( – promoted by buhdydharma )
Yesterday, I noted that the L.A. Times was reporting that the president was going to follow the advice of General Stanley McChrystal, and escalate the escalation in Afghanistan. Today, the New York Times offers this:
As President Obama prepares to decide whether to send additional troops to Afghanistan, the political climate appears increasingly challenging for him, leaving him in the awkward position of relying on the Republican Party, and not his own, for support.
The simple political narrative of the Afghanistan war – that this was the good war, in which the United States would hunt down the perpetrators of the Sept. 11 attacks – has faded over time, with popular support ebbing, American casualties rising and confidence in the Afghan government declining. In addition, Afghanistan’s disputed election, and the attendant fraud charges that have been lodged against President Hamid Karzai, are contributing further to the erosion of public support.
A CBS News poll released on Tuesday reports that 41 percent of those polled wanted troop levels in Afghanistan decreased, compared with 33 percent in April. Far fewer people – 25 percent – wanted troop levels increased, compared with 39 percent in April. And Mr. Obama’s approval rating for his handling of Afghanistan has dropped eight points since April, to 48 percent.
Congressional Democrats, particularly those on the left, report increasing disenchantment among constituents with the idea of a long and possibly escalating conflict in Afghanistan, especially as the American strategy comes to resemble a long-term nation-building approach rather than a counterterrorism operation.
“I and the American people cannot tolerate more troops without some commitment about when this perceived occupation will end,” Senator Russ Feingold, Democrat of Wisconsin, said Wednesday in an interview.
Does the president ever listen to his liberal base? Does he ever listen to the public? Who, exactly, is he trying to appease? Why?
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He listens to his corporate base, works very hard for his real constituents, and delivers big time every time they tell him to deliver.*
* see Goldman Sachs, and the insurance and ‘defense’ industries
he was elected by the ‘left of the left’, the people who actually believed in the fierce urgency of now. How in the hell is he going to sustain any support when the policies and agenda he is pursuing are obvious to everyone who voted for change, the people who don’t give a rats as about party labels, centrists, Blue dogs, bi-partisan, and have had it with fear, be it of the insane right, the ‘terrorists’ or falling too bigs.
They are my neighbors, they are teachers, software geeks, firemen, they are not left of the left they are just not stupid enough to fall for another bamboozle no matter how charming the new puppet is. They were smart enough and audacious enough to stand up and say this is enough. What’s up with Obama they ask me’? I feel like apologizing as I am the resident political junkie who helped deliver this precinct.
So who’s going to support this, the bonkers on the right who hate him cause he’s a Muslim and a socialist? The political myths of the past do not hold up in reality. Pockets of pig ignorance are not enough and neither is insane Democratic party loyalists who blame and defend the political bamboozle as pragmatic and call all doubters the enemy of the good. What a waste winning is if this is what we win, over and over.
From Danny Schecter, The News Dissector, 9/3/09
U.S. Troop Levels in Afghanistan
Fiscal Year Troops
2001 N/A
2002 5,200
2003 10,400
2004 15,200
2005 19,100
2006 20,400
2007 23,700
2008 30,100
2009 50,700*
US Troops in Afghanistan by Year Since 2001
* Current Troop Levels – There are roughly 62,000 U.S. troops currently in Afghanistan. This number is expected to grow to at least 68,000 by December. [Gates Says Additional Local Forces May Be Needed In Afghan War, Bloomberg News, September 1, 2009.]
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Plus +++ Remember that at least half the military forces in Afghanistan…are mercenaries!!!
Answer!
The MIC, with the Wall St corporatists, with public money in the war room.
We ARE playing clue, right?
Not a damn thing. Iraq & Afghanistan are still black holes sucking lives into them with no end in sight becasue there is none. What did we vote for? Change? Well, there was, the face but not the game.
to them than is the left wing of their own party. They won’t hesitate to use their “base” at election time, but unlike the republicans, the New Democrats don’t give their “base” any respect, any power, or any say.
They still believe that they can make it into power and keep power only by
kissing the behinds of the republicanscontinuedgroveling“bipartisanship”. Ironically, this means capitulating to the demands of the republicans, who are themselves, pretty much controlled by their birther/tea bagger/racist/fascist base.One group of people that the POTUS continues to ignore:
We’ve been ignored about HRC, and also about the War(s). It seems the War Profiteers & their paid servants in the Pentagon have more influence (more $$$’s & “be very afraid” BS?) than do the people who got the POTUS elected. I wonder if they’ll have more votes next go ’round?