Dana Milbank in The Washington Post
In an open letter to Obama on his Web site Monday, liberal activist Michael Moore wrote that by increasing troops in Afghanistan, "you will do the worst possible thing you could do -- destroy the hopes and dreams so many millions have placed in you."
Bob Herbert in The New York Times
I suppose we’ll never learn. President Obama will go on TV Tuesday night to announce that he plans to send tens of thousands of additional American troops to Afghanistan to fight in a war that has lasted most of the decade and has long since failed. After going through an extended period of highly ritualized consultations and deliberations, the president has arrived at a decision that never was much in doubt, and that will prove to be a tragic mistake. It was also, for the president, the easier option. It would have been much more difficult for Mr. Obama to look this troubled nation in the eye and explain why it is in our best interest to begin winding down the permanent state of warfare left to us by the Bush and Cheney regime. It would have taken real courage for the commander in chief to stop feeding our young troops into the relentless meat grinder of Afghanistan, to face up to the terrible toll the war is taking — on the troops themselves and in very insidious ways on the nation as a whole. So much for change. Really disappointing to see the President choosing the same old goals the same old way while there are so many more important and sensible things to do. I'm going to hope we at least try some innovative strategies, but we're probably still tied to massive troop buildups, bombers, and supposedly surgical drone strikes while we get worn down with effective and deadly IEDs. What kind of coincidence made this the day that Stones into Schools is released? When I was reading about this book, I found a reference to a column by Nicholas Kristoff
Nicholas Kristof, the New York Times reporter and columnist who won two Pulitzer Prizes for shining a light on human rights abuses, said Monday in Bozeman that sending 40,000 more U.S. troops to Afghanistan would be “a mistake.”