Here’s the Afghanistan portion of today’s interview with Jennifer Brunner. We talked about other stuff, that’ll come next week. Some thoughts.
Jennifer clearly seems conflicted about the Afghanistan situation. I respect that she’s changed her position, but change her position she did. We discussed drones in Pakistan, Al Qaeda, and how Jennifer would vote on funding for the war if Senator. We’ll have to agree to disagree on the troop increase announced this month.
Bottom line, I came away supporting Jennifer more than I did before, largely because this discussion occurred. This kind of engagement with voters says a lot about a candidate, all of it positive. I can’t imagine Lee Fisher even contemplating such a discussion, live online, recorded for Youtube, with any media, let alone bloggers in Ohio, much less bloggers in Ohio who called him out on a policy inconsistency. The invitation is open, Lee. Not gonna hold my breath.
Video of the Jennifer Brunner interview we live streamed today will be available on Youtube later today. Thanks to all who watched online. More thoughts later, but generally, we all found Jennifer very forthcoming, and we appreciate the opportunity to engage. Stay tuned for video.
Join us today at 11am when we’ll be interviewing Jennifer Brunner on her position related to Afghanistan. We’ll be spending 30 minutes with the candidate for U.S. Senate and will be streaming the discussion live. We’ll also be shooting some regular video and will post for those unable to view the live stream.
See you at 11am. To comment and interact, go here.
Note: The live stream concluded at 11:30am today. Thanks for those who watched. It was fun learning a bit about Ustream.tv. We will probably do these more often as the situation warrants. We forgot to also record the stream for archive playback, but are working on an edited video of the interview that we’ll have up on YouTube soon.
I’m having one hell of a rotten month, so this game we’ve been playing with the Brunner campaign is supremely ill-timed. But I’m gonna take something positive from it. WARNING – inside blog drama below.
It was almost exactly four years ago that I and other bloggers reported – that’s right, reported – on another US Senate candidate’s public words, after which said US Senate candidate sent a brigade of anonymous commenting goons out to destroy the messengers, plural. On that occasion, the reporting wasn’t even about a policy position. It was about total idiocy. There was no engagement from the candidate, just an all hands on deck, vicious scorched earth campaign of madness. It’s well remembered, I don’t need to link to it here.
Four years later, Jennifer Brunner’s words have led to a legitimate policy question about her position on a fundamental issue of US foreign policy, on which as Senator she will be required to vote, repeatedly. That inconsistency is indisputable. And what was Jennifer Brunner’s response?
Jennifer Brunner immediately contacted all of us here at Plunderbund to engage on the topic. Not a few days later, within hours. Not at our suggestion, at her own.
Start taking notes, people.
Setting up this discussion has not gone smoothly, at all. In fact, the whole thing is really starting to become tiresome. However, we as bloggers here at Plunderbund have something of a duty to make this discussion happen. We are the ones objecting to the inconsistency, pointing it out, and looking for answers. But it is a rare candidate indeed who runs toward the inconsistency, not away from it. If we can get those answers, us bloggers should do all we can to get them.
What the US Senate candidate 4 years ago did not understand is that in this new world of authenticity driven politics, enforced by the internet, there is far more upside to dealing transparently with such matters than there is in ignoring them. And there’s precisely zero upside, for all involved, in reacting defensively, becoming aggressive, and killing the messenger.
As of this post, the only response we’ve had from the Brunner campaign has been sincere (albeit clumsy) attempts to engage us on the topic. That is an unmitigated piece of good news, indeed. And it has not gone unappreciated. Whatever the result of the policy discussion or the scheduling nonsense, as of right now, I’m more than impressed with Jennifer’s response. Let’s hope we can get this done.
We’ve just been notified, 2.5 hours ahead of time, that Jennifer Brunner needs to reschedule the interview her campaign requested to clarify her position on Afghanistan, scheduled themselves, and announced unilaterally through their blogger Jeff Coryell on Saturday around midnight.
