BASEBALL DIARY:
Mets 5, Tigers 0: the Tigers continue to struggle on the road. They fall meekly to the Mets in last night's affair, getting only 5 hits. It doesn't help that the Mets are hot, having won 21 of their last 28, and at home.
Meanwhile it was Rangers 13, Pirates 3: the Rangers are streaking; they're hot, everyone's hitting, they've won 10 in a row now, and they're playing the reeling Pirates at home. It all adds up to victories. The Rangers piled up 17 hits last night.
POLITICS UPDATE DEPT:
The McChrystal firing:
I can't really blame President Obama for doing it, given the near-insubordination McChrystal and aides professed, given how it must have soured the relationship between the prez and the general, given McChrystal's obvious level of discomfort with the administration (otherwise he would never have let the ROLLING STONE article go forward). But, as Thomas Sowell notes today, the truly important issue is our Afghanistan policy--and it has real holes in it:
"This is, after all, an administration that waited for months last year before acting on General McChrystal’s urgent request for 40,000 more troops, which he warned would be necessary to prevent the failure of the mission in Afghanistan. He got 30,000 eventually — and a public statement by President Obama about when he wants to start withdrawing American troops from that country. In no previous period of history has an American president announced a timetable for pulling out troops. They may have had a timetable in mind, but none of these presidents was irresponsible enough to tell the world — including our enemies — when our troops would be leaving. Such information encourages our enemies, who know that they need only wait us out before they can take over, whether in Afghanistan or elsewhere. At the same time, it undermines our allies, who know that relying on the United States is dangerous in the long run, and that they had better make the best deal they can get with our enemies."
Meanwhile, poll numbers don't look so good for President Obama these days, either. Check out the results from the latest NBC News-Wall Street Journal poll:
"Americans are more pessimistic about the state of the country and less confident in President Barack Obama's leadership than at any point since Mr. Obama entered the White House, according to a new Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll. The survey also shows grave and growing concerns about the Gulf oil spill, with overwhelming majorities of adults favoring stronger regulation of the oil industry and believing that the spill will affect the nation's economy and environment. Sixty-two percent of adults in the survey feel the country is on the wrong track, the highest level since before the 2008 election. Just one-third think the economy will get better over the next year, a 7-point drop from a month ago and the low point of Mr. Obama's tenure. Amid anxiety over the nation's course, support for Mr. Obama and other incumbents is eroding. For the first time, more people disapprove of Mr. Obama's job performance than approve. And 57% of voters would prefer to elect a new person to Congress than re-elect their local representatives, the highest share in 18 years."
In other polling news, polls still show the supposedly un-electable Sharron Angle leading Democratic leader Harry Reid in Nevada--by 7 points no less.
