By BJ Bjornson
Every now and again I get reminded just how much I would hate to be in President Obama�s shoes. It isn�t the big things usually, like the fact that he gets covered more negatively than the entire pack of WTFs running to oppose him, or the fact that the media treats his opponents as though they have anything constructive to add to the conversation. That kind of stuff just makes me happy that I�m not living in the U.S.
No, for me it is usually a story like this one from McClatchy, questioning whether or not Obama tried hard enough to keep U.S. troops serving in Iraq past the end of this year. Now, Obama was elected in part due to his consistency on claiming Iraq was an expensive and dangerous waste of time and critical resources (resources that he wanted to use in Afghanistan, but whatever), and there is a huge majority in the U.S. that has been wanting the troops out of Iraq for quite some time.
Now ordinarily given such starting points, the question someone would be asking is, why are we even trying to maintain an indefinite military presence in Iraq? Unfortunately, the idea that the U.S. should maintain military bases everywhere on the globe where they once landed troops, even if mistakenly, is so ingrained that not only does the question of why on earth the U.S. would want to maintain an expensive and likely counterproductive presence in Iraq not get asked, but the White House now has to work on claiming that they did really, really try and go back on Obama�s election promise and against the wishes of the majority of the voting public to keep U.S. troops on the ground in Iraq.
Honestly, there�s no way that can�t suck. Can't we just be happy that, however it was accomplished, the American military will no longer be sending soldiers into harm's way in Iraq rather than writing an attack piece over how terrible it is that the President didn't appear to work harder to continue their ultimately worthless presence going.
Apparently we can't, which is why I'll never envy the man.
Agreed.
ReplyDeleteWhen the completion of withdrawal announcement was made criticisms were raining down as soon as the words were out of his mouth.
My reaction was better late than never but the criticisms seemed to presume Iraqis had no say in the matter. The announcement was clear: the Iraqi parliament said "No." It made me want to yell at the critics, "What part of NO do you not get?
The war was to replace a tyrant with representative government.
It happened.
They said Buh-bye...
Get over it."