need to be in the streets. Citizens need to be demonstrating. Citizens need to be calling representatives to demand the kind of change that will make this country more representative, make our democracy more fair.”

    —- Eric Holder

    Colonel Haiku (0c588c)

  118. It gets old having the big stick taken from you and then getting a beating with it.

    mg (8cbc69)

  119. Holder’s thinly disguised call to arms goes out to Black Bloc and other regime Brownshirts…

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  120. https://abc7chicago.com/indiana-university-amy-coney-barrett-supreme-court-vaccine-mandate/10949155/

    If a certain someone was still allowed on Twitter, we’d see a “nasty ungrateful b-” tweet this morning.

    urbanleftbehind (d8ea9b)

  121. They should stop talking so much about the vaccine, which everyone knows about, and talk more about the anttibodies. It’s not getting talked about in the news.

    The Biden Administration is at least doing more about them:

    https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/12/us/politics/biden-covid-monoclonal-antibodies.html

    …Distribution of doses, which are ordered by medical providers, increased fivefold from June to July….The treatments, which the federal government pays for and makes free to patients, mimic antibodies that the immune system generates naturally to fight the coronavirus. They have been shown to sharply reduce hospitalizations and deaths when given to patients soon after symptoms appear, typically by intravenous infusion. There is also evidence that they may be able to prevent the disease entirely in certain people exposed to the virus. Unlike coronavirus vaccines, which take as long as six weeks to provide full protection, the antibody treatments can be given to patients who are already sick, with a more immediate effect.

    The latest data from the Department of Health and Human Services shows that just under half of the distributed supply of the treatments has been used, by more than 6,000 hospitals and other provider sites, dating back to late last year….

    ….Interest in the monoclonal antibodies has been spotty throughout the pandemic. When they were authorized last year, the treatments from Regeneron and Eli Lilly were expected to be in high demand and to serve as a bridge in fighting the pandemic before vaccinations ramped up. They were relentlessly promoted by Mr. Trump, who called the Regeneron treatment a “cure,” and top health officials in his administration.

    Still, they ended up sitting on refrigerator shelves in many places, even during recent surges. Many hospitals and clinics did not make the treatments a priority because of how time consuming and difficult to administer they were at the time, when they had to be given via intravenous infusion. Physicians can now administer the most frequently used treatment, from Regeneron, subcutaneously, or by injection.

    “These are important tools,” said Dr. Dan Barouch, a virologist at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston who has worked with Regeneron on a study that showed that the company’s antibody treatment may be able to prevent Covid-19 when given to people living with someone infected with the coronavirus. “They have shown substantial therapeutic effects.”

    Dr. Rajesh Gandhi, an infectious disease physician at Massachusetts General Hospital who was an investigator for that study, said evidence of the benefit of the antibody treatments had only grown stronger in recent months. He said more needed to be done to educate physicians and patients on how effective they can be.

    “Patients need to know to call their physicians” and ask about the treatments, he said.

    …Regeneron has aired a series of television advertisements for its treatment this year.

    Virtually all Covid-19 patients receiving monoclonal antibodies during the Delta surge are getting the kind made by Regeneron, one of three that have been authorized by the Food and Drug Administration during the pandemic. The company estimated last week that its treatment was now reaching more than a quarter of eligible patients, up from less than 5 percent earlier in the pandemic.

    The F.D.A. last month expanded its emergency authorization of the Regeneron treatment so that it could be used to try to prevent Covid-19 in a small number of high-risk patients. They include people with certain health conditions who are not vaccinated or may not mount an adequate immune response, who have been exposed to the virus, or who live in nursing homes or prisons. It had previously been available, like the other monoclonal antibody treatments, only for high-risk patients who had already tested positive for the virus.

    The federal government in June indefinitely paused shipments of the first authorized monoclonal antibody treatment, from Eli Lilly, because new lab data suggested it would not work well in cases caused by the Beta and Gamma variants.

