From “we’re getting everyone out” to “everyone who wants to get out” to “there’s nothing we can do about the hostages”
The State Department says there is little it can do to help Americans and at-risk Afghans whose planes are reportedly grounded at an airport as the Taliban prevents them from leaving the country.
At least six chartered planes are attempting to evacuate these Americans and others from Mazar-i-Sharif International Airport, but the Taliban is reportedly preventing them from taking off. Since it evacuated U.S. military forces and diplomatic personnel from the war-torn country, the Biden administration has not had the resources necessary to ensure that flights chartered by nonprofit groups and others can depart Afghanistan.
Afghanistan was a functioning country just a little while ago, with a government that did not include the Taliban. No, it wasn’t Switzerland, or even close. But there was no big crisis there back in April, when Biden announced his withdrawal deadline, and no great urgency to any pullout, which could have been engineered by someone other than the utter incompetents and/or saboteurs who seem to have been in charge in all branches under the supposed control of our brilliant commander-in-chief.
Come to think of it, though – with their track record, it’s probably best that they’re saying that there’s nothing they can or will do at this point. Haven’t they already done enough to wreck Afghanistan, the US, our relations with our allies, our military, and our standing in the world?
They could have prevented all of this by following established evacuation protocol. Failing that, there’s always common sense – and in this case a second grader could have figured out a better way. Instead, they voluntarily (and with malice aforethought? – one can’t help but wonder) gave up every bargaining chip we had. Their stance right now is probably giving ideas to many other groups who perceive us as a helpless Gulliver tied down by a bunch of Lilliputians.
Now the Taliban call the shots, not us.
Losing children? It’s only news when the right does it
Last week, Axios reported that the Department of Health and Human Services has lost contact with more than 4,500 children who’d crossed the border illegally after it had released them into the country. That’s a third of the migrant children it was supposed to be tracking.
But don’t worry – the MSM is on it.
Not:
As of Sunday, the New York Times hadn’t mentioned it. Nor had the Washington Post. Nor any other major newspaper. There’s been no mention of the findings on the network news, on CNN, or on MSNBC. The story has been picked up only by some conservative news outlets.
This is all in glaring contrast to the reaction to the New York Times report in May 2018 that the Trump administration had lost contact with fewer than 1,500 migrant children.
That story set off a tidal wave of outraged news articles, commentaries, and tweets. Every press outlet covered the story. Reporters demanded answers from White House officials. The hashtag #WhereAreTheChildren started trending on Twitter – peaking at 35,000 mentions an hour.
Politicians and celebrities joined the frenzy.
The MSM does this because it works. It’s as simple as that. There is no guiding principle involved except that the news that’s fit to print is the news that favors left over right, and if there’s a story that cuts the opposite way, it’s best to spin it or kill it. They know that their readers will never read news from outlets on the right, which they are told give out “misinformation” and lies.
I don’t care how low the MSM sinks in the polls, or how many people get news from other sources, the reality that I see and hear is that the MSM continues to shape the viewpoints of a majority of Americans or close to it. The MSM members are neither stupid nor unaware. They are skilled politically-biased operatives who like to pretend they are objective. They are blatant in the skewed nature of their coverage, but because it still works to shape opinions they now are also shameless about it.
The Jewish New Year begins tonight
Jewish holidays start at sundown, so tonight is the beginning of Rosh Hashanah, the two-day celebration of the beginning of the new year:
…[It] is the traditional anniversary of the creation of Adam and Eve, the first man and woman according to the Hebrew Bible, and the inauguration of humanity’s role in God’s world.
Rosh Hashanah customs include sounding the shofar (a cleaned-out ram’s horn), as prescribed in the Torah, following the prescription of the Hebrew Bible to “raise a noise” on Yom Teruah. Its rabbinical customs include attending synagogue services and reciting special liturgy about teshuva [repentance], as well as enjoying festive meals. Eating symbolic foods is now a tradition, such as apples dipped in honey, hoping to evoke a sweet new year.
We could use a sweet new year, right? Happy New Year!
Happy Labor Day!
[NOTE: This is a slightly edited version of a previous post.]
Labor Day is the bookend standing at the opposite end of summer from its holiday beginning, Memorial Day.
July Fourth is summer’s early peak, with the promise of long light-filled days ahead. But Labor Day is summer’s last gasp, the moment I dreaded as a child because it marked the end of vacation and the start of the school year. Spiffy new clothes, a shiny bookbag, freshly sharpened pencils, and the promise of the beautiful autumn leaves’ arrival were nice. But they couldn’t make up for the fact that a new school year was beginning. Where oh where had the summer gone?
