British allies lose five more in Afghanistan; public support wanes
Five British troops in Helmand Province have been killed by an Afghan policeman inside a supposedly secure military base. Another six were wounded. Two Afghan police officers were wounded as well, and their attacker apparently escaped. The Times of London reports that the assailant had been with the Afghan police for two years.
The heavy death toll raises the number of British dead in Afghanistan this year to 94, and comes at a delicate time.In a poll taken last month for the Times of London, 36 percent of British adults supported pulling all troops out of Afghanistan immediately, and another 32 percent called for withdrawal within a year regardless of the situation on the ground.
So far, both the Labour and Conservative parties support a continued commitment in Afghanistan. But with 68 percent calling for full withdrawal within a year, that stance may be difficult to sustain.
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76 comments Add your comment
Jefferson
November 4th, 2009
11:53 am
Nothing to win there, bring home the brave men.
Normal
November 4th, 2009
11:54 am
Maybe if England pulls out, we can too
I Report :-) You Whine :-( Ate Up With Envy mmm, mmmm, mmmmm!
November 4th, 2009
11:56 am
What’s Obozo’s, mmm, mmmm, mmmmm, excuse this week?
I Report :-) You Whine :-( Ate Up With Envy mmm, mmmm, mmmmm!
November 4th, 2009
11:57 am
He was busy kampaigning for Corzine, hardee, har, har.
getalife
November 4th, 2009
12:02 pm
“COLUMBUS — Ohio voters have opened their wallets to veterans, easily approving bonuses of up to $1,000 for those who served in the Persian Gulf, Afghanistan or Iraq.”
Now that is a great idea.
Common Sense
November 4th, 2009
12:04 pm
Yep ……… the British. They could have had us in the Revolutionary War but they got tired and quit.
“When you’re wounded and left on Afghanistan’s plains,
And the women come out to cut up what remains,
Jest roll to your rifle and blow out your brains
An’ go to your Gawd like a soldier.”
Rudyard Kipling
“When civilized man can no longer stand the horror of war and refuses to fight, then he will surely be killed or enslaved by the uncivilized who can.”
Author Unknown
Turd Ferguson
November 4th, 2009
12:11 pm
1st, get all the heroin.
2nd, bomb the hell out of them.
3rd, take a heroin break.
4th, bomb them some more.
I Report :-) You Whine :-( Ate Up With Envy mmm, mmmm, mmmmm!
November 4th, 2009
12:13 pm
Time to work on Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, mmm, mmmm, mmmmm!
Normal
November 4th, 2009
12:15 pm
Bring our troops out of that hellhole, rest them, refit them, then let’s see.
Normal
November 4th, 2009
12:16 pm
Whiner, you’re a real blessing to mankind…just sayin’
Turd Ferguson
November 4th, 2009
12:19 pm
Give Obobo a helmet and gun then send his sorry-Ace over there.
Joan
November 4th, 2009
12:22 pm
I am a fiscal conservative, and would just as soon have unwanted kids aborted, and would love it if someone would do a reality check on our purpose for staying in the Mideast. There is no way in the world we will put a democracy in place in that hellhole. There is no way to contain the Taliban there. We need to try to keep the Taliban, and others who would destroy this country–like Pelosi and Reid, who do more harm than any Taliban member ever could–out of this country and out of our lives. Put our troops on our own borders. We are under invasion, and nobody seems to care.
Common Sense
November 4th, 2009
12:24 pm
“Peace is that brief, glorious moment in history when everybody stands around reloading”. Anonymous
“A bad plan executed violently is better than a good plan executed slowly.”
Gen. George Patton
“While we are certain there are no good wars, we are not so naive as to believe that there are no necessary wars.”
Lt. Gen. Harold Moore
“Beat your plowshares into swords and your pruning hooks into spears. Let the weakling say, “I am strong!”
Joel 3:10
“Salus populi suprema lex – The safety of the people is the highest law.”
DoggoneGA
November 4th, 2009
12:26 pm
101st chairborn are out in full force I see
Heaven and Hell
November 4th, 2009
12:28 pm
I’m certainly thankful for Whiner.
@@
November 4th, 2009
12:28 pm
My response to your previous topic…
jay, It’s no surprise that you, a liberal would be excited about candidate Reed. In a previous column, you offered your support based on his desire to fight crime and his political connections!!?!!
