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Frank Bruni, a contributing Opinion writer, hosted a written online conversation with Katherine Mangu-Ward, the editor in chief of Reason magazine, and Nate Silver, the founder and former editor of FiveThirtyEight and the author of the newsletter Silver Bulletin, to discuss their expectations for the third Republican debate on Wednesday night. They also dug into and sorted through a blizzard of political news particularly the new New York Times/Siena battleground-state polling with dreadful news for President Biden that has Democrats freaked out (again).

Frank Bruni: Thank you both for joining me. While well pivot in short order to the debate, I cant shake that poll, whose scariness ranks somewhere between The Texas Chain Saw Massacre and The Exorcist. I know my own head is spinning. I mean: Donald Trump ahead of President Biden in five of six crucial battleground states?

How loud an alarm is this? Should Biden at this late stage consider not pursuing re-election? Would that help or hurt the Democrats in winning the White House? And if not Biden, who would give the party the best chance? Nate, lets start with you.

Nate Silver: Thanks for having me, Frank. Its nice to be back in the (digital) pages of The Times. I think whether Democrats would be better off if Biden dropped out is very much an open question which is kind of a remarkable thing to be saying at this late stage. Theres a whole cottage industry devoted to trying to figure out why Biden doesnt get more credit on the economy, for instance. And the answer might just be that hes 80 years old and that colors every impression voters have of him.

Katherine Mangu-Ward: The voters in these polls just seem to be screaming, Hes too old, and I feel poor! The most shocking finding was that only 2 percent of voters said the economy was excellent. Two percent! Fewer than 1 percent of voters under 30 said the economy was excellent. In Arizona, Nevada and Wisconsin, exactly zero polled respondents under 30 said the economy was excellent.

Bruni: Nate, I take your point about open question I have no crystal ball, and my God, Ive never so badly wanted one, because the Democrats getting this right and blocking Trump is, well, incalculably vital to this democracys future. But if you were the partys chief adviser and you had to make the call: Yes to Biden or no to Biden and an invitation to someone else?

Silver: Well, Im the probabilities guy, so Ill usually avoid answering a question definitively unless you force me to. Really, the best option would have been if Biden decided in March he wouldnt run, and then you could have a vigorous primary. If you actually invested me with all this power, Id want access to private information. Id like to do some polling. Id want to canvass people like Gretchen Whitmer and Raphael Warnock about how prepared they are. Id like to know how energetic Biden is from day to day.

Bruni: And you, Katherine? Biden thumbs up or thumbs down? And if thumbs down, tell me your favorite alternative.

Mangu-Ward: If were picking up magical artifacts, a time machine would be more useful than a crystal ball. And youd need to go back before the selection of Kamala Harris as vice president. A viable vice president would have been a moderate threat to Biden, but a weak one is a major threat to the party. If were scrounging around for an alternative, I dont completely hate Gov. Jared Polis of Colorado.

Bruni: Id settle at this point for a Magic 8 Ball. And Katherine, dont completely hate in 2023 politics equals want to marry and live with forever in the politics of decades past. Were a cynical lot.

In any case, Nate mentioned age. How do you two explain that the same poll weve been talking about revealed that while 62 percent of Americans feel that Biden, 80, doesnt have the mental sharpness to be effective, only 44 percent feel that way about Trump, 77. Only 39 percent said that Trump is too old to be president, while 71 percent said that Biden is. Do those numbers make any sense at all to you?

Silver: There are at least three things going on here. First, the three-and-a-half-year difference between Trump and Biden is not nothing. Its certainly something you start to notice if you have older friends, parents, relatives entering their late 70s or early 80s. Second, Bidens manner of speaking and presentation just reads as being more old-fashioned than Trumps, and that perception is reinforced by media coverage. Third, I wonder if younger voters feel like Bidens a bit of a forced choice there wasnt really a competitive primary so old serves as a euphemism for stale.

Mangu-Ward: Because this election cycle has been largely bereft of serious policy debate, I also think age is one thing people can grab on to to justify their unease about a Biden second term.

Bruni: I wrote a few months back about this: Trump is so deliberately and flamboyantly outrageous such a purposeful cyclone of noise and distraction that the normal metrics dont apply to him. He transcends mundane realities like age. Hes Trump! Hes a horror-movie villain, a Saturday-morning cartoon, a parade float. Those things dont have ages (or four indictments encompassing 91 counts).

