So, the escalation and surge worked?

[robdogbucky]

Did anyone else happen to see Restrepo? robdog sez check it out:

Afghan police die in Taliban raid
Afghanistan News.Net


"An attack by Taliban fighters on the police headquarters in Kandahar city has resulted in the deaths of over 20 people.

The attack in southern Afghanistan took place on on Saturday when suicide bombers armed with guns and grenades tried to take over the police station.

The siege went on for several hours and left at least 45 other police officers injured.

Attackers initially fired on the main police headquarters from a building across the street..."


http://www.afghanistannews.net/story/743809/ht/Afghan-police-die-in-Taliban-raid


U.S. says cutting aid threatens Afghanistan fight

(Reuters) - "Congressional plans to slash U.S. foreign assistance, including multibillion-dollar aid to Afghanistan, risk undermining the Obama administration's bid to leave behind a stable nation when it withdraws its troops.

Rajiv Shah, a doctor and administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), said pledges from some leading lawmakers to cut funding for his agency, a prime target in Republican belt-tightening plans, would undermine the U.S. fight in Afghanistan and ultimately jeopardize U.S. security...

...Despite record violence in 2010, U.S. President Barack Obama and other Western leaders hope a tenacious Taliban insurgency can be turned back in 2011 as foreign troops seek to put an unsteady Afghan military in the lead by the end of 2014.

Shah, 37, said USAID had struggled in the past to hold its aid contractors accountable, but said it had made big strides in maternal health, sending Afghan girls to school, increasing wheat yields and making tentative steps to expand farm exports..."

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/02/13/us-afghanistan-usa-aid-idUSTRE71C0QP20110213?feedType=RSS&feedName=politicsNews&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Reuters%2FPoliticsNews+%28News+%2F+US+%2F+Politics+News%29



Egypt uprising could spark people's movement in Afghanistan

“When once a nation begins to think, it is impossible to stop it,” Voltaire prophetically scribed more than a decade before the 1789 Storming of the Bastille. Not unlike French revolutionaries over 200 years ago, the people of Egypt have awoken after years of demoralization, making one wonder if and when a similar epic rousing shall be seen in Afghanistan, where the government has degraded and preyed upon its citizenry to an even greater extent than Mubarak has the Egyptians.

The parallels are so striking it prompted Dexter Filkins to ask in a New Yorker piece: “After Tahrir Square, do we really think the Afghans won’t notice?”

Of course, the Afghans have already noticed that, like Egypt, they live under a repressive, illegitimate and corrupt puppet government of the United States and certainly have noticed how their leaders criminally hoard countless billions of Western aid that was initially not intentioned to help build summer homes in Dubai for Afghan political and societal elite.

The Afghans have also noticed how their de facto dictatorship retains its power through elections so fraudulent they insult the collective intelligence of the population, in the same way Mubarak’s mockery of democracy insulted the people of Egypt..."

http://www.examiner.com/afghanistan-headlines-in-national/could-egypt-inspire-afghan-people-s-movement




So explain to me how/why suddenly the pubs want to decrease US ability to pursue their strategic goals in Afghanistan/Pakistan, as it is they that are seeking to cut the funds. Amazing. Anything to undermine a Democratic administration no doubt. Even if is endangers our security or regional strategic interests. I wonder what the eternal warhawks hereabouts have to say about this? Dems as the hawks and pubs (should I just refer to them as whores now, as it seems to fit them) as the anti-war party on econoic reasons?

Up is down, war is peace, etc.


Didn't we invest mucho troop buildup, much hype and new Paetreus over there to have that last surge succeed? Wonder what went wrong, eh? Could it be Satan?



Hands off my Social Security!
Hands off Latin America!



rdb

[msongs]

1. the taliban is vanquished and everyone if free and safe there now nt

[robdogbucky]

2. I guess no one cares anymore n/t

[nomb]

8. Afghanistan? Is there still a war there?

Are we still there, or is it the UK?

[uppityperson]

3. Afghanistan is such a poor country, so difficult to survive in a healthy way there.

To me, some places like this deserve the help of the world to get themselves where the people want to be. Not where those in power want to keep them. It's been so poor, so fragmented for so long that it is difficult to get many to work together.

[robdogbucky]

5. Agree 100%

and why it is such a monumental cock-up to address problems there with the assets of the MIC, to wit, guns and bombs and soldiers.

I have the distinct feeling that this will all build up to a major karmic payback sometime down the road for the good ol' USA.

What was that street expression again, "What goes around, comes around?"



Hands off my Social Security!
Hands off Latin America!


rdb

[Submariner]

4. For the Iraqis and Afghans it did

The U.S. lost both wars early on, so Bush just kicked the can down the road for 5 years until his incompetent ass left town.

edited for humor

[robdogbucky]

7. Submariner, could I ask a favor?

To placate a victim of their own shortsightedness and failure to proof read what I wrote(me), and seeing as how the time has expired for me to make any edits to my original post, I hate to leave those two typos there but I waited too long to re-read it.

Can you remove that apostrophe from the Iraqis? In your post header?

The possessive case does not belong in this plural application.

Thanks in advance from a tortured soul.

I know, it's over the top but please can you humor me?

It's bad enough to have to read my own sloppy writing.




Hands off my Social Security!
Hands off Latin America!


rdb

[robdogbucky]

10. You're a Champ, Sub,

I owe you one.






Dear SOS Clinton and President Obama:

Thanks for nothing

The People of Honduras

[midnight]

6. Bring them home....

[Adsos Letter]

9. Petraeus expecting bloody summer...

"General David Petraeus, the top U.S. and NATO commander in Afghanistan, says he is excepting a brutal fight in the spring when Taliban insurgents try to return from their winter safe havens to areas already cleared by the international forces.

"When you have 110,000 more of us than we had a year ago, we're obviously in many, many more places," he said in an interview with NATO TV. "We have taken away areas that matter to the Taliban and they have to fight back."

But he doesn't see more violence as mission failure.

"When you're on the offensive... the insurgents have to fight back and violence goes up, it's a necessary part of any counter-insurgency."

Last year was the deadliest for American troops in the 10 year war, with 499 service members dying in the line of duty."

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503543_162-20031135-503543....

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x396008