World-News

http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig10/lindorff5.1.1.html

Obama et al. have apparently found the perfect model and game plan for winning in Afghanistan
http://www.lewrockwell.com/douglas/douglas29.1.html

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New president, same old scam
http://www.brasschecktv.com/page/743.html

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Bipartisan Group of Legislators Opposes Increasing Troops in Afghanistan

Mary Susan Littlepage, Truthout: "A bipartisan group of legislators wrote a letter to President Barack Obama to oppose his call to increase the number of US troops in Afghanistan. The group consists of Sen. Russ Feingold (D-Wisconsin), Rep. Jim McGovern (D-Massachusetts) and Rep. Walter Jones (R-North Carolina). Feingold, McGovern and Jones said they think that Congress should debate and vote on an increase in troops for the eight-year war in Afghanistan. The group also opposes the increase because the three men said they think it could undermine the United States' ability to address the global threat posed by al-Qaeda, and they expressed concern for the loss in lives and resources from the war, as well as a concern that the war creates many mental health troubles such as post-traumatic stress disorder and suicide among many soldiers."

http://www.truthout.org/1203099

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Afghan training mission faces tough obstacles

MSNBC

12/03/09

America’s eight-year effort to build a functional Afghan security force has been a study in slow motion, raising doubts about President Barack Obama’s new plan to quickly get the nation’s army and police in shape so U.S. forces can begin to leave in 18 months. A lack of competence, resources and confidence have hampered Afghanistan’s army and police, as have illiteracy and corruption. Those continuing obstacles provoked skepticism from Congress this week about whether the U.S. military can train the Afghans quickly and effectively enough to begin to replace American forces by Obama’s proposed exit start date of July 2011...

http://tinyurl.com/yd6prdd



Congress confused about Afghanistan plan

Pittsburgh Tribune-Review

12/03/09

The Obama administration sent what many lawmakers saw as vague and sometimes confusing signals Wednesday about its intentions in Afghanistan, leaving members of Congress unsure how to proceed as they consider a plan to deploy 30,000 more American troops there. President Obama had said Tuesday night that U.S. troops would begin leaving Afghanistan in July 2011, but under grilling yesterday at the Senate Armed Services Committee, Defense Secretary Robert Gates suggested that date could change...

http://tinyurl.com/yhp8ds6



Obama’s war: The reaction

AntiWar.Com
by Justin Raimondo

12/04/09

I’m actually pretty surprised to see that many liberals and progressives are not climbing on board Obama’s war wagon — notably Rachel Maddow, who made a stinging criticism of the escalation by comparing the rhetoric of the Bush administration and that of the New Obama, concluding that the latter had adopted and even extended the essence of the ‘Bush Doctrine,’ the morally indefensible idea that we have to strike at targets that might possibly pose a threat to U.S. national security some time in the indefinite future. … Keith Olbermann was clearly embarrassed, like a father whose child has just crapped his pants in the middle of Walmart...

http://original.antiwar.com/justin/2009/12/03/obamas-war-the-reaction/



Civil war president

The American Conservative
by Sheldon Richman

12/03/09

Barack Obama’s intensification of the occupation of Afghanistan is nothing less than a full commitment to one side in the civil war raging there. What he calls a threat of a Taliban takeover is actually a Pashtun resistance to the U.S. occupation and the corrupt Karzai government it backs. Obama’s and Hillary Clinton’s spin cannot change those facts. Obama’s story isn’t even coherent...

http://www.amconmag.com/blog/2009/12/03/civil-war-president/



The fog of war

Slate
by John Dickerson

Since his inauguration, Barack Obama has tripled the number of troops fighting in Afghanistan. After announcing the latest surge of 30,000 new soldiers in a speech at West Point, it is clear that he is a president actively prosecuting a war, not merely tending to one that was left to him. The rest, though, is a bit blurry. According to his speech, Obama is escalating while retreating, adding more troops while also setting a date for their departure. Obama said he was putting pressure on the Afghan government, but he didn’t suggest how...

http://www.slate.com/id/2237100/



The Obama war plan: A recipe for disaster!

Root for America
by Wayne Allyn Root

12/03/09

I believe President Obama has made a grave decision that will result in a never-ending commitment to a war that America can neither afford, nor win. Unlike Iraq, Afghanistan is a country comprised of people without national identity, with only family and tribal loyalties. They have no interest or desire to build a democracy. America has no business in attempting to force them to do so, and I, for one, am unwilling to commit American lives and treasure to support a corrupt group of war lords. Let them fight their own battles. I would not risk the lives of my young sons on this tragic game plan. Would you? Would Obama? Would any of the gung-ho Republicans who have come out in support of Obama’s war expansion plans? I don’t think Karl Rove or Newt Gingrich would send their sons. I know that Mitt Romney has never sent any of his 5 sons. But they certainly have no problem sending your sons with enthusiasm...

http://www.rootforamerica.com/blog/index.php?entry=entry091203-154412



A postscript: Choices have consequences

The Power of Narrative
by Arthur Silber

12/03/09

Choices have consequences. When people choose to support a system such as ours today, endless destruction, murder, torture, barbarity and devastation are what they will get, necessarily and inevitably. Almost no one chooses ‘the only honorable course.’ Instead, most people avail themselves of transparent rationalizations, of mindless invocation of ‘lesser evils,’ and of the full panoply of denial and avoidance. But the suffering and the death go on...

http://tinyurl.com/y9jgj8q



We will be your insurgency

Freedom's Phoenix
by Mel Mason

12/03/09

So it’s come to this. Obama’s gotta wage his war, and I gotta sit in the street. It’s not that I like blocking traffic or getting arrested or dealing with the fall-out when I could be reading a book. It’s that I can’t live with endless war and I must end it or surely die. I’m not leaving this country. This is my mess, so help me, and I’ll scrub it till my fingers bleed. I will not compromise with genocide...

http://tinyurl.com/yaxc3sc


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp



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