Exit Ramps: Democrats Grow Restless on Afghanistan Strategy

ABC News’ Rick Klein reports: One exit strategy down, one to go.

An off-ramp, finally, for the decision-making process on Afghanistan: Monday night’s two-hour minute meeting of President Obama’s war council (meeting No. 9 — and this one, tellingly, with Office of Management and Budget Director Peter Orszag present) will be the last such gathering.

“President Obama is expected to address the nation in prime time a week from today, Tuesday, December 1, to announce his new strategy for Afghanistan and Pakistan,” ABC’s Jake Tapper reports. “Though the president has yet to pull the final trigger, officials expect him to select a strategy of sending approximately 34,000 additional U.S. troops to Afghanistan, officials said. Troops would begin deploying early next year.”

This whole process has been problematic for the White House — with the leaks (both directed and not so much), the rolling meetings, the public speeches and private hints, and the many distractions feeding storylines the president could do without.

And while the decision was not to decide, opposition has grown and cemented on both sides. The Dick Cheney “dithering” critique got stronger with age; throw in the skepticism of David Obey, Carl Levin, and Nancy Pelosi, and things get interesting on his left.

At this point — who on the Hill is going to want to stand beside the president when he announces his new strategy? (Is there a worse political case to make than giving Gen. Stanley McChrystal his numbers, but not an unqualified endorsement?)

The political storyline has beaten the president to the finish line. As if the war in Afghanistan isn’t enough, he’s got a quagmire at home to contend with — tied up with the other big forces pressing on his presidency.

ABC’s David Chalian: “The cost of human life and limb is, no doubt, the one that weighs most heavily on President Obama as he prepares his final touches on his Afghanistan strategy, but the estimated cost of $1 million per solider per year in the current economic context and its impact on other Obama priorities is one the White House is taking into very serious consideration. … On Afghanistan, Democrats are mixing a much more dangerous political brew for President Obama [than on health care.]”

A more problematic narrative — tied together by Les Gelb, coming out of the Asia trip. “Amateur Hour at the White House”:

“First, the trip’s limited value per day of presidential effort suggests a disturbing amateurishness in managing America’s power,” Gelb writes for The Daily Beast. “On top of the inexcusably clumsy review of Afghan policy and the fumbling of Mideast negotiations, the message for Mr. Obama should be clear: He should stare hard at the skills of his foreign-policy team and, more so, at his own dominant role in decision-making. Something is awry somewhere, and he’s got to fix it.”

Henry Kissinger, to columnist Roger Cohen: “He reminds me of a chess grandmaster who has played his opening in six simultaneous games. … But he hasn’t completed a single game and I’d like to see him finish one.”

Cohen, on the Afghanistan decision: “The clarity of March yielded to the cloudiness of fall and the long think has, in the words here of John McCain, ‘sounded an uncertain trumpet.’ Peter MacKay, the Canadian defense minister, said the hesitation was ‘not helpful’ because ‘everyone has hit the pause button until the U.S. decision.’ ”

“I worry now that Obama’s quest for perfect calibration will yield a less than resounding fudge where the tenacious message of a troop increase is undermined by talk of exit timing. That’s not how you break the will of an enemy.”

Some details: “Aides say this is not going to be a nation-building strategy,” Tapper reported on “Good Morning America” Tuesday. “Last night we’re told President Obama heard the right answers when it came to those off-ramps.”

McClatchy’s Jonathan S. Landay, John Walcott and Nancy A. Youssef: “The administration’s plan contains ‘off-ramps,’ points starting next June at which Obama could decide to continue the flow of troops, halt the deployments and adopt a more limited strategy or ‘begin looking very quickly at exiting’ the country, depending on political and military progress.”

Plus: “They will really push NATO — and what they want is 5 to 10,000 troops from NATO,” ABC’s Martha Raddatz reported on “GMA.” “So in the end, Stan McChrystal may get exactly the number he wanted.”

The sales pitch — wedged around the jobs summit: “The top U.S. general and the U.S ambassador in Afghanistan have been told to prepare to testify before Congress as early as next week, according to White House and other U.S. officials, giving an indication of how and when President Obama plans to announce his war strategy,” Michael D. Shear and Scott Wilson report for The Washington Post.

