Washington Post's blinders on Afghan War

Sometimes when perusing the Washington Post's editorials, you have to wonder if the editors read their own newspaper's reporting or perhaps they just look at what reinforces their preconceived opinions–as just occurred regarding Afghan War progress. On Thursday, the Post's neocon editorial writers basked in recent breaks in the clouds over the new Kandahar offensive. The armchair warriors proclaimed there is now "evidence to suggest that the Afghan surge [which the Post's editorialists favored] is beginning to succeed in its first aim, which is to break the Taliban's military momentum." And, in fact, the editorial writers can point to a recent Post article to back up this assessment. However, what's amazing–even by the Post's standards–is that the editors ignored a front-page news article in the Post on Wednesday that essentially contradicted the earlier happy-news story. The Post 's national security correspondent Greg Miller reported that "an intense military campaign aimed at crippling the Taliban has so far failed to inflict more than fleeting setbacks on the insurgency or put meaningful pressure on its leaders to seek peace, according to U.S. military and intelligence officials citing the latest assessments of the war in Afghanistan.