If there’s any indication that we are marred in chaos indefinitely, or as I put it ” up Shiite creek with no paddle,” it is in John McCain’s ludicrous statements from the stump (”A Hundred Years”). These startling statements reveal a man so detached from reality and so utterly afraid to confront Hilary and Obama on the economy, an issue he readily admits little knowledge of, that the so called maverick has no other choice but to tout the surge. Scary enough, a lot of Americans are still miserably uninformed when it comes to Iraq. For example, more Americans than ever before - 42 percent - say the troop surge in Iraq has made things better, the percentage of Americans who say the war is going well is now ten points higher than it was in September of last year and, worse yet, twenty-eight percent of Americans still believe Saddam was personally involved in the Sept. 11 attacks.
This radical and seemingly inconceivable disconnect implies that Americans aren’t paying attention, and why should they? The coverage of the war has dropped precipitously — down to 3 percent of available news space and air time this year, according to the Project for Excellence in Journalism. Indeed, war coverage did make a comeback last week ( no Govs Gone Wild?) because of the American death toll reaching 4000, which I suppose reflects the media’s affinity for round,easy numbers (3,557 is fluff; bring out the horny governors!)
Enter Barack and Hillary (she still in it?)
In order to demystify the belief that the surge is working, Messrs. Barack and Hillary are going to have to do more than call for vague timetables. Rather, the candidates will have to constantly remind Americans of the astronomical costs for this monumental foreign policy blunder, link it to the crumbling domestic economy, and offer real and imaginative solutions in the face of a war hero while simultaneously highlighting McCain’s gaffes (the Iran/Sunni connection) on the issue. In short, they will have to demonstrate that gravitas and war hero status, although admirable and noteworthy, do not equate to sound and reasoned judgement.
Please make a Difference and Spread the Word
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