Wise words from strange quarters

Who knew? Maybe it will catch.....

[Grover] Norquist said conservatives recognize the weakness of the arguments for the war, which is why they don't often make them.

He scoffed at the notion that fighting two wars was making American stronger. "Being tied up there does not advance American power," he said. "If you've got a fist in the tar baby Iraq and you've got a fist in the tar baby Afghanistan, then who's afraid of you?"

Norquist, the spirited leader of the anti-tax wing of the Republican Party, also noted that the cost argument alone is a potent one against the war.

The Congressional Research Service estimates that total Afghan war funding in fiscal year 2011 will hit $119 billion, up from $19 billion in 2006 -- and all that in a country with an annual gross domestic product of less than $12 billion.

Norquist said the question for those who want to reduce government spending is this: "If you don't take $10 billion out of the occupation of Afghanistan, you're going to take it out where?"

He said the debate about the war in Afghanistan should include discussion "about the vast expenditures of cash, the vast expenditures of other people lives, and the opportunity cost" of money and effort that could be expended elsewhere.

"It seems to me that it has been more expensive than not. And it has made America weaker than otherwise," he said.

HuffPo