I don’t know anything about the intricacies of publishing a newspaper, or about the relationships or sequence and timing between the on-line and printed versions of a major newspaper such as the New York Times. Although I am not a journalist, I remember from my Journalism 101 class that newspapers pay a lot of attention to their headlines—to every word and every punctuation mark. I am mentioning...

Boston Globe columnist Kevin Cullen wrote a good column based on an interview with Stephen Landrigan, a US aid worker who has spent five years working on humanitarian projects in Afghanistan. Landrigan supports the surge of troops, but recognizes that there isn’t a military solution to Afghanistan’s problems. Money quote: “It’s 99 percent economics,” Landrigan said. “You want...

What are the long-term gains/losses for the USA in sending more troops to Afghanistan? Is it a smoke-screen for America’s “other” ambitions? Or, is this another naive manifestation of the decade-old American foreign policy? Will the US “surge” in Afghanistan lead to more violence locally and elsewhere? In terms of future US containment strategy of China, Afghanistan air bases offer...

Getting it Right? A Half-Hearted Afghanistan Strategy Revealed by Michael Reagan As many of you will recall, in previous writings I urged President Obama to do the right thing when it came to providing Gen. McChrystal with his requested troop increases in support of the war effort in Afghanistan. And during the early debate over troop levels, I even accepted the president’s request for reasonable time to...

Cyrus the Great, who ruled Persia as the Roman Republic was just getting off the ground – and after the Jewish people had been ejected from Judea and exiled to Babylon. Why do Westerners, Jews and particularly Israelis mistrust Iran so? That seems to be the question that this historical defense of Iranian morality and behavior seeks to address. From Iran’s state-run Kayhan newspaper, Kian Mokhtari...

From what can be gleaned from editorials coming out of Pakistan today, President Obama’s long-awaited speech on his Afghanistan strategy has been anything but well received. Chief among Islamabad’s concerns is that more U.S. troops in Afghanistan mean more militants will flee into Pakistan – particularly from Afghanistan’s Helmand Province, where British forces will soon get a big...

Now that the President has announced his Afghanistan policies for the remainder of his current term, we can all move onto other things domestically and internationally. In several prior TMV posts, I was a vocal opponent of continuing or escalating the war. However I now support the President and sincerely wish our troops all the success their incredible dedication, sacrifice, and hard work deserve in one of...

WASHINGTON — President Obama has bought himself some time on Afghanistan and lived up to his promise to seek policies that fit into no one’s philosophical pigeonholes. He has also split his own party, diminished the enthusiasm of his natural allies, yet earned himself no lasting credit with his domestic adversaries. By these measures, Obama’s surge-and-wind-down strategy is both gutsy...

When the President unveiled his vehicle for getting from here to there in Afghanistan last night, it was not, as W’s chief of staff described the Iraq invasion in 2002, a “new product” but an eight-year-old jalopy retooled for an even longer, bumpier ride. As Barack Obama “assumed full ownership,” there was no shortage of tire-kickers, starting with John McCain, who judges wars...

Okay, here’s what I really think about President Obama’s strategy to fight al Quada in Afghanistan and Pakistan. It sucks. It is a short-term approach that in the end will not improve our national security. The president makes a good case for a stable, self-governing Afghanistan. That’s wishful thinking. He failed to convince me how that will translate to a more stable Pakistan which owns nuclear...

In his most recent editorial, Newsweek’s Editor Jon Meacham poses “Why Dick Cheney should run in 2012.” After dismissing the expected “rolling of their eyes dismissively” and warning Liberals not to spit out their lattes, Meacham explains that he is serious about a Dick Cheney bid for the presidential nomination in 2012, as such a run would be “good for Republicans and...

As expected, it was an admirable speech (transcript), regardless of the questionable content, but, then, we’ve come to expect such lofty rhetorical flights from Obama. The tone was serious, which it had to be, and, on the whole, the president made his case effectively, I thought. But do we buy the case? I do not. In making the case for war, Obama sounded at times a lot like Bush. Yes, there was good reason...

No matter how you slice it, President Barack Obama’s announcement last night that he will order another 30000 US troops to Afghanistan is a historical turning point. The question is: which way will it turn? Is it the recipe for success, or political and military failure? One thing for sure: it is a political and military obstacle course with myriad paths that can lead to twists and turns with an unsatisfying...

I am not one who believes that criticizing presidential war policy gives you a big fat F on the litmus test for patriotism. But the high-profile bloggers and media pundits on the far right certainly adhere to that belief. Or at least they did adhere to it, throughout the eight years of the Bush presidency.

Here is a video of President Barack Obama’s complete address on his Afghanistan war policy: Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy UPDATE: Here’s the full text of Obama’s speech. UPDATE II: What Obama told reporters earlier in the day at lunch.

On the banks of the Hudson River at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point the country and world heard spelled out the Obama Doctrine by the nation’s commander-in-chief. Kill al Qaeda who murdered more than 3,000 innocent civilians on Sept. 11, 2001, render the Taliban impotent by increasing our troop levels, improve the Afghan security forces and support Pakistan’s government so terrorists never...

The President’s tactics were flawed. It was a good idea, positioning himself as commander on the stage at West Point, as if he were announcing an order of battle in Afghanistan to the 4,600 cadets, which they would have understood and appreciated. But the President had to make it a policy speech, too, and it was not at all a good idea to ask the cadets, at the end of a typical Tuesday at West Point,...

Let me first echo David Adesnik’s remarks on President Obama’s Afghanistan speech. The moral basis for action was clear from the beginning, and Obama proclaimed American supremacy with more robustness than he has ever done before. The obvious point of debate is the 18 month withdrawal order. Adesnik rightly questions just how fast this withdrawal will take place. My sense is that the 18 month withdrawal...

As if you need me to say what I think about this. Almost the equal of MoveOn’s “General Betray-us”. Original image here. Cross-posted at Conventional Folly

Live-blogging below. Bottom line here: The President was crystal clear about why we are sending more troops to Afghanistan. We were attacked on 9/11. If the Taliban take back Afghanistan, Al Qaeda will come back with them. America’s security is directly at stake. Right now, we only have enough troops for a stalemate, not for success. How will our military strategy change in Afghanistan? What will...