In January 2007, when General David Petraeus took command in Iraq, he called the situation “hard” but not “hopeless.” Today, 18 months later, violence has fallen by up to 80% to the lowest levels in four years, and Sunni and Shiite terrorists are reeling from a string of defeats. The situation now is full of hope, but considerable hard work remains to consolidate our fragile gains.
Progress has been due primarily to an increase in the number of troops and a change in their strategy. I was an early advocate of the surge at a time when it had few supporters in Washington. Senator Barack Obama was an equally vocal opponent. “I am not persuaded that 20,000 additional troops in Iraq is going to solve the sectarian violence there,” he said on January 10, 2007. “In fact, I think it will do the reverse.”
Now Senator Obama has been forced to acknowledge that “our troops have performed brilliantly in lowering the level of violence.” But he still denies that any political progress has resulted.
Read More of Full Text of McCain OpEd Rejected by The New York Times off-site...John Powers says:
Comments like the above are exactly the reason to publish Sen McCain's op-ed, rather than allow mind boggling assaults, like the one posted by commenter "MsSwin" to go unchallenged.
JBP
MsSwin says:
Gaffes Happen has become the official teeshirt of the McCain campaign and they may come to regret 'whining' for more news coverage.
Politicians put their foot in their mouth on a regular basis. Sometimes it may be the result of long hours on the campaign trail, sometimes because they simply can't keep their facts straight and sometimes because they can't keep their lies straight. Sometimes it's simply because they do not understand the facts.
Couric/McCain Interview:
http://www.cbsnews.com/sections/i_vid...
Per President Bush and Col. MacFarland, the Anbar awakening was already well under way through organized efforts by the tribal leaders well before the surge began. These events took place months before the surge was even announced. Per McCain, the surge 'began' the Anbar awakening.
http://www.defenselink.mil/transcript...
The Couric interview gets even more interesting as McCain tries to distance himself from the numerous failed Iraq policies under the Bush administration:
Why would McCain support a president responsible for four years of failure?
“no one has supported President Bush on Iraq more than I have.” [John McCain, 03/28/08)
“I am proud of this president’s strategy in Iraq.” [John McCain, upon receiving endorsement from President Bush, 02/13/08]
Gaffes and old quotes are a living history of our thought processes, how well we think, what we think and when we think it. Even Carly can't change that fact:
“To say that John McCain was aligned with President Bush on the prosecution of the war in Iraq is to change history.” [Carly Fiorina, McCain Campaign Advisor, 07/13/08]
The McCain campaign should be thankful the media has let them slide on many major issues, such as his voting record on veteran health issues and successful effort to shut down all investigation into remaining POW/MIA over the protests of their families and veteran groups in order to open up trade with Vietnam (his father-in-law immediately opened up a multi-billion dollar beer industry there).
http://www.aiipowmia.com/sea/schanber...
McCain has been given no media coverage on the very real probability he suffers from PTSD.
“Among U.S. servicemen taken captive during the Korean War, as many as nine out of 10 survivors may suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and other mental disorders more than 35 years after their release, psychologist Patricia B. Sutker of the New Orleans Veterans Administration Medical Center and her colleagues report in the January AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PSYCHIATRY.”
Perhaps McCain should quit whining about media coverage and not look a gift horse in the mouth.