Bush's Unfinished Business

Seymour Hersh, still one of the best shoe-leather reporters still working a beat, has a sobering piece on the "deteriorating" situation in Afghanistan, where the Taliban is far from defeated, where "nation-building" languishes, where a too-small force of American troops have been left as a rear-guard while Bush/Cheney & Co. moved on to the bigger fool's gold in Iraq. Here's a key paragraph from the New Yorker piece:

"The turmoil in Afghanistan has become a political issue for the Bush Administration, whose general conduct of the war on terrorism is being publicly challenged by Richard A. Clarke, the former National Security Council terrorism adviser, in a memoir, "Against All Enemies," and in contentious hearings before the September 11th Commission. The Bush Administration has consistently invoked Afghanistan as a success story -- an example of the President's determination. However, it is making this claim in the face of renewed warnings, from international organizations, from allies, and from within its own military -- notably a Pentagon-commissioned report that was left in bureaucratic limbo when its conclusions proved negative -- that the situation there is deteriorating rapidly."

Thanks to Stumpy for the tip.