If you listen to CBS when it comes to the new Afghanistan report released by the Biden Administration on the debacle of a withdrawal, you might think they had been red-pilled because their response to it was so true — and so scathing.
The “report” is a summary of two classified reports that the Biden team only turned over to Congress after a subpoena threat by House Foreign Affairs Committee Chair Michael McCaul (R-TX). That’s how little they think of our right to know about an issue so important — and how much they want to cover things up so it doesn’t come back and hit Joe Biden in the face as he considers whether to run again in 2024.
As I already reported, CBS’ Margaret Brennan was busting the Biden “Baghdad Bob” lies. But there was even more, such as in this report.
The father of a marine killed in the Kabul airport attack calls Biden's shameful attempt to rewrite history on the Afghanistan withdrawal an "insult."
"You're the President of the United States. The buck stops with you. It's your responsibility. Stop making excuses." pic.twitter.com/KuWp7PfaKD
— GOP (@GOP) April 7, 2023
McCaul said the Biden Administration owed answers to the American people and their families.
Marine Lance Corporal Jared Schmitz’s father, Mark Schmitz, said they deserved so much more than what they got in the report, and that the 12-page summary that was released “was an insult.” Schmitz said that the “buck stops” with Joe Biden, it’s his responsibility, and he should “stop making excuses.”
CBS’s Margaret Brennan pointed out how they dropped this on a holiday weekend, and there were no plans to give out any of the further details that were in the classified reports. She was asked, “Was there anything missing from this summary?” “Yes,” she replied, noting that they left out a July report showing the Taliban was making “rapid territorial gains” and recommending that the evacuation be sped up. So when they say now that they had no warning this shows that was just a lie — and they knew it. She also explains that they left out any reference to the dissent of the military to Biden’s withdrawal actions. Biden did this over the objections of his military commanders, Gen. Frank McKenzie, the commander of U.S. forces in the Middle East; Gen. Austin Scott Miller, who led NATO forces in Afghanistan; and Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. They likely knew what would happen with how Biden was doing it, yet he ignored their recommendations.
It wasn’t just Brennan who excoriated the Biden team. CBS Senior White House and political correspondent Ed O’Keefe blasted the Biden Administration’s attempt to “whitewash” the situation as well.
O’Keefe said the account blamed Trump, and they only acknowledged a mistake “once” in the ridiculously brief report — when it came to where they gunned down 10 civilians, mostly children, in a drone strike. “That is the one time we see the word ‘mistake’ on an incident in all of this,” he said.
“But it spends three and a half pages laying it out and saying it’s the Trump administration’s fault,” O’Keefe said.
“National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said they were going to do a ‘hot wash’, which is a fancy bureaucratic term for a deep dive into what went wrong. This 12 page document is a whitewash,” O’Keefe declared.
O’Keefe went on to further slam the shoddiness of the document.
“It is narrative. It is light on specifics. It’s devoid of citations. And it is, in essence, their version of events,” he said.
He also called it a “watered down, neutered cleansing” that was dropped on the “high holidays.”
They are of course right on the money. Now, it’s up to Congress to respond to this “whitewash” when they come back into session next week. The failure to take accountability for any of this is an insult to the American people, particularly those who died and their families.
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