    The government has not ordered any doses of a third treatment, from GlaxoSmithKline and Vir, which is being used only minimally so far. Kathleen Quinn, a spokeswoman for GlaxoSmithKline, said the treatment was available at health care facilities in 26 states and U.S. territories.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  122. Almost on topic: There is something strange about Florida’s COVID numbers. Yesterday, the state registered 24,869 cases — and only 18 deaths. (That’s by far the largest number of cases for any US state, and a record for Florida.)

    (In contrast, Texas registered 14,182 cases and 140 deaths, which, sadly, is about what I would expect.)

    Ordinarily, deaths lag the cases by 2 to 3 weeks or more, but in Florida they are — supposedly — going in different directions.

    It may be something as simple as the people registering the deaths falling behind, way behind. (That happens on weekends, all over the world.)

    Jim Miller (edcec1)

  123. Biden withdrew at the worst possible time (the sart if fighting season) and without any planning.

    The Taliban rest from the war in Pakistan. The United States and the Afghan government have (with minor exceptions, like the raid on bin Laden) have always respcted te Afghan-Pakistan border. Not so the Taliban. Whihch is why the war did not end.

    Donald Trump has issued a statement claiming

    https://www.livemint.com/news/world/donald-trump-blames-joe-biden-for-unacceptable-taliban-surge-in-afghanistan-11628784054543.html

    “If I were now president, the world would find that our withdrawal from Afghanistan would be a conditions-based withdrawal,” Trump claimed in a statement.

    “I personally had discussions with top Taliban leaders whereby they understood what they are doing now would not have been acceptable,” he said.

    “It would have been a much different and much more successful withdrawal, and the Taliban understood that better than anyone,” he said.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  124. Jim, I think there may be some explanations for that
    -Delta is more contagious but less dangerous
    -Vaccination rates are higher among older Americans who were more likely to be seriously impacted
    -Treatments for Covid have gotten a lot better.
    -There’s still a lag between case, hospitalization and mortality

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  125. @124 no one believes him.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  126. 123.

    There is something strange about Florida’s COVID numbers. Yesterday, the state registered 24,869 cases — and only 18 deaths….(In contrast, Texas registered 14,182 cases and 140 deaths, which, sadly, is about what I would expect.)

    It may be something as simple as the people registering the deaths falling behind, way behind.

    Or this maybe:

    From the NYT article cited @122:

    Dr. Nunez-Smith said that shipments to Florida, which is experiencing a devastating surge in virus cases, had increased eightfold over the past month, and more than 108,000 courses of the treatments were shipped around the country in July.

    They may be testing more and also saving more lives.

    Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida on Thursday introduced a “rapid response unit” for administering the Regeneron treatment in Jacksonville, saying that the state would set up similar sites in other cities.

    What cured president Trump, is at last, being used more in Florida.

    That could also be in combination with a reporting lag.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  127. https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2021/08/12/census-data-race-ethnicity-neighborhoods/

    This is interesting. I wonder how the “Stop teh white genocide.” Wing of the GOP is going to react?

    The first race and ethnicity breakdowns from the 2020 Census, released Thursday, show a more diverse population than ever in the nation’s history. The report marks the first time the absolute number of people who identify as White alone has shrunk since a census started being taken in 1790. The number of people identifying as non-Hispanic White and no other race dropped by 5.1 million people, to 191.7 million, a decrease of 2.6 percent.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  128. I wonder how the “Stop teh white genocide.” Wing of the GOP is going to react?

    Who is that and how many members do they have?

    BuDuh (7bca93)

  129. Florida’s elderly are more healthy than almost anywhere else in the lower 48 die to the aggregation of highest-earning and affinity for outdoor recreation activities. Contrast this with a rust belt or northeastern urban center.

    urbanleftbehind (d8ea9b)

  130. So only 1/3 of New Yorkers (approximately) have been vaccinated at this point?

    If true, damn dat Donald Trump!

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  131. Our problem in Afghanistan was like our failure in Vietnam — we were about nation-building and not subjugation. The Russian approach — which worked until we started supporting the Mujuhideen — was to kill everyone who did not submit. We were not willing to do that, and so the enemy just waited.

