Just one diary of many here, I'm sure.
I'm of about fourteen minds about the speech tonight. The number one thing that struck me is the sense that Obama is capitulating somehow. It's a vague feeling, let me see if I can piece it together.
First, there's this undercurrent of Obama phrasing this as a do-over. Waving off what Bush tried, and doing it right this time, as it should have been done the first time.
There are couple of problems with that. First, there's that he already escalated forces into Afghanistan earlier in his term, and that's a card he should have played then. And you can really only play it once.
But second, it misreads the whole situation. The reason that doing it right would have worked eight years ago is because there was the appetite for it then. We were relatively prosperous at the time - we had experienced a crash, but after a huge period of prosperity. We had just suffered a major attack. We felt powerful, indignant, and pissed off, and righteous in the knowledge that this was a once-in-a-lifetime moment, demanding a united response. We gave that to Bush and he squandered it.
But now, the nation is feeling weakened and a bit impotent from the unemployment, economy, and war fatigue. We (meaning the nation as a whole) don't have the patience or the gumption to support the policy as much as we had back then.
So, it sucks to look at it this way, but I think that even if he has the policy right, he's misreading the politics. And I think in this case I don't agree with the assertion that some things are bigger than politics. If doing the right thing here means that the Democratic brand is weakened, then it means our nation gets hurt through more Bush/Cheney/McCain/Palin sorts of choices down the line.
The way I think Obama capitulated here was in capitulating to the left. If the right policy choice here was to escalate, then he should have done this differently. If in his best judgment, and in the judgment of the competent professionals he truly trusts, the right decision is to escalate and nation-stay until we're done, then that should have been the only option.
But instead, with all the allowances for the exhaustion, and the end date, and the assurances we'd be out of there before his first term is over... he's setting himself up for a huge political failure here. Because, the only way he comes out of this without being weakened is if it works perfectly. What happens if things don't go as planned in Afghanistan over the next year? It's not exactly beyond the realm of possibility. His phrased "end date" gets thrown out the window, in which case the end date is silly. It's as if the general tells his army to only pretend he's burned the bridge behind them. It undermines the seriousness with which we should be approaching the problem.
I came out of this speech believing Obama's contentions that al Queda really is planning more attacks, that Pakistan is more destabilized, that al Queda has more possibility of finding a nuclear weapon of their own from Pakistan, and that if the Taliban's power increases, al Queda will once again have an inviting home base in Afghanistan even as they now do along the border. If that's all true, then we do need more presence in both Afghanistan and Pakistan. But if that's true, President Obama shouldn't be starting this in a way that sets himself up for political failure, because that has a possibility of hurting our nation, too.
I'm also willing to consider other solutions from other folks, smart progressive folks, that don't involve staying in Afghanistan. Although I can't take seriously any suggestion that completely ignores al Queda, Pakistan, nuclear weapons, and the Taliban and says there is no further risk of terrorist attack from that area.
Update: Nate Silver at 538.com makes a similar point much more concisely: click.
