Prog Blogs, Orgs & Alumni
Bank Slate
Betsy Devine
birch, finch, beech
Democracy for NH
Live Free or Die
Mike Caulfield
Miscellany Blue
Granite State Progress
Seacoast for Change
Still No Going Back
Susan the Bruce
Tomorrow's Progressives
Politicos & Punditry
The Burt Cohen Show
John Gregg
Krauss
Landrigan
Lawson
Pindell
Primary Monitor
Primary Wire
Scala
Schoenberg
Spiliotes
Welch
Campaigns, Et Alia.
Paul Hodes
Carol Shea-Porter
Ann McLane Kuster
John Lynch
Jennifer Daler
ActBlue Hampshire
NHDP
DCCC
DSCC
DNC
National
Balloon Juice
billmon
Congress Matters
DailyKos
Digby
Hold Fast
Eschaton
FiveThirtyEight
MyDD
The Next Hurrah
Open Left
Senate Guru
Swing State Project
Talking Points Memo
50 State Blog Network
Alabama
Arizona
California
Colorado
Connecticut
Delaware
Florida
Georgia
Idaho
Illinois
Indiana
Iowa
Kentucky
Louisiana
Maine
Maryland
Massachusetts
Michigan
Minnesota
Missouri
Missouri
Montana
Nebraska
Nevada New Hampshire
New Jersey
New Mexico
New York
New York
North Carolina
North Dakota
Ohio
Ohio
Oklahoma
Oregon
Pennsylvania
Rhode Island
South Dakota
Tennessee
Texas
Texas
Utah
Vermont
Virginia
Washington
West Virginia
Wisconsin
Perhaps to deflect attention off the friendly fire Frank Guinta's campaign received yesterday, the NHGOP got the "flip-flop" vapors today over this:
"I have not been in agreement with this. I used to be until I went to Afghanistan myself and certainly have talked to many people who are involved in Afghanistan. At this point I have been holding my comments. I am deeply concerned about where this country is right now and our own deficits and our own problems and the fact is we still don't have these countries stepping up like I think they should," [Shea-Porter] said.
More succinctly she said later in the interview that on she wouldn't support Obama's proposed plan: ""For this build up my inclination is no, but I am going to listen very carefully."
Note how Carol goes out of her way in her remarks to point you to the fact that her view on Afghanistan was shaped as a result of her trip there seven months ago:
Afghanistan simply needs more help than the United States alone can provide and the country is engulfed in chaos with no obvious end, Congresswoman Carol Shea-Porter said after a recent trip to the war-torn nation.
"It's been seven years now, and really to fix Afghanistan would require an effort that I don't see happening," Shea-Porter said by phone from Washington.
The United States has by far the most troops and money invested there, Shea-Porter said, and fixing Afghanistan would require huge amounts of money and manpower from Europe as well, a political prospect that seems unlikely at best.
I don't know why the NHGOP doesn't read the Union Leader, but there it is - Carol's view on Afghanistan, consistent with today's interview, from as far back as last May.
Nearly eight years after the start of the U.S. campaign there, things are so bad, she said, that "Afghanistan makes Iraq look extremely sophisticated."
...She said she's worried for the men and women of the military, who she was "so impressed by."
"I don't want this to be another Vietnam," she said.
...or the Portsmouth Herald:
"We have succeeded in eliminating al-Qaida from Afghanistan, but the Taliban are terrorizing the people while providing some social order in areas where the central government has no legitimacy," she said. "We need to have an honest conversation to tell the American people what needs to be done and how we are going to do it. I was told it's going to take 12 to 14 years to stabilize the country and it can't just be a military solution."
..."We don't want to have another Vietnam, where we do enough to keep it going but not do enough to win," she said. "I remember the Bush administration saying, 'We do what we must in Iraq and what we can in Afghanistan.' We are paying the price for that neglect."
