In a Thanksgiving profile in the New York Times, Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman John Kerry was labeled “almost giddy.” Kerry, as is his wont, offered a turbid synonym, suggesting that “there’s been a certain amount of mutual ripening. ... Maybe I’m ripening after all these years, and maybe the issues are ripening at the same time.”

To all appearances, this was a man who was finished wrestling with past demons — particularly the 2004 election, in which he was slandered like no other presidential candidate since the age of Jackson, and the more recent ignominy of being passed over the secretary of state by a youthful democratic president he helped groom.

It only took four days to shatter that illusion.

On Nov. 28, Kerry’s committee released its long-awaited report concerning the conduct of the Afghan War under President George W. Bush — specifically, a little-known episode from December 2001 in which some experts insist U.S. forces had Osama bin Laden in their sight, in the mountains of Tora Bora. Prepared at Kerry’s request, the report alleges that a larger influx of troops into the area would have captured not only bin Laden but also Ayman al-Zawahiri and Mohammad Omar. The blame for their escape — which thus set the stage, according to the committee, for the current Taliban insurgency — is to be laid at the feet of Gen. Tommy Franks and then-Defense Sec. Donald Rumsfeld.

The case is convincing. But it’s nothing new. During the Oct. 8, 2004 presidential debate, Kerry argued that “the right time [to capture bin Laden] was Tora Bora, when we had him cornered in the mountains.” At another campaign rally, Kerry told the crowd, “It was wrong to outsource the job of capturing [bin Laden and his lieutenants] to Afghan warlords who a week earlier were fighting against us, instead of using the best-trained troops in the world who wanted to avenge America for what happened in New York and Pennsylvania and Washington.”

Aside from residual bitterness, it’s hard to understand what ends the Foreign Relations Committee’s report serves. The report itself concludes that “removing the al-Qaeda leader from the battlefield eight years ago would not have eliminated the worldwide extremist threat,” and while it does attribute crucial symbolic significance to bin Laden’s alleged escape into Pakistan, it doesn’t draw a direct connection between what it sees as Franks’ and Rumsfeld’s blunder and the present situation. The committee’s new insights may serve the interests of the public’s right to know, but there’s no particular explanation contained in the report that would answer the question of, “why at this moment?”

But while it’s easy to scoff at the martial presumptions of those still at home, Kerry’s opinion does carry real weight given his stature and first-hand experience with the tragic aspects of war. Less worthwhile, however, is criticism of the kind now being leveled at the Obama administration for their conduct of the Afghan War — a typical example coming last Sunday from Arizona Sen. Jon Kyl, who sagaciously expounded to FOX News host Chris Wallace: “Let’s don’t have talk of a phased deployment. ... We’ll send a few troops immediately, and then we’ll see what happens, see how it plays out, maybe send some more. That’s kind of reminiscent of Vietnam. That escalation, that slow escalation didn’t work there.” (At least Kyl then had the courtesy to reveal the common sense solution, that has clearly sailed completely over the heads of President Obama and Robert Gates: “You need to put in everybody you can as quickly as you can and deliver a knockout punch to the enemy.”)

But for Republicans who were so piqued when Kerry used his platforms in 2004 and beyond to assail Bush’s war effort, turning around and doing the same now that they’re out of power seems unhelpful at best and subversive at worst. Playing couch general may be a fair enough idle activity for those it would be unreasonable to expect better from, such as television pundits, but individuals whose words and actions are actually taken seriously by citizens and troops should probably be exercising more forethought — and holding their tongues if they don’t see a tangible benefit to their inserting themselves into the conversation.

Editorials Editor Asher Smith is a College junior from Great Neck, N.Y.