Media bias and national security

As I was preparing my inaugural blog, on Afghanistan and the recent request by Gen. McChrystal for additional troops, I went to my Google page and typed in “Obama AND Afghanistan.” I assumed, with all of the recent media coverage about this topic, there would be numerous links to the current discussion. As expected, the very first link on my results page was about Obama approving an increase in troop levels for Afghanistan; however, it was a CNN article from February 2009. Why would an article from February be the number one result on my results page with all of the new talk about troop increases?

Then it hit me. It is an effort by the pro-Obama media to ensure the American people are aware that Obama has approved troop increases before, thus ensuring the American people are behind Obama when he denies this current request. Obama’s administration can point to the fact that he has approved a troop increase this year and try to make it seem as if the military commanders in Afghanistan and Tampa cannot manage the war.

There has been a lot of discussion about the liberal media and its pro-Obama bias, but this is outrageous. This is tantamount to psychological operations being used against a domestic audience in order to effect a desired outcome.

Since October 2001 our troops and the troops of our allies have operated at a tempo at which the enemy, the Taliban and al-Qa`ida, is unable to operate. Our troops keep them off-balance and unable to think about bringing terror back to the United States. If this leads to increased support for Obama and the military commanders’ warnings are not heeded, it could result in an emboldening of the enemy and cause further casualties among our troops we do have there or possibly allow them to operate at the level they need to in order to carry out another attack in the United States.