Video from Kabul’s international airport shows people clinging to departing American planes as thousands of desperate Afghans attempt to flee the city following the Taliban’s takeover.
The Taliban’s seizure of Kabul on Sunday prompted large crowds of people to head to Hamid Karzai International Airport in hopes of escaping the city with evacuating Americans as the U.S. completes its withdrawal from Afghanistan. The U.S. sent troops Sunday to secure the airport and facilitate the evacuation of American and allied personnel.
U.S. forces repeatedly fired into the air and helicopters dropped smoke grenades in an effort to disperse the crowd, according to The Wall Street Journal. People were hanging onto boarding ramps and crowding around parked planes in an effort to escape the city.
Evacuation flights from the airport in Kabul were suspended Monday morning due to the crowds, Fox News reported.
At least five people have been killed during the chaos at the airport, Reuters reported, though their cause of death is unclear. One witness told Reuters a stampede occurred that may have caused injury or death.
The scene outside the Kabul airport gate this morning, where people were arriving by the thousands and things were rapidly spiraling out of control, as false rumors spread of flights out for anybody without visas. Several killed inside and outside already. pic.twitter.com/Rzdi2D9BTe
Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen told the BBC that troops were under strict orders not to harm anyone, and that the militants desired a “peaceful transfer of power.”
Ashraf Ghani, president of Afghanistan, fled the country to Uzbekistan early Sunday, reportedly bringing with him four cars and a helicopter full of cash, a Russian Embassy spokesman told Reuters.
The team of forensic auditors in Arizona are set to release their preliminary report on fraud in the 2020 election next week. According to reports Sunday, state auditors will release their early findings the week of August 22.
The preliminary report is expected to show data and election discrepancies found in Maricopa County that they have analyzed to date. Meanwhile, auditors have yet to examine internet routers and voting machines under subpoenas by the state Senate.
Republican state Sen. Wendy Rogers said other states can now use Arizona’s experience to conduct their own audits.
“The media is beside itself because they won’t communicate the truth of the excruciating detail to which this analysis was done,” she stated. “2.1 million ballots…this is a package-able effort, this is a transportable, usable again in other states project that you can take.”
Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich is now expected to enforce the subpoenas to acquire the routers, voting machines and other evidence from the Maricopa Board of Supervisors and Dominion Voting Systems.
A group of moderate House Democrats rejected Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s attempts to fashion a compromise on the timing of the $1.2 trillion infrastructure package and a broader $3.5 trillion party line spending bill.
The nine moderates, led by Rep. Josh Gottheimer of New Jersey, said the speaker’s proposed solution of conducting simultaneous procedural votes on both measures was insufficient. Instead, the moderates argued for a stand-alone vote on the infrastructure package.
“While we appreciate the forward procedural movement on the bipartisan infrastructure agreement, our view remains consistent,” the lawmakers wrote. “We should vote first on the bipartisan infrastructure framework without delay and then move to immediate consideration of the budget resolution. … We simply can’t afford any delays.”
Mrs. Pelosi, a California Democrat, initially pledged that the House would not take up the infrastructure bill, until after the Senate passed the $3.5 trillion social spending measure. Moderate Democrats, however, balked at the idea, demanding a stand-alone vote.
Since the infrastructure bill passed the Senate last week, the group of moderates making such demands has only grown exponentially. Mrs. Pelosi can lose no more than three defectors to pass legislation through the closely split House.
That reality forced the speaker to offer the moderates a compromise over the weekend, proposing to hold a vote on both the infrastructure bill and the $3.5 trillion measure when the House reconvenes on Aug. 23.
“Let us proceed united, respectful of everyone’s views and determined to deliver the results we need in the weeks ahead,” she wrote in a letter to the moderates on Sunday.
The rejection of Mrs. Pelosi’s compromise is only the latest sign of an intra-party skirmish over the infrastructure deal.
Far-left Democrats, including Mrs. Pelosi and the 95-member Congressional Progressive Caucus, have lambasted the package for not doing enough about climate change and other liberal priorities. Some progressives, in particular, are threatening to withhold their support from the infrastructure bill, unless it is accompanied by the $3.5 trillion social spending plan.
“This is the Democratic agenda, it’s the president’s agenda, and it’s what we promised people across America,” said Rep. Pramila Jayapal, a Washington Democrat who chairs the Congressional Progressive Caucus. “Now we must deliver.”
Democrats have dubbed the $3.5 trillion legislation “human infrastructure” in hopes of making it an easier sell to voters. The legislation includes a wish list of liberal priorities, including free community college, universal pre-kindergarten and expanded health care benefits.