We’ve nailed down a BlogTalk interview with Jennifer Brunner for tomorrow, 10 am, right here at Plunderbund. For the record, this interview was at the Brunner campaign’s request, in response to this post noting that Jennifer Brunner supported Barack Obama’s increase in troops to Afghanistan in February, which she now opposes.
This Saturday, just before midnight, Brunner campaign blogger Jeff Coryell wandered into a day and a half old Kos diary to leave a lonely comment defending the flip flop. This morning, Plunderbund’s Modern Esquire forensically demolishes Coryell’s logically challenged, strained to the point of absurdity, apologia. I don’t have much to add to Modern’s post, other than that I agree with it in full, and the following.
When I was running campaigns for a living, if I had one rule that was never to be challenged, it was that campaign staff do not publicly freelance their opinion about the candidate’s campaign, on any issue, to any media, ever. Once you take the paycheck, your mouth is to be shut, unless the campaign tells you to open it. Period. So the question of whether Jeff is speaking for the campaign in his comments defending Brunner’s Afghanistan flip flop is closed – Jeff is speaking for the campaign. It’s incumbent upon the candidate to decide whether Jeff is off the reservation or not. Uncomfortable? Yes – and that’s why I had that rule when I ran campaigns for a living.
And announces a Brunner appearance on Plunderbund, Tuesday at 10am, to have a “debate” about Afghanistan. We have yet to confirm any of that on our end, but I guess Jeff gets to make those decisions for all of us!
I’m not going to address Jeff’s arguments, as he claims to not be speaking for the campaign. I find that odd, given that he is staff. However, I do look forward to asking Jennifer about this, and when we do confirm it, we’ll let you know.
To all the anti-war pacifists in my party. Please remember the following.
No Democratic candidate for president in 2008 who advocated what you now advocate made it past the Iowa caucuses.
Not one.
If Barack Obama had changed his Afghanistan proposals, which he has held to, without variation, for more than 3 solid years, to what you now advocate, at any time while he ran for president, we’d now have President John McCain and Vice President Sarah Palin.
The Democratic Party electorate beyond this website didn’t just reject every presidential candidate advocating what you now advocate – that electorate buried them.
With good reason. There is zero chance that a Democrat holding the position you advocate can win the presidency.
Zero.
If you wanted to vote for the Afghanistan withdrawal you now advocate, no such candidate was on the ballot, because our Democratic Party REFUSED to put such a candidate on the ballot.
And if you decide that you did, in fact, vote for the wrong candidate, and would rather have stayed home than vote for a Democrat who advocated this position tirelessly, without variation, his entire campaign, that means that you would prefer to have VICE PRESIDENT SARAH PALIN than a Democrat in the White House.
When Jennifer Brunner announced her candidacy in February in a thread at BSB, I asked her point blank about a troop increase in Afghanistan.
Jennifer, as a US Senator, you will be an integral part of the foreign policy decision making of the country. What is your vision of the US role in the world going forward, and specifically, how would you vote on troop increases to Afghanistan?
Here’s Jennifer’s answer, titled “The Resurgence of Al Qaeda”
The resurgence of al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan is the greatest threat to our national security. I would support a troop increase in Afghanistan and work with the White House and Congressional leaders to expand our NATO allies’ troop presence in Afghanistan. We must also work with the Afghan government to help revitalize Afghanistan’s economy and provide more opportunities for Afghani citizens.
So who got pandered to, Jennifer? Me in February, or the pacifist crowd now?
UPDATE – I’ve posted this at Kos, with additional thoughts.
Add to the base pandering list one Jennifer Brunner. Jennifer decided to go the route of the panderers even before Obama’s speech, which she spent being featured at a women’s forum. We call that pot shots from the cheap seats. If you have a strong principled stand against the President’s plans in Afghanistan you might want to have a forum on that during an important speech.
