the first rule of any diplomatic contact is to come out of it
at least singing the same song. the iraqi foreign minister
pretty much said "stay the course; the surge is working", but Obama heard "get the f*ck out of my country". if obama
was the president right this moment, we he would have created a huge international rift with this gaffe.
this is a huge story that no one is picking up on.
is barack obama simply
incapable of hearing any opinion that is different from his cherished prejudices? what is
going to happen when he meets with the military leaders on the ground in iraq? they are going to say the same
thing; is he going to ignore them as well?
Obama and Iraqi Foreign Minister Have Different Memories of their Conversation
On Monday, Sen. Barack Obama, D-Illinois, talked on the phone with the Iraqi Foreign Minister, Hoshyar Zebari.
At a press availability in Michigan, I asked Obama if Zebari had expressed any concern to him that his plans to withdrawal U.S. troops as president would undo any security advances.
"No, he did not express that," Obama said. "He did emphasize his belief that we've made real progress and I think was eager to see political accommodations between the factions follow up in the wake of this progress.
"I think that he expressed what President Maliki has expressed as well," Obama continued, "which is that the Iraqis are obviously concerned about their sovereignty and are not seeking a long term occupation by the U.S. And so my sense is that we should be able to execute a withdrawal and set a timeframe - a timetable that continues to allow US forces to support Iraqi forces in going after terrorists, that continues to train the Iraqi police and military as long as we're not training militias that are turning on each other. One area that I think is important to emphasize is that as a consequence of a huge spike in oil prices - the Iraqi government's budget is twice as large as it anticipated and so I think its important for the Iraqis to start picking up more of the tab both for reconstruction efforts as well as the need to continue to boost their military capacity."
But today comes this report that Zebari told the Washington Post "that he had some frank talk for the candidate: 'The foreign minister said ‘my message’ to Mr. Obama ‘was very clear...Really, we are making progress. I hope any actions you will take will not endanger this progress.’"
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