Democrats are also working to include amnesty for illegal immigrants and new climate change mandates that would phase out fossil fuels such as coal and natural gas from the electric grid.
Since the $3.5 trillion package is unlikely to garner Republican support, Democrats plan to pass it along party lines via budget reconciliation. The process allows some spending measures to avoid the Senate’s 60-vote filibuster threshold and pass with a simple majority of 51 votes.
Moderate Democrats are uncomfortable with both the proposed legislation and the means with which it is set to be passed. Many also fear that by delaying a vote, the package will only lose support.
“The route we’re going is let’s get a vote right now on that great bipartisan infrastructure package,” Mr. Gottheimer said during an appearance on CNN over the weekend. “The key is not risking the momentum we’ve got.”
Progressives, though, say the push is short-sighted.
“We can’t call people moderate Democrats if they vote against child care, paid leave, health care and addressing climate change,” Ms. Jayapal said.
This weekend the US experienced another “Saigon moment,” this time in Afghanistan.
After a 20 year war that drained trillions from Americans’ pockets, the capital of Afghanistan fell without a fight. The corrupt Potemkin regime that the US had been propping up for two decades and the Afghan military that we had spent billions training just melted away.
The rush is on now to find somebody to blame for the chaos in Afghanistan. Many of the “experts” doing the finger-pointing are the ones most to blame. Politicians and pundits who played cheerleader for this war for two decades are now rushing to blame President Biden for finally getting the US out. Where were they when succeeding presidents continued to add troops and expand the mission in Afghanistan?
The US war on Afghanistan was not lost yesterday in Kabul. It was lost the moment it shifted from a limited mission to apprehend those who planned the attack on 9/11 to an exercise in regime change and nation-building.
Immediately after the 9/11 attacks I proposed that we issue letters of marque and reprisal to bring those responsible to justice. But such a limited and targeted response to the attack was ridiculed at the time. How could the US war machine and all its allied profiteers make their billions if we didn’t put on a massive war?
So who is to blame for the scenes from Afghanistan this weekend? There is plenty to go around.
Congress has kicked the can down the road for 20 years, continuing to fund the Afghan war long after even they understood that there was no point to the US occupation. There were some efforts by some Members to end the war, but most, on a bipartisan basis, just went along to get along.
The generals and other high-ranking military officers lied to their commander-in-chief and to the American people for years about progress in Afghanistan. The same is true for the US intelligence agencies. Unless there is a major purge of those who lied and misled, we can count on these disasters to continue until the last US dollar goes up in smoke.
The military industrial complex spent 20 years on the gravy train with the Afghanistan war. They built missiles, they built tanks, they built aircraft and helicopters. They hired armies of lobbyists and think tank writers to continue the lie that was making them rich. They wrapped their graft up in the American flag, but they are the opposite of patriots.
The mainstream media has uncritically repeated the propaganda of the military and political leaders about Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, and all the other pointless US interventions. Many of these outlets are owned by defense industry-connected companies. The corruption is deep.
American citizens must also share some blame. Until more Americans rise up and demand a pro-America, non-interventionist foreign policy they will continue to get fleeced by war profiteers.
Political control in Afghanistan has returned to the people who fought against those they viewed as occupiers and for what they viewed as their homeland. That is the real lesson, but don’t expect it to be understood in Washington. War is too profitable and political leaders are too cowardly to go against the tide. But the lesson is clear for anyone wishing to see it: the US global military empire is a grave threat to the United States and its future.
The new meltdown over Governor Ron DeSantis’s management of COVID-19 in Florida could be the most ridiculous one to date. The corporate media is upset that Florida will now count deaths on the date they occur rather than the date they get reported. Some journalists do not understand that the curve will be normalized, but the area under the curve will remain the same.
Georgia’s COVID-19 dashboard allows users to select whether they want to view deaths according to the date they happened or when the state received the report. When you look at the graph by day reported, you can see gaps on weekends, and it is evident there are days when the state receives a data dump:
Georgia COVID dashboard.
When you view the same data by date of death, the curve is normalized. There is a lag as the Department of Health enters a report received today on the correct date. But every death on the report date page is eventually placed on the day someone passed away.
Georgia COVID dashboard.
The corporate media is mad because, on the day Florida receives a data dump, they can no longer point it out and screech about how horrible DeSantis is. The lag in reporting creates a curve that reflects the reality of what is happening in the state. It will not prevent any data from being recorded, but it will stop the daily vapors over what is occurring in the state.
