Cut to the News
Cut through the clutter to today's top news
August 19, 2021
Good morning
Welcome to today's top news.
Leading the News . . .
It’s Time to Purge the ‘Experts’ . . . The United States’ military mission in Afghanistan has collapsed in chaos and ignominy. The catastrophe has many parents. “The experts” upon which our leader relied bear much blame. They were the ones who often failed to comprehend the power of religious belief and the role pride in Islam played in the Taliban’s unyielding commitment to victory. They were the ones who thought we could remake
Afghanistan into a western liberal image. They were the ones who failed to comprehend the intractable tribal nature of Afghan society. To say the least, Afghanistan has vividly exposed the utter stupidity of our vaunted foreign policy and national security experts.
State Department spokesman reiterated an unintentionally hilarious United Nations Security Council statement urging the Taliban government to be “inclusive and representative—including with the full, equal and meaningful participation of women.” I’m sure the barbarians will get right to including women as soon as they are finished raping them. The hubris of these whizzes might be tolerable if they were adept at technocracy. But they stink at it. Indeed, every American debacle in
my lifetime has “the experts’” fingerprints all over it. There was the Bay of Pigs fiasco. Vietnam. The farce of the missing Iraq WMDs. The list goes on and on.
Too many of our current “experts”—in foreign policy, law enforcement, science, education, the medical intelligentsia, the list goes on and on— now think they should be deciders rather than advisers. These faux specialists now perched in powerful government and think tank sinecures must turn in their resignations or be fired. The time has come for that great sorting out to begin. Opinion. Epoch Times
Poll: Most Voters Say Biden Is a Weak Leader . . . A majority of American voters believe President Joe Biden is a weak leader, according to a poll conducted this week amid the collapse of the Afghan government to the Taliban. Fifty-three percent of registered voters who responded to the Economist/YouGov poll said Biden is weak, with 47 percent calling him strong. Thirty-nine percent said they believe Biden is a "very weak" leader.
The poll queried 1,500 U.S. citizens from Aug. 14-17 and had a 3 percent margin of error. Washington Free Beacon
Bannon says Trump should become speaker, lead Biden impeachment, resign, and run for president in 2024 . . . The former White House chief strategist discussed the unprecedented scenario during an episode of his War Room show on Wednesday while criticizing Biden's handling of the Afghanistan withdrawal. After saying "people should be court-martialed" over U.S. forces abandoning Bagram Airfield , which some have opined could have been used
to help with evacuations following the Taliban's rapid takeover of the country, Bannon said this issue could be "one of the big charges eventually brought" against Biden. ". . . Donald Trump should be elected the speaker of the House after [Republicans] have the sweeping victory in November '22, at least for 100 days, take the gavel from [House Speaker] Nancy Pelosi, gavel him in, start the impeachment process. In 100 days, punch out and go run for president of the United States in
2024." Washington Examiner
Trump compares Afghanistan to Dunkirk . . . A lot of stranded people, to be sure. Only, Kabul seems a little more complicated than the beach. “This could be—Afghanistan—another Dunkirk situation!” Donald Trump said Wednesday in a statement. Certainly not Joe Biden’s “finest hour.” Trump added in a separate state that the Sept. 11 celebration belongs to our enemies and “we already have the Taliban flag flying over our Obama-Biden
built $1 Billion U.S. Embassy in Kabul.” White House Dossier
House hearing on Afghan chaos to start early next week, Pelosi says . . . The House Foreign Affairs Committee’s hearing on the disaster in Afghanistan will begin early next week with testimony from “the highest level” administration officials, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said. “That is Congress’s role, the role of oversight, and that will take place early next week — at least it will begin then,” the California Democrat told KPIX in San
Francisco late Tuesday. Committee Chairman Gregory W. Meeks, New York Democrat, has asked Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin to testify about the chaotic Afghanistan withdrawal “as soon as possible.” Senate Democrats also plan to hold hearings on the fall of Kabul to the Taliban, and the hasty evacuation of Americans and allies from the airport. The collapse is the biggest foreign policy crisis in President Biden’s seven-month tenure. It has
seriously undermined his claim, long challenged by his critics, to be a foreign policy expert. Washington Times
Biden fleeing White House press corps since fall of Afghanistan . . . It’s not a good look, what’s happening over there. And the sight over here of the president fleeing the press in the East Room is not very reassuring either. He did do a sit down with former Clinton administration official George Stephanopoulos, though. White House Dossier
There Are Already Tell-Tale Signs Democrats Could Get Wrecked In Midterms . . . Midterm elections have long been known to favor the party out of power in U.S. politics, but early indicators are showing that the 2022 elections could be especially disastrous for Democrats. Daily
Caller
First polls show mixed picture on Rubio-Demings race . . . A pair of polls out of Florida paint a mixed picture of the state’s closely watched Senate race, suggesting an unpredictable contest in one of the nation’s most unpredictable battlegrounds.
