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If it's Sunday, it's another John McCain "exclusive" interview on one of the bobblehead shows. David Gregory joined the set of Morning Joe to talk about all the insightful analysis we're going to get on his show from the panel segment on the United States' strategy in Afghanistan which looks like it includes exactly one anti-war opponent, Barbara Lee. And of course before we hear from that panel, we're going to be treated to the umpteenth interview too many from soreloserman Bomb-Bomb-Bomb-Iran McCain with his take on what our policy should be as well.

Mark Halperin of course, thinks that McCain is the perfect guest to be used as a "barometer" for how that bipartisanship is working out for President Obama. Yeah right. Not since he got a primary challenger. The only thing he serves as a "barometer" for these days is just how far right the Republicans are willing to go to please their wingnut base.

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Geraldo Rivera goes after Rolling Stone reporter Michael Hastings for his reporting which led to the resignation of Gen. Stanley McChrystal and goes so far as to compare him to al Qaeda. This is coming from the same guy that the military kicked out of Iraq back in 2003 because he disclosed information about troop movements on the air. He made similar remarks earlier in the week on Fox when he appeared with KT McFarland when he said "whoever was in charge of putting that reporter with those soldiers in that context allowed a rat to be in an eagle's nest." More on that from Reason Magazne:

Losing the War in Afghanistan? Blame Rolling Stone, Suggests Geraldo Rivera:

And now some pundits are making the reporter, Michael Hastings, out to be the bad guy. [...]

True, there are strategic implications: We learned that the top general in Afghanistan surrounds himself with idiots. As KT McFarland points out in the video, public officials and their aides should know better than to make disparaging and derogatory remarks in front of reporters. Far from having jeopardized our mission in Afghanistan—which is what Rivera is implying—the Rolling Stone article reveals important details about the people McChrystal relied on. Like, for instance, the McChrystal aide who described a meeting with a French minister as "f**king gay." Does this sound like the best team to head a war effort where the U.S. needs to win the hearts and minds of the people in Afghanistan and Pakistan?

I suspect Rivera is probably just jealous that someone went out and did real reporting for a change. Other journalists are jealous, too. Check out Jon Stewart making fun of them here.

During this interview with O'Reilly, Geraldo rails on about how the soldiers remarks should have been considered "off the record", he claims that they didn't know they were beig interviewed, he accuses Rolling Stone Magazine of being just as dangerous as al Qaeda to the mission in Afghanistan and wanting to rush the story to press without checking with the military first and even O'Reilly who obviously hates Rolling Stone for the article they did about him has to call out Geraldo for going over the top.

O'Reilly tells him that Rolling Stone claims they ran the quotes by Gen. McChrystal and he allowed the story to go to print and Geraldo does a complete 180 and says he'll take the magazine at their word and then credits Gen. McChrystal for "not trying to sleaze away." I guess it was asking too much of Geraldo to maybe actually find out himself if the magazine cleared the story with the military first before he went on the air and accused their reporter of being akin to a terrorist.

Transcript below the fold.

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Stephen Colbert has a suggestion for Gen. Petraeus to keep Americans as interested in what's going on in Afghanistan as they are in reality television; locate your headquarters in a cave-side mansion filled with cameras, 10 bachelorettes and your second in command, Lieutenant Colonel "The Situation."

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Here's your "liberal network" MSNBC giving Republicans unchallenged air time to insist that we need to stay in Afghanistan indefinitely, or in other words, forever. Andrea Mitchell interviewed William Cohen who informs us that we'd better be ready for another ten years there if we are going to "change hearts and minds" and stop the insurgents.

I would love for someone to explain to me how occupying a country and dropping bombs on the population is supposed to make someone love us. It's a ridiculous excuse for endless war.

Cohen: This goes down to the strategy level in terms of whether or not the American people are going to support a long term commitment because if changing hearts and minds would not be accomplished in eighteen months, it will take years, a decade or more of a substantial presence on the ground making sure that the Taliban, the insurgents don't come back. And so the notion that this is going to be... that we're going to have a reduction of the bulge so to speak or the increase in 18 months, it doesn't really deal with the issue that we still have to stay there for years to come and will the American people support that as our allies are leaving. That's a big issue.

