I'm sorry, Bob. Some people are distorting things to the extreme right now and I guess they just need to blow off steam. I am avoiding all reports on Afghanistan for the rest of the week because we are at an unproductive time.

No one is paying attention to anything but the number 30k. They are ignoring the purpose of the increase and don't want to accept that those 30k are going to protect the troops already serving so that everyone CAN come home. I do not like the war and I am not happy about the escalation but I see where if we don't escalate, we can't protect the troops that need to train the Afghan security forces. If we need to send troops to watch their backs while they train, then I can only see that as better than leaving the troops to train and protect themselves at the same time. I can only see it as if we don't escalate, we leave the troops already there vulnerable. I see the escalation as needed cover. I can only see denying an increase as denying the current troops help. I try to think of it that way and see it for what it is: we either help the current troops or we don't. Numbers aren't the issue -- their mission is. Unfortunately, everyone is focused on the number and nothing else.

Jennifer

Oh, the "enlist" argument. I don't recall Bob's use of it, but I did see it all the time on Daily Kos back when I read it.

As arguments go, it carries all the intellectual heft of the playground taunt, "if you love it so much why don't you marry it?"

Are crippled citizens forbidden to have opinions on foreign policy? A cripple can't enlist. Nor anyone older than 28 for the Marines, 42 for the Army, 28 for the Air Force and if I recall correctly 34 for the Navy.

I do not describe myself as anti-war. I find it a ridiculous position, like being "anti-tax" or some other thoughtless construction like "anti-government." All wars? All taxes? All government? Nonsense. War, as the great von Clausewitz said, is diplomacy by other means. A war has a stated strategic goal. It is a tool, albeit one that ought to be used cautiously and ideally as a last resort.

I find Afghanistan justified. Not so Iraq. As such, I support the President's efforts to conclude the Afghan conflict.

To the extent that I understood the situation in Afghanistan (which was not very well at all), and after I read Bob's take on this current development, it was one that I was content to adopt as mine. I also agree that a response of "then go ahead and enlist" is kneejerk.

I am always amazed at the positions taken by people that are always zero-sum, polar stances. We live in a world limned primarily in shades of gray, and it would seem that most decisions, and sensibilities, will arise from that middle-ground. It is also because this perception, that, as of late, I find it curious that the extreme left of our party considers itself "the base".

@Klaus -- Daily Kos is the source I am avoiding most right now on Afghanistan. It's scary over there, man! Damn scary.

Jennifer

Nuance has never been a forte of the far left or right, Bob. I had the same exact conversation with someone, how I didn't like the idea, hated that we'd have to stay, how we've done nothing there for eight years but leaving now will be like the early 80s all over again, that a timetable for withdrawal was a good thing, making sure Pakistan's nukes didn't fall into Taliban hands was a good thing, how it's no surprise as Obama has characterized Afghanistan as "the good war" as opposed to Iraq and how he voiced his opinion while still Senator to expand there. And the response I got: "So you're for the expansion of the war then?"

Has anyone been happy with the policies of a politician they voted for 100% of the time? Can't it be possible to still support a president for the things he's doing right and a "wait and see" attitude on the things you disagree on?

Apparently not, Carl. I was told last night that that was akin to Britney Spears' blind support of Bush... :( There is no gray area - you're either in support of Obama on everything or on nothing. It's the extension of Bush's "you're either for us or agin' us".
The GOP's mocking of Kerry's nuanced view of world affairs apparently taught the lesson that all things are black & white - for withdrawal or for expansion of the war. There is no comprehension of using the one to attain the other - and no desire to comprehend it.

@ceu, I just used the black/white versus gray argument yesterday on this very topic. I expect it from the right but it pisses me off to be getting the black/white argument from the left. And not only is the black/white being used about the escalation, some on the left are using it to suggest Obama doesn't support women's rights in Afghanistan because he's not making that his focus, he's a corporate sell-out, he's the new Bush. I can't even keep up with all the reasons the left is starting to despise Obama. And apparently, some of these people think there will be someone we can primary against him who would be a black/white candidate who could win.

