Washington Post: "Obama's a pussy !!"

Maybe not those exact words, but those are the sentiments expressed by Richard Cohen.

Barack Obama's trip to Copenhagen to pitch Chicago for the Olympics would have been a dumb move whatever the outcome. But as it turned out (an airy dismissal would not be an unfair description), it poses some questions about his presidency that are way more important than the proper venue for synchronized swimming. The first, and to my mind most important, is whether Obama knows who he is.

This business of self-knowledge is no minor issue. It bears greatly on the single most crucial issue facing this young and untested president: Afghanistan. Already, we have his choice for Afghanistan commander, Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, taking the measure of his commander in chief and publicly telling him what to do. This MacArthuresque star turn called for a Trumanesque response, but Obama offered nothing of the kind. Instead, he used McChrystal as a prop, adding a bit of four-star gravitas to that silly trip to Copenhagen by having the general meet with him there.

This is the president we now have: He inspires lots of affection but not a lot of awe. It is the latter, though, that matters most in international affairs, where the greatest and most gut-wrenching tests await Obama. If he remains consistent to his rhetoric of just seven weeks ago, he will send more troops to Afghanistan and more of them will die. "This is not a war of choice," he said. "This is a war of necessity. Those who attacked America on 9/11 are plotting to do so again. If left unchecked, the Taliban insurgency will mean an even larger safe haven from which al-Qaeda would plot to kill more Americans."

Obama could have gone further. Not only would the Taliban be restored, but the insurgency might consume Pakistan. If that happens, then a nuclear power could become a failed state -- Pakistan's pretty close to that now -- and atomic weapons could fall into the hands of terrorist organizations. India, just next door and with mighty antipathy for Muslim terrorism, could well act on its own. The bloodbath the British tried to limit in 1947 when they partitioned the subcontinent might well resume -- this time with nuclear weapons

Also of note in the article -- after years of the media breathlessly reporting every casualty in Iraq, Cohen now finds it necessary to put the casualty count in perspective.*

America, after all, has little tolerance for loss of life. The killing of eight American soldiers in Afghanistan over the weekend was front-page news. Contrast that with the numbers from Vietnam -- 61 dead from a single battalion in a single 1967 battle.

* To be clear, the loss of every single American in this war is a terrible price and an unspeakable tragedy for a family here in the states and should never be minimized. My point is simply that context was never provided when they were trying to denigrate Bush.