Buzzflash
del.icio.us
Digg
Facebook
Mixx it!
RedditSo far, at least, the only political bloc in Iraq to support the US-Iraq agreement that would allow the continuation of the American occupation are the Kurds. It doesn't look like there will be any agreement at all before November, and possibly -- as I've been predicting since last spring -- they simply won't reach an accord at all.
According to ABC, the proposed accord calls for a 2011 timetable for an American withdrawal without adding conditions, i.e., without linking the withdrawal to the security situation. ABC got ahold of the text of the accord, which so far, at least, hasn't even been shared with Congress, even though the Bush administration is lobbying Congress to support the deal. Says ABC:
The United States has agreed to a firm deadline for withdrawing combat troops from Iraq that does not set preconditions that must be met, according to a copy of an agreement reached recently and obtained by ABC News.
Doom and gloom is coming from Admiral Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs. Here's what he said, according to a report from AFP:
"We are clearly running out of time," said Mullen. ... "It is also clear that the Iranians are working very hard to make sure this does not pass. This should not be lost on the Iraqi people. ... It's time for the Iraqis to make a decision."
Mullen will be disappointed, however. The proposed text has been submitted to the Iraqi Cabinet, which was supposed to send it to the parliament, but now the cabinet wants more changes. Foreign Minister Zebari of Iraq said that it is "unlikely that the Iraqi parliament will approve the SOFA [Status of Forces Agreement] before the American presidential election on November 4."
Making the chances for a pact worse, Grand Ayatollah Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah, the pro-Iran Shiite clerical leader in Lebanon -- who has lots of connections in Iraq, and who is himself an Iraqi -- called for an immediate end of the occupation, in a fatwa, and added:
"No authority, establishment or an official or nonofficial organization has the legitimacy to impose occupation on its people, legitimize it or extend its stay in Iraq,"
Fadlallah said that any pact should call for an "unconditional withdrawal of occupation forces from Iraq," and put a "fixed and imminent timetable for a complete American withdrawal from Iraq."
Share this article
Robert Dreyfuss
A chronicle of America's adventures in foreign policy and national security.
RSS
So Chimpy McFlightsuit has given the terrorists our timetable, with no conditions regarding the actual conditions on the ground.
Fascinating.
Akin to saying "We were never stay the course".
Posted by crabwalk at 10/21/2008 @ 12:25pm
So what's next? Are Republicans going to call for the forced occupation of Iraq to protect the Iraqi people? This is just more evidence of why we need to leave. They don't want us there. They are telling us to get out of their country. It's time to stop arguing with them and leave otherwise you need to escalate the situation and call for a full scale occupation of Iraq because that is soon to be the only other option.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 10/21/2008 @ 12:38pm
Damn! What a joyride!
W's parting shots no team of comedy writers could invent.
Nationbuildling nations that beg us to stop nationbuilding them cause they're already a nation.
Socialistic nationalizing the economy in the name of capitalism.
China gold medal levels of deficit spending.
Posted by winyahn at 10/21/2008 @ 1:01pm
So now if Obama is elected and we walk away from Iraq, he will shoulder all the blame for any future problems in that region. The Bush Administration has left such a colossal mess for the next president to clean up, from Iraq to Pakistan and the economy that it becomse a no win situation for whoever is next. I can hear the republican talking points now for the next election if Obama does not succeed in fixing the mess Bush has created in his first term. "He surrendered in Iraq" etc.
Posted by Extraneous at 10/21/2008 @ 2:19pm
Obama truly nails McCain over this stuff when he points out that McCain and 30% of the US....
opposes 70% of the US, most Iraqis, and almost all of the Iraq government, in wanting us to get out.
Posted by Maskdelta at 10/21/2008 @ 2:43pm
I remember a discussion with my relatives, Thanksgiving dinner of 2006. They said we had to 'stay the course.' They were neo-liberal Democrats. I was the 'nut case' who wanted out of Iraq immediately.
How far we have fallen!
Posted by ElyDog at 10/21/2008 @ 3:12pm
"So, do you like Saddam Hussein?' That from a repub I was talking to a while back, just after shock & awe. No, I replied, I don't like you either, but that doesn't mean I want to firebomb your house.
Posted by Sorelish at 10/21/2008 @ 3:39pm
Posted by ElyDog at 10/21/2008 @ 3:12pm
No doubt, PONTI will tell them "You were right...we stayed the course and WON in Iraq"...
and then fall over himself explaining how you "win a war"...but then "can't leave or you'll lose the war"!
LOL
Posted by Maskdelta at 10/21/2008 @ 3:39pm
What does everyone think will happen to Iraq and its government after we pull out?
1. Will it remain a democracy? (If it is one now)
2. Will Iran join the party?
3. Will the civil war escallate?
4. Will terrorist take over?
Perhaps we will never be out of Iraq. It may be one long nightmare.
Posted by Truthman at 10/21/2008 @ 3:50pm
What about all that oil we were supposed to get in on the ground floor of, as Greenspan admitted right before he kissed Shrub goodbye? What about all that "democracy" we were fomenting in the Middle East? All those lapel flags now floating in the Tigris and Euphrates? What were all our military funerals for? Zippo? Sheesh! Somebody aure told a biunch of big whoppers on Pennsylvania Avenue.... --MickNamVet
Posted by MickNamVet at 10/21/2008 @ 3:59pm
At some point, the Iraqis will have to take care of themselves! We cannot make them a nation! Only the Iraqis can make themselves a nation!