One survey conducted by St. Pete Polls for the website Florida Politics shows Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and his main Democratic opponent, Rep. Val Demings, neck-and-neck. Rubio leads Demings by a scant 2 percentage points, 48 percent to 46 percent. That’s still within the poll’s 2.2-point margin of error.
Another poll commissioned by the gaming company BUSR and fielded by Susquehanna Polling and Research shows Rubio leading in the race against Demings 50 percent to 39 percent, giving him an 11-point lead that sits well outside of the survey’s 3.7 percentage point margin of error. The Hill
Republican Flips State Senate Seat Where Biden Won By 25% . . . A Republican candidate for state senate in Connecticut flipped a seat where then-candidate Joe Biden won by just over 25% during the 2020 presidential election. Ryan Fazio, a member of Greenwich, Connecticut’s Representative Town Meeting, defeated Alexis Gevanter, a gun control advocate who had never before held public office on Tuesday by less than three percentage points in
the wealthy, suburban 36th State Senate District. Republicans are hailing the victory as a preview of the 2022 congressional midterms. Daily Caller
Crenshaw Debunks the ‘Endless Wars’ Fallacy . . . Dan Crenshaw may be a rising Republican star thanks to his ability to speak with uncommon pointed clarity on the issues of the day. But his latest op-ed on Afghanistan is the fruit of his intellect and his experience: “He was deployed to Afghanistan in 2012 as a member of the U.S. Navy’s SEAL Team 3.” Crenshaw writes: The “no more endless wars” position has a blind spot: Its advocates
are unable to distinguish between wasteful nation building and a small residual force that conducts occasional counter-terror operations. As a result, when many Americans hear that there is a single soldier on the ground in Afghanistan, they interpret it to mean “nation building” and “world police.” That’s wrong. There are a lot of foreign policy options between nation building and giving up. He notes that the U.S. found a pretty good balance in that regard for much of the last 20
years, and it could continue almost indefinitely at minimal cost. The U.S. presence in Afghanistan was meeting the original strategic goal of denying a safe haven for terrorists and preventing another 9/11. The 18 months before withdrawal saw no U.S. combat deaths. Does that really sound like “endless war” in any traditional sense? More important, does it sound better or worse than the current outcome? Patriot Post
|
|
The Taliban’s Swift Victory Was Years in the Making . . . The end came fast, but the militants laid the foundation with years of shadow government, steady recruitment and patience. The first major Afghan city fell on Aug. 9. The last one, Kabul, capitulated just six days later. The offensive that returned the Taliban to power 20 years after they were ousted by a U.S.-led coalition seemed dizzyingly fast. In reality, the
Taliban’s road to victory winds back many years. Throughout the war, the Taliban capitalized on mistakes by the Western coalition and its Afghan partners to recruit fighters. They harnessed popular anger at human-rights abuses, civilian deaths and corruption to turn Afghans against the central government and its foreign backers.
