Greets and saluts from the NYC metro area. President Obama says that he wont agree to large reductions of troops in Afghanistan, and that sounds like good news, until you realize that he leaves the door open to smaller reductions, and he clearly doesn’t have Democrats’ support for troop increases as House Democrats want to set an exit strategy and are opposed to troop increases.

Afghanistan is on the razor’s edge, and Democrats who have complained for years that the Bush Administration ignored Afghanistan by not sending more troops and support, are now pursuing a strategy that would further reduce support for operations in Afghanistan. Even as the situation has improved in Iraq; and US troops are taking advisory roles instead of leading roles in combat operations in Iraq, and troop numbers have been reduced, Democrats are unwilling to engage in troop increases in Afghanistan to stabilize the situation there and to take the fight to the Taliban who have continued to harbor al Qaeda on both sides of the Afghan/Pakistani border.

Throw in the fact that you’ve got some Democrats, like Sen. Levin, pushing a nonsensical theory that increased troops will be counterproductive ignores the success of troop increases in Iraq to stabilize the situation there. The Surge worked, and troop numbers are down, and Iraq’s government has control over most of the provinces directly; not the sign of an occupying power, but one that looks to create a stable situation. Levin claims he’s concerned that we’d be viewed as an occupying nation, and yet that has not been the case. He’s made a bogus strawman argument, and one that doesn’t hold water.