Wake me when the madness is over, please.

Jennifer

Bob, first I love your writings, but your current position on the Afghan "escalation" I can not agree with. Your position has one vital flaw. Wall Street & the Pentagon only care about PROFITS & ENDLESS WAR! No matter what they say about a "withdrawal date" they are LYING!!!!

The glorification of GREED & ENDLESS WAR are the ONLY things the Wall Street & Pentagon "monsters" care about!

NOW Obama has thrown our future, his Presidency & OUR country to the WOLVES of GREED & ENDLESS WAR!!

I am sure you have read Matt Taibbi's Rolling Stone piece about Obama's Wall Street connection, and now this past Tuesday night at West Point we saw Obama'a Pentagon connection!

When will enough be enough?

July 2011?

Yeah right!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Obama has made it clear, he will continue like all his predecessors to just "steady the tiller" of the USS CORPORATE EMPIRE, while We the People continue to lose our jobs, our health care, our homes, etc.... all for the glory of GREED & ENDLESS WAR!!!!

Believe me NOTHING will change in July 2011!!!!!

This INSANITY must end "NOW"!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

... some on the left are using it to suggest Obama doesn't support women's rights in Afghanistan because he's not making that his focus...

Not just the left, Jennifer. I heard douchebag Jake Tapper at the WH press briefing yesterday ask Robert Gibbs if Obama is changing his stance on women's rights in Afghanistan because he didn't specifically mention "women" in his speech. Gibbs said he talked about "human rights" and that would fall under that umbrella, but Tapper had to ask again just make sure. What a dipshit.

@exoevolution - If you are correct then there won't be a 2012 for Obama. I doubt that he is that duplicitous and I disagree with your assessment, but if that is truly the case then we're looking at a new President in 3 years.

By the way, did you spill some Coke on your keyboard? Seems like the Caps lock and the exclamation point keeps getting stuck.

@Carl, well, Jack Tripper (as I call Tapper) and the right are a given. Although, the right seems to only care about women's rights when it's politically advantageous to them. Well, not even then...

Jennifer

Did I miss Al Qaeda's memo stating that they surrendered or have quit the fight?

This best sums up my view on Afghanistan. H/T to AngusGodofMeat at Balloon-Juice:

Obama did not get “rolled.” He made a very tricky and difficult decision, and I have never seen one person anywhere whose ability or judgment I would rate as being superior to his, and that includes the pundits or the blogosphere. Not one, not even for one day.

This decision is not about hippies, or Vietnam, or weak Democrats, or any of that other bullshit. It’s about the realities of the situation in Afghanistan, and whether I agree with the exact assessment profferred by the president last night (and I don’t know whether I do or not) I certainly would not consider for a second that I have enough information or enough good advice from other people who do have enough information to overrule Obama’s decision.

Here’s the bottom line for me. The war in Afghanistan was voted for by all but one member of Congress, between the two houses, back in 2001. Most people supported it. I know I did. I really didn’t know anyone who didn’t.

So, we made a bad call back then, as a country. The whole country, not a defective few. Basically, almost all of us. We didn’t forsee the mess we are in there now. We were blinded by anger over 9/11 and wanted to go do something, and that is what we chose to do.

And as a country, we sat by and let this war turn into a trainwreck over the years(this is an 8 year war), and then we hired a new guy to come in and try to get things back on track. And that new guy has shown himself to be pretty competent and pretty careful, and this is the course he has chosen to take under the authority we gave him.

Okay, I support his decision and I hope that this new course produces a beneficial result for all stakeholders to the greatest possible extent. That’s a tall order, but I am willing to get behind it and give it a chance to work.

The amazing thing about this decision and situation is that they are not the biggest problems on our plate right now. Economics and other domestic issues are bigger, in my view. We must stabilize the situation in Afghanistan in order to give ourselves space to move ahead, just as Obama stated that we need to give Afghanistan room to make progress. We have a lot of things that need to be done and fixed.