And as the insurgents expanded their territorial control, they set up shadow governments in the provinces that settled local disputes, levied taxes, provided public services and built a broader base for recruitment. By the time the Taliban began their final offensive, morale among security forces and local officials had been so depleted that the insurgents could flip them one by one and capture the country’s major cities, often with no fighting at all. Wall Street Journal
Seems like Taliban is much better at planning and strategizing than General Milley's Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Afghanistan disaster puts intelligence under scrutiny . . . The unfolding disaster in Afghanistan has put a spotlight on the intelligence community’s role in the largest foreign policy crisis of Joe Biden’s presidency. Afghanistan unraveled much more quickly than intelligence suggested, something President Biden himself acknowledged this week. Joint Chiefs of Staff Chair Gen. Mark Milley on Wednesday said officials underestimated the
pace at which Taliban insurgents would overrun the Afghan government, an extraordinary admission likely to put more scrutiny on intelligence assessments. “There was nothing that I or anyone else saw that indicated a collapse of this army and this government in 11 days,” Milley told reporters during a Pentagon briefing. Milley said that intelligence showed “multiple scenarios were possible,” including a rapid Taliban takeover over the course of weeks or months or years. But he made
it clear the 11-day collapse was not something that had been foreseen. The Hill
Biden Admin Was Reportedly Set To Halt Trump-Era Program To Protect, Evacuate Threatened US Citizens As Taliban Rose To Power . . . President Joe Biden’s State Department reportedly moved in June to abolish a crisis response office developed in order to help Americans evacuate dangerous foreign countries, as the Taliban was beginning to capture territory in Afghanistan. An internal memo obtained by the Beacon and reported Wednesday
announced the “discontinuation of the establishment, and termination of, the Contingency and Crisis Response Bureau (CCR).” A State Department spokesman told the Beacon the Biden administration did not abolish any program, as it “was never established in the first place.” The State Department’s Foreign Affairs Manual reportedly listed the CCR as operative as recently as January. Daily Caller
Biden says as many as 15,000 Americans looking to flee Afghanistan . . . As many as 15,000 American citizens may remain inside Afghanistan, struggling to get out, days after the Asian nation fell to control of Taliban terrorists, President Biden said Wednesday. Also looking to flee are tens of thousands of Afghan citizens who fought alongside or aided U.S. troops over the past two decades – and now fear retribution from the terrorist
organization now wielding power in the country. Biden said the U.S. was committed to getting every American out of Afghanistan – even if that meant some U.S. troops would remain in the country beyond his Aug. 31 deadline for their withdrawal after a two-decade-long military operation. Fox News
Witnesses grouse about Garland's handling of Durham inquiry: Report . . . Witnesses are getting antsy with special counsel John Durham 's criminal inquiry into the opening and conduct of the Russia investigation. Last week, nearly seven months into the Biden administration, reports said the federal prosecutor had presented evidence before a grand jury, a sign he is considering more criminal charges beyond the one brought against former
FBI lawyer Kevin Clinesmith, who admitted to altering an email about a Trump campaign aide who was under government surveillance. Adding another layer to the public's understanding of the politically charged review, Attorney General Merrick Garland is pressing for a swift end to Durham's endeavor, which has long been criticized by Democrats and legal observers who claim the inquiry is meant to undercut special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into alleged ties
between the Trump 2016 campaign and Russia. Washington Examiner
Fort Bliss in Texas becomes ground zero for resettling Afghan refugees during chaotic exit . . . Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas, is best known as home to the Army’s tank division, the revered Old Ironsides military insignia and the country’s largest military-controlled airspace. But the Biden administration’s botched exit from Afghanistan is turning the vast installation into ground zero for the evacuation of Afghans who spent two decades
helping the United States fight the war against terror.
Texas Sen. John Cornyn says the fort is preparing to receive 10,000 Afghan refugees, and military officials have hinted that number could reach much higher. It’s the second major wave of civilian guests to be hosted at the fort, which began this spring helping the Homeland Security and Health and Human Services Departments to house thousands of unaccompanied minor children who were brought across the border. Just the News
Scarborough: Democrats face political threat from Biden crises . . . MSNBC sees the threat to Democrats, as crime rages, the border is erased, and Afghanistan falls apart. Host Joe Scarborough is concerned that there will be a growing sense the President Biden and the Democrats cannot govern the country.