And then we got treated to Lawrence Eagleburger a bit later in the day trashing the Obama administration for saying they are going to draw down troops in a year and for not sending in more troops as McChrystal had requested. I guess it was asking too much of the MSNBC host to inform the viewers about Mr. Eagleburger's affiliations and how they might relate to his position that endless military conflicts are just grand.

Lawrence Sidney Eagleburger became a member of the Iraq Study Group in November 2006 following the November 8, 2006, nomination of Group member Robert M. Gates by President George W. Bush to serve as Secretary of Defense and to replace Donald H. Rumsfeld, who resigned the same day.

Eagleburger, "a retired foreign service officer," served under Group Co-Chair James A. Baker III, "as deputy secretary of state and became secretary of state in August 1992 when Baker became White House chief of staff." [1] Eagleburger also served briefly as Secretary of State under President George H.W. Bush.

Among other boards, Eagleburger has served on the Board of Directors at Halliburton. [2] He is also on the board of counselors for the Arabic media group Layalina Productions.

Eagleburger has either served or is serving with the following:

• Chairman Emeritus, Academy of Diplomacy
• Director, Atlantic Institute (1987)
• Director, Halliburton Company (since 1998)
• Director, International Foundation for Education and Self-Help [2]
• Director, ConocoPhillips
• Director, Stimsonite
• Director, Universal Corporation
• Director, Corning Corporation
• Director, COMSAT
• Advisory Board, OILspace
• Strategy Board Member, Appian Group
• Member, Council on Foreign Relations (1988, 2001)
• Member, Trilateral Commission (1992, 1998)
• Advisory Committee, AmeriCares (at least in 2004)
• Former Director, It's My Party Too [3]
• National Honorary Advisory Council, Council for America's First Freedom [4]

And it's not just these two. That's all I've heard out of the right wing yappers for the last two days, endless wars and continue to enrich the military industrial complex as they bankrupt our country.

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In his Special Comment Keith Olbermann argues that President Obama should not accept Gen. Stanley McChrystal's resignation. Steve Hynd at Newshoggers has this take.

McChrystal: Once A Petulant Jerk... (Updated):

And so the big question is: will McChrystal be fired for this? There's certainly enough reason to do so, but I don't think so, reading between the lines of SecDef Gates' statement (emphasis mine):

"I read with concern the profile piece on Gen. Stanley McChrystal in the upcoming edition of ‘Rolling Stone’ magazine. I believe that Gen. McChrystal made a significant mistake and exercised poor judgment in this case. We are fighting a war against al Qaeda and its extremist allies, who directly threaten the United States, Afghanistan, and our friends and allies around the world. Going forward, we must pursue this mission with a unity of purpose. Our troops and coalition partners are making extraordinary sacrifices on behalf of our security, and our singular focus must be on supporting them and succeeding in Afghanistan without such distractions. Gen. McChrystal has apologized to me and is similarly reaching out to others named in this article to apologize to them as well. I have recalled Gen. McChrystal to Washington to discuss this in person."

In my experience, that's the kind of statement managers issue when they're giving a petulant jerk a final, written, warning. It's not the kind they make when they're looking to fire someone. It's full of language suggesting the miscreant realises his mistake, is sorry, and won't let it happen again. What it doesn't contain is anything suggesting the miscreant has crossed a line. So, I expect that McChrystal will get some kind of reprimand on his record, but won't get canned. Bringing political strategy into it, as it must, that's probably how the White House is thinking too. If McChrystal gets fired for insubordination, even despite his previous record of speaking - and leaking - out, then the G.O.P. and Democrat hawks will always say that the mission in Afghanistan suffered because of it and will make political hay from that conjecture. From the White House's point of view, better to wait another six months, perhaps, and fire McChrystal for actually failing.

I agree this is a lose/lose for the President no matter how he handles it. I don't agree with Keith that we're going to see a "humbled" Gen. McChrystal that will help him redefine the mission in Afghanistan. We need to redefine the mission there, but I don't see how McChrystal is the man to do that and tragically Obama does not appear to have any interest in getting us out of there either.

