To anyone who says both parties are the same: Fuck. You.

[zipplewrath]

84. But that's not all he said

Barack Obama yesterday pledged to increase US troops in Afghanistan by a third if he becomes president, sending 10,000 more to reinforce the 33,000 already there.

What he ACTUALLY did was send over 60,000 more troops, basically 6 times what he claimed while campaigning (or, 18 3rds instead of 1/3rd. Can I call that 18 times? . This in conjuction with:

Previewing the speech in an article written for the comment page of the New York Times yesterday, Obama wrote: "As president, I would pursue a new strategy and begin by providing at least two additional combat brigades to support our effort in Afghanistan. We need more troops, more helicopters, better intelligence-gathering and more non-military assistance to accomplish our mission there."

In the end, he basically tried to end this on a purely military basis by training and shoring up an Afghan military force. He tolerated for YEARS corruption at the highest level, not to serve the interests of the population of that country, but to shore up the government that would use the military we trained to fight and maintain a Taliban free country. (At least a Taliban hostile to the west).

Again, none of this is an outright lie. As I said, it was a imbalance in his rhetoric to position himself to the left of Hillary (and then McCain) but allow himself the space to move to the right when actually implementing policy. Nothing unique to this president, nor candidates in general. But none the less what people complain about regularly and the basis of SOME peoples claim that there is "no difference".

(And then there is the whole pre/post election position on health care mandates)