A To-Do List
Many of us use lists to try to stay organized. For some, they’re almost a blueprint of how to handle our days.
The Biden Administration has now made use of lists twice in very different ways, with potentially tragic consequences.
You may recall when Biden met with Vladimir Putin of Russia in the wake of cyber ransomware attacks purportedly done by Russians. Biden said he asked Putin to crack down on such hacks, which Putin denied even happened. Then the American president gave his Russian counterpart a list of key operations tied to the power grid and supply chain that absolutely must not be hacked in this way because of the impact it would have on this country. In essence, the idea was to let Russia know which ones we’d really be upset about if they got hacked.
Some of us have called that a hacker’s checklist. So far, no new hacks…not yet.
This week, another list…and with immediate consequences. It appears the U.S. government gave Taliban leaders a list of Americans still in Afghanistan, with the idea being that if they came to the airport to leave the country, the Taliban would check their name off the list and let them pass.
Some of us, however, think it’s a murderer’s checklist, and that we literally gave a brutal enemy a list of names of Americans to seek out and kill.
We have no idea how such a list is being used, if at all…again, not yet. But the consequences could be stunningly tragic, and certainly if the death of more than a dozen American military members yesterday is any guide.
