The 2008 Presidential Campaign (was Obama Phenomenon 2)

[solicitr]

Voronwë, there's a bit of confusion in that exchange because the 'surge', proper, isn't really in play. It seems McCain perhaps read Couric hinting at the notion that 'the Awakening did it all, not us (gee, I wonder why?) "All the good stuff would have happened anyway without the surge" is the new Obama spin-setting. This I think is what McCain is responding to. Yes, it's correct that McFarland and the beginnings of the AA predated the surge by some months- in fact it was a component in the decision to appoint Petraeus, who had been advocating just this sort of thing all along.

Of course the Iraqi Army's stepping up only occurred quite recently.

I also suspect McCain was just as irritated as I at the 'increased number of troops contributed to increased security' phrase, which is a slighting reference and wholly inaccuarate, implying as it does that these were just cops on the beat, not the TOE of a series of massive and hard-fought offensives. But then, the press never did report any of that, did they?

The thrust of McCain's answer, therefore (if w/o Obamesque glibness) was that it's 'a false depiction of what actually happened' to claim that the Iraqis did or could have done much of anything by themselves, when the fact is their role was to act as an auxiliary to the US Army and Marines. By themselves they wouldn't have lasted five minutes.

It's a bit like crediting the Maquis for liberating France- D-Day had nothing to do with it.

[solicitr]

Vison, the media is not all-powerful, of course. But the bias does present an additional obstacle for any Republican candidate to overcome.

-------

The fact is that the press (together with Obama and the Congressional Democrats) were the *last* people to realize or admit that the corner had been turned in Iraq. For all of 2007 all they reported was 'increased violence'- without mentioning whose violence it was, or the end to which it was directed, or the progressive clearing of militia strongholds. The cluelessness and absence of context and only-the-bombs-and-US-dead reporting has been driving me crazy for months, since the actual developments were easily available to anyone who felt like looking for them. If you believed the MSM reports at the time, Maliki's recent offensive in Basra was a fiasco, a Keystone Kops FUBAR- and yet the IA (who apparently don't watch CNN) went ahead and took the city anyway- something the press never bothered to mention.

And, no, many people 'don't believe it'- because they've been fed a steady diet of 'quagmire' and 'unwinnable.'

[sauronsfinger]

So the Republican candidate for President made another mistake yesterday. And he did it in the very field that he proclaims his expertise to be in - foreign policy. Everyone makes mistakes. Everyone misspeaks. In a 24 hour news cycle with constant coverage of even minor speeches, this is going to happen.

But for McCain, its just the latest in a growing series of mistakes he makes in his expert area of foreign policy. Confusing the different sects in Iraq, confusing training sites, the Czechosolovakia gaffe, and now this, all adds up to a big problem.

People are going to start asking the embarassing questions. "is he just too old?" "Is he not very bright?" "Does he simply not know the facts?"
With each mistake he makes in his field of expertise he invites these sort of inquiries.

And that Republican charge against Barack Obama that he does nto have any foreign policy experience: its a body lying in a coffin and the lid is now on it and McCain is hammering each nail into that lid. If he keep this up that charge will be dead and buried thanks to his own mistakes.

And lets keep in mind that the debates have not even happend yet and they are much higher pressure situations than what caused these errors. The prospect of a Gerald Ford-Poland gaffe is hanging out there like a Mexican pinata at a 10 year olds birthday party. What happens when he does this in front of a nationwide live audience in a forum like that?

[Alatar]

SF, your point might hold more weight if you left out the "oh, so clever" McStake rubbish.

Seriously, I'm beginning to wonder if anyone's capable of discussing politics without inventing stupid buzzwords. Lets see, so far we've had:

Obamessiah
Billary
McStakes

Anyone I'm missing?

Its childish.

[sauronsfinger]

Alatar - if he made one - it would not be fair. But when it becomes an indentifying pattern of his campaign, its now worthy of being named.

If its childish, there are many good columnists being paid good money to do the same.

But I will tell you what I will do --- I will go back and change each of the McStakes to mistakes. This time. When it happens again, all bets are off.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

That's interesting VtF, I am curious as to how much success was inevitable without the surge, and how much depended on it.

Me too, hal, but of course we will never know. That Military Review article does make a very strong case, however.

