behind us. >> president obama today talking about the policy in afghanistan after his decision to put general david petraeus at the helm there, on the ground. now here is how defense secretary robert gates described the change. he said that general petraeus is absolutely behind the president's strategy. he agrees with the december review and he also agrees with the timeline to begin a drawdown, gate said, in july of 2011, that is conditions-based. that is a word that you did not hear from president obama today. what about all of this? bring in the panel. stephen hayes for "weekly standard." a.b. stoddard, "the hill." and syndicated columnist charles krauthammer. okay, steve, did you detect nuance here and how it was phrased about the july 2011 drawdown? >> yeah. there was some. you still didn't have the president say it's all off. everything we talked about before, the recommendation that came from the political team to have the july 2011