Missed the Point

President Joe Biden (D) took a break, Monday, from his vacation (which he decided to go on during his Afghanistan failure) to come to the White House and deliver a 20-minute talk about why he’d taken us out of Afghanistan so precipitously. Then he returned to his vacation.

Just the News thinks he messed up with his speech.

Forced to confront bipartisan anger over the bungled US exit from Afghanistan, President Joe Biden instead gave a speech on why drawing down US troops after two decades [of] war was in the American interest.
In so doing, he missed the point.

It’s true enough, as JtN goes on to say, that most Americans wanted us out of Afghanistan, and it’s true enough, as JtN adds, that what we didn’t want was the utter failure of Biden’s withdrawal execution.

But JtN missed the point of Biden’s little talk.

Biden didn’t interrupt his vacation to justify his withdrawal or his method of withdrawal. On the contrary, Biden disrupted his vacation to make a Saul Alinsky-esque effort to change the subject from his bungled withdrawal to the subject of it being everyone else’s fault we still were there, and it being the Afghans’ fault their government didn’t perform up to snuff.

That Biden botched even that simple task is just a measure of the man’s own, continuingd, failure to perform up to snuff.

America Last Again

In the collapse of the US presence in Afghanistan and the collapse of the Afghan “army” and so of that pseudo-nation, there is a wholly justified effort to help Afghan refugees escape from the coming destruction and slaughter.

However.

This is what our President Biden/Harris and their Defense Secretary, Lloyd Austin are doing about that:

[Department of Defense Press Secretary Admiral (Ret) John] Kirby says American citizens will not be given priority evacuation over Afghan SIV [Special Immigrant Visa] applicants.

In Biden/Harris’ and Austin’s own words, recited by Kirby:

We’re going to focus on getting people out of the country, then sorting it out at the next stop. It’s not going to be just Americans first, then SIV applicants. We’re going to focus on getting as many folks out as we can.

It’s not going to be just Americans first.

Wow.

Not even in this administration’s present failure are these folks putting Americans anywhere but the back of the metaphorical bus.

Oblivious

President Joe Biden’s (D) Secretary of State Antony Blinken, just a few days ago in the depths of the Afghan collapse:

We’ve known all along: the Taliban are at their strongest since 2001.

Yet Biden chose to withdraw, completely and relatively suddenly, it turns out, at the height of the Afghan fighting season. When he, Blinken says, knew the Taliban were at their strongest. He chose not to wait until winter. He chose not to carry out former President Donald Trump’s withdrawal plan, even as he claimed he was trapped by it, both in his Saturday “statement” and Monday afternoon when he finally showed up for work—briefly; he hustled off the stage rather than take questions—to make his excuses for his everyone else’s failure in Afghanistan.

That speech came after he and Vice President Kamala Harris (D) both were absent from duty until after Kabul had fallen, together with our embassy; the Kabul airport was blocked from incoming/outgoing flights; and he’d surrendered Bagram Air Base north of the fallen capital.

This is a level of dereliction of duty that is amoral and seriously dangerous to our national security, to our nation itself.

“I’m no different than any other family”

That’s what New Jersey Phil Murphy (D) says about his decision to hare off to Italy on a 10-day vacation at his—his!—23-room villa.

“After this past 17 months, just having a few days together is something that I think all of us want to do with our family, and I’m looking forward to that.”
The governor planned to leave last Tuesday for a visit to his 23-room multimillion-dollar villa in Umbria and return to New Jersey next Thursday[.]

My objection to Murphy’s move, which he’s in the middle of, has nothing to do with his being wealthy enough to own a vast villa in an overseas tourist mecca; I aspire to become stinking rich, too. Nor do I object to Murphy taking some vacation time.

No, my objection is to Murphy’s utter cynicism. He’s not looking to hav[e] a few days together with his family; he’s been doing that right along. So have we all, especially those of us in States like New Jersey where, through government-ordered lockdowns, we’ve been on-again, off-again prisoners in our homes. Murphy is looking to escape his duties.

He’s not looking to have a vacation, either; he’s looking to escape from his State—from our nation—during a period of crisis for his State. He’s looking to duck his responsibilities.

Murphy is Governor of New Jersey. His duties don’t go on vacation; they go with him wherever he goes. Except to Italy, where even were he aware of events back in New Jersey (he likely will be), he’ll in no position to deal with them in anything remotely like a timely manner.

Even President Joe Biden (D) hasn’t left our nation for his vacation—he’s just taking a few days of isolation from his duties in Delaware.

How obliviously out of touch with the average Americans in his State and around our nation is this Progressive-Democrat.

Or, how cynically unconcerned is this Progressive-Democrat with the ordinary American family, comparing himself only with his fellow rich.

“What’s the Goal Here?”

That’s the question New York Assemblywoman Latrice Walker (D, 55th District) is asking on the matter of impeaching and bringing to State Senate trial soon-to-be ex-Governor Andrew Cuomo (D). He’s already resigned, she says. If the goal here was to move this particular governor out of office…, she says.

Other State Democrats are pressing for impeachment and conviction even after Cuomo’s resignation has taken effect.

Latrice misunderstands the situation, and those pushing for impeachment and conviction anyway, are clearer on the matter.

Cuomo resigned of the sex abuse allegations that have come to the fore, and that’s all he’s resigning over.

What about his other misbehaviors and abuses of his authority?

What about all the deaths that resulted from his demand that Wuhan Virus-infected elderly patients be put back into nursing homes to infect—and kill—thousands of other elderly?

What about his abuses of his authority regarding the Mario Cuomo Bridge?

What about his misuse of State government facilities and resources to write and peddle a book?

What about his abuse of his authority to give preferential virus testing treatment for family members and favored cronies during a time of limited testing resources?

What about his disbanding of the Moreland Commission when it began investigating his cronies?

What about his relationship with a crony convicted of bid-rigging for State government contracts?

What about the relationship between Crystal Run Healthcare’s donation of $400k in campaign donations to Cuomo’s 2016 campaign and Crystal Run’s subsequent award of a $25 million in State grants?

These, and especially the victims and victims’ survivors of Cuomo’s nursing home moves, badly want adjudication and justice. They, each of them individually and all of them together, badly need impeachment and a State Senate trial.

And: on conviction, the State’s legislature then would have the authority to bar Cuomo from State office for the rest of his life.