President Bush touched down in Seoul, South Korea, for the first stop on his trip to Asia, his last visit to the region as president. The president will be talking trade and troops with his South Korean counterpart, Lee Myung-bak. South Korea is awaiting action by the U.S. on a free trade deal between the two nations, but the agreement is not likely to come up for a vote in Congress before the November elections. The president praised and thanked South Korea for its commitment of troops to Iraq, more than 900 troops served in the Multi-National Force in that country, and is seeking a similar commitment from Seoul in Afghanistan. "Obviously we'd like to see a greater role for South Koreans in Afghanistan, if the South Korean people are willing to move in that direction," a National Security Spokesman traveling with the president said.

Also on the agenda is the status of nuclear disarmament in North Korea. The South has played a vital role in the Six-Party Talks on North Korea's illicit nuclear weapons programs, and the president hopes to continue the momentum towards dismantling all of the North's nuclear capabilities. North Korea dismantled its Yongbyon nuclear reactor late last year as part of its agreement in the talks. Now the U.S. is pushing for verification of the North's activities. "It's one thing to say it, but I think it's going to be very important for them to understand that we expect them to show us," the president told South Korean television in advance of the trip.

From South Korea, President Bush will head to Thailand for a brief stay before making his controversial visit to Beijing, China, for the Olympic Games opening ceremonies. Bush said that security at the games could be a problem for the Chinese if they overreact to potential threats to the games. "[M]y hope is, of course, that as they have their security in place...if there is a provocation, they handle it in a responsible way without violence." Some in the U.S. called for the president to boycott the games in protest of China's record on human rights. But the White House said it was never questioned the propriety of the president's visit, citing the president's close relationship with Chinese premier Hu Jintao, and the president's ability to make U.S. concerns about human rights conditions known in personal diplomacy between the two leaders.

Update: 3:30 pm - Obama Communications Director Bill Burton has sent out a memo entitled "Obama Leading on Foreign Policy, McCain Following." Full text after the jump.

The question remains, though, whether the mainstream media will accept this framing, and if they do, will it resonate with voters? In 2004, all of the information available pointed to the disaster that was the Bush administration, but in the end, enough voters couldn't get over the general impression that Republicans are the party of national security.

As I said several days ago, the true test of Obama's road trip will be to see if he can move the poll numbers on foreign policy and security issues. In the era of so-called "Low-information voters," it can take a long time for things like this to sink in.

Obama's job, now, is to continue his trip without completely blowing it. His stated intention to talk less, and listen more , hits just the right note. The media will take care of politicizing the trip, so Obama is wise to stand aside.

The McCain campaign also might want to lay low for awhile. It seems like whenever they open their mouth, reality steps up to offer a rebuttal.

At the time, it probably seemed like a good way to score political points. Back in May, John McCain began regularly taunting Barack Obama for not having visited Iraq in two years. Though McCain's own photo-op Iraq trips had provided controversy of their own, the Arizona Senator sensed an opening to portray Obama as out-of-touch with the situation on the ground:

"Look at what happened in the last two years since Senator Obama visited and declared the war lost," the GOP presidential nominee-in-waiting told the Associated Press in an interview, noting that the Illinois senator's last trip to Iraq came before the military buildup that is credited with curbing violence.

"He really has no experience or knowledge or judgment about the issue of Iraq and he has wanted to surrender for a long time,"

A couple of weeks later, after McCain had continued to push this line of attack, Obama announced he'd visit Iraq and Afghanistan before the November election. McCain seemed to have forced Obama's hand on the matter of visiting Iraq, though Obama was quick to portray the decision otherwise, and reiterated his stance on his long-term priorities by relaying a conversation with Iraq's Foreign Minister, Hoshyar Zebari, in which he stated:

"I emphasized to him how encouraged I was by the reductions in violence in Iraq, but also insisted that it is important for us to begin the process of withdrawing U.S. troops, making clear that we have no interest in permanent bases in Iraq," Obama said.

"I gave [Zebari] an assurance that should we be elected an Obama administration will make sure that we continue with the progress that's been made in Iraq, that we won't act precipitously."

But the points the McCain might have scored by the sight of Obama making an isolated trip to Iraq, in effect responding to a McCain's dare, have been all but erased in the past few weeks.