Florida has also moved from a dashboard with daily totals to a weekly report for COVID-19 data. This change is the first step in treating COVID-19 as other respiratory diseases get monitored, such as respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) and the flu. To respond to all patients requiring care, health departments need to know what is going on across various illnesses.
The current situation is a good example. While the southeast experiences a spike in COVID-19 cases, there is also an off-season surge of RSV. The CDC warned healthcare providers about this possibility in late June. Lockdowns and isolation in 2020 reduced the circulation of the virus:
Due to reduced circulation of RSV during the winter months of 2020–2021, older infants and toddlers might now be at increased risk of severe RSV-associated illness since they have likely not had typical levels of exposure to RSV during the past 15 months.
CDC surveillance confirms a spike in RSV in the South, which includes Florida. Percent positive in the region was 26% last week and 17.4% in Florida:
Georgia COVID dashboard.
Hospital systems in the South need to be on alert for this virus and COVID-19, particularly in children. No data from Israel or the UK indicate the Delta variant is any more dangerous to children than previous versions of COVID-19. RSV causes approximately 57,000 hospitalizations of children under five annually and causes between 100 and 500 deaths.
As a study in California found, this distinction matters. As of August 7, 1299 children under four have been hospitalized with and possibly for COVID-19 during the pandemic. Hospitalizations of children for COVID-19 decreased 40% when researchers reviewed the clinical information. Appropriate diagnosis in a world only concerned with COVID-19 is critical. States like Florida that begin to integrate the management of COVID-19 with other illnesses position their health systems to respond appropriately.
Hopefully, Florida’s next move will be even bolder. With weekly reporting and using the date of death to report mortality, perhaps the state can distinguish between dying with COVID-19 and a death caused by COVID-19. A detailed review in two California counties found this decreased the number of deaths by approximately 25%. The CDC makes a similar distinction evaluating deaths following COVID-19 vaccination. This is the footnote on the agency’s current report:
1,883 (25%) of 7,608 hospitalizations reported as asymptomatic or not related to COVID-19. 341 (21%) of 1,587 fatal cases reported as asymptomatic or not related to COVID-19.
If Florida moves in this direction, we may see heads explode on live television. The wailing will be glorious. But if Florida and other states want to exit Covidstan, it is precisely the move they need to make.
Are you free to speak in public, even if I find you insulting?
According to a coalition of unlikely allies, including Christians, secularists, comedians, and LGBT activists, you are, and have been since 2014. Back then, the coalition successfully campaigned against the criminalization of insulting speech in section 5 of the Public Order Act 1986, which made it an offence to use “threatening, insulting or abusive” words or behavior.
The campaign, which ran under the banner “Feel free to insult me“, successfully persuaded Parliament that the value of freedom of speech to a free and democratic society was such that even shocking, offensive or disturbing speech should be robustly protected, rather than criminalized, in the public square.
Heralded as a victory for free speech, the hope was that change in the law would prevent those expressing their views in public, such as street preachers, comedians and peaceful protesters, from unlawful arrest and legal uncertainty.
And yet, London-based street preacher.
Hazel Lewis found herself in the headlines this week. Last winter, she was arrested for allegedly repeatedly referring to people as “sinners” and appealing to bystanders goading her, including for her biblical views on human sexuality, to “accept Jesus and God into their souls to redeem themselves from sin”.
This week, after an 18-month ordeal of arrest, detention and prosecution, she finally found justice. Concerning the charge under section 5 – yes, the same section 5 of 2013 fame – the judge found that there was “no case to answer” – a ruling reserved for prosecutions so bereft of evidence that no reasonable tribunal of fact could convict based on a proper understanding of the law.
A similar situation occurred this summer with street evangelist David McConnell. He was arrested for preaching whilst being heckled by bystanders on his view on sexuality and abortion – despite that not even being the subject of his presentation. In June, West Yorkshire Police Force admitted liability and paid him damages for his troubles. Likewise, in April, John Sherwood, a 71-year-old grandfather who had been preaching in Uxbridge for over 35 years, was arrested simply for expressing his Bible-based beliefs on marriage.
Numerous other examples can be given of individuals arrested and detained, and though not prosecuted, chillingly warned not to repeat the alleged behaviour. Or individuals restricted from exercising their fundamental rights whilst an accusation about offensive speech is investigated. Or those who, after arrest, release and confirmation that their actions are perfectly legal, are simply too scared to re-engage in the lawful activity for fear that another officer may think differently – reasoning that a repeat of the ordeal is not worth risking.
