The progressive blogosphere and media are often more dishonest than any one could imagine. Even their most passionate opponents. Case in point; this post over at the Nation. The author states that Maliki, Iraq’s Prime Minister, has clearly endorsed Barack Obama’s plan for Iraq. This is, of course, not true, but that doesn’t matter to these supporters of Obama, who play such a vital role in educating the American public about what happens in the world. They are more than willing to distort and even outright lie, as long as Americans do what they think is best.
Sickening.
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Spiegel and the NYT has the audio now. Maliki says that the candidate who wants out sooner has the best idea about Iraq.
The media isn’t reporting about the interview that much in the first place.
McCain said a hundred years, now he’s hanging on to superior Obama’s coattails.
Washington Post is saying that Maliki got pressure from the administration before changing his mind.
The Reuters article didn’t have a proper translation in the first place.
This development breaks the meme that Obama is an ideologue and that McCain’s bombing runs means he’s better at assessing a foreign policy situation. Which is why the media that created the meme doesn’t report it.
Your tone and content was aimed to up the stakes, to claim that left-wingers had placed their credibility in the pot and thereby threaten them to fold. The community cards are on the table and we got a full house because our hand matches up with these new developments. You are wrong about Obama, again.
Hilzoy posts at Sullivan’s and blows your slanted coverage of Obama and McCain into bits. You didn’t even report on McCain talking too much and endangering Obama Re: the Middle Eastern trip. Had the roles been the opposite it seems ironcast that you would have jumped on it gleefully
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2008/07/more-on-maliki.html#more
First you couldn’t handle obedient and "moderate" Clinton losing and now McCain can’t do no wrong, Obama nothing right. Not very impressive.
Have to agree with utsu: The NYT says that their translation of the tape matches the translation that Der Spiegel came up with when they announced Maliki’s endorsement of Obama’s plan.
In addition, even the White House sent out an email after the interview announcing "Iraqi PM backs Obama troop exit plan."
Worst of all is that The Nation now is the progressive blogosphere ("case in point" my sit-upon) and it is portrayed as dishonest."but that doesn’t matter to these supporters of Obama"Seems to me that it is Obama’s detractors who are a bit uncaring about the truth. Oh wait, Michael doesn’t represent the gamut of Obama’s detractors. "In addition, even the White House sent out an email after the interview announcing "Iraqi PM backs Obama troop exit plan""Oh that is just sickening. My poor tummy…
anyone who talked themselves into thinking that Obama will remove troops any faster than McCain will suffers a severe case of delusion.
This is the perfect opportunity for Bush to reduce the troops now. Absent of McCain’s support and lets see if the violence flairs up.
This is actually a huge opening for the Bush Administration. If the violence flairs back up well then its the next presidents problem. If it does not then the focus of this battle can turn to Barak Obama who wants to escalate the war in Afghanistan and has even announced that he wants to go after the taliban and Bin Laden in Pakistan provinces.
This is such a huge opening for putting Obama on the defensive and paint him a war mongerer after all but I have zero belief that Bush or McCain understand much of anything anymore.
Thus another huge opportunity will pass them by and they will be stuck in there mindless intransigence that is Iraq.
utsu,
Anybody who says "McCain wants to get out in a hundred years" doesn’t even have a shred of objectivity, so you don’t have the right to lecture anybody on this.
The discussion is closed.
McCain’s statements have, I think, been misconstrued.
On to Maliki’s statements, I think he’s trying to play a game between pleasing the Iraq people and the U.S. government. I still think we saw/heard his true views in the interview.
MvdG, your getting a bit ridiculous.
It’s clear the Obama’s stance is more in line with the Iraqi people and their government. This isn’t even anything new. Polls have routinely shown for years that most Iraqi’s want US troops to leave. It is no surprise at all that the Elected government of those people would have similar feelings. That doesn’t means that withdrawl is still in the best interest of the US, or even Iraq, but it does bring up a very thorny aspect of this debate.
