USA Today‘s “Obama’s War” cover story today (2/18/09) is long by that paper’s usual standards, but can’t seem to find any space for critics of the plan to send 17,000 additional troops to Afghanistan.
Quoted in the piece:
–Barack Obama
—Michael O’Hanlon of the Brookings Institution
–political scientist Richard Eichenberg of Tufts University
–White House press secretary Robert Gibbs
— Joe Biden
–Robert Gates, Pentagon
–Sen. Joe Lieberman, “a leading hawk on both wars.”
–Richard Holbrooke, Obama’s special adviser on Pakistan and Afghanistan
—Anthony Cordesman, Center for Strategic & International Studies
–U.S./NATO commander David McKiernan
USA Today does note, however, that public opinion is more mixed:
Those surveyed split evenly, however, when asked whether the U.S. should keep troops in Afghanistan until things get better, even if that takes years, or set a timetable for removing them regardless of what’s going on there at that time.
Other polls suggest the public isn’t crazy about an escalation either. When will those voices be heard in the media?
Leaving troops ’til things get better …
Isn’t that like asking if you shouldn’t flush, on the assumption that the turd floating in your toilet will somehow act as a cleansing agent over time?
And here’s yet another example of the corpress’ divorce from reality … in the implication that the US did the Afghans a favor by invading and occupying their country, and now that they’ve shown their inability to take advantage of our largesse, maybe we should just leave them to their fate.
Running an empire’s such a thankless task.
I used to be in favor of the Afgan fight. That was before W & Co. screwed it up, probably for good, and before Pakistan signed a “cease fire” with the Taliban in the Swat Valley.
We are just as cooked as the Brits or the Ruskies were. It no longer matters when we pull out, it’s going to be a disaster.
Were is the FUN in FUNdamentalist? Come to think of it, where is the Mentalist?