As for the whole war/antiwar thing in general, I’ve been generally antiwar consistently for a while, and continue to be so. But that is not license to just pull the plug on an ongoing war situation, running away, Sarah Palin style, because it’s too hard. That’s a fucked response and I won’t support it.

I don't really care about the enlist comment, but if you support Obama on this you support an escalation of the war. Withdrawal promise or not, this is an escalation of war.

A couple other points.

1. I have a hard time believing many Obama supporters would have been this forgiving with Bush, even if he unveiled the same exact plan. The same people would be calling Bush a war monger.

2. Obama's broken several promises already and I'm 100% sure he will not meet this one. Moreover, he said we will "begin withdrawal" in 2011. We'll have 10's of thousands of troops there and in Iraq indefinitely. Is that withdrawal?

@Allen: Please list the numerous amounts of promises he has broken.

And we did support a war after 9/11. We all did.

Carl makes the perfect point here. Obama is basically putting his Presidency on the line with this approx withdrawal date. I know that there are some who will tell me that I am drinking the Obama Koolaid, but in my view what he is doing is asking us to put our trust in his decision and if it doesn't work, his re-election will be on thin ice. Again, maybe I am being naive, but I really believe he is thinking about what is best for this country and I choose to try and look at the glass as half full.

OK, stepping over the screeching, to extend Bob some sympathy...

Yeah, this is a tough one. Here's where I come down on it all:

1. As a matter of principle - the US is in the right to fight a war once someone aggresses us. Morally - Afghanistan is the only war we ought to be in, if we have to be in a war.

2. As a matter of politics - Obama has never promised anything but an escalation in Afghanistan. If people thought he was just joking, or just saying that to get elected, they do violence to his character. Maybe he's just "saying" he's Christian, too? Oh wait - lots of folks, left and right, believe that. No wonder so many seem surprised that he actually is escalating in Afghanistan.

3. The drawdown is going to start in July 2011, but the war will not be over then. There's no possible way it could be. All that's happening in 2011 is the beginning of transition to Afghani responsibility.

4. That said - if you don't start that transition some time - you'll never start. So GOOD on the president for making a firm commitment. It means we won't be there forever, and we will leave better than the soviets did.

Bob - you have articulated a good bit of sanity, as you always do. Thank you for it, and screw the nutcases who can't think well enough to understand your position- even if they don't agree.

QT

The proliferation of stupid comments is not surprising. There is an abundance of intellectually-challenged people out there. I hate to use an old warn-out phrase, but they really are incapable of seeing the "big picture".

Those that actually get it know that President Obama voluntarily parachuted into an enormous maze created by eight years of Republican greed and lunacy. There is no easy way out. That is the big picture.

What is easy, however, is to define everything in black and white terms or to oversimplify things like your Af-Pak post with "enlist" comments.

Just dumb.

Moreover, he said we will "begin withdrawal" in 2011. We'll have 10's of thousands of troops there and in Iraq indefinitely. Is that withdrawal?

It depends on whether or not there are any active combat operations. American forces no longer patrol Germany, but they're there.

I understand the desire to see conflict end, but as I said above objectives have to be realized. Should Lincoln have given up on the Civil War just because McClellan was a tool? No. We the People elected a President who campaigned on escalating the conflict in order to reach a satisfactory conclusion - that being the elimination of the Taliban as a hostile force inclined to provide assistance to Al-Qaeda. Pakistan is key to that as well.

I'm glad I voted for Obama. I think he's doing a fine job broadly, and that includes his decision regarding Afghanistan. Unlike some of the mouthbreathers on DailyKos, I can (and have) given reasons why I support this escalation. I have yet to see any substantive, grounded arguments from Glenn Greenwald or anyone else why this escalation is a net negative; I've instead seen peaceniks who oppose war "on principle" and whiny concern trolls devoid of reasoning. It's an argument I'd love to have.

