When Did Keith Olbermann Lose His Mind? It is infuriating when an intelligent Liberal makes a fool of himself, and takes stances that are not just inexcusably stupid but also completely at odds with Liberal values. Keith Olbermann, one of the most outspoken and important voices for Liberalism in the United States, disgraced himself last nite in arguing that President Obama should decline General Stanley McChrystal's resignation and keep him on — so we could, somehow, recognize the folly of remaining in the "morass" that Afghanistan has become, declare victory, and pull out. McChrystal wants to STAY in Afghanistan, and INCREASE troop levels to enable us to do the very "nation-building" that Olbermann opposes. So why would Olbermann want to keep in Afghanistan a general who stands for the exact opposite of what he claims to want? That's just insane.
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Moreover, Olbermann criticized the Bush Administration for firing generals who opposed the Administration's POLICIES, and compared that to Obama's temptation to fire McChrystal for MOCKING the President, Vice President, and two U.S. Ambassadors PERSONALLY, even while agreeing with the President's policy of destroying the Taliban and with it a future refuge and training center for a revivified Al-Qaeda if the U.S. runs with its tail between its legs, DEFEATED by Islamist extremism. The comparison is absolutely false, and for Olbermann not to understand that the one thing (advice on policy) has nothing to do with the other (disrespect of civilian authority) is appalling.
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Does Olbermann think it would be a good thing for the United States and other nations of the West if the Taliban were to win in Afghanistan, then invite Al-Qaeda and other extremists to train on Afghan territory, with the active assistance of the triumphant Taliban, to attack U.S. and other Western interests all over the planet?
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Does Olbermann think it would be a good thing for the state of human rights on planet Earth to permit enemies of all modern conceptions of human rights to return to power in Afghanistan, close schools to girls, return Afghan women to abject slavery to male privilege, end freedom of the press, religion, speech, assembly, and every other human right, and start executing homosexual men again? What the hell is wrong with him?
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Let us review. The belief (albeit pooh-poohed by some people with an anti-U.S. ax to grind) is that Al-Qaeda became an effective transnational terrorist organization, capable of launching attacks upon U.S. interests in Africa, the Arabian peninsula, New York City, and Washington, DC, thru intensive training and indoctrination IN AFGHANISTAN, with the complicity if not actual financial and military assistance of the Taliban government then in power. This was when the Taliban had NOT yet made any effort to, itself, launch attacks upon the United States. Now, the Taliban regards the U.S. as the very devil himself, and is dedicated at least to destroying the United States as a world power, and possibly to killing Americans anywhere they can be found. Keith Olbermann is fine with that? Oh, sure, let the Taliban return to power. What harm could they possibly do? Idiocy.
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But that idiocy is synthetic, because Keith Olbermann is not an actual idiot but an intelligent man who has allowed some incomprehensible emotional impulse — what? pacifist? anti-militarist? what?! — to make him see U.S. interests and human rights worldwide as being best served by allowing the most regressive, anti-human-rights government in modern times to regain control of Afghanistan, a country in which a TRILLION DOLLARS in mineral wealth has recently been found. A triumphant Taliban would rule over not an impoverished country incapable of launching attacks at all far from its borders, but a mining powerhouse, whose income from exploitation of minerals would give Taliban operatives, or proxies, worldwide reach.
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A triumphant Taliban wouldn't even need immediate worldwide reach to be a horrendous threat to this planet. They need merely train and finance Islamists of like dogma to overthrow the government of adjoining Pakistan, and thus gain control of NUCLEAR WEAPONS.
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I cannot understand how any Liberal / "Progressive" could think for even one second of permitting the Taliban to return to oppress 30 million people, and recruit (from within and without), train, and dispatch thousands, even tens of thousands of mujahedeen to attack the United States and other Western countries, such as the NATO countries that sent soldiers to Afghanistan. Did he bump his head? Did a foul ball hit him on the noggin as he sat in a baseball park? I am at a loss to understand. I hope sanity returns to Mr. Olbermann soon, and he completely retracts his remarks of last nite and completely changes his stance on withdrawal from Afghanistan.
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Meanwhile, I can at least rest relieved that President Obama did not heed Olbermann's advice, but took the same stance as I did, yesterday: that McChrystal had to go.
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(The current U.S. military death toll in Iraq, according to the website "Iraq Coalition Casualties", is 4,408 — for Israel.)
- posted by L. Craig Schoonmaker @ 5:01 PM