The Patriot Post® · Thursday Short Cuts

Insight: “Censors are infused with the sentiment of moral indignation — a dangerous and misleading sentiment because, by blinding those who voice it to the real reasons for their indignation, it makes them puppets whose fears can be manipulated for ends and purposes they do not foresee or intend.” —Carey McWilliams (1905-1980)

Fact-check: True: “Nothing in Joe Biden’s lifetime of government experience suggests that he’d be any better at executive leadership than he’s proven to be. He enjoyed a half-century of privileged service as a U.S. senator and vice president, with stature and influence but zero personal accountability for any decision he’s ever made. He’s a 78-year-old rookie.” —Jack DeVine

For the record: “We went from 15,000 troops to 2,500 troops and we still had order in Afghanistan. There’s almost triple that number of American forces on the ground now and there’s complete chaos. So when someone asks ‘could you have maintained this?’ My response is ‘for six months after the agreement was signed we didn’t get a single American killed. We didn’t have a single Taliban attack on an American.’” —former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo

Non compos mentis: “I trust his judgment.” —House Speaker Nancy Pelosi regarding Biden’s Afghanistan debacle

Dezinformatsiya: “This is the best run evacuation from a war America lost. Vietnam was much worse including the killing of American soldiers who were helping the evacuation and whose bodies were left behind in a Saigon hospital.” —MSNBC’s Lawrence O'Donnell

Grand delusions I: “President Biden has defied expectations and exceeded even his own administration’s goal in successfully ramping up evacuations from Afghanistan.” —Democratic National Committee

Grand delusions II: “[Biden] was dealt a horrible situation and as of today, he’s done an extremely good job in this situation. … I actually think the president, for what he was dealt and what he’s done over the course of the last week, should be congratulated on the way this was done. … And he’s the first president in four presidents to actually get done what the American people wanted done in Afghanistan, which was get out.” —political commentator Matthew Dowd

Non sequitur: “Republicans Are Weaponizing Afghanistan Chaos to Get Ahead in 2022.” —Vanity Fair’s Eric Lutz “A more accurate headline would be ‘TALIBAN WEAPONIZING WEAPONS HANDED TO THEM BY BIDEN.’” —Ben Shapiro)

Huh? “Follow these important hurricane preparedness tips from CDC: … Get a COVID-19 vaccine as soon as you can.” —CDC's National Center for Environmental Health

And last… “The President needs to clearly and firmly state the United States will stay as long as it takes and use whatever force is necessary to ensure we do not abandon our people or our friends. But he keeps paying more attention to arbitrary timetables than to reality.” —Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell