obama's heart was never in victory, just in political survival, and of course, last week the danger facing us from the islamist stalkers came home. u.s. embassies and consulates shut down through the the middle east and africa, headlines screamed impending doom, but thosnospecifics on what this isl about. why announce the threat at all? government officials almost always insist they can't talk about terrorists' chatter because the enemy might get a peek into our intelligence methods. benghazi may have spooked them so the story goes. up witone can't be too careful . perhaps, but the president is an artful dodger. after a dozen years of war, we're still worried about the bloody reach of al-qaeda. let's not get lost in some argument about whether it's core al-qaeda or a franchise from yemen. the latest commanding general in kabul wants more troops, so much he asked the "new york times" for space to air his views.