This is something I’d never heard about before:
I’m tempted to give up discussing what Blinken says on Afghanistan or anything else
What’s the point, when nothing the man says can be trusted? Of course, I shouldn’t single out Blinken. It’s that way for the entire administration.
And yet I feel duty-bound to mention this story. Note the way Blinken phrases his words:
“We are not aware of anyone being held on an aircraft or any hostage life situation in Mazar-i-Sharif,” Blinken said during a joint news conference with Qatar’s top diplomats and defense officials in Doha.
Blinken did, however, reveal that the U.S. has identified a “relatively small number” of Americans who are trying to depart from the airport. He also said the administration has been “assured” by the Taliban that American and Afghan citizens with valid travel documents will be allowed to exit.
So, we are not aware. Even if that were true, that doesn’t mean something isn’t happening just because we are “not aware” of it.
And of what are we “not aware”? No one is on an aircraft, as far as “we” know. How reassuring. Where are they, then? In the airport? At home, waiting, having been to the airport and not allowed to depart the country? Also, he is also only speaking of Mazar-i-Sharif.
Another thing of which we’re not aware: whether anyone is being held in a hostage life situation. In other words, at the moment we know of no Americans who have a gun held to their heads with a threat to blow them away?
And what is that “relatively small number”? Is the State Department capable of counting? They’ve given little indication of being able to do so, but if they can, then what is this number? And “relative” to what?
One thing of which Blinken may be aware – but we the public are not – is what promises the Biden administration is making to the Taliban in exchange for letting people out.
As for assurances from our new good buddies the Taliban, that is both ludicrous and insulting to any listeners Blinken thinks he’s addressing here. But actually, I don’t think anyone believes him. The left is just happy to have its talking points, and the right long ago justifiably lost trust in these self-serving habitual liars.
As has the rest of the world.
Here’s another statement by Blinken:
And again, we intend to hold the Taliban to that,” he added.
How do you propose to do that, when you’ve given away your leverage, and have shown your extreme propensity to go belly up?
And now something from the past. Blinken has been with Biden for a long time and has worked on previous policies formulated by Biden:
Blinken worked to help Biden formulate one of his most idiotic foreign policy proposals, the partitioning of Iraq into three separate regions along ethnic lines — “Sunnistan”, “Shiastan”, and “Iraqi Kurdistan.” Other than the fact that it was rejected by the US military, the Shiites, Sunnis, Kurds, and Turkey, it was a fabulous idea.
The ultimate indictment of Blinken as unsuited to serve as Secretary of State comes from the fact that while the 2008 Democrat Presidential Primaries involved Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, John Edwards, Bill Richardson, Chris Dodd, and Tom Vilsack, among others, Blinken chose to work in the “Biden for President” campaign. Apparently, he never recognized in his years of working for Joe Biden that Biden was a moron.
When Obama and Biden were elected, Blinken became National Security Advisor to the Vice President. He served Biden in that capacity for four years.
In 2014, Obama nominated Blinken for Deputy Secretary of State, and John McCain spoke out against that. Now, McCain said a lot of things and did a lot of things with which I take issue. But he certainly seems to have been prescient about Antony Blinken. Please listen to this short excerpt from a speech McCain made back then, and pay particular attention to what he predicts about Blinken and Afghanistan (at :55 to 1:17):
From 2014, Sen. John McCain floor speech opposing nomination of Tony Blinken.
"We will see the same movie in Afghanistan that we saw in Iraq if we have a date-driven withdrawal rather than a status-driven, conditions-driven situation."
Full video here: https://t.co/QmmprWIli0 pic.twitter.com/DxgRcCJjc0
— Jeremy Art (@cspanJeremy) August 16, 2021
It’s not really the same movie that we’ve seen in Afghanistan as we saw in Iraq, though. It’s a much worse one.
Documents implicate Fauci further in gain-of-function research
Is anyone surprised at this?
The Intercept has obtained more than 900 pages of documents detailing the work of EcoHealth Alliance, a U.S.-based health organization that used federal money to fund bat coronavirus research at the Chinese laboratory. The trove of documents includes two previously unpublished grant proposals that were funded by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, as well as project updates relating to EcoHealth Alliance’s research, which has been scrutinized amid increased interest in the origins of the pandemic…
One of the grants, titled “Understanding the Risk of Bat Coronavirus Emergence,” outlines an ambitious effort led by EcoHealth Alliance President Peter Daszak to screen thousands of bat samples for novel coronaviruses. The research also involved screening people who work with live animals. The documents contain several critical details about the research in Wuhan, including the fact that key experimental work with humanized mice was conducted at a biosafety level 3 lab at Wuhan University Center for Animal Experiment — and not at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, as was previously assumed. The documents raise additional questions about the theory that the pandemic may have begun in a lab accident, an idea that Daszak has aggressively dismissed….
The bat coronavirus grant provided EcoHealth Alliance with a total of $3.1 million, including $599,000 that the Wuhan Institute of Virology used in part to identify and alter bat coronaviruses likely to infect humans. Even before the pandemic, many scientists were concerned about the potential dangers associated with such experiments…
According to Richard Ebright, a molecular biologist at Rutgers University, the documents contain critical information about the research done in Wuhan, including about the creation of novel viruses. “The viruses they constructed were tested for their ability to infect mice that were engineered to display human type receptors on their cell,” Ebright wrote to The Intercept after reviewing the documents. Ebright also said the documents make it clear that two different types of novel coronaviruses were able to infect humanized mice.
Not only does the research seem inherently dangerous, but in any sort of cost-benefit analysis, why would the US have considered it worth the risk?
I have already asked the DOJ to review Fauci’s testimony for lying to Congress. This report should make it abundantly clear that he needs to be held accountable.
https://t.co/PfuketQaWc— Senator Rand Paul (@RandPaul) September 7, 2021
Jean Paul Belmondo dies at 88
The French actor Jean-Paul Belmondo has died at 88.
Quite a few of the tributes to Belmondo call him “handsome.” That surprises me, because I never thought him handsome. He was something else – unique and compelling and magnetic. I didn’t see many films of his, and yet I knew his name, because for a while he was that famous. I did see “Breathless,” the film that had made him a star, but to me it wasn’t all that great.
The movie of his that I did see, and which I loved (and loved him in it), was one in which he had a much more atypical role: he played the sensitive young eye-glassed man who falls in love with Sophia Loren in “Two Women.” That film made a huge impression when I saw it in 1960 – in a movie theater, at an age I consider way too young to have seen it. I think I was taken by an aunt, but at any rate I went, and was terrified by the film while at the same time I thought it was a masterpiece.
I can’t find a video segment online from “Two Women” that highlights Belmondo, despite there being quite a few video compilations of his greatest roles. But I guess everyone has either forgotten that one or considered it dismissable; it’s certainly atypical for him. But this short trailer for the film does show a bit of him here and there:
I see now that Belmondo said this of his role in that film:
It may disappoint those who’ve got me typed,” said Belmondo. “But so much the better.
Well, it sure didn’t disappoint me. But then, I had no prior idea of who he was and I had no expectations.
Why was Belmondo playing an Italian in that movie? Well, he was actually half Italian, with an Italian father born in Algeria. And Belmondo came by his busted nose in the old-fashioned way, as an amateur boxer before he became an actor.
Here’s a video about Belmondo’s other films. It helps if you speak or understand French. I don’t:
RIP.
Open thread 9/7/21
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.