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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsThe Media Manufactured Biden's Political 'Fiasco' in Afghanistan
Americas withdrawal from Afghanistan has yet to cost our nation a single casualty. Evacuations of U.S. citizens and allies from Kabuls airport are proceeding at a faster pace than the White House had promised, or than its critics had deemed possible. Afghanistans decades-long civil war has reached a lull, if not an end. On the streets of Kabul, order and quiet have replaced rising crime and violence. Meanwhile, the Taliban is negotiating with former Afghan president Hamid Karzai over the establishment of an inclusive government acceptable to all Afghans.
In other words, Joe Bidens withdrawal from Afghanistan has been a disastrous and humiliating fiasco, in the words of the mainstream medias ostensibly objective foreign-policy journalists.
This may be an accurate description of what recent events in Kabul have meant for the president, politically. The latest polls have shown sharp drops in Bidens approval rating, driven in part by widespread opposition to the way his administration handled its (otherwise popular) exit from Afghanistan. Yet this political fiasco is not a development that the media covered so much as one that it created.
The Biden administration made some genuine errors of contingency planning. It could have done (and should now do) more to facilitate the mass resettlement of Afghan refugees. But as far as conclusions to multi-decade wars go, Americas withdrawal from Afghanistan is thus far proceeding with relatively little chaos and tragedy. And its far from clear that the withdrawal could have been much more orderly had the White House only executed it in a better way.
Read more: https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/08/media-bias-biden-polls-approval-afghanistan-withdrawal.html
Irish_Dem
(47,057 posts)Biden made the right decision and will be hung out to dry for it.
But I really don't think the American people care about Afghanistan, so it will not hurt Biden in the long run.
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)-having to send in several thousand troops anyway (should have been done earlier);
- conflicting comments among WH, military, State Department, etc.;
-Hillary Clinton having to charter planes to get a few of the forgotten women out;
-prioritizing American mercenaries and profiteers over Afghans who helped us;
-State Department saying its your responsibility to get to Kabul since we abandoned another airport;
-not leveling with us at the start or maybe there wasnt much thought put into it;
-not having an estimate of people we needed to get out and initial resources to do it;
-blaming trump a worthless POS for sure as if we had to follow his cruddy plan;
-letting Taliban take over so quickly (yeah I know the government and military collapsed, but that was foreseeable);
-some people wanted out of Afghanistan no matter what we left behind;
-telling British, French, German leaders to butt out when they asked for more time;
-way to much pointing fingers to avoid taking any blame;
-no support from elected Democrats other than to say, I support withdrawal, but execution sucks;
-Bashing people like Schiff, Moulton, etc. for saying it sucks;
-trying to defend the pullout when we would have called for a 3rd impeachment if trump did it;
and more.
I do think Biden kicked some military and State Department officials rears because they were obviously not ready at the beginning. Best move.
but you forgot to finger point the 'media' for manufacturing a crisis.
It is going better - but trying to paint this as a 'success' story - that's a hell of a spin. "Mistakes were made." And how.
One caveat - there are apparently thousands and thousands of private American citizens (and other nationals) that Biden and the U.S. military had no authority over - who apparently thought it was going to be just swell staying on until sometime AFTER the U.S. departure - and now (in like the last 20 seconds) have suddenly 'woken' to the idea of, "Oh, wait - Taliban!" So - a lot of these 'privates' share some degree of blame - for having little or no game plan in place for 'contingencies.' Remember, the roads, airports and paperwork were wide open and there for the using (to these folks) - up until about a week ago.
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)They didn't plan on this stuff and their excuses were just BS.
But, the news is shifting. Tonight on CNN they did a lengthy segment on the guy who is suing the alternative rock band Nirvana for an album cover they did 20 some years ago.
The fact that our 'allies' are absolutely furious with us ... Probably tells you something.
Like I said, 'mistakes were made.' And, if I were Biden (and top staff) - I think I'd be looking around for some alternative faces to be running departments. There's some pretty incompetent 'looks' out there.
Now about that album art ...
Martin68
(22,800 posts)"balanced" and "fair" they are. I'm so sick of false equivalence and both-sidesism. I will give the Washington Post credit for the many columnists who defended Biden and criticized the bogus negative coverage from the very first.