[...] HillBuzz: Thank you former President George W. Bush and former First Lady Laura Bush Flopping Aces: Obama at West Point: Portrait of a US Commander in Chief on the defensive Le·gal In·sur·rec·tion: Small Man On A Big Stage Diary of a Mad Conservative: You sir, are an [...]

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[...] View: Sarah Palin’s Governing Philosophy Emerges In “Going Rogue” Flopping Aces: Obama at West Point: Portrait of a US Commander in Chief on the defensive Weasel Zippers: Olberdouche: Obama Must “Declare Victory and Get Out” of [...]

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[...] View: Sarah Palin’s Governing Philosophy Emerges In “Going Rogue” Flopping Aces: Obama at West Point: Portrait of a US Commander in Chief on the defensive Weasel Zippers: Olberdouche: Obama Must “Declare Victory and Get Out” of [...]

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[...] View: Sarah Palin’s Governing Philosophy Emerges In “Going Rogue” Flopping Aces: Obama at West Point: Portrait of a US Commander in Chief on the defensive Weasel Zippers: Olberdouche: Obama Must “Declare Victory and Get Out” of [...]

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[...] View: Sarah Palin’s Governing Philosophy Emerges In “Going Rogue” Flopping Aces: Obama at West Point: Portrait of a US Commander in Chief on the defensive Weasel Zippers: Olberdouche: Obama Must “Declare Victory and Get Out” of [...]

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Think of “goal” as the goal line on a football field rather than the fund raising goal of the local charity bazaar. In the former case, if you do not meet your goal by the expiration of a given time, you have failed. Making the one yard line nets you nothing but a lot of expended effort. In the latter case, if your goal was $1000 and you raised $999, you did extremely well. The generals understand the former definition. I am not sure the CinC does.

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Ya know what I have a beef with?
This feckless POS president.
I read and listened to his whole speech (bad as it was).

He set a “done” date, but gives himself an out with the “conditions” quip.

McCrystal is asked about this end date this morning, and he publicly swears the president has July 2011 as a goal, not an expiration date. Tells his co-commanders this also with the CNN TV crew in the tent in Afghanistan while he’s saying it….this morning.

The senior Republicans get this same response during hearings from Gates and Hillary…This morning.

http://hotair.com/archives/2009/12/02/mccain-grills-gates-how-fixed-is-this-2011-timetable-for-withdrawal/
Baghdad Bob this morning wasn’t absolutely sure at this mornings presser….

But the president is a bold faced lying piece of garbage. The date is set in stone, and Baghdad Bob has the chisel. Baghdad says the Liar in-Chief told him this afternoon.

http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2009/12/02/politics/politicalhotsheet/entry5868282.shtmlent.

Whatever Bush did or didn’t do in Afghanistan, he never told the enemy when to take back the territory gained, and never told them how long to rest-up before they do.

Letter to US Ambassador to Cambodia John Gunther Dean:

“Dear Excellency and Friend, I thank you very sincerely for your letter and your offer to transport me towards freedom. I cannot, alas, leave in such a cowardly fashion. As for you, and in particular for your great country, I never believed for a moment that you would have this sentiment of abandoning a people, which has chosen liberty. You have refused us your protection, and we can do nothing about it. You leave, and my wish is that you and your country will find happiness under this sky. But, mark it well, that if I shall die here on the spot and in my country that I love, it is too bad, because we are all born and must die one day. I have committed this mistake of believing in you, the Americans. Please accept, Excellency, my dear friend, my faithful and friendly sentiments. Prince Sirik Matak.”

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My… “everything you need to know” about me? How omnipotent of you, billy bob. Quick, he says… does two and two equal 5, or 3 and a half? Tell me your answer, and I know all about you… LOL

Ah if but the world truly functioned in your black/white simple mentality.

I think Bush’s major Afghanistan mistake was to acquiesce to the liberal progressive mentality… i.e. you… and let NATO get anywhere near Afghanistan. That’s my largest beef. I never wanted… nor ever want in the future… an int’l force to take charge because they’ve a history of being proven failures.

From 2001-summer 2006, there were ample NATO troops and a small contingent of US troops under the DOD/OIF command. The problems that lead to the increasing jihad problems were not with troop numbers, but because there was no reason to have national loyalty to a central government in Kabul that didn’t do squat for the outlying tribal areas. Does this sink in for you yet? Bad guys gone, but why be loyal to Kabul… so far away… when all your local services and benefits came from the guy with the biggest guns and ammo stash in the village. They provide cash for poppies for food. They provide protection. They also install Sharia law and terrorize the town. Where’s Kabul? What can they do? Come in… kill them again, and wander away. No schools, no roads, no jobs, no infrastruction like roads/power/fresh water. No hospitals. And definitely no protection.