    If we are assigning blame to the loss to the Taliban, maybe Charlie Wilson is the culprit.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  132. Biden seems to default to an all-of-the-above strategy for most anything (except climate change but maybe we’ll see it there too – adaptation plus lower emissions even if he is against oil production in the USA – but there he wants OPEC to produce more, at least right now)

    1. Infrastructure; any spending project that anybody lobbies for, even if the same result could probably be gotten, sooner and better and cheaper. Part of the idea behind this approach s that what maybe matters is how much money goes out the door.

    2. Afghanistan: Withdrawal and more troops. Deadline for the end of U.S. air support and no deadline.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  133. The problem was sanctuaries. The Korean War ended because Eisenhower threatened escalation (actually he threatened to drop nuclear radiation along the front line.)

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  134. 128. They’ll ignore it. They are only interested in restricting immigration.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  135. A lot of it is due to tabulation changes for white-mixed-with-other. Apparently, White-“ABB*” recipients were more enthusiastically encouraged by Census to select Other.

    *Anything But Black

    In recent times, mixed white-black and white-Hispanic were more likely to identify as the minority race than white-Asian or even White-Nat Am for program eligibility purposes.

    This also reminds me of the “Bob Martin / Roberto Martinez, 2 persons exactly 50%Anglo land 50% mexican, but with different choices apparent to them” analogy that Victor Davis Hanson would bring up in several of his columns.

    urbanleftbehind (d8ea9b)

  136. Who is that and how many members do they have?

    Ain’t nobody got time for dat!!!

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  137. @Col Haiku:

    The vaccination rate in New York State is past 70%

    https://covid19vaccine.health.ny.gov/covid-19-vaccine-tracker

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  138. https://www.flgov.com/2021/08/05/governor-ron-desantis-highlights-success-of-monoclonal-antibody-treatments-for-covid-19-at-tampa-general-hospital

    “Although monoclonal antibodies have been used in earnest for almost all of 2021, they have not received much attention,” said Governor Ron DeSantis. “The results have been very positive, but the key is having patients receiving it in time, early enough in the infection to neutralize the virus. They provide your body an ability to fight back against the virus and results from the trials were a 70% reduction in hospitalization or death.”

    https://www.cbsnews.com/news/covid-19-florida-desantis-monoclonal-antibody-treatment-hospitals

    Florida is launching a rapid response unit to administer monoclonal antibody therapies to residents fighting COVID-19, and developing “strike teams” to deliver the treatment directly to long-term care facilities, as Florida struggles with record-high hospitalizations.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  139. I wonder how the “Stop teh white genocide.” Wing of the GOP is going to react?

    There best reaction, and the one that I expect, is to have more babies. The more sophisticated white folk in both parties will be talking it over with their only child.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  140. *Their

    sheesh.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  141. Florida is launching a rapid response unit to administer monoclonal antibody therapies to residents fighting COVID-19

    The Pound of Cure™

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  142. 138… I’ll take it up with the Armstrong & Getty radio show, Sammy… thanks.

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  143. We were holding the place together with a few thousand troops and aid money. We hadn’t lost a soldier there since February 2020, so we had found a way to do it with a small footprint and targeted strikes, without a serious hit to our defense budget.

    Since invading Afghanistan in 2001, the United States has spent $2.26 trillion on the war, which includes operations in both Afghanistan and Pakistan. Note that this total does not include funds that the United States government is obligated to spend on lifetime care for American veterans of this war, nor does it include future interest payments on money borrowed to fund the war.

    Serious hit to DoD budget?!?! $2.26 trillion over 20 years ain’t serious money???

    Oh. Right. The conservative Neocon mindset: Reaganomics.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  144. 142, lots of people in FL with experience moving “pounds” from place to place, though it might be from 25 years ago and further back.

    urbanleftbehind (d8ea9b)

  145. 140. Kevin M (ab1c11) — 8/13/2021 @ 9:35 am

    The Pound of Cure™

    No, in this case it’s a Pound of Prevention versus an Ounce of Cure.

    You have to vaccinate everyone to have an effect, and at least two weeks in advance, but you have to administer the cure only to the small number that get infected, and it’s cheaper to manufacture. And the cure can also be used as prevention.

