Twitter This Commentary In The News: Thanks this morning to ChrisM, my MP3Angel, for supplying the news and commentary audio files. Suddenly It's Foreign relations... President Obama is in Lisbon Portugal at a somewhat contentious NATO meeting. Most members planned to be OUT OF AFGHANISTAN by 2011, but the US just unilaterally decided 2014 would be better. But "After more than 50 years of marriage, the (NATO) partners are growing weary of one another." (NATO: Following the 20th Century Into History @ Truthout). Hamid Karzi, illegitimate 'president' of Afghanistan is there to plead with them to lower their overall presence in the country at least in the urban areas and quit the nighttime raids that seem to kill civilians out of proportion to anyone who's armed.

"The time has come ... to reduce the intrusiveness into the daily Afghan life. We'd like to have a long-term relationship with America... But we'd like the Afghan countryside ... not to be so overwhelmed with the military presence." _{[More @ Newsys]}

(Video below the fold... in the "Notes:") Meanwhile, SOME people (Juan Cole at Informed Comment and a guest blogger) think "Afghanistan a 'Trap'; NATO stuck There Past 2014" But Josh Mull @ Firedoglake pretty much sums up the mood of the American people in regard to our Imperial war...

No Really, We Should Abandon Afghanistan Afghanistan: No Withdrawal, No Reconciliation By: Josh Mull Thursday November 18, 2010

I am the Afghanistan Blogging Fellow for Brave New Foundation. You can read my work on Firedoglake or at Rethink Afghanistan. The views expressed below are my own.

Back in the summer of 2007, there was a debate in the Democratic presidential primaries over whether or not the United States ought to negotiate without preconditions with our enemies. Senator Obama said he would meet with Iranian president Ahmadinejad, among others, and Senator Clinton replied that this was naive, that it would be used for propaganda purposes, and so on. Obama eventually won out, but the criticism of his position continued into the 2008 general election. The McCain campaign doubled down on the Bush policy of negotiations as a "reward", and they relentlessly attacked Obama as weak on national defense, cozying up with dictators - you remember the commercials. Despite all that, candidate Obama held firm in his position that the US should negotiate with its enemies. And not just dictators and foreign leaders, mind you, but even militant groups like the Taliban. Here Obama explains his rationale to NBC's Brian Williams: So far, so good. He uses some really unhelpful language (what the heck is a "moderate Taliban"?) but he admits that the process will not be easy or quick. . . . Fast forward a year or so to late 2009, candidate Obama is now President Obama, and we're hearing whispers out of Afghanistan that the Taliban and Hamid Karzai have begun very quiet, very preliminary discussions. Nothing really exciting, just an intermediary or two meeting secretly in Pakistan, the UAE, and elsewhere. President Obama orders a massive military escalation in order to "break Taliban momentum" (the same Taliban who were at the time negotiationg an end to hostilities), and General McChrystal (and now Petraeus) instituted his ultimately disastrous counter-insurgency campaign in the south and east of the country.... _{[In Full with links]}

An EU meeting is also coming to Lisbon after the NATO conference and president Obama will attend that conference as well, with the focus liable to be Western economic downsizing and how to avoid a general revolt across Europe as social benefits begin their government mandated downhill slide in a number of EU countries. The US BEGINS to look at the "New S.T.A.R.T." treaty with Russia to replace the one that expired a year or so ago. There are no inspectors overseeing nuclear weapons development in either country right now, we are operating on faith, and the Republicans DON'T WANNA work on ratifying the treaty. Further, just a day or so ago president Obama attempted to convince the Republicans that it WOULD be a good idea to have nuclear weapons inspectors in a country that, like the United States, has the capability of destroying the people of earth few times over, but the Republicans weren't impressed by that argument and continue to plan blocking the legislative action if there's an attempt to ratify. For more about what that course-of-action means in terms of Republican patriotism, listen to the commentary. A Judiciary committee hearings regarding Congressman Charles Rangel parking his non-oped car for too long in the congressional garage and un-reported income from his Dominican Republic rental property is in session. Next week the battle in congress begins over the Bush administration's tax cuts and whether they should be extended or eliminated, or 'modified'. YOU be the judge:

[After the commentary Sun Ra and his Celestial Arkestra... Courtesy of the respectve artists. Gleaned from the Adbusters CD Live Without Dead Time (Torrent, currently showing 4 'seeds')] -30-
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