We'll see. As long as you're "considering," I suppose you can't get in trouble for actually doing something. Obama is trying to figure out how to bail out without looking like he's bailing out, and as soon as he figures that out, he'll probably do it.

Like Iran's nuclear weapons policy morphing into "so what's wrong with Iran having nuclear weapons?" I suspect Afghanistan policy is going to morph into "so what's so bad about the Taliban running things?"

Keep in mind that this same Obama spent a lot of time a while back fighting against the surge in Iraq.

Obama has an interesting view of reality that seems to be common among a certain kind of academic or politician. I'm sorting it out, but it's the same gap you see in a university between those who specialize in "fuzzy" studies, and those who work in engineering, science, or anyplace else where objective reality drives things more than someone's opinion does.