Biden's Afghanistan Speech

Submitted by Linda Wood on Tue, 08/17/2021 - 11:09pm

I read the text of Biden's speech today, not having the courage to watch it yesterday, perhaps because I was afraid of him being too weak, perhaps because I was afraid his critics would be too awful.

But I hope we all have a chance to read it at least once. I think it's a very good speech. Here's just one interesting part:

Full text of Joe Biden’s speech on withdrawal from Afghanistan

https://news.yahoo.com/full-text-joe-biden-speech-220226032.html

August 16, 2021

... So I’m left again to ask of those who argue that we should stay, how many more generations of America’s daughters and sons would you have me send to fight Afghanistan’s civil war when Afghan troops will not? How many more lives, American lives, is it worth? How many endless rows of headstones in Arlington National Cemetery?

I’m clear on my answer. I will not repeat the mistakes we’ve made in the past. The mistake of staying and fighting indefinitely in a conflict that is not in the national interest of the United States. Of doubling down on a civil war in a foreign country, of attempting to remake a country through the endless military deployments of US forces. Those are the mistakes we can not continue to repeat because we have significant vital interest in the world that we cannot afford to ignore...

Tags:

Biden

Afghanistan withdrawal

afghanistan

Vote

Comments

Submitted by CB on Tue, 08/17/2021 - 11:34pm

Was Biden using a teleprompter?

Submitted by on the cusp on Wed, 08/18/2021 - 12:05am

He can't read, so who knows.

@CB He doesn't even realize that he is to blame for a 20 year disaster. Goofball voted for the war. Get over it, Prez.
Seems a 20 year war makes us forget a war is ensuing over time. We are a majority against it. But the "look" of the defeat has made anti-war folks pissed that Biden didn't stay in the fray.
Funny how a person can be anti_war until one is lost by their country.

—

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981

Submitted by humphrey on Wed, 08/18/2021 - 12:17am

Oh he can read and the teleprompter is his best friend.

@on the cusp The problem is that I have my doubts whether he can comprehend what he is reading.

Submitted by tle on Thu, 08/19/2021 - 8:28pm

Yes, he voted for it, but he wasn't alone.

@on the cusp Remember who else voted for it - EVERYBODY! (except Barbara Lee, whose common-sense but also heroic vote got her labeled "traitor").

Submitted by Cant Stop the M... on Thu, 08/19/2021 - 9:01pm

Paul Wellstone.

@tle

Who, I believe, died because he voted against the Iraq War in an election year for him---and his numbers in Minnesota went up, not down. Uh-oh, oligarchs! Can't have that.

Just my belief, which is not supported by proof.

—

"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

Submitted by ggersh on Wed, 08/18/2021 - 11:18am

Looked that way

@CB https://www.reddit.com/r/WayOfTheBern/comments/p686y6/im_impressed_that_...

—

I never knew that the term "Never Again" only pertained to
those born Jewish

"Antisemite used to be someone who didn't like Jews
now it's someone who Jews don't like"

Heard from Margaret Kimberley

Submitted by CB on Wed, 08/18/2021 - 11:27am

Thanks. I figured there was something odd

@ggersh
about the way he was speaking. I wonder how long the MSM will run with this charade. The truth is the country is being run by a cabal of unknown and unelected powerful people. The fact that the MSM is covering up I am putting my money that Obama and Hillary are pulling the levers behind the curtain.

Submitted by Cant Stop the M... on Thu, 08/19/2021 - 9:09pm

Obama is pretty smart, so he might have gotten some

@CB

actual leverage, but I bet it's limited.

Most of the people who actually own and run the country reside mostly in the private sector or in the security side of the public sector (CIA, NSA, etc.) It's only on rare occasions that they enter politics (think George H.W. Bush, who was the head of the CIA long before he was Reagan's VP or President in his own right, or Cheney, who I believe was (is?) part of the Carlyle Group and certainly was CEO of Haliburton before he became VP). Those guys brought their power with them to public office; they didn't get the power from the public office. Most politicians either bring power with them from somewhere else, or else they don't have much. They're more like actors reading bad scripts--scripts that are written by someone else. Not sure how long it's been since the politicians really ran the show, though it hasn't been that long since the legislators held at least some power (think the first three or four years of this century).

