GRIST FOR THE CRITICS

Neo-conservatives in the United States are having a field day at the President's expense as Mr. Obama appears to be struggling to meet his own self-imposed pre-election deadlines from a year ago.

Two of the President's most vocal and frequently irrational critics, broadcaster Glenn Beck, and former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin are both shilling books and taking every advantage of their grossly exaggerated book tours to pillory the President, Cabinet and his supporters.

Mr. Obama's own failures and delays in delivering on his overly ambitious agenda in the wake of last year's November Presidential elections is offering-up plenty of the grist for the self-proclaimed defenders of the "Right" and their self aggrandising media fueled pulpits.

Americans will break this week for the Thanksgiving Holiday long-weekend with official Washington dead-locked over the President's Health Care Reform agenda. Despite Mr. Obama's own commitment to the nation after his election to have the matter resolved by August - Three months ago.

Plans to shut-down the international embarrassment which is the Guantanamo (Cuba) terrorist detention centre by January are once more "on hold" with little real sense of when the President will be able to deliver on this once critical element of the 2008 election campaign.

When the President hand-picked Army General Stanley McChrsytal as his emissary and Field Marshall in Afghanistan six months ago the mandate was clear: Find the way to end the seven and a half year-old war which was, and still is, spiralling out of control. McChrystal was quick and clear on delivering to Mr. Obama. Send-in an additional 40,000 troops on top of the 26,000 you have already committed since taking the Oath of Office. The President's harshest critics, with some level of reason, say he has been dithering ever since. The war is now eight years old. On an up-date visit to Kandahar Airfield on Thursday, the American Secretary of Defence, Robert Gates, appeared optimistic that Mr. Obama's decision would finally be in place by this week's Holiday break.

In a related decision, though it has taken that many years through no fault of the current President: The New York terror trials of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and some of the other Muslim radicals charged in connection with the attacks of 9/11 are likely to drag-on through America's judicial system for years...some perhaps wishfully predicting even beyond Mr. Obama's term(s) in office. At the very least, the trials and the American media hoopla in their wake will ensure that the messes which are Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo will remain bull's eye center in the public perception.

And...if all that isn't bad enough the President's plans and agenda on self-sustaining renewable energy; as well as on reforming the American financial system -from the banks through the investment houses and on to the stock markets - are crippled by the nation's still sputtering economy. The failure of last week's charm initiative in China to deliver on any concessions from the country's Communist regime once again served as a reminder to Americans that the world's greatest economy is crushed under a national debt of such staggering proportions that they've run out of "zeros" to illustrate it...except perhaps for the oft repeated reminder that they owe at least One-Trillion of it to a country they still so despise.

STRATEGIC DITHERING?

There is increasing speculation in Washington that on President Obama's return to the Capital after his eight day visit to Asia, a decision will be forthcoming on the military's request for thousands more additional troops for Afghanistan.

That would mean that the Commander-in-Chief could announce his decision on the request for 40,000 additional troops by Friday. The troops would be in addition to the 21,000 already authorized by Mr. Obama earlier this year.

General Stanley McChrystal who commands U.S. and NATO forces, including Canada's, in Afghanistan has been quoted as saying the situation in Afghanistan is "headed towards defeat" unless the Government acts to turn the tide and regain the initiative. But, while America's military commitments remain in limbo pending the President's decision; there is plenty of anecdotal evidence suggesting that the delays are part of a strategy to extract additional concessions from the fraud and corruption tainted administration of Afghan President Hamid Karzai. Karzai is set to be sworn-in to a second term as President of the war demolished country later this week following a less than spectacularly fair election process which confirmed him only after his opponent threw in the towel in disgust.

Likely in the face of pressure from Obama emissaries, Karzai's government has just created a national "Anti-corruption Squad" to root-out the worst elements within the administration. The problem though for the Afghan President may be that he owes his re-election to many of those fraudsters he's now pledging to expose and turf-out.

On another front, U.S. and Afghan officials have apparently agreed on a strategy financed by the American Government to organize defacto "Neighbourhood Watch" programs to bolster the country's security. On a much smaller scale, Canadian troops in Kandahar Province have for some time encouraged a similar offensive by providing local tribal leaders with incentives to guard against and report on Taliban insurgents. The American plan takes the strategy one step further by proposing that individual villages or tribes form their own militia. Until now the Afghan government had been against a nationwide scheme as practiced by the Canadians in Kandahar because Hamid Karzai feared arming local villagers could threaten his own authority.

The leadership abilities and vulnerabilities of President Hamid Karzai are crucial and central to any Obama Administration decision to commit more military resources to a war now entering a ninth year without any significant advances nor resolution in sight. While there are no plans nor rumours in official Washington about Mr. Obama's plans at week's end; a sure sign of America's commitment would be for the President to make an unannounced visit to Kabul to attend the Karzai swearing-in ceremony and make his announcement on additional American troop commitments from the Afghanistan capital.

ROAD STORIES/2009 (Part 2)

A WEATHER ROLLER COASTER: Each year on the drive south I look forward to the inescapable change of the seasons the further south I travel along America's eastern seaboard states. Travelling away from the inevitable early stages of November's winter in eastern Ontario, through the just turned fall leaves of the stunning (steeped in history) Shenandoah Valley of northern Virginia; into the ready to pick cotton crops of the Carolina's and summer's appearance from Savannah on to the Sunshine State. Well...09's been different. Oh! The leaves have turned in the historic valleys of Virginia; and the cotton's ripe for the pickin'. Up north though it was early November summer as temperatures topped 20 degrees; and the very late season Hurricane "Ida" dumped more water on my Wednesday's trek through the Capes (Fear & Hatteras) and the Beaches (Myrtle & Hilton Head) than I'd seen ever!

