Did I hear correctly? Did Andrea Mitchell just ask Blinken "But, what about the MILLIONS of Afghan

[Atticus]

women who have taught their daughters they were free to seek an education and equality?" (Not a quote---paraphrased)

[chowder66]

1. Yes and it followed questions about

lawyers, doctors, etc that allegedly feel abandoned. She made it sound like we should be evacuating an entire nation.

Blinken assured her they take all of this very seriously and they are doing everything to contact everyone. They seem to not be able to get in touch with some.
Those people could be out of the country.

[2naSalit]

6. she's been peddling that bile for a couple days now...

On every show she can muscle her way onto. She really is vile.

[FBaggins]

14. The VP opened the door to this a couple of days ago

"There’s no question there will be and should be a robust analysis of what has happened, but right now there’s no question that our focus has to be on evacuating American citizens, Afghans who worked with us and vulnerable Afghans, including women and children,”

There was never any way that we could evacuate every vulnerable Afghan.

[2naSalit]

15. I agree...

We can't bring the whole country here.

[crimycarny]

21. I had to turn off Brian Williams last night when Andrea Mitchell started this speil

I can't stand that woman anyway, the way she talks is like nails on the chalkboard let alone what come out of her mouth. When she started talking about "millions" last night I turned the TV off. What are we supposed to do? That's a legit question....does she mean we stay there forever?

Trump had made a deal with the Taliban that put is in a situation where Biden had two choices: 1) work with the Afghan President to meet a withdrawal deadline or 2) surge in thousands more US troops and extend the deadline for withdrawal to who know how long. #1 was never going to be without pain for the Afghans, #2 would most certainly have caused an increase in violence from the Taliban and we'd be back at square one.

What in the h*ll does Andrea Mitchell expect Joe Biden to do? Keep US troops there for another 20, 30 years??????

[2naSalit]

56. She's a warmonger...

And I highly suspect that she and her spouse are heavily invested in the war machine (MIC). Now that Biden has killed the cash cow of the war profiteers, they are going to scream bloody murder all the live-long day.

[JaneQPublic]

12. Does Andrea not care about the women of Yemen, Qatar, Somalia, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Niger, Sudan?

Clearly, she would say the US should either send 20,000 troops to each of these countries to nation-build or evacuate all their women and girls. Anything less would be a dreadful failure for the Biden Administration.

[GoCubsGo]

45. Mrs. Greenspan doesn't even care about women in her own country.

Has she ever railed against all the anti-choice legislation that has been, and is being passed over the past decade, the way she's screeching here? Or, said anything about the stifiling of equal pay legislation. Nope. Nary a peep from her. If they ain't rich, white women, she doesn't give a shit.

[JaneQPublic]

52. Yep. (nt)

[secondwind]

2. if that's true, what the EFF does Andrea Mitchell want him to say or do about it?

Honestly, I'm getting sick and tired of "gotcha" questions!!!!!!!!!!

[chowder66]

7. The goalposts are moving at lightening speed.

[Shellback Squid]

3. God, she's a thorn

[pwb]

4. Cant help you not watching but if I remember

Andrea sucks like that all the time.

[BlueMTexpat]

11. Absolutely this! eom

[wryter2000]

5. I would not be surprised

I had to turn Chuck Todd off because, according to his telling, not only are Americans and Afghans furious with Biden because of all the people Biden is leaving behind, but the whole world community is.

One might want to ask Andrea how those women and girls were doing before we invaded.

[panader0]

32. If the world community, including the G-7, are upset that we're not bringing

as many people as they wish, then perhaps they should send their army forces in to do the job.
Pretty simple. Put up or shut up.

[sarcasmo]

8. Andrea Emails, always asking the wrong questions.

[dalton99a]

9. So Republicans want to extend the deadline and evacuate 39 million Afghans to the U.S.?

[DET]

10. What Does She Expect?

Couldn’t believe she asked that. I feel terrible for the Afghan women, but we can’t be responsible indefinitely for the hopes and dreams of an entire country.

[Hoyt]

13. Kind of hard to criticize someone for serious questions. Guess she should have asked "Mr. Sec do we

really need to give a damn about these women?"

[crimycarny]

16. So we stay in Afghanistan forever?

That's the only alternative, to stay in Afghanistan forever. Rightly or wrongly, American's don't have the stomach for that. Joe Biden is the President of the United States, not the President of Afghanistan.

It was ridiculous in the first place to think we could change a nation that has suppressed women for years and somehow turn it into a beacon of freedom for women in 20 years, let alone 100. We would have to stay there for another 20, 30, 40 years and I know I don't want my kids, grandkids, great-grandkids, great great grandkids, etc. going over there and dying for an unwinnable war.

