Starting with Afghanistan, from what I've read the prevailing thinking is that (Afghan army) commanders were paid to surrender, and that most of this phase was engineered by Pakistan's ISI. To some Afghans, this is actually the Taliban capturing Kabul to be governed in a sense as a client-state of Pakistan's ISI, so we might see how that works.

No doubt a lot of wannabe jihadists will flock to Afghanistan now, and in the long run the entire episode may be more costly than having stayed. 

Here people want to know why the American Military wasn't really prepared to deal with this kind of 'emergency' full-speed exodus. Why given most troopers who've been there 'knew' the Afghan Army would fold (as I mentioned in one video today, a first-hand account of how they would bail from missions with a necessary response by US personnel, and that was from a Navy medic who was there 8 years ago). Basically he re-framed what we already knew, that of course being President Trump's decision to leave, and President Biden's to do an efficient exit, which is not what we've been seeing. 

(This was actually departure, the C-17 took off with at least 2 boys holding on insanely and they died. Marines were aboard on-arrival. Departure was 800 or so refugees, not 600 as reported. The world record is Israel's El Al, which did manage to get 1000 Ethiopians on a Boeing 747 during heroic rescue there.)

So there was political framing, said the 'buck stopped' with him, but pointed at lots of fingers at the former Afghan government, leaving much unanswered for the moment. Essentially there is a foreign policy disaster, even as the policy is right from an American perspective, and not being at the heart for Americans, in a sense, is a sad reflection on the 'state of affairs'. The speech rang hollow.

The comments that were more specific, were Major General Hank Taylor, he is Vice Director for Logistics, in the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Sounds like the buck actually stops with him. And he said by late tonight we'll have 3000 infantry as well as Marines on the ground, and have taken over Air Traffic Control, finally cleared the runway which is now operating. I'm surprised he just revealed the number of soldiers physically there so far, but otherwise ok. Then we had the Special Immigrant Visa head, Garry Reid, describing Texas bases preparing to receive refugees from Kabul.

Let's summarize:

• The Fed mulls earlier-than-consensus tapering.

• Chinese slowing retail sales (COVID) inhibits growth and thus Oil demand.

• Oil should remain firm (60's - 70's) but we didn't expect 80-100 others were suggesting, barring another chaotic situation in the Middle East.

• Inflation is more broad-based than historically, primarily due to wages, once wages go up they don't really fall again, absent a Depression.

• The United States will likely have to be more, not less, resolute in firm foreign policy, as a result of the blundering exodus from Afghanistan.

• The buck stops at Biden's desk, but who guided the policy execution, was it Gen. Milley and staff?, and where is reflection on.. well many things.

• Who is directly responsible for 'the plan', philosophy, logistics, execution and probably responsible for selling it to POTUS, scapegoats or not, we the inquiring minds (and those who sacrificed and fought) wish to know.

• Hence budget allocations to defense and the agencies ringing DC, will likely be stable or increased, as nothing in this situation suggests cuts in defense or internal security, just the opposite (and hopefully a few of our politicians will mature enough to grasp this).

• Overall costs of defense and 'domestic' security will increase, not drop, because terrorists will feel emboldened or inspired to 'try things'.

Meanwhile:

• Washington has declared a 'water shortage' on the Colorado River, a first ever Federal declaration forcing water delivery cuts in Arizona, Nevada, and to Mexico (as yes we supply farmers with water on both sides of the border), Nevada has a minimal cut (perhaps to keep Las Vegas going?).

• Mentioned before: the drought isn't ending and has economic impact on business and Western companies that isn't generally reflected in 'prices'.

• Tesla has cameras monitoring drivers now, which is 'sort of' improving the safety aspect of their 'camera-based' auto-pilot (we've noted occasionally Tesla's system was limited by not using 'infrared-based' lidar systems).

• We wish him well, but if Catholics needed more encouragement to get a vaccination, it might be due to Cardinal Burke being placed on a ventilator at a Wisconsin hospital, he had been an anti-vax critic of Pope Francis.

• The data breach of T-Mobile's (TMUS) customers is actually a big story drowned a bit by the maze of news to wade through today of global significance.

• COVID-19 (ah yes, remember that?) is on the rise in 40 states, and hasn't paused while media coverage understandably shifts, 5 states report today report record high case levels, and probably more breakthrough cases.

• You realize that Israel has been a 'canary in the coal mine' for COVID-19, because they are about the highest proportion of vaccinated citizens in all the world, well, the number of serious cases has risen almost 30-fold since late June, and roughly 60 percent of those people are fully vaccinated, for the most part they used the Pfizer (PFE) vaccine.

• The foregoing should emphasize the limitations of mRNA, and that also is happening as vaccines efficacy starts to wane, too many are focused on 'boosters', not enough (though increasing) on monoclonal antibodies.

• One stock work on monoclonals is Sorrento (SRNE), it got hit again (others too), in it's case I suspect circulation of reports that the Covi-stix test is made in China worried some, I actually see that as not a problem, if the reagent is made in China and efficacy is fine, so what, many drugs origin is China.

• The real problem is Dr. Ji the CEO cleverly phrases press releases and he dances around issues rather than confronting them, Covi-stix might be assembled in the USA (or Vietnam?) and sent wherever, perhaps the only way to make a profit was to make the basics in China, big pharmas to too but patients usually don't realize it.

• Yes Sorrento is long on deals (irons in the fire) and short on results, so far of course, that can change not so much with 'stix' sales in Mexico (also not confirmed but authorized), but with early (verified) data on clinical trials ongoing in both Brazil and the U.K..

• Shareholders deserve to know, and this company while it wants to be big and has a lot of potential, doesn't hold proper 'conference calls' either.

• If you can visualize 600-800 escapees from Kabul on a USAF C-17, just imagine that flight and Kabul Airport as super-spreader events too.

• The Pentagon, by the way, talks of 'investigating' the C-17 flight, the pilot made a risky but brave decision to take-off, he had no heavy cargo, thus I am sure he knew his gross takeoff weight (that's all digital these days) so if it was within limits for the air-frame, he should be viewed as a hero.

• S&P (SPX, SPY) not breaking, yet, but market internals weaker, note A/D line.