THE JOY OF RADIO: Here in the southern United-States, the Peterborough, Ontario based broadcaster, Prior Smith, has just launched the 56th season of "Canada Calling" - the daily broadcast of news for vacationing Canadians. I am among almost 4 million Canadians in Florida, the Bahamas, Arizona and south Texas with access to the news from home each weekday. A CBC Producer, Dave Price, launched "Canada Calling" in 1954 after he was unable to get the Stanley Cup Playoff results while vacationing in Miami. Prior Smith hasn't missed a day "on air" since taking over 33 years ago.

HOME FOR THE WINTER: I am just a couple of hours drive away from "home south", and contemplating with a Martini in hand (drink of preference and choice) the next several hours of clearing-out the cobwebs (Lord know what else) from a cottage unoccupied for the last 6 1/2 months in a sub-tropical climate. Though experience dictates that before week's end all will once again be in the right order, and retired life's regular routines will resume. I hope you'll hang around for future posts on this and my "Politics Canada" blog. Who knows what the immediate future may hold? Whatever it may be, I'll want to offer and to share my insight with you.

ROAD STORIES/2009 (Part 1)

Americans are the among the friendliest people on earth. They are more ambivalent and reticent when it comes to Canadians. I don't know why!

THE NEW GUY AT THE BORDER: Wouldn't you know it? I got the new guy at the Thousand Islands' border crossing. Not quite sure whether to "frown efficiently"; be "passive and emotionless"; or put on his "happy face". All of which are (as required) appropriate attitudes and postures doubtless taught at the American Border Academy. A nice young man who, since he was being supervised by 2 obviously senior officers, was on his best behaviour and most efficient through my border processing. Amen!

THE WEATHER EXPERIENCE: I first went to Florida in 1972. My first road-trip was in the fall of 1987 driving a new out of the showroom "Buick Somerset". I don't ever recall making it through Oswego County, New York with the windows rolled-down. Oswego, on the very southeastern tip of Lake Ontario, is where "Lake Effect Snow" was invented. If ever...or when my memoirs are written, I can report that I have cruised through northern New York State in mid-November in 23C (roughly 75F) temperatures.

ROAD MONSTERS: Ah Jeez! It's that time of year when my fellow countrymen "Quebecois," drive their "Gi-Normous" recreational vehicles south. Live in a hovel in Canada...mortgage the home and pay a quarter-million bucks to drive the "house on wheels" south for the winter. Trouble is "the house" is towing a car (sometimes also with its own trailer attached with the motorbike and BBQ grill)...Sixty or more feet long and nothing more than a valid Quebec basic driver's licence at the helm. To think I once considered joining those happy campers: Sanity prevailed before I mortgaged the condo and sold a kidney to afford my own metallic road hog. Alas; lest I be accused of calling the kettle black - I shan't complain their damned drivers are all "senior citizens".

STRANGE BUT TRUE: You would think that the City of New York could find a better way to ship new subway cars. New York's subway system is historic, efficient, and among the oldest in the world. I've not ever taken the "A-train", but Duke Ellington's signature song about the Brooklyn subway line conjures-up just about all the emotions one should have about the "Big Apple's" famed underground. You'd think! I don't know where these subway cars are built - obviously in Northern New York - But Interstate #81 seems hardly the appropriate place for a convoy of railway cars on flat bed trucks.

Though still, I shall carry-on!

REASSESSING THE OPTIMISM

The U.S. Vice-President, Joe Biden, offered a bleak assessment just a few days ago in a public statement about last year's Presidential elections: "We inherited a mess!"

His statement, timed with a recent sharp decline - [The sharpest ever second to third quarter (annual) drop for an elected President] - in "Job Performance" statistics for Barack Obama, caused me to reflect about the joyous optimism I sensed a year ago driving through 20% of the contiguous States just a few days after that election.

In a blog post then - "ROAD STORY (Part 1)" (November 7/08) - I wrote of my impressions after the first of three days travelling south; from a surprising greeting at the Canada-U.S. border crossing at Hill Island, New York; to complete strangers sharing their optimism at highway rest stops. Has one year made such a difference?

In about 72 hours, I will be on that journey once more through the nine States of the American Atlantic seaboard crossing from New York into Pennsylvania; through Maryland, West Virgina, Virginia, then North and South Carolina and Georgia before reaching my winter destination in central Florida.

Just this week Canada's new Ambassador, Gary Doer, presented his credentials to the American Head of State. Mr. Doer faces several challenges: He must convince the Americans to ease-up on the threat occasioned by their isolationist economic policies; somehow he must offer workable solutions to bridge over the "hardening" of our shared border; and he must resist pressure on Canada to extend our combat commitments in the Afghanistan War. Doer's challenges though are just small "blips" on the increasingly complicated and complex American agenda.

Crucially important and relevant mid-term Congressional elections are now less than one year hence and, as witnessed by this week's surprising elections of independent Governors in New Jersey and Virginia, President Obama is facing potential significant losses in both of the Legislative Houses which are now controlled by the Democrats. Canada's role may be insignificant, but the Afghanistan War effort looms large in the minds of Americans sick of two wars begun more than eight years ago. Though significantly watered down to appease critics; the President's health care agenda is being stymied at every step. The national debt of the United-States, now well in excess of $10-Trillion, has essentially mortgaged America's future beyond the end of this century...if not till the end of time.

Void of effective political opposition from the Republican party; ultra-conservative media critics and commentators have filled the vacuum and have been relentless in their personal attacks on the President, his policies and his administration.

Gauging and reassessing America's new political reality after the renewed sense of optimism which swept the country a year ago this week will make for an interesting educational journey. It may even challenge my notions about human dynamics. I am anxious to find out once I begin driving south later this weekend. Stay tuned!