Silver: I like that theory. Theres a sense in which some voters feel theyre in on the joke with Trump. Although I also dont think that voters have quite shifted into general-election mode, and maybe the media hasnt, either. Trump as candidate is a very different ball of wax from Trump as president, and thats what Democrats will spend the next year reminding voters about.

Bruni: Katherine, lets say Biden stays in the race. Certainly looks that way. Can you envision a scenario in which Democrats grow so doubtful, so uncomfortable that hes seriously challenged for the nomination and maybe doesnt get it? If so, sketch that for me.

Mangu-Ward: As a libertarian (but not a Libertarian), Im always cautiously interested in third-party challenges, and that seems more likely to me than a direct challenge for the Democratic nomination. After each election cycle, theres a moment when pundits decide whether to blame a Green or a Libertarian or an independent for the fact that their pick lost, but an appealing outsider peeling off support from Biden or Trump seems more likely to be a real consideration this time around. We have a lot of noisy characters who dont fit neatly into partisan boxes on the loose at the moment.

Bruni: Veterans of Barack Obamas 2012 campaign are arguing that he was in a similar position to Biden a year out from that election. Nate, do they have a point? Or do their assurances ring hollow because Biden is not Obama, isnt as beloved by the base, is indeed old and has been stuck in a low-approval rut going back to 2021 or some combination of those?

Silver: Certainly, its generally true that polling a year in advance of the election is not very predictive. But Bidens situation is worse than Obamas. His approval ratings are notably worse. The Electoral College has shifted against Democrats since 2012 (although its now not a given). And theres the age thing. Remember, a majority of Democrats did not even want Biden to run again. I think the Democratic communications and strategy people have been shrugging off that data more than they maybe should.

Mangu-Ward: Biden is definitely not Obama, and its definitely not 2012. The concerns about Bidens age are valid. Though they would apply to Trump just as much in a sane world.

Bruni: Youre both so admirably or is that eerily? calm. I need to get your diet, exercise or pharmaceutical regimen. Am I nuts to worry/believe that Trumps return to the presidency isnt just an unideal election outcome but a historically cataclysmic one? How much does that prospect scare you two?

Mangu-Ward: Thats my secret, Frank. Im always angry. Like the Hulk. I think the current offerings for president are deeply unappealing, to say the least. But thats nothing new for someone who prefers to maximize freedom and minimize the role of the state in Americans personal and economic lives. I am concerned about the peaceful transfer of power, and Trump has shown that he and his supporters are more of a threat to that.

Silver: On that, one thing I feel better about is that the reforms that Congress made to the Electoral Count Act made a repeat of Jan. 6 less likely. Theres also perhaps less chance of another Electoral College-popular vote split. If Trump wins the popular vote by three points and theres no other funny business, Im not sure what to say exactly other than that in a democracy, you often have to live with outcomes that you would not have chosen.

Bruni: Biden, theoretically, isnt the only bar to Trumps long red tie dangling over the Resolute Desk anew. I mean again, theoretically one of the candidates in this third Republican debate could be the nominee. Yes? Or is it time to admit that, barring a truly extraordinary development, the Republican primary contest is over?

Silver: Prediction markets say theres a roughly 75 percent chance that Trump is the nominee. That frankly seems too low no candidate has been this dominant at this stage of the race before. I suppose theres a path where Ron DeSantis or Nikki Haley does relatively well in Iowa, the other drops out and then actually, Im still not sure theres a path. Maybe Trumps legal trouble begins to catch up to him? As much as the early states tend to produce surprises, I think if you put all the numbers into a model, it would put the chances at closer to 90 percent than 75.

Mangu-Ward: The Times/Siena poll is bad news for Biden, but its even worse news for the folks on the G.O.P. debate stage, because it suggests that they simply neednt bother. Trump is doing just fine holding his own against Biden, so theres no need to change horses midrace. Unless your horse goes to jail, I guess.

The debate will be a primo demonstration of Sayres Law: In any dispute the intensity of feeling is inversely proportional to the value of the issues at stake.

Bruni: If one of the five people on the debate stage were somehow to overtake Trump, who would that be? Has Nikki Haley supplanted Ron DeSantis as the fallback?

