This is funny; Obama has finally come around to saying that he would be comfortable leaving a residual force in Iraq that would be conditions-based. Which is what McCain has been saying all along.
In Iraq, it’s not new that Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki has wanted to take control of his own country. But there’s always been this gap between his assessment of his abilities and American commanders’ saying he’s not up to it. As president, faced with that difference between what he says he can do and what the commanders say he can do, how would you choose between them?
Iraq is a sovereign country. Not just according to me, but according to George Bush and John McCain. So ultimately our presence there is at their invitation, and their policy decisions have to be taken into account. I also think that Maliki recognizes that they’re going to need our help for some time to come, as our commanders insist, but that the help is of the sort that is consistent with the kind of phased withdrawal that I have promoted. We’re going to have to provide them with logistical support, intelligence support. We’re going to have to have a very capable counterterrorism strike force. We’re going to have to continue to train their Army and police to make them more effective.
You’ve been talking about those limited missions for a long time. Having gone there and talked to both diplomatic and military folks, do you have a clearer idea of how big a force you’d need to leave behind to fulfill all those functions?
I do think that’s entirely conditions-based. It’s hard to anticipate where we may be six months from now, or a year from now, or a year and a half from now.
Um yeah, that’s where McCain was going with his 100 years comment. He just, you know, phrased it inartfully. It’s even funnier that Obama has the gall to say that McCain is coming around to supporting his poistion on Iraq. I swear, I can’t make this ish up. You know Team McCain was all over this.
“Today Barack Obama finally abandoned his dangerous insistence on an unconditional withdrawal of U.S. combat troops from Iraq by making clear that for the foreseeable future, troop levels in Iraq will be ‘entirely conditions based.’ We welcome this latest shift in Senator Obama’s position, but it is obvious that it was only a lack of experience and judgment that kept him from arriving at this position sooner.
“John McCain has always held the position that any withdrawal from Iraq must be based on conditions on the ground. With the incredible success of the surge, which John McCain advocated, it is increasingly likely that U.S. troops will be able to withdraw with victory in hand. John McCain had long urged Barack Obama, who opposed the surge, to return to Iraq in order to see the immense changes in the security situation there since his last visit. Now that Obama has finally met with General Petraeus, it appears that he has also come to the conclusion that troop levels in Iraq must be based on the conditions on the ground.”
Ouch.
10 Comments
July 28, 2008 at 1:06 pm
Psst Snarky You have a typo in your headline.
McCain has adopted Obama’s idea to send more troops to Afganistan. Of course it would not have been necessary if McCain had not insisted on diverting all those troopps to Iraq.
July 29, 2008 at 4:30 pm
McCain was taken out of context if you read all of what he said if made perfect sense.
July 29, 2008 at 6:36 pm
I am glad that McCain made perfect sense to you.
Did the Iraq invasion also make perfect sense to you.
July 29, 2008 at 7:00 pm
Why yes it did.
So you are telling me that after hearing the entire quote from McCain you didn’t understand what he was saying? You don’t know that the U.S. has troops in bases and shares bases with people in Germany, Japan, Singapore, England, Bahrain, South Korea, Columbia, Australia as well has others on every continent on this planet?
July 30, 2008 at 6:00 am
Save you breath letters-
Gasdick has been bought and sold by the One-World Government, NWO candidate, Nobama
July 30, 2008 at 9:44 am
Obama said, many times, that we need to be more careful about leaving Iraq than we were going in.
Which part of that do you not understand?
July 30, 2008 at 3:39 pm
But I was talking about McCain’s speech not Obamers speech…
Are we having two different conversations or are you just trying to change the subject rather then debate it?
As for Obamers he says a lot of things most of then are hope and change and then some change and a little hope, then there is a lot of hope with a side of change and peas and carrots.
July 31, 2008 at 6:02 am
Once again, save your breath letters.
As soon as you make a good point about how this whole Obama thing is a lot of hype perpetrated by about 20% of people living in liberal big cities, Gasdick just mentions Iraq.
He doesn’t know how to respond to anything except by mentioning Iraq.
He’s like Rudy Giuliani and “9/11″. It’s all he has to say!
BTW- does all this not remind you of 1972. With the climate in the country then you would have thought the Dems could of put a monkey up against Nixon (they probably should have).
Nixon ended up winning 49 states much to the chagrin of college graduates, the press and dirty hippies everywhere.
Obama is the new McGovern. Enjoy it while it lasts Obamatards!
July 31, 2008 at 10:47 am
I voted for Richard M. Nixon three times starting in 1960 against Kennedy. (You had to be 21 to vote in those days.) I would have voted for Eisenhauer, if I could have. I proudly marched in his inaugural parade in 1957.
Obama has said all along that “WE MUST BE MORE CAREFUL ABOUT GETTING OUT OF IRAQ MORE CAREFULLY THAN WE WENT IN. ” That sounds like based on conditions on the ground to me.
Speaking of McGovern, He had twice as many combat missions in WW2 than McCain and never lost a US warplane. McCain lost at least five.
The title of this post is
Obama Has Finally Adopted McCain’s Iraq Plan
Gasdick just mentions Iraq ?
Is’nt that the topic?
July 31, 2008 at 10:20 pm
I was talking about the McCain 100 years speech something you didn’t try to fight me on other then say I didn’t understand without backup on why.
But I guess I won’t waist any more of my breath.
On Obama he changes positions like he changes friends.
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