neck-in-neck with his top gop rivals. james carville and david are standing by. we ll talk about that. i m wolf blitzer and you re in the situation room. a new wave of fury may be about to explode in afghanistan after a u.s. soldier allegedly walked out of his base and went on a house to house shooting rampage. 16 civilians are dead, nine of them children. military authorities say the soldier acted alone and turned himself in. vowing revenge for the killings, a statement from the taliban calls u.s. forces and i m quoting, sick-minded american savages. u.s. officials are voicing deep sorrow. let me say that like many americans, i was shocked and saddened by the killings of innocent afghan villagers this weekend. we send our condolences to family who have lost their loved ones and to the people of afghanistan. this is not who we are. and the united states is committed to seeing that those responsible are held accountable. let s go straight to kabul with sara sidner stan
how about we make him pay 9%? warren wouldn t be hit by the vat tax. a lot of working class people would. let s talk about afghanistan. we have news on afghanistan as well, mika. this is something surprisingly enough that i think republicans should seize on. there s a report out, of course, that in afghanistan we have been exaggerating our gains against the taliban. the fact of the matter is it s a much bigger mess than we expected. that s part of it. there s also news on the surge drawdown. nbc news has learned that defense secretary leon panetta and joint chiefs chairman marty dempsy presented president obama with the first round of the afghanistan surge drawdown. the plan which the military is calling a surge recovery includes how the u.s. will bring home 10,000 american forces by the end of this year. this first round will be a combination of troops that are finishing their tour, not being replaced, troops not deploying