Moulton Did the Unpopular but Correct Thing in Going to Afghanistan

For most people in Massachusetts politics, the beating that Seth Moulton has been taking in the press and on the airwaves these last couple of days on account of his unauthorized trip to Afghanistan would be difficult, if not painful.  But for Moulton, I suspect, this is very close to being a cause for laughter.  

When you are a Marine who's been fired at repeatedly in combat, as he has, what's a bunch of insults from pundits and fellow members of the political class?

I don't think, for example, that Moulton went into a tailspin after an unnamed "senior official" in the Biden administration gave the following description of his Afghan adventure to the Washington Post: 

"It's as moronic as it is selfish.  They're taking seats away from Americans and at-risk Afghans -- while putting our diplomats and service members at greater risk -- so they can have a moment in front of the cameras." [Washington Post]

Ditto for the commentary from Jon Keller, who called the trip "an especially clueless publicity stunt."  [Keller@Large, CBS Boston]

Here's a recap for those unfamiliar with the story:  

Moulton, a Democrat representing the Sixth Massachusetts District in Congress, and Peter Meijer, a Republican representing Michigan's 3rd Congressional District, took a commercial flight from Washington to the United Arab Emirates on Monday, paying for the tickets themselves. They then flew to Kabul on a military aircraft, arriving Tuesday morning, Aug. 24.  Moulton and Meijer, both veterans of the Iraq war, said they were on a fact-finding visit, exercising their Congressional oversight rights upon the executive branch of government as President Biden commands a massive, ongoing evacuation of Americans and Afghanis from the capital of a country now in the hands of the Taliban. They remained at the airport in Kabul, the only place in the country still occupied by U.S. troops, for just under 24 hours before leaving on a military flight.  Moulton and Meijer emphasized that they left Kabul "on a plane with empty seats, seated in crew-only seats to ensure that nobody who needed a seat would lose one because of our presence." 

This situation first struck me as a very bad idea.  Two Congressmen interviewing troops amidst the stress and danger of a final, forced retreat from a futile war, I thought, was like a city councilor going to an out-of-control, multiple-alarm fire to ask the firefighters, "Hey, how's it going, guys?"

Then I recalled the words I always got from the boss when I was learning how to be a newspaper reporter a very long time ago.  "You've got to get on the ground," he would say.

That meant there was no substitute, such as a phone call, for actually seeing a situation with your own eyes and asking questions face-to-face of the people directly involved.

So I give credit to Moulton and Meijer for having the guts and the determination to get on the ground in Afghanistan at this big moment in U.S. history.

And I'll take Seth Moulton, an officer and a gentleman, at his word when he says he learned a couple of things he would not have learned had he stayed home.  

One, Moulton said, he believed before his trip that the U.S. should extend its Aug. 31 deadline to leave Afghanistan because it would not be long enough to get everyone out who should be out.  Now, he believes we should stick to the Aug. 31 deadline because "there's no way we can get everyone out, even by Sept. 11 (Biden's initial, pre-fall-of-Afghanistan deadline).  So we need to have a working relationship with the Taliban after our departure.  And the only way to achieve that is to leave by Aug. 31." 

Second, Moulton said, "...one of the critical things we learned from our visit is that the task force prioritizing all special immigrant visa applications (by Afghans now desperate to leave the country) is overwhelmed by requests from members of Congress.  That's never  been communicated to us, but that is something that we are now communicating to our colleagues."  

[Source: Last two comments by Moulton appeared in yesterday's edition of The New York Times.]

ENDNOTE: In its first account of the Moulton-Meijer trip, The Washington Post reported that the two got from the United Arab Emirates to Afghanistan because they "figured out a way onto an empty military flight going into Kabul."  One has to wonder if the officer who OK'd that votes Republican.