Admiral Michael Mullen said today that he expects to be able to recommend troop reductions in Iraq this fall, as security gains from the troop surge continue to hold. Mullen made his comments in a Pentagon press conference with Defense Secretary Robert Gates on the occasion of the removal of the last of five additional brigades ordered into Iraq as a part of the surge. The withdrawal of the third infantry division's second brigade officially ended the surge, and went little noticed in the mainstream press, itself an indication of the strategy's effectiveness.

Mullen said that any additional troop withdrawals would be dependent on conditions on the ground in Iraq, but that the trend was looking good for reductions.

"I won't go so far as to say that progress in Iraq from a military perspective has reached a tipping point or is reversible - it has not, and it is not. But security is unquestionably and remarkably better. Indeed, if these trends continue I expect to be able early this fall to recommend to the secretary and the president further troop reductions."

Now that the surge has ended, Iraq Commander Gen. David Petraeus will evaluate the ability of Iraqis to hold the security gains for the next 45 days. That would put a decision on troop withdrawals sometime after Labor Day, the traditional start of the presidential election season.

The surge has been an unquestionable success, resulting in dramatic reductions in violence, a greatly enhanced Iraqi Army and police force, and the defeat of al-Qaeda in Iraq. Military planners are now turning their attention to Afghanistan, where a stubborn insurgency, fueled by cross-border attacks from Taliban militants seeking sanctuary in Pakistan, is increasing pressure on U.S., Afghan, and NATO forces. An increase in troop levels seems warranted in that country. With Gen. Petraeus the new head of U.S. Central Command, which has jurisdiction over the Afghan war, any change in strategy there will likely closely resemble the troop surge in Iraq.

Sen. John McCain laid out his plan for the war in Afghanistan at a town hall event in Albuquerque, New Mexico, today, modeling it on the successful troop surge strategy in Iraq. McCain called for three combat brigades to be sent to Afghanistan and for Afghan Army forces to be doubled to 160,000. McCain also took a shot at his rival, Sen. Barack Obama, who made a speech of his own on the wars today, while calling the improving security situation in Iraq a blueprint for success in Afghanistan.

"Sen. Obama will tell you we can't win in Afghanistan without losing in Iraq. In fact, he has it exactly backwards. It is precisely the success of the surge in Iraq that shows us the way to succeed in Afghanistan.

I know how to win wars. And if I'm elected president, I will turn around the war in Afghanistan, just as we have turned around the war in Iraq, with a comprehensive strategy for victory.

McCain added an assessment of the situation in Afghanistan, calling it, "not acceptable." He said that the next president would face tough decisions about the war effort there. Then, in remarks reminiscent of the Republican primary, McCain vowed to find Osama bin Laden. "I will get Osama bin Laden and bring him to justice," he said. It was during the first Republican primary debate at the Reagan Library in Simi Valley, California, when McCain promised to, "follow bin Laden to the gates of Hell."

As Josh Marshall, Tommy Christopher, and Marc Ambinder point out today, John McCain's new promise to balance the federal budget in his first term of office is no better than meaningless hot air.

In fact, as Josh notes, what's astonishing about McCain's assurance is that it comes with absolutely no supporting information. That's right. No specifics, no hard numbers to debate and dissect, only the delusional notion that we'll balance the budget by giving massive corporate tax cuts, and by "winning" the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Given that some economists have looked into McCain's previous economic plan to extend Bush's tax cuts and decided that they will increase the size of the budget deficit, the new pledge amounts to little more than the punch line to a very tired joke.

McCain, like Bush, often talks of "winning" our current wars, and yet, as with his economic plans, he offers no specifics as to what metrics we should use to asses such a victory. And while the situation in Iraq continues to improve, the one in Afghanistan continues to deteriorate. Certainly, we'll have to keep pouring lots of money into those conflicts, whatever our role may be there over the next four years.

So, a contest. The punch-line is: McCain's Budget Promise. Now you supply the text of the joke.

On Tuesday military officials testified before a House Committee about a huge military contract somehow awarded to a company run by a 22-year-old man from Miami Beach to provide arms to coalition troops in Afghanistan, despite the fact that Diveroli is on a State Department watch list designed to monitor suspected international arms dealers. A $298 million contract was issued to Efraim Diveroli's company, AEY. AEY and a supplier the company worked with were also on the list.

