When testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee, General David Petraeus told senators that he understood the frustration with the Afghanistan War, conceding that "we have spent an enormous amount of money." The general has a gift for understatement.
We are spending $2 billion a week on this futile, brutal war that's not making us safer, and even that "enormous" amount of money (to say nothing of the lives lost or broken) hasn't hammered the square peg of a military solution into the round hold of the crisis in Afghanistan. News flash: if you can't turn the war effort around with 30,000 more troops at a cost of $1 million per troop, per year, maybe the military solutions aren't solutions after all.
To say the American people are "frustrated" is putting it very, very mildly. Despite the mainstream media's best efforts to pretend there's no war on (last year, Afghanistan coverage comprised about 4 percent of all news coverage), a large majority of Americans say they follow Afghanistan news closely. The vast majority of Americans now tell pollsters they want Congress to act to speed up troop withdrawals, and most likely voters want all troops out within a year. A record 64 percent now say that the war hasn't been worth fighting, a 20-percent jump in opposition since President Obama announced his latest troop increase.
Millions of Americans are still burning in an economic hell while our leaders waste precious resources on Hellfire missiles. Just one statistic drives it home: the poverty rate for children in the U.S. may soon hit 25 percent. And while those kids are living in hotels or on the street, or wondering where their next meal will come from, Petraeus will keep right on "understanding" your frustration while he spends almost $10 billion a month that could be used right here at home, getting those kids and their families back on their feet. We can't let that happen.
Brave New Foundation's Rethink Afghanistan is fighting to get the truth out about this war while the mainstream media sleeps on it. If you're fed up with this war that's not making us safer and that's not worth the cost, join Rethink Afghanistan on Facebook and Twitter, and join a local Rethink Afghanistan Meetup. Together we can make sure Petraeus and politicians in Washington, D.C. really understand our frustration and bring our troops home.