Just to be contrarian (0.00 / 0)

didn't the same thing initially happen in Iraq after troop levels were increased?

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by: illissius @ Thu Oct 01, 2009 at 05:13:12 AM CDT

Three data points... (0.00 / 0)

...nary an argument make.

Our presence in Afghanistan is equally as wrong as our presence in Iraq.

I'm interested to see what else dcrowe has to say on his blog, but after only watching this video and looking at the two graphs I have to say that he's merely shown a correlation and not actual causation.  This jump in logic happens all too often in MSM (foolish home buyers CAUSED the housing bubble; cow methane CAUSED global warming) and its a major stumbling block for actually delving into a real discussion of fixing/ending our presence in Iraq/Afganistan.

If we want to bring the troops home we need to bring it all the way around to causation to have a really strong argument to do so.  

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by: jlars @ Thu Oct 01, 2009 at 11:54:31 AM CDT

I realize this is a very late reply (0.00 / 0)

But I don't disagree with jlars characterization of the above. This is not intended to prove causation (troop increases LEAD TO civilian casualties), but correlation (troop increases have been ACCOMPANIED BY rising civilian casualties). The trick is, though, if correlation exists, that's sufficient to show that troop increases do not "shield Afghans from violence."

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by: dcrowe @ Mon Oct 05, 2009 at 21:00:19 PM CDT

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