Obama On Afghanistan

I wasn't all that impressed with President Obama's speech on Afghanistan tonight, but then I didn't expect to be. He announced that 10,000 troops will be withdrawn by the end of this year, with a total of the removal of 33,000 troops by the end of September 2012. That will still leave twice as many troops - 66,000, according to one count - as there were when Obama took office in January 2009.

This stance pleases no one. House Speaker John Boehner laments that the plan is based more on the calendar than on strategy, and Representative Barney Frank (D-MA) says that more responsibility with global security should not be the sole responsibility of the United States, adding the Boehner should support tax increases to keep the war in Afghanistan going if he feels we should - rather than cutting domestic programs.

Noting that plenty of damage has been done to al Qaeda and the Taliban and that the Taliban should be prepared to negotiate with the Afghan government, Obama says that the U.S. is on track to get troops out of Afghanistan entirely by 2014, once Afghanistan is relatively stabilized. Uh, that's three more years. Haven't we been there long enough? And Obama's stated re-commitment to rebuilding our infrastructure and reviving our economy rang hollow in light of the fact that we haven't been able to do either.

Based on Obama's plan, the only certainty about 2014 is that January 1 that year will fall on a Wednesday.