and of course the MSM yawns, scratches ass, rolls over.

Thousands of years they've been living in those caves and tunnels and nobody has ever driven them out or beat them. If they were a sport team their record would be 2,875 wins 0 loses. Do the math.

Deeply involved in a long un-winnable civil war, far far away, our kid's getting killed everyday, backing a corrupt government no one voted for. I know I've heard that somewhere else before.

I'm ashamed that I was on the wrong side 35 years ago. Ho Chi Minh was a patriot protecting his country and people from invaders. I see no difference in ANY country in the Middle East where there is a U.S. military presence.

Lies + Greed + manipulation of facts and people = Invasions. (I don't call them "wars" anymore.)

PEACE is not a dirty word.

Nothing like betting on combat deaths... wow i'm ashamed to be human.

why not bring the troops home and send in the assclownz the bush admin who illegally started it

So, If Obama withdraws immediately, is he strong on security, taking decisive action to bring our folks home, or weak on the Al Qaeda threat as some Republicans will undoubtedly claim?

It's a politically vulnerable situation for Obama until there's A LOT MORE NOISE coming from the American people.
If pullout gets dissed by Republicans and Americans buy the bullshit, Democrats will bail out on Obama like rats from a sinking ship to save their next election cycle.

Many thanks to Matt Hoh for joining the needed chorus.
Bring our troops home.

damixaustex. Obama said he was willing to be a one term president. So who the fuck cares if he's labeled weak on terror (stupid concept - war on an adjective). In fact, I am tired of hearing about how he's waiting to get things done so that he can win reelection. Hell, if he'll get things done, he'll be reelcted...Or assassinated, this is Amerika after all.

I care. Regardless Obama's political future, we never need to see the fear mongering again. Our domestic house is awry. Republicans are currently setting you up. They can't WAIT for the left to force Obama to make a hasty decision so they can pounce and cry. It'll usher in a new era of defense spending.

Obama’s crucial decisions on Afghanistan --- and ‘Beyond Afghanistan’ --- on EMPIRE.

All the media talk is about the crucial decision that Obama faces in Afghanistan. Whether to give in to the generals, and allow the war to expand, after years of 40,000 to 70,000 US troops fighting and training Afghanistanis, to over a 100.000 troops (or more) with a massive weapons build-up.

But while the intense speculation regarding Obama’s decision about expanding the Afghanistan War, the designed-to-be-expanded ‘Global War on Terrorism’, into a likely AfPak war is on everyone’s front-burner, Obama has a multiplicity of other foreign policy decisions, and an even more vast array of domestic economic and social goals he desperately wants to pursue in the U.S.

Has any president, has any leader, ever had so many critical decisions to make at one time, and so many issues to speak to the American people about –-- and build their confidence that he can speak with them openly and address their combined problems?

Has any leader ever had such a problem in dealing with critical domestic issues that mean so much to him, and yet had such risks to his plans and hopes caused by a foreign war he would rather not have to speak about?

Like Obama, Rev. Martin Luther King was confronted with a similar monumental decision about whether to speak-out against the imperialist war ‘abroad’, that was grinding up the working-class sons of both black and white Americans, or to continue focusing on his most heart-felt problem ‘at home’ of inequality and racism’s tyranny against young blacks.

For more than a year, Rev. King kept his focus on the racial battle at home, and would not be detoured by addressing the combination of multiple issues that would inevitably spring from taking-on the crimes of imperialist foreign war, domestic racism, and the ‘class-warfare’ that linked these crimes of Empire.

Finally, on April 4th, 1967, and at the Riverside Church in New York City, Dr. King decided that it was “A Time to Break Silence” not only about Vietnam, but Beyond Vietnam, and to speak the truth about the nature of Empire and the class-war that Empire always uses to maintain its unfair, unjust, and un-democratic control over the indivisible political-economics of power both ‘abroad’ and ‘at home’.

Hopefully, Obama will reach the same monumental decision as Dr. King – and even more hopefully, average Americans of all colors will respond to a seminal outing of Empire by recognizing their common humanity, their common-wealth in country, their common ‘public interest’ in democracy (against the ‘private interest’ of Empire), and by treating this 21st century messenger and leader against Empire and for democracy differently than Dr. King was treated.

I hope that Obama is benefiting, in his time of decision, from taking the time to re-read King’s Riverside speech:

http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/mlkati...

King noted, “The war in Vietnam is but a symptom of a far deeper malady within the American spirit”

And today, hopefully, Obama will take note that, “The war in [fill in the blank____________] is but a symptom of a far deeper malady within the American spirit”

King continued:

“It is with such activity in mind that the words of the late John F. Kennedy come back to haunt us. Five years ago he said, "Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." Increasingly, by choice or by accident, this is the role our nation has taken, the role of those who make peaceful revolution impossible by refusing to give up the privileges and the pleasures that come from the immense profits of overseas investments. I am convinced that if we are to get on the right side of the world revolution, we as a nation must undergo a radical revolution of values. We must rapidly begin...we must rapidly begin the shift from a thing-oriented society to a person-oriented society. When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights, are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, extreme materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered.”

Finally, King concludes with, “If we will make the right choice, we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our world into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood.”

I hope that Obama, in preparing to make his choice, recognizes that the multiplicity of those “jangling discords of our world”, those pressing problems ‘abroad’ and ‘at home’ are but the uniform fingerprints of one thing ---- EMPIRE.

I hope that Obama recognizes that those “giant triplets of racism, extreme materialism, and militarism”, plus the arrogance of super-power (as Francis Fukuyama now recognizes) are really the shadow of EMPIRE --- even if it is presented under the veil of sweet sounding speeches and through the facade of 'Vichy' democracy.

I can only hope that Obama recognizes that what makes peaceful revolution impossible is EMPIRE --- and that he soon shares this terrible truth with the American people, that the Empire is posing as us, the U.S.

Alan MacDonald
Sanford, Maine

Thank you Mr. Hoh for your brilliance and integrity, two attributes sorely lacking in our government.