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I thought it was a terrible speech. In fact, I found is so excruciatingly awful and embarrassing I 
had to fight myself to keep from turning it off. The speech had a weird kind of fairy tale quality about it, as if President Obama had swallowed some strange kool-aid, or had been smoking something he shouldn’t have. First of all, he seemed to accept the idea that it was necessary to start a “war” to deal with what was/is in reality just a small band of international criminals. The “war” was hardly a war of necessity, contrary to what Obama seems to believe. Even now there aren’t many al Quaida/Morialekafa. More here. Also: Afghan war now Obama’s war/Dennis Mansfield.
Question: After hearing President Obama’s speech on Afghanistan, do the Obama supporters in the HBO blogos believe, as Morialekafa does, that Obama has “swallowed some strange kool-aid”?
D.F. Oliveria is a columnist and blogger for The Spokesman-Review. Huckleberries Online was judged the best 2008 Idaho newspaper blog by the Idaho Press Club. And the best 2007 news blog in the Pacific Northwest by the Society for Professional Journalist. Print Huckleberries is a past winner of the Herb Caen Memorial Column contest by the National Association of Newspaper Columnists. The Readership Institute of Northwestern University cited this blog as a good example of online community journalism.
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lewis8457 on December 02 at 9:37 a.m.
I switched over for about a second to the speech but caught Obama at that moment saying we were fighting because of 9/11 what a pile of carp. I thought that was why we rolled into Iraq and blew the hell out of it. That we are now rebuilding with US dollars.
Do we have money for this? NO
Bring our people home where they belong and man our borders. Stop this wasting of dollars we don’t have. The more they print the lower in value our dollar falls.
In my book O’mama has been smoking something far better then I can get from Canada
It amazes me all the O’mama supporters that can over look all the questionable things he has done and still stand tall for their crazy president.
god help us
Pecky on December 02 at 9:39 a.m.
oh oh.. here it comes!
Cindy_H on December 02 at 9:40 a.m.
“swallowed some strange kool-aid”?
If people would drink less kool-aid and more wine or Bent’s brew, the world would be a better place, imo.
fortboise on December 02 at 9:52 a.m.
Weird response, Lewis. We did in fact go to war in Afghanistan as a response to the terrorist attack on 9/11. Iraq is a sordid tale of lies and distraction and has arguably exacerbated the problem of instability in the Middle East.
There’s room for debate on whether the response chosen now is the right one, but your contribution doesn’t move that forward.
Pecky on December 02 at 10:00 a.m.
Our Rookie President again proved that he is one of the greatest orators of the 21st century. He can weave with words a fabric of smoke and mirrors unequaled in history. When the fog clears there is no substance, there are contradictions, there are excuses and a flow of indecisiveness that makes a laughing stock in the eyes of the world. Two quick examples: On Afghanistan: “We will start bringing hope troops in 18 mos. while saying it will depend on our degree of success. And…did your hear anything re: being really tough on Iran…which is the greatest threat to the planet when the have their hands on a nuclear device. We gotta get this guy back to Chicago ASAP.
hmoffsuite on December 02 at 10:05 a.m.
Pecky. Go girl! You’ve got it right. Btw, have you been to Millies since Butch bought it?
IdahoDad on December 02 at 10:20 a.m.
“He can weave with words a fabric of smoke and mirrors unequaled in history.”
I don’t know. I thought the Bush/Cheney tag team did a pretty good job of that with the war in Iraq.
Cabbage Boy on December 02 at 10:33 a.m.
Idahodad, Bush didn’t have to work to hard to convince the democrats back then to give up their war powers. Only after it started becoming “unpopular” did they decide to be against it.
I am sick of all the foreign military actions. Bring our boys home.
IdahoDad on December 02 at 10:36 a.m.
CB, so you’re saying that Bush was a much more convincing liar? I think you’ve nailed it.
IdahoDad on December 02 at 10:38 a.m.
“Only after it started becoming “unpopular” did they decide to be against it.”
Actually, I think it was only after we all realized the entire military action in Iraq was based on lies.
BrandonHansen on December 02 at 10:43 a.m.
It’s funny how conservatives are saying things like “this war cant be won” and “bring our troops home now”
Sounds like … democrats from a few years ago.
We have to stay the course with a Republican president, but if there’s a liberal as a president… by god, let’s cut and run.
Fllliiiiiiiiiiiiiipppppp Floppers. All of them.
Brandon Hansen
Just South of North
http://www.justsouthofnorth.com
Sisyphus on December 02 at 10:45 a.m.
LOL Pecky. “Being tough on Iran”, that cracks me up. Obama goes from one Bush travesty to another like a game of whack a mole, giving considered thought about a reasoned multi-faceted approach that escaped his predecessor whose one dimensional thinking settled on only military solutions for international issues. Bring it on. True Bush came by it honestly since Republicans and their culture of life don’t extend to brown people of Muslim persuasion. But finishing with the “dithering” in Afghanistan was a campaign promise Obama is fulfilling.
