Mainstream hawkish pundits rarely have a change of heart that leads them fully into the withdrawal camp. They’ll often get to the point where they hem and haw a bit, explaining all the downsides of continued engagement and the longs odds against success, but then they’ll conclude with either a reluctant insistence that we have to keep on fighting anyway, or else a murky affirmation that there’s no good choice to be had, just a least bad one.
But Afghanistan is changing that. Tom Friedman has now joined George Will in flatly recommending that we leave. “China, Russia and Al Qaeda all love the idea of America doing a long, slow bleed in Afghanistan,” he says today. “I don’t.” The conventional wisdom is slowly but surely shifting before our eyes.
So who will be the next bigfoot pundit to jump ship? Vote in comments.