Hell, if you had a principled stand against escalation in Afghanistan you might campaign against the candidate who said in the campaign that he’d do just that. Jennifer, if I remember correctly, didn’t do that. My recollection is she was a supporter of the candidate, now President, who said he’d send more troops to Afghanistan.
Where was the wringing of hands back then? Why the wringing of hands now? You want attention. I get it. Anti-war libs are jumping with joy. The GOP is attacking YOU and not Lee. I get all that. I also get that you are now one of the crowd who seems to have conveniently forgotten what this President specifically campaigned to do. A campaign you so vigorously defended at one point.
You need to take a broader look at this. There’s no real long term gain in staking out this position and hanging on to it. For every anti-war lib you gain you lose a moderate or pragmatic progressive.
Brunner’s latest release reads like a staffer got peanut butter in the chocolate. A release about using bailout money for infrastructure jobs (not a new idea) gets confusing when the campaign again takes a shot at Obama:
President Obama informed the American public the next day that he plans to deploy 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan with a definite timetable to begin withdrawal, starting in July of 2011. Despite the future promise of relief, I would rather have our soldiers building bridges and schools right here in Ohio than in Afghanistan.
Earth to Jennifer Brunner. Soldiers are trained to fire weapons at targets, not pour concrete. You can argue all you want about bailout money, stimulus funds, and infrastructure improvements. All good stuff and it’s hard to disagree with your call to focus on main street instead of wall street (hmmm, where have I heard that before!?). What you should stop doing is trying to get more mileage out of your break with the President on Afghanistan. It’s starting to look pathetic.
Hey liberal groups and 2010 campaigns. You know what? That base you are pandering to? They voted for more troops in Afghanistan. So did you. Do me a favor and stop the breathless pandering to the anti-war bloc of the Democratic Party and get back on the O-train. It is, after all, what you busted your ass to get elected. My how soon we forget:
I highlight this image because it’s from a resulting search for “obama campaign afghanistan”. Side by side are results from July 20, 2008 and November 25, 2009. On July 20, 2008 during the summer of of the Presidential Campaign Barack Obama was very clear about Afghanistan:
“The Afghan government needs to do more. But we have to understand that the situation is precarious and urgent here in Afghanistan. And I believe this has to be our central focus, the central front, on our battle against terrorism,”
… Obama said troop levels must increase in Afghanistan.
“For at least a year now, I have called for two additional brigades, perhaps three,”
The defense official said Tuesday that the military is planning to send three U.S. Army brigades, totaling about 15,000 troops; a Marine brigade with about 8,000 troops; a headquarters element of about 7,000; and between 4,000 and 5,000 support troops — a total of about 34,000 troops. CNN reported last month that this was the Pentagon’s preferred option.
You should not be surprised and you should stop sending me emails expected me to join in your outrage. Elections have consequences, we say. The consequences is this is the precise policy on Afghanistan your President advocated while campaigning. You remember, right? The guy you sent countless emails urging us to get out the vote for? The guy you sent email after email congratulating on his historic win? The guy who said outright he’d escalate in Afghanistan and begin to disengage with Iraq.
You know. That guy.
Lucy moving the football on Charlie Brown indeed. I’m keeping track of all of you. Brave New Foundation. Vote no on spending that would send troops to Afghanistan? Are you out of your fucking minds? Yes. Let’s do that. Elect a guy who says he wants to send more troops to Afghanistan and get out of Iraq then petition our members to oppose funding it. Holy fucking nose to spite your face batman!
MoveOn needs to make up it’s mind. You’re trying to ride the fence here. You don’t oppose a first round of troop increases, but you send your members a note encouraging them to screen the Brave New film against war in Afghanistan. Now after Obama’s speech you send out a tightrope walking note to members encouraging them to sign a petition (cough…list build…cough) to support this call to Congress:
“Congress must push the Obama administration to outline firm benchmarks and a binding timeline to bring all of our troops home from Afghanistan as soon as possible.”
