"[W]e should continue the airlift as long as we can. But that won’t be forever, as conditions deteriorate... and not everyone who desperately wants to get out will be able to do so."

"That is tragic. But it would be true, I believe, whenever and however the U.S. mission ended. The images we’re seeing from Kabul are shocking, heartbreaking and embarrassing. But the real stain on our national honor was in making promises to Afghans that we never had the intention or even the ability to keep. Twenty years of U.S. blood and treasure gave Afghanistan not a secular democracy but its flickering illusion. And history will see this withdrawal, painful as it is to watch, not as ignominious but as inevitable."

Writes Eugene Robinson in "What’s happening in Afghanistan is horrible. But how else was U.S. involvement going to end?" (WaPo).

I'm quoting this because it's what I assume is the administration's position, though they won't say it to us so bluntly. It can be put more bluntly: It's going to be a nasty few days, but we'll get past it, and Americans have permission to look away and not agonize over the details.

AND: To put it more inanely, "I want to talk about happy things, man." That's a quote from Biden, something he said on July 2d, when reporters pressed him on the withdrawal from Afghanistan, and his idea was to talk about the economy. Because it's always the economy. You can count on Americans to recenter ourselves on the economy. As they say in politics, "It's the economy, stupid." They're talking to us.