McCain and the MSM still trying to spin his clueless and pathetic remarks on the surge

[ProSense]

Pot Meet Kettle

Posted by Michael Cohen

Today in the New York Times article on the back and forth between Obama and McCain on the surge there is this rather incomprehensible moment:

But several foreign policy analysts said that if Mr. McCain got the chronology wrong, his broader point — that the troop escalation was crucial for the Awakening movement to succeed and spread — was right. “I would say McCain is three-quarters right in this debate,” said Michael E. O’Hanlon, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution.

I'm trying to decide what's more shocking here that the New York Times couldn't find ANYONE other than Michael O'Hanlon to offer a comment or that Michael O'Hanlon thinks John McCain is right. Jeez, of course Michael O'Hanlon thinks John McCain is right! I can't imagine what McCain could say about Iraq that Michael O'Hanlon wouldn't agree with (hey Michael Cooper, O'Hanlon is running to be McCain's national security advisor).

But here's the best part:

Mr. O’Hanlon, of the Brookings Institution, said he did not understand why Mr. Obama seemed to want to debate the success of the surge. “Any human being is reluctant to admit a mistake,” he said, noting that it takes on added risk in a political campaign.

Mr O'Hanlon meet kettle. Kettle meet Michael O'Hanlon.

What is John McCain Talking About?

Posted by Ilan Goldenberg

Just to follow up on Shawn's point. Here is the video of John McCain somehow trying to retroactively argue that by "surge" he meant "counterinsurgency strategy" and that the counterinsurgency strategy and thus the surge actually went back to 2006.

(Video)

One problem. Just two months ago McCain came under attack for saying this:

"I can tell you that it is succeeding. I can look you in the eye and tell you it's succeeding. We have drawn down to pre-surge levels."

Of course, U.S. forces hadn't drawn down to "pre surge" levels. They are only now just getting back to 140,000, which is still above pre-surge levels. But that's besides the point. What was McCain referring in that moment? Was he saying "We are drawing back down to where we were before Colonel McFarland started using counterinsurgency tactics in Anbar as part of the Anbar Awakening." No, that is completely and patently absurd. He meant that we are coming back down to pre-January 2007 numbers when the "surge" actually began.

In fact, he added later:

"The surge, we have drawn down from the surge and we will complete that drawdown to the end -- at the end of July. That’s just a factual statement."

According to this statement John McCain is basically asserting that the surge is over. But based on his own definition today the "surge" actually equals the counterinsurgency strategy. So, is the counterinsurgency strategy over? I think that might be news to General Petraeus.

Basically this is one of the most pathetic attempts of political spin that I have seen in quite a while. Let's face it. When John McCain went on CBS he completely bungled the facts and demonstrated that he had no idea of how the surge and Anbar Awakening played out. His attempted explanation today by somehow claiming that by "surge" he actually meant the counterinsurgency strategy that was going on months before the troop increase, might make sense if he hadn't spent the past few months referring to the surge synonymously as the troop increase that began in early 2007.

Surge Protection (for McCain). Also, McCain needs to apologize to Obama

[Hepburn]

1. I tried to listen to and follow McShame's bullshit explanation on what the hell...

...a "surge" is or was by his definition of the term. Unbelievable. I felt like Alice going down the Rabbit Hole. Talk about altered reality! :wow:

[napi21]

2. I tried to understand what he was talking about too, but I gave up

after the 1st two minutes. He sounded like he was just stringing a bunch of words together that collectively made no sense! I figure he's been hangin with Shrub too long!

[ProSense]

3. It's rather surreal.

He's just making shit up as he goes along.

[godai]

4. Any debate on the past leads to McCain's Iraq vote.

He doesn't want to go there. Unfortunately, the MSM is willing to stop talking about the past beyond the surge.

I believe that the surge was a kind of trap to lure Democrats into voting no. There's no way such a small increase in troops had such big effects but bushco did other things which had nothing to do with the surge and now they like to lump everything into the surge. Clever politics.

[ProSense]

5. Not so clever. The people who are paying attention should hit them on this.

The surge didn't stop the violence, a time line isn't radical and comparing the U.S. to Iraq?

Note, a year ago Kerry asked if it would take another thousand U.S. troops killed. A year later, it has.