Shields, Brooks Analyze Obama’s Upcoming Afghanistan Announcement

Read the Full Transcript

• JUDY WOODRUFF:

  And to the analysis of Shields and Brooks. That's syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks, who joins us from Philadelphia.

  Gentlemen, thank you for being with us again.

  Mark, four days away from the president's announcement of strategy in Afghanistan.

  What do you expect from him, and what does he need to do?

• MARK SHIELDS:

  Well, Judy, he is speaking to a nation that is not simply skeptical; it's pessimistic and it's divided over Afghanistan.

  And we have had nothing but bad news, really, from Afghanistan, whether it is the corruption in Kabul, whether it is stuffed ballot boxes in the election, whether it — most of all, the increasing number of American casualties from that — that theater of combat.

  And, so, I think what the president, first of all, has to do is basically four things. First, he has to lay out to the American people who do not understand it, and it's starting with me, what it means if we lose Afghanistan — quote, unquote — "lose," I mean if we withdraw.

  And then, second, he has to lay out specifically what his strategy is, that new strategy, and how — quite — quite honestly, make that clear, and what that strategy sets out to achieve.

  And then the troops, the number of troops come in there, on top of that. And I think he has to tell us how success is going to be measured, progress is going to be measured, what success is, what form it will take. And, finally, I would say, he has to say how we're going to pay for it. And I think is what's — the issue that has been brought up by David Obey, the chairman of the Appropriations Committee, and other members of Congress.

  We have put $1 trillion on the credit card since the war began on 9/11 on both Iraq and Afghanistan. It's been unpatriotic in a literal since, and it's fiscally immoral to do so. And I think that's going to be a major issue in the coming debate over Afghanistan.