[Hoyt]

19. Didn't say that. But I think it's a legitimate question.

[crimycarny]

23. No it's not

Because she isn't asking a legit question, she basically made a speech full of assumptions. It was a "what about world peace" type question.

[Hoyt]

25. Well, it's a speech that needs to be made, even if inconvenient for some.

[crimycarny]

26. Inconvenient?

A bit of a spin there, don't ya think? I prefer practical questions that have real answers, not rhetorical questions meant to push an opinion. At least in the midst of trying to work on a problem. Leave the speeches and pontification for later.

[Hoyt]

31. If trump were still Prez, gawd forbid, would hope the question would be asked.

[crimycarny]

33. Doesn't matter who the President was

Rhetorical questions in the middle of working on a problem aren't helpful. And, honestly, I'd feel the same way even if Trump were President. Valid questions to me are:

1) What about the threat to the Kabul airport from ISIS-K?
2) What can Americans at home do to help?
3) What is the Administration doing to speed up the vetting process and how long do they expect that to take?
4) Where are the refugees being held while they are being vetted?
5) What is the US doing to help those still trying to get to the Afghan airport work through the Taliban checkpoints?
6) How is the US tracking those Americans still in Afghanistan who may not have registered with the US embassy. How can they contact the US to reach safe passage?

Those are real questions regarding realistic situations that the US can actually do something about and is (I'm assuming) actively working on. The whole "What about the millions who were used to the type of life 20 years of US/Allied occupation gave them going to do now?". That is a question of morality, not logistics.

I prefer to do what I can to help by donating https://www.rescue.org/

[Hoyt]

35. The people left behind, especially women in this case, are a concern

at least for me.

[crimycarny]

44. Yes, they are

But was that our mission in going over there? Was our mission supposed to include a contingency plan to evacuate millions of Afghans out of Afghanistan if need be? I never heard that was our mission. I never heard that those millions of Afghans would want to leave Afghanistan in the first place.

What I suspect those millions DO want is not to fall victim to the Taliban. So...what's the answer? Since our mission was never supposed to include evacuating millions of citizens out of Afghanistan, the only alternative left to Joe Biden is for a surge of US troops to descend upon Afghanistan and occupy it again. And that's a completely new mission, a completely new war.

So, again, how is that question supposed to be answered?

[Hoyt]

46. Fortunately, Hilary Clinton is also concerned. Maybe it's a women thing.

[LanternWaste]

54. She didn't ask that question, though.

It seems disingenuous (at best) to conflate the question asked by the media with Sec. Clinton's personal position.

That said, Biden is also concern. But unlike you and me, he if forced to weigh multiple concerns against each other rather than pretending each exists in a vacuum.

"Maybe it's a critical thinking thing"

And if you're not in fact pretending each concern exists independently of each other, it seems irresponsible to avoid the measure and consequence of those additional concerns in regards to your narrative of nation building.

[Hoyt]

55. The question needs answering, even if the government says we don't care,

and don’t believe Americans care either.

[LanternWaste]

51. I think it's no more a legitimate question than "do you still beat your wife?"

It's a bullshit question lacking necessary and relevant detail and context.

[Hoyt]

53. I guess she and Hilary Clinton just have a concern for Afghan women.

[rockfordfile]

17. Actually it's because of people like her that our country got stuck there for 20yrs.

[Hoyt]

20. The question is still legitimate.

[leftstreet]

30. +1

[Hugh_Lebowski]

37. A more serious question would be along the lines of ...

"After we evacuate and leave the country, what is the plan to protect vulnerable women in Afghanistan from the depredations of the Taliban?"

Asking it in the context (as it apparently was) of 'who is left to be evacuated' gives the impression the Admin is doing something wrong by not evacuating millions of women.

If the former was the phrasing, nobody here would be up in arms about it.

[Hoyt]

40. At least Hilary Clinton is taking it seriously.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/hillary-clinton-afghanistan-flights-women-b1908161.html

“Hillary Clinton has been arranging charter flights out of Afghanistan for at-risk women, reports say”

“ Former secretary of state Hillary Clinton, who previously warned of the “huge consequences” of withdrawing US troops from Afghanistan, has now reportedly attempted to charter flights out of the country for the country’s at-risk women.”

[Hugh_Lebowski]

43. So you think her plan is to get millions of women out of Afghanistan

with her personally arranged charter flights?

Where are they all going?