Pakistan accomplished the biggest nuclear proliferation in history, giving the technology to North Korea, Syria, and Iran and Bushes response was to label them the axis of evil, quit talking to them and gives Pakistan’s Musharaf a pass in exchange for his help in rounding up al qaeda, a promise he never kept, but one that Obama has already rectified. Lewis is right, that approach is ridiculous since we can’t police the world ourselves. “Laughingstock of the entire world”? Hmmm, the facts don’t bear this out.
http://features.csmonitor.com/globalnews/2009/10/06/new-poll-finds-obama-has-already-rebuilt-americas-global-brand/
What is a laughingstock is thinking that a military strike in Iran would further any international objective we may have. It would only serve to solidify the political power of the the repressive regime.
Americans are weary of this war and its cost in this economic climate. But there is NO DOUBT whatsoever that the Taliban harbored and continues to harbor al Qaeda, training the 9/11 terrorists in country. I find it very amusing that hard core self promoting ‘patriotic’ Republicans like CB are willing to now claim defeat lest a Democrat clean up another Republican failure.
Bent on December 02 at 10:49 a.m.
I liked the speech, and yes, I agree with most of Pecky’s summation of it. But I am not sure I disagree with Obama’s stance, either.
I thought he made good case for how the violence is on the rise that country despite our presence there, and I also believe to let it grow unchecked would pose grave danger to the US and our allies…
It’s tough issue. My sister has done two very long and dangerous tours in Iraq and I held my breathe the entire time…
I don’t like the thought of a continued war, but we haven’t done the job Afghanistan in my opinion.
Cabbage Boy on December 02 at 10:53 a.m.
Brandon, your rather new here so you get a pass, but no, I never wanted to “stay the course” with Bush. Never even wanted that to be a course. Afghanistan was a legit action because of the Taliban. But we abandon that to head to Iraq. Now we are still in both places and look to do some nation building in Afghanistan after our “success” in Iraq.
Bring em home. No waffling here.
@Idahodad, no Bush wasn’t that convincing of a liar, just the deceived were easily led down that path. And they had access to the data, they just wanted to follow a popular lead.
Phaedrus on December 02 at 11:07 a.m.
I thought that was why we rolled into Iraq and blew the hell out of it-lewis
Since when has Iraq ever had anything to do with 9/11?
Pecky on December 02 at 11:25 a.m.
@ hmoffsuite. yes I have been to MIllies - I can not tell you enough here without boring the others so check this out
http://www.peckycox.com/priestlake/2009/11/famous-mexican-dish-mole-debuts-at-millies-tequila-tuesday.html
Fixer on December 02 at 11:59 a.m.
Regardless of our military strength, we will not be able to change certain aspects of Iraqi and Afghan culture:
- Business relationships are often based on family, religious or tribal relationships, not on professional expertise.
- Greed, nepotism and corruption are an accepted way of doing business in both cultures.
- Many government officials do not want to make decisions at their level. They can’t be blamed for something if they never decided to do it in the first place.
- Afghans in particular do not view themselves as a conquered people. Many do not readily take direction or advice from Westerners. But they do like the money.
It’s time to end this foolishness and bring the troops home.
Oh, and the Iranians are ecstatic that the U.S. has invaded both Iraq and Afghanistan. They are working hard to expand their influence in both countries. (Guess who gave Al-Maliki his presidential airplane?)
Charlie on December 02 at 12:44 p.m.
He did a good job reading the tele prompter!
daveo on December 02 at 12:45 p.m.
I think our President got it wrong on this one, mostly I think to support the true coalition of countries with troops in Afghanistan (unlike Iraq). At least this guy is playing ball with the civilized world ,too bad it is at our domestic expense at a time when we really need help.
Cabbage Boy on December 02 at 1:05 p.m.
Good post Fixer.
“Oh, and the Iranians are ecstatic that the U.S. has invaded both Iraq and Afghanistan. They are working hard to expand their influence in both countries. (Guess who gave Al-Maliki his presidential airplane?)”
Funny how the group we fought while invading Iraq is now the group we have to protect from the side that we fought to free. There are better ways to topple dictators than with American blood.
Sisyphus on December 02 at 1:13 p.m.
“There are better ways to topple dictators than with American blood.”—and you call me the hypocrite.
Cabbage Boy on December 02 at 1:46 p.m.
Why sis? My continuation of that thought was, stop sending US $$$ their way. Or stop sending them weapons. Or stop setting them up in the first place.
Does that clarify for yah?
spokelooneh on December 02 at 2:07 p.m.
I didn’t see what I was looking for out of this speech. Among other things, I wanted to hear concrete examples of what it is we will be doing differently.
We won’t see any real measurable progress until mid summer 2010 because things are generally pretty quiet in Afghanistan over the winter.
Escapee on December 03 at 2:24 a.m.
I’m not happy about this whole Afghanistan thing. When will we know when we’ve won, emerged victorious or even come away with a sense that we’ve done more good than harm? I heard a small part of his speech, and I was troubled when I realized that what Obama was saying made me feel no different than I felt upon Dubya making the same points about immersing ourselves in a War which We Didn’t Want Then And Don’t Want Now.. As Rachel Maddow would say, “Talk me down, please”. Ack.