Reply #17: I like the way you phrased that, bigtree [View All]

"A hard slog, for sure, but \we definitely turned the debate away from supporting the Iraq occupation. All of us, the President included. We're moving the polls on Afghanistan right now, as well."

You prefaced it with "Our party has shifted the debate." I think it would be more accurate to say "the people who have stood against this war have shifted the debate." Giving our party credit for it is stretching it. The American people are fed up with Iraq and Afghanistan. If our party had really been against this from the start we would have been out sooner because they would have starved the war budget, forcing the withdrawal, and we would not have ramped up Afghanistan the way it got ramped up--by a Democratic administration.

I give President Obama credit for pulling the troops out. It is a major step. When he follows with the 52,000 "advisers" and the 150,000-plus mercenaries I will be very impressed and convinced that he is trying to get us out of the Middle East.

The movement of pawns around the board does not mean the objective has changed. But I'm not a chess player.