what has obama done that makes him a better POTUS than bush?

[HUGGY]

You cant capture someone the size of Afghanistan with 50,000 troops.

We had him asshat...Reinforcement requests were denied and our guys were told to stand down.

At least TRY to know what you are flapping your pie hole about!

Why you getting your panties in a knot for? What am I missing?

The 50,000, sometimes 30,000 troops stationed in Afghanistan for 8 years that couldnt do their job? Whats there to miss?

Sorry sparky...I didn't know you were retarded. When we first invaded Afghanistan Ossama fled into the Torah Bora mountains. We had him surrounded on three sides. The CIA called in support to close the door and were denied support. They were told to let the locals handle Ossama's capture. You can google it. He immediately fled out of Afghanistan into Pakistan. Our troops there for the 8 plus years were not authorised to go into Pakistan. Now we are fighting Pashtoons that had nothing to do with Al Qaeda.

Our mission has been morphed into trying to nation build by murdering those that do not want us there. We support the world biggest supplier of opium.. and will kill anyone that feels differently.

 

[JScott]

We had him asshat...Reinforcement requests were denied and our guys were told to stand down.

At least TRY to know what you are flapping your pie hole about!

Why you getting your panties in a knot for? What am I missing?

The 50,000, sometimes 30,000 troops stationed in Afghanistan for 8 years that couldnt do their job? Whats there to miss?

Sorry sparky...I didn't know you were retarded. When we first invaded Afghanistan Ossama fled into the Torah Bora mountains. We had him surrounded on three sides. The CIA called in support to close the door and were denied support. They were told to let the locals handle Ossama's capture. You can google it. He immediately fled out of Afghanistan into Pakistan. Our troops there for the 8 plus years were not authorised to go into Pakistan. Now we are fighting Pashtoons that had nothing to do with Al Qaeda.

Our mission has been morphed into trying to nation build by murdering those that do not want us there. We support the world biggest supplier of opium.. and will kill anyone that feels differently.

You think Im retarded? Im hurt, truly I am. No need to discuss this further with you because its pointless.

 

[HUGGY]

Giving up at Tora Bora
by Susan B. Glasser


Trapped in al-Qaeda's Tora Bora cave network two months after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Osama bin Laden seemed prepared to die. Instead, he was allowed to escape: The United States never fielded a serious ground effort to stop him, instead pointlessly trying to bomb him from the sky and handing out cash to Afghan warlords who had no intention of capturing him.

The disaster flowed from one bad idea: that the United States could win in Afghanistan without a "big footprint," using locals who wouldn't trigger the renowned Afghan hostility to foreign invaders. Not to mention that deploying a small contingent of special forces armed with cash would prove Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's ideological point about the need to transform the U.S. armed services from a lumbering Cold War conventional force into a leaner, meaner, high-tech military capable of lightning strikes.

Rumsfeld may have been right about the need for transformation. But Tora Bora was a case study not in innovation but in the arrogance of a superpower that made bad decisions in the face of overwhelming evidence that they wouldn't work.

Seen from the ground, and despite the assurances of Pentagon spokesmen in Washington that bin Laden was cornered, the evidence slammed us in the face: rows of massive peaks in the White Mountains connecting Afghanistan and Pakistan. With no American troops to cover those mountains and only handfuls of Afghan militiamen rattling up the Tora Bora road, nearly barefoot in the snow and clinging to pickup trucks and worn Kalashnikovs, it was inconceivable that bin Laden was surrounded. The 100 or so international journalists gathered there (outnumbering the U.S. forces) saw little more than sporadic gunfire, surreal warlord news conferences (We've killed Zawahiri! Al-Qaeda is surrendering!), a few rusted tanks from the Soviet war and the spectacle of B-52 bombing runs.

After the battle, I returned there to find out what had really happened. Local Afghans told me in early 2002 the same thing that a Senate Foreign Relations Committee investigation has recently concluded: Corrupt warlords allowed bin Laden to escape while the special forces pleaded with the Pentagon to let them get in the fight. It was probably around the night of Dec. 13, 2001, that a tall man known as the sheik gathered his men, drank tea and then fled toward Pakistan.

For years, the failure at Tora Bora would spark Washington bickering; the accusation that Rumsfeld & Co. "outsourced" the war was a centerpiece of Sen. John Kerry's 2004 presidential bid. But it was much more than a botched military operation. Given the lives since lost and the effort since expended in the hunt for bin Laden and the war against al-Qaeda, we are still suffering the consequences of the decision not to fight at Tora Bora.

