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Is Obama's Afghanistan Turning Into LBJ's Vietnam?

Both presidents tried to push big home agendas during war

By Matt Cantor,  Newser Staff

Posted Aug 23, 2009 9:23 AM CDT

(Newser) – As the war in Afghanistan rages alongside President Obama’s sweeping domestic battles, he’s keenly aware of the dangers of becoming a modern-day LBJ, an insider tells the New York Times. Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society program at home was dogged by the Vietnam war, a historian says; Obama must “worry about the outcome” in Afghanistan “and how it could spill over into everything else he wants to accomplish.”

Afghanistan “has indisputably become his war,” Peter Baker writes, and Obama seeks to contain terrorism just as Johnson sought to contain communism. Meanwhile, war opposition is getting louder in Washington, and even Obama’s Afghan envoy finds success difficult to define. “We have the wolf by the ear,” says a retired Army officer—while there may not be the “political and financial capital” to “stick it out” 10 years, “withdrawing, the cost of that seems awfully high.” And, concludes Baker, "as LBJ discovered, the wolf has sharp teeth."

President Barack Obama walks from the Oval Office of the White House in Washington Friday, Aug. 21, 2009.
President Barack Obama walks from the Oval Office of the White House in Washington Friday, Aug. 21, 2009.   (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
President Barack Obama talks about the the Afghan elections, Friday, Aug. 21, 2009, outside the White House, prior to boarding Marine One and departing for Camp David.
President Barack Obama talks about the the Afghan elections, Friday, Aug. 21, 2009, outside the White House, prior to boarding Marine One and departing for Camp David.   (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
President Lyndon B. Johnson addresses the nation on his first Thanksgiving Day television program, broadcast from the executive offices of the White House, 1963.
President Lyndon B. Johnson addresses the nation on his first Thanksgiving Day television program, broadcast from the executive offices of the White House, 1963.   (Getty Images)
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COMMENTS
Showing 3 of 17 comments
cognitivefilter
Aug 24, 2009 3:18 AM CDT
i am so nervous about this afghan war and how it might destroy obama's dreams of becoming the best president evarrrrr. WAR IS NEVER GOOD FOR NO ONE ANYWHERE
Newser001
Aug 23, 2009 11:29 AM CDT
Well put, CaptainZ64. Its a Catch-22.
freethemall
Aug 23, 2009 10:57 AM CDT
I am not aware that it ever was our goal to "conquer" Afghanistan.

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