Joe Biden Asked How Much Truth the American People Are Prepared to Hear

[mcar]

Joe Biden Asked How Much Truth the American People Are Prepared to Hear
The president gave them an adult portion in a speech on Afghanistan Monday afternoon.

By Charles P. Pierce
Aug 16, 2021

I guess we’re going to learn how much truth the American people can handle, because the president gave them an adult portion on Monday afternoon. It was time for the adventure in Afghanistan to end. It was time for the Afghan government and the Afghan military to defend their country without the United States holding their hands, and neither one was up to the job, nor did it appear as though they ever would be. And that was the basis of his decision, and he stands by it....

For decades, I’ve heard barroom sages wax nostalgic about Harry Truman, and how plainspoken he was, and how we needed that kind of man back in the White House. (It got so thick for a while that Chicago made a record about it, displacing Paul Simon’s Joe DiMaggio as the archetypal American hero.) Well, there it was, in the face of the terrible video from the airport in Kabul, and the carping of superannuated neocon geniuses who got us into this whole mishkadenze in the first place, and the ravings of the Madman of Mar-a-Lago, who cut the deal that set the chaotic endgame in train, and all the rest of the second-guessing world. He made the decision. He stands by it. And if America can’t take that, then America should grow up....

There are open questions about why the administration was caught so flat-footed by the speed with which our erstwhile allies folded. (We were there for 20 years. Somebody should have had an inkling.) But there is no question about why the president made the decision he did. He spoke as plainly about it on Monday as any president has on any event or policy in my lifetime.

https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/a37321709/joe-biden-afghanistan-speech/

[sheshe2]

1. K&R

[flamingdem]

2. The Truth President

My heart goes pitter pat for honest Joe.

HE'S GOT GUTS and tells it like it is.

[brer cat]

3. K&R

[2naSalit]

4. K&R

[niyad]

5. KNR

[crickets]

6. K&R for visibility.

[Demovictory9]

7. kick

[betsuni]

8. K&R

[Wounded Bear]

9. K & R...nt

[HAB911]

10. Kick

[George II]

11. What wasn't expected was how cowardly the Afghan military is, or on the other hand how much....

....they sympathize with the Taliban.

It could be either, or a combination of both, but no one expected them to fold so easily.

[mcar]

13. That's what is so surprising

I'm starting to see, though, that the military may have known and kept it quiet.

[Hekate]

12. KnR!

[DemocraticPatriot]

14. This is what I voted for--

a President who will tell the truth.

[mcar]

15. Exactly

[Caliman73]

16. The answer has been and still is... "Not too much".

We love to say that we want the "TRUTH" and for our politicians to be honest and transparent, but the reality is that we all like the shelter of the warm lie. We like hearing that we are #1, even though no one knows what we are #1 in. American Exceptionalism is such a caustic myth, it has caused so much damage, but we cling to it. I know better and yet I freely admit that I am still drawn to its seductive simplicity.

There is the old saying, "Ignorance is bliss". One of my teachers in high school told me once, "I envy you for your youth, but I feel somewhat sorry for you because you are smart and curious." I understand that now. Knowing things is difficult. The more you know, the more you realize that you do not know, and the more choices you are faced with. When you are ignorant and incurious, you can go through life sure in what you do know, even if it isn't much. Seems like the less people know, the more sure they are in the little they do know. People who seek knowledge seem to understand the complexities and how little our religious, moral, and ethical codes serve to guide us.

We were spoken to like adults in 1979 by another good man, Jimmy Carter who told us that, "First we must face the truth, then we can change our course" He also reminded the people that "Two-thirds of our people do not even vote."

This good man was a one term president, who was ousted by a carnival barker in his time. The guy was so simple that his own vice president had called his economic plan "Voodoo Economics". Yet that guy, blowing smoke up everyone's ass, defeated a truthteller, a man who had listened to the people and who was ready to make changes. A man who in the 1970's was prescient enough to put solar panels on the White House. I don't know what would have happened if Jimmy Carter would have remained as President for another 4 years. I do know that this "Great Communicator" Slashed taxes of the wealthy, shifting that burden onto the middle and working class. Taxing Social Security as income to pay for lagging revenue. This smoke blowing bastard started to dismantle everything the FDR and Democrats put into place which was somewhat in line with the "General Welfare" and "Common Good" philosophies in Europe.

So again, we say we want truth, but the reality is we want just enough truth to feed our illusions of power. We don't want truth that makes us feel uncomfortable, like we have to change, or work, or anything.

[The Roux Comes First]

17. Great Post!

Not too much, if any! Hammer, meet nail!

To expand slightly, as we have been witness to now for well over four years, a disturbingly large fraction of our supposed adults are desperately eager to have a well-known con-man and charlatan, famous for stiffing his subcontractors and cheating at every possible opportunity, sing them a pleasant Song of Lies about just how right, downtrodden, disrespected, and deserving they all are. Meanwhile vast numbers of them reside in states subsidized by the libs they feel the need to own.

[Ingersollman]

18. This

fits. So I'll just leave it here.