I still support President Barack Obama but the noise machine is making my ears bleed and I am not watching any cable news. I also believe we should bring our men and women home from Iraq & Afghanistan now....not in 1, 2, or 3 years but NOW. However, there are alot of moving pieces in this conflict that I don't understand. I believe the President will be honest with us tonight about the purpose of this mission and I still trust the President that he will do the right thing in this instance. Now for all of the folks out here who are screaming the President is going back on his promise I ask "were you listening to the President during his campaign for almost 2+ years or did you just hear what you wanted to hear?" Because if I remember correctly President Obama always said that he would end the war in Iraq and FINISH THE JOB IN AFGHANISTAN.
I can appreciate the differences of opinions that are out here. Like I said my own recollection of why America went to war with Afghanistan was to get those folks who brought down the Twin Towers. Also, somebody said something about getting them "Dead or Alive". THAT DID NOT HAPPEN so those critics should not be allowed any platform to criticize anything this President does (Do you hear that Politico)!! They should be in jail in my humble opinion but I digress...I also do not recall ANYONE saying anything about nation building and no matter how you spin it that is exactly what we will be doing. It amazes me that those same congressmen who don't want to help build in America a good educational system, a good healthcare system, or a solid jobs programs they seem to can always find money to nation build or warmonger(seems like the same thing as of late). It's disgusting.
Again, I digress...I've often wondered is Afghanistan a ruse to contain Pakistan in case the state completely fails with all those nukes and more than 2000 radicalized scientists who could sell this technology to the Taliban? So many questions...that is why I am glad President Obama is President and I am not. I haven't heard the President's speech tonight, I am pretty sure that I want out of both conflicts now, but I will listen with an open mind as he tries to explain the purpose of this mission. However, to all of those folks who are angry and want to call the President a liar or primary him where were you the last 2+ years when he campaigned on "finishing the job in Afghanistan"? If you missed that part of his message over the last few years I've listed excerpts from a few speeches below where he is doing EXACTLY what he said he would do IF elected President. If you don't remember it is because you don't want to or didn't really listen to him and thus you voted for the wrong candidate. I will also ask you to pay real close attention to tonight's speech because he usually tells us exactly what he is going to do and why. Unfortunately, we here at KOS and the media choose to hear what we want to hear and not necessarily what was said. Here are some of the quotes:
"I will finally have a comprehensive strategy to finish the job in Afghanistan -- with more troops, more training of Afghan security forces ... and more focus on eliminating the Taliban and al Qaeda sanctuary along the Pakistan border," he said.
dated 9/9/08 link
You know, war is never easy, as I said in my speech last night, but Afghanistan is a war that we have to win. We do not have an option. We can't have a situation in which Al Qaida and the Taliban have created safe havens that are potentially disruptive not only in the region, but end up being the focal points around which terrorist attacks are planned that could affect Paris or New York.
So we don't have a choice. We've got to -- we've got to finish the job. And that involves not just the military; it also involves economic development. And, again, that's an area where the Europeans and NATO can obviously been -- be extraordinarily helpful and have already been extraordinarily helpful.
dated 7/25/08 link.
"There are terrorists holed up in those mountains who murdered 3,000 Americans," Mr Obama said, adding that Iraq was "the wrong battlefield" and "the war the terrorists want".
"It was a terrible mistake to fail to act when we had a chance to take out an al-Qa'eda leadership meeting in 2005. If we have actionable intelligence about high-value terrorist targets and President Musharraf will not act, we will." He warned: "They are plotting to strike again."
dated 8/2/07 link.
Dated 8/1/2007
Just saying........