—

"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

Submitted by CB on Wed, 08/18/2021 - 12:57am

Taliban Afghanistan Speech

Afghanistan - Taliban Press Conference Notes

Q Aljazeerah:
About women.

Talib:
Women key part of society. Will work with them. Within framework of Islam.

Q:
Security of contractors, translators who worked for U.S., others etc.?

Talib:
We assure that all have been pardoned. No revenge. We don't want them to leave. We need their talents. Nobody will be interrogated or will have their houses searched.
All soldiers who have been fighting against us are pardoned.

Q Tolonews:
Pardoning?

Talib:
Everyone is pardoned. Harm was done by Talib due to the war. Assures that such will no longer happen.

Q:
About riots, thieves reports?

Talib:
We had to intervene in Kabul to stop that. Will disarm such people. Will bring back services.
...
Q:
International relations?

Talib:
Want to have good relations with all.

END

Submitted by CB on Wed, 08/18/2021 - 3:21am

Kabulov's (Russia) Afghanistan Speech

[translated]

https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/6989731.html

"Special Representative of the President of Russia for Afghanistan, Director of the Second Department of Asia of the Russian Foreign Ministry Z.N. Kabulov on the situation in Afghanistan in an interview with the Russian media. Main theses:

Now it is safe there [in Kabul]. Any security is a conditional concept, but now it is safe there. Let's start with the fact that yesterday the representative of the Taliban leadership changed the security of the Russian embassy, took over, provided security. Tomorrow, our ambassador will meet with their plenipotentiary representative and discuss further modalities, as we say, of the functioning of our diplomatic mission.

If we compare the negotiability of colleagues and partners, the Taliban have long seemed to me much more negotiable than the puppet Kabul government. We proceed from the premise that the agreements must be implemented. So far, with regard to the security of our embassy and the security of our allies in Central Asia, the Taliban have respected the agreements.

I think the authors of the inventions that the transfer of power in Afghanistan to the Taliban movement was the result of certain agreements with the United States, are trying to somehow justify the failure of the Americans in Afghanistan and file a case that this is a planned action. I think that's completely unreasonable. And it happened as it happened.

The Americans were sent five thousand infantrymen to evacuate a certain number of their employees. They were apparently forced to stop temporarily arriving and landing civilian flights. This created chaos and, by and large, a mess, so it has nothing to do with the situation inside Kabul. Not only is there no unrest in Afghanistan's capital, but no other city captured by the Taliban.

First, all members of the Security Council must make sure that the new government is ready to behave conditionally, as we say, in a civilized manner. That's when this point of view becomes common to all, then the procedure [of removing the Taliban from the list of terrorist organizations] will begin. Only first the resolution of the Security Council, which will take such a decision, and then the technical point.

It is not for nothing that we have established contacts with the Taliban movement over the past 7 years, discussed many points. And we've seen that yes, this force will eventually, if not fully come to power, at least play a leading role in the future in Afghanistan. These are all factors, taken together plus, of course, the guarantees given to us by the top leadership of the Taliban gave us reason to treat the development of events calmly, but remaining vigilant.

Our ambassador is in contact with representatives of the Taliban leadership. Tomorrow he will meet with a coordinator from the Taliban leadership for security, including our embassy. He will discuss with him all the details of how they will ensure the external safety and security of our diplomatic mission.

We have long established ties, contacts with the Taliban movement. The fact that we have prepared the ground for a conversation with the new government in Afghanistan in advance is an asset of Russian foreign policy, which we use to the fullest in the long-term interests of the Russian Federation.

Russia is not guided by the opinion of the EU countries, developing its position on the situation in Afghanistan. A special feature [of the EU countries] is to make foreign policy mistakes. They have already committed one, for which the Afghan people are paying. Therefore, they are not a decree or an example to us.

We do not see a direct threat to our allies in Central Asia. There is not a single fact to the contrary.

Submitted by Battle of Blair... on Wed, 08/18/2021 - 9:36am

Victory for the warmongers.

