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Politics : Liberalism: Do You Agree We've Had Enough of It? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Carolyn who wrote (36146)	7/23/2008 8:28:15 PM
From: Ann Corrigan	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 224704

Ken won't agree with this: Found Overseas, Obama's Historical Dyslexia By Mark Davis, ABC Radio, July 23 2008 The first thing Barack Obama should do upon returning to America next week is thank John McCain and President Bush for making his trip possible. There is one reason the war zone he visited was quiet enough to welcome him: the surge. That would be the surge he never supported in the midst of the increasingly successful war he has never supported. This week, Mr. Obama got to meet with troops he has never supported. They showed him the respect and deference any U.S. senator or presidential candidate should receive. But one has to wonder how his words hit their ears. Mr. Obama's expressed goals in Afghanistan and Iraq were to hear commanders' "biggest concerns" and "to thank our troops for the heroic work they've been doing." I could gag. The commanders did not dare inform him that their biggest concern is a commander-in-chief who would yank them out before their mission is complete. And as for "thanking" the troops, it appears District Attorney Harvey Dent of the new Batman film is not the only two-faced character on wide display this week. Democrats have done shameful things on Iraqi soil over the years – slandering the president, casting doubts on a mission in progress, ignoring positive developments that do not feed their politically mandated narrative – but this is unequaled gall. Mr. Obama's treacly words come as a double insult to our magnificent men and women in uniform. To hold their exploits in low regard is one thing, but to call them "heroic" while plotting their premature surrender is an act of duplicity for the ages. These are not observations you will hear from the fan clubs of adoring media paparazzi accompanying the candidate on his fact-finding mission – and rarely has there been a candidate more in need of one. But something is impeding this sharpest of all recent presidential aspirants as he seeks to find facts – his self-created learning disability. Call it historical dyslexia, a phenomenon in which one sees events in 2008 and believes it is still 2006. At that time, the seeming futility of America's Iraq effort was a fertile ground for anyone who wanted to mock the war or President Bush. During what Democrats surely call "the good old days," anyone suggesting that we throw in the towel could have expected nods of agreement from a wide cross-section of Americans. Anyone making such a suggestion now appears to be blind by choice to the remarkable success of the surge. Obamaphiles may lunge toward recent quotes from Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki that seem to echo the Obama timetable of a 16-month withdrawal, but this is a complete misunderstanding that the Iraqi government hastened to defuse. There is a vast difference between recognizing that things are going so much better that most U.S. troops might be withdrawn by 2010 (Mr. al-Maliki) and the blanket assertion that the war must end with the troops redeployed by that time without regard to events on the ground (Mr. Obama). Democrats need the spectacle of the Obama trip to be a grand-slam home run; Republicans need it to be a disaster. It will be neither. But anyone expecting to see a coming-of-age moment as if these global travels have conferred some grand wisdom should think again. Witness the candidate's stammering response to ABC's Terry Moran, who asked if he would support the surge if he had a do-over. Mr. Obama answers no, and Moran asks incredulously, "You wouldn't?" And then: "Hypotheticals like this are tough; hindsight is 20/20." Yes, it is. And anyone who cannot use that hindsight to see occasions of bad judgment has no business being president of the United States. Mark Davis is a columnist for the Dallas Morning News. The Mark Davis Show is heard weekdays nationwide on the ABC Radio Network. His e-mail address is mdavis@wbap.com.