Biden/Harris Presidency Discussion Thread

Retr0gamer · 20-08-2021 4:01pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117781274#Comment_117781274

https://www.healthline.com/health/asthma/can-you-join-the-military-with-asthma#history-of-the-asthma-waiver

It's a disqualifying condition for the military.

bewareofthedog · 20-08-2021 4:05pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117781423#Comment_117781423

So is bone spurs, glad we cleared that up. Both men dodged the draft you can pretend to not acknowledge reality if you wish. The last President who didn't was George Bush senior.

Manic Moran · 20-08-2021 4:30pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117781443#Comment_117781443

The problem with the 'draft dodge' narrative for Bush Jr is that it's attempting to place a retrospective idea of from the war as a whole to the specific situation as applied to mid 1968, especially with respect to the Air Guard.

The argument is that joining the Air Guard at a time the Air Guard were actually flying missions in Vietnam was considered dodging the draft. He joined a month after the Sec Def ordered to Vietnam four Air Guard fighter squadrons (120th from Denver, CO, 174th from Sioux City IA, 188th from Albuquerque NM, and 136th from New York). Plus 75% of the "regular" 355th were Guardsmen, including a couple of pilots from his own squadron. The 120th flew its first combat mission less than a week before Bush Jr signed the dotted line.

If you want to avoid Vietnam, joining an organization which is actively sending forces to Vietnam at that exact moment (Guard pilots tallied 30,000 sorties that year), is a pretty silly way of doing it. 2/3 of draftees didn't go to Asia either: Germany and the US were more likely destinations.

20-08-2021 4:32pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117781443#Comment_117781443

If Trump had bone spurs, he did not dodge the draft.

If Biden had asthma, he did not dodge the draft.

If you've ever had asthma beyond the age of 14, you can't serve. No exceptions. People with asthma excelling at sports is nothing unusual, and people who don't think that's possible did not do leaving cert biology. Biden also had sinus surgery later in life to help correct his issues. Anybody who does not think Biden had asthma should be ridiculed.

On the other hand, Trump lying about bone spurs has much more validity. Don Lemon said that Trump showed him the bone spurs but he didn't see anything. The children of one of the two doctors who diagnosed Trump with bone spurs said that referral was made as a courtesy to Trump. Many of Trump's peers also say he received special treatment at school.

None of Biden's peers, on the hand, have claimed that Biden did not have asthma.

Biden did not dodge the draft. Trump may or may not have dodged the draft. The statement of "both men dodged the draft" is not correct. Either Trump dodged the draft or neither men dodged the draft.

bewareofthedog · 20-08-2021 4:33pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117781568#Comment_117781568

Good to know and learn - I didn't spend much time researching it. Some news reports based on the subject are obviously somewhat misleading.

bewareofthedog · 20-08-2021 4:55pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117781578#Comment_117781578

Even if the point about his asthma rings true, that he had it past 14 or whatever the age cut off was at the time - he still received five student draft deferments before that avoiding military service. It was only after this that he received the 1-Y classification, the same process Trump used to avoid signing up. Personally I find the asthmatic story questionable as he would go on to become a lone lifeguard guarding a single pool community and a top college athlete only a few years later.

20-08-2021 5:03pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117781673#Comment_117781673

Dodging the draft in an honest manner shouldn't have any scrutiny associated with it. Both Biden and Trump doing so with student deferments is fine in my books.

And again, there is nothing odd about about both having asthma and becoming an athlete. Paula Radcliffe had asthma. David Beckham had asthma. Greg Louganis had asthma. Justine Henin had asthma. Dennis Rodman had asthma. There's nothing strange about being an athlete and having asthma.

bewareofthedog · 20-08-2021 5:17pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117781729#Comment_117781729

I agree with you, many did the same at the time. Whatever about an honest war, not many would want to go fight in a jungle full of booby-traps and whatever other monstrosities were awaiting them there. It was a tongue in cheek comment given all the slating the previous President got over deferring.

