1 big thing: Biden's stain  —  Rarely has an American president's predictions been so wrong, so fast, so convincingly as President Biden on Afghanistan.  — Usually military operations and diplomacy are long; the outcomes, foggy.  Not here.  —  Just five weeks ago, President Biden assured Americans …

Taliban enter Kabul, await ‘peaceful transfer’ of power  —  KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Taliban fighters entered Kabul on Sunday and sought the unconditional surrender of the central government, officials said, as Afghans and foreigners alike raced for the exit, signaling the end …

Taliban Enter Kabul as Panic Spreads in Afghanistan's Capital  —  Mass evacuations of Western diplomats and civilians under way, with insurgents preparing to assume power  —  KABUL—Taliban fighters on Sunday entered Kabul, freeing inmates at the city's main prison and triggering a massive effort …

Afghanistan Live Updates: Taliban Advances on Kabul; U.S. Evacuation Accelerates  —  The insurgents, after seizing control of the eastern city of Jalalabad, encircled the Afghan capital.  A senior American official said key diplomatic staff had been moved to a compound at the airport.

Biden's Betrayal of Afghans Will Live in Infamy  —  There's plenty of blame to go around for the 20-year debacle in Afghanistan—enough to fill a library of books.  Perhaps the effort to rebuild the country was doomed from the start.  But our abandonment of the Afghans who helped us …

Terrorist threat to U.S. levels up after Taliban rise, Joint Chiefs chair says  —  Afghanistan has fallen to the Taliban much faster than President Biden or his top military leaders predicted.

A frenzied flight from Kabul as the U.S. evacuation accelerates.  —  KABUL, Afghanistan — As the Taliban stood at the gates of Kabul, completing the near total takeover of Afghanistan two decades after the American military drove them from power, a chaotic and frenzied evacuation of U.S. diplomats …

Afghanistan updates: US Embassy says to avoid airport because it's taking fire  —  Taliban militants were ordered into Kabul, President Ghani has left Afghanistan.  —  Taliban militants have been ordered to enter Kabul, following earlier assurances by Taliban officials that they do not intend to take Afghanistan's capital by force

POLITICO Playbook: How the White House wants to spin the fall of Kabul  —  DRIVING THE DAY  —  President JOE BIDEN, July 8: “The Taliban is not ... the North Vietnamese army. ...  There's going to be no circumstance where you see people being lifted off the roof of ... the United States from Afghanistan.

All Biden Had to Do Was...Nothing  —  All Joe Biden had to do was nothing.  Had Joe Biden done nothing, Afghanistan would not have fallen to the Taliban today.  Had he just let the status quo continue, the status quo would have continued.  Afghanistan would have plodded along and we would have kept …

How America Failed in Afghanistan  —  The New Yorker staff writer Steve Coll on the humanitarian catastrophe that is now likely to engulf Afghan civilians.  —  On Sunday, as the Taliban entered Kabul—the last remaining major Afghan city not under the group's control—the President of the country …