Tag: Afghanistan

Lost Afghan Baby Reunited With Family

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Lost Afghan Baby Reunited With Family

Despite all the bad news coming out of Afghanistan there was some good news.

Lost Afghan Baby Reunited With Family

At long last, some happy news out of Afghanistan. After an agonizing five months a baby lost during the chaotic American military evacuation has been reunited with family members in Kabul.

By D. S. Mitchell

 

Left With A Soldier

On August 19th, 2021 thousands of people rushed the Kabul airport trying to leave Afghanistan, in the wake of the U.S military withdrawal. Anyone who was watching on television saw the chaos that unfolded.  After twenty years of military occupation America was pulling out. In the chaos of the evacuation the father of a then 2 month old boy, Sohail Ahmadi, left him in the care of an Afghan Republican soldier. The boy and soldier somehow, yet unclear, became separated.

A Taxi Pick Up

A taxi driver told social service officials and reporters from Reuter’s News Service that he had found the baby alone and crying, abandoned on the floor of the airport. By his report, the driver searched the area for the child’s family but was unsuccessful. On his wife’s advice the man took the baby home. The couple’s initial attempts to locate the parents of Sohail were unsuccessful. The couple gave him the name Mohammad Abed. “If we had not found his family then we would have protected and raised him as our own child,” the taxi driver Hamid Safi told news reporters.

Mournful Goodbye

Sohail’s father, Mirza Ali Ahmadi, said he searched for 3 days at the airport for his missing son. In utter despair he said, he finally boarded a plane to the United States with his wife and their four other children. Months after the departure,  with the help of social media channels, several emergency relief agencies and local police, the relatives of Sohail were tracked down in Kabul just last week. It was at that time the boy was handed over to his grandfather.  The grandfather was elated, telling reporters that Sohail will be cared for by his aunt until he can be cleared to join his parents in the United States.

Tears of Sadness, Tears of Joy

It was a sad goodbye for the taxi driver, his wife,  and their three daughters. Mrs. Taxi Driver, Safi’s wife Farima said, “I felt responsible for him like a mother. He used to wake up a lot at night. Now when I wake up he is not there and that makes me cry. I am a mother. I understand he will not be with us always and he needs to be with his parents,”

Sohail’s Father 

‘We were in a bad condition these past five plus months,” Sohail’s  father reported, after they had had a video reunion, “but now that our son has been found we are happy,”  The case of Sohail Ahmadi has a happy ending, but for many other children separated from their families in a war torn world this outcome is rare and we should celebrate it.

Kaill McNeil Alter-Narratives 8/27/21

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ALTER-NARRATIVES

By Kaill McNeil

When, if ever, is war a good thing?

 

What Is War Good For?

 

Ideal World

One hears a lot about a perfect world, even in the political arena. Much of progressive philosophy is based on it. Working on progressing society to the way they wish it could be. Conservatives, on the other hand, are more likely to see things in terms of cold, hard reality, while also having little to no imagination on bettering the lot of mankind. Somewhere between these two extremes are what could be called ‘moderates.’ Neither caught in the mire of human filth, or off with the fairies, these folks are more able to see the forest for the trees. Particularly when it comes to things like military engagement.

War, What Is It Good For?

“War, what is it good for? Absolutely nothin,’” according to the song. Edwin Starr apparently keen to be speaking Japanese. A nearly sure outcome of the Japanese campaign of WWII if the U.S. had not entered into the war.  One of Japan’s major targets being the west coast of the United States. There might not be good wars, but there are necessary ones. A fact recent generations have lost sight of due to the baby boomer experience in Vietnam and the more recent invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, which were more about political face saving.

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Ethics, No Worries

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Ethics, No Worries

D. S. Mitchell

Dog Ownership

It was 10:00 in the morning before the rain stopped.  My dog, Lily, had become quite irritated with me by this time. I had refused to endure a downpour to take her for her ritual 7:30 am walk and instead had pushed her butt out the door to do her business in the yard.  These are the kind of things that start slowly, and before you know it, the dog is in charge. I should probably resume reruns of The Dog Whisperer.

Just The Headlines

Political news and world news are sharing a lot of media space today.  Please, humor me dear reader, as I write a couple of paragraphs for the Calamity Politics blog site for each breaking story, rather than focus on a specific topic of political investigation and analysis.

1.) Bill O’Reilly: Settlements payments totaling $13,000,000 paid over a decade were exposed this week. Those payments, disguised with some bookkeeping trickery kept the payments secret from the public, the FCC and Fox shareholders. The revelation cost Bill O’Reilly his job. A Murdock spokesman announced that Bill O’Reilly had been fired.

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RUMBLINGS AND GRUMBLINGS

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Rumblings And Grumblings

D. S. Mitchell

FOREIGN POLICY

The dog has been walked. My Dinner is the remainder of my Cobb Salad, from lunch. I’m waiting for The Rachel Maddow Show to end. Dan Rather is giving an interesting interview, or I would just turn it off.

I worked on a long Calamity Politics blog post earlier today. The article focused primarily on the similarities between Donald Trump and Jared Kushner. What I want to do now, is drink an Irish Coffee, and get into the hot tub, and zone out.

But, I spend 23 hours a day wound up, thinking about the wild, turbulent, U.S. political daily may lay, and have trouble unwinding. Like right now, I cannot forget that 59 Tomahawk missiles were launched at a Syrian airbase on April 7th, 2017 by United States naval forces, for a yet, undefined purpose. Each one of those Tomahawk missiles cost a million dollars.

Less than a week later, the American military dropped the “mother of all bombs,” or, a MOAB, on a set of ISIS tunnels and linked caves, in Afghanistan. So, back to the previous question. What is the purpose? Is there a thought out strategy? We killed 36 terrorists. How much did that bomb cost? I think I read that bitch cost 314 million dollars. That is about $85 million dollars per ISIS fighter.

On top of that, the Carl Vinson and its Pacific Command strike force are headed toward the Korean Peninsula. Where apparently, the 30 year old dictator of North Korea, is having a party to celebrate his Grand dad’s birthday, and possibly detonate a nuclear weapon.

The U.S. Vice President, Mike Pence, is headed to South Korea as the first stop on his Asian tour. Is that reassuring, or not? I mean, Pence being there. If there is going to be a conflagration, wouldn’t he want to stay away? Or, maybe they know that no one is going to push the button and start a war, so it’s okay for him to go, right?

What am I gonna do? I can’t just ignore this stuff. It’s my job to report on the political news. I think I’ll have that Irish Coffee, to start with. Good night.

Join the Resistance

Dar