From your previous column:
Kasim Reed, an Atlanta attorney and veteran state senator, stresses the importance of public safety in his campaign, promising to hire 750 additional police officers by the end of his four-year term. Given the city’s financial situation, that is a hugely ambitious and probably impractical goal, but Reed says he is committed to achieving it.
Trying to choose among such well-qualified candidates is a welcome chore, but at this point, I’ll cast my vote for Reed. The record of legislative consensus-building that he describes is very real. Given that some of the metro region’s biggest challenges cannot be solved without the assistance of state leaders, an Atlanta mayor with such connections would be a major asset.
How realistic can fighting crime be without the funds to do so. You either have no problem with raising taxes or running a deficit. Typical.
A conservative, who thinks things thru, however, comes to a different conclusion.
Kyle Wingfield: Reed chooses public safety as his priority…..But it’s not the issue for me in a city so cash-strapped that it can’t afford the 750 new officers Reed says he would add within four years. Those officers would cost some $58 million a year plus recruitment and training costs, a daunting figure considering Atlanta raised taxes this year by $56 million just to end furloughs and fund its pension liabilities.
Fixing the city’s finances is a prerequisite for addressing public safety and all other concerns. As big a problem as dollars and cents are, it’s a bigger problem than just that.
There is a trust gap between Atlanta’s citizens and its civil servants, not to mention between Atlanta and our state government. Both Borders and Norwood acknowledge this gap.
Both women talk about the need to enforce city code better and clean up neighborhoods wracked by mortgage fraud. Borders, worryingly, puts a bigger emphasis on eminent domain and making it easier for the city to seize such properties.
Both women talk about collecting more of the fines and other monies already owed to the city.
Both women acknowledge the need to get a handle on who does what in the city, and to make sure the work force is lean and efficient.
This is a long-standing problem in Atlanta.
Borders has the endorsement of the union for nonpublic safety workers, who will expect forbearance in return. Norwood has the support of those who lodged the complaints. In a close call, I’ll take the candidate who is more free to change the status quo. In a close call, I’ll take Norwood.
That ^^^ is common sense of which you have none.
Congratulations to the winners in yesterday’s elections.
Congratulations to the “little guy”, Hoffman, who without the benefit of party and charisma, did pretty dawg gone well. He’s a bean-counter by profession. Lawd knows….we could use more of those in Washington.
And Mr. Owens? He’s got one year in which he can prove his bona fides as a fiscal conservative. What better way to campaign against the leftists on the hill. I’m betting he’ll be pushing hard to prove his mettle. That’ll put him far right of where liberals would like HIM to be.
Since Obama has no comment to offer regarding his Af/Pak strategy, I’ll follow suit. I’ll let the pain and suffering be his. He sure hasn’t let the pain and suffering of those brave troops already in Afghanistan go to his head OR heart. Too busy addressing “THINGS” he considers crucial.
Common Sense
November 4th, 2009
12:28 pm
To Joan @ 12:22pm:
The MSM is pretty much ignoring this story from Texas so check out this article from a foreign paper:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/6489418/Planned-Parenthood-leader-resigns-after-watching-abortion-ultrasound.html
By the way, have you ever watched one?
Joey
November 4th, 2009
12:29 pm
The Democrat’s-Afghan-Error began when Democrats decided that they could bring Bush down by saying over and over that the correct, the right, the necessary war was the Afghan-War. The Left Wing of our media leaped upon this assignment and began repeating that accusation at every opportunity. Jay Bookman was one of the most consistant purveyors of The-Right-War-Story.
Immediately after taking office President Obama increased the commitment of military personnel to Afghanistan just as he had promised. Now here we are.
Democrats dug themselves this pit. Jay Bookman and any Media’s-Left-Wing certainly made major contributions to the error.
You guys know so damn much and are so damn smart, maybe we should let you completely redo the health care system. Really.
Heaven and Hell
November 4th, 2009
12:30 pm
Thank God for the scroll feature.
Common Sense
November 4th, 2009
12:31 pm
To DoggoneGA:
Nope. 4th Marines.
Heaven and Hell
November 4th, 2009
12:33 pm
It’s only common sense that God expects a 100 percent success rate from every attempt at creating one in his likeness.