And it goes even more quickly these days. But let’s be happy about the fact that we don’t have to worry about the start of school anymore—except, perhaps, for the teachers among us.
Here’s wishing you all a Happy Labor Day, despite the difficult times. Barbecues, picnics, the beach, just hanging out in your yard, whatever you desire and whatever you decide. And for the historically-minded among you, here’s some information on the origins of the holiday.
Open thread 9/6/21
When you need a dosa and you need it fast, here’s your guy:
The Bee Gees and others: “Too Much Heaven” minus the falsetto
I’ve discussed the Bee Gees’ 1978 song “Too Much Heaven” before. Released at the height of their disco era, it’s not disco but rather an R&B ballad with all three brothers singing in falsetto. Barry is the featured soloist and shows off his vibrato-falsetto, but the threesome is really the star. I’ve read that the recording was done with multi-tracks (some of them very very soft in volume) so that there were extra layers to the voices.
The song has an especially transcendent quality that most “reactors” on YouTube immediately perceive. People often say the group sounds like angels (the “heaven” reference in the song doesn’t hurt, either). If you’re somehow unfamiliar with it, here’s the original official video with 215+ million views as of this moment:
Other groups have tried to cover the song. The best falsetto version (actually, part-falsetto) I’ve found is by the Reo Brothers, who specialize in covers. They do a good job, but can only go so far. To me, it’s a demonstration of how incredible the Bee Gees were, because the Reo Brothers, although good, show the voice strain of singing so much falsetto. The lead singer (the drummer in this case) is actually the only one singing falsetto, as far as I can tell, and he doesn’t have the effortless flow of Barry. Then again, who does? Plus, there’s something ever-so-slightly draggy about the tempo:
The Reos sing part falsetto and mostly regular voices, but the Hanson Brothers dispense with the falsetto altogether and sing only in their normal voices in an a capella version. It’s pretty good, but it just doesn’t do it for me. The tone isn’t right. And the Bee Gees are so convincing when they sing lyrics like, “Loving’s such a beautiful thing” in the chorus (which I used to hear as “Love is such a beautiful thing”). You believe them when the Bee Gees say it – at least, I do. The Hanson’s sing it, but none of their words carry anything like the conviction of the Bee Gees:
To round things off, I’ll add this 11-years-later (1989) version by the Bee Gees. They rarely performed the song in concert – my guess is that they were such perfectionists that they felt they couldn’t create enough of that multi-layered effect live, although they were famous for the great quality of their live singing. However, a couple of times they decided to sing excerpts of “Too Much Heaven” live as part of a medley of old hits which they performed on one mic with very simple accompaniment.
This is a video of one of those occasions. You’ll notice that the Bee Gees chose to use their normal singing voices here rather than falsetto. It surprised me by being so different from the original and yet, to my ears, still very beautiful. It’s an almost-casual version; the brothers are very relaxed and happy, and there is no discernible effort whatsoever. It’s as natural as breathing; maybe more so. Barry was in his early 40s here and the twins were around 40:
I think the reasons that the Bee Gees surpass all the others are that they wrote the song, they sing it effortlessly but with emotional intensity that isn’t over-the-top and yet seems sincere to me, and in particular their individual voices are not just good, they’re very beautiful. And then of course there’s that special harmonic vibration that isn’t just the result of their being brothers – after all, the other groups are brothers too – but is something else, something indefinable but perceptible and joyful.
[NOTE: I say that the Bee Gees’ original version has all three brothers singing in falsetto, and I’m pretty sure that’s true. But because both Robin and Maurice had enormous range, they could use very high head voices and sound almost like they were singing in falsetto, so I can’t be 100% sure that all the multiple voice layers were sung in falsetto. At any rate, though, the general effect of the original is of three falsetto singers.]
What’s next for our new partners in peace, the Taliban?