QueenTiye -

Calm and wise as usual :)

Af/Pak is a high stakes game, perhaps the highest since Pak has nukes and is unstable, unreliable. Unlike Vietnam, in which the Viet Cong or NVA could not and would not (even if they could) cross the ocean in pursuit of us when we left, leaving Af/Pak could result in the worst of consequences. 9/11 happened once, it can certainly happen again. I respect Obama for making a tough decision. Also, unlike Bush, I trust Obama's judgment on this, which is why I voted for the guy in the first place.

And...

If you recall during the campaign, he said he would not abandon Afghanistan. He was pretty clear about that.

Is that a broken campaign promise?

We'll have 10's of thousands of troops there and in Iraq indefinitely.

The SOFA says US troops out by 12/31/2011...so not indefinitely.
And this leftie would have cheered heartily if Bush had announced a timeline for withdrawal from Afghanistan.

@Allen
1. I have a hard time believing many Obama supporters would have been this forgiving with Bush, even if he unveiled the same exact plan. The same people would be calling Bush a war monger. -- Many, if not all, Obama supporters wanted more troops in Afghanistan and NONE in Iraq and we would have wanted a timeline. I think people like you are forgetting the reason we didn't support Bush on Iraq. It wasn't because we're anti-war activists, it's because it was a fraud. You are playing a shell game by moving around the motives. Many, if not all, wanted Bush to send more to Afghanistan and had he treated that war like he should have, he would have had more support. He wasted time, resources and his "political capital" on Iraq. Don't pretend Obama supporters would have acted otherwise just because you want to rewrite history. Had Obama been President on 9/11 this would all be over by now. He wouldn't have stepped foot in Iraq. Now he's stuck trying to make a failed strategy work long enough to get out.

2. Obama's broken several promises already and I'm 100% sure he will not meet this one. Moreover, he said we will "begin withdrawal" in 2011. We'll have 10's of thousands of troops there and in Iraq indefinitely. Is that withdrawal? -- We can't count broken promises until his term or terms are up. He has until the last second of his last day in office to fulfill every one of them. Until then he doesn't owe anyone a specific time and date on any of them. We elected him to get the job done and anyone who wasn't paying attention to how he operates and what he said should stop acting as if they know what the hell they're talking about.

Obama's true base knows exactly what he does, how he does it, why he does it and when he does it. We may not all like the details but his true base gets it. If you don't get it, then you aren't paying attention and never were.

Jennifer

"Please list the numerous amounts of promises he has broken."

This is really tiresome. Do your own homework. It's really not that hard. To name just a couple.

- He promised to close Gitmo. He has not.
- He promised to restore Habeus Corpus. He has not. He SAYS he has, but he has not. Read Greenwald. Look at the facts.
- He promised to end torture as an American policy. He has not. Outsourcing our torture is not ending it.

I know the predictable responses to these. I suggest you wake up and accept facts. The left is getting even worse than the right with its knee-jerk loyalty.

Ah, the insipid "enlist" argument (if that be the right word). It was tedious when used against the Right, it's tedious now.

I'm just surprised it took over four hours for someone to fling that particular handful of poo at you.

Substantively, I'm not at all happy with the personnel increase, but I understand why it's being done. The pity is that Sarah Chayes has been saying since the day the Taliban fell that military action won't make Afghanistan a safe, secure, stable country; foreign investment in infrastructure and anti-corruption efforts will. It would be cheaper, too.

@Allen Frederick: Look, mate, we all know that Obama hasn't given us our magical unicorns. I for one am willing to give the man more than 10 months to put everything in the world right. If you're not, well, we'll just have to agree to disagree.

@Allen: Knee-jerk loyalty? don't you think it odd that you accuse us of knee-jerk loyalty while naming a left wing hero Greenwald? I just have to laugh at people who diss others for listening to and supporting the president while saying that we should only listen to their pre-approved list of pundits.

A knee-jerk reaction labeling you as a chickenhawk? Sounds like something a self labeled "progressive" would say.

Im not sure you even owe an explaination to those who lack reading comprehension or those who are uninformed on history.

