They are Americans of every race, faith, and station. They are Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus and nonbelievers. They are descendents of immigrants and immigrants themselves. They reflect the diversity that makes this America.
57 percent of Americans said in a CNN/Opinion Research poll that they believe Obama has been doing a better job as president than Bush had during his eight years in office. 34 percent of Americans said Bush did a better job.
34% of Americans must be pretty stupid!
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U.S. Continues Quagmire-Building Effort In Afghanistan
October 27, 2009 | Issue 45•44
Hill by hill, U.S. forces tirelessly work toward the strategic goal of complete immobility.
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KABUL, AFGHANISTAN— According to sources at the Pentagon, American quagmire-building efforts continued apace in Afghanistan this week, as the geographically rugged, politically unstable region remained ungovernable, death tolls continued to rise, and the grim military campaign persisted as hopelessly as ever.
In fact, many government officials now believe that the United States and its allies could be as little as six months away from their ultimate goal: the total quagmirification of Afghanistan.
"We've spent a lot of time and money fostering the turmoil and despair necessary to make this a sustaining quagmire, and we're not going to stop now," President Barack Obama said in a national address Monday night. "It won't be easy, but with enough tactical errors on the ground, shortsighted political strategies, and continued ignorance of our vast cultural differences, we could have a horrific, full-fledged quagmire by 2012."
Added Obama, "Together, we can make Afghanistan into a nightmarish hell-scape Americans will regret for generations to come."
The U.S. plan to build a lasting quagmire in Afghanistan calls for the loss of at least 5,000 coalition troops, nearly 1,500 of whom have already been killed, and a wasted investment of nearly $1 trillion, a quarter of which has thus far been spent.
With more than 80 percent of the country currently under Taliban control, Defense Secretary Robert Gates argued that U.S. nation-dismantling efforts are actually proceeding ahead of schedule.
"We've made a complete mess of local institutions, and moving forward this substantial lack of infrastructure will be the cornerstone of our strategy to ensure long-term chaos in the Afghanistan-Pakistan region," said Gates, gesturing to a complex, 6-foot-tall wall map of what were either newly established al-Qaeda bases in Waziristan, tribal trade routes over the Hindu Kush, or perhaps U.S. military outposts of some kind. "I couldn't be happier with our progress. This place is a complete clusterfuck."
A number of Pentagon officials said they were proudly holding on to their false glimmer of hope for a victory that remains forever out of reach, and explained that waging a war that can only end in sorrow has validated all their efforts.
The U.S. effort in Afghanistan hasn't always looked so bleak. In 2004, when Afghanistan ratified a new constitution and directly elected a leader for the first time in its history, a number of government officials feared the quagmire would fail and perhaps even lead to relative peace and security. But American military and diplomatic initiatives to prop up the corrupt regime of Hamid Karzai paved the way for this year's utterly fraudulent presidential election, an event which gave the quagmire-building effort a much needed shot in the arm.
"Some say the war in Afghanistan is already a quagmire, being as it's gone on for eight years and the situation on the ground continues to rapidly deteriorate," said Gen. Stanley McChrystal. "But I know we can do better. There are still dozens of tribal allies to alienate, troop morale could sink even lower, to the point of mutiny, and by continuing to fire a bunch of missiles from unmanned predator drones we have the opportunity to scare the living shit out of every last civilian in the region."
Continued McChrystal, "If we play our cards right, the word 'Afghanistan' could soon replace the word 'Iraq' as the agreed-upon successor to the word 'Vietnam' in the American political lexicon."
The loose network of warlords who rule the Afghan countryside were also optimistic about quagmire-building efforts.
"Our nation is already impossibly fragmented, but I believe the United States has the ability to make things even worse here," said a local tribal leader, who asked to speak anonymously due to his constantly shifting alliances with the two sides. "Afghanistan has a proud, ancient tradition of quagmires: Soviet Russia, the British Empire, Alexander the Great, Genghis Khan. These are big shoes to fill, but if anyone can do it, these foolish Americans can."
With President Karzai's government maintaining ties to known drug traffickers, and 68,000 U.S. soldiers struggling to police a harsh, challenging landscape, all the conditions for a multigenerational quagmire seem to be in place.
For many analysts, the question now is: How will Obama ensure the U.S. entanglement in the region remains permanent? By deploying more troops, by withdrawing them and leaving behind an unspeakable disaster, by increasing sympathy for the Taliban in nuclear-armed Pakistan? There are so many options on the table that many feel a quagmire is virtually guaranteed.
"We have so much to thank the Americans for," said Marshal Muhammad Qasim Fahim, a notorious warlord who will become vice president if Karzai wins a runoff election scheduled for Nov. 7. "Not only have they created a lawless environment that has allowed us to capture 90 percent of the opium market, but their heroin habits have made a few of us very rich."
