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Home Front: Politix

Noobama's Vietnam moment

2009-10-31

It's not easy striking the right balance, is it? He doesn't seem to hesitate when it comes to screwing up America though.
Seven years ago, Dick Cheney proclaimed: "The Taliban is out of business, permanently." Last week, the former vice-president came close to accusing Barack Obama of lacking the guts to "do what it takes" to win the war against the very same Taliban.

Some time in the next two weeks, Mr Obama is likely to bring months of agonised deliberation to a close when he decides how many more troops to send to Afghanistan. The number, which could be as high as the 40,000 recommended by Stanley McChrystal, the general in charge, will be analysed minutely for what it can achieve on the ground in Afghanistan.

But as Mr Cheney's contrasting observations illustrate, the more influential war is being fought politically on the ground in America. Somehow, the compulsions of US politics have brought the candidate who electrified America by promising to pull out of Iraq to a position where many of his most ardent backers fear he may be about to get America into another Vietnam.

The decision, much like the one by Lyndon Johnson to step up involvement in Indochina, could prove to be the most important Mr Obama takes in office. It presents America's most liberal president in a generation with a classic dilemma between guns and butter that is only likely to deepen, whatever choice he makes.

"What began as an almost reflex debating stance on the campaign trail -- that George W. Bush had started the wrong war in Iraq and that Hillary Clinton had voted for it -- has brought us to this moment," says Daniel Markey at the Council on Foreign Relations. "Only now is the president really analysing the implications of escalation in Afghanistan. And they are potentially paralysing."

Posted by:gorb

#9 Nobody doubts Mr Obama's intellectual ability to parse the constant advice he is soliciting.

Bull. Where did this meme about Zero's intellectual ability come from? Can anyone actually site evidence of his intelligence and intellectual accomplishments?

As far as I can tell he is a gifted con man in the political area with all the morals and compassion of a hit-man for a drug cartel.

Posted by: AlanC 2009-10-31 12:47

#8 I doubt any British schoolmarm would approve of "hotting up" in a grammar class, TW. Somehow this horrible bit of slang seems to have entered the mainstream over there and I'm sad it has won the approval of editors at a newspaper that should know better.

Posted by: Scooter McGruder 2009-10-31 12:43

#7 "President Johnson had relatively few military associations as Senator or Vice President. As President, he had a mistrust of the military...There was no such closeness of contact between the Commander-in-Chief and his responsible advisers in uniform as existed between President Roosevelt, President Truman or President Eisenhower and their Chiefs of Staff
...The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff was the only member of the Joint Chiefs who say the President with any regularity in the crucial years 1965-1968 [but even he] rarely saw the President alone; only about once in every eight or nine White House visits. He was almost always accompanied either by the Secretary of Defense or his deputy, who never hesitated to "second guess" the Chairman and to dilute and contradict his statements. The individual members of the Joint Chiefs - the responsible heads of the fighting services: the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines - seldom saw the President privately. In the crucial twelve months from June 1965, to June 1966, when large numbers of US ground troops were committed to Vietnam..The Chief of the Staff of the Army saw the President twice." - Hanson. W. Baldwin, Strategy for Tomorrow (NY; Harper&Row, 1970), pgs 13-15

Posted by: Procopius2k 2009-10-31 12:10

#6 Much like LBJ, Mr Obama is surrounded by the best and the brightest, many of whom are urging the president to take the advice of the military, which appears to be nearly unanimous.

The Washington Post via Bob Woodward flogged this "MacNamara's Ghost" meme about two weeks ago. Same with the NYT's Cohen, though as befits a lesser talent, it was a lesser display.

What was also mentioned, directly by Cohen and suggested by Woodward, was the fall of South Vietnam when Congress cut that nation off at the knees.

Poor libs - caught between their baser instincts and the growing realization that they're the Power they once fought against.

Posted by: Pappy 2009-10-31 11:42

#5 Many of the liberals who populate northern Virginia around Washington are expected to sit on their hands -- a sense of disillusion already sinking in.

Liberal dumbasses are so easily duped.

Posted by: Woozle Uneter9007 2009-10-31 11:15

#4 'Decider-in-Chief' was a statement of fact, not an insult.

Posted by: Glenmore 2009-10-31 10:53

#3 "Heating up" is American. "Hotting up" is British. In a British newspaper it is perfectly legitimate to use a British formulation, Scooter.

Separately, when the need of the time is to fight an foreign war, domestic concerns have to be modified. If Mr. Obama can't handle reality, he shouldn't have run for the most reality-based job in the world. "The buck stops here," is a description, not a folksy saying burnt into a piece of old barnwood hanging on the wall.

Posted by: trailing wife 2009-10-31 09:17

#2 But as Mr Cheney's contrasting observations illustrate, the more influential war is being fought politically on the ground in America.

Pompey's threat was not the Gauls or Hellas Asian Princes or even the mobs of Rome. Pompey knew his real threat was Caesar. The one American who stands to threaten by social hierarchical standing over The One, is in Asia.

If The One reinforces his enemy in Asia and his enemy is successful, then The One does not profit from that success, but his enemy does.

If The One cuts the strength of his enemy in Asia then any failure is his and not his enemy's.

That means The One must do neither for as long as possible, playing for time, for an opening to reduce his enemy.

Posted by: Procopius2k 2009-10-31 08:42

#1 "will also be hotting up with midterm congressional elections..."

I feel the need to say that I think the phrase "hotting up" sounds absolutely STUPID!!!!!

The term is "heating up". Heat, heating, heated. A perfectly good verb. Trying to turn the adjective/adverb "hot" into a verb just seems idiotic and pointless. Very disappointing to see a semi-reputable British institution like the Financial Times using such sloppy style.
[end rant]

Posted by: Scooter McGruder 2009-10-31 06:26

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