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September 22, 2012
In Afghanistan, as in so many countless other things, what can be truly said about Obama except this:
The U.S. troop surge in Afghanistan, which began in 2009, ended this week. As the Times aptly notes, the conclusion of one of Obama’s biggest military endeavors has come and gone with little fanfare. The president is doubtless happy about this, as the mission has been far from an unqualified success
Posted by Vanderleun at September 22, 2012 8:29 PM. This is an entry on the sideblog of American Digest: Check it out.
Your Say
"The current state of the Middle East would be reported as illustrating the complete collapse of American foreign policy
"—if Bush were in the White House. The criticism of drone strikes and Guantanamo that is now mostly confined to the far left would be mainstream conventional wisdom, and the current unrest in the Middle East would be depicted as a response to American militarism.
"The in and out surge in Afghanistan would be mercilessly exposed as a strategic flop, reflecting the naive incompetence of an inexperienced president out of his depth.
"The SEALS rather than the White House would be getting the credit for the death of Osama bin Laden, and there would be more questions about whether killing him and then bragging endlessly and tastelessly about it was a contributing factor to the current unrest. Political cartoons of Cheney spiking the football would be everywhere. It’s also likely we would have heard much more about how killing Osama was strategically unimportant as he had become an increasingly symbolic figure and there would have been a lot of detailed and focused analysis of how the foolish concentration on bin Laden led the clueless Bush administration to neglect the rise of new and potentially much more dangerous Islamist groups in places like Mali.
"The Libyan war would be widely denounced as an unconstitutional act of neocon militarism, with much more attention paid to the civilian casualties during the war, the chaos that followed, and the destabilizing effects on the neighborhood.
"The White House fumbling around the Benghazi murders would be treated like a major scandal and dominate the news for at least a couple of weeks.
"If Bush were in the White House, the Middle East would be a horrible disaster, and it would all be America’s fault."
http://blogs.the-american-interest.com/wrm/2012/09/23/americans-turn-on-msm-what-does-it-mean/
Posted by: Fat Man at September 23, 2012 10:43 AM
Yeah, right...
Of course, The (sn)Oregonian reported this morning that the 41st Brigade (most of the OR National Guard) had been put on alert for mobilization of 1800 bodies to go to... wait for it... Afghanistan!
We're withdrawing... by pulling 1800 civilians out of their lives to... do what?
Posted by: bud at September 25, 2012 4:15 PM