Posted on 08/30/2009 5:35:09 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
The anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan headed to Martha's Vineyard last week, where President Barack Obama was vacationing, to once again protest our two wars abroad.
But Sheehan is a media has-been. ABC's Charlie Gibson used to cover her anti-Bush rallies in Crawford, Texas. Now he says, with a sigh, of her recent anti-Obama efforts, "Enough already."
The war in Iraq is scarcely in the news any longer, despite the fact that 141,000 American soldiers are still protecting the fragile Iraqi democracy, and 114, as of this writing, have been lost this year in that effort.
But after the success of the surge, there are far fewer American fatalities each month -- eight in July, five in August. Former anti-war candidate Obama is also now President and Commander in Chief Obama --with Democratic majorities in Congress.
Public opinion and media attention about Iraq were always based largely on two factors that transcended whether Americans felt the removal of Saddam Hussein was wise and necessary -- or misguided and wrong.
First was the perception of costs to benefits. In May 2003, after a quick, successful American invasion, a Gallup poll revealed that 79 percent of the public supported the war -- despite our not finding weapons of mass destruction. But by December 2008 -- more than 4,000 American fatalities later and at the end of the Bush presidency -- only 34 percent, according to an ABC News/Washington Post poll, still felt the war had been worth the effort.
Second was how the changing public mood affected politics. In October 2002, the Republican-controlled House and Senate, with plenty of Democratic support, voted overwhelmingly to authorize the Iraq war.
Congress cited 23 reasons why we should remove Saddam. The majority of these authorizations had nothing to do with weapons of mass destruction.
Yet as the subsequent occupation became messy and costly, prior Democratic support evaporated. In both the presidential campaigns of 2004 and 2008, running against what was now George Bush's war was seen as wise Democratic politics.
From all that, we can draw more conclusions about the present media silence and absence of public protests over the Iraq war. As long as Obama is commander in chief, and as long as casualties in Iraq are down, there will be no large public protests or much news about our sizable Iraq presence. The cost and the attendant politics -- not why we went there -- always determined how the Iraq war was covered.
Afghanistan is more complicated. So far this year -- for the first time since our 2001 removal of the Taliban from power -- more Americans have been killed there (172) than in Iraq (114). The Obama administration recently sent more troops into Afghanistan to reach our highest level yet at 32,000.
Yet so far there have been none of the public protests that we used to see in connection with Iraq. Why?
Over the last few years, we have become used to the idea that Afghanistan was "quiet." Indeed fewer were killed there in most years than in some of the bloodiest single months in Iraq.
Democrats also ran on the notion of Afghanistan as the "good war." It was the direct payback for the Taliban's involvement with Osama bin Laden. It garnered United Nations support. And it had been neglected by Iraq-obsessed, neo-con George Bush.
Many anti-war candidates also thought the "good" Afghan war was largely over, while the "bad" Iraq one was hopeless -- already "lost" in the words of the Senate majority leader, Harry Reid, D-Nev.
In addition, Afghanistan -- landlocked, backward, with a harsh climate and little natural wealth -- was always the harder challenge for fostering constitutional government. Iraq has ports, a central location, oil riches, flat and open terrain, and an educated populace.
So now we have public confusion about both wars. Bush's "wrong" war is largely won and Iraq's democracy fairly stable. But the good war in Afghanistan is becoming Obama's and heating up -- more American troops, more American casualties and little political stability.
If the past is any guide to media and public reaction, some predictions seem warranted. Obama will enjoy far more patience, since the anti-war left and a liberal media will go easier on a kindred president.
Yet if casualties peak, the American people will sour on Afghanistan as they did on Iraq. Then even Obama, I think unfairly, will be blamed in the media for a war that Americans used to think -- as in the case once of Iraq -- was necessary and just.
And even reluctant Charlie Gibson might have to return to covering Cindy Sheehan's latest pursuit of a beleaguered American president.
Where are the thousands of peace demonstrators in the major cities?
Why isn't code punk calling for impeachment?
>>Mr. Obama: What’s the exit strategy?
Where are the thousands of peace demonstrators in the major cities?
Why isn’t code punk calling for impeachment?<<
Don’t you know? Protesting against THIS administration is racist!
Actually, despite being on the opposite side of the issues as Ms. Sheehan, she at least is consistent in her views and should be given credit for that. The elitists in the media and on the left that used her when she was useful to them are, on the other hand, just showing their hypocrisy.
Can you tell me if she has called for Obama's impeachment and when and where she did it? If she hasn't she's a hypocrite.
The more I heard, nearly from the beginning, the mantra about Afghanistan being the necessary war, the war we can and should get behind, the more deeply I suspected it as a military equivalent of “good cop/bad cop”: Afghanistan was used almost exclusively for these short term purposes by people across a great deal of the Left/Right spectrum as a talking point and rhetorical counterweight to the War in Iraq. WHY?????Because Osama bin Laden was presumably “hiding there”, and according to the likes of John Kerry and his ilk, all of our efforts should have gone single-mindedly towards ferreting him out and killing him, and then supposedly Islamic Jihad would curl up and die. Well, I for one never believed that, but it was at least the earliest linchpin for the anti-Iraq “movement”.
Now, as we know, the Taliban, with or without bin Laden being anywhere nearly there, or even alive (I doubt it) is proving to a more troublesome presence than any I know of in Iraq.
There, fixed it.
I’ll tell you what is really really really racist racism…
Voting for someone based on the color of their skin and not the content of their character and ideas combined!
I actually was just responding in general to the article, not your comments. I agree with your comments.
My Mom spits nails when she sees this a$$hole step off of Marine One and "salute" the Marines. Disgusting.
It's no coincidence that Afghanistan was quiet, while Iraq was hot. IIRC, some commentators believe that Bush's strategy was to pick the best battleground for fighting Al Qaeda, & their ilk. Al Qaeda is now able to “redeploy” (to use one of J.F. Kerry's favourite terms) fighters to Afghanistan.
So...if I’m fairly tolerant of the present level of KIA, I can be TOLERATED, but how many more US dead would I have to tolerate to be genuinely LIKED...?
I’m just shopping for now, OK?
“Why isn’t code punk calling for impeachment?”
As long as abortions are maximized and Christian denigration is encouraged, Obama could drown his secretary by running their car off a bridge and not a peep would be heard.
Nothing will happen except Americans will continue to Die in Large Numbers because the Press will Ignore it as long as Democrats are in Power .
Hey Obama Got Bin Laden Yet ? Just thought I would ask
As long as Cindy is aggravating Obama it’s OK with me!
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I so seldom see that Iraq's populace has been MUCH better prepared for democracy that it nearly distresses me. The populace there, by and large, is quite interested in being "westernized" and has long been hoping to take advantage of their education and interest in bettering themselves. They are much more Persian, not typical "arabs" with ties to their former nomadic tribes. Their democratic instincts were squashed by Hussein and his henchmen, but the people in general have yearned for freedom. That is the reason the more "moderate" forms of Islam have greater popularity in Iraq.
This is the core reason why I have continued to maintain that it IS worth our efforts to help them achieve a strong democracy. A strong democratic Iraq will strengthen Jordan, as well as Israel, and will become the strategic lynchpin of the MidEast in the future.
We can still prevail in Afghanistan though it must be kept as a long low-level struggle. In order to prevail in the end, it is essential that either Iran or Pakistan be brought on board- again arguing that we keep the struggle low level while facilitating change in those countries. It is also important to realize that as long as AlQ has a "cause celebre" in Afghanistan to attack, the level of threat in the rest of the world is more diffuse. (We had a better AlQ trap in Iraq, though.)
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