Obama now faces the terror test

[CHIMO]

With U.S. President George Bush, it was all "axis of evil," all the time.

With Barack Obama, it's about uniting Americans around "a hymn that will heal this nation, repair this world and make this time different than all the rest." It's about having "the imagination to see the unseen," and becoming "the ones we've been waiting for."

This soaring if oddly prophetic rhetoric plays well with voters hungry for hope. But is there more substance to Obama's healing hymn than there was to Bush's malign axis? We don't yet know.

No test in politics is sterner than the 9/11 test, which Obama now faces as frontrunner in the Democratic race. If he has a coherent plan to better manage the terror file, he may want to roll it out soon.

http://www.thestar.com/comment/article/304087

And meanwhile in Canada we are miles behind any debate.

Onward armchair generals, marching as to war

Defending the Liberal party's latest position on Afghanistan, Stéphane Dion insisted he did not want to play armchair general, or tie the hands of field commanders. "We will not micromanage the military," he told reporters. "It is for them to determine how to implement this new mission."

It's good that he cleared that up. A casual observer, parsing the Liberal leader's many public meditations on the precise differences between "providing security" and "proactive" engagement with the enemy, or between "hot pursuit" and "search and destroy," might be deceived into thinking that was exactly what they intended.

At that, anyone who wades through the Liberals' 1,400-word "amendment" to the Conservative motion to extend the Afghanistan mission to 2011 — itself a 550-word, eight-whereases beast of a thing — might be forgiven for wondering just what this "new" mission was, or how it differed from the old. That, of course, is the point. In all the blizzard of verbiage, it is hoped the public will be left with the impression that there is some substance left in the Liberal position, or that it differs in any serious way with that of the Conservatives.

But it won't wash. Much as the party might wish to congratulate itself on its statesmanship in forging a compromise position, what we are witnessing is a fairly abject climbdown. Where once Mr. Dion demanded the government serve notice that Canadian troops would be pulled out of Kandahar, or at least out of combat, by February 2009, it is now clear they will stay in both until at least February 2011. And then? The Liberals still cling to the position that the troops must begin to be withdrawn then. For their part, the Conservatives are willing to acknowledge it is their "intention" that the mission should conclude by that date. But, as House leader Peter Van Loan blithely notes, the current Parliament cannot bind its successors.

http://www.macleans.ca/article.jsp?content=20080213_118845_118845&page=1

Well, except certain parties have staked out their philosophy. Even though it drew the wrath of the indoctrinated and the media.

[daleo]

1. I wonder what Obama's ultimate Afghanistan policy will be

Should he become president?

That will have more effect on the Canadian presence there than anything our parties might say or do, I should think. If the U.S. president decides it isn't worth the expense, then we would be bound to withdraw, regardless of the pros and cons of the mission.

[Iceburg]

2. He seems to have his sights set on Pakistan. A 3rd front --why not?

[daleo]

3. Yeah, he has made some noises like that

It seems hard to believe the "anti-war" candidate would commit that folly, but who knows? He may be a trojan horse for the neo-cons, for all I know.