Everything to gain.

Editor,

Washington continues year after year to harbor the fantasy that if we are nice to the ISI, they will be nice to us, the same fantasy the Obama White House harbors vis a vis the Republican Party. It has been obvious for years to anyone even marginally informed about Pakistani policies that the U.S. is being played for suckers by Islamabad in a serious and deadly game.

For me the Pakistan/Taliban story is the oldest of old news. But this story provides a teachable moment. Our president needs to wake up with respect to his Republican enemies in the same sense as our Secretary of State needs to wake up with respect to our Pakistani enemies. Getting to smile and feel expansively in the presence of one's enemies that we are all getting along just fine is the most foolish of foolish dreams.

Give up this post-partisan fantasy, Mr. Obama. The Republicans hate you, and you have nothing to lose -- and everything to gain -- by going directly and unrelentingly for their political throat.

Re: "The War Logs: Reaction to Disclosure of Military Documents on Afghan War" (7/25/2010)