President Obama will finally have a bipartisan piece of legislation passed through Congress because opposition to the troop surge he proposes in Afghanistan is so strong within his own party. "The president is going to have to count on getting almost all Republicans to support this funding, because he's unlikely to get more than half the Democrats, especially in the House," notes George Stephanopoulos of ABC News.

Make no mistake about how badly the Afghan decision is playing among media allies and grassroots supporters of the president. Several highlighted the contradiction between Mr. Obama announcing the sending of 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan and also insisting he will begin to pull them out in 2011.

"Where's the hope? . . . It sounds more Rube Goldberg than 'Remember the Alamo,'" was the reaction of MSNBC host Chris Matthews last night. "If I were with the Taliban right now, I'd put a little Post-it up on that month in 2011, and say: 'This is when we do OUR surge.'"

Pat Caddell, a Democratic pollster who worked for both George McGovern and Jimmy Carter, says liberals in the party will consider the president's decision "a betrayal." He notes that Mr. Obama won the Democratic nomination in 2008 in large part because he opposed intervention in Iraq while downplaying the support he'd given to the U.S. commitment in Afghanistan. Liberals were not prepared to have Mr. Obama become a war president in his own right, which is what last night's speech has made him.

"There was something strange in last night's speech to liberal ears," says Mr. Caddell. "I thought it was the best delivered George W. Bush speech he's ever given." Mr. Caddell doesn't believe liberals will abandon Mr. Obama, but says the White House should be worried about the "enthusiasm level" of its base. "It will show up in fundraising, candidate recruitment and turnout in the mid-term elections," he says.