In March, The New York Times published a story about how Diveroli's company, with only a handful of employees, managed to become a successful military contractor. The company, AEY, then supplied ammunition to coalition forces operating in Afghanistan that was more than 40 years old and "in decomposing packaging". That ammunition was cobbled together from aging stockpiles in old Communist bloc and China.

Committee Chairman Henry Waxman lashed out at the contracts saying, "It appears that anyone--no matter how inexperienced or unqualified--can win a lucrative federal contract worth hundreds of millions of dollars." He added that it was "hard to imagine a less-qualified company than AEY." Officials from the defense department could not confirm whether or not AEY is currently supplying troops in Iraq.

Although he was invited, Diveroli did not testify. He cited his fifth amendment right not to incriminate himself, which Waxman accepted because last week Diveroli and three other associates were indicted in Miami on a variety of fraud charges.

Democratic and Republican negotiators have reached a tentative deal in the ongoing battle over funding for the war in Iraq. The Pentagon will receive all of the money requested by the White House for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan without restrictions, while Democrats will get some domestic measures inserted into the bill to help satisfy their political base. Most important politically for the Democrats, however, is that the deal will provide funds for the war through fiscal year 2009; thereby avoiding an election season vote on war funding. The compromise is slated for a vote in the House today.

A House source with knowledge of the deal said that Republican negotiators were able to secure the funding with no restrictions, eliminated funding for Planned Parenthood, and cut two Senate amendments from the final bill which would have added $8 billion in spending on pet projects and prevented the Bush Administration from restricting states from extending access to the the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP). In return, Democrats won a 13-week extension of unemployment benefits, although they had wanted 26 weeks, and generous spending on education benefits for soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan, a new GI Bill, without increasing taxes. The White House has indicated that it will sign the bill once it is passed.

On balance, it appears that Congressional Democrats, in order to avoid a politically tricky vote on the war funding this fall, gave more than Republicans in reaching the deal. Like any good compromise, neither side will be entirely happy with the outcome. But more important than the scoring of who won or lost, is the fact that the troops will receive the funding they need and deserve to continue operations in the war on terror. With violence declining steadily in Iraq, and the Iraqi government demonstrating more control over the country, interruptions in funding for the troops helping to achieve that progress could have been devastating to the growing success there. In Afghanistan, on the other hand, attacks by Taliban militants are up, and the funds are needed to help extend the reach of the government in Kabul.

Speaking to the Washington Post, CIA Director Gen. Michael Hayden said that the United States has made great strides in its battle against al-Qaeda in just the past year. Hayden said that the international terrorist group is facing "strategic defeat" across much of the Muslim world, most especially in Iraq and Saudi Arabia. And the situation is not simply a military one. Hayden said that al-Qaeda is facing "ideological push back" from many in the Islamic world who are rejecting the strict form of fundamentalist Islam preached by Osama bin Laden and the al-Qaeda hierarchy.

Hayden credited a stepped-up campaign against the al-Qaeda leadership for the turnaround. "The ability to kill and capture key members of al-Qaeda continues, and keeps them off balance -- even in their best safe haven along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border," he said. But he also cautioned that al-Qaeda remains dangerous and warned against the United States falling back into a pre-September 11th mindset.

"The fact that we have kept [Americans] safe for pushing seven years now has got them back into the state of mind where 'safe' is normal. Our view is: Safe is hard-won, every 24 hours."

In April, The New York Times reported that the pentagon used retired military officers, so called "message force multipliers," to generate positive news coverage by echoing Bush administration positions on Iraq and Afghanistan. On Friday, Congress passed an amendment to the military authorization bill that would mandate an investigation into whether the program violated laws prohibiting the government from funding domestic propaganda. The investigations will be conducted by the Department of Defense's inspector general's office and the Government Accountability Office.

Republican Representative Duncan Hunter of California gamely tried to defend the program. "The idea that somehow Don Rumsfeld got these people in a room and told them what to say, if you believe that you don't believe in the independence of these general officers. None of them are used to having people tell them what to say."

Media critic Josh Silver writing for Huffington Post points the finger at the people who put the officers in front of the cameras in the first place. "[A]t the end of the day," Silver wrote, "it is the television newsroom producers and 'bookers' - and the executives who hire them -- who decide who gets on TV and who doesn't. And the vast majority of them consistently turn to government officials, major politicians and party insiders. They seldom turn to dissenting voices, critical public interest advocates and fierce critics of government policy."