Intelligence or Idiocy

The White House is on the Sunday shows again today reaffirming the start date for the Afghan pull out. Why must they do this. Hasn't Obama yet learned that phony deadlines are not a good idea. Here in the USA we saw the long list of deadlines for passage of heathcare come and go. Each time the deadline passed without action, obama just looked a bit less in control and a bit more ineffectual. We have heard that cap and trade wold be passed this year for sure and then that it was dead. The same is true of comprehensive immigration "reform". And we all remember the absolute deadline for the closure of Gitmo. That deadline passed almost six months ago and gitmo is still going strong. In other words, Americans have come to realize that Obama's deadlines have about the same finality as when a two year old stamps his foot and says "NO!", only to change his mind a milisecond later.

The problem with Obama's phony deadlines is that the rest of the world does not know Obama the way we do. They think that when the President of the United States sets a deadline, he means it. So when Obama says again and again that US forces will begin leaving Afghanistan next summer, overseas observers take him at his word. Don't like the US presence in Afghanistan? No problem, just wait a year and they will go. Don't think that your cause is hopeless in the face of US resolve, just wait another year and the US will leave. Thinking of supporting the US side in the fighting? Better not, since in a year it will just be you against the Taliban with no US backup. Trying to decide which side your country should support, if any? since you cannot rely on the US which is leaving in the middle of the fight, you better not side with the USA.

The point is a simple one: whether or not the US intends to start leaving next year, it is crazy to announce that now. Obama is playing to the lefties among his base who want out of Afghanistan, and it is hurting the US cause. If Obama does not think Afghanistan is worth the fight, we should be out now. On the other hand, if he does believe that we need to win there, then he should commit to victory and not just to a one year deadly photo op.

This is the time that the country needs a true leader. It is terrible that we do not have one. Obama has got to go!