Who in the hell send their children to the hell hold, when the US State Dept issued travel warnings starting in March.

At least 24 students from the Cajon Valley Union School District in El Cajon and 16 parents are stranded in Afghanistan after taking a summer trip abroad.

They are among thousands of individuals waiting to leave the country amid political unrest caused by the U.S. military pullout after 20 years of occupation. The U.S. government is accelerating efforts to rescue Americans as the Taliban takes over the country.

Cajon Valley Supt. David Miyashiro told school district board members via text message Tuesday that he and other Cajon Valley staff met virtually with U.S. Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Bonsall) and his staff about the situation.

Miyashiro said that the families are on special visas for U.S. military service and that the Department of Defense considers them allies. He said that the district was able to provide information on the families and that government officials are working to locate the children and their families. He said he was encouraged by the assistance.

[link:https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2021-08-24/students-from-cajon-valley-school-district-stranded-in-afghanistan?utm_id=36108&sfmc_id=4509190|]

In case you missed it


A group of 169 Americans were airlifted from a hotel outside the Kabul airport on Thursday, Pentagon spokesman John Kirby confirmed to reporters Friday, one of a very limited number of actions that U.S. troops have undertaken outside of the Hamid Karzai International Airport walls since a contingent of 6,000 began deploying last week.

[link:https://www.marinecorpstimes.com/flashpoints/afghanistan/2021/08/20/inside-the-mission-to-rescue-169-americans-from-a-hotel-outside-the-kabul-airport/|]

[link:https://twitter.com/i/status/1429446406343888900|]

Biden and his team have clearer memories of the long litany of egregious and crippling missteps America’s leaders made during the first years of this century than do their critics

In world affairs, first impressions can be misleading. Soviet and American generals were photographed toasting the triumph of a great alliance in 1945 but in the blinking of an eye the Cold War was underway and we were great enemies. Crowds pressed against the U.S. embassy gates as Saigon fell and America lost a long, bloody war mere decades before Vietnam embraced a market economy and became a top tourist destination for Americans.

Statues are toppled, regimes collapse, city squares are thronged with tens of thousands of people demanding change, “Mission Accomplished” moments occur, and yet what follows is not what the pundits caught up in the drama and imagery of individual events predict. With time, members of the Biden administration anticipate, we will come to see the events of the past week very differently.

In fact, with perspective, we may well come to see their exit from Afghanistan as part of a major, generational, foreign policy reset. In fact, if events unfold consistent with the president’s vision, this moment will be seen as a watershed in a return to American global leadership after two decades of misguided, erratic, damaging foreign policy in the wake of 9/11.





[link:https://www.thedailybeast.com/biden-insiders-our-afghanistan-exit-is-a-part-of-a-much-bigger-reset/body|]

Now we find out in 2001 he tried to surrender all Taliban forces


[link:https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-taliban-leader-emerges-hunted-jailed-and-now-free-11629154710|]

if people want to get out, they should have been doing it . If we went back on the Trump agreement, we might have been thrusted back into the conflict.

The Right Wing NY Republicans must be choking on those words that Cuomo drove people away with high taxes, business regulations, guns, etc.

Upstate cities have been seeing growth in the past decade, reversing decades of decline. All told, New York State gained just over 400,000 people from 2010 to 2020. During that decade, New York City added over 600,000


Well, that fact seems to call the Right Wing Republican " bullshit myth" that the former Governor drove people away in droves. That NY high taxes and regulations turned people away. My county alone grew by 37,500 people. I hope ever Democrat in NY reminds people, NY has thrived even with the calamities from 911 to storms and flooding. NY Strong wasn't just the Governor saying it was what he led.

Lots of interesting facts, Yonkers is the next largest city, Westchester has a majority minority population


[link:https://www.lohud.com/story/news/local/new-york/2021/08/12/census-2020-new-york-population-diversity-changes/8105171002/|]

I gave up on my newspaper a couple of years ago after the delivery guy insisted throwing it in the driveway on the lawn, everywhere except the newspaper box.
Now I have to look on-line, sometimes even with smaller weekly's or the did you hear, to find out who passed.

This pass week 3 friends or acquaintances gone, those I know. It is the ones that died over a year ago the obit pops up, and you do the oh, no, no him...then you see it was last March. Many people don't do obits anymore because it costs over $100 to publish. Times sure changed from when we had obituary editors, at least a name showed up. Our historic society gathers local obits for those that might come looking sometime in the future.

A lot of memorials are now taking place, it's like reliving 2020 all over again.

I was coming home last night its was so bad I could barely see the east bank of the Hudson River, even the moon look like fire.

The sneezing and dryness is replaying allergy season. I hope we get a shower.



[link:https://pix11.com/news/local-news/hazy-nyc-skies-as-wildfire-smoke-from-west-coast-hovers-over-tri-state-area/|]

Source: new york times

The Vatican announced on Sunday that Pope Francis had been admitted to a hospital in Rome for colon surgery.

Matteo Bruni, a Vatican spokesman, said in a statement that Francis, 84, had been taken to the Gemelli hospital in the Italian capital. Mr. Bruni said the “scheduled surgery” would take place later on Sunday, and noted that a medical bulletin would be issued afterward. He said that the pope had “symptomatic diverticular stenosis of the colon.”

The surgery would be performed by Dr. Sergio Alfieri, who heads the hospital’s complex operational unit for digestive surgery, the Vatican said.

Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/04/world/europe/pope-francis-surgery.html

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I feel sorry for him, I've been plagued with the disease since my early 20's. I've had Multiple hospitalizations over the years, fortunately medications, iv's and bed rest can get it under control. When active, it can be excruciatingly painful. I had a reminder this past week, stay away from roughage (salads).