Voronwë, there's a bit of confusion in that exchange because the 'surge', proper, isn't really in play.

soli, if there is confusion in that exchange, it really does seem to be on the part of McCain. He has put so much political stock into "having been right about the surge" that it seems to be twisting his judgment, or his memory. As you point out, he certainly has some valid points to make about the Iraqi's not having been able to do it themselves, but attributing the Awakening to the surge is just plain wrong.

It is interesting, however (given the discussion about media bias) that CBS News choose not to air this exchange, and actually spliced in a different response of McCain's to Couric's question.

____

sf, thank you for editing your post (and thank you Alatar for calling him on it). You still don't seem to understand what we are trying to accomplish here. It doesn't really matter what columnists do; that kind of childish sniping is not acceptable here.

[sauronsfinger]

CNN ran the exchange with a discussion of McCain mistakes in the time line and events. What was interesting is that anchorman Anderson Cooper seemed to be defending McCain saying this was no big deal and something that we can expect to happen on the campaign trail. It was the opposite of the alleged bias that we have been talking about.

Everyone make mistakes. McCain will make them and Obama will make them. They are human beings and thats part of the game.

The problem here is that John McCain has staked much of his campaign and reputation on being an expert on foreign policy, with the speciality of Iraq. This is simply the latest in a growing series of errors where he confuses the sides, gets locations wrong, confuses the timeline or has events out of sequence.

After how many of these will it take before the claim of foreign policy expertise begins to ring hollow and false with many voters who are now undecided?

And the debates, which are much higher pressure, and in which much more is at stake, have not even happened yet. I distincty remember Gerald Ford discussing Poland and the impact that mistake had on his efforts.

[solicitr]

actually spliced in a different response of McCain's to Couric's question.

Wow, did they really? I thought they'd given up on that years ago when 60 Minutes was called on the carpet for doing so. Recently that gimmick has been reserved to the Michael Moores.

How could anyone square that with notions of honest and ethical journalism?
----

Where did McCain ever attribute the Awakening to the surge?

As to the 'surge:' there certainly had been successes on a local level before last year- notable among them McFarland's, and also 101st Airborne's sector when Petraeus commanded that division. (As usual, the press never reported on any of them). The problem was the 'water balloon'- if you squeezed the insurgents out of one locality, they just moved somewhere else and kept on raising hell. And when our forces moved on, the insurgents seeped back in behind them.

In order to solve the water-balloon problem it was necessary to hit them all over the country at the same time, and maintain a continuous presence in cleared areas so that they remained cleared. To do this required more men than were available in 2006. It took five months (Feb-June 07) to get them all in place: but once Operation Phantom Thunder was launched on June 16, AQ-I and its allies got no respite, no opportunity to regroup, no refuge. The offensive involved approximately 30,000 men- in other words, the 'surge' forces.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

actually spliced in a different response of McCain's to Couric's question.

Wow, did they really? I thought they'd given up on that years ago when 60 Minutes was called on the carpet for doing so. Recently that gimmick has been reserved to the Michael Moores.

How could anyone square that with notions of honest and ethical journalism?

I agree, and I'm glad to see that you are just as offended by an action that was apparently done to protect McCain as you would be by one to protect Obama.

Where did McCain ever attribute the Awakening to the surge?

In this statement:

"Colonel MacFarland was contacted by one of the major Sunni sheiks. Because of the surge we were able to go out and protect that sheik and others. And it began the Anbar awakening."

That's as clear a statement as could be that the "awakening" was the result of the surge. And it is completely false.

[solicitr]

In 2007 the leader of the movement, Sheik Abdul Sattar Buzaigh al-Rishawi, formed the Anbar Awakening Council also called "Anbar Awakening" to counter the influence of Al-Qaeda in Iraq.

You're quibbling over semantics here. Where do you define the beginning of the "Awakening" proper? Summer 2006 when Abu Risha first rebelled? Late 2006 when McFarland contacted him? March 2007 when the Awakening Council was formed? The key point is that it was thanks to the surge that the Sunni uprising bore fruit, and you're just trying to generate a 'gaffe' ex nihilo like 'Czechoslovakia' and '100 years.' Bah. The press hasn't jumped on Obama for "57 states" or "8 to 10 years in office"- nor should they. I don't hold Obama's momentary lapses against him. Candidates (or anyone else) speaking on their feet occasionally misspeak. God knows courtroom lawyers do it all the time.

I do however hold Obama's prepared speeches and written statements against him.

The surge worked. McCain was right. Obama was wrong.