“If I were a Republican running, I would say ‘Democrats can’t protect us across the world, Democrats can’t protect our street, Democrats can’t protect us at the border.’ There is — we don’t talk about it enough — there is a massive border crisis on the Southern border right now,” Scarborough said Wednesday. White
House Dossier
|
|
CNN Reporter Says Two Taliban Fighters Tried To ‘Pistol Whip’ Producer Recording Video . . . A CNN reporter in Kabul, Afghanistan, said Taliban fighters attempted to attack her crew after they saw a producer filming the scene with his phone. “Two Taliban fighters just came up with their pistols, and they were ready to pistol whip [the producer],” CNN Chief International Correspondent Clarissa Ward said during an
interview Wednesday. “We had to intervene and scream.” Another Taliban fighter eventually intervened and stopped the attackers, explaining they were journalists, Ward said. She added that it was one of the scariest moments during her time reporting from Kabul. Daily Caller
Video shows child being hoisted over wall amid Kabul airport chaos . . . Harrowing footage from Kabul’s international airport shows desperate Afghans attempting to flee their country by any means necessary — even handing children to US soldiers on the other side of the airport wall in the hope of getting them on evacuation flights. The nonprofit organization Rise to Peace posted a series of video clips of the chaos Tuesday. The footage
shows a mass of humanity outside Hamid Karzai International Airport, some of them waving passports and other identification documents. A video clip shows a woman clad in traditional dress pulls herself up to the top of the wall as well, and one of the soldiers reaches down to pull the girl over the wall. New York
Post
China and Russia poised to step into the Afghanistan gap . . . The Taliban’s takeover in Afghanistan redraws Asia’s geopolitical map and hands China and Russia — two of America’s staunchest strategic rivals — an opportunity to project their power in the wake of Washington’s chaotic withdrawal, analysts in several countries said. “China has benefited from the irresponsible behavior of [the US], which has deeply undermined the international
image of the US and the relationship between Washington and its allies,” said Zhu Yongbiao, a Chinese government adviser on central Asia and professor at Lanzhou University. Arkady Dubnov, a political analyst and central Asia expert in Moscow, had a similar take. “We can align our interests [with China] in opposing the US,” he said. “ What is good for us is bad for Americans, what’s bad for us is good for Americans. Today the situation is bad for Americans and so it is good for
us.”
The Taliban declared victory on Sunday, bringing to an end almost 20 years of a US-led coalition’s presence. The Afghan army, despite years of training and investment by Nato, barely put up any resistance as the insurgents rolled into Kabul. Financial Times
Israeli Prime Minister Bennett to Visit White House . . . Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett will meet with President Biden at the White House on Aug. 26, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said. The two leaders will discuss Iran, among other issues, Ms. Psaki said. “The visit will also be an opportunity for the two leaders to discuss efforts to advance peace, security and prosperity for Israelis and Palestinians and the importance
of working towards a more peaceful and secure future for the region,” Ms. Psaki said. Wall Street Journal
|
|
Angela Marie Wulbrecht jumped at the first chance to get a COVID-19 vaccine. Twelve minutes after her Moderna shot, she stumbled into the paramedic tent with soaring blood pressure and a racing heartbeat. And so began a calvary of severe fatigue, brain fog, imbalance and other symptoms that are still with her eight months later. Wulbrecht, 46, had been a nurse for 23 years before the shot. She was healthy, ate a vegan diet, and was an accomplished salsa dancer. Since
January she’s had to leave her job and missed out on many activities with her husband and 12-year-old daughter. She has spent about $35,000 on out-of-pocket medical bills, despite having insurance. The options are slim for people who suffer rare life-altering injuries after a COVID shot—a problem whose significance has grown as states and the federal government increasingly ponder vaccination mandates. A federal program compensates people experiencing vaccine injuries, but not injuries
from COVID vaccines—not yet, anyway. Epoch Times
|
|
Costco shoppers see toilet paper, water shortage amid Delta variant . . . Customers may be leaving Costco empty-handed amid supply shortages. Toilet paper, paper towels, water and various other groceries are just some household items users are saying are missing from store shelves with shoppers complaining on social media about items that are out-of-stock, reminiscent of days during the early pandemic when shoppers were buying in bulk
before lockdowns. No bottled water on shelves or toilet paper said one shopper of the scarcity "could be a sign of the times." A shortage of food items like canned dog food, chips, oils, frozen chicken nuggets and Costco-brand sauces were also reported to be in short supply at select locations. Fox Business