Silver: The one thing DeSantis originally had going for him was a perception of being more electable. But hes pretty much squandered that by being an unappealing candidate along many dimensions. And Haley largely performed better than Trump in that new Times/Siena poll. Still, Im not sure how many Republicans are going to be willing to oust Trump on the basis of a New York Times poll. And its not an easy argument to make to Republican voters when Biden looks vulnerable against anyone right now.

Mangu-Ward: I appreciated Haleys early debate appearances, where she put a lot of emphasis on the shared responsibility for budgetary malfeasance between the Democrats and Trump. But now shes giving me 2012 Mitt Romney flashbacks. Shes a sane and competent Republican who has realized the best way to keep her primary campaign viable is to go hard on immigration restrictionism. She was never an open borders gal, but she did usually offer some warm fuzzies about our nation of immigrants followed by a get in line.

Bruni: Trump has said he doesnt want a running mate from any of the people on the debate stage. Do you see anyone like Haley in particular who could force his or her way into at least serious consideration? And possibly help him get elected?

Mangu-Ward: The Harris debacle certainly offers lessons for Trump, but Im not sure whether hes in the mood to learn them.

Silver: The conventional political science view is that V.P. choices do not matter very much unless they seem manifestly unqualified. But they probably ought to matter more for candidates as old as Biden and Trump. I do think Haley would represent some softening of Trumps image and might appeal to Republicans who worry about a second term being a total clown show. Who would actually staff the cabinet in a second Trump administration with Trumps tendency to be disloyal and the legal jeopardy he puts everybody in his orbit in is one of those things that keeps me up at night.

Bruni: Nate, your cabinet question haunts me, too. The quality of Trumps aides deteriorated steadily across his four years in the White House. And anyone who came near him paid for it in legal fees and the contagion of madness to which they were exposed. So who does serve him if hes back? Do Ivanka and Jared make peace with him? Power again!

Silver: I dont think I have anything reassuring to say on this front. I do think, I guess, that Trump has some incentive to assure voters that he wouldnt go too crazy in a second term in 2016, voters actually saw Trump as being more moderate than Clinton.

Mangu-Ward: A second-term president will always have a different kind of cabinet from a first-termer, and a Trump-Biden matchup would mean a second-termer, no matter who wins. But either way, the cabinet will probably be lower quality and more focused on risk mitigation, which isnt ideal.

Bruni: So is there any reason to watch this debate other than, when the subjects of the Middle East in particular and foreign policy in general come up, to see Haley come at the yapping human jitterbug known as Vivek Ramaswamy like a can of Raid?

Silver: TV ratings for the second debate were quite low. But I suspect the main audience here isnt rank-and-file voters so much as what remains of the anti-Trump Republican establishment. If Haley can convince that crowd that shes more viable than DeSantis and more electable than Trump, that could make some difference.

Mangu-Ward: Historically, debates have been my favorite part of the campaign season, because Im in it for the policy. But G.O.P. primary voters have been pretty clear that policy is not a priority. I suppose Ill also tune in to see Chris Christie scold the audience. This weeks spectacle of him telling a booing crowd, Your anger against the truth is reprehensible, was pretty wild.

Bruni: OK, lightning round fast and dirty. Or clean. But definitely fast. Will Trump ever serve a day in prison?

Silver: Id say no, although prediction markets put the odds at above 50 percent.

Bruni: You and your prediction markets, Nate. You could have given me your own hunch. Or wish. My wish is a 10-year sentence. At least. My hunch is zip. Hulk?

Mangu-Ward: He will probably serve time. He will certainly exhaust every avenue available to him before doing so. In general, the fact that there are many opportunities for appeal is a good thing about our justice system.

Bruni: Which 2024 Senate race do you find most interesting?

Silver: Undoubtedly Texas, just because its one of the only chances Democrats have to pick up a G.O.P. seat. Ted Cruz won fairly narrowly last time, and Colin Allred is probably a better candidate than Beto ORourke.

Mangu-Ward: Peter Meijer just joined the Senate Republican primary race in Michigan. I appreciated his performance in the House; hes quite libertarian and was one of the few Republicans who voted to impeach Trump.

Bruni: Americas medium-term future are you bullish, bearish or, I dont know, horse-ish?