Susan B. Glasser, executive editor of Foreign Policy magazine, covered the battle of Tora Bora for The Washington Post.

 

[Barb]

"if you support pres obama..."
Well, if you will allow me to infract your rule, as I do not support the President, I would like to offer a suggestion as to why many support[ed] him.

Skin color.

The desire to feel good about themselves, and cast off what is seen as the racist aspect of American history.

Richard Brookhiser has an excellent essay some years back that explored this aspect of elements of the electorate.

Brookhiser wrote an essay characterizing the left’s depiction, as follows:
“Who is the Numinous Negro? He is everywhere, especially in our hearts, and if we are lucky he is our friend. The Numinous Negro is a presiding divinity. The place he presides over is America, and contact with him elevates us spiritually. You see him in the gooey prose of white liberals whenever a Negro appears….The saintly Death Row hero of The Green Mile was so Numinous that even movie reviewers noticed the technique…
liberalism is a secular faith concerned to remedy what political scientist Kenneth Minogue called “suffering situations.”
The Numinous Negro - Flashback - National Review Online

Seriously PC, Skin Color was the reason Obama was elected?

Did you miss out on the last ten years? The 2006 congressional election was a referendum on the idiocy of the Iraq War. Republicans at all levels were voted out of office and Donald Rumsfeld paid with his job.

The 2008 election was about the economy. Since 2007, the economy had been in a freefall and the Republicans denied it right up to the election. Remember "The economy is fundamentally strong" from McCain? If skin color were the only reason for Obamas election, why were Republican Congressmen, Senators and Governors also voted out of office? Were they the wrong skin color too?

I think you have quite a valid case had I said "Skin Color was the reason Obama was elected..." as you have posited it.

And, again, your words: "If skin color were the only reason for Obamas election,..."

I like the technique...if you can get away with it.

But that is not quite what I said.

This from my post: "...why many support[ed] him."

I would love to debate the aspect of the Democrat playbook known as 'identity politics,' and then try to give some percentage of the vote that the President garnered due to skin color...but for this thread, I'll stick to 'many' being the operative term.

Of course the soaring oratorial ability must be a large part of the equation, and the economy. But I'll stick with my premise.

Were you able to read the Brookhiser essay?
Are you ready to make the argument that skin color was not a factor to any degree? I thought not.


If you would like to base your thinking on "Did you miss out on the last ten years?" then you are forced to answer this query:
Why was McCain ahead in September, prior to the financial meltdown?

If McMunster was ahead before the meltdown, wouldn't it make more sense that Obama won predominantly because of the economy, and the lack of any acknowledgment from the Republican party that things were going as bad as most regular people saw them to be (and anyone who paid attention in HS history class saw clear indicators it was)? McCain made a fool of himself, and Obama was cool and collected. McCain said our economic indicators were strong, then decided it was such a crisis he would suspend his campaign to deal with it. The he decided he wouldn't. Face it, McCain practically handed this over. It was like the Republicans didn't want to deal with the mess coming, and handed it off to the Democrats to be blamed for.

 

[Barb]

Bush was warned? About what? How many times can we go over the same ground?

Seriously? The Congressional record of the hearings means nothing to you? It is all public record, and freely available on the net for you to see for yourself.

 

[boedicca]

Then please link to the findings which show he was warned.

 

[Barb]

Then please link to the findings which show he was warned.

I'm sorry if I've got you confused with someone else, but aren't you the one who tells people to do their own research when asked the same?

http://http://wn.com/condoleezza?orderby=relevance If it doesn't go to the specific vid, scroll down the list to Condi Gets Served. The Title of the CIA security briefing memo of August ...the rest of the vids are telling as well, mostly her own words.

 

[HUGGY]

There are literally hundreds of references..here is one.. New York Times
Google Bush warned

BUSH WAS WARNED BIN LADEN WANTED TO HIJACK PLANES
By DAVID E. SANGER
Published: May 16, 2002
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WASHINGTON, May 15— The White House said tonight that President Bush had been warned by American intelligence agencies in early August that Osama bin Laden was seeking to hijack aircraft but that the warnings did not contemplate the possibility that the hijackers would turn the planes into guided missiles for a terrorist attack.

''It is widely known that we had information that bin Laden wanted to attack the United States or United States interests abroad,'' Ari Fleischer, the president's press secretary, said this evening. ''The president was also provided information about bin Laden wanting to engage in hijacking in the traditional pre-9/11 sense, not for the use of suicide bombing, not for the use of an airplane as a missile.''

