Eh, I don’t know. There is a double standard at work here, but it has less to do with who’s in office than with the fact that the left’s painted itself into a corner by using Afghanistan as a talking point against Iraq for the past six years. Afghanistan’s the “good war” to which we should be devoting our resources, the argument goes, not to the neocon rodeo in Mesopotamia. Disparities in public support for the two missions over the last four years have backed that position up. That being so, what can the media do now when The One says he’s ready to send 17,000 troops to Kabul except swallow hard?

Rest assured, he will eventually face pushback from the left for this — the first stirrings are already occurring — but they’re not going to ruin the honeymoon a month into his term. A more useful discussion for the Foxies than media bias would be why, oh why, with Hopenchange fever supposedly sweeping the globe, Europe refuses to kick in a few extra troops to win the war even liberals think (or so they say) needs to be won. Thanks to Legal Insurrection for that link.