Silver: Everyone is so bearish now, you can almost seem like a bull by default just by pointing out that liberal democracy usually gets its act together in the long run. But the younger generation of voters takes a different attitude on a lot of issues, such as free speech, which has begun to worry me a bit.

Mangu-Ward: Bullish, always. Politics ruins everything it touches, but not everything is politics.

Bruni: Finally, should Democrats be brutally victory-minded and just swap out Joe and Kamala for Taylor and Travis?

Mangu-Ward: I just said politics ruins everything it touches. Must you take Taylor from us, too?

Bruni: Fair point, Hulk. You have me there.

Silver: It would be a very popular ticket. Taylor Swift will turn 35 only a month before Inauguration Day in 2024, Id note.

Bruni: You both have my thanks. Great chatting with you.

Frank Bruni is a professor of journalism and public policy at Duke University, the author of the book The Beauty of Dusk and a contributing Opinion writer. He writes a weekly email newsletter.

Katherine Mangu-Ward (@kmanguward) is the editor in chief of Reason magazine.

Nate Silver, the founder and former editor of FiveThirtyEight and author of the forthcoming book On the Edge: The Art of Risking Everything, writes the newsletter Silver Bulletin.

The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. Wed like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And heres our email: letters@nytimes.com.

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Excerpt from:
Opinion | 'He's Too Old, and I Feel Poor!': Three Writers Discuss ... - The New York Times

He was born Mohammed Sadiq Habibi in the southern Afghan province of Kandahar in 1935 a time, he says, when Kandahar had one doctor and two homeopaths. The conservative Habibi family was well known. Seven generations of its men before him had trained as Islamic scholars, known as Mawlawis.

But his father, Mawlawi Mohammed Rafiq Habibi, was a conflicted man.

Although he had studied as a religious scholar, he worked as a bank clerk and was for years the Afghan state banks representative in Karachi, which was then a port city in undivided India. He dressed in suits and ties and was open to debating theological questions with his son about the existence of God.

It was his mother, though, who opened new worlds for him.

Some of his earliest memories involve listening to his mother, Bibi Hazrata, and other women of the family in Arghandab, a district of pomegranates and vineyards, as they sang folk songs at weddings and family gatherings. His mother was also his early interpreter of poetic verse. She did not have formal schooling, but classical poetry in those times was a pillar of education in the mosque and at home.

My mother had a lot of interest in poetry, and knew the meanings well, he said.

One of the first recordings he made, years later, for Radio Afghanistan was of a Pashto folk song he had heard as a child, which his mother helped him understand. On a bus ride from Kandahar to Karachi, the conductor softly sang the song.

I am going to visit my beloved today

May God shorten these earthly ropes.

The boy tugged at his mother and asked what earthly ropes meant. She described God as a puppet master of sorts, sitting in the heavens.

All these distances in the world the threads, the ropes are in Gods hand, she told him. Whenever he wants to connect the lover with the beloved, brother with brother, husband with wife, he pulls the strings and the distances disappear.

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The Artistry of Nashenas Speaks to the Afghanistan He Had to Leave Behind - The New York Times

ProPublica is a nonprofit newsroom that investigates abuses of power. Sign up for Dispatches, a newsletter that spotlights wrongdoing around the country, to receive our stories in your inbox every week.

This month, in collaboration with The New Yorker, the ProPublica Films team published an animated documentary called The Night Doctrine. The film follows the investigative journey of reporter Lynzy Billing as she pieces together what happened to her own family members when they were murdered in Afghanistan 30 years ago. During her reporting, Billing began to learn of a series of other killings of Afghan civilians committed by the Zero Units, elite Afghan special forces groups backed by the U.S. That investigation, called The Night Raids, was published late last year.

The accompanying film weaves together Billings personal story, the recent history of Afghanistan and the hauntingly recurrent nightly raids carried out by the Zero Units. I spoke with ProPublica visual journalist Mauricio Rodrguez Pons about the production of The Night Doctrine, which has so far been selected for screening by more than a dozen film festivals, including the Tribeca Film Festival, HollyShorts, the New Hampshire Film Festival and BIAF, among others. It is an incredible feat of animated journalism, and I encourage you to watch the 16-minute piece on our site or on YouTube. Now, on to the discussion, which has been edited for clarity and length.