"I love the Americans and I hope they stay for many years," he added. "Many, many, many, many years."
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One of the Onion's best efforts
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Perhaps he's worried the kids will grow up and be President.
- BILL QUIGLEY,
- director of the Center for Constitutional Rights and Justice, referring to President Obama's mixed heritage after a Louisiana justice of the peace refused to marry interracial couples
Hahahaha!
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The surprise for some Democratic voters who believe that all lefties are sensible people will be the reaction of the Obama-isn't-progressive-enough left. Obama's critics to the left (Krugman/Maher et al) will issue lists ranging from his "failure" to change the don't ask don't tell policy fast enough, to the fact that we are "still in Afghanistan" to show that the Nobel committee was somehow mistaken.
Because President Obama has not been on a timetable of a fast-paced music video but rather has approached governing at a measured pace working for long term results the smart ass part of the left, raised on high sugar content breakfast cereals and too much TV, a group of people who think in soundbites and 30 second news cycles, will somehow, like the far right, turn this good news into bad news.
The rest of us who have steadily stood by our man, worked to get him elected and have faith in his brilliance, good humor, patience and kindness will rejoice.
Odd how some of the left joins with apparently most of the right as bitter, begrudging killjoys.
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By Patrick Yoest Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRESWASHINGTON (Dow Jones)--The Senate Finance Committee approved an amendment to health-care legislation Thursday that would allow states to use federal funds to set up public health insurance plans for lower-income and middle-income people.
The amendment, offered by Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., would allow states to steer funds from the government from the health-care measure to set up plans for those whose income puts them between 133% and 200% of the poverty line. The state plans would then contract with private insurers to provide the coverage.
Cantwell referred to it as "a public plan, but negotiated with the private sector." The amendment was approved by a 12-11 vote, with all Republicans and Sen. Blanche Lincoln, D.-Ark., voting against it.
States wouldn't be required to set up the plans. If they did, the amendment encourages them to offer "care coordination" - or greater collaboration among health care providers - as part of an effort to lower costs. Cantwell suggested that the states would have significant bargaining power with their own plans, pointing to an example in her home state, known as the Basic Health Plan.
"This is a way to help the whole nation move towards those kinds of efficiencies," Cantwell said.
Those that would eligible for coverage in a state plan - which Cantwell estimated would be up to 75% of the adult population currently lacking insurance - don't qualify for Medicaid in most states.
Under Senate Finance Chairman Max Baucus' health-care bill, they would receive subsidies to purchase health coverage in an insurance "exchange." The Cantwell amendment would allow states to use the value of the subsidies to finance a state health plan, however.
Roughly $200 billion in what would have been spent on subsidies would instead be steered to the states under the amendment, according to Cantwell. She said that "about a dozen states" would be immediately ready to set up the plans. The state plans would attract managed care organizations to areas that don't currently have them, she said.
America's Health Insurance Plans, a trade group that represents health insurers, raised questions about the Cantwell amendment in a statement.
AHIP spokesman Robert Zirkelbach said the Basic Health Plan in Washington state "has had significant unintended consequences, including budget shortfalls, skyrocketing premiums, waiting lists, and reductions in enrollment."
Zirkelbach said the group doesn't have "a lot of specifics" on the Cantwell amendment right now, but that "a new government-run plan in any form is not necessary."
Leading insurers in AHIP include Aetna Inc. (AET), Humana Inc. (HUM), Cigna Corp.(CI) and UnitedHealth Group Inc (UNH).
Cantwell acknowledged the budget shortfall in her state, but said that the state plan was still functioning effectively and that a number of insurers still participated in the Washington state health plan.
"It's been tough economic times, but that's all the more reason that we don't want to see poor people fall through," Cantwell said. "If you don't put a negotiator in the room to negotiate with insurance companies, you are not going to get the rates down."
-By Patrick Yoest, Dow Jones Newswires; 202-862-3554; patrick.yoest@dowjones.com
Maria Cantwell is one of my Senators
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I can't imagine standing for 130 photos! My smile would be frozen on my face too, LOL
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As a child in Armenia, Henry Gasparian witnessed firsthand the horrors of Nazi Germany. Two uncles were killed, his father wounded and a brother starved to death during the German invasion and occupation of the Soviet Union. So when Gasparian, 70, of Edmonds, saw a poster of President Obama with a Hitler mustache near the entrance to the Edmonds Farmers Market on Sept. 5, he admits that his reaction was "personal and emotional.
A local story. I don't blame Mr. Gasparian for reacting that way. The right in this country seems to be going over the edge.
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This is a microblog for politics-related web clips.
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