SURGE YOU CAN BELIEVE IN
Dec. 5th, 2009 01:04 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
defrogI was considering posting something on the Obama Afghan Surge, but what can I really say that Jon Stewart hasn’t already said?
The alternative speeches bit in the last two minutes are well worth waiting for.
I do have a couple of things to add, though:
While I understand why the left is upset about Obama keeping the war going (though how that’s any different from the way JFK and LBJ ran Vietnam, I’m not sure), I’m not convinced by Rachel Maddow’s argument that Obama’s biggest sin is justifying the Bush Doctrine, Bush’s most radical policy shift (and certainly his worst, most dangerous and irresponsible idea), under which the Afghanistan invasion was sold. Obama’s borrowing from Bush’s war speech aside, he’s using the surge as a ticket out of a country we already invaded. So it’s not really the same thing.
On the other hand – and I posted it before but it’s worth repeating – Paul Pillar, deputy chief of the counterterrorist center at the CIA from 1997 to 1999, said recently that the role of terrorist training camps isn’t really all that big in al Qaeda’s operations these days. So if the point of “winning” is to ensure Afghanistan can prevent such camps from being established, it’s not all that much of a victory in the War On Teh Terrorz.
Which is why I suspect Obama is doing what he’s doing for pretty much the same reason Bush did – it’s a political decision designed to make the president look as though he is Doing Something About Terrorism without making it look as though we are Giving Up. And why not, Jim? Obama may be 30,000 times smarter than Bush, but he’s still a politician at the end of the day. And politicians base their decisions on politics. That’s how this works.
Not that I approve. But no one really should be surprised by this. It's certainly not the first time Obama has continued certain Bush policies.
Of course, if Stewart’s take is anything to go by, Obama’s not making anyone happy with the New Improved Surge. I haven’t yet worked out if I should be encouraged by this or not.
The urge to surge,
This is dF
The alternative speeches bit in the last two minutes are well worth waiting for.
I do have a couple of things to add, though:
While I understand why the left is upset about Obama keeping the war going (though how that’s any different from the way JFK and LBJ ran Vietnam, I’m not sure), I’m not convinced by Rachel Maddow’s argument that Obama’s biggest sin is justifying the Bush Doctrine, Bush’s most radical policy shift (and certainly his worst, most dangerous and irresponsible idea), under which the Afghanistan invasion was sold. Obama’s borrowing from Bush’s war speech aside, he’s using the surge as a ticket out of a country we already invaded. So it’s not really the same thing.
On the other hand – and I posted it before but it’s worth repeating – Paul Pillar, deputy chief of the counterterrorist center at the CIA from 1997 to 1999, said recently that the role of terrorist training camps isn’t really all that big in al Qaeda’s operations these days. So if the point of “winning” is to ensure Afghanistan can prevent such camps from being established, it’s not all that much of a victory in the War On Teh Terrorz.
Which is why I suspect Obama is doing what he’s doing for pretty much the same reason Bush did – it’s a political decision designed to make the president look as though he is Doing Something About Terrorism without making it look as though we are Giving Up. And why not, Jim? Obama may be 30,000 times smarter than Bush, but he’s still a politician at the end of the day. And politicians base their decisions on politics. That’s how this works.
Not that I approve. But no one really should be surprised by this. It's certainly not the first time Obama has continued certain Bush policies.
Of course, if Stewart’s take is anything to go by, Obama’s not making anyone happy with the New Improved Surge. I haven’t yet worked out if I should be encouraged by this or not.
The urge to surge,
This is dF