I think I just read someone complaining that we will have troops stationed in Iraq for a long time and THAT is not withdraw....

Let me give you a history lesson:

We still have 30k men in South Korea (since the 1950s)
50k men in Japan (since the 1940s)
50k men in Germany (since the 1940s)
We still had thousands of men stationed on the outskirts of Saudi Arabi following Desert Storm and they stayed there until 2003.

Guess what? When Afghanistan is "over" we'll still have men there too just like all those other places. When Iraq is "over" we'll stil have men in Kuwait and the 5th fleet in the Gulf.

Quick, you better blame Obama for not withdrawing from all of those places! Go!

Afghanistan is a Shit Sandwich and Obama just took a big bite.

@Allen Frederick: Oh, I do my homework.

As for closing Gitmo, did he say he would close it in a year?

It's been only 10 months. I guess Glenn Greenwald is the beacon of all things Obama.

It's getting tiresome listening to whiny ass tity babies like you point out all the negative shit and not point all of the positive things this administration's done.

Did you even read Bob's post from several days linking to TPM's list of things Obama's accomplished in a short period of time? How about Politifact?

Oh I know, Glen Greenwald didn't say it so it must not be true?

Just becuase Obama hasn't given you a unicorn that pisses liquid gold and poo-poos $100 bills in less than year doesn't man he's a failure.

Get a grip!

@ JM Ashby:
Don't let the cat out of the bag. There will be a post on some idiot's blog blaming Obama for leaving folks in South Korea. I wouldn't put it past some of the dolts that are considered "punditry"

@AllonFla: I agree.

Yes,yes..they have now arrived at the point of using President Obama as a scapegoat, in that they sit on their arses and write all day long on any shit that comes in their heads and then they blame him for any and everything!
The man is trying to CLEAN UP THE MESS you'all. ..clean up the damn mess made by some-one else! Oh, it is real easy to get it right on paper,but when you are in the shit, it's a whole other story.
Who the hell can like war? Trauma for people involved, and for those not involved....And Bob, pay them no mind the little playground bullies on paper can only do so on paper!

Let's deal in reality...We have troops all over the world because of wars and dust-ups that have occured in our recent history including South Korea, Okinawa, the Balkans, etc. This will not change. And, for all of you out there with your heads in the sand, the same will apply to Iraq and Afghanistan because of what has happened there. We will never be completely gone (or at least not in the forseeable future), so you might as well get used to it. There is a price to pay for making mistakes (Iraq in general and losing Afghanistan after it had been "won"), and that price is a troop presence in south central Asia. So quit wasting everyone's time with philosophical ramblings about war and deal with the situation at hand.

It's the suddenly pacifistic Republicans and neo-cons that are cracking me up over all of this.

apparently bob is as mambi pambi as obama. cesca why do you always forgive, permit, allow, and forgive the prez?

his speeches are so murky that he ends up saying nothing.

take a real firm honest stance once in awhile, bob. bad enough our president is a pushed around puppet; but do our bloggers have to be too? aren't you guys supposed to challenge authority and not suck up to it?

geez.

I don't want an escalation. I don't want more casualties. I don't want more spending when Congress is being miserly on domestic programs. I want the thing to end. I didn't even want it to start in the first place.
But the president's plan contains a direct path to withdrawal -- a plan which he never promised and which we're now getting. That's good news. And so I very reluctantly have taken a "let's see" approach to this plan as a means to ending the war in not only the quickest way possible, but also in a responsible way that could potentially ameliorate a longer crisis involving blowback and loose nukes

obama's a pussy.

LOL!!! Oh, Blade. I really needed some humor today and your humor did it for me. I'm laughing so hard I'm crying. Can't.stop.laughing. Do you open for Glenn Beck on his comedy tour? You should because you are just that funny. Seriously, stop. I can't take anymore. Oh, you so funny.

Jennifer

@Blade: Did you take your meds today?

The best dissent in this situation is the weaker argument.

"kneejerk and stupid"

You just described 40% of American adults.