The Mercenary’s Cookbook

Do we all remember the outrage over Obama’s insistence that if he had the location of Osama Bin Laden, he would take him out, even if Bin Laden was is on the Pakistan side of the border? Such an action was said to be irresponsible and demonstrate Obama’s naivite regarding foreign policy. Turns out, the Bush Administration has attacked our ally a time or two.

Now, we have word that Bush is setting up a diplomatic mission in Iran, and considering speeding up the drawdown of troops in Iraq. It seems like only yesterday we were hearing about how talking with Iran would be the equivelant of capitulation.

Then this week, we have McCain taking up Obama’s position on troop strength in Afghanistan:

Then just yesterday, we have the ultimate in oddness: McCain’s foreign policy advisor claims it’s not McCain but Obama who is the most like Bush regarding foreign policy.

So what’s going on here? Are Bush and McCain really going to adopt Obama’s foreign policy? And how does that jibe with making Obama out to be a lightweight?

What you are seeing is the result of an unavoidable political reality. The policy difference between the two could not be more clear regarding foreign policy: Obama believes in maintaining diplomatic contact with all countries, friend or foe, Bush and McCain do not. Obama thinks we’ve done everything we can in Iraq militarily, and that our troops should come home and deployed eslewhere, like Afghanistan. McCain and Bush think we should stay until the job is done.  The polling shows that Americans are overwhelmingly on Obama’s side of this.

But this doesn’t mean Bush and McCain have flip-flopped. Bush has floated the idea of drawing down troops before every major election, and it’s always set to begin after the vote is cast. It didn’t take long after the last midterm election for the promised withdrawal to become a “Surge”. What McCain and Bush are doing is muddying the issue because they know Bush’s handling of Iraq is wildly unpopular, and that the Republicans can not maintain control of the White House if they openly campaign for continuing the occupation as they are now.

This is why those who support a continued occupation of Iraq support John McCain, and those who want to leave support Obama. Even though Obama is making the same noises about basing any decision on the reality on the ground, people know he’s committed to leaving. Supporters of McCain know that no matter what McCain says, if he’s elected the troops will remain. So proponents of both those positions are willing to fuzzy the issue by making leaving “contingent” on the Generals, or predicting, yet again, that things will be stable enough in Iraq to leave.

But make no mistake about it. If you believe in staying in Iraq, you should vote for John McCain. And if you think it’s time to leave, you should vote for Barrack Obama.

The West, long since written off as red state, is looking more blue all the time. It is central to Obama’s strategy for rewriting the political map, by putting traditionally red states in play to offset losses in Florida or Ohio, which have traumatized Democrats in recent elections. Central to such a strategy is Colorado, which is why the Dems are holding their Convention here. Though the state’s wilderness has always attracted a strange mixture of hunters, survivalists and hippie environmentalists, Colorado has a huge influx of people who offset some traditionally libertarian elements.

So, the cosmopolitan city centers, mixed with rural voters more receptive to the populist message, make the West possible Ground Zero of 2008.

Helping matters in Ohio and Colorado is the fact that the major players in the Republican Party in these states are suffering from multiple investigations, corruption and sex.

Today demonstrated just how much the state of the state has changed. Today, during a speech, McCain was shouted down by protestors chanting “Endless War!”
 

One doubts the Democratic Convention can hope to come close to the disarray of 1968, when you not only had a war, but assassinations seemed commonplace. But there are definitely some Democratic activists around to make this hostile territory for Republicans.

First, we needed to get rid of Iraq’s WMD. Once we made sure the country was free of those, we needed to occupy the country to liberate them. Then we had to round up all the Iraqis to interrogate them so we could keep the peace. Once we destroyed the terrorist networks, we were the only thing keeping Al Qaeda out, and we couldn’t just up and leave after that with Al Qaeda causing trouble everywhere.

Around this time, all hell had broken loose, and we were the glue holding everything together, and so many people had died we didn’t want them to die in vain.

Remember, a civil war was possible, and once that crisis had passed, we found ourselves the only thing maintaining order during Baghdad’s transition into ethnic enclaves, and we had a moral obligation to prevent an ethnic cleansing.

With so much at stake in such a vital region, it would be devastating to our national interests if we let things deteriorate. After all, we’re the only thing preventing Iran from influencing the Iraqi government, but now that they appear to be backing the Iraqi coalition, we need to give the Iraqi government the breathing room to set up a government, and give the disbanded Iraqi army time to organize, so they can take over security without the country erupting into chaos.

So the only thing we have left to do before we withdraw is to continue fighting until we win the war, so we can maintain a military presence for the next 100 years.