The contrast on scientifically-based concerns over global warming couldn't be greater between Presidents Barack Obama and George W. Bush, as President Obama illustrated today in his brief, bold speech at U.N. Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen.

Obama may be stumbling on health care reform legislation, but he scored resoundingly in his landmark remarks on the urgent international need for a climate change treaty, when the President insisted:

"... all major economies must put forward decisive national actions that will reduce their emissions, and begin to turn the corner on climate change.

"I'm pleased that many of us have already done so, and I'm confident that America will fulfill the commitments that we have made: cutting our emissions in the range of 17 percent by 2020... "

And in great historical contrast to President Bush, whose administration alternatively denied and ignored climate change altogether, President Obama orated:

"This is not fiction, this is science. Unchecked, climate change will pose unacceptable risks to our security, our economies, and our planet. That much we know. So the question before us is no longer the nature of the challenge - the question is our capacity to meet it."

President Bush, of course, famously refused to allow the U.S. to sign on to the Kyoto international pact to stem global warming.

Take a few minutes to savor President Obama's Speech at U.N. Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, and to rejoice at the positive difference for our great country, and the world, that an election can make!

Quick Reading on Climate Change Basics

• What Is Global Warming?
• Global Warming Facts and Evidence
• The Causes of Global Warming
• The Effects of Global Warming
• Solutions to Stop or Slow Global Warming

(Photo taken on December 12, 2009 at the U.N. Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen: Miguel Villagren/Getty Images)

I fully agree with Dr. Howard Dean that the Senate health care "reform" bill, which President Obama has permitted to be neutered by Sen. Joe Lieberman, must be killed.

My logic is simple: without either a public plan option or buy-in to Medicare or a similar plan, the Senate bill does not reform the existing system. In fact, it clearly exacerbates the existing system. Hear me out:

• The sole purpose of a Medicare-like plan is to provide lower-cost competition to private insurers. Competition will naturally force them to lower their exorbitant costs to consumers.

• The Obama-Lieberman health care plan eliminates all proposed competition for private insurance corporations in what Dean calls "a bigger bailout for the insurance industry than AIG."

• It's unclear whether or not the Obama-Lieberman Health "Reform" Plan still contains a mandate that all Americans must buy health insurance coverage. But both stances have major conundrums.

• An Obama-Lieberman plan mandate that all Americans purchase health care coverage will translate into tens of billions more annually for private insurers, but with absolutely no measure to control costs charged to consumers.

  Thus, the same private insurers who caused our current unaffordable mess can (and will, according to history!) charge sky-high prices, and we have no choice but to pay.

• If the Obama-Lieberman plan does not mandate that all Americans purchase health care coverage, then only the sickest uninsured people are likely to purchase coverage... which, of course, will raise premiums prices charged to consumers by the private insurers.

It's easy to blame Joe Lieberman... which I do... but let's be honest: Joe's been a preening, obstructionist jerk for years now. We should have expected no less than this last-minute attention-getting stunt from him.

Besides, "Mr. Lieberman has taken more than $1 million from the industry over his Senate career... He doesn't seem to have forgotten that," per the New York Times.

The buck stops squarely with President Obama, who got himself elected by solemnly promising "a new national health plan to all Americans" that offers "quality, affordable and portable Coverage for all" and that "lowers costs for the U.S. health care system ." (Source: Obama Campaign Promises: Health Care.)

But President Obama rolled over and acquiesced to Sen. Lieberman's demands to neuter the bill, in order to eliminate reform of private insurance corporation practices.

I committed earlier this week that if Senators Russ Feingold and Sherrod Brown and Dr. Howard Dean expressed full-on support for the Senate health care bill, count me in.

Per The Hill, "Feingold said that responsibility ultimately rests with President Barack Obama and he could have insisted on a higher standard for the legislation. 'This bill appears to be legislation that the president wanted in the first place, so I don't think focusing it on Lieberman really hits the truth,' said Feingold."

