PRESIDENT AND PARTY - AT 9:45 A.M. ET:  A well-reported Washington Post story makes it clear that the president's greatest opposition to his Afghanistan plan will come from his own party:

President Obama will reveal his new Afghanistan war strategy in a speech Tuesday evening to cadets at West Point, but his most skeptical audience is likely to be the powerful Democrats on Capitol Hill who oppose a troop buildup.

Top Democrats have made it clear to Obama that he will not receive a friendly reception should he announce what is considered the leading option: sending 30,000 more U.S. troops to Afghanistan. The legislators have indicated that a request for more money to finance a beefed-up war effort will be met with frustration and, perhaps, a demand to raise taxes.

How pathetic.  This was once the party of Roosevelt, Truman, and Kennedy, not to mention Lyndon Johnson, who receives too little credit for his concern for national security. 

Now it's the party of Dennis Kucinich and Barney Frank. 

The president should see the opposition of the leftist wing of his party as an opportunity to declare his independence and show a little spine.  But will he?  So far, the record isn't encouraging. 

On Tuesday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) described what she called "serious unrest" in her caucus over the prospect of another vote to finance billions of dollars for an expanded war.

Serious unrest?  Really?  Will they have to send the Capitol Police?  Use tear gas?  Will the California delegation be Tasered?  I've never heard the term "serious unrest" used to describe a condition in a caucus of the House of Representatives.

In June, Pelosi strong-armed anti-war Democrats into voting for a $100 billion measure to fund the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. During an interview in July, she recounted her appeal to the lawmakers: "Will you change your mind and one more time vote for war funding?" She also promised not to ask again. "This is the very last time," she told them.

Real smart, Nance. 

Now, barely five months later, Pelosi and Obama will soon have to go back to the war well, even as they seek difficult votes from the same Democrats on health-care reform, climate change legislation and regulation of the financial industry.

Those domestic policy efforts are far from settled, but Pelosi has described them only as "heavy lifts" that were "nothing" compared with the war votes of the past three years. "You have to go to somebody who is totally, completely, entirely opposed to war funding, and you need to have them vote on it. And you don't even want to vote on it yourself," she said in the July interview.

What a strange world that party has become.  What a strange and dangerous world.  The sound you hear is our enemies applauding.

November 26, 2009