Bottom line in Afghanistan… who needs Kabul outside of Kabul’s city limits? No one. The big zero’s major flaw. There is no victory without first… security. Can’t get the central govt making cash and exploiting their few resources if no civilian business will set foot inside the country since their contractors will be beheaded or kidnapped.

Second…. infrastructure and a reason for supporting a central government. Don’t know what you hot shot lawyers call it, but we dumb citizen types call that nation building and reconstruction. Some private and some govt funds, assuming mining natural resources and businesses/manufacturing will commence. In other words, we have the heart and caring to want to bring Afghanistan into the 20th Century, even tho we are well into the 21st.

After 2006… despite beating back the bad guys, it steadily degraded from there with NATO’s ROE. They couldn’t secure it. Troops or not, Afghans trained in security or not. You can’t live there in squalor with the rest of the inhabitants and just be security. There needs to be economic growth. In other words, not only was Kabul useless as a central government, NATO ROE were a pile of manure for security.

So the tribes/villages got security… from the village thugs and jihadis. They used the poppies cash crops for food, and the jihadis got their baby caliphates.

With the demise of security, there was a need for more NATO troops… repeated requests of which the allies simply ignored, or refused. To increase the US footprint merely put an “empire US” face on the “int’l” force. And within mere months of the security decline, the Dems owned both chambers of Congress. Did you hear your buds cry for more troops? Did you hear your hero zero POTUS demand more troops? Of course not. What were the chances of Bush getting significantly more than the 7000 he *did* put in without your incessant whining? And as the Pentagon defense spokesman I noted above from Missy’s links firmly stated, we had the troops to send… even with the Iraq surge ongoing.

Answer? Zip… nada.

Was that Bush’s fault? Nope. NATO war, NATO troops, and a whiny Dem Congress who didn’t want to escalate jack shit…. Afghanistan *or* Iraq. It behooved them to incite failure for political expediency. Afterall, an election was around the corner, and they had a good chance, after fostering years of hatred for Dubya since 2004, for a clean sweep at power.

Would I have appreciated if Bush had simply made it a US mission without int’l acquiescence at that point? Absolutely not. And listen to your types whine even more about Bush’s “empire”? Nope… let NATO reap what they did not sow. Let Congress take the heat for their double speak. They were thrilled to see deterioration in Afghanistan. They convinced you, and others, that it was a US war, not a NATO war… and you bought that line with all the “hope” and “change” you could muster. They wanted power, so they fed you lies, and you handed them power. Congrats, oh “real thinking” American….

We can give the eunuch in chief credit that he’s now trying to re’educate you to the same reality all along.. that this is “not America’s war”… because it’s a NATO endeavor. How politically convenient for that instant change on inauguration day. feh

Frankly, I am not happy even today to see our troops head off to foreign soils to serve under any others’ command but US military leaders. You can take NATO and UN peacekeeper blue helmet types and keep them for some tough job… like maybe parade control. They are utterly worthless, and I resent our soldiers being ordered by others.

Love that “when Obama gets finished” bit… Guess you missed the fact that I posted above where the 30,000 is a Bush figure they were working on, and now taken into Obama’s admin as originally theirs. What a laugh…. Not an original thought in his head, eh? And too insecure (rightly so) to give credit to the previous admin officials who did their homework.

So bottom line… I have no beefs with Bush on Aghanistan. I do, however, have a beef with NATO on Afghanistan. And I have an even bigger beef with Congress… which you can claim as your own since Jan 2007. And that includes all the economic problems and spending that goes with it.

And I have a real beef with you and your tunnel vision focus on talking points instead of facts. Getting a bit testy about the eunuch in chief, are we? So shall we peg who is the “real thinking” American, and who is the partisan now?

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@ MataHarley —

I have a simple question that will tell me everything I need to know about you and partisanship –

Do you think Bush did a good job in Afghanistan?

No, I don’t mean just the initial invasion. I mean the whole thing, from 2001 to January 2009, when he left office. What grade would you give him?

And do you think there were enough troops?

Face facts — if we had had enough troops during the last seven years, we would not be needing to TRIPLE THE US FORCE over the last two years. That’s right . . from 32,000 up to about 100,000 when Obama gets finished.

The commentary on this board exposes exactly why the American people (the real THINKING American people) lost all trust in the GOP and its ilk. There is much name calling but absolutely no introspection. Sad what the movement Barry Goldwater and Bill Buckley began has devolved to . . . .

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