Stake out a position guys. LOL. Why don’t you send out a petition drive calling on Obama to be a decent enough President and hold him accountable to trying his best.
Listen. Half of these groups and campaigns sending out their little whining base pandering emails built their lists on the back of the historic Obama campaign. Now they cut him loose to pander to a base who voted for the precise thing the President is doing?
Please. Guys. Stop.
Spare us this charade of righteous indignation against a war that everyone knew we’d have to fight. Everyone is against war. Even those who fight it. No. ESPECIALLY those who fight it. Stop acting like you are somehow above it. I’d rather see you send notes of support for Obama having kept his word and his eye on the ball. I’d rather you appreciate the hard work we did to elect someone who could deliver the speech he did at West Point. It’s as if you completely missed the news.
There is new leadership in the White House. Principled, thoughtful leadership. We all busted our ass to get him there. I’m not going to join in your silly little parade of nonsense in trying to move the goal posts. Your team won and you blocked your guy into the end zone and you are already abandoning him in the locker room because he did exactly what he said he’d do?
Again, I’m keeping track of all you progressive groups, non profits, and campaigns. So stop. Please.
So the president makes a decision, the orders are given, it’s done. Cue the cowardly pandering.
Nothing says “courage” quite like waiting for the precise moment that your “principled” position is literally an impossibility before you run out to tell us all that NOW, yes NOW, after the troops are literally on their way, NOW we must withdraw from Afghanistan, NOW.
I respect the anti-war position in the Democratic Party base. It makes me happy to be in the Democratic Party. I even respect loud disagreement with the policy after it was announced on Tuesday night. In fact, I would rather pressure come from the LEFT than from the RIGHT, and I applaud it.
What I do NOT respect is politicians, bloggers, organizations like MoveOn, candidates for office like Lee Fisher in Ohio, using the occasion to pander incessantly to a legitimately upset base of our party.
This is what Republicans do. They lather up the base in pursuit of policies they know for a fact are not going to be implemented, and then they milk that base for all its worth.
Barack Obama listened to the arguments, and made a decision. That decision ENDS THE WAR. Maybe not fast enough, but certainly faster than anyone else’s decision would. If Lyndon Johnson gave the same damn speech in 1965, and the Vietnam war ended 3 years later, it would have been a good thing, and would have ended the Vietnam War even before Woodstock.
To watch our party’s base get pandered to like this makes me ill. It’s pathetic.
Get your progressive-values created “I’ve got your back, Barack” t-shirt
I like being in a political party, the Democratic Party, so resolutely anti-war at its core, and within its base. There is no “pro-war” Democrat. Those people are Republicans. Anti-war Democrats include us all. It means when we decide to fight a war, we make sure we do it right, because we want it to end.
Anti-war pacifists do not, however, include all Democrats. That too is a good thing. Ask any Kosovar Albanian, who last month raised a statue to our Democratic president Bill Clinton in gratitude for saving them from genocide. Ask Bosnian Muslims. Ask the whole of Europe, who to this day still treat the memory of Democrat Franklin Roosevelt with hushed reverence, even though Roosevelt waged more horrifying warfare in Europe on a wider scale than anyone would even imagine happening today.
This is why after September 11, the US was able to invoke Article 5 of the NATO charter. Article 5 is the provision within NATO that commits other NATO members to military action if any other member is attacked. It was a historic moment of great sadness that the leader of NATO, the United States, had to become the first country in NATO’s history to ever do so. Our NATO allies responded as we knew they would – they came to our defense.
NATO exists to prevent war. Article 5 was designed as a deterrent against war. Once Article 5 is invoked, however, NATO’s credibility, indeed the existence of the oldest, most durable and positive force for peace and stability in the history of the world, is on the line. Barack Obama clearly understands that. As I noted last night after the speech, Barack cited Article 5 himself in the speech, both to remind us all of the stakes, and remind our allies.