I wonder if the "defending our freedom" enablers think we are going to lose our freedom now that the "defenders of freedom" lost?

Submitted by Dr. John Carpenter on Wed, 08/18/2021 - 9:42am

Excellent analysis here:

https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2021/08/michael-hudson-biden-forfeits-hi...

—

Idolizing a politician is like believing the stripper really likes you.

Submitted by fire with fire on Wed, 08/18/2021 - 10:07am

It was an excellent speech compared to . . .

Top level politicians of course do not write their own speeches and they all read from a teleprompter. In this case the Biden Team had exactly two choices in the face of the media frenzy over this past weekend:

1. Give in to the media pressure and re-invade and re-occupy Afghanistan.

2. Stick to the withdrawal narrative -- it is past the time for the Afghans to sort things out on their own.

No matter how charitable or harsh one is about Sleepy Joe, this political decision made itself. To recapture all those "provincial capitals" would require tens of thousands of pairs of boots on the ground. That would cost blood and money that I suspect is already earmarked for other wars. Whether my paranoia is accurate (or course it really is), the spectacle of the US reversing course yet again would stretch credibility beyond any conceivable repair.

This is not to denigrate the simple wisdom of Joe's speech. To try to control events in Afghanistan was from the strart, is now, and forever will be a fool's errand. Just ask Alexander the Great.

—

I cried when I wrote this song. Sue me if I play too long.

Submitted by CB on Wed, 08/18/2021 - 11:18am

Scott Horton was plugging his new book

@fire with fire
"Fool's Errand: Time to End the War in Afghanistan" to a conservative audience. It is an excellent talk on how we got to where we are - each administration compounding the errors of the previous. It covers the war from inception under the Carter Administration to the first part of of Biden's in 2021.

When he spoke of the Republican Administrations he tongue-in-cheek named it after the Democrat who lost in that election. The purpose of which was to "not offend the audience" by keeping the blame on the Democrats.

eg Bob Dole instead of Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter instead of Ronald Reagan, Walter Mondale instead of Ronald Reagan, Michael Dukakis instead of George H. W. Bush, Al Gore instead of George W. Bush, John Kerry instead of George W. Bush and Hillary Clinton instead of Donald Trump. This brought home the fact that the Afghanistan War was an equal opportunity effort - BOTH parties were in up to their snouts.

This one of the most concise historical description of that war I've witnessed.
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kOYjJBRYvlI]

Submitted by fire with fire on Wed, 08/18/2021 - 1:36pm

I rarely have the patience for videos of speeches

@CB .
.

This was a superb presentation and I could not turn it off. It tells the story hidden in plain sight of America's end game. The bureaucracy runs itself and the political parties are the two hands of the same puppeteer. Our Empire is living on the credit card and it will soon be dead as the result.

I love his gag about the Mondale, Gore and Hillary Administrations. Perfect way to make the point without having to argue about the painfully obvious.

—

I cried when I wrote this song. Sue me if I play too long.

Submitted by Linda Wood on Wed, 08/18/2021 - 12:40pm

You've said this so well,

@fire with fire .

Much better than I could. I've always liked Biden because if his gaffes. Biden's Gaffes, criticized by the mainstream media as "saying dumb stuff," were not dumb. The most important one, in 2014, told us the Saudi government was arming Al Qaeda and the Islamic state in Syria and that we were allied with them.

So I see him as blurting out the truth when he can't stomach the crap he has to feed us. I've seen this since the Anita Hill hearings. But that doesn't mean he's not part of the problem.

And so, yes, as others may point out, he didn't read the Afghanistan Papers describing our rapacious corruption. He didn't name the MIC heavy hitters. He didn't point out the U.S trucking contractors arming the Taliban for 20 years. He blamed the Afghan army, but he did so in making it logical that they would choose the Taliban over us. I thought that was a clear refutation of our phony so-called good intentions.

And I am most impressed with his description of his meeting with Putin last month, riddled as it was with horseshit. He made the key joint statement that nuclear war is not winnable and described Putin as logical and clear in pursuit if his country's interests. Putin said pretty much the same thing about Biden. For me, these were big things.

