Reply #26: In general you are correct, Obama ran as what he is: a centrist.

[Lasher]

But I'm going to take issue with one thing you said:

For example, he never promised to end the Iraq war as soon as he took office. He said he would end the war "responsibly," within 18 months. That is exactly how it is headed We will be 99% out of Iraq by the end of August.

18 months would have put the deadline just 1 month and 22 days from now. In February 2009 he said that all but 50,000 of them would be out by August 31, 2010. That deadline was two months later than the one he cited during the campaign. And he's re-classified 50,000 of them as 'non-combat' soldiers so that it will look like they won't be there until the end of 2011 when they will finally come out. Or not.

As a veteran I know there is no such thing as a 'non-combat' soldier. But OK, I'll go with what he said in February 2009: 50,000 or less by August 2010.

The troop level at the end of April this yearwas 95,000 (scroll to page 19). In January 2009 there were 142,000 US soldiers in Iraq. That means we had a total of 20 months to get 92,000 soldiers out. So far it's taken 16.5 months to get 47,000 soldiers out, an average of 2,849 per month. We'll have to withdraw 45,000 more soldiers to get the troop level down to 50,000 by the new deadline 3.5 months from now. That's 12,857 soldiers per month.

Obama broke his campaign promise of 18 months. And it doesn't look like he's going to keep his February 2009 promise of 50,000 or less by the end of August this year. I hope I'm wrong. We'll see.