‘The remaining mission,’ whatever that is

benfell

Afghanistan

Army General Austin “Scott” Miller is out and “the remaining mission,” whatever that is, in addition to the troops guarding the U.S. Embassy in Kabul, will apparently be run out of Central Command. And your guess might well be better than mine as to why that Embassy guard in a landlocked country will be run by the Navy.[1]

Marine Gen. Kenneth “Frank” McKenzie, the chief of U.S. Central Command, arrived Monday morning in Kabul to assume command of the remaining mission. He is expected to oversee the small-scale operation from his headquarters in Tampa, with a two-star Navy SEAL, Rear Adm. Peter Vasely, leading about 650 troops tasked with protecting the U.S. Embassy.[2]

Dan Lamothe, “Top U.S. commander in Afghanistan steps down, marking a symbolic end to 20 years of war,” Washington Post, July 12, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2021/07/12/last-us-general-afghanistan/

White supremacy

Chas Danner, “Charlottesville Finally Removes Confederate Statues,” New York, July 10, 2021, https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/07/charlottesville-removes-confederate-statues-photos-videos.html

Erin Edgerton, “George Rogers Clark statue at UVa removed,” Charlottesville Daily Progress, July 11, 2021, https://dailyprogress.com/photos-george-rogers-clark-statue-at-uva-removed/collection_0000b42a-e260-11eb-aceb-cbc2b676ebc1.html

Pandemic

Nathan Jeffay, “In world first, COVID boosters rolled out for some at-risk Israelis,” Times of Israel, July 12, 2021, https://www.timesofisrael.com/in-world-first-covid-boosters-rolled-out-for-some-at-risk-israelis/

Virginia Military Institute

Ian Shapira, “Derision, misogyny, sexual assault: VMI women face attacks on campus and online,” Washington Post, July 12, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2021/07/12/vmi-women-sex-assault-misogyny/

Ageism

Douglas Heingartner, “Older job seekers on LinkedIn get fewer job offers, but a younger profile photo helps,” Psych News Daily, July 11, 2021, https://www.psychnewsdaily.com/older-job-seekers-on-linkedin-get-fewer-job-offers-but-younger-profile-photo-helps/

Voting rights

This[3] is an encore performance.[4] The Texas Democrats are flying to Washington, D.C., to press for Congressional action.[5]

Elizabeth Findell, “Texas Democrats to Stage Walkout to Kill Voting Bill,” Wall Street Journal, July 12, 2021, https://www.wsj.com/articles/texas-democrats-to-stage-walk-out-to-kill-voting-bill-11626110179

Jane C. Timm, “Texas Democrats flee state in effort to block GOP-backed voting restrictions,” NBC News, July 12, 2021, https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/elections/texas-democrats-flee-state-effort-block-gop-backed-voting-restrictions-n1273667

Bill Cosby

Among those celebrating [Bill Cosby’s] release, though, was the actress Phylicia Rashad, who played Clair Huxtable on The Cosby Show. In response to the news, Rashad tweeted: “FINALLY!!!! A terrible wrong is being righted – a miscarriage of justice is corrected!”

Her tweet was met with outrage, with many pointing out that her blatant disregard for survivors was especially galling given that she had recently been named a dean of the College of Fine Arts at Howard University. Yet for those with experience with historically Black colleges and universities, and how those institutions treat survivors of sexual assault, nothing about the incident came as a shock.[6]

It seems that historically Black colleges and universities, like Howard University, have a poor reputation for addressing rape and sexual assault survivors’ complaints, in part because they don’t want Black men going to prison.[7] Which is to say that while Nikole Hannah-Jones may have dodged[8] the racism that delayed a vote to grant her tenure at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill,[9] she’s walked into a different hornets’ nest on sexual assault and rape.[10]

Clarissa Brooks, “Phylicia Rashad Is Just the Beginning,” Cut, July 12, 2021, https://www.thecut.com/2021/07/what-phylicia-rashads-cosby-tweet-says-about-hbcus.html

Donald Trump

If Lin Wood[11] and Rudy Giuliani[12] are subject to discipline for entirely fraudulent election claims, it follows that a bunch of other lawyers should be too. There’s a pissed off judge who just might make that happen.[13]

Josh Gerstein, “Lawyers retreat from pro-Trump election suit,” Politico, July 12, 2021, https://www.politico.com/news/2021/07/12/lawyers-pro-trump-suit-499252

Wilkinsburg

WTAE, “Wilkinsburg pumps brakes on merger with city of Pittsburgh,” July 12, 2021, https://www.wtae.com/article/wilkinsburg-pumps-brakes-on-merger-with-city-of-pittsburgh/37002738

