{"id":1699,"date":"2007-11-25T11:45:39","date_gmt":"2007-11-25T16:45:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/?p=1699"},"modified":"2007-11-25T11:45:39","modified_gmt":"2007-11-25T16:45:39","slug":"rational-sobriety","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/?p=1699","title":{"rendered":"Rational Sobriety"},"content":{"rendered":"

From Michael Yon’s Thanksgiving report from Baqubah<\/a>, a call for sober <\/em>appreciation of significant progress – one that takes an ironic turn:<\/p>\n

Bottom line is that progress is clear and real, but there are tough days ahead and al Qaeda, for instance, is far from dead. The mood is of cautious optimism, with a concern that some of the very positive media lately might set expectations too high. (That\u2019s right: many military leaders are concerned that the media lately might be too positive.)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Call for Charles Krauthammer.<\/p>\n

Bottom line is that I am more optimistic than ever before, but I share that caution. It\u2019s obvious, too, that the tough fighting is not over.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It’s too early for anyone to be chanting the “V” word.\u00a0 Just as it’s too late to be crowing that Iraq is a lost cause (while mentally tallying up electoral votes).<\/p>\n

But I came across something today that might make veterans of the fighting in Baqubah proud. Back in May, just before operation Arrowhead Ripper, there were about 60 violent acts per day. Now there are about 6. The markets are opening and the streets are again filled with people. I thought the veterans of Baqubah might like to know that their efforts have made a tremendous difference for the people here. You fought hard. This writer saw it. Your sacrifices truly meant something.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

There’s nothing I could possibly add.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From Michael Yon’s Thanksgiving report from Baqubah, a call for sober appreciation of significant progress – one that takes an ironic turn: Bottom line is that progress is clear and real, but there are tough days ahead and al Qaeda, for instance, is far from dead. The mood is of cautious optimism, with a concern […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1699","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-war-on-terror"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1699","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1699"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1699\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1699"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1699"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1699"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}