    The Biden Administration is at least doing more about them:

    https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/12/us/politics/biden-covid-monoclonal-antibodies.html

    …They have been shown to sharply reduce hospitalizations and deaths when given to patients soon after symptoms appear, typically by intravenous infusion. There is also evidence that they may be able to prevent the disease entirely in certain people exposed to the virus. Unlike coronavirus vaccines, which take as long as six weeks to provide full protection, the antibody treatments can be given to patients who are already sick, with a more immediate effect….

    …”These are important tools,” said Dr. Dan Barouch, a virologist at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston who has worked with Regeneron on a study that showed that the company’s antibody treatment may be able to prevent Covid-19 when given to people living with someone infected with the coronavirus. “They have shown substantial therapeutic effects.”

    …The company estimated last week that its treatment was now reaching more than a quarter of eligible patients, up from less than 5 percent earlier in the pandemic.

    The F.D.A. last month expanded its emergency authorization of the Regeneron treatment so that it could be used to try to prevent Covid-19 in a small number of high-risk patients.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  146. Re the Census and white replacement theorem, JD Vance’s hallowed Middletown OH actually gained population, but isn’t he at best a demographic wash himself?

    urbanleftbehind (d8ea9b)

  147. And then to those vaccinated, you have to add those naturally infected, often with an unnoticeable case.

    People may also get booster infections because there’s something I read that makes no sense without it.

    With time there seems to be a greater variety of antibodies in those with naturally acquired immunity.

    Of course there’s greater risk from real Covid compared to the vaccine. It could kill you. At least without getting the antibodies quickly. But it could still.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  148. @129, Tucker Carlson and whoever was tuning in for his segments on replacement theory.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  149. Sammy, thank you for the thorough and thoughtful information.

    Time123 (9f42ee)

  150. The CDC has appproved a third shot in certain circumstances, But only for people who got the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines.

    People who got one dose of J&J don’t have anything approved yet.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  151. 143. Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 8/13/2021 @ 9:37 am

    138… I’ll take it up with the Armstrong & Getty radio show, Sammy… thanks.

    I don’t know anything about them, but there could be a question if they will allow themselves to be corrected.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  152. Sammy,

    pretty sure they are talking about the black population in NYC. They’ve been the topic lately since DeBlasio declared they will have no rights next month when his fascist policies go further into effect.

    On another note, glad I got to visit the Met one last time before they demanded “papers please.” I will never prove I’m a legitimate citizen beyond my ID.

    NJRob (eb56c3)

  153. The CBS Evening News will have a segment tomorrow evening (Tuesday) probably repeated on Wednesday morning (they’ve been promoting it) about people buying fake vaccine cards.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  154. https://www1.nyc.gov/site/doh/covid/covid-19-vaccine-eligibility.page

    Proof of Age

    You must bring proof of age to your vaccination.

    You will not need to provide proof of immigration status or a social security number to get vaccinated. ID is only required for proof of age.

    When you receive the vaccine, your privacy will be protected. There are strict laws in place to ensure confidentiality of your personal information.

    Proof you are 12 or older may include:

    Driver’s license or non-driver ID
    IDNYC
    State or government-issued birth certificate
    Current U.S. passport or valid foreign passport
    Permanent resident card
    Certificate of Naturalization or Citizenship
    Life insurance policy with birthdate
    Marriage certificate with birthdate

    For people younger than 18, a parent or guardian can accompany them to the vaccination site to attest to their age

    Proof of Consent for Minors

    A parent or guardian must provide consent for their child to be vaccinated in person or by phone. They will not need to provide proof they are the child’s parent or guardian.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)

  155. Breaking: Texas Governor Abbot tests positive for Covid after being fully vaccinated.

    Feds plan to announce new seres of booster shots.

    $$$$$$ ‘Pig’ Pharma $$$$$$

    Wait. For. The. Pill.

    DCSCA (f4c5e5)

  156. What vaccine did Gov. Abbott take? Amd how positive was he – or they don’t release that, of course, and treat it as binary?.

    Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c)


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