About the fate of the Senate bill, Sen. Feingold said, "I am not making a judgment until I see the CBO numbers and that's only the beginning."

Per The Columbus Dispatch, "Sen. Sherrod Brown acknowledged last night that he is 'disappointed' that the compromise health-care package does not include a federal plan or expand Medicare, but he said he will support the current version because it would extend insurance to 30 million more Americans... it could be better. I think it's a good bill, but it's not a great bill."

This morning on ABC-TV, Howard Dean stated, ""You will be forced to buy insurance. If you don't, you'll pay a fine. It's an insurance company bailout... This is an insurance company's dream. This is the Washington scramble, and it's a shame."

Another rich bail-out of greedy corporations. More costs and fees foisted on the American people. And the benefits are quite questionable, at best.

I say kill the Obama-Lieberman health care "reform" bill, and let the Senate start over from scratch.

Essential Reading

• By Glenn Greenwald at Salon: White House as helpless victim on healthcare
• Liberal Comfort with Health Bill from Dean, Feingold, Brown
• Connection Between Afghan War Surge and Sputtering Health Care Prospects?

My 2010 New Year's resolution is to judge President Obama by his actions, and not by his words.

Sure, it'll be hard to do. Very hard. His smooth words and ringing sentiments are usually metaphorical water for the thirsty, food for the hungry, liberal manna for the Democratic masses. It's difficult to separate the substance of the 44th U.S. president from his extraordinary eloquence.

Indeed, his transcendent ability with the orated word first brought him to national attention with his charismatic 2004 Democratic convention speech when he pronounced to startled, thunderous liberal acclaim:

"The pundits, the pundits like to slice-and-dice our country into Red States and Blue States... But I've got news for them...

"We worship an awesome God in the Blue States, and we don't like federal agents poking around in our libraries in the Red States. We coach Little League in the Blue States and yes, we've got some gay friends in the Red States."

But five years later, Obama has done absolutely nothing to either help his "gay friends," or to scale back the intrusiveness of the Patriot Act.

He campaigned brilliantly in 2007-08, and won our hearts and minds with seemingly sincere promises for wonderful ideas, including:

• Health Care for "All" - "Quality, affordable and portable health care coverage for all"

• Iraq War - "Obama will immediately begin to remove our troops from Iraq. He will remove one to two combat brigades each month, and have all of our combat brigades out of Iraq within 16 months."

• Jobs - "Barack Obama believes we need to double federal funding for basic research and make the research and development tax credit permanent to help create high-paying, secure jobs."

• Rural America - "Obama will invest in rural small businesses and fight to expand high-speed Internet access. He will improve rural schools and attract more doctors to rural areas."

But health care legislation is struggling, in large part due to hs presidential silence. Mr. Obama often alludes to ending the Iraq War, but 120,000 U.S. soldiers remain quietly stationed there. Until lately, jobs creation has been a back-burner issue for the Obama White House, and new federal funding for research is anemic. And new investment in rural areas... education, small businesses, doctors... is zilch.

The list of Obama's other grand plans followed by half-completions, slipping timelines, and missed deadlines goes on and on and on... Think Guantanamo Bay detention camp closure, think green technology, think teacher residency and mentoring programs.

Just today in colorful, TV-ready remarks, President Obama lambasted bankers for failing to do their part to "rebuild our economy" after Americans saved banks and bankers from imminent disaster.

If you heard Obama's bitten words, you were definitely on the President's side. But where's the follow-up action-plan by this President, who bailed out the bankers with no-strings billions, turned a blind-eye to their obscenely rich bonuses, and hawks toothless "reform" of the banking industry?

Where are Obama's post-hot air mandates for banks? Does he still naively believe that bankers will change their ways out of conscience and fear of presidential scorn? Or is Obama's can-do fierceness reserved for TV cameras?

(Look closely at the photo, above, of today's meeting. How many frowning, worried bankers do you see? I see exactly NONE.)