You need to calm down and distance yourself from your emotions about Obama.
Kevin , your link has as its first item a poll conducted by BBC which shows in sept. 2007 only 47% want immediate withdrawl, which isn’t in that poll a majority. It means 53% don’t want withdrawl until at least security is restored. If you go further into the polling report on the BBC site, earlier that year–in February, only 35% wanted immediate withdrawl (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/6983027.stm). The idea that we withdraw when the Iraq is secure, is not any different than what McCain wants.
So you have no basis for saying either that polls have routinely shown for years what you claim, or that Obama’s stance is more in line with what Iraqis want.
First of all, Utsu can we once and for all dispose of the "100 year" meme. I have no problem with discussions/disagreements regarding the prudence of "permanent" bases in Iraq but to reflexively spout "for 100 years" gets us nowhere.
As far as Maliki’s "endorsement" of Obama’s timetable I believe there is enough "wiggle room" to suggests that translation, rethinking the statement, concerned feedback from the Bush administration and trying to stake out an "independent" position all played into this confusion. From a bigger perspective, I would expect that if things continued to improve in Iraq all positions would begin to converge. As a McCain supporter, I’m ok with that. I expect McCain to continually state "But you were against the surge!" and I expect Obama to continually state "I was against the war" and "I want to bring the troops home but…"
I simply hope that the presidential campaign doesn’t obscure the encouraging situation in Iraq that will allow a half way decent outcome and the return of our troops. Frankly, just as the McCain states that opposition to the war is irrelevant because "we’re there now", eventually (and we may be we’re close to this point) opposition to the surge will become irrelevant because it’s happened, has worked and now we’re on to the next phase. Now, having said that I’d have more respect for Sen. Obama if he simply stated "I thought the surge was a bad idea but that judgment was wrong. It worked and so now the question is, ‘What next?’ and I disagree with my opponent’s approach"
Here’s a breakdown of the Sept 2007 poll (post-surge) results:
Leave now 47% / Remain until security is restored 34% / Remain until the Iraqi government is stronger 10% / Remain until Iraqi security forces can operate independently 7% / Remain longer but leave eventually 2% / Never leave 0% / Refused/Don’t know 0%
This is a breakdown of the Feb 2007 poll (pre-surge) results:
Leave now 35% / Remain until security is restored 38% / Remain until the Iraqi government is stronger 14% / Remain until Iraqi security forces can operate independently 11% / Remain longer but leave eventually 2% / Never leave 1% / Refused/Don’t know 0%
This is a breakdown of Feb 2005 poll results:
Leave now 26% / Remain until security is restored 31% / Remain until the Iraqi government is stronger 19% / Remain until Iraqi security forces can operate independently 16% / Remain longer but leave eventually 3% / Never leave 1% / Refused/Don’t know 4%
Oh I forgot; I read the referred to article, there seems to be no content in the article that refers to the headling (or did I miss something?)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/bsp/hi/pdfs/10_09_07_iraqpoll.pdf
"Anybody who says "McCain wants to get out in a hundred years" doesn’t even have a shred of objectivity, so you don’t have the right to lecture anybody on this."
I should have put quotation marks there seeing as that would have implied heavily that I meant to take his saying as an example of his level of faux-gusto and commitment.
"anyone who talked themselves into thinking that Obama will remove troops any faster than McCain will suffers a severe case of delusion."
It’s a matter of what you are willing to tell the world, about when you are ready to propose this and that. I think Obama wants to take troops out after 16 months, that Maliki, other Iraqis and the troops want this as well and that McCain is a flip-flopper who is emulating Obama now. Obama proposed "sooner" earlier than McCain, and that tells me enough whether he will actually go through with it or not.
(I think he will, because people like you don’t really have any facts that suggest Obama will be as tardy as McCain on withdrawal. You need that, seeing as you have displayed no common sense on Obama or the war for a while now.)
