A Bad Poster posted:

A brilliant idea that would gain him 0 votes.

quote:

U.S. military officials publicly touted the August 22, 2008, Azizabad raid – Operation Commando Riot – as a victory. A high-value Taliban target had been killed; the collateral damage was minimal; the village was grateful.

None of it was true.

The Taliban commander escaped. Dozens of civilians were dead in the rubble, including as many as 60 children. The local population rioted.

It remains one of the deadliest civilian casualty events of the Afghan campaign. But the story of how the operation turned tragic has been largely hidden from the public.

USA TODAY spent more than a year investigating the Azizabad raid and sued the Department of Defense to obtain almost 1,000 pages of investigative files previously kept secret because it had been deemed “classified national security information.” The records included photographs of the destruction in Azizabad and sworn testimony from the U.S. forces who planned and executed the operation.

USA TODAY also obtained Afghan government records, evidence collected by humanitarian groups, including the Red Cross, and a confidential United Nations investigation into the incident.

In addition, a reporter traveled to western Afghanistan to interview government officials, investigators, first responders, witnesses and the villagers who survived.

Together, the records and interviews tell the story of a disaster that was months in the making as military and company officials ignored warnings about the men they had hired to provide intelligence and security. The records also reveal that the Defense Department has for years downplayed or denied the fatal mistakes surrounding the tragedy.

The problems began in 2007 when ArmorGroup, a private security company working on a Pentagon subcontract, hired two local warlords on the U.S. intelligence payroll to provide armed guards at an airfield on the western edge of Afghanistan.

Those warlords fought each other for control of the weapons and money ArmorGroup was giving out. The tangle of espionage and tribal infighting eventually drew in the very same military units that had helped empower the warlords in the first place.

The breakdowns in the U.S. military intelligence machine culminated with the raid itself. Some troops were never warned of Azizabad’s civilian population, and the special operation commanders who did know unleashed devastating force from the air anyway. Ground troops directed an American gunship to demolish house after house where at least one insurgent took cover, without knowing who else was inside.

FrozenVent posted:

Christ proposing open office on the eve of 2020.

Talk about being out of touch.

hobbesmaster posted:

https://twitter.com/mikebloomberg/status/1211781268922359810?s=21

Brilliant, all foreign intelligence has to do is constantly call the White House press office and they’ll hear every classified conversation in the background!

Bored As gently caress posted:

Hahahhahahahhahahahha this stupid gently caress.

People like having their own space and some semblance of privacy, you loving dickhead.

Not to mention the obvious OPSEC poo poo as stated above.

Godholio posted:

I don't think he really expects/intends to win. He's a spoiler to keep the liberals out.

A Bad Poster posted:

So what you're saying is, Michael Bloomberg has $400 million to cause another 9/11 which will get him elected, eh

Kesper North posted:

Boomers willl love it. Bloomberg Analytica says so!

Nissan chairman Carlos Ghosn has fled his house arrest in Tokyo, turning up in Lebanon.

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/12/30/ousted-renault-nissan-boss-carlos-ghosn-violates-house-arrest-in-tokyo-lands-in-lebanon-reports-say.html

Flying_Crab posted:

Kesper North posted:

Boomers willl love it. Bloomberg Analytica says so!

Nissan chairman Carlos Ghosn has fled his house arrest in Tokyo, turning up in Lebanon.

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/12/30/ousted-renault-nissan-boss-carlos-ghosn-violates-house-arrest-in-tokyo-lands-in-lebanon-reports-say.html

sharknado slashfic posted:

I come from a blue collar family, and have worked mostly blue collar or service jobs in my life, and...Joe I gotta disagree that -literally anyone- who can shovel coal can learn to code.

Best Friends posted:

I'm sometimes considered a smart guy irl and have a couple degrees in what could be considered smart guy fields, and through some cosmic accident I even used to actually work for a major tech company occasionally adding some (bad) code to production. Despite that, all my attempts at learning to program for real have ended in ruin. I can't hack it.

Also lol at the idea that if someone does know how to code they just hand you a job now, let alone one that pays decently. It's not 1995 (except in Joe Biden's mind, forever)

GoGoGadget posted:

Will Trump be getting his own Benjamin Ghazi?

Comrade Blyatlov posted:

Nope

Thanks Killary

Smiling Jack posted:

https://mobile.twitter.com/thestevennabil/status/1211952280074780674



oh poo poo

Edit: shiiiit

https://mobile.twitter.com/thestevennabil/status/1211950832645595137

ded posted:

It's the response to the US bombing Iran backed militias or w/e.

Smiling Jack posted:

Yup, Kataib Hezbollah members in the crowd. Along with several Iraqi government members.

bird food bathtub posted:

So we get to see the dumpy, orange fuckface on trial for 11 hours now right? It happened on his watch after all. Hell he's not even secretary of state, he's the guy in charge. Testify you poo poo head.

mlmp08 posted:

Guys, I bet this means republicans demand a multi-month investigation into the Secretary of State’s handling of embassy security!

Stravag posted:

Why do these people evade house arrest? Dont they pretty much just ask and go wherever? The one fucker only had to do jail on weekends and got time out to use his superbowl tickets ffs