Mrs. Godzilla
November 4th, 2009
12:33 pm
Bring ‘em home.
@@
November 4th, 2009
12:33 pm
Oh, and Bruno?
Thanks again for your early morning “smoothical” for teacher.
(IWH)
Common Sense
November 4th, 2009
12:35 pm
To Mrs. Godzilla @ 12:33
Don’t tell us ……….. tell Obama.
DoggoneGA
November 4th, 2009
12:35 pm
“Nope. 4th Marines.”
Really? The 4th Marines are posting here today? Individually, or do they have a designated speaker?
Joan
November 4th, 2009
12:39 pm
Common sense–it pays to use some. There should be limits to a right to abort–and those limits ought to be set at a few months into it. If a woman doesn’t want a kid and doesn’t have enough sense to figure it out in the first three months, then maybe she should have to go through with it. I don’t know what is messier though–a messy abortion, or a very unloved, messed up, human being, raised without love and discipline, and doomed to continue the cycle of dependency. Certainly the pain of the latter lasts a lot longer.
@@
November 4th, 2009
12:43 pm
H&H:
My apologies for the long post. My time is limited.
When it’s not limited, I often offer short and biting quips. Those are attacked by leftists as well.
I’m damned if I do and damned if I don’t.
Never try to make a liberal happy. It’s not in their DNA.
Turd Ferguson
November 4th, 2009
12:46 pm
“Im am strong, I am invincible, I am Woooman…” Helen Reddy
Mrs. Godzilla
November 4th, 2009
12:46 pm
Common Sense
I do. Weekly.
Have you?
Try it here:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact
Normal
November 4th, 2009
12:48 pm
Joan: ” I don’t know what is messier though–a messy abortion, or a very unloved, messed up, human being, raised without love and discipline, and doomed to continue the cycle of dependency. Certainly the pain of the latter lasts a lot longer.”
You are absolutely correct,
But it would be considered socialistic to set up foster homes and the loving environments therein, to set up opportunities for education, health care, and other cost of living funds.
Normal
November 4th, 2009
12:51 pm
Common Sense, I do too, daily. Here, White house, and the democratic party sites.
T
November 4th, 2009
12:54 pm
There was a time when Afgan was the right war. When that 6ft mass murdering towel head resided there. Now, I don’t know what we are doing there.
I find it unfortunate that we spent all those resources and lives looking for WMD’s to get OIF, when most Americans (well this one) just wanted to see Bin Laden hanged.
stands for decibels
November 4th, 2009
12:54 pm
I’m thinking George McGovern has a point…
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20091103_mcgovern_get_out_of_afghanistan/?ln
A historian, McGovern said he would remind Obama that foreign powers have been trying unsuccessfully to prevail in Afghanistan “ever since Alexander the Great. Genghis Khan even made a shot at it. The British throughout the 19th century were in there several times trying to pacify the [country] and finally gave up. The Russians were there for 11 years, 1979 until 1990, they put in 100,000 crack soldiers, 25,000 of them killed … in Afghanistan, another 25,000 crippled or injured. And the Russian treasury went broke, and some of our best Soviet experts believe that’s what really led to the collapse of the Soviet Union.”
Asked how he would get out of Afghanistan if he were president, McGovern said: “I would say to the Afghan people that ‘we’ve been here for eight years, and we’ve come to the conclusion we can’t resolve your problems. You’ve got the Taliban, you may have al-Qaida, but—our soldiers have fought, died bravely—but it’s my conclusion, as president of the United States, that we can’t resolve the problems here. We’ll do what we can to help you, but we can’t do it with our military forces. As a matter of fact, while we’ve been here, the Taliban have grown stronger, and we don’t know where al-Qaida is—we think they’re in Pakistan—but having our troops in Afghanistan is not going to help that. So it’s our judgment that the best thing for us, and maybe for you, is for you to take over the handling of your own problems.”
Normal
November 4th, 2009
12:57 pm
SFD: I wish McGovern had sounded that wise when he was running for President. I’da voted for him…
stands for decibels
November 4th, 2009
12:58 pm
There should be limits to a right to abort–and those limits ought to be set at a few months into it. If a woman doesn’t want a kid and doesn’t have enough sense to figure it out in the first three months, then maybe she should have to go through with it.
