ARTICLE: Afghan War Debate Now Leans to Focus on Al Qaeda, By PETER BAKER and ERIC SCHMITT, New York Times, October 7, 2009

This shift provides my rationale for saying that Obama is heading toward a non-state-actor-level version of the Powell Doctrine: we go anywhere we need to and kill anybody we deem bad, but as far as the locals are concerned, they can simply fuck off in terms of any implied responsibility on our part to fix the situation.

There is a huge flaw in this reasoning, and it's called pissing off a lot of locals with your bloodthirsty cynicism.

Hard to marry this tack with a Nobel Peace Prize, yeah?