December 02, 2009 04:00 AM UTC

Obama disappoints on Afghanistan

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• by: Barron X

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The President could have struck out in a bold, decisive new direction.  

Instead, his West Point Speech explored how to make hostile military occupation more palatable to the Afghan civilians who suffer under it.

His core new strategy is to hope even harder that the Afghan puppet government becomes effective, and that the Afghan people fall in line to help their colonial masters.  Change that Karzai can believe in.  

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How long before the US adopts a strategy toward Afghanistan that reflects American values like “consent of the governed ?”

How much longer will our military continue to punish Pashtun hillbillies for their temerity in demanding to be left alone ?

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The President did not persuade me that prolonging the war against Afghanistan makes me any safer.

There should be a pretty high threshold for going to war.  It was met in September 2001, but circumstances have changed, and that threshold is no longer satisfied.

The 19-month deadline was an unfortunate choice.  He set himself a 19-month deadline during the campaign for withdrawal from Iraq, but once in office, he deferred to the Bush timetable of 35 months.  

Tonight he said that the “Surge” would only last 19 months.  Why not 18 ?  Why not 16 ?  

It’s Bush’s fault that we got bogged down in both Iraq and Afghanistan.  But these aren’t his wars anymore.  

Obama has embraced them both, made them his own.  

Keith Olberman needs to get himself a new signoff,

“XXX days since the current President declared ‘Mission I can’t finish’ in our perpetual wars.”

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