Nonetheless the revelation by the White House, made in response to a report about the intelligence warning this evening on CBS News, is bound to fuel Congressional demands for a deeper investigation into why American intelligence agencies and the Federal Bureau of Investigation had failed to put together individual pieces of evidence that, in retrospect, now seem to suggest what was coming.

In the past few days, government officials have acknowledged for the first time that an F.B.I. agent in Phoenix had urged the F.B.I. headquarters to investigate Middle Eastern men enrolled in American flight schools. That memorandum also cited Mr. bin Laden by name and suggested that his followers could use the schools to train for terror operations, officials who have seen the memorandum said.

Administration officials reached this evening said the warning given to Mr. Bush did not come from the F.B.I. or from the information developed by the Phoenix agent. Instead, it was provided as part of the C.I.A. briefing he is given each morning, suggesting that it was probably based on evidence gathered abroad.

The C.I.A. had been listening intently over the July 4 holiday last year, after what one investigator called ''a lot of static in the system suggesting something was coming.'' But then the evidence disappeared as quickly as it had arisen, and by August, officials have said, little was heard from Al Qaeda.

The warning of the hijacking was given to the president at his ranch in Crawford, Tex., where he was on vacation.

Taken together, the news of the C.I.A. warning and the information developed separately by the F.B.I. explains Mr. Bush's anger after Sept. 11 that intelligence gathered on American soil and abroad was not being centrally analyzed and that the agencies were not working well together.

Several times he has told audiences that he is working on solving that problem, and these days he is briefed jointly by the F.B.I and the C.I.A., ensuring that each hears information from the other agency.

It was not clear this evening why the White House waited eight months after the terrorist attacks in New York and Washington to reveal what Mr. Bush had been told.

But Mr. Fleischer noted that in the daily flow of intelligence information the president receives, the warning of what appeared to be the threat of a conventional hijacking was not as serious as it appears in retrospect. ''We were a peacetime society, and the F.B.I. had a different mission,'' he said.

Mr. Fleischer said the information given to the president in Texas had prompted the administration to put law enforcement agencies on alert. But there was no public announcement.

Nonetheless, a senior administration official said tonight that there was speculation within the government that heightened security -- if it truly existed in August and September -- might have prompted the hijackers to use box cutters and plastic knives to avoid detection.

The C.I.A. warning might also explain why Mr. Bush's aides were so certain that Mr. bin Laden was behind the attacks almost as soon as they happened. ''We never had any real doubt,'' one senior official involved in the crucial decisions at the White House on Sept. 11 said several months ago.

Until recently, Mr. Bush has deflected demands for a lengthy and detailed investigation into the intelligence failures surrounding the Sept. 11 attacks. White House officials were concerned that the investigation would feed into demands by Senator Richard C. Shelby, the Alabama Republican who is the vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, for the replacement of George J. Tenet as director of central intelligence.

But the news that the hijacking warning was in the president's brief, which Mr. Tenet sees and approves, and that it was linked to Mr. bin Laden is almost certain to widen the scope of the investigation.

Already, several lawmakers who have read the Phoenix memorandum written by the F.B.I. agent have described it as the most significant document to emerge in Congressional inquiries into whether the government might have been warned about possible hijackings.

Now those investigators are almost certain to demand the details of the president's August briefing by the C.I.A. and may ask to hear about how that evidence was developed

 

[Avatar4321]

How about he hasn't started two wars that he couldn't pay for? Now, add all the lives and billions of dollars that has cost the US and I think History will remember him for NOT being an idiot.

No you're right. Obama didn't start two wars he couldn't pay for.

He has only continued two wars he said he couldn't pay for

Added a so called "Health care" program that we can't pay for and that no one wanted.

Spent Trillions of dollars bailing out failing organizations and sending money to special interests that supported his campaign.

Not really sure how that makes him better.

 

[CrusaderFrank]

Bush was warned? About what? How many times can we go over the same ground?

Seriously? The Congressional record of the hearings means nothing to you? It is all public record, and freely available on the net for you to see for yourself.

What was Bush warned about? The Aug PDB?

 

[CrusaderFrank]

The question no Liberal has answered in 9 years:

At what point on 9/11 do you authorize the USAF to shoot down fully loaded, but off course US Commercial Airliners?

 

[HUGGY]

Bush was warned? About what? How many times can we go over the same ground?