Billionaire space race

Erik Shilling, “Richard Branson Didn’t Go To Space,” Jalopnik, July 12, 2021, https://jalopnik.com/richard-branson-didnt-go-to-space-1847274538

  1. [1]Dan Lamothe, “Top U.S. commander in Afghanistan steps down, marking a symbolic end to 20 years of war,” Washington Post, July 12, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2021/07/12/last-us-general-afghanistan/↩
  2. [2]Dan Lamothe, “Top U.S. commander in Afghanistan steps down, marking a symbolic end to 20 years of war,” Washington Post, July 12, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2021/07/12/last-us-general-afghanistan/↩
  3. [3]Elizabeth Findell, “Texas Democrats to Stage Walkout to Kill Voting Bill,” Wall Street Journal, July 12, 2021, https://www.wsj.com/articles/texas-democrats-to-stage-walk-out-to-kill-voting-bill-11626110179; Jane C. Timm, “Texas Democrats flee state in effort to block GOP-backed voting restrictions,” NBC News, July 12, 2021, https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/elections/texas-democrats-flee-state-effort-block-gop-backed-voting-restrictions-n1273667↩
  4. [4]Stephen Collinson, “Revolt by Texas Democrats heaps pressure on Washington to act on voting reform,” CNN, June 1, 2021, https://www.cnn.com/2021/06/01/politics/texas-democrats-voting-reform-pressure/index.html↩
  5. [5]Jane C. Timm, “Texas Democrats flee state in effort to block GOP-backed voting restrictions,” NBC News, July 12, 2021, https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/elections/texas-democrats-flee-state-effort-block-gop-backed-voting-restrictions-n1273667↩
  6. [6]Clarissa Brooks, “Phylicia Rashad Is Just the Beginning,” Cut, July 12, 2021, https://www.thecut.com/2021/07/what-phylicia-rashads-cosby-tweet-says-about-hbcus.html↩
  7. [7]Clarissa Brooks, “Phylicia Rashad Is Just the Beginning,” Cut, July 12, 2021, https://www.thecut.com/2021/07/what-phylicia-rashads-cosby-tweet-says-about-hbcus.html↩
  8. [8]Lauren Lumpkin and Nick Anderson, “Nikole Hannah-Jones to join Howard faculty after UNC tenure controversy,” Washington Post, July 6, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2021/07/06/howard-nikole-hannah-jones-tanehisi-coates/↩
  9. [9]Jon Allsop, “On NHJ, UNC, and CRT,” Columbia Journalism Review, June 25, 2021, https://www.cjr.org/the_media_today/nikole_hannah_jones_unc_tenure.php; Sarah Brown, “Race on Campus: The Racial Climate at UNC,” Chronicle of Higher Education, July 6, 2021, https://www.chronicle.com/newsletter/race-on-campus/2021-07-06; Jack Stripling, “‘What the Hell Happened?,’” Chronicle of Higher Education, June 11, 2021, https://www.chronicle.com/article/what-the-hell-happened; Jack Stripling, “‘Look Us in the Eye,’” Chronicle of Higher Education, July 1, 2021, https://www.chronicle.com/article/look-us-in-the-eye↩
  10. [10]Clarissa Brooks, “Phylicia Rashad Is Just the Beginning,” Cut, July 12, 2021, https://www.thecut.com/2021/07/what-phylicia-rashads-cosby-tweet-says-about-hbcus.html↩
  11. [11]David Cohen, “Georgia State Bar seeking to discipline Lin Wood,” Politico, February 14, 2021, https://www.politico.com/news/2021/02/14/lin-wood-georgia-469015↩
  12. [12]Erica Orden, Veronica Stracqualursi, and Katelyn Polantz, “Rudy Giuliani suspended from practicing law in New York state,” CNN, June 24, 2021, https://www.cnn.com/2021/06/24/politics/rudy-giuliani-suspended-law/index.html; Jaclyn Diaz, “An Appeals Court Has Suspended Rudy Giuliani’s Ability To Practice Law In D.C.,” National Public Radio, July 8, 2021, https://www.npr.org/2021/07/08/1014047881/an-appeals-court-has-suspended-rudy-giulianis-ability-to-practice-law-in-d-c↩
  13. [13]Josh Gerstein, “Lawyers retreat from pro-Trump election suit,” Politico, July 12, 2021, https://www.politico.com/news/2021/07/12/lawyers-pro-trump-suit-499252↩

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