Monday News & Notes
AUGUST 30, 2021 -- THURGOOD MARSHALL CONFIRMED AS SUPREME COURT JUSTICE, 1967
•OUR SUMMER RECESS: The Hustings will post once again this week, after Tuesday’s Afghanistan withdrawal deadline, and then return after the extended Labor Day weekend, on Tuesday, September 6.
•Hurricane Ida has been downgraded to a tropical storm as it hovers over the Mississippi River, the AP reports. Ida made landfall over Louisiana Sunday 16 years to the day after Hurricane Katrina, which killed more than 1,800 people.
•Tuesday is President Biden’s deadline for U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan. The number of troops helping airlift remaining citizens as well as local allies has been reduced from 5,800 to about 4,000.
U.S. Military Has Capacity to Airlift 300 Remaining Americans – The United States has the capacity to evacuate approximately 300 Americans remaining in Afghanistan before the Tuesday deadline to leave, the Associated Press reports. The U.S. military intercepted five rocket fire attacks aimed at Kabul’s Hamid Karzai International Airport Monday, NPR’s Morning Edition reports.
“This is the most dangerous time in an already extraordinarily dangerous mission these last couple of days,” said Secretary of State Antony Blinken (AP). The U.S. has conducted two drone strikes against ISIS-K militants since more than 200 Afghanis and 13 U.S. troops were killed in last Thursday’s suicide bombing at the Abbey Gate of Karzai Airport.
Speaking on ABC’s This Week Sunday, Blinken said he expects the Taliban will continue to allow people to leave Afghanistan after Tuesday’s deadline.
Note: There are still many U.S. allies who helped our two-decade war effort in Afghanistan desperate to get out, though several different numbers have been bandied about, most in the “hundreds of thousands.” It seems criticism of President Biden’s late planning for the August 31 withdrawal from Afghanistan has been tamped down a bit over the weekend, as analysts criticize misguided attempts at “nation building” by four presidents over nearly 20 years.
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France Proposes Kabul Airport Safe Zone – France and the United Kingdom will propose to the United Nations Security Council establishment of a “safe zone” at Hamid Karzai International Airport, in order to continue to allow people to leave Afghanistan, French President Emmanuel Macron told Le Journal du Dimanche, as reported by Politico.
“Our resolution proposal aims to define a safe zone in Kabul, under UN control, which would allow humanitarian operations to continue,” Macron said. In the interview, he said that the U.K. backs the proposal, though there has been no confirmation from London.
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Berenson Banned from Twitter — Alex Berenson, American thriller writer and former New York Times reporter, has been permanently banned from Twitter for violating COVID-19 misinformation rules. The Hill reports it received a statement from a Twitter spokesperson that reads: “The account was permanently suspended for repeated violations of our COVID-19 misinformation rules.”
Note: Newsweek noted that Sen. Ted Cruz, R-TX, took to Twitter to write: “I don’t know Berenson. But all the Leftie Brown Shirts cheering his being banned — you are the problem. You’re supporting authoritarian billionaires’ arbitrary censorship. & you are contributing to so many people’s distrust of Covid info — by silencing dissent, many are skeptical.” Not surprising, Cruz has gone over the top. The “Brown Shirts” he references goes to the Nazi Sturmabteilung, storm troopers. People Tweeting about a Twitter ban? And isn’t it somewhat ironic that Cruz has taken to the very billionaires’ site?
--Edited by Todd Lassa and Gary S. Vasilash