I'm not going to quibble back and fourth beyond saying that I don't take it as a fact that Biden had asthma - anyone back then with connections could produce such a document like Trump did and the question remains that if he did have such a document why didn't he produce initially instead of deferring 5 times? I'm a skeptical person in general especially when it comes to powerful people it's just the way my mind works.

20-08-2021 5:25pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117781781#Comment_117781781

Not all of Biden's peers went on to be democrats, so why have none come forward saying that they don't recall him having asthma? Why did he have sinus surgery?

Student deferment may simply have involved filling in less forms, or it may have been done automatically by the college, who knows.

Black Swan · 20-08-2021 5:35pm

Kabul will be Biden’s Saigon in 2024. Biden should have learned from Reagan. When 40 screwed up, he would not hesitate to claim “there I go again.” Folks would laugh and let him slip away in plain sight. Iran Contra comes to mind.

20-08-2021 5:37pm

Great to have so many military experts on Boards. Thank you for your service people

Manic Moran · 20-08-2021 5:52pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117781585#Comment_117781585

Ha. Well, when would that be a new concept in the last two decades? The problem is it requires nuance.

It's not that joining the guard wasn't seen as a way of getting out of Vietnam overall, it just wasn't seen that way in mid 1968. After the various Air and Army Guard units finished their tours in 1969, very few other Guard units went, something which would have been noted as policy in early 1969 (as it would take a few months to spin up a unit to replace the ones overseas). Thus, if you were eligible for the draft in, say Summer 1970, the Guard could be a haven to avoid getting deployed. As long as no other wars started, of course. Germany and Korea were still taking a lot of the military's attention at the time, which is where most of the draftees actually went as well.

Brian? · 20-08-2021 7:00pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117781274#Comment_117781274

No. It’s called the truth.

Fact 1: He’s has asthma his entire life.

Fact 2: Asthma disqualifies you from serving in the US military

Fact 3: The rate of asthma among elite level sports people is higher than the general population.

facts can’t be partisan, let alone hyper partisan

Retr0gamer · 20-08-2021 7:09pm

He has asthma. You can deny it all you like but it doesn't make it not true and doesn't magically cure Biden of something he has been documented to have suffered with.

Plenty of reasons to dodge the draft anyway. Lots did because they didn't believe in the war I'm Vietnam.

The big difference here is that Trump unlike Biden insulted members of the military and called a war hero McCain a cowards, someone who suffered years of internment and torture. That's some classless cowardice right there and something Biden would not do.

Student deferments also aren't draft dodging. It was a legitimate way to not get drafted. Asthma only came into it when student deferments weren't allowed.

astrofool · 21-08-2021 9:43pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117782227#Comment_117782227

Nothing to do with Biden, but asthma has usually been a way to acquire a therapeutic use exemption for corticosteroids in multiple sports hence it can be advantageous to be diagnosed with Asthma in (and one of the reasons elite sportspeople have a higher % asthmatic than general pop.), but this is a relatively recent phenomenon.

TomOnBoard · 26-08-2021 6:50am

It appears that the evacuation effort from Kabul has reached its end game. Serious security threats have been reported overnight, with a number of Western countries advising any of their citizens, not already in the airport, to leave its environs immediately and go to a 'safe place'. Taliban 'security' around the airport appears to be in the throes of being strengthened, as ISIS-K attacks on the people awaiting entry are now considered very high risk. Belgium and Poland have now ceased their evacuation efforts, and it is likey that many other countries' efforts will be wound down before the weekend, so that those countries can remove their own ppl handling the evacuations before the US leaves for good. Assuming that some thousands of additional ppl will get out before the 31st, it looks like the efforts since the Taliban took over Kabul will reach/exceed 100,000. That's some effort on the part of all involved, although many intended evacuees may not get out in time.

A dreadful fortnight for all those adversely affected by the Taliban takeover, but a markedly better outcome than doom-sellers predicted early last week. Of equal note has been the extent to which the reality of why/how it came to this has finally been aired by/in the media. From the perspective of the Biden/Harris Presidency, a no-win outcome is being achieved, but the apparent early mis-steps of 10 days ago may have been somewhat corrected. I hope no disasters occur before the withdrawal is over.

