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March 11, 2010
Glenn Garvin: Conspiracy theories, why people believe them and how they spread
JWisdom.com For Yourself, Not By Yourself with Rabbi Lawrence Hajioff (8 minutes)
The Kosher Gourmet by Linda Gassenheimer : Turn leftovers into tasty New England hash
Paul Richter: Biden promises 'viable Palestine' is in the offing
March 10, 2010
Paul Greenberg: Death Checks In
JWisdom.com How To Get A (Real) Life with Rabbi Warren Goldstein ( EXTENDED EPISODE)
Paul Richter: Israel exerts soverign right to its capital as Biden looks on astounded
Richard A. Serrano: 'Jihad Jane' indictment alleges threat from within U.S.
March 9, 2010
Wesley Pruden: Joe's Israeli adventure
JWisdom.com Free To Be (Responsibly) You and Me! with Rabbi Naftali Brawer ( 8 MINUTES)
David G. Savage: Supreme Court to rule on free speech in case of soldier's funeral
March 8, 2010
The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Make a fuss about those who cuss?
JWisdom.com Finding or Losing Yourself? Here's How! with Rabbi David Aaron ( 5 MINUTES)
Steven Emerson: America must learn from the UK about the future of Islamist subversion
March 5, 2010
Rabbi Berel Wein: Golden Calf still with us --- except it has multiplied
JWisdom.com The Limits of Eternity with Rabbi Sroy Levitansky ( 4 MINUTES)
Caroline B. Glick: Biden's lost cause
March 4, 2010
Alan M. Dershowitz: How About A Real Campaign Against Abuses?
JWisdom.com Using Things, Loving People with Rabbi Lawrence Hajioff ( 7 MINUTES)
Jordan "Gorf" Gorfinkel's Everything's Relative
March 3, 2010
JWisdom.com Grasping The Name of Your Life Game with Rabbi Warren Goldstein ( 8 MINUTES)
The Kosher Gourmet by Marialisa Calta : A cowboy's recipes for really good grub
March 2, 2010
Rabbi Avi Shafran: Someone's there
Diane Toroian Keaggy : Have we misunderstood Michelangelo?
March 1, 2010
JWisdom.com Whole in One with Rabbi David Aaron ( 5 MINUTES)
Michael Muskal: Hillary meets with Israeli official, discusses gefilte fish dispute
Feb. 26, 2010
Rabbi Francis Nataf: The Megilla of Spring
JWisdom.com A Biblical Secret for a More Powerful You with Rabbi Sroy Levitansky ( 5 MINUTES)
Caroline B. Glick: When rhetoric rules the roost
Feb. 25, 2010
The Jewish Ethicist By Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: When walking away from your mortgage is both economically sound and makes ethical sense
JWisdom.com The Second Most Important Question in Your Life with Rabbi Yehoshua Karsh ( 5 MINUTES)
Seema Mehta : U.S.-Israel relations raised in California's Senate race --- by conservatives
Feb. 24, 2010
Rabbi Avi Shafran: The gift of the ‘prayer bomber’
Steven Emerson: Why Religious Freedom Commission is under attack
Feb. 23, 2010
Dennis Prager: Government, Yes! The Divine and Parents, No!
JWisdom.com The Last Laugh of Enlightenment with Rabbi Yaakov Asher Sinclair ( 5 MINUTES)
Anne Applebaum: Prepare for war with Iran --- in case Israel strikes
Feb. 22, 2010
Rabbi Yonason Goldson: Is it not refreshing Tiger Woods' career has crashed and burned so dramatically?
JWisdom.com Esther and the third Truth with Rabbi David Aaron ( 9 MINUTES)
Kelly Brewington: Going smoke-free may raise diabetes risk
Feb. 19, 2010
Rabbi David Aaron: Is the Divine beyond us or within us?
JWisdom.com Olympic Faith with Rabbi Sroy Levitansky ( 5 MINUTES)
Caroline B. Glick: Israel and the West are perpetrators of a myth that endangers the Jewish State
Feb. 18, 2010
Cal Thomas: Who is Rashad Hussain?
JWisdom.com A Wedding Disaster to Remember with Rabbi Y.Y. Rubinstein ( 3 MINUTES)
Feb. 17, 2010
JWisdom.com Think your life is messed up? with Rabbi David Aaron ( 11 MINUTES)
Greg Logan: 'Greatest Jewish sporting event of all time since David versus Goliath' may be postponed because of bar mitzvah
Feb. 16, 2010
Anya Martin : Boy's 'cerebral palsy' fixed with diet
JWisdom.com Feet On The Street Spirituality with Gavriel Aryeh Sanders ( 8 MINUTES)
Marty Peretz: Let Europe Mind Its Own Business. It Brings Nothing To The Table Save For Mischief
Feb. 15, 2010
Herb Geduld: Lincoln and the Jews
JWisdom.com Are Our Children Really Ours? with Rabbi Mordechai Becher ( 5 MINUTES)
Susan King: 'Wolf Man' reflected writer's wartime Jewish experience