How, despite changes in law specifically created to protect free speech, has it continued to be unjustly restricted in the public sphere?
A large part of the problem appears to be that the removal of the word “insulting” has done little to prevent officers from simply interpreting insulting conduct or words as “abusive”, which remains an offence under the Act. CPS guidance on section 5 is unhelpful in this regard. It states, rather astonishingly, that “In the majority of cases, prosecutors are likely to find that behaviour that can be described as insulting can also be described as abusive”. To the extent that this seeks to equate insulting words with abusive words, this is wrong in law and is contrary to the intent of Parliament.
Further, the laws concerning the scope of free speech protections under the Human Rights Act 1998 in the context of public order legislation are not easily navigated. When broad powers are given to police officers, it is difficult for them to apply the rigourous proportionality assessment required to correctly balance between tackling genuine public disorder and protecting the suspect’s right to free speech. Officers must receive specific training and guidance (with reference to case law from both UK courts and the European Court of Human Rights), such as to equip them to handle common public order complaints.
It is also worth noting that whilst the Public Order Act does contain a specific free speech clause under section 29J (which precludes parts of the Act from being “read or given effect in a way which prohibits or restricts discussion, criticism or expressions of antipathy, dislike, ridicule, insult or abuse” of religions, beliefs and practices), this does not apply to section 5, the very section under which speech is most routinely restricted. The parts to which it does apply, perhaps tellingly, are prosecuted relatively infrequently.
The Government has a manifesto commitment to “champion freedom of expression”. The opportunity to deliver on this in the public square and realign police and prosecutorial practice with Parliament’s intent is presented in the Police, Crime, Sentencing, and Courts Bill 2021 – a Bill intended to improve public order legislation and due for second reading in the House of Lords in September.
As currently drafted, many, including senior police officers, have raised concerns that the Bill will hand even more powers to the state machinery at precisely the time when such powers should be narrowed or, at least, clarified in law. If free speech protecting amendments are forthcoming in the House of Lords, street preachers and others wishing to exercise their free speech rights in public will hope that the Government support them and, in so doing, deliver on the intent of Parliament in 2013 to protect free speech in the public square.
In May of this year, Dr. Anthony Fauci made some statements to Senator Rand Paul during a hearing which caught my attention. Those patently false statements, for which Dr. Fauci hasn’t been held accountable, launched one of the most in-depth article series I have ever written. During the course of my research, I had an NIH/NIAID whistleblower approach me with information and direction on my investigation which required that I FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) numerous documents and communications from within those federal agencies.
As part of most FOIA requests (I have made numerous FOIA requests in the past), there are two questions regarding providing the information. The first is whether or not you qualify for expedited filing and the second is whether or not you qualify for a fee waiver. On my NIAID FOIA, I requested both expedited processing and a fee waiver. Imagine my surprise, that despite being clearly in an act of investigative journalism (informing the public regarding the operations of a Federal Agency is one of the exemptions), the NIAID denied my expedited request. Essentially, it was a slap to my face and the face of RedState, stating that neither I nor RedState amounted to “real journalism.” Additionally, they stated that we would likely have to pay for the information because they had yet to make a determination on our fee waiver request.
NIAID Letter 1, Page 1NIAID Letter 1, Page 2NIAID Letter 2, Page 1NIAID Letter 2, Page 2
The NIAID FOIA Department then approached me about “narrowing” my request, stating that it was “too broad,” despite focusing the search on specific keywords and people. They have now requested twice that I remove certain people from my request, which I have refused to do. Additionally, the information I have requested, for the most part, is digital. That means that any “hands-on” searching for the requested information is significantly reduced.
Imagine my surprise when they told me it would be over a year before I could expect the return of my requested information. While I certainly understand that a department that handles information on the biggest pandemic in a century, might be overwhelmed currently, denying me an expedited request amounts to petty retaliation for my journalistic work.
As a result, I then FOIA’d information regarding the sale of the stock and the public affairs campaign launched at the CDC, against the evidence that suggests favorable treatment in the awarding of the grant to Walensky’s company. Expecting another FOIA fight, I made direct efforts to ensure that my request was as clear as possible.
In the days following my request, I received a letter from the CDC, which surprised me. Not only were they granting both my expediting request, but they also granted the fee waiver on my request. The person with whom I have been in contact at the CDC was nothing but professional, courteous, and direct, which allowed me to focus my search within the CDC records. This person didn’t question why I requested the information I had requested (like the NIAID did), nor did they show any bias (you know… by stating we weren’t a real media organization). After trading a few emails and some pleasant phone calls, I was told I would have my information in a few weeks.