Flush with the success Biden handed them, and strutting with propagandist pride, the Taliban are moving forward with their newfound power. Last night there was a discussion here of just how bad it would be, and I wrote in a comment earlier today:
…[T]he Taliban are just getting started again in Afghanistan, and they know the eyes of the world are on them, so they are on relatively good behavior now. Also, they’re not dumb, and are not necessarily doing whatever bad stuff might be going on in front of the cameras or in public…
These are the early days for the Taliban redux. The Taliban have not yet, as far as I know, instituted sharia law. But that’s what they did last time they took power, which represented a big change for the people of Afghanistan…It was repressive by any standard except maybe medieval ones. Some history from that time:
“Edicts which governed social behavior under the Taliban encompassed aspects of everyday life. The Taliban imposed a ban on the watching of movies, television and videos. In addition, listening to music was banned. Men were ordered not to shave or trim their beards, mandating that the facial hair should protrude from the chin. Those people with non-Islamic names were ordered to change the names to Islamic ones. All people were ordered to attend prayers in mosques five times a day. Certain sports deemed to be un-Islamic were banned…
“In addition to the strict social polices that encumbered the general population, the Taliban placed additional restrictions on women. One of the first acts by the Taliban was to close girl’s schools. In addition, women were prohibited from working outside their homes. Hospitals were segregated and only fully clothed women and girls could only be examined by a male doctor. Women were not allowed to laugh in public, let ankles or wrists show, or wear nail polish. In addition, women could not move outside their homes without a mahram (a close male relative such as a father, brother or husband) to escort her. Those women who broke the restrictions placed upon them could be publicly beaten by the religious police under the Department for the Propagation of Virtue and the Suppression of Vice. As a result of the strict social policies under the Taliban, ninety percent of women and sixty percent of men were illiterate. No elections or political debates were held. The policies regarding medical treatment resulted in Afghanistan having the second highest maternity mortality rate in the world.
“The Taliban also required women moving outside of their homes to wear a burqa. A full burqa covers the entire face and body of the woman, in addition to a net curtain which conceals the woman’s eyes. The burqa existed in Afghanistan before the Taliban’s rise to power but was not required by law, until they came to power. The policy was enforced by threats and beating by the religious police. The burqa became a metaphor for the oppression felt by women under the Taliban’s policies. However, the policy was also economically oppressive. The cost of purchasing a burqa prevented many women from owning their own. Neighborhoods shared a single burqa and women not in possession of the dressing could not leave their homes.”
The Taliban were not merely reinstating something in 1996 that the Afghans had already been doing prior to the Soviet takeover, a takeover which had lasted for much of the 1980s. The Taliban were considerably more repressive.
You might ask why we should care. After all, there are plenty of awful places around the world. That is certainly the case, but in addition to our (that is, the Biden administration’s) having betrayed promises we made, and losing prestige all over the world (which will have its own repercussions), and the probable increase in Islamic terrorism against western countries, the Taliban have geopolitical plans that go far beyond making their own population miserable:
Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid compared Israel to a tumor that needed to be destroyed, reports in the Iranian state media show. “Israel is like a tumor in the body of the Islamic Ummah [community of believers],” Taliban spokesman Mujahid declared in a recent interview on Iran’s Al-Alam TV network.
The comment’s made by Taliban’s official spokesman echo the position taken by the Iranian regime. Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and the leading members of his regime have repeatedly called Israel a “cancerous tumor” that needs to be “uprooted and destroyed.”
The remarks come as the Taliban is building a Islamic regime in Afghanistan modeled on Iran, the world’s biggest state sponsor of terrorism. The Taliban is set to name its top Mullah, Hibatullah Akhundzada, as Afghanistan’s Supreme Leader, a title similar to one assumed by Iran’s Ayatollahs. Akhundzada was Taliban’s chief executioner during its previous rule, running Sharia Courts in 1990s.
The Taliban will be partnering with China, and there are also plans to stir up trouble in India:
On Friday, Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen declared support for Islamist separatists waging jihad in Indian province of Kashmir…
Pakistan-backed jihadi groups such as Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohammed are waging a deadly jihad against Indian security forces and civilians in Muslim-majority region of Kashmir. At least 47,000 India’s have been killed in Islamist terror attacks in recent decades.
The Taliban and other fanatic Islamic terrorists are riding high, the west is lost and confused, Biden is both an incompetent fool and a traitor (yes, it’s possible to be both, and perhaps the only thing he’s competent at is being a traitor), and England is very very angry. It’s ironic that many people voted for Biden thinking he’d restore respect for the US around the world, although I was always deeply puzzled as to why anyone would ever entertain such a notion.
A post-9/11 political changer tells her story
I think the most interesting thing about it is the writer’s description of how she used to make political decisions. One might say, “frivolously.” There was also a strong family-tradition influence. Both things are not unusual, in my experience. I don’t think I was ever as frivolous as this woman, but I certainly wasn’t researching most issues in great depth when I voted during the 20th Century:
The 1988 Presidential Election was the first time that I got to exercise my right to vote. I went to the polling place with my parents and excitedly pulled the lever for Michael Dukakis. Why? I liked his wife Kitty. I also grew up in a Democrat-voting family. My grandparents had a photo of JFK hanging in their home. My grandmother would proclaim “Democrats are for the working people.” Both of my parents voted for Democrats most of the time, although they were registered as Independents. They claimed to keep open minds on the off chance they may vote differently but they never did. I did the same, registered as an Independent but voted Democrat up and down the ballot.
