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marginallymanic
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marginallymanic
Cabinet Minister
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Joined: 09 Mar 2005
Posts: 4070
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| Posted: Sun Jul 20, 2008 2:35 pm Post subject: |
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Political leverage in the 51st state
It's almost a convention of politics that when a politician says he was misquoted, but doesn't detail the misquote or offer an alternative, he's really saying he wishes he hadn't said what he did, or that he needs to issue a pro-forma denial to please someone.
The Iraqi Prime Minister's vague denial seems to fall in that category. The fact that it arrived to the American press via CENTCOM, seems to support that. It came, as Mike Allen notes, 18 hours later, and at 1:30 a.m. Eastern, a little late for Sunday papers; his staff also seems, Der Spiegel reports, not to have contested Iraqi reporting of the quote, even in the "government-affiliated" Iraqi press.
The notion this was a misquote also bumps up against Der Spiegel's standing by its reporting, and providing a long, detailed transcript.
More broadly, Maliki's words illustrate a political reality: Foreign players have a real influence on American politics, and they know it. Osama bin Laden appeared to be trying to tilt the 2004 election with a sinister 11th hour statement. His motives are unknown, but observers including John McCain thought he helped President George W. Bush. There's already quiet speculation about how Al Qaeda will seek to influence this election, and whether they see themselves as standing more to gain from continued American presence in Iraq or from withdrawal.
Leaders of a number of countries have some power to affect our election. An Israeli strike on Iran before November would dramatically shift the terrain. Iranian belligerence, or cooperation, could favor one candidate or the other. Europeans could pledge more, or less, support for American efforts abroad. North Korea could continue to engage, or withdraw. Many other leaders, from Syria to China, could offer their own October surprises.
The conventional wisdom is that gestures of engagement or negotiation would favor Obama, who has pledged negotiations; war or belligerence favor McCain, who is more skeptical of the power of diplomacy. But this isn't always easy to predict.
In this context, though, Iraq's elected leaders have more power than any others. There used to be occasional references to Iraq as the 