Despite my misgivings about some of Candidate Obama's policy stances—Afghanistan in particular—I worked hard for him last year, being deployed as a Deputy Field Organizer by the campaign to New Hampshire. Sadly, of all the promises he made before the election, the one President Obama chooses to pursue the most vigorously is escalating the disastrous war in Afghanistan, just as President Johnson did when he inherited Vietnam.
Our increased troop presence is further inciting Taliban and al-Qaeda, which continues to destabilize not only Afghanistan, but nuclear-armed Pakistan as well. As has been noted before, hope is not a strategy, and our troops cannot defeat an ideology, which a RAND Corporation study definitively demonstrated last year. At a time of economic crisis and dire domestic needs, pursuing a losing war is an unthinkable waste of our money.
It's long past time to put pressure on the President to rethink the failed war that his predecessor launched. Thankfully, Representative Peter Welch not only voted against the recent Supplemental funding bill, he also is a co-sponsor of HR2404, which calls for an Afghanistan exit strategy. I urge all my fellow Vermonters to call or write the Congressman to thank him for his stand against escalation, and to contact Senators Leahy and Sanders on this issue as well.
We cannot afford to waste more blood and treasure in the land where empires go to die.
NTodd Pritsky
Fletcher, VT
PS--Wrote this as part of National Media Day of Action on Afghanistan; Monday Lobby Blogging is in a similar vein.
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