This doesn't mean that I think it is mandatory (or even wise) to support his programs. What I had in mind was President Clinton, who lacked a real moral or political compass and easily shifted policies when confronted with opposition. Republicans were reduced to complaining that he was stealing their ideas. We should all have problems like that. President Clinton won reelection easily.
But one thing should be beyond politics--the war. Much of the former loyal opposition was unable to support the troops by supporting the war. I remain grateful that the clear majority of those opposed to the Iraq War did indeed avoid descending into Leftist madness to condemn the troops--though the common idea of troops as child victims edged darn close in my opinion.
So when I hear hints that the current loyal opposition is calling the Afghanistan Campaign "Obama's war," I cringe. To be fair, for many of these people on the right, I suspect they only suppressed their anti-war views out of party loyalty when Bush was in office. Now ideology and party considerations make it easy to oppose the Afghan war.
But that is something that should be resisted. Afghanistan is America's war:
Republicans should resist the reflex that all opposition parties have, which is to oppose the stands of a president of the other party because he is a member of the other party. In this instance, President Obama has acted in a way that advances America's national security interests and its deepest values. Republicans should say so. As things become even more difficult in Central Asia, it's important to keep bad political patterns we have seen before from re-emerging.
Obama doesn't fail if America loses the Afghan war--America fails. And America benefits regardless of whether the president benefits--and more power to him if he benefits from winning that campaign. Especially given the opposition to the war already building in his own party:
Key Senate Democrats signaled Friday that any push by President Barack Obama to send more troops to Afghanistan is likely to hit resistance on Capitol Hill, deepening a growing political divide on the war even within his own party.
I'm certainly all on board in debating what we should set as our objective in Afghanistan. But as I've argued before, there should be no expiration date on supporting the war until victory. We owe it to our troops and we owe it to our nation. And we owe it to the Afghans who've bet their lives and futures on supporting us.
Good grief, people, be grateful that President Obama isn't retreating from our wars. Support the president to win our wars.