CDC Letter, Page 1CDC Letter, Page 2
Two FOIAS, Two federal agencies within the HHS, two completely different results. How could the CDC grant our expediting and fee waiver, while the NIAID denied it? The old adage, “If you’re getting flak, you’re over the target,” appears to be true in this case. My requests were virtually identical. The only difference, according to the information I have received, is that while the CDC request has the potential of making a few people uncomfortable, my NIAID request has the potential of destroying not only the legacy of Dr. Anthony Fauci and his flying monkey minions but also the accompanying narrative which the left has weaponized to label lockdown/mask/vaccine opponents as terrorists.
I sent my CDC determination letter to the NIAID to appeal their garbage expediting and fee waiver decision. At the time of publishing this article, no response has been received.
I will continue to update you on this issue as more information comes to light…. even if it is in a year when I get my FOIA’d information back from the NIAID. Hopefully, they see the light, expedite my request, and get me my information back much sooner than that.
A new study has found that mean IQ scores of young children born during the pandemic have tumbled by as much as 22 points while verbal, motor and cognitive performance have all suffered as a result of lockdown.
“With limited stimulation at home and less interaction with the world outside, pandemic-era children appear to have scored shockingly low on tests designed to assess cognitive development,” reports the Guardian.
The study was conducted by researchers at Brown University and included 672 children born both before and after the pandemic began in March 2020.
“In the decade preceding the pandemic, the mean IQ score on standardised tests for children aged between three months and three years of age hovered around 100, but for children born during the pandemic that number tumbled to 78,” the study found.
Researchers concluded that the primary reason for the impairment on cognitive functioning was lack of stimulation and interaction at home.
According to lead study author Sean Deoni, “The ability to course-correct becomes smaller, the older that child gets,” meaning that this inferior foundation is likely to impact the child throughout adolescence and into adulthood.
As Michael Curzon notes, all of these factors were exacerbated by lockdown measures which kept babies and young children away from other children, as well as mask mandates.
“Children born over the past year of lockdowns – at a time when the Government has prevented babies from seeing elderly relatives and other extended family members, from socialising at parks or with the children of their parent’s friends, and from studying the expressions on the faces behind the masks of locals in indoor public spaces – have significantly reduced verbal, motor and overall cognitive performance compared to children born before, according to a new U.S. study. Tests on early learning, verbal development and non-verbal development all produced results that were far behind those from the years preceding the lockdowns.”
The study was conducted in the state of Rhode Island and included predominantly white children.
The fate of poorer children from less affluent socio-economic backgrounds, most of whom will be non-white, is likely to be significantly worse.
However, don’t expect many leftists, who in general have vehemently supported draconian lockdowns, to care much about that.
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy on Sunday called for the Biden administration to be investigated over its handling of the Afghanistan withdrawal after the Taliban retook the country in a matter of days.
McCarthy, a Republican from California, told Punchbowl News Sunday that President Joe Biden’s decision to fully withdraw before Sept. 11 was a “mistake that will haunt us for decades,” and that pulling out during the summer was wrong because that is “when [the Taliban is] at their height.”
He called for congressional probes into the administration and the intelligence community regarding what they knew in the weeks and months before Afghanistan’s government fell.
“How does the rest of the world look at us?” McCarthy added. “They like that the president doesn’t tweet, but they don’t think America is very tough.”
Biden announced that 1,000 additional troops would be temporarily deployed to Kabul, the Afghan capital, to assist with evacuating American personnel. Some were reportedly trapped in the city Sunday as the Taliban seized it and Ashraf Ghani, the country’s democratically-elected president, fled to Uzbekistan.
Biden defended his decision in a lengthy, sharply-worded statement Sunday.
“Over our country’s 20 years at war in Afghanistan, America has sent its finest young men and women, invested nearly $1 trillion, trained over 300,000 Afghan soldiers and police, equipped them with state-of-the-art military equipment, and maintained their air force as part of the longest war in U.S. history,” he said. “One more year, or five more years, of U.S. military presence would not have made a difference if the Afghan military cannot or will not hold its own country. And an endless American presence in the middle of another country’s civil conflict was not acceptable to me.”
His administration has also tried to deflect blame to former President Donald Trump, who negotiated terms of withdrawal with the Taliban and originally called on Biden to withdraw faster. Trump, along with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, has joined the chorus of Republicans blasting Biden for the botched withdrawal.
