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CONTEXT

A compilation of quotations on a variety of issues by national, state and regional writers, well-known personalities, just plain everyday people and from various publications collected by the editors of THE ADVANCE.

Quotes for our Times:

Greg Gutfeld, host of Gutfeld! and cohost of The Five: Our leaders botched the Afghanistan withdrawal, they were too busy destroying the US.

I'm not bashing the decision to leave. It’s how the atrocious exit negated so much sacrifice. This is truly a man-made disaster. In Biden’s speech yesterday he defiantly defended his botched exit. As if we were critical of leaving. But we weren’t. We were critical of his incompetence in carrying it out.

Judith Miller, Fox News contributor, author, and Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter formerly with The New York Times: Biden's Afghan debacle is devastating. It's been made worse because he won't own his mistakes.

Reasonable people can disagree about whether the U.S. should have kept at least a modest troop presence in Afghanistan for the foreseeable future to prevent a Taliban takeover. But Biden himself is to blame for the disaster sparked by the manner of his withdrawal.

His decision to send 6,000 more soldiers to the country reflects recognition of that error, and of his failure to plan adequately for the evacuation of the 18,000 Afghans (with their 57,000 family members) who worked with the American military.

John Stossel, author of 'Give Me a Break: How I Exposed Hucksters, Cheats, and Scam Artists and Became the Scourge of the Liberal Media': Silenced!

The U.S. military is highly skilled at NEO [Noncombatant Evacuation Operation — 'the departure of civilian noncombatants and nonessential military personnel from danger in an overseas country to a designated safe haven … ']. Even a NEO involving an area as large as Afghanistan could have been planned and prepared in 30 to 45 days if the Joint Chiefs of Staff had coordinating power and the State Department arranged for temporary refugee housing in third-country safe havens. The decision to withdraw from the huge air base at Bagram was utterly stupid, at least until threatened Afghans were extracted.

Matt Vespa, Senior Editor at Townhall. com: Why one ex-CIA agent says we could enter one of the most dangerous times in history post-Afghanistan.

Strong leadership is required to keep the US level and there is no way Biden could handle China and Russia and terror groups challenging American power. Biden can barely handle evacuating the US Embassy staff out of Kabul. The man gave some remarks about how he was awesome in Afghanistan and how it’s everyone else’s fault…and then goes back on vacation? He can’t do the job. And if I were America’s enemies, I’d be plotting perpetually. This guy will never be able to handle the pressure. He’s already on the verge of stroking out.