The lens he is looking through.
"Keating’s overseas trip highlights challenges; Iraq, Afghanistan at key junctures" by Theo Emery, Globe Staff / June 12, 2011
WASHINGTON — From within the US embassy walls in Baghdad, he could hear the explosion.
Message: We gotta stay.
Cui bono?
Ever notice anytime these guys show up on a supposed secret and secure mission they are greeted with explosions of one sort or another?
US Representative William R. Keating, Democrat of Quincy, and other members of Congress were meeting with military and State Department officials Monday when a roadside bomb, reportedly laid to ambush a passing convoy, was detonated. Although no one died in that blast, the delegation had just been told of an earlier rocket attack that killed five US service members, the most devastating attack against American forces in Iraq in two years.
For the freshman congressman, the attacks early in his first trip to the restive Middle East and near Asia served as a sobering reminder of the cost of US involvement there. They also highlighted the difficult questions American leaders face in the coming months as they seek to complete a drawdown of forces in Iraq and begin one in Afghanistan....
What lie. We are begging to stay in both places, and looking for (and creating even) reasons to stay.
Keating’s delegation visited Pakistan just days after paramilitary troopers shot a teenage boy.
The killing was broadcast on TV stations around the country, deepening tensions between the public and powerful security forces....
“What we don’t want to have happen . . . is military success followed by civilian defeat, where we just leave and then the Taliban come right back in and set up shop,’’ Keating said.
Well, they DO LIVE THERE!
And have you noticed how Taliban has replaced "Al-CIA-Duh" in all this?
“Then our national security back at home, the regional security, is all at stake again,’’ he said.
He's a Democrat, right??
Where are we, America, if the alleged "good" party won't stand up for the truth?
The Senate Foreign Relations Committee, which Kerry chairs, released a report last week critical of the economic aid and stabilization strategy in Afghanistan, saying that nation-building efforts may not last after US troops are gone and could have damaging consequences.
The president has asked for $3.2 billion in aid for Afghanistan next year.
What's that debt ceiling you are bumping up against, America? I'm sure the Afghans would be happy without the dough if we just left them alone.
Iraq and Afghanistan show the limits of a “one-size-fits-all’’ foreign aid strategy, Keating said. Iraq has an educated population and relatively developed infrastructure, he said, whereas Afghanistan’s high illiteracy and deep poverty, coupled with decades of war that preceded the US invasion, make nation-building there particularly difficult.
Iraq had that before placed them under sanction and then smashed the place with invasion and occupation without rebuilding it. Unreal.
But Keating was heartened, he said, by his conversations with Afghans, such as one with a police recruit who told him that he sought only a stable and peaceful country where his children could thrive and learn.
“In Afghanistan, there are those people that I met that are doing it for themselves, for their own families, for their own communities,’’ he said. “Ultimately — that’s how success will be measured.’’
Then they REALLY CAN'T BE "terrorists," can they?
And remember I told you it is 90% of the people that live there!
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