[sauronsfinger]

If indeed

The surge worked. McCain was right. Obama was wrong.

Perhaps reasonable people can come to some understanding about what success and failure constitutes? Otherwise, its all just opinion without any foundation or rubrics to measure those evaluations.

If we go the speech of President Bush on January 10, 2007, in which he announced the troop escalation known as The Surge, he said that these things would be achieved by it.

1. To establish its authority, the Iraqi government plans to take responsibility for security in all of Iraq's provinces by November.

2. To give every Iraqi citizen a stake in the country's economy, Iraq will pass legislation to share oil revenues among all Iraqis.

3. To show that it is committed to delivering a better life, the Iraqi government will spend $10 billion of its own money on reconstruction and infrastructure projects that will create new jobs.

4. To empower local leaders, Iraqis plan to hold provincial elections later this year.

5. And to allow more Iraqis to re-enter their nation's political life, the government will reform de-Baathification laws, and establish a fair process for considering amendments to Iraq's constitution.

Those are not my words. They are the promises of President Bush in announcing the troop escalation.

It is not fundamentally ethical to use highly selective results and pronounce the surge a success.

Why is it not right to apply the promises of the President to the results achieved or not achieved in the intervening time period?

[solicitr]

Back to media bias: ABC News has hired Ben Affleck to film a documentary for Nightline. Ben Affleck. Whose two favorite books are Chomsky's "Manufacturing Consent" and Zinn's "A People's History of the United States."

I would really, really say something snide and sarcastic here, but I've promised to be good. Besides, I don't really need to.

[solicitr]

Hello everyone,

As you know I am not a very political person. I just wanted to pass along that Senator Obama came to Bagram Afghanistan for about an hour on his visit to ' The War Zone ' . I wanted to share with you what happened.

He got off the plane and got into a bullet proof vehicle, got to the area to meet with the Major General (2 Star) who is the commander here at Bagram.

As the Soldiers where lined up to shake his hand, he blew them off and didn't say a word as he went into the conference room to meet the General. As he finished, the vehicles took him to the ClamShell (pretty much a big top tent that military personnel can play basketball or work out in with weights) so he could take his publicity pictures playing basketball. He again shunned the opportunity to talk to Soldiers to thank them for their service.

So really he was just here to make a showing for the Americans back home that he is their candidate for President. I think that if you are going to make an effort to come all the way over here you would thank those that are providing the freedom that they are providing for you.

I swear we got more thanks from the NBA Basketball Players or the Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders than from one of the Senators, who wants to be the President of the United States . I just don't understand how anyone would want him to be our Commander-and-Chief. It was almost that he was scared to be around those that provide the freedom for him and our great country.

If this is blunt and to the point I am sorry but I wanted you all to know what kind of caliber of person he really is. What you see in the news is all fake.

In service,

CPT J
Bagram, Afghanistan

[halplm]

Where did you get that?

[N.E. Brigand]

Where did you get that?

Here, possibly.

Is Cpt. J a trustworthy source?

[halplm]

I had wondered why we got so little out of Obama while he was in Afghanistan.

However, this seems a little to exact in it's critisism... but then again, maybe that's all there is to say.

[N.E. Brigand]

Did Senators Reed and Hagel, who were also there, similarly skip the handshakes?

[ToshoftheWuffingas]

Soli, would you deny Affleck a voice because he had read two books and enjoyed them?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_People's ... ted_States

[Faramond]

I would hesitate to assume that something posted on a blog is true. Even if the man who wrote the letter is telling the truth as he perceives it, he may not know all the facts or all that went on or what kind of schedule constraints were in place.

I think Obama's mistake may have been restricting press access during his Afghanistan visit. Maybe this was done because Afghanistan was a fact-finding stop, not a campaigning spot, hence no need for the press. I'm not sure how realistic this is, and in any case there was video released of Obama playing basketball with troops. That's fine, because the truth is where ever McCain or Obama go they are on some level campaigning. And so --- the press should have had more access. If they had, we might know more about the truth of this letter, or the context of the situations described.

[solicitr]

I wouldn't deny him a *voice*- but I would deny him a platform on what puports to be a "News" program given his fondness for left-wing conspiracy-theorists.

Would you consider it appropriate for the Beeb to hire David Irving to film a documentary?

Incidentally, Ben has said Chomsky's book "changed his life". I would submit not for the better.