MAGA Republicans’ latest talking point: Blaming 'woke generals' and 'critical race theory' for the Taliban’s victory
With the Taliban having seized control of Afghanistan, politicians and pundits are offering a wide range of opinions. Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming and Rep. Adam Kinzinger of Illinois believe that the Donald Trump/Mike Pompeo plan for withdrawing U.S. troops from Afghanistan was badly flawed and that President Joe Biden was wrong to go along with it; paleoconservative isolationist Patrick Buchanan views the Afghan War as a failed experiment in neoconservative nation building that was doomed from the start.
And then there are MAGA Republicans. Per the Daily Beast, these Trump-supporting right-wingers are claiming that "woke generals" and "critical race theory" are to blame for the Taliban's victory.
Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas tweeted, "It's clear President Biden and his Department of Defense have been more concerned with critical race theory and other woke policies than planning an orderly withdrawal from Afghanistan." And the American Conservative's Rod Dreher, an admirer of Hungarian strongman Viktor Orbán, claimed, "The U.S. government is so busy centering wokeness that it is ignoring the real world. Our military is telling itself woke lies."
It\u2019s clear President Biden and his Department of Defense have been more concerned with critical race theory and other woke policies than planning an orderly withdrawal from Afghanistan.— Tom Cotton (@Tom Cotton) 1628858671
:::deep sigh:::\n\nThe point, young man, is that the US government is so busy centering wokeness that it is ignoring the real world.https://twitter.com/Timodc/status/1426968887183110147\u00a0\u2026— Rod Dreher (@Rod Dreher) 1629078257
Far-right Newsmax pundit Greg Kelly tweeted:
Secretary of Defense\u2069 Lloyd Austin: TRAGICALLY, Planning and preparing for AFGHANISTAN wasn't a priority. Instead, he made the Military WOKE. And told everyone how bad the racism was when he was in the military, the same organization that made HIM a 4 STAR GENERAL. RESIGN.pic.twitter.com/zCuQFVoVU4— Greg Kelly The PROJECT is a Secret (@Greg Kelly The PROJECT is a Secret) 1629071669
The Daily Beast notes that Republicans have been "fundraising off of" Afghanistan, often failing to mention that former President Donald Trump aggressively pushed for withdrawing U.S. troops from that country.
Asawin Suebsaeng, who co-hosts the Daily Beast's "Fever Dreams" podcast, pointed out, "It's now a fundraising ploy to them. And it doesn't matter that Trump was one of the loudest voices in the country — even though he was incompetent and lazy and mentally incongruous about it — for even speedier withdrawal than what Biden did. It doesn't matter. This is a time for score settling and dunking for him and guys like him."