Watchdogs Sound Alarm as Rep. Ilhan Omar Continues to Evade Financial Disclosure of Reportedly Lucrative Book Deal . . . Multiple watchdog groups said Rep. Ilhan Omar may have violated federal law for failing to mention any income received from her critically-acclaimed 2020 memoir in her latest financial disclosure report filed on Friday. Omar, D-Minn., reportedly signed a deal worth up to $250,000 for her memoir “This Is What America
Looks Like” in January 2019, around the same time she was sworn into Congress. Omar’s communications director said the House Ethics Committee approved the book deal, but the Democratic lawmaker’s financial disclosures covering the calendar years 2018 and 2019 contain no mention of the book or any advance income received upon signing a deal. The book was published in May 2020 to rave reviews by the press and Omar’s Democratic colleagues. Daily Signal
|
|
Who Has the Cure for America’s Declining Population? Canada. . . . To continue America’s upward trajectory in the 21st century, the country must reverse its current demographic decline. As the Census Bureau reported last week, in the past decade, the U.S. population grew at the second slowest rate since the government started counting in 1790 — and the slowest since the 1930s. The most expeditious way out might be if
the federal government gave up its monopoly on immigration and allowed states to bring in workers from anywhere in the world, based on their own labor needs, without being held to federal quotas. The growing concern is that the United States is facing a population bust. The U.S. fertility rate, which had bucked Europe’s low-fertility trend during the last century, is now around 1.73 children per woman — roughly on par with that of Denmark and Britain. New York Times
Total fertility rate of 2.1-2.2% per woman needed to maintain population stable.
Dozens of homes burn as California wildfire siege continues . . . A small wildfire swept through a mobile home park, leaving dozens of homes in ashes, the latest in a series of explosive blazes propelled by gusts that have torn through Northern California mountains and forests.
The drought-parched region was expected to see red flag warnings for dangerously high winds and hot, dry weather through Thursday. Those conditions have fed a dozen uncontrolled wildfires, including the month-old Dixie Fire and the nearby Caldor Fire in the northern Sierra Nevada that incinerated much of the small rural towns of Greenville and Grizzly Flats. No deaths have been reported despite the speed and damage of the blazes. New York Post
Manassas Mosque can import Iranian tiles with Koranic verses, Treasury rules . . . The Manassas Mosque, an Islamic worship center in Northern Virginia, will be able to claim 750 pounds of Iranian ceramic tiles inscribed with Koranic verses, the Treasury Department decided in a letter revealed Tuesday.
The decision means the tiles, made in the Iranian holy city of Qom, won’t have to be destroyed or re-exported, as a previous message to the mosque indicated. “Based upon the request dated July 31, 2021, and supplemental correspondence dated August 8, 2021 to the Office of Foreign Assets Control (the ‘Application’), the transactions described herein are hereby authorized,” Alan W. Christian, deputy assistant director for licensing at OFAC, offered no explanation for the decision,
which was handed down six days after a news conference petitioning for their release took place. Imports from Iran, a nation under strict commercial sanctions, usually are not allowed unless a license has been obtained in advance. In this instance, the license application apparently was made after the shipment arrived at Washington Dulles International Airport in late June. Washington Times
|
|
'Rumors That The Taliban Have Taken Over Are Unfounded,' Says Jen Psaki Wearing Hijab . . . Many are expressing concerns over how far the Taliban has managed to advance after Press Secretary Jen Psaki gave her latest press conference while wearing an Islamic Hijab.
"No, there is nothing to worry about, Alhamdulillah, Allah be praised," said Psaki. "The Taliban poses no danger to the U.S. and they definitely have not advanced as far as Washington, D.C. Everything is fine here." When asked about her new modest religious veil, she responded, "What do you mean? I always wear these! It's sunny out and it keeps the sun off my head. Nothing to worry about!" She then circled back to face Mecca and bowed her head to the ground.
The White House also confirmed that the crowd of military-aged males with AK47s playing soccer on the White House lawn was just a fun little bit of performance art and nothing to be concerned over. In other news, D.C. has confirmed that call to prayer will be at 3pm this afternoon and that everyone needs to be on time. Babylon Bee
|
|
Do you love Cut to the News? Let your family and friends know about it! They'll thank you for it. Spread the word . . .
By Email - use the message that pops up or write your own. On Facebook - On FB, write your own message
Thank you for doing it.
Have a great day.
Rebekah
Rebekah Koffler
Got this from a friend? Subscribe here and get Cut to the News sent to your Inbox every morning.
|
|
|