If you listen to Obama's soaring words or read his masterly speeches, it's oh-to-easy to confuse his utopian thinking with boots-on-the-ground reality.

Yet last night, President Obama told Oprah that he grades himself "a good solid B+" for his first year performance in office. My first reaction was to wonder about the President's self-aggrandizing grade inflation.

But then I realized: President Obama seems to confuse polished wordsmithing and speaking with the heavy lifting of actual leadership. And he doesn't seem to grasp that anyone can sermonize; the hard task of principled leadership takes more effort, more energy, more commitment, more involvement, more boldness.

As I stated before, my 2010 New Year's resolution is to judge President Obama by his actions, and not be blindsided by his words. Based on his actions in 2009, I grade his first year in office a shaky C.

And I pray that in 2010, President Obama snaps out of his dreamy cocoon of ivory-tower intellectualizing, and starts providing the sharp-edged, hands-on leadership that everyday Americans desperately need and deserve. He failed to do that in 2009.

About the rumored new Senate health care plan proposal, I agree with Dr. Howard Dean, former DNC chair and author of "Prescription for Real Health Care Reform," who commented to the Washington Post's The Plum Line:

"The question is, is there enough of a kernel of real reform in the bill to make it possible for progressives to vote for it? Given the details we know today, I think there is.

"The group at largest risk is being taken care of, those over 55. There really is reform. Is there enough reform? No. But significant reform matters."

I call it "rumored" because full details haven't been released... and because the "facts" of the plan vary widely, depending on the political persuasion of the particular U.S. senator commenting on the "deal."

The expansion of Medicare, which now covers Americans 65 years and older, to cover Americans starting at 55 years old, is pure genius... and cleverly designed to embarrass Republican senators into supporting the measure. For weeks, a plethora of Republicans has railed against any Medicare cuts that might be economically necessary to pay for health care reform that includes a public plan option.

Truth is, the public plan option is merely a watered-version of single payer health coverage, which is much more desirable to liberals. Medicare, which is universally admired by both conservative and liberal users, is a successful single-payer system.

But much remains unknown about this new Senate health care plan proposal. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid sent the plan to the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office this week for scoring, which will provide many answers. One fact I need to know before throwing my support behind this latest bill is: how many uninsured Americans will remain uninsured under this plan?

In the most inspired move of the entire 2009 Democratic drive for health care reform, Sen. Reid established a working group of ten Democratic senators... five centrists and five liberals... who have worked, and will continue to work, together on this latest iteration of health care legislation. The ten Democratic senators are:

Liberal Democrats in health care working group

• Sen. Russ Feingold of Wisconsin
• Sen. Sherrod Brown of Ohio
• Sen. Tom Harkin of Iowa
• Sen. Jay Rockefeller of West Virginia
• Sen. Chuck Schumer of New York

Centrist Democrats in health care working group

• Sen. Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas
• Sen. Mary Landrieu of Louisiana
• Sen. Mark Pryor of Arkansas
• Sen. Tom Carper of Delaware
• Sen. Ben Nelson of Nebraska

One definitive statement I can make today about this newest Senate health care plan proposal: I deeply respect the hearts, minds, and voting records of Sen. Feingold and Sen. Brown.

If these two progressive senators, and Howard Dean, give the Senate health reform bill a hearty YES, count me in, too!

(Photo of Dr. Howard Dean: Mark Wilson/Getty Images)

Turnout is expected to be very light on December 8th, Tuesday, when Massachusetts voters go to the primary polls to decide the Democratic and Republican candidates to succeed Sen. Ted Kennedy, who passed away on August 26, 2009. Sen. Kennedy occupied the U.S. Senate seat for 46 years.

Per all polls, frontrunner state Attorney General Martha Coakley holds a substantial lead over an interesting field of four Democratic candidates, including:

• Rep. Michael Capuano, a six-term Congressman who drew both praise and endorsement from House speaker Nancy Pelosi, who dubbed Capuano "courageous" for his support of the House health care reform bill. Noted the Speaker, "He's not ideological; He's operational. He's there to get the job done for the American people."