Watch The Night Doctrine

In the beginning, our plan was to create a three-minute video explainer. But when we started to work at the beginning with video that Lynzy [Billing] and another photographer, Kern Hendricks, took in Afghanistan, we saw the potential to create the story around it. Then we decided, OK, lets do a nine-minute animated video about a single raid through the perspectives of a family and a soldier. And as we kept working with Lynzy, and with Tracy [Weber, ProPublica managing editor], and with Almudena Toral, ProPublicas executive producer and co-director of the film, we discovered that Lynzys story was really, really hard and really connected with the families, the Zero Units and the story of Afghanistan itself. So we started asking questions: What if we created a film that connects the three stories into one while trying to explain what happened in Afghanistan?

Part of the style of the film is the idea that everything is connected. Its like an infinite journey. We wanted to create a journey that never ends mimicking Afghanistans cycle of violence, loss and no accountability.

A phrase that we wrote on a storyboard is infinite nightmare, and we asked ourselves how we can represent that. I came up with this idea of creating an infinite sequence that connects with each sequence, and the whole film is like a connection. Its like youre always navigating the stories and the journey. I mean, Lynzys journey and Afghanistans journey is at the end of the day the same, right?

Of course, the night is kind of the main thing here. In the night, the darkness is important. We wanted to again create that infinite nightmare and the mood, the colors, everything is connected with the night, the shadows, the blue color is also kind of like a nightmare. Everything was driven by that idea.

From the technical perspective, its hard to create differences in black.Thats why we wanted some light elements present like the candle at the beginning that the little kid has next to his bed, and the lanterns, and the lights of a car.

The security of our sources was important for us. And the access was impossible especially after the Taliban took over Afghanistan again. We also really wanted to add some elements to communicate that this is a true story. And thats why we decided to add real footage elements.

For example, the image that everybody saw when the United States left Afghanistan was that plane so we wanted to use that to remind people: Remember this image? These are the stories that were around that image you saw. And at the end we show the main characters of the piece in their actual, modern environment. Its to give some kind of truth; that this is a true story. Its not just a fiction animated piece. We didnt invent this.

I think the animation gives you the power not just to fill the gaps, but to fill the gaps creatively. That creativity, that freedom that the animation gives you, allows you to present not just the facts but also the sentiments that people felt. Its something that not only animation can do, but its also kind of like its main role. Especially here in ProPublica, a place where we really care about facts, and with what happened and what didnt happen, animation is a powerful tool to represent not just what happened with the families but to represent how the families felt and how Lynzy felt.

The Night Raids

The main inspiration for me came from a soundtrack that Milad Yousufi, the musician we worked with, shared with me. It was like a soundtrack of Afghan old movies and the instruments include the main instruments, the rabab and piano, we used in the film. It was really, really dark. And I played that all day for days. I dont remember how many months; maybe eight months. I would work with that music on and kind of allowed myself to feel that darkness and the suffering of the story, of the Afghan people. I mean, how many families suffered there? For me, thats the main thing. It's the main inspiration.

I hope viewers take away the story, and I hope they think about what the United States is doing in places like Afghanistan, and about accountability. Like Lynzy said in the film, it happened in Afghanistan, it happened in Vietnam, it happened in Iraq. Thats why I said at the beginning that this is a never-ending story. You just cant imagine all the sad stories that are destroying families right now. I guess I just want people to consider the families that are affected. Thats the intention of the film. Thats what we wanted to represent. And I hope we can put another voice out there to try to make change.

More:
How We Made the Animated Documentary The Night Doctrine - ProPublica

Hundreds of new medals -- including Distinguished Flying Crosses and Bronze Stars -- are being given to airmen who helped with the 2021 evacuation of Afghanistan, and more awards are on the horizon.

The latest awards include a total of 229 Air Medals, 98 Meritorious Service Medals, eight Distinguished Flying Crosses and two Bronze Star Medals and are for "maintainers, loadmasters, Raven-trained security forces, aeromedical evacuation personnel and pilots" involved with one of the largest humanitarian evacuation efforts in military history, the Air Force's Air Mobility Command announced Wednesday.

"It is with great humility, gratitude and honor that I have the opportunity to recognize the actions of these mobility heroes," Gen. Mike Minihan, head of Air Mobility Command, said in a statement. "This recognition is long overdue, but I hope everyone involved in this incredible operation knows our deepest appreciation for their sacrifice while saving more than 124,000 American and Afghan lives."