I voted for President Clinton both times. He was young, good looking, charming and played the saxophone on the Arsenio Hall show during the 1992 campaign. Yes, I thought, this guy is going to be an amazing President.
What changed for her? After being in Manhattan on 9/11 she got interested in politics, researched things more, and it ended up changing her voting patterns. I think this is fairly typical of a rather straightforward kind of political change story from a person who previously had a rather shallow involvement. The real change, from which the rest followed, was that politics suddenly got her attention.
Does Biden hate Governor Newsom?
Why do I ask that question? Because I can’t believe that even in California this visit would be considered a plus for the Newsom campaign:
President Joe Biden will campaign for Gov. Gavin Newsom in California ahead of the Sept. 14 recall vote, Newsom said Thursday.
“I’m humbled by the fact the president will be out here soon,” Newsom told reporters during a campaign stop in San Francisco’s Chinatown district.
Get it? He’s humbled by the emperor’s resplendent suit of clothing.
The article goes on to say that VP Harris as well as Biden were originally scheduled to come and help him campaign – Harris being another dubious plus – but that Afghanistan caused a cancellation by Harris. My guess is that the real reason is she doesn’t want to subject herself to the heckling.
Polls in California:
Biden’s numbers have also fallen in California, though he still enjoys strong ratings. A Public Policy Institute of California poll released Wednesday night showed 58 percent of Californians approve of Biden, down from 70 percent in January and 66 percent in May. Still, 83 percent of Democrats back the president, and his support could help motivate the governor’s base.
Or not.
And of course, Republicans pounced – like the predators they are:
Republicans jumped on Newsom’s comments Thursday.
“Dozens of California school children remain stranded in Afghanistan, abandoned by this Administration,” California Republican Party Chair Jessica Millan Patterson tweeted.
The students live in Sacramento and are from families of Afghan ethnicity, and their families are trapped with them, adding up to about 72 total.
Sacramento apparently is home to a lot of Afghan immigrants. This is the sort of story that would be on the front pages of every newspaper had Trump been in charge, but the Democrats’ great concern about children – particularly immigrant children – seems to have pretty much evaporated at the moment. After all, these children are probably the offspring of legal immigrants.
I make no predictions about what will happen in the Newsom recall, except to say that the Democrats will do everything they can – including a sufficient amount of vote fraud, if possible – to keep him in office.
Open thread 9/4/21
This Moiseyev number in rehearsal starts slow, but it certainly picks up speed. The attention to detail and style is phenomenal – in particular the ever-changing lean of the head and upper body, and the interplay between the men and women. Even when the men and women are doing the same steps, they do them so differently: the women with sedate yet subtly flirtatious charm, and the men with a bit of swagger.
Enjoy.
Biden’s six Afghanistan Big Lies
Those are not his only lies about Afghanistan, either. But they’re certainly important ones. Biden really is one of those people who is used to lying, has lied his entire life, has almost never been called on it or suffered bad consequences for it (except for the plagiarism charges that knocked him out of the 1988 presidential race), and knows he will almost certainly be protected by his party and the MSM for every single lie he tells.
Although Biden has some cognitive challenges, he’s not so far gone that he has forgotten how to lie. It is that basic to him. I also noticed that, in the transcript of his call with Ghani that was leaked to Reuters, he sounded relatively in command of his mental faculties and just as duplicitous as ever.
One oft-repeated statement – not by Biden, but by members of the press and by a lot of other people too – is that we were defeated in Afghanistan. No, we were not. While it’s true that we failed to obliterate the Taliban, that was because we only wage limited wars these days and because this was an asymmetrical and ideological war as well. But when Biden announced his pullout “plan” (in mid-April of 2021), the country of Afghanistan was not being ruled by the Taliban, and there had been no large-scale Islamic terrorist attacks in the US since 9/11.
Biden and the Democrats chose to surrender, and they chose to surrender in this manner. Their hand was not forced. They removed all conditions from the agreement, set a hard time limit no matter what, and stuck to it. And they certainly were not required to withdraw in the worst possible way, although they managed to accomplish that dubious feat. They thought they would get away politically with the surrender because the American people had tired of Afghanistan, and they knew the MSM would ultimately back their decision up (even if there was a bit of a kerfluffle for a while).
And maybe they will get away with it politically. Maybe they won’t. But this was an unforced surrender.