• Steve Pagliuca, an extremely wealthy investment banker as well as co-owner of the NBA's Boston Celtics, who is reputed to have spent what may equal $100 per vote on this race.

• Alan Khazei, a Harvard-educated social entrepreneur who has founded several influential community service non-profit organizations. Khazei won the Boston Globe endorsement for this primary election.

Despite Ms. Coakley's lead in the polls, low voter turnout can be a wild-card that leads to unpredicted results. And, as the editor of the Boston Business Journal penned about Coakley, "She has been about as exciting as a dial tone in this race."

On Sunday, though, Attorney General Coakley won the former President Bill Clinton's endorsement, which will be robo-called to 500,000 Bay State voters. Coakley is expected to draw the lion's share of Democratic women's votes, largely due to her uncompromising pro-choice stances, her vociferous support of Hillary Clinton in the 2008 presidential race, and her strong support of gay marriage. (See Profile of Martha Coakley, Senate Candidate from MA.)

In contrast to Rep. Capuano. Martha Coakley firmly pledged that, as a senator, she would not vote for health care reform legislation that contained Stupak amendment-like restrictions on abortion rights.

Despite an energized get-out-the-vote drive by some progressives, including Progressive Democrats of America, for Rep. Capuano, I predict that Attorney General Martha Coakley will be the victor in tomorrow's Democratic primary for Ted Kennedy's Senate seat... although by a smaller margin that predicted by the polls.

The election between the primary winners is slated for January 19, 2010. Look here for handicapping of the race.

Essential Reading

• Stupak Amendment Takes Toll on Massachusetts Senate Race
• Profile of Martha Coakley, Senate Candidate from MA
• Profile of Sen. Ted Kennedy of Massachusetts, Equal Opportunity Champion

If I was more deeply cynical, I'd believe that the timing of President Obama's Afghan War surge announcement was conveniently related to the sputtering Senate health care reform debate..

After all, Obama's Afghan War will cost at least $30 billion more yearly, in addition to $3.6 billion monthly now spent in Afghanistan.

What better face-saving excuse is there for President Obama to "reluctantly" embrace scaled down health care reform... without a public option... than fiscal pressures caused by pouring requisite billions into a war in "our vital national interest" involving the "security of the United States and the safety of the American people." (Quotes from Obama's Afghan War speech).

As acerbic Rep. David Obey (D-WI), a 40-year House member and chair of the powerful Appropriations Committee, astutely drolled in The Economist, "There ain't going to be money for nothing if we put it all into Afghanistan."

It's the perfect, victim-based rationale for the Obama administration's highly possible failure to deliver effective health care reform after a year of intense debate and negotiations, and two years of candidate Obama's solemn promises to "make available a new national health plan to all Americans... to buy affordable health coverage that is similar to the plan available to members of Congress."

Just last week, despite record-level unemployment across the nation, President Obama said he has no money for jobs creation programs... and yet he apparently has plenty to fund 30,000 more soldiers for more nation-building in the Middle East. Could health care reform suddenly be the next program for which he has "no money?"

Yes, if I was more deeply cynical about the Obama administration, I could just hear it coming: I really do want genuine health care reform, including a public option to drive down costs for everyone, but, because the American people are in grave danger, we can't afford it right now.

Senate debate of health care reform is going badly, and negotiations for genuine reform appear to be next to nil.

And as of now, President Obama doesn't seem to have the gutsy appetite to boldly pass the Senate's "Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act," H.R. 3590, with only 51 votes via the reconcilation process.

Besides, boldly pushing health care reform legislation advocated by liberals would likely lose all those independents and conservatives who may give President Obama a second look now that he's decided to join George W. Bush in lavish spending on hapless, aimless, corporate-enriching wars in the Middle East.

