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NPR: Was the Surge Successful?
Blackfive ^ | 7/30/08 | Blackfive

Posted on 07/30/2008 10:04:18 PM PDT by Dawnsblood

I like NPR. They are one of the very few media outlets that have treated me extremely fairly.

But here, in this NPR interview with General (retired) Jack Keane, you can hear the bias of host Alex Chadwick, and the surprise in the response of GEN (ret) Keane - one of the architects of the Surge. I think it's important to hear both Alex Chadwick and Jack Keane discuss the events around the Surge.

To me, this is an indication of the level of effort being made to spin away the Surge as not successful or due to the the planning and efforts of our active military and people like GEN (ret) Keane and David Kilcullen.

It is horribly false for anyone to claim that the Surge is not a success. Make no mistake, there's a long way to go, but some people on the left seemed determined to throw our progress away.

(Excerpt) Read more at blackfive.net ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Foreign Affairs; Politics/Elections; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: iraq; liberalmedia; npr; propagandawingofdnc; surge
Audio at the link.
1 posted on 07/30/2008 10:04:18 PM PDT by Dawnsblood
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To: Dawnsblood
Was the Surge Successful?

Not if you're a rotten RAT like Barak Obama who wanted America to lose so it could help him get elected.
2 posted on 07/30/2008 10:06:32 PM PDT by advance_copy (Stand for life or nothing at all)
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To: Dawnsblood
NPR makes it a point of honor to air stories deliberately designed to demoralize the American Home Front to the maximum extent possible in regards to the war.

If Josef Goebbels were alive today, he would give NPR "two thumbs up".

3 posted on 07/30/2008 10:11:19 PM PDT by Polybius
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To: Dawnsblood

So the libs what to try the surge in Afghanistan even after such a dismal failure in Iraq? I don’t get it.


4 posted on 07/30/2008 10:13:13 PM PDT by Liberal Bob (looneyleft.com)
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To: Dawnsblood

Left Radio has never made it commerically simply because Public Radio already ready neatly fills that niche.

Kind of unfair since they are tax subsidized, yet still solicit donations and commerical “sponsors” in addition to their public funding. They use up the audience and the ad dollars that chase them.


5 posted on 07/30/2008 10:22:30 PM PDT by Wiseghy ("You want to break this army? Then break your word to it.")
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To: Dawnsblood; advance_copy

The Levin-Reed-Smith amendment, which would have forced our troops out of Iraq through spring of 2008, was co-sponsored by my second least favorite Oregon Senator Gordon Smith.

The failed amendment dramatized how to support the troops and not their mission. Senators unanimously confirm Lt. General David Petraeus to lead our Iraq troops, and then move immediately to thwart him. This Princeton PhD, who co-authored the Army’s manual on counterinsurgency, provided Senators a splendid dissertation defense for utilizing the surge to implement classic counterinsurgency strategies, consistently victorious when not politically sabotaged. Clearly, his comments so terrified Senators Levin, Reed, and Smith; etal they demanded legislation to cripple the strategy from the outset.

Just a few weeks ago I got a letter from Senator Smith countering the April 8 reports of General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker and maintaining illusions rejecting existence of their testimony. He contended there is a civil war. General Petraeus said the country had moved away from the brink of civil war. Smith said the source of violence was ancient Iraqi sectarian divisions. General Petraeus said impetuous for violence resided outside the country with Al-Qaeda Iraq (AQI), foreign fighters injected by Syria, and special groups trained and funded by Iran.

Smith said Iraqi leaders were unwilling to focus on steps for a better country. Ambassador Crocker reported recent passage of legislation for pension benefits extended to former Hussein regime members, de-Ba’athification reform, a far-reaching amnesty law, and agreement among all major parties for local elections in October. Smith’s statement also refused to acknowledge constitutional review, semi-autonomous region laws, minority party protections, informal sharing of oil revenues, and capital funds allocation happened when the surge was only two months old. His letter further refused acknowledgement that 540,000 have volunteered, and now serve in the Iraqi security forces. 540,000 citizens find securing peace through victorious national government sufficiently compelling to risk their lives.

Smith repudiates instruction successful counterinsurgency operations allows these people, and emerging local moderate leaders, to demand and/or facilitate national reconciliation on difficult outstanding issues. He grasps for evidence of failure by claiming a “Jeffersonian Democracy” is not emerging. These novice Iraqi legislators are just now emerging from a world in which they, and their immediate and extended families, were subject to “lobbying” amounting to murder and torture by bestial elements. Political success means a board range of constituencies substituting vitriolic rhetoric and emotional, even violent, demonstrations for abundant slaughter.


6 posted on 07/30/2008 10:57:56 PM PDT by Retain Mike
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To: Polybius
NPR makes it a point of honor to air stories deliberately designed to demoralize the American Home Front to the maximum extent possible in regards to the war.

That's how they show they're "objective."

7 posted on 07/30/2008 11:19:51 PM PDT by Steely Tom (Without the second, the rest are just politicians' BS.)
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To: Wiseghy

It is only fitting that Socialists would listen to radio that was paid for by the gummint.


8 posted on 07/31/2008 2:01:08 AM PDT by wastoute
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To: Dawnsblood

Was the Surge Successful?

Does a bear shit in the woods?


9 posted on 07/31/2008 3:25:22 AM PDT by RU88 (The false messiah can not change water into wine any more than he can get unity from diversity.)
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To: Dawnsblood

I hate NPR. They’re commies.


10 posted on 07/31/2008 3:37:10 AM PDT by toddlintown (Morons; all of 'em.)
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To: toddlintown

I resent ANY of my tax dollars supporting them; with talk radio (Rush!) I have a CHOICE whether to support them with purchases, with NPR, I have no choice. I thought the lefties are all about CHOICE — I guess only if I make the choice THEY want...

This is one reason why I despise NPR:

http://search.yahoo.com/search?p=%22we+only+do+hit+pieces%22&ei=UTF-8&iscqry=&fr=sfp

P


11 posted on 07/31/2008 4:49:42 AM PDT by Peet (Insert clever phrase here.)
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mark and bump...


12 posted on 07/31/2008 8:11:54 AM PDT by eureka! (McCain....I guess.)
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