Blaming Biden is ludicrous.

[WarGamer]

POTUS doesn't sit in front of a map table moving pieces around and confirming logistics.

We have people for that.

Presidents convey a theme, a message. Others pick up the message and turn it into policy and strategy.

Someone at State or DoD dropped the ball, BIG TIME.

Joe is a compassionate man who truly wanted to end this national nightmare before passing it along to another POTUS (Thanks Shrub, you fucking pos)

I'd love to be a fly on the wall for DoD meetings at the WH the last few months. But I'm 100% confident a ball was dropped... and Biden didn't drop it.

[Hoyt]

1. Then, Biden needs to announce their forced resignation. Unfortunately, 2022 elections in 15 months

will include 24/7 ads of Biden saying it wouldn't be like Saigon, while scared people are falling from airplanes.

Biden does seem to be taking control now, and I'm hopeful.

[JohnSJ]

5. Biden won't do any forced resignations unless there was an intentional effort by someone or

group to actually sabotage this evacuation

Barring that, Biden will take full responsibility

[Hoyt]

6. Stupidity is good enough reason for me.

[JohnSJ]

7. I don't see him blaming others. However, I have no doubt is this was under trump he would be

Blaming everyone but himself

[Hoyt]

8. It's not trump, wish it were. We'd be calling for a 3rd Impeachment and

might actually have a chance to get him.

[JohnSJ]

9. If it was trump it would mean we lost in 2020, and that would be far worse

[brush]

10. Oh, please. The Biden admin has been in office 7 months and gets blamed for 20 years...

and three previous presidents policies that didn't end our Afghan deployment.

And btw, the Afghan president fled his own country with as much cash he could cram into his baggage, and the fucking Afghan military folded like a three dollar suit when it was time to fight for their own country.

The Biden administration was operating in the dark too as to what trump agreed to in his secret agreement with the Taliban last year. And ya just know trump took care (bribes/kickbacks) of himself and expected to be back in office to reap the benefits and praise of withdrawal, and so did the Taliban.

Kinda hard to pull off an orderly evacuation plan when all that goes against you in a matter of days...just about impossible I'd say so fellow Dems get off the "Resign now high horse" and give Biden, Austin and Milley a break.

And while you're at it, cite an example of an orderly, chaos-free, military withdrawal. Dunkirk maybe, Dien Bien Phu, Saigon, Bull Run, the Soviets from Afghanistan, trump from Syria?

They're as rare as a republican governor admitting a mistake on banning masks.

[Hoyt]

11. If he couldn't pull it off, then why not postpone it rather than saying there would

not be chaos.

If our military and intelligence honestly thought the Afghans could hold the line for months, they were badly mistaken.

[brush]

12. Ask the cowardly Afghan president why he didn't put off his fleeing.

Ask the military why didn't they put off their refusal to fight. That is what caused the immediate crisis just four days ago. The Biden admin, nor anyone else could foresee all that happening withing days.

And by the way, we won the invasion years ago and chased Bin Ladin out, and then later got Bin Ladin.

Twenty years of deployment and no evacuation but Biden gets blames after seven months in office, and having to deal with a pandemic and an insurrection. Then that's dumped in his lap.

[Hoyt]

13. So Biden was duped by the Afghans? No chit.

[brush]

15. Put it like that if you want. Where'd you hear that, from FOX?

Because you're repeating republican talking points.

[Hoyt]

16. If you are going to call criticism "Republican Talking Points," don't

read articles like “Uncle Joe did not know best” in the Economist or watch any news reports.

[brush]

17. What does that even mean. You make a remark that the Taliban duped Biden...

then you say that. What do you think, the Taliban are, stupid? They knew what they had agreed to with corrupt ass trump. They knew they'd been making deals with the corrupt ass government and military for months. They knew Biden and the new admin didn't know what's up and the fleeing of the president and the laying down of arms by the army caught the new admin by surprise.

You don't understand that? You think Americans are supposed to know everything...about their treachery with trump, and the treachery of the cowardly president and army?

Instead of calling for resignations, call for the new admin to use the fact that Afghan funds are held back as a bargaining point with the Taliban. The country in running out of cash. Give the new admin time to use that to bargain with the Taliban to get our people and Afghan allies out.

What the fu_k good is having mass resignations and new people who have to get familiar and start all over again. Let's stop contributing the "Dems in disarray/Dems screwed up" hysteria that republican keep pushing and look for ways that the admin can succeed because if we lose in the mid-terms Democracy is over with.

Show unity for fellow Dems because all this bashing is going to lose us support and eventually votes.

[Hoyt]

18. Christ, if Biden and intelligence didn't know what's up, then don't

friggin walk into a trap.

Put the damn thing off a month. Bring in air support and rear guard if necessary. Don’t say everything will be fine, then claim you always knew there would be chaos. Tell the truth.

The one good thing is that I think the Taliban may let us get out. They don’t seem to be shooting at us now.

But as one CNN guest said, “it only takes one shot in a tense situation to get a lot of people killed.”

[brush]

20. Walk into what trap? You mean the one we've been in for 20 years?

Hell, the corrupt Afghan president got the fuck out too. You mean that trap?

[Hoyt]

21. Trap of royally messing up on worldwide stage with election on horizon.

[brush]

22. So are you going to get behind the president or keep Dem bashing like the repugs want?

I'd think I was on FOX or NewMax instead of on Democratic Underground if I didn't know better.

[Hoyt]

23. So we can't criticize Democrats who make mistakes?

[Treefrog]

24. We're all supposed to ignore obvious mistakes?

Somebody bungled this.

I still don’t think it will hurt Biden in the long run. I just don’t.

[Frasier Balzov]

2. Agreed. Provided however...

That the President did not reject clear recommendations which might have avoided this.

He could have heard plans and contingencies for so long that they seemed like dithering and ceased to be credible to him.

Most probably though, as you suggest, he was fed assumptions by people whose supposed expertise deserved reliance.

[Kaleva]

3. Yes. People who advised Biden need to be held accountable as I said in another OP.

[LetMyPeopleVote]

4. I stand with Joe Biden

Link to tweet

[Sympthsical]

14. This has State and Defense written all over it

Apparently the State Department really, really dragged on evacuating Americans when the military was begging them to do it.

But, since everyone's in CYA mode, we can't say for certain who is telling the truth. I'd say this aspect rings true, simply because there were so many of our people just sitting there when Kabul fell. Tens of thousands are still there and in trouble.

We'll see what information got to the President - and more pertinently, what did not.

[BootinUp]

19. Its so easy though, no research required at all. nt