“Several people briefed on administration deliberations said that the president’s advisers had been testing the reaction to an increase of 20,000 to 30,000 troops,” The New York Times’ Eric Schmitt and Helene Cooper report. “American commanders in Afghanistan said they were anxious to learn whether Mr. Obama would approve 40,000 additional troops, as requested by General McChrystal, or something less.”

Did the middle ground slope upward? “Military officials and others expect Obama to settle on a middle-ground option that would deploy an eventual 32,000 to 35,000 U.S. forces,” the AP’s Anne Gearan and Jennifer Loven report.

Pressing, from the Democratic side of the aisle: “Call it ‘pay as you fight.’ After months of listening to conservatives caterwaul over deficits and health care, senior House Democrats want a graduated surtax on individuals and corporations to pay for another big drain on the treasury: the Afghanistan war,” Politico’s David Rogers reports. “The speaker has been silent thus far, and many dismiss the idea as more rhetoric than real legislation. But with President Barack Obama due to make a final decision soon on adding more U.S. troops, the initiative testifies to the growing restlessness among Democrats over the costs of the American commitment in Afghanistan.”

As for their critics — it’s a time for unease among the base:

“He had little record but lots of rhetoric — much of it morally stirring and beautifully written,” Richard Cohen writes in his Washington Post column. “As president, though, he has tried so hard to be the un-George Bush that the former president’s overweening moralism — his insistence on seeing things as either black or white — has become an Obama gray. Human rights in general has been treated as if it’s a Republican idea. Obama should reread his Philadelphia speech. He’ll find a good man there.”

A decision soon on Copenhagen: “What the president has always said is that if it looks as though the negotiations have proceeded sufficiently that going to Copenhagen would give a final impetus, a push, to the process, then he would be willing to go,” a senior administration official said Monday, per ABC’s Sunlen Miller. (Wasn’t this the Olympics standard, too?)

Coming Tuesday: A joint press conference with President Obama and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in the White House East Room, at 11:35 am ET.

And the evening brings the Obamas’ first State Dinner, with the guest list at 320.

It’s “the hottest ticket in town and the most highly anticipated social event of the year,” ABC’s Karen Travers reports. It is “the ultimate invitation and the result of months of planning by hundreds of staffers, including the First Lady herself.”

The entertainment: “Soul singer and Chicago native Jennifer Hudson has been confirmed to perform at the White House state dinner Tuesday evening, according to a representative at the singer’s label, Arista Records,” per The Washington Post.

Big names: “Among the Hollywood contingent asked to attend, are onetime DreamWorks partners David Geffen, Steven Spielberg and Jeffrey Katzenberg; Sony Pictures Entertainment chairman Michael Lynton; and WME Entertainment Agency co-CEO Ari Emanuel,” Nikki Finke reports for Deadline Hollywood.

Also on the list, per ABC’s Claire Shipman: Actress Freida Pinto, and Citigroup CEO Vikram Pandit — plus Robin Roberts.

The business end: “Behind the elaborate ceremony of the Indian prime minister’s state visit Tuesday, Manmohan Singh and President Barack Obama will be working to smooth over differences on climate change and U.S. ties with Indian rivals China and Pakistan,” the AP’s Foster Klug reports. “The White House is eager to show that, despite what some Indians see as a lack of attention during Obama’s first 10 months, it values Singh’s country as a key partner in dealing with extremists in South Asia, in settling international trade and global warming pacts and in steering the world economy out of turmoil.”

On health care — the big (true) picture: “So many Democrats have drawn so many lines in the sand on what they can and can’t support that the only way anything may get passed is if several of them go back on their word,” ABC’s Jonathan Karl reports.

Howard Dean, growing pessimistic: “This is really tough. I didn’t anticipate being in this position. I thought it would pass. Maybe Harry has some magic up his sleeve. But I don’t see how he gets those four votes … without compromising the bill,” Dean tells The Huffington Post’s Sam Stein.

Making that line in permanent ink: “I’m going to be stubborn on this,” Sen. Joe Lieberman, I-Conn., tells The Wall Street Journal’s Jerry Seib.

Seib: “So any version of a public option will compel Mr. Lieberman to vote against bringing a bill to a final vote? ‘Correct,’ he says.”

Back — and staying for a while: “Lobbying over abortion was turning into a sleepy business. But the health care debate has brought a new boom, and both sides are exploiting it with fund-raising appeals,” David D. Kirkpatrick reports in The New York Times.