Read Next: Pulling Close-Air Support Airmen from Army Bases Would Increase Risk on the Battlefield, Republicans in Congress Say

Air Mobility Command played a crucial role in the evacuation, from loading up the first evacuee to boarding the last American soldier onto the final C-17 Globemaster III from Kabul on Aug. 30, 2021. More than 124,000 people ranging from government employees to Afghan refugees were flown to safety as more than two decades of U.S. military involvement in the country was left behind.

That military-led evacuation also came at a major cost. When a suicide bomber struck at the Kabul airport's Abbey Gate during the rescue mission on Aug. 26, 13 troops -- 11 Marines, a sailor and a soldier -- were killed, marking the final American casualties of the war in Afghanistan. More than 20 other troops were wounded, and about 170 Afghans were killed.

"Airmen proved, once again, that they can make the impossible possible," Minihan said. "But it came with great personal sacrifice and risk."

The latest announcement of medals connected to the mission, known as Operation Allies Refuge, marks the sixth awards board related to the evacuation. Last year, Air Mobility Command announced 96 Distinguished Flying Crosses, 12 Bronze Star Medals and a Gallant Unit Citation for the 621st Contingency Response Group.

More recognition is on the way for airmen involved with the operation, too. A seventh awards board is scheduled for Air Mobility Command next week.

In late August, on the two-year anniversary marking the chaos of the Afghanistan exit, the Pentagon announced that many of the Marine Corps and Army units involved in the effort would be honored with a Presidential Unit Citation, the highest distinction that a military unit can receive.

Members of the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit, the Special Purpose Marine Air-Ground Task Force-Crisis Response-Central Command, and Joint Task Force 82 of the Army's 82nd Airborne Division were recognized with the citation for their efforts during Operation Allies Refuge.

Besides the Army and Marine Corps units, elements of 20 other units, including active-duty and National Guard troops, were awarded the Presidential Unit Citation.

Minihan told reporters during a media roundtable at the Air and Space Force Association's conference in National Harbor, Maryland, in September that he was also fighting for airmen involved to be honored with a Presidential Unit Citation.

"With a lot of hard work, there's been some exceptional recognition, including individually and in units, but it is not at all where I want it to be," Minihan said in response to a Military.com question. "So, there is lots of work that remains on units and individuals, including the Presidential Unit Citations ... but what I intend moving forward is to take those units, those individuals, and sponsor those all the way up."

Some of the latest awards will be given at a private ceremony during the 2023 Airlift/Tanker Association Convention in Grapevine, Texas, this week.

"We continue to reveal incredible actions taken to carry out this mission, and it is our duty to recognize each and every one of them," Minihan said.

-- Thomas Novelly can be reached at thomas.novelly@military.com. Follow him on Twitter @TomNovelly.

Related: Air Force General Fighting to Get Airmen Presidential Unit Citation for Afghanistan Evacuation

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Hundreds of Airmen Will Receive New Medals for 2021 Afghanistan Evacuation - Military.com

On October 7, a 6.3 magnitude earthquake struck western Herat Province in Afghanistan, claiming thousands of lives, flattening entire villages, and leaving communities to live in tent cities after losing their homes. In the days that followed, two more devastating earthquakes hit the region, deepening the severity of this crisis along with multiple challenges the people of Afghanistan were already facing.

Over the last two years, the number of people across Afghanistan in need of humanitarian assistance has increased to 67% of the population. Three consecutive years of drought, spiking costs of basic necessities, and reductions in international funding have pushed millions of Afghans living on the edge further into crisis.

It is imperative that international attention and funds be urgently directed to this crisis, says Dayne Curry, Mercy Corps Country Director for Afghanistan. The support committed to the response thus far is simply not enough to address the long recovery ahead or prepare communities for potential future shocks.

Mercy Corps is responding to the recent earthquakes, working to address the urgent water and sanitation needs of earthquake-affected communities. Our team in Herat is providing clean water, sanitation kits, and cash assistance to help communities rebuild and recover.

Mercy Corps has worked alongside communities in Afghanistan since 1986, growing access to clean water and sanitation services as well as connecting people to agricultural and vocational training. In 2023, we reached more than 96,600 people across the country.

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The crisis in Afghanistan after series of devastating earthquakes - Mercy Corps