Obama’s Afghanistan Surge Speech Prediction

If you haven’t heard, Obama is planning to implement a “surge” in Afghanistan. He’s going to announce his plan to send more than 30,000 additional troops (and who knows how many government contractors) to the war next Tuesday.

My prediction for Obama’s speech is another “Bush” like speech:

• The war is necessary
• We need to change the strategy in Afghanistan (meaning things remain the same)
• Our security as a nation relies on it
• This war is not open ended
• This war is the “good war”
• We want to hand responsibility to the Afghans ASAP
• Benchmarks (that probably won’t matter nor will they be met)
• How we plan to work with other nations to ensure a stable Afghanistan
• We need to “finish the job”
• The next few months (or years) will “demand more patience, sacrifice, and resolve”

The speech will also NOT contain the following:

• An exit strategy
• A time line
• How much more this war will cost
• The goal
• How much strain this war is putting on our already strained military
• In what way this war is tied to our national security

This war is a drain. Obama is sending every other brigade left to Afghanistan leaving us with very few units. We need to cut our losses, end both wars, and send our troops home where they belong.

It never ceases to amaze me how the Congress and the president can be so willing to escalate a war with all the problems we’re facing here. We’re told we have to accept cutbacks on health care and our infrastructure in order to help balance the budget, yet every time there’s a war bill, Congress rubber stamps it. I don’t understand how we have to compromise on health care yet the wars have no compromise. They can be funded open endedly.

I wrote to my congressmen, Ben Cardin, asking him to help push HR 676 (Universal Single Payer Health Care for the US). He wrote back to me:

As a member of the Senate Budget Committee, I firmly believe that any reform proposals we enact must be fully paid for, and the budget resolution passed by Congress requires that.

What about the wars, Senator?