I look forward to the 'after-action' analysis by the Congress, and clear establishment of the facts as to how a withdrawal, agreed in February 2020, and assumedly planned thereafter, could have ended in such chaos!

AbusesToilets · 26-08-2021 7:16pm

Suicide bomber kills 20~ people, including 4 US Marines. Let's see how that redline plays out now.

Biden has spectacularly messed this up.

Itssoeasy · 26-08-2021 7:33pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117807575#Comment_117807575

It’s been a disaster and they had it under control after a shaky start and they had been seriously ramping up numbers getting out. Getting out of Afghanistan was something he had the backing of the American people on, but today was an awful day.

AbusesToilets · 26-08-2021 8:56pm

Reports of up to 12 marines dead, along with many more afghans. The videos are pretty horrific

AbusesToilets · 26-08-2021 9:49pm

https://www.politico.com/news/2021/08/26/us-officials-provided-taliban-with-names-of-americans-afghan-allies-to-evacuate-506957

Christ on a bike

Larbre34 · 26-08-2021 10:29pm

This is a really bad speech.

Really bad.

AbusesToilets · 26-08-2021 10:30pm

Yea, this is pretty painful

Larbre34 · 26-08-2021 10:34pm

A secular America will just love the invocation of Christian scripture too.

Danzy · 26-08-2021 10:34pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117782227#Comment_117782227

It's the the same draft dodging that leading US Presidents and politicians, of all parties have used.

It's up their with Trump's heel spurs and whatever bs Dubya had a Doctor sign off on.

Rjd2 · 27-08-2021 2:55am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117807575#Comment_117807575

I'm very much on the fence at the moment.

I think for actually having the balls to get them out unlike Obama and Trump who merely teased they would he deserves credit as he was always going to get push back from mainstream media who are quite hawkish especially with the neocons flourishing everywhere.

However I do fear he may have slightly messed this up by rushing it for September 11th 20 year anniversary ,,,unlike most who are in the MSNBC or Fox echo chamber I don't think we can pass total judgement on this for now.

beggars_bush · 27-08-2021 7:15am

Yeah, don't see what the huge rush was. Abandoning Bagram was folly

Looks like they are running away from the Taliban and Trumps deal has basically screwed the country over

Sam Russell · 27-08-2021 8:51am

I think that Biden needs to start getting the blame shifted onto Trumps shameful deal with the Taliban that got the Taliban leaders released from jail.

Trump gave the Taliban a level of legitimacy they did not deserve. He did the same for the N Korea leader who does not deserve to be even name checked.

PalLimerick · 27-08-2021 9:06am

Afghanistan is Bidens downfall. It will be Trump/DeSantis in 2024. Biden owns the Afghanistan disaster. Mentally, physically and morally Biden is unfit to serve. Only hardcore Democrats make excuses for his disaster of administration. Supporters are turning on him.

pixelburp · 27-08-2021 9:35am

I don't think it's going to be his downfall, but it's also a huge bloody nose in the political spheres that value or (over)rate military strength and competence. If they managed to leave Afghanistan without incurring any fatalities I would have reckoned this all blow over within 6-12 months. Now with the loss of dozens of soldiers, the enterprise strikes a much more calamitous silhouette. Less of a rearguard action and more a chaotic retreat. If Trump runs again then certainly you can be sure he'll bring it up during the debates, gleefully ignoring the hypocrisy or his part in this tragedy.

Timberrrrrrrr · 27-08-2021 9:52am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117809391#Comment_117809391

Biden followed through on an agreement that TFG made with the Taliban, Americans want thier troops home.

Give it a couple of months and the dems will be able to say that they are saving XXXX billions by not having troops abroad and this money is being spent on job creation, schools, healthcare etc. That's what the American people will care about.

Everytime the R's mention the withdrawal from Afghanistan they dems will just roll out the pics/video of Trump meeting the Taliban, if the deals being signed and constantly remind people that it was him that invited them to camp David and started the withdrawal.

Biden/Harris Presidency Discussion Thread

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