On Biden, McAuliffe and Covid

 Biden – No Room Under the Bus

The View from the Middle

 

It didn’t take long for our top military leaders to start throwing people under the Afghan withdrawal bus, including our President Joe Biden.  Remember, back on August 18^th, George Stephanopoulos asked President Biden a very straight forward question.  George asked, “So no one told – your military advisors did not tell you, ‘No, we should keep 2,500 troops.  It’s been a stable situation for the last several years.  We can do that.  We can continue to do that?”  And the President answered, “No!  No one said that to me that I can recall.”

But in front of both the Senate and House Arm Services Committees all three of Joe Biden’s top military advisors testified that they had not only given the President that advice, but that he had heard it.  Generals Milley and McKenzie swore they had given that advice, and Secretary of Defense Austin confirmed that the President had heard it.  I’m sure Joe will stay in the Whitehouse basement until his staff comes up with a plausible, market tested line of BS to explain his answer, but it will not be easy given the nature of the question and answer.

Then, all three leaders basically admitted that all of the really tragic, poor decisions in Afghanistan were driven by troop level limitations that had been forced upon them by Joe Biden.  They said that Biden had limited them to 650 troops which wouldn’t allow them to keep control of the Bagram air base.  That was a huge strategic and tactical mistake.  General McKenzie also confirmed that the Taliban offered to give us complete control of the entire city of Kabul during the evacuation.  This would have made it American checkpoints that evacuees had to pass through and would have eliminated the chaos that resulted under Taliban control.  He, however, didn’t even consider it because it couldn’t be accomplished with the troop limitations given to him by the President.

Finally, when asked why they didn’t consider starting the civilian evacuation sooner, Secretary Austin threw the State Department under the bus to keep Joe company.  Austin simply said that the timing of the civilian withdrawal was a State Department decision.  Maybe this was all a way to avoid any accountability for the colossal failure that the withdrawal for Afghanistan was, but it certain is getting crowded under that bus!

 

McAuliffe – Parents, Shut Up and Get in Line!

The View from the Middle

 

The new definition for a “Freudian Slip” is when a politician accidently tells the truth to the public.  Well, Terry McAuliffe made a huge “foot-in-mouth” – “Freudian Slip” during Tuesday night’s gubernatorial debate in Virginia.  He actually said, “I don’t think parents should be telling schools what they should teach.”  There are several problems with that statement.  First, almost all parents in this country and particularly in Virginia, disagree with that idea.  The second problem is that McAuliffe sent his four kids to a $40,000 a year private school, where his wife chaired the trustee board AND he vetoed three bills that would have expanded school choice in the state of Virginia when he was last governor.

So, let me get this right.  McAuliffe has a “choice” as to where his kids go to school, and he and his wife have a huge impact on what is taught there, but he doesn’t want those same rights to apply to you and me or any other parent in Virginia.  That sounds a lot like “Rules for Thee, But Not for Me”.  My fear is that this is what the entire Democrat Party believes.  So, if you vote for these guys, get ready to “shut up and get in line!”

 

Politicians Will Take Credit for Covid Trends

The View from the Middle

 

Here’s some good news on the Covid-19 front.  According to the Washington Post daily Covid tracker, cases, hospitalizations and deaths are all going down across the country.  Through yesterday’s results, cases are down 12.7%, hospitalizations are down 9.4% and deaths are down 4.7%.  Cases have been going down steadily for almost a month now. 

I tell you this for three reasons.  First, all the college football games have not turned out to be the “super-spreader” events that fearmongers have promised, so be responsible, but go out and enjoy life.  Second, these results could not have been caused by the vaccine mandates that are being forced on the public by our politicians.  This positive direction began before any vaccine mandate was issued.

Finally, I want to warn you that politicians will try to take credit for this recent (and I hope final) decline by claiming that the vaccine mandates caused it.  You need to remember that is NOT true.  This decline predates any mandate.  However, here is the politicians’ plan.  If they are always doing something – anything, then when this virus finally goes away (nothing lasts forever) then they can claim credit for something that was going to happen anyway.  That’s a very sophisticated form of lying, but then again, that’s what they are really good at!