Posted by P. J. Casey at 10/21/2008 @ 5:03pm
Well it's obvious that Bush and company "Will not go gentle into that good night" but to the contrary, with the investment they have made in their quest to procure and control Iraq's petroleum resources as well as the secondary investments and profits being made off the defense industry as well as private security contractors and subsequent emerging market shares will indeed "Rage, rage against the dying of the light."
Posted by chiled28 at 10/22/2008 @ 03:42am
No comment from the cons?
hmmm, they must be over at Travelocity making their hotel reservations in Baghdad for 2011.
Posted by crabwalk at 10/22/2008 @ 07:25am
don't look for movement on this or any other issue. everyone is waiting for Obama.
we cannot afford Iraq, that much is clear.
what will happen in Iraq, no one knows, but there is definitely going to be more bloodshed, nothing has been settled. the whole thing has been an exercise in hubris.
reality has a way of altering the political landscape. you think any pres could sell a war of choice now? notachance.
it's not too late to impeach Cheney/Bush. that torture thing is only one of several possible indictments.
if Obama and the dems get a landslide, that will be a powerful mandate. the repubs could be in trouble for the next several election cycles, if they do not remake themselves as a more centrist party.
or they could go out of business, as happened to the Whigs. look it up.
Posted by emile duBois at 10/22/2008 @ 09:39am
the repubs could be in trouble for the next several election cycles, if they do not remake themselves as a more centrist party.
Posted by emile duBois at 10/22/2008 @ 09:39am
the comma is not needed.
Posted by frosty zoom at 10/22/2008 @ 09:44am
sorry brother just trying to make a point it matters not to me what punctuation you use peace fz
.,,.,,.,??!!¡¿"'"
Posted by frosty zoom at 10/22/2008 @ 09:48am
I personally find the plan disgusting, it is another (puppeteer's) plan to extend a "disastrously" failed foreign policy. We should never have "invaded" Iraq, we have never been seen by the Iraqis as "liberator's" (except by the puppets put in place by the Bush administration), only as invaders who have murdered, destroyed, and committed atrocities using the military"foot soldiers".
As you see this "so called" plan is not being overly discussed in the news, the Bush administration is disparately trying to shove this policy "down the throats" of Americans to get in passed in congress fast.....before to many people take note. Do not blame the Iraqis, Iranians, Syria, etc., the whole region (besides Israel, which is a puppet of the American government, and should be brought up on war crime charges....) wants American troops out and why should they not?
Look at the devastation the America military (and other countries/governments) has caused......for what I ask you.....freedom/democracy....please! Lets not even talk about why, the American government has allowed "mercenaries" to set up shop (Blackwater, etc.) in Iraq, or why mercenaries have more personnel in Iraq then American military soldiers........?????
Every American should feel disgusted at what this administration has been allowed to do, and the deaths (not freedom or liberation) is has caused. Simply put the military needs to withdraw from Iraq now....not later. Admiral Mullen.....he simply is another puppet of the puppeteers, and any remarks/response from him are worthless. Contact your state representative, and request that they do not approve of any plan that has our troops stay in Iraq extended.
Posted by rayven at 10/22/2008 @ 09:51am
http://www.thenation.com/blogs/action/warn.mhtml?pid=374740
good summing up.
both campaigns are mired in minutia, the big issue will not be discussed, to their great relief.
the entire Sarah Palin thing is calculated. her "malapropisms" are just like Ann Coulter's hate speech, designed to get attention at any cost. playing dumb got Bush where he is now, maybe it will work a second time?
remember you can play dumb even while actually being dumb.
Posted by emile duBois at 10/22/2008 @ 10:41am
excellent points as always emile.
We don't kick this around much, but the dumbing down is about the most powerful tactic the neocon/MSM employs in setting the narrative.
Have a beer with Bush, BBQ with McCain. Hockey mom Palin. Sift only for gaffes and digs.
Interestingly, the lack of giant faceplants in the debates forced the herd to notice, however faintly, something beyond. Forced a glimpse of differences in clarity, demeanor, reasoning.
The debates forced rightleaners to see Obama is not really any of the many forms of bogeyman their brainwashers from Fox and Clear Channel have been insisting on...
More than the MSM drivel, where Entertainment Tonight has equal valence with political coverage, the debates helped create some cognitive dissonance.
Obama just simply didn't match the many ways he's painted 24-7 by the media - albeit with much of this done via ASSOCIATION. He was not scary or wierd or off-putting or unstable or irrational. Not blackpower-ish as Wright; not underhanded, anti-American as Ayers; not Jesse Jackson jibberish, not socialist, not Muslim-looking sounding, and except for his name, hmmm, not altogether not-American...
Posted by winyahn at 10/22/2008 @ 11:04am
Hence the debate poll bumps have tended to be in the direction of reality and fairness. The better man keeps winning these.
Posted by winyahn at 10/22/2008 @ 11:05am
it's not too late to impeach Cheney/Bush. that torture thing is only one of several possible indictments
Posted by emile duBois at 10/22/2008
Unfortunatly, it is too late. We can only hope that historians will "do the right thing" or should I say; "the correct thing."
Posted by Truthman at 10/22/2008 @ 11:05am
impeachments have lasted an average of six weeks, so in that sense there is enough time. in the political sense you are correct.
Posted by emile duBois at 10/22/2008 @ 1:03pm
Yes, I agree with the six weeks. I wanted more, I wanted a recall vote.
Posted by Truthman at 10/22/2008 @ 2:37pm