Yes, if I was more cynical about the timing of President Obama's fear mongering-laced epiphany to surge U.S. involvement in the eight-year long Afghan War, I might find these sentiments quite believable.

Instead, I choose to believe this Democratic president who was elected to the White House by a liberal groundswell, when he said in his contradictory speech this week, "... the nation that I'm most interested in building is our own."

One thing, though: I confess to continuing puzzlement over Obama's inclusion of a quote from Republican President Dwight Eisenhower that "Each proposal must be weighed in the light of a broader consideration: the need to maintain balance in and among national programs."

He couldn't mean that because he HAS to send 30,000 more troops to nation-build in Afghanistan, he might not be able to afford comprehensive health care reform... could he?

Related Food for Thought

• Obama's Afghan War "Plan" Leaves Many Unanswered Questions
• Obama Endangers Presidency, Lets Down Troops By Sending More To Afghanistan

(Photo taken on Dec 3, 2009: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

President Obama's Afghanistan War speech last night was a tepid almagamation of compromises and odd contradictions made by someone with the mindset of a neutral, middle-management facilitator, not a President of the United States and leader of the free world whose worldview is firmly anchored by a set of guiding principles.

As a result, President Obama's confusing, platitude-heavy, specifics-light speech, and Afghanistan War "plan," satisfied no one. And his wordy speech left listeners with many more questions than answers.

Granted, President Obama is, at heart, concerned about protecting the U.S. from terrorism, and protecting the world from nuclear weapons now held by Pakistan. Orated the President last night:

"In the last few months alone, we have apprehended extremists within our borders who were sent here from the border region of Afghanistan and Pakistan to commit new acts of terror. And this danger will only grow if the region slides backwards and al-Qaeda can operate with impunity... " and

"We will have to take away the tools of mass destruction. And that's why I've made it a central pillar of my foreign policy to secure loose nuclear materials from terrorists, to stop the spread of nuclear weapons... "

All important sentiments, and probably true. But little in President Obama's nervous, unconfident speech answers how he would accomplish these urgent goals. Basic questions left unsatsified by Obama include:

• How are 30,000 more soldiers, in addition to 68,000 already there, supposed to tamp down terrorism in 18 months, a goal the U.S. has failed to accomplish in eight years? What will be different, new, and finally effective?

• How does the President propose to pay for his Afghan War initiative, which he vaguely estimated "is likely to cost us roughly $30 billion for the military this year... "? Let's be brutally honest with ourselves, liberals: Obama has not proven himself (yet?) to be an effective money manager.

• What is the exit plan for U.S. occupation of Afghanistan? The President blithely said that "After 18 months, our troops will BEGIN to come home." As the New York Times observed, "But he made no promise about when all American combat troops would be gone, saying only that the decision would be based on conditions on the ground."

Not even considering other pressing economic questions and legislative priorities, President Obama has not provided nearly sufficient reasons for our war-weary nation to send 30,000 more men and women of the U.S. armed forces into another ongoing Middle East conflict.

Based on what the President set forth last night, we've heard this fuzzy blather before, and it turned out to be a big, fat, expensive loser for the U.S. And long after the President has retired into richly comfortable private life, the American people are stuck with the bankrupting tab for another war mistake.

As is, I have to agree with Sen. Russ Feingold, even the pragmatic bellweather of careful progressive thought, who wrote in an email today:

"I do not support the president's decision to send additional troops to fight a war in Afghanistan that is no longer in our national security interest. It's an expensive gamble to undertake armed nation-building on behalf of a corrupt government of questionable legitimacy.

"Sending more troops could further destabilize Afghanistan and, more importantly, Pakistan, a nuclear-armed state where al Qaeda is headquartered. While I appreciate that the president made clear we won't be in Afghanistan forever, I am disappointed by his decision not to offer a timetable for ending our military presence there."

Related Reading

• Will the Buck Stop at Obama's Desk or Will He Continue To Whine About Bush?
• Obama Endangers Presidency, Lets Down Troops By Sending More To Afghanistan

Little disillusions me more about President Obama than his proclivity to either implement his own policies or to indulge in procrastination paralysis, then send his staff out to whine about the previous administration.