Also, Biden lost one son, probably as a result of his exposure to toxins in his military service, and he has another son whose life is in ruins because of drug addiction. We all understand now that Biden is president because of those laptop videos. We get it, that that's how you become president, by being vulnerable to, and thereby controlled by, the deep state.

But Biden let those videos do their worst this week, and he gave his speech anyway. I think that took enormous courage. The deep state didn't underestimate the Taliban. They've been arming them all along. They underestimated how much a man who has lost two sons to war and drugs could hate warmongers and drugrunners.

Submitted by Raggedy Ann on Wed, 08/18/2021 - 10:38am

This is all well and good, but

the dimwits just increased the MIC budget. What's up with that? Pulling troops from one place to send them somewhere else? It's a racket.

—

"The “jumpers” reminded us that one day we will all face only one choice and that is how we will die, not how we will live." Chris Hedges on 9/11

Submitted by Pluto's Republic on Wed, 08/18/2021 - 7:41pm

Great speech. Tells us everything

...we need to know about our dying Empire, thrashing about on the world stage.

First it's the good news to disarm the critics on the Left; then it's the bad news to titillate the American people with promises of extreme violence.

[ I will not repeat the mistake] of doubling down on a civil war in a foreign country, of attempting to remake a country through the endless military deployments of US forces.

Those are the mistakes we can not continue to repeat because we have significant vital interest in the world that we cannot afford to ignore...

BINGO! The US war on China. He knows the American mob has been primed and propagandized for this new war. They are brimming over with hatred for the Chinese and the righteousness of US murder and mayhem.

The US is starting to smell like a German train station.

Thanks for posting it, Linda. I didn't want to see it, either — mostly because I cannot stop seeing what is really happening. I am doomed to channel the Neocons, who control the Federal Government in service to the Ruling Families.

Psychopaths, all.

—

IMAGINE if you woke up the day after a US Presidential Election and headlines around the the world blared, "The Majority of Americans Refused to Vote in US Presidential Election! What Does this Mean?"

Submitted by Linda Wood on Wed, 08/18/2021 - 8:16pm

Thanks for responding,

@Pluto's Republic

and for highlighting and expanding on the statement, which I too saw as him saying, we have bigger fish to fry.

But whether he meant it or not, I think his words about wasting young lives, about endless rows of headstones in Arlington National Cemetery, those words outweigh whatever glory the CIA is selling in the prospect of endless war with China.

If this mess proves anything, it proves our MIC doesn't want to win wars unless by nuclear war and the annihilation of all life on earth. And I don't think the American people want either, not endless stalemate, and not the death of our planet.

I think Biden is successfully showing us our MIC is that corrupt and treasonous, whether he knows it or not. I think he does know it.

Submitted by Pluto's Republic on Wed, 08/18/2021 - 9:29pm

I'm open to your point of view.

@Linda Wood

And he did use rhetoric that I approve in discussing it.
I am happy to dwell in such a comfortable place.

However, I would do so knowing it was my preference for a manufactured reality. I would love to view the world (not too closely) with a hopeful, non-threatened frame of mind — perhaps in a community that ignored politics and its harsh realties. I would certainly like to try. Better things would fill my time.

But if media was allowed to intrude, and I sensed delusions that Joe had the ability to reason — that would be a spoiler for me. If people had fantasies that Joe was stepping out of the cesspool of corruption where he has dwelled for his entire career, in order to expose the murderous depravity of the government — which he helped orchestrate — I just couldn't maintain.

The psychopaths would have won.

Maybe they have.

—

IMAGINE if you woke up the day after a US Presidential Election and headlines around the the world blared, "The Majority of Americans Refused to Vote in US Presidential Election! What Does this Mean?"

Submitted by Nastarana on Wed, 08/18/2021 - 8:16pm

I guess someone forgot

to tell the new Afghan government that nation states are obselete

—

Mary Bennett

Submitted by Fishtroller 02 on Thu, 08/19/2021 - 12:09pm

The question never was SHOULD we get out of

Afghanistan, but HOW we do it. Biden screwed that part up just about completely.

Plus, he's a liar through and through, but that's for another day.

—

"Without the right to offend, freedom of speech does not exist." Taslima Nasrin