Jewish World Review March 4, 2009 / 8 Adar 5769

Then and now

By Jack Kelly

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http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | Barack Obama probably wouldn't be president if he hadn't taken a strong stand against the war in Iraq. He was an underdog to Sen. Hillary Clinton when the Democratic primaries began, and needed an issue to distinguish himself from her. He chose her vote to authorize the war. The strategy worked. Mr. Obama gained the support of the antiwar Left, which was crucial in the early primaries.


After he wrapped up the nomination, Mr. Obama talked less about Iraq, partly because the extreme position he had taken wasn't as appealing to a general election electorate, partly because by the summer of 2008 it was clear the troop surge was working.


But even during the Democratic primaries Mr. Obama talked about another war, the war in Afghanistan. That was the important war, he said. He'd beef up the U.S. presence there.


Strategically, Mr. Obama's emphasis on Afghanistan was nutty. Iraq, a populous, oil rich country in the heart of the Arab world, is strategically critical. Afghanistan is a backward bywater.


But politically, it made a great deal of sense. The moonbats, thrilled by his opposition to the war in Iraq, overlooked Mr. Obama's hawkish rhetoric about Afghanistan. And no Republican could accuse him of being weak on national security. He wasn't against fighting America's enemies; he just wanted to fight them in the right place.


But a national security policy designed chiefly for its effects on domestic politics has its drawbacks. President Obama says little about Iraq these days, since he's essentially following George W. Bush's strategy there. And Afghanistan — where he has announced he will boost U.S. troop strength by 17,000 — has become "his" war.


That war isn't going well. "Nearly every indicator in Afghanistan is heading in the wrong direction," Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz) said in a speech Feb 25. "The number of insurgent attacks was higher every single week in 2008 than during the same week in 2007."


With the war in Iraq all but over, the antiwar Left is developing a predictable queasiness about Afghanistan. "We've seen a hopeful presidency, Lyndon Johnson's presidency, burn up in the furnace of war," President Obama's onetime pal, former domestic terrorist Bill Ayers, said in an interview Feb. 23. "I fear that this brilliant young man, could easily burn their prospect of a great presidency in the war in Afghanistan."


President Obama has ordered an interagency review of U.S. policy in Afghanistan, to be completed before the NATO summit meeting in April. Such a review is long overdue.


"It's our own failed policies that are the problem," Sen. McCain said. "We have tried to win this war without enough troops, without sufficient economic aid, without effective coordination, and without a clear strategy."


There is no doubt egregious unforced errors have greatly complicated the situation in Afghanistan. Lewis Irwin, a professor at Duquesne university and a colonel in the Army Reserve who spent six months in 2007-2008 as an advisor to the Afghan national police, described in an off the record discussion with the editorial board of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette mind-blowing examples of insularity and lack of coordination between the U.S. military and civilian agencies, and between the U.S. and other NATO governments. But the fundamental strategic situation is this: we cannot lose in Afghanistan as long as we maintain a major military presence there. But we cannot win as long as the Taliban has a safe haven in Pakistan.


Afghanistan has become the principal front in the war on terror, and that's curious, because we are fighting there the Taliban, not al Qaida. The Taliban are evil mean nasty rotten guys, but they want to control Afghanistan, not blow up shopping malls in Miami.


We can't just walk away from Afghanistan, as the antiwar Left would like to do. But we need a clear-headed understanding of what our strategic goals are there, what it is likely to cost to achieve them, and whether the American people are willing to bear that cost.

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JWR contributor Jack Kelly, a former Marine and Green Beret, was a deputy assistant secretary of the Air Force in the Reagan administration. Comment by clicking here.

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