[Hoyt]

47. At least she's trying and cares about Muslim women. Guess it's a woman thing.

All we cared about when we went in before was killing Muslim in retaliation for 9/11, or just because we could.

[crimycarny]

49. That's sort of comment isn't helpful

Yes, Hillary is trying and that's a wonderful thing. But Hillary trying to do what's in her power to help and the US trying to suddenly evacuate millions out of Afghanistan, are two different things. Also, just because it's not possible to evacuate those millions doesn't mean people don't care.

[crimycarny]

48. I give up

The conflation of what's practical with what we wish would happen is driving me crazy. Good for Hillary that she is stepping up to try and get women out. But she's not trying to evacuate MILLIONS, just as you state. We can all be concerned with the fate of those left behind while acknowledging it's logistically impossible to evacuate millions nor was the evacuation of millions ever part of the mission in the first place. So asking why the military isn't evacuating millions is not a fair question.

It's also a bit arrogant and presumptuous to assume those millions want to leave in the first place. I'm sure the vast majority want to stay and be able to live free in their own country.

So if the question was stated differently, just as you said in an earlier comment, that would be more legit. And the answer wouldn't be pretty, because the answer would most likely be "We can't ensure their safety. Not unless we bring troops back in."

[Demsrule86]

39. There is little we can do. We would have send thousands of troops. I am not willing to do that.

[Hoyt]

41. Glad Hilary Clinton doesn't feel like that.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/hillary-clinton-afghanistan-flights-women-b1908161.html

“Hillary Clinton has been arranging charter flights out of Afghanistan for at-risk women, reports say”

“ Former secretary of state Hillary Clinton, who previously warned of the “huge consequences” of withdrawing US troops from Afghanistan, has now reportedly attempted to charter flights out of the country for the country’s at-risk women.”

[grumpyduck]

18. And how does she know there are millions of them?

Did she do a survey? Does she have any proof?

This is what pisses the hell out of me. These people make statements like this, without backing them up, and people believe them.

Hey, I can go out there and say, hey, everybody knows Outer Mongolia is preparing their Navy to invade Afghanistan to take over the kumquat farmers, and I'll bet a lot of people would believe me.

[Paladin]

22. I loathe Andrea Mitchell.

MSNBC needs to put us out of our Andrea Mitchell misery, and damn soon.

[Treefrog]

24. Don't watch?

I can’t remember when I last saw her.

[argyl]

27. If the Taliban revert to their murderous ways and strand or begin executing people at Kabul Airport.

Send in our best killing units we have.Men of those calibre could leave a few hundred Taliban with their heads blown off at little harm to them.

No nation building, just a final attempt to get as many of our citizens out as we can.

And if it doesn't work it's bye, bye Afghanistan with hundreds of their thugs slaughtered in the streets as well. They deserve it. And then they're Russia, China, and Iran's problem.

[onetexan]

28. The husbands, fathers & brothers of the millions of women & girls

Will need to stand up & protect their women. The US & the world cannot be expected to take care of them all.
If the afghan soldiers stood their ground & fought the taliban would it even be am issue at all?

Course we know that didnt happen. They surrendered like cowards.

[Sogo]

36. To be fair, in pictures coming out of Afghanistan these days,

it's the Taliban who all have the guns. Pretty hard to stand up to those ARs.

Having said that, we do NOT have the responsibility of protecting all their hopes and dreams and women (unlike what Andrea Mitchell seems to believe).

[Hugh_Lebowski]

38. NOW they have all of them. Before the Afghan army scarpered like a band of Sir Robin's

They were very well armed.

[ecstatic]

29. If that were the case,

why would their government fold so quickly and without a fight? Unless she's saying that the millions of Afghan women were completely separate and isolated from the country's leaders and military personnel?

[Sogo]

34. Exactly.

She's some kind of loopy....

[Hoyt]

42. Thank goodness for Hilary Clinton, she's concerned too.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/hillary-clinton-afghanistan-flights-women-b1908161.html

“Hillary Clinton has been arranging charter flights out of Afghanistan for at-risk women, reports say”

“ Former secretary of state Hillary Clinton, who previously warned of the “huge consequences” of withdrawing US troops from Afghanistan, has now reportedly attempted to charter flights out of the country for the country’s at-risk women.”

[GoodRaisin]

50. I hope someone asked Andrea when did Joe Biden promise to evacuate everyone

in Afghanistan except the Taliban?

A lot of other stupid people also need to answer that same question. Especially all the ones who said they wanted us to get out of Afghanistan and are now crying that "Joe Biden is leaving people there". This is just turning into another example of the overwhelming amount of stupidity that exists in this country.