In the hot seat

A contentious congressional hearing on last month's chaotic Afghanistan withdrawal left the nation's top diplomat playing defense yesterday. Secretary of State Antony Blinken admitted that the Taliban is now "the de facto government of Afghanistan," a statement that marks the apparent end of a Western attempt to create a stable democracy in the war-weary country. "This is the product, alas, of one side getting the upper hand in a civil war," he told the House Committee on Foreign Affairs when asked if the Biden Administration recognized the Taliban as a legitimate government. "We made the right decision in ending America's longest war," he added. —CNBC

• — "We inherited a deadline. We did not inherit a plan." Blinken and some Democrats argued that the messy end to America's 20-year military presence in Afghanistan was inevitable, and pointed a finger at Donald Trump, who negotiated the full U.S. withdrawal in a 2020 deal he made exclusively with the Taliban. Unmoved, Republicans on the panel called the execution of the withdrawal a "disgrace" and "an unmitigated disaster" that leaves Americans vulnerable to future terrorist attacks. Blinken was told by at least three GOP members that he should resign. —USA Today
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• — Facing the Senate Foreign Relations Committee today, Blinken isn't faring much better. "The execution of the U.S. withdrawal was clearly and fatally flawed," Democratic Committee Chair Bob Menendez said in his opening remarks. "This committee expects to receive a full explanation of the administration's decisions on Afghanistan since coming into office last January. "There has to be accountability." Menendez also threatened to subpoena Defense Sec. Lloyd Austin if he doesn't agree to testify "in the near future." Holding members of your own party accountable…imagine that. —USA Today
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• — Meanwhile, the Pentagon continues to defend its last drone strike in Afghanistan, asserting that it was necessary to prevent an attack on American troops. The Aug. 29 strike reportedly killed Afghan aid worker Zemari Ahmadi. A New York Times investigation, which used witness interviews, security video, satellite imagery, blast analysis, and forensics, also suggests children in a car in a Kabul neighborhood may have been killed in the strike after being mistaken by the U.S. for ISIS. —The New York Times

Schneider: Defeating Covid will take collective sacrifice

"Our war in Afghanistan was launched after the terrorist attacks of 9/11. We lost more than 2,400 American service members in that 20-year war. Yet, today our war against COVID-19 sees that many American deaths in just two days. That is a staggering loss of life. … The sad and frustrating part is that we are all in this together. It is no longer enough for some of us to do the right thing, to sacrifice, to be responsible. The war against COVID-19 is not the war in Afghanistan. It's going to take all of us" —Jennifer Schneider in Hartford Courant

Jennifer Schneider is a political media consultant and a partner at Metro Square.

MORE: COVID-19 cases in American children are at an all-time high —The Economist

Twitter's off the hook

The Federal Election Commission has dismissed a claim by the Republican National Committee that Twitter violated election laws in the run-up to the 2020 presidential election. The social media platform prohibited users from posting links to a story published by the New York Post last October that contained alleged details of Hunter Biden's business dealings with a Ukrainian energy company. The story also claimed that Joe Biden met with an adviser of the company. Twitter said at the time that the story violated its existing "hacked materials" policy. The FEC agreed, concluding that Twitter's move was allowable because it was enacted with a valid commercial reason and not for a political purpose. —Reuters

MORE: Social media making political polarization worse —The Hill

Challenge to Texas abortion law

A Texas state judge issued an injunction yesterday blocking the pro-life group Texas Right for Life from enforcing the state's new abortion law against Planned Parenthood in Texas. The law bars abortions after six weeks of pregnancy, and incentivizes Texans to sue anyone suspected of helping a pregnant person obtain an abortion—by awarding at least $10,000 to plaintiffs who succeed. The injunction, which applies only to Texas Right for Life and its affiliates, prevents them from suing Planned Parenthood for possible violations of the abortion ban. Issued in Austin by Texas District Court Judge Karin Crump, the order will stay in effect until at least April 2022, when a trial on the merits of the case is expected. —Axios

MORE: Analysis: Texas and the U.S., lawyered up and ready to go to court —The Texas Tribune