Personally I think he should accept his resignation, but given the political climate as Keith and Steve pointed out, I would suspect they're right and he keeps him, at least for a while.

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David Gregory talks to author Jon Krakauer about his new book 'Where Men Win Glory' and Gen. McChrystal's part in the cover up of Pat Tillman's death.

GREGORY: Jon Krakauer, I want to get to a key element of your book, "Where Men Win Glory," about Pat Tillman and how it relates to this current conversation about Afghanistan. Because it does involve General Stanley McChrystal, who was obviously critical on the stage now and was critical in the Tillman story of well. As a reminder, if you look at pictures of Pat Tillman, the NFL star with the Arizona Cardinals, decides to enlist in the Army, serves in the Rangers after 9/11. This was certainly a big story when he enlisted. And at the time, General McChrystal was actually head of Special Operations command.

So Pat Tillman was killed in a friendly fire incident and ultimately won the Silver Star, and that's what you focus on in the book and in a subsequent piece that you wrote for The Daily Beast. And here's what you wrote: "An October 5 Newsweek article [said, about General McChrystal] that `he has great political skills; he couldn't have risen to his current position without them.

But he definitelydoes not see himself as the sort of military man who would compromise his principles to do the politically convenient thing.' In the week after Tillman was killed, however, this is precisely what McChrystal appears to have done when he administered a fraudulent medical"--excuse me--"a fraudulent medal recommendation"--we're talking about the Silver Star--"and submitted it to the secretary of the Army, thereby concealing the cause of Tillman's death." Briefly explain what happened.

KRAKAUER: The--after Tillman died, the most important thing to know is that within--instantly, within 24 hours certainly, everybody on the ground, everyone intimately involved knew it was friendly fire. There's never any doubt it was friendly fire. McChrystal was told within 24 hours it was friendly fire. Also, immediately they started this paperwork to give Tillman a Silver Star.

And the Silver Star ended up being at the center of the cover-up. So McChrystal--Tillman faced this devastating fire from his own guys, and he tried to protect a young private by exposing himself to this, this fire. That's why he was killed and the private wasn't. Without friendly fire there's no valor, there's no Silver Star. There was no enemy fire, yet McChrystal authored, he closely supervised over a number of days this fraudulent medal recommendation that talked about devastating enemy fire.

GREGORY: And that's the important piece of it. And, and he actually testified earlier this year before the Senate, and this is what he said about it.

(Videotape, June 2, 2009)

LT. GEN. STANLEY MCCHRYSTAL: Now, what happens, in retrospect, is--and I would do this differently if I had the chance again--in retrospect they look contradictory, because we sent a Silver Star that was not well-written. And although I went through the process, I will tell you now I didn't review the citation well enough to capture--or I didn't catch that if you read it you could imply that it was not friendly fire.

GREGORY: Even those who were critical of him and the Army say they don't think he willfully deceived anyone.

KRAKAUER: That's correct. He, he just said now he didn't read this hugely important document about the most famous soldier in the military. He didn't read it carefully enough to notice that it talked about enemy fire instead of friendly fire? That's preposterous. That, that's not believable.

GREGORY: All right, part of this debate. Thank you all very much.

We'll continue our discussion with Jon Krakauer in our MEET THE PRESS Take Two Web Extra. Plus, read an excerpt from his book, "Where Men Win Glory." It's all on our Web site at mtp.msnbc.com. And we'll be right back.

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I suppose Bill Kristol fancies himself the "grown up" during this argument on Fox News Sunday. While discussing whether President Obama should be increasing troop levels in Afghanistan or not, Juan Williams points out that President Obama already gave Gen. McChrystal 21,000 additional troops this year, and the result has been nothing but increased casualties. Later in the segment Kristol responds.

Wallace: I know there are political pressures but I would like to think that this President—I do think that this President is trying to make the right decision. There is no guarantee if you give McChrystal the 60,000 troops that it’s going to work…(crosstalk) …particularly given the nature of the government that is in control in Afghanistan.

