Biden says he did not see a way to withdraw from Afghanistan without ‘chaos ensuing’  —  In an exclusive ABC News interview, Biden opens up on his decision to withdraw.  —  In an exclusive interview with ABC News' George Stephanopoulos, and the president's first since the fall of Afghanistan to the Taliban …

Security Alert: U.S. Embassy Kabul (August 18, 2021)  —  U.S. government-provided flights are departing.  U.S. citizens, LPRs, and their spouses and unmarried children (under age 21) should consider travelling to Hamid Karzai International Airport.   You should plan to enter the airport at Camp Sullivan.

The mujahideen resistance to the Taliban begins now.  But we need help.  —  Ahmad Massoud is the leader of the National Resistance Front of Afghanistan.  —  In 1998, when I was 9 years old, my father, the mujahideen commander Ahmad Shah Massoud, gathered his soldiers in a cave in the Panjshir Valley of northern Afghanistan.

Vaccines' protection against virus infection is waning, C.D.C. studies suggest.  —  The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released three studies on Wednesday that federal officials said provided evidence that booster shots of the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna coronavirus vaccines …

EXC: Joe Biden's State Dept Halted A Trump-Era ‘Crisis Response’ Plan Aimed At Avoiding Benghazi-Style Evacuations Just MONTHS Before Taliban Takeover.  —  Joe Biden's State Department moved to cancel a critical State Department program aimed at providing swift and safe evacuations of Americans …

How Pelosi is trying to jam the rebels threatening to tank Biden's agenda  —  Incredibly, the nine conservative Democrats who have been threatening to derail passage of President Biden's $3.5 trillion reconciliation bill are still at it.  They're still demanding a vote only on the bipartisan …

Biden to require nursing homes get staff vaccinated or lose federal funds  —  Surgeon general on Covid-19 boosters: The time is now  —  (CNN)The Biden administration will direct all nursing homes to require their staff be vaccinated against Covid-19 in order to continue receiving Medicare …

CIA's Former Counterterrorism Chief for the Region: Afghanistan, Not An Intelligence Failure — Something Much Worse  —  While it's certainly convenient to depict the shock and miscalculation U.S. officials claim over Afghanistan's tragic, rapid fall to the Taliban as an intelligence failure, the reality is far worse.

Kushner Friend Who Was Pardoned by Trump Is Charged in New York  —  Ken Kurson, the former editor of The New York Observer, has been charged with two felonies.  Prosecutors said he installed spyware on his former wife's computer in order to surveil her.  —  Seven months after he was pardoned …

Trump promoted vaccines on Fox.  Then the host goaded him into bashing boosters.  —  Wednesday was a big day in the fight against the coronavirus.  It's the day the U.S. government launched its campaign to get Americans to take booster shots for the vaccines, amid the increasingly challenging situation brought on by the delta variant.

Larry David ‘screamed’ at Alan Dershowitz at grocery store over Trump ties  —  It seems that Alan Dershowitz's ties to the Trump administration have made him persona non grata among the Martha's Vineyard elite — including Larry David.  —  A Page Six spy spotted the Harvard Law professor …

Israeli data: How can efficacy vs. severe disease be strong when 60% of hospitalized are vaccinated?  —  A surge involving the rapidly-transmitting Delta variant in heavily vaccinated countries has led to much hand-wringing that the vaccines are not effective against Delta, or vaccine efficacy wanes after 4-6 months.

Socialist Publication Current Affairs Fires Staff for Doing Socialism  —  “We were fired by the editor-in-chief of a socialist magazine for trying to start a worker co-op,” five fired staffers wrote in a letter posted on Tuesday.  —  Lauren Kaori Gurley  —  Nathan J. Robinson …

“A Smile With Sharp Teeth”: Mike Richards's Rise to ‘Jeopardy!’  Host Sparks Questions About His Past  —  The ‘Jeopardy!’ host search is finally over.  New reporting reveals that concerns about Richards and the show's selection process remain.  —  One day in the fall of 2013, Mike Richards called Ken Jennings.

Latest Polls Of The California Recall Election  —  Voters will decide whether to remove Gov. Gavin Newsom and — if removed — whom to replace him with  —  Opponents of Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom of California have gathered enough signatures to trigger a recall election for him on Sept. 14 …

The U.S. could be on the verge of a productivity boom, a game-changer for the economy  —  Rapid adoption of robots and artificial intelligence during the pandemic combined with a rebound in government investment is making some economists optimistic about a return of a 1990s economy with widespread benefits

The Biden administration will use a federal civil rights office to deter states from banning universal masking in classrooms.  —  The Biden administration, escalating its fight with Republican governors who are blocking local school districts from requiring masks to protect against the coronavirus …

The GOP is losing the PR battle on coronavirus mandates  —  The Republican Party has rather clearly marched itself into a minority position  —  Early in the coronavirus pandemic, mitigation was by and large a consensus issue.  To be sure, there were those who balked at or even fought masking …