Boland & Rudensky: You can't always judge a district by its shape

"Now that the 2020 Census data has been officially released, states will soon unveil new congressional and legislative maps. In many states, a lack of meaningful safeguards and single-party control of the process once again threaten to produce districts shaped by gerrymandering, which carves up communities based only on the partisan inclinations of each household. The public has an important role to play in pushing back against the practice, but it's important to understand that recognizing unfair maps means considering more than just the shapes of their districts." —Julia Boland & Yurij Rudensky on Brennan Center for Justice

Julia Boland is a research and program associate in the Democracy Program at the Brennan Center for Justice, where she focuses on redistricting and democracy reform. Yurij Rudensky serves as counsel in the Brennan Center's Democracy Program, focusing on redistricting policy reform and jurisprudence, and is an adjunct professor at NYU School of Law.

MORE: Can a mathematician help prevent gerrymandering in Virginia? —U.S. News & World Report

Focus on the California recall election

Today, California voters are deciding whether to recall Gov. Gavin Newsom. The ballot asks voters two questions: First, should Newsom be removed from office? Second, if Newsom is recalled, which candidate should replace him? A number of candidates (46!) are on the ballot, with "Trump clone" Larry Elder, a conservative talk radio host, leading the way. Polls suggest Newsom will keep his job, but that hasn't stopped conspiracy theorists from questioning the election results ahead of time…and making other outlandish claims.

• — QAnon has made significant inroads in California. The extremist ideology is particularly noticeable in Orange County and San Diego, where people sporting QAnon flags and shirts have been seen at anti-lockdown and anti-Newsom protests over the past year. In addition, four of the candidates running to replace Newsom have expressed support for QAnon, according to Media Matters.
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• — "Watch California." QAnon-ers have glommed onto a December 2018 Q post responding to a commenter asking, "Will voter fraud in CA ever be brought to light?" Q told followers to watch the state. Now, three years later, some are convinced this means Newsom will fraudulently win the recall election, and confronted with overwhelming evidence of the alleged fraud, Californians will kick off a national audit that gets Donald Trump back into office. You can roll your eyes here.

1. — But not all Q believers are convinced. "So now we need a third time? We have Nov. 3rd...we have the Georgia Senate runoffs...now we need California," one poster recently fretted on a QAnon forum. "Is there a point around here that the question can be raised? I'm not sure patriots are in control. Are we the sheep? I don't think so, but I mean are we the sheep for letting this go on? Are we the ones being gaslit?" Gee, ya think? —San Francisco Chronicle

Olsen: Politics are changing everywhere

"Americans often wonder why their traditional party system seems to be dissolving into a fractious and ungovernable mess. The answer is simple: The entire developed world is experiencing the end of the stable party systems built to answer the political questions posed by the ends of the Second World War and the Cold War. New political questions always lead to new political coalitions, and neither the United States nor the rest of the world is nearing the end of this global political realignment." —Henry Olsen in The Washington Post

Henry Olsen is a Washington Post columnist focusing on politics, populism, and American conservative thought, and a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.

MORE: What Andrew Yang's new party means for American politics —The Fulcrum

On the filibuster, how about reducing the number of votes needed to invoke cloture? That has happened several times in the past. I don't think a 50-50 "majority" should have free reign to do whatever it wants without any support at all from the other party—no matter which party it is. If you require, for example, 54 votes instead of 60, that means either that the country has put enough confidence in a party to offer them a reasonable majority; or, alternatively, the measure has at least a little bit of bipartisan support. —Dave S., Kansas

I don't understand why there isn't a true pro-life party. Why does one major political party favor birth, but not helping those struggling? Why does the other favor helping the suffering while also favoring abortion? Why can't we stop arguing over who deserves to live and just work on helping everyone who is living, regardless of their birth status or color or gender or whatever criteria someone comes up with to discriminate against? Are we really so greedy and selfish that we can't be okay with everyone living a full, decent life? It makes me so heartsick to have human life treated like it is worth debating over. I will NEVER fully support any political party that does not treat EVERY human life like it is sacred and worthy of living. —Amanda K., Idaho

The views expressed in "What's Your Take?" are submitted by readers and do not necessarily reflect the views of the editorial staff or the Stand Up Republic Foundation.