What should have been done immediately after we invoked Article 5 was NOT done by George W. Bush. That is the tragedy which leaves us with today’s mess. It is also one small piece of the wreckage Bush left behind that Barack has to clean up. Not only does Barack have to fix the entire catastrophe (one catastrophe of many), he must restore NATO’s credibility on this very specific use of NATO’s reason for being.
Escalation of this war is not only necessary for the goals Barack outlined last night, it is necessary as yet another required step to restore this country’s credibility in the international community. We cannot be running around invoking Article 5 of the NATO charter, then frittering that away because of incompetence in our idiot president, then leaving when we fuck the shit up, particularly once a new president takes the catastrophe over. America must, at the very least, take every possible military step to make the invocation of Article 5 a credible deterrent again.
The strategy outlined last night will put that credibility back into NATO. I happen to also believe the strategy will work on the ground to achieve the substantive goals outlined in Barack’s speech. Would I have rather seen 150,000 troops go to Afghanistan in 2002 instead of to Iraq in 2003? Of course. Can we get this done now, with this strategy? Probably, but certainly not guaranteed.
But this war will end. It will end on Barack Obama’s terms. Anti-war pacifists will still be enraged. If Barack announced total withdrawal last night, pacifists would be enraged because every soldier wasn’t gone yesterday. Pacifists argued we should be focusing on Afghanistan, but not Iraq, and now that we are focusing on Afghanistan, pacifists move the football. Just like Lucy does to Charlie Brown. Where have I seen THAT before.
But that’s o.k. I prefer being in a party with purists who hold a pacifist view, than being in a party with Republican purists who hold the opposite. And I’m glad the pacifists are arguing their positions with passion. That’s what makes us the Democratic Party.
I just hope all of us, pacifists included, still got Barack’s back.
Speaking to the nation from the White House Treaty Room at 1:00 p.m. Eastern Time, on Oct. 7, 2001, President George W. Bush announced the beginning of Operation Enduring Freedom against the Taliban regime and al-Qaeda in Afghanistan:
Get your progressive-values created “I’ve got your back, Barack” t-shirt
Tonight’s speech was nothing less than a total repudiation of the Bush doctrine by President Obama, in every way. There is no open-ended war. No good vs. evil. We know when, and precisely how, the war in Afghanistan will end. Barack put American values ahead of American might. And by giving this speech to a military audience, Barack made it clear that this new approach, “doctrine” if you will, comes from the top.
Invoking September 11, as weary as that has become, had to be done, but Barack did it in a much better way. Barack invoked Article 5 of the NATO treaty – the provision that binds NATO allies to defense of each other on occasion of attack. The last time we heard Article 5 mentioned this prominently was in the first days after September 11, when Colin Powell used the phrase “teed up”, to describe the US invocation of it.
Using Article 5 in this speech, tonight, on national television, not only reminded Americans of the stakes, it reminded our allies. That is a big deal. We are not in Afghanistan alone, never have been, and we are there for a reason so commanding it triggered NATO’s only effective provision, in fact NATO’s reason for existence. By putting NATO credibility this explicitly on the line, Barack not only made an argument against withdrawal, he made an argument for the escalation, and completion of the mission.
Pakistan was discussed more in this speech than in any speech any US president has made on national TV. That’s also a big deal, and it puts enormous pressure on the Pakistani side of the border, whether Pakistanis like it or not. I cannot imagine George W. Bush being this explicit about making demands, military and political, on Pakistan. Another repudiation.
Tying this speech so tightly to the economy was politically smart, a practical necessity, executed well, and a mission critical vision for our forces to whom Barack is issuing his orders. The price tag was clear, transparent, and explicit. It seemed to sink in to the cadets, too. Over time, this rationale will probably take hold within the day to day narrative from the White House. Good.
The most important takeaway for me is that next summer will be the hottest in Afghanistan since the war began. The new troops will all have arrived, and a spring offensive will certainly be coming from the Taliban. That means this strategy will succeed or fail by the end of 2010.