Seriously? The Congressional record of the hearings means nothing to you? It is all public record, and freely available on the net for you to see for yourself.

What was Bush warned about? The Aug PDB?

Nothin Frankie...we was just jokin around... A real smart bubble gum wrapper educated guy like you should have figured that out.

 

[CrusaderFrank]

Seriously? The Congressional record of the hearings means nothing to you? It is all public record, and freely available on the net for you to see for yourself.

What was Bush warned about? The Aug PDB?

Nothin Frankie...we was just jokin around... A real smart bubble gum wrapper educated guy like you should have figured that out.

Did you know that during the transition, Clinton had "Al Qaeda: Roll Back" on about slide 16 of their threat assessment to the incoming administration?

Why do you think Bush "asked" that the Clinton traveling circus stay on at CIA and Intelligence at the time?

 

[HUGGY]

What was Bush warned about? The Aug PDB?

Nothin Frankie...we was just jokin around... A real smart bubble gum wrapper educated guy like you should have figured that out.

Did you know that during the transition, Clinton had "Al Qaeda: Roll Back" on about slide 16 of their threat assessment to the incoming administration?

Why do you think Bush "asked" that the Clinton traveling circus stay on at CIA and Intelligence at the time?

Super smart Frankie!...Talkin in "code". That way "the enemy" won't get it!

"Slide 16"... You are the man! Mums the word...loose lips sink ships... A nod is the same as a wink to a blind horse...

 

[elvis]

i thought bush was a terrible pres for the most part, although i did vote for him in 2000 because he wasn't al gore. i voted lib in 2004 and in 2008 i didn't vote for POTUS at all.

if you support pres obama,please tell me why you feel he's a better pres than bush was. from where i sit, it's more business as usual, and if anything, it's more cynical than usual, too.

Obama killed a fly.

 

[The Rabbi]

Another example of reality going against a slogan is with DADT. He assertively campaigned for repealing it, but has not been as active in pursing that repeal as he had led me to believe. I feel like a violated sheep on this.

He's been pretty active on it, but you're right, it wasn't at the front of the agenda.

He basically has the same draw-down policy in Iraq that Bush did, and I think Bush, like Obama, would've increased troop levels in Afghanistan were he still president. So on those two fronts I don't see much of a difference. Kept Gates, too.

Except that Bush's policy of his last year or so was a full-fledged surrender to the position of Congressional Democrats. Saying "Obama is following the Bush strategy in Iraq" misses that key point.

no, bush's policy of the last year was following the policy promulgated by robert gates (thank god bush finally got a real secdef). i give obama credit for keeping both gates and that policy.

Poor dear. Does it hurt in there?

 

[xsited1]

i thought bush was a terrible pres for the most part, although i did vote for him in 2000 because he wasn't al gore. i voted lib in 2004 and in 2008 i didn't vote for POTUS at all.

if you support pres obama,please tell me why you feel he's a better pres than bush was. from where i sit, it's more business as usual, and if anything, it's more cynical than usual, too.

Obama killed a fly.

It is most definitely his greatest accomplishment to date:

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6sV3_LUBGTU&NR=1]YouTube - Obama Kills Fly: Ninja REMIX![/ame]

 

[Rozman]

I say skin color,also he was given very favorable treatment by the liberal media who control the airwaves
with only FOX to offer a different viewpoint.MSNBC totally cast Clinton in a bad light while offering Obama tremendous support.Watching MSNBC there was no doubt who they were pushing for President.I will go to my grave telling anyone who will listen that the majority of people who voted for him did so because of his skin color.If asked about why they voted as they did the answer would have been they wanted "change".If pressed further they would not have been able to answer beyond that.

 

[The Rabbi]

A white obama was basically John Edwards. And we see how well he did.
Obama has benefitted greatly from not being Bush. He was elected because he wasn't Bush. He won a Nobel Peace Prize because he wasn't Bush (along with Jimmy Carter and Al Gore). So not being Bush has been his strong point.

 

[del]

He's been pretty active on it, but you're right, it wasn't at the front of the agenda.



Except that Bush's policy of his last year or so was a full-fledged surrender to the position of Congressional Democrats. Saying "Obama is following the Bush strategy in Iraq" misses that key point.

no, bush's policy of the last year was following the policy promulgated by robert gates (thank god bush finally got a real secdef). i give obama credit for keeping both gates and that policy.

Poor dear. Does it hurt in there?

wtf are you talking about?