Don’t forget jobs: “Just as Katrina exposed critical weaknesses in the priorities and competence of the Bush administration, the unfolding unemployment disaster is threatening to do the same for the Obama White House,” Arianna Huffington writes.

Palin 2012? “While the conventional wisdom has it that Palin is too badly damaged to make a serious run in 2012 — and I agree that her success is not probable — it is definitely a possibility that Palin could be elected president of the United States,” Matthew Dowd writes in a Washington Post op-ed. “Like it or not, if Sarah Palin decides to seek our nation’s highest office, she has a shot. The probability of her success depends on her ability, and that of President Obama, to admit and learn from their mistakes as we head into 2012.”

From the battle for the party soul — what Dede’s done: “A group of conservative Republican leaders is proposing a solution to the internecine warfare over what the party should stand for: a 10-point checklist gauging proper adherence to core principles like opposing government financing for abortion and, more generally, President Obama’s ‘socialist agenda,’ ” Jim Rutenberg and Adam Nagourney write in The New York Times. “In what was being dubbed a purity test when it leaked out to reporters on Monday, the proposal would require the party to withhold campaign money and endorsements from candidates who do not adhere to at least seven principles on the checklist.”

“The purpose is to assist in reestablishing the conservative bona fides of the Republican Party by putting our money behind conservative candidates who will govern as conservatives,” National Committeeman James Bopp Jr. of Indiana tells ABC’s David Chalian.

More party turmoil: “ABC News has learned RNC communications director Trevor Francis has resigned his post atop the GOP’s messaging shop.  No replacement has yet been named to succeed Francis,” Chalian reports. “The RNC advises that veteran Republican consultant and ad man Alex Castellanos will take over as senior communications adviser to the RNC.”

Vicki Kennedy sat down with Oprah, in an interview set to air Wednesday. Will she ever run for Senate? “No, no, not for me. Not for me, no,” she told Oprah. “We had Senator Kennedy in our household, and — no, not for me.”

(But keep the seat warm for Little Teddy — who’s ready to run in about 30 years, ABC’s John Berman reports.)

A Kennedy, as an issue in the race to replace Sen. Ted Kennedy, D-Mass.: “US Representative Michael Capuano and Attorney General Martha Coakley both said Providence Bishop Thomas Tobin’s overreacted in his written request that US Representative Patrick Kennedy not take communion because of the Rhode Island Democrat’s stance on abortion,” The Boston Globe’s Matt Viser reports.

In Florida, the pushback begins: “It’s hard to be more conservative than I am on issues — there’s different ways stylistically to communicate that — I’m pro-life, I’m pro-gun, I’m pro-family, and I’m anti-tax. I don’t know what else you’re supposed to be, except maybe angry too,” Gov. Charlie Crist, R-Fla., told the St. Petersburg Times’ Adam Smith. “Campaigns, thank God, are an educational opportunity. … I believe in Reagan’s 11th Commandment — thou shall not speak ill of a fellow Republican — but I also think you need to be honest and truthful and make sure that before people go to the ballot box they have a good opportunity to be well-informed.”

The never-ending saga of Gov. Mark Sanford, R-S.C.: “The State Ethics Commission has charged Gov. Mark Sanford with breaking state ethics laws 37 times, including using state planes for family trips, spending campaign funds on a hunting trip and flying first class, instead of coach, while on state travel,” Gina Smith writes for The State. “The commission, which last week wrapped up its preliminary, three-month-long investigation into allegations against the embattled governor, released the charges to the public Monday. The commission’s findings have been eagerly awaited by legislators, who are deciding whether to oust Sanford from office before his term ends in January 2011.”

Under Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, a new tone: “A new focus inside the State Department is financial inclusion: ensuring women have access to savings accounts, health insurance, home ownership and business funding,” Bloomberg’s Janine Zacharia reports. “By elevating the plight of women so publicly, Clinton has breathed new life into women’s issues on Capitol Hill.”

Congrats, and welcome: “Kevin Huffman wins the title of America’s Next Great Pundit, and along with it a three-month contract with The Post and a launching pad into the world of punditry.”

(Surely it was this performance, on ABCNews.com’s “Top Line” Monday, that put him over the top.)

The Kicker:

“National security.” — David Axelrod, in not discussing President Obama’s golf scores.

“Yes is the answer.” — Lou Dobbs, asked by Fred Thompson whether he’s thinking about running for president in 2012.

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