Granted, the fledgling Obama administration was dealt a bad hand, but so are many administrations.

And let's be honest: by February 2007, when Barack Obama declared his presidential intentions, everyone already realized that picking up the broken pieces of our country left behind by George W. Bush and Dick Cheney would be a very tough slog. True, U.S. financial markets collapsed after Mr. Obama won the Democratic presidential nomination, but throughout 2007-08, middle-class Americans were already facing undue financial pressures.

Presidential Advisor Valerie Jarrett, close Obama confidant from hometown Chicago, commented two weeks ago:

"Think about what we were handed. Two wars. A global economic meltdown. The largest deficit in the nation's history. A health-care crisis. A public-education crisis. An energy crisis. And a crisis in how we've been perceived around the world... "

In her ode to Obama's victimhood, Ms. Jarrett failed to acknowledge:

• H.R.1, American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, the landmark $825-billion stimulus bill urged and signed by President Obama as his first legislation in office.

• That President Obama has, thus far, willfully abdicated leadership on health care reform by never once clearly articulating what he supports in health care reform legislation.

  Instead, the President continues to play a semi-skillfull game of political dodge-and-weave, while colorfully bemoaning on TV, "We are the only advanced democracy on Earth... that allows such hardships for millions of its people."

• That he has accomplished a sum total of ZERO progress on either public education or the energy crisis, other than to punt these issues, which he claimed were top priorities, down the road. All while animatedly yakking in town halls about his supposed education and energy policies, of course.

• That little has changed in the Iraq War since President Bush left office. 120,000 U.S. troops remain in Iraq, as well as tens of thousands of U.S. private contractors. Troop deaths and serious injuries continue to mount, with deaths expected to soon reach 4.400 U.S. soldiers.
  Read more...

Holiday dinners with my husband's mostly moderate-Republican family in Reno, Nevada always provide me with new, interesting political insights quite different from my UCLA-educated, NPR-listening, Southern California liberal perspective.

Thanksgiving 2007 "gave me great hope for the 2008 presidential elections," especially my husband's Uncle Jack, a retired Army veteran and West Point attendee, who praised John McCain of old, but sadly commented, "I'm not so sure about John McCain anymore... " He then held little hope for any potential Republican presidential candidates. And his assessments two years ago were dead-on correct.

Thanksgiving 2009 with the same libertarian-leaning crowd offered an equally revealing take on the pressing issues of the day... but it all boils down to Clintonesque cliche: It's the economy, stupid!

The middle-aged husbands of two cousins, an orthopedic surgeon and an urban planner, are facing unanticipated salary cutbacks and diminished professional prospects, causing financial woes for these fathers of three children each... kids who range in age from 7-year-old twins to a 16-year-old college-bound high school junior.

Fortunately, these two men are among the lucky ones in northern Nevada: they're employed, their wives have returned to the work force (teaching and part-time nursing), and they're in no danger of losing their comfortable homes, although both houses have plunged in value. But both men have heart-rending stories of long-time friends or colleagues who are jobless, and a few who are homeless...

Meanwhile, Uncle Jack, the sharp-witted 80-year-old patriarch of the clan, pronounced that President Obama is "wishy-washy," and that Mitt Romney "is my guy" in 2012. Jack admires Romney in large part because of his economic expertise, but also because he's a leader and a "moral," stand-up guy.

When I asked him about Sarah Palin, Uncle Jack looked down at the table, shook his head, and quietly commented that he doesn't trust her, and that she knows... well, nothing. She has no substance, in his opinion; he doesn't take her seriously. And plainly, he wishes she would go away.

The only other topic of concerned discussion was over the No Child Left Behind Act. One of the cousins returned to elementary teaching after a six-year hiatus, and she's disgusted by new, undue pressures placed by NCLB mandates on both teachers and her fourth-graders to achieve, at all costs, high standardized test scores.