You do realize that Roe v. Wade more or less establishes just those things, already, and has been law of the land since 1973, yes?
Turd Ferguson
November 4th, 2009
1:00 pm
Those afghanis dont want a civilized form of govt. Cut-throats and sell-outs all of em. Pull the troops out immediately, well after we get all the heroin, and let them fend for themselves.
Normal
November 4th, 2009
1:01 pm
T, back in’03, I told all who would listen that first put Bin Laden’s head on a pike at the rubble of the Twin Towers, then come talk to me about Iraq…nobody listened, though.
Mrs. Godzilla
November 4th, 2009
1:01 pm
Bill Moyers: We Can’t Afford to Escalate the War in Afghanistan
http://www.alternet.org/blogs/video/143652/bill_moyers%3A_we_can%27t_afford_to_escalate_the_war_in_afghanistan/
mm
November 4th, 2009
1:02 pm
@@,
Us libs are always happy. It’s you wingnut dittoheads that are always whining.
I think the writing is on the wall for you far right teabaggers. Your candidate in NY was defeated. America will not tolerate the teabaggers.
PULL THE TROOPS!!!!!!!
AmVet
November 4th, 2009
1:05 pm
BHO, STOP THESE USELESS WARS NOW.
Though the patriots at Haliburton and KBR are profiting enormously, these stone-age people are not worth one more American life.
Not one.
National security, my a$$…
Turd Ferguson
November 4th, 2009
1:08 pm
Bin Laden is probably dead…the govt just doesnt want to announce it. Having troops in Iraq/Afghanistan puts us on Iran’s East and West borders. Ya know, just in case.
BHO
November 4th, 2009
1:10 pm
AmVet,
I can’t bring the Troops home. Haliburton and KBR would be forced to lay off their workers and I’d be forced to cut a stimulas package for them because they are too big to fail. How could I get re-elected if I did that? No, I’ll send more, that’s what I’ll do. What would George do?
AmVet
November 4th, 2009
1:12 pm
I personally hope this costs the GOP suckup Obama the White House.
We libs have been saying the same thing for years. STOP THE WARs. Bush was a lying scumbag and a deadly fool for embroiling us in them. This is widely known.
But now the transparent, Party First chicken-conned are suddenly anti-Afghanistan!???
And ONLY because there is no longer a Republican CiC. That is the only reason.
Man, do you guys seriously suck. And have for a long time…
Mrs. Godzilla
November 4th, 2009
1:15 pm
Depends on which george….
George of the Jungle would hit the tree.
George Clooney would do another movie.
George Burns would light up a stogie.
George Bush would outsource the choice to Dick.
George Allen would mumble macaca.
George Forman would grill a burger.
Turd Ferguson
November 4th, 2009
1:19 pm
Ms G…what would Boy George do?
Turd Ferguson
November 4th, 2009
1:20 pm
AmVet, you need to buy some stock and then sit back for a nice relaxing ride on the Gravy-Train.
Normal
November 4th, 2009
1:24 pm
I agree! Bring our troops home now!
Bosch
November 4th, 2009
1:24 pm
Turd,
“what would Boy George do?”
Shoot his arm full of heroin that you mentioned earlier.
Bosch
November 4th, 2009
1:25 pm
Oh, and yeah, bring the troops home.
AmVet
November 4th, 2009
1:25 pm
Normal,
November 1972, I was 17 years old and in boot camp. And as I was considered on active duty the otherwise 18 year old age limit to vote was removed.
And let me tell you brother, there was no way in hell I would have voted for Tricky Dick.
Please understand, I do not fault you or your choice.
You were older and likely wiser than me, but I just felt compelled to vote for McGovern.
And of course had the last laugh when 11 months later that repulsive criminal Agnew left town. And less than ten months after that, Nixon left with his tail between his legs.
Between that gang, Ronnie, Newtie and Georgie, I’m fairly amazed that anybody still trusts in that party.
Turd, given what just happened, you’re a braver (more gullible?) man than me trusting those criminals on Wall Street with your money.
I totally lucked out and avoided almost all of the fallout/theivery from last year.
I’m in, of course, but heavy into cash, etc at this point in my life…