Eliot Cohen regrets that the we discuss matters best left to our betters

A precious and revealing comment reported by Spencer Ackerman at the Washington Independent, 23 September 2009  (assuming that Ackerman reports this correctly):

At a conference on leadership in counterinsurgency at the National Press Club sponsored by Marine Corps University, Eliot Cohen, the respected Johns Hopkins scholar who advised Condoleezza Rice at the tail end of the Bush administration, slowly and steadily built up a critique of the Obama administration on Afghanistan. Obama’s apparent reconsideration of counterinsurgency strategy for the war hangs over the conference, and Cohen brought it to the fore.

… Obliquely referencing the leaked McChrystal review as the “events of this week,” Cohen said bringing disputes about “strategy” into the public had “real impact” — deleterious impact — for events “on the ground,” since friends, enemies and undecideds “all watch CNN.” And now, Cohen intimated but did not say directly, they’d question Obama’s “commitment” to Afghanistan.

How awful, allowing the peasants to even discuss matters of war and peace!  The horror! What is America coming to?

Let’s show these bastards that we are citizens, not serfs.  Speak up!  Whatever your opinion of the war, make it known.  Write your congresscritters.  Wtite letters to the Editor, and post comments to the blogs you read.

More important, get active politically.  Contribute time and (to the extent you can) cash to the campaigns of politicians whose policies you support.  America is what we make of it.  If we are couch potatoes, then folks like Eliot Cohen are right. 

Let’s prove them wrong.

Afterword

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For more information from the FM site

To read other articles about these things, see the following:

• About Iraq & Sub-continent Wars – my articles
• About America – how can we reform it?

Reference pages about other topics appear on the right side menu bar, including About the FM website page.

Some posts about the war in Afghanistan:

1. “War without end”, a great article by George Wilson, 27 June 2009
2. The trinity of modern warfare at work in Afghanistan, 13 July 2009
3. You can end our war in Afghanistan, 20 August 2009
4. How many troops would it take to win in Afghanistan?, 15 September 2009

Some posts about solutions, ways to reform America:

1. Diagnosing the Eagle, Chapter III – reclaiming the Constitution, 3 January 2008
2. Obama might be the shaman that America needs, 17 July 2008
3. Obama describes the first step to America’s renewal, 8 August 2008
4. Let’s look at America in the mirror, the first step to reform, 14 August 2008  
5. Fixing America: shall we choose elections, revolt, or passivity?, 16 August 2008
6. Fixing American: taking responsibility is the first step, 17 August 2008
7. Fixing America: the choices are elections, revolt, or passivity, 18 August 2008
8. What happens next? Advice for the new President, part one., 17 October 2008
9. What to do? Advice for the new President, part two., 18 October 2008
10. How to stage effective protests in the 21st century, 21 April 2009
11. The first step on the road to America’s reform, 29 May 2009