Kristol: Look, what is better about giving him, “giving him”—I like that—why do we have to use that formulation?—The President is sending as many troops as he thinks he should send, as many troops as he thinks best to accomplish the mission—unless he wants to abandon the mission. But he doesn’t want to abandon the mission. What argument… what serious grown up argument is there that sending 15,000 is any better than sending 40,000 troops when the generals, Gen. McChrystal and Gen. Petraeus think 40,000 is what we need to adequately resource the counter-insurgency.

Maybe we shouldn’t send so many bullets either—we shouldn’t send too many vehicles. They’re very expensive. I mean this notion that we’re sending—that we’re going to have more casualties is ridiculous Juan. Short term of course when you engage the enemy you might have more casualties. Ask any soldier or marine over there, “Would you prefer to have 110,000 of you or 70,000 of you?”—that we are stretched too thin. If we’re going to fight, let’s fight the war.

So when are you signing up to go over there Bill? Liz? Both of you ready to suit up and go put your lives on the line over there? I think if you asked those soldiers what they'd rather be doing, most of them would rather be home. Not on their third, fourth and fifth tours of duty.

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Contessa Brewer takes the NRCC to task for their remarks about putting Nancy Pelosi "in her place". I don't think I've ever seen her quite this pissed off. Give 'em hell gal.

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From CNN's State of the Union. Looks like some pushback against the Lindsey Grahams of the world from Jim Jones.

National Security Adviser Chides McChrystal:

President Obama's National Security Adviser James L. Jones suggested Sunday that the public campaign being conducted by the U.S. commander in Afghanistan on behalf of his war strategy is complicating the internal White House review now underway, saying that "it is better for military advice to come up through the chain of command."

Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, who commands the 100,000 U.S. and international forces in Afghanistan, warned bluntly last week in a London speech that a strategy for defeating the Taliban narrower than the one he is advocating would be ineffective and "short-sighted." The comments effectively rejected a policy option that senior White House officials, including Vice President Biden, are seriously considering nearly eight years after the U.S. invasion.

McChrystal's statement came a day after he was challenged by senior White House officials over his dire assessment of the war -- and what it will take to improve the U.S. position there -- during a video conference from Kabul with Obama and his national security team. Obama then summoned McChrystal to Copenhagen the day after the general's speech for a private meeting aboard Air Force One.

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Of course no one in the media is bothering to ask why Obama would have promoted the likes of Gen. McChrystal in the first place given his record.

McChrystal's Pat Tillman Connection:

Now the man who greased the chain of command that orchestrated this great deception is prepared to assume total control of US operations in Afghanistan: Lt. Gen. Stanley McChrystal. It was McChrystal who approved Tillman's posthumous Silver Star, a medal given explicitly for combat, even though he later testified that he "suspected" friendly fire.

Yet despite this, both Democrats and Republicans are rushing to heap praise on McChrystal, including Sen. John McCain. It was McCain who rushed to speak at Tillman's funeral and then, when the cover-up became known, pledged to help the Tillman family expose the truth. McCain later turned his back on the Tillmans when they raised the volume and demanded answers. As Pat's mother, Mary Tillman, said last year, "He definitely eased out of the situation. He didn't blatantly say he wouldn't help us, it's just that it became clear that he kind of drifted away."

And now the Tillman family, amidst bipartisan praise for Obama's new general, must once again raise the inconvenient truth.

[....]

What particularly rankles about Obama's choice of McChrystal, whose background is in the nefarious and shadowy world of "black ops," is that his actions in the Tillman cover-up feel emblematic instead of exceptional.

[....]

Clearly President Obama is trying to "own" the war in Afghanistan: upping the troop levels, making it his "central front" in the battle against terrorism and now placing his own general in charge. But the president is also disappointing a generation of antiwar activists who voted for him expecting an end to imperial adventures and torture sanctioned by the executive branch. Now a man who should perhaps be on trial at the Hague is in charge of Afghanistan. Obama needs to know it's not just the Tillmans who are enraged by this terrible choice.

As Siun at Firedoglake notes:

Jones was not the only one to push back on the McChrystal PR campaign this week and it seems that a number of informed voices seem to share my concern that McChrystal is “teetering towards insubordination.”

Transcript below the fold.

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