Texas Governor Greg Abbott has COVID

Sorry, but somebody has to lose their job for Afghanistan collapse, probably Cabinet-level

If the shoe was on the other foot, everybody here would be baying for heads to roll, and that's not "both-siderism."

State, DoD, somebody.

This has been completely bungled and mis-managed, and it's not OK.

And I agree with full withdrawal, but it needed to be managed properly, and it wasn't. At some point, the honorable thing to do is admit a colossal fuck up and turn in your keys.

On October 7, 2001, the United States and its Partners Began a Bombing Campaign against the Taliban

It's quite possible that the Taliban will commemorate the twentieth anniversary of that day in full control of Afghanistan.

Kabul - the Afghan capital - could literally fall to the Taliban on September 11, 2021, and that's probably an optimistic assessment.

We probably think too much in terms of "symbolism" when it comes to things like this, but good Lord the bookending here. Imagine if the Taliban "take" Kabul on 9/11.

Lollapalooza: The COVID Surge that Wasn't

We heard a lot about how Lollapalooza was a very foolish super spreader event, and that Lightfoot was extremely foolish to let it go on. We saw mocking posts of unmasked young people putting themselves at "extraordinary risk." Fake vaccine cards are being peddled in every alley of the Loop, we were told! How, how could they let it go on, we were asked.

Chicago would surely become the next COVID hotspot.

Two weeks later and, to put it simply, none of that seems to have come to pass.

To be sure, Chicago saw the same Delta surge profile on its curves as everyone else. But the curves on those graphs started before Lollapalooza and, if anything, have even somewhat flattened after Lollapalooza.There's even been a mild trending downward! Here's your Chicago Covid Dashboard: https://www.chicago.gov/city/en/sites/covid-19/home/covid-dashboard.html

And we have today, this, from today's Billboard article titled "Lollapalooza Wasn't a 'Super Spreader' Event, Say Chicago Health Officials":

fauci told (with apologies to e.e. cummings)

fauci told

him:he couldn’t
believe it(jesus

told him;he
wouldn’t believe
it)the

CDC
certainly told
him,and surgeon general
(yes

mam)
murthy
and even
(believe it
or

not)you
told him:i told
him;we told him
(he didn’t believe it,no

sir)it took
a Plastiflex bit of
the old auto

ventilator
tube;down the back of his throat;to tell

him

(The original, plato told, https://www.sccs.swarthmore.edu/users/01/jillyb/plato_told.htm )