Bush & co. knew we’d be doing it sooner or later but had the sense to refute it in public. Not a bad ploy, apparently as it seems to have given our enemies a false sense of confidence, leading them to concentrate in Pakistan and thus expose themselves to attack. We did similar ploys in Iraq where entire neighborhoods would seem ‘out of control’, sometime for months when suddenly we’d drop the hammer and nail a bunch. Seems like a good strategy against terrorism to me… but then again IAMAG (I am not a general)

I remember thinking the same thing. It is much easier to deal with the repercussions, after the fact,politically, than before.

The Obama campaign should be making a much bigger deal about this. ”

In the last election the biggest difference between Kerry and Bush was the Kerry was pushing the “surge” while the Busheviks were going on about how terrible he was for doing so.

Perhaps Obama’s campaign has noticed that “I’m a more crazed warmonger than the other guy” didn’t really work out all that well for Kerry, even if it turned out not to be true in the end.

It’s likely against international law, but then, so is harboring the Taliban/al Qaeda.

#10 Crack: Great point. The Republicans think all Obama’s ideas are stupid until they decide to appropriate them.

They probably would, if they weren’t so busy chasing after Palin. Evidently her personal life is more important than how the country is run.

McCain thought it was stupid because Obama said it and he didn’t think it would happen. McCain does not give thought to things beyond their political value to his ambitions.

Iconoclast: given the position we’re in, it’s a strong way of saying “You clean up this problem, or we’ll clean it up with or without your permission.” It puts it on everyone’s radar: Pakistan knows we’re not going to sit by and let their indifference harm us, AQ knows that they don’t have the safehaven they think they have, and the US knows that we’re not sitting around with our thumbs up our butts playing defense in Afghanistan. I think if you’re serious about following your words with action, it’s good. If you’re just saber-rattling (Bomb-bomb-Iran?), you get people’s hackles up without any reward for doing so (at least in the foreign policy arena. It’ll sure make the neo-cons happy).

But it’s irresponsible for a major-party candidate to SAY that out loud. It’s the kind of thing that you DO and don’t talk about. If somebody asks, you say “who, us?”

This is not to say that Senator McCain hasn’t been similarly irresponsible — it’s irresponsible to make up little ditties about bombing Iran, or to make open-ended security commitments to Georgia.

But Obama was wrong to signal his intent to take such action in advance.

I was more under the impression that the ridicule was based on its obvious flouting of international law. I think that may have been spectacularly naive of me. Your explanation is more likely the correct one.

I’m just happy McCain and Obama had the good sense not to show up in NYC this morning for the reading of the names ceremony at the World Trade Center Site.

Why is it such a good time now? If anything, the ridicule that Obama received for his stance was based on the presumption that cross-border activities would destabilize Pakistan. In July, they were going through a significant national crisis and the ruling party was even calling for the president to resign. Are we to believe Pakistan is somehow more stable now?

This issue will never get attention of course. It is difficult enough to simply call out McCain/Palin on same lie about the Bridge to Nowhere being systematically repeated, much less inform the public on complicated international affairs.

1. Withdraw from Iraq in 16 months. Bush on the verge of an official agreement with Iraq to withdraw all troops in that time frame.

2. Enter Pakistan as necessary, Bush now clearly doing that.

3. Hold talks with Iran. Bush has now had high level officials engage in direct talks with Iran.