It is my understanding that Senator John McCain made the attempt yesterday while a group of Senators were gathered at the White House to discuss the war in Afghanistan, from this MSNBC story
The highlights of yesterday's bipartisan Congressional leader meeting with the President seem to be overshadowed by an exchange between Obama and his '08 foe, John McCain. Reports Politico's Lee: "Senator John McCain drew a sharp response from Obama during the meeting Tuesday afternoon when the Arizona Republican told his former opponent that he shouldn't be making a decision on a strategy for the war in such a "leisurely fashion," a source familiar with the meeting said.
A visibly irked Obama sharply replied that he is not making this decision in a "leisurely fashion," and moved on to the next member of Congress, the source said."
There are also others that are complaining about Secretary of Defense gates chastising General McChystal for taking his case public in London last week for his 40,000 man increase in American forces during a speech there. This was part of what led President Obama to order General McChrystal to Copenhagen for that 25 minute meeting on Air Force One.
So the trip to Copenhagen to try and get the Olympics for Chicago in 2016 wasn't a complete waste, he was able to have a face to face meeting with one of the Generals. I read somewhere that one of the talking heads thought President Obama should not have wasted the Generals time by making him make the trip to Copenhagen to meet with the President, excuse me, but the last time I looked the General is an underling to the President, the President issues the orders and the General complies. Or he can take his ball and go home RETIRE if you don't like what is going on, the Army will continue to go on with or without McChrystal.
Some people took offense to Secretary gates telling the Generals that their advice should be offered thru the Chain of Command and not in public speeches and newspaper, magazine or television interviews.
The options they see and envision is sent up the Chain of Command, thru the Pentagon, to the Chief of Staff of the Army, then the Joint Chiefs get it and the Secretary of Defense, and then the options and expected outcomes are presented to the National Security Team, and after a few weeks of working thru this stuff the President is given the choice of which options does he want to approve, since the "buck stops on his desk" does he want to add 10,000 or 20,000, 30,0000 or 40,000 troops and that is the mission?
Since January when President Obama was sworn into office and he made the claim that the Afghanistan War was the right war and we needed to win it, there has been a few things happen Karzai ran a really bad election, that would make some union bosses ashamed, (come on ballot boxes that were full of votes at 8 am when the polling place opened)
I wrote this diary on September 23 Is it time for President Obama to have a "General MacArthur" moment? I was right then and it appears it is only getting worse, even though it appears General Petraues has taken his opportunity to be the good soldier and "shut up" publicly, like soldiers are supposed to.
Senators and Congressman have the right to make idiots out of themselves, regardless of how much military time they have or if they are supposed to be "hero's" it doesn't always make them right, but given they are elected and represent either a state or a congressional district. John McCain can run his mouth but bottom lineis he lost the election and he is NOT the President so he does not get to make the choices about how big of a war we throw.
Someone from the White House should also find a way to throw a monkey wrench into Senator NO Demints activities, his recent trip to Honduras to support the illegal government that our state department does not recognize as being legitimate, is one step to far, he is a Senator he doesn't get to establish diplomatic relations with governments that we as a nation do not deal with, I bet the bastard will really hate it when the Obama Administration normalizes diplomatic and lifts the sanctions of Cuba, I can hear the Republicans screaming now, but heck after 50 years it's about time, we lost a war to Vietnam and we have re-established relations with them, Senator Mccain even goes and visits the Hanoi Hilton occasionally, we never went to war with Cuba, so that should be a piece of cake, but for some reason the republicans have a lot invested in keeping that fight going, why?
Oh Sarah Palin I know this ain't face book but you are nothing but a caribou Barbie stay out of war decsions and real diplomacy and stick to seeing Russia from your house.