Obama's 16 month scenario which he flip-flopped on and then was forced back to by Moveon.org and like radical left wing organizations is recipe for disaster.
The greatest foreign policy president in my lifetime made almost no mistakes. He and Kissinger in their prime were supreme! If Nixon made one possible mistake it was his "68 promise to bring all combat troops home. It was a political mistake but he thought he could make it work. He kept supply and embassy personnel their and financed the Vietnamization of the war and it was a disaster in the end. If Nixon was still president instead of Ford during the disastrous end episode it would have ended better.
All should learn from history. Half way measures for political reasons may look good in the abstract but rarely if ever work in the long run.
If The Media Isn't Too Busy...
by BarbinMD
Sat Jul 26, 2008 at 02:20:27 PM PDT
There has been a lot of attention paid to John McCain’s apparent flip-flop
yesterday on timetables for withdrawal from Iraq, and given his
frequent attacks on Barack Obama’s call for a 16 month timetable (or if you prefer,
horizon), McCain’s words were rather stunning:
BLITZER: So why do you think he said that 16 months is basically a pretty good timetable?
McCAIN: He said it’s a pretty good timetable based on conditions on the ground. I think it’s a pretty good timetable, as we should — or horizons for withdrawal. But they have to be based on conditions on the ground.
But why don't we just add this to his ever growing list of
flip-flops since McCain will dismiss any questions on this about-face and the media will go along with whatever he says because he is
the foreign policy expert (despite his confusion or outright lies about his
past statements on the war,
Sunnis, Shiites, Iran and the
Anbar Awakening). But since McCain has spent the past week whining about the press, perhaps the media could oblige him with some primetime coverage and ask him to
clarify a couple of other comments he made during yesterday’s interview. None that would call into question his foreign policy expertise, of course. After all, he was a P.O.W. nearly 40 years ago. But just to have him clear up a couple of points he made. For instance, at McCain said:
I can only tell you, I will not discuss hypotheticals and I can’t.
But earlier in the day, McCain went über-hypothetical while
imagining a world without the surge:
The Iraqi Army would have collapsed. Civilian casualties would have increased dramatically," he said. "Al Qaeda would have killed the Sunni sheikhs who had begun to cooperate with us, and the "Sunni Awakening" would have been strangled at birth. Al Qaeda fighters would have safe havens, from where they could train Iraqis and foreigners, and turn Iraq into a base for launching attacks on Americans elsewhere. Civil war, genocide and wider conflict would have been likely.
Perhaps the media can ask him why he will not, cannot talk about hypotheticals when it comes to foreign policy questions that concern all Americans, but he can describe a hypothetical scenario of the Middle East engulfed in flames if he thinks it helps him politically. And heck, maybe ask him what "victory" in Iraq means...hypothetically. After all, McCain keeps saying "we’re on the road to victory," so it would be nice to know if he knew where the hell that road is. And while they’re on the subject of Iraq, maybe they could have him clarify that whole
birth of the secret surge thing.
And speaking of secrets, what I think all Americans would really be interested in is the secret, guaranteed plan to capture Osama Bin Laden that McCain mentioned to Blitzer yesterday.
BLITZER: You're President of the United States, you vowed that you will capture Osama Bin Laden and bring him to justice. Now we know that President Bush, since 9/11, has been doing the best he can. What would you do different?
MCCAIN: Well, I'm not going to telegraph a lot of the things that I'm going to do because then it might compromise our ability to do so. But look, I know the area, I've been there, I know wars, I know how to win wars, and I know how to improve our capabilities so we will capture Osama Bin Laden, or put it this way, bring him to justice. We will do it, I know how to do it. [...]
It might be a good thing to reveal to the world the enormity of this guy’s crimes and his intentions which are still there and he’s working night and day to destroy everything we stand for and believe in
Leaving aside the fact that besides World War II, John McCain has never seen a war won, can the media ask him why he is keeping his sure-fire plan to capture Osama Bin Laden a secret? And perhaps more importantly, why he hasn’t shared the details with anyone over the past 7 years? He knows that Bin Laden was responsible for 9/11, he says Bin Laden is actively seeking to destroy us every single day, and he won’t reveal his plan unless he’s elected? Why, that almost seems like a terrorist threat. And if Bin Laden launches a successful attack against the U.S., can we hold John McCain responsible since he could have captured him but refused to do so? That's a discussion that I'd like to see airing from coast to coast.
John McCain wants more media coverage, so by all means, bring it on.