We talked about the inherent complexities in effectively inspiring fourth-graders to learn, and the unfairness of linking a teacher's salary to the performance of a classroom of young students to the results of one federally-approved test series.

No one had praises for President Obama. Or for Democrats. Or for Republicans, either.

I was left by my Nevada in-laws with a distinct impression not of anger, but of anxiety and bone-deep weariness. And of a gnawing, desperate hunger for bold change and smart, strong leadership.

Unlike my positive epiphanies at Thanksgiving 2007, Thanksgiving 2009 dinner table talks for our family conveyed an unmistakable discontent with all political incumbents... and an extraordinary desire for any measures or policies to stem unemployment and to bolster lagging real estate values.

For Thanksgiving 2009, U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan will feast on 467,499 pounds of turkey, 199,779 pounds of ham and beef, 61,813 pounds of stuffing, and 68,020 pies and cakes.

They'll also consume 13,231 cans of sweet potatoes and 8,952 cans of cranberry sauce, per the Defense Logistics Agency via USA Today. (Cans? Our troops aren't worth fresh produce and home-style cooking?)

Sadly for both our troops and our country, they'll likely also experience Thanksgiving 2010 in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The White House leaked word yesterday that President Obama will finally announce, next week, his verdict regarding committing more troops to Afghanistan. And, as liberals who voted for Obama in 2008 feared, Obama is apparently poised to send another 34,000 troops to the endless, futile fighting in Afghanistan.

After Obama's addition of 34,000 more troops, the U.S. will have more than 220,000 soldiers embattled in two fruitless Middle East wars: 102,000 in Afghanistan, and as of now, more than 120,000 remaining in Iraq. (For the latest, see Iraq War Facts & Statistics at Nov 20, 2009.)

Despite being mired in disastrous economic doldrums at home, the U.S. continues to spend $7.3 billion monthly in Iraq, plus $3.6 billion for Afghanistan, per a Congressional Research Service report dated September 28, 2009.

You read that correctly: $10.9 billion now spent monthly on two losing, directionless, corporate-enriching wars.

And yet Obama, who won the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination by billing himself as the anti-"dumb war" candidate, plans to up the ante with more troops, more spending, more casualties, more catastropic injuries... all for naught, as history has richly illustrated. Frankly, nothing could be much dumber than throwing untold tens of billions more down the black holes of Iraq and Afghanistan.

My fervent Thanksgiving prayer is that our so-called brilliant President comes to his senses, and announces full and immediate withdrawal of all U.S. combat troops from the Middle East, leaving less 40,000 American soldiers in both countries combined for a limited, well-defined post-U.S. peacekeeping transtion period.

To do otherwise... to order 34,000 more U.S. soliders to Afghanistan... would be incalculably devastating for the U.S. economy. Would be cruelly demoralizing for the U.S. armed forces, which are already badly demoralized as epitomized by record-high suicide and desertion rates.

And I fear will be as deadly to President Obama's fledgling tenure in the White House as Vietnam was to Lyndon Johnson's presidency.

If Obama loses his liberal base, he basically has no more supporters, as Palin-loving conservative crazies and the rest of the Republican Party will never, ever support him. And significantly increasing the Middle East war effort will cause liberals to irrevocably lose what remains of their beleaguered faith in Barack Obama. Period!

So please, Mr. President, do the right thing next week by telling our great country that most of our troops will finally be returning home sooner, not later, and that no more Americans will be sent to fight in Iraq and Afghanistan.

And please tell those brave fighting men and women that next year, they can enjoy Thanksgiving turkey, stuffing, pumpkin pie, and lovingly homemade sweet potatoes and cranberry sauce, with their families, not in a mess hall thousands of miles away from home.

(Photo taken on November 22, 2007 of a U.S. soldier at the Baghdad eating Thanksgiving dinner with his weapon close at hand: Chris Hondros/Getty Images)