"First of all, Utsu can we once and for all dispose of the "100 year" meme. I have no problem with discussions/disagreements regarding the prudence of "permanent" bases in Iraq but to reflexively spout "for 100 years" gets us nowhere."
I didn’t believe that either and I am sorry for any misunderstandings. But that was what McCain said, and that shows a lot about his pompousness and what he wanted as a profile up until he flip-flopped. In short, first he was ready to say things that suggested he would wait a long while, and then he dressed up as Obama recently. Either he would wait far too long with withdrawal, or he was insincere about staying too long. That was what I wanted to say with that paragraph.
So redfish – nice try.
"concerned feedback from the Bush administration and trying to stake out an "independent" position all played into this confusion. "
Maliki talked about the withdrawal issue three times and that was before he was reminded that he was allied with a republican president. I believe he spoke his true mind during the interview, but that doesn’t neccessarily mean most Iraqis agree with him. It does suggest him agreeing with Obama is politically smart for him.
"I simply hope that the presidential campaign doesn’t obscure the encouraging situation in Iraq that will allow a half way decent outcome and the return of our troops."
In that case we need to decide when a decent outcome can be very probable even after withdrawal. McCain tried to boost the image of the surge without giving people the idea that it was good enough for withdrawal in the past. He said "indefinite continuation", and I KNOW "hundred years" was just a lame little slogan he threw the dogs of war among the 29%-ers. Today he is tending towards Obama’s "Withdrawal at a SET date, focus on Afghanistan". McCain is the one making things difficult re: a withdrawal with good results, and it appears Obama was ahead of him.
"Now, having said that I’d have more respect for Sen. Obama if he simply stated "I thought the surge was a bad idea but that judgment was wrong. It worked and so now the question is, ‘What next?’ and I disagree with my opponent’s approach""
He wouldn’t gain anything from that. You might respect him more but that doesn’t mean Obama would do himself or anyone anything good if he did it.
utsu,
It wasn’t even an example of faux-gusto and commitment, he was simply stating a fact of how he believes things work. That after a war is over, we leave bases there. The reason he said that, was in response to someone who was making an issue about when the last soldier came home. His response was when the last soldier comes home isn’t necessarily the issue, unless you’re specifically saying that you don’t want a permanent base. And even on that issue, Obama wants soldiers to stay in Iraq past 16 mos. from counter terrorism activities. I’m not sure Obama doesn’t want a permanent base.
What McCain has stated publically, with some level of faux-gusto, is that he will win the war in his first term in office.
They both want to get out as soon as possible, and both Obama and McCain will have to listen to generals on whether the time of withdrawl can be brought closer, or postponed.
Obama recently made a statement that he won’t take orders from generals on strategy just on tactics. But to postpone leaving by a few months or by a year is something I think Obama would rule a ‘tactical’ decision when he gets in office.
Obama portrayed the question as if McCain will kowtow to generals on longer term, strategic decision-making, when really the only issue now is tactics.
I think people without a partisan bent are discovering that the difference between Obama’s plans and McCain’s plans are SEMANTIC.
or maybe i should say rhetorical
actual 100 year quote:
So it’s just enough to pay lip-service? Words without anything to back it up is good enough for utsu
"So it’s just enough to pay lip-service? Words without anything to back it up is good enough for utsu"
Seeing as people are called out on what they say, what you are ready to say says something. No one can ever really know what someone who doesn’t have the power to do what he says he will is telling the truth. Because he is just saying what he will do if he has the power to do it.
So, seeing as I have no reason to believe Obama will be slower than McCain on withdrawal (au contraire), no reason to believe his withdrawal would be less well-planned than McCain’s (ditto; Maliki has explicitly said that sooner rather than later is the wise man’s approach now) and no reason to believe Obama will stay longer than 16 months if not a sure threat to the Iraqi population looms, I’m with him.
Even if I didn’t hold Obama’s words more valuable than McCain’s, his verbal positioning says good things about him.
Words are good enough for utsu right now, because that is all Obama and McCain have, no?