Robert Gibbs responded predictably to former Vice President Dick Cheney’s criticism that the Obama administration dithers on Afghanistan, answering with an attack on the Bush administration. (I know you’re shocked.) He offered no explanation about why the Obama administration is taking so long to reach a decision or why the military, our allies, and members of the president’s own party are wringing their hands about the president’s public angst. And what of the charge that the Obama team in effect lied when it claimed that it had to start its war-planning from scratch? Well, there was no answer:

Gibbs sidestepped a question about whether Lt. Gen. Douglas Lute, who was tasked with assessing war strategy by the Bush administration, had filed a report with the recommendations Cheney mentioned. “I have not looked at that review,” Gibbs said. ”I don’t know whether what he describes is accurate.”

The mainstream media might want to press that point. Did the Obama team lie about that, in the same way it concealed the Qom enrichment facility? What does the president have to say for failing to approve the plan his own general recommended, aside from “They were in disarray too!”?

You will not find a better example of what ails this administration. It is all blame game, all Not Bush (or get Bush), and not much serious governance. American troops are in combat, and all the administration can do is rerun the campaign. It’s the sort of thing that causes moderates and those who invested great faith in Obama’s intellect and temperament to wonder if they were fooled. The evidence mounts daily that they were.

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