Michael Cohen watches the Afghanistan news cycle:
So once again we've hit a point that we seem to hit every few weeks with Afghanistan; reems of data and anecdotal evidence suggests that the war in Afghanistan is going badly; that civilian death tolls have increased; that the Karzai government remains deeply alienated from the US/NATO effort; that our security gains may not be sustainable . . . and then confident predictions from the US military that we are on the cusp of turning the tide in the war.
In short, we have reality in Afghanistan - and then we have what our military and political leaders tell us.
It really is Vietnam all over again, isn't it? Along the same lines, Greg Scoblete questions the administration's negligible troop reductions. What I cannot fathom is Obama's stance on this. Did he intensify the war to prove it was unwinnable, thereby giving him lee-way to withdraw? Did he think the "surge" was worth a shot and an earlier withdrawal would have been too costly initially? Has he merely waited for public opinion to shift decisively? Does he want to use this issue to divide the GOP?
Or, more worryingly, does he believe the bullshit Petraeus is continuing to shovel? Or is he too weak to stand up to the face-saving general?