Well, I could give you some links to some interesting articles I've read in Canada's press about the history and purposes of USA policy in Afghanistan, but I doubt they'd convince you of anything, Bill. ;-) No, I don't do mindreading, I just read the political articles in our press, that's all. I mostly read the Toronto Star and the Globe and Mail, which are both highly respected mainstream Canadian newspapers with some very good columnists (not all of whom agree by any means...). It's not Mr Obama himself I have a negative opinion of, it's the overall foreign policy objectives of the American empire, and he's the guy who has the bad luck to be officially leading it at the moment.

The main reason the oil and gas policy is "secret" (meaning it doesn't get discussed much in your mass media) is because your American empire, like all empires, would prefer its own people to believe that it's acting out of idealism...not out of sheer pragmatic self-interest. It would like them to believe it's helping other nations, not robbing them.

In this respect it's like all aggressive empires. They all tell their people misleading fairy tales in order to keep them in support of imperial policy, and imperial policy always involves fighting wars of choice and making incursions on other people's land to secure their strategic resources and to achieve a better strategic position vis a vis competing empires.

The main competing empires facing the USA/UK right now are the Russians and the Chinese. The Russians and the Chinese play similar imperial games, of course, and they also feed their people with misleading fairy tales to get them onside in support of national imperial policy. This sort of thing has been going on for the past 4,000 years if not longer, but the main players keep changing as the centuries go by.

You happen to be living in the present "Rome" and Obama is the new emperor. When he's done, another emperor will replace him, but the real player is the Empire itself. I happen to be living in one of the present "Rome's" client states, an unofficial but actual part of the Empire...a colony in all but name. As such, we have a rather different view of the situation, but our government usually complies pretty closely with your government's imperial policy, because it cannot afford not to...there would be very severe financial measures taken against us if we didn't do pretty much as we are told to.

Our press, however, is not nearly as taken in by the official line as yours is vis a vis your foreign policy. As for our politicians? Well, they do what the big financial players (who are American) tell them to. ;-) They cooperate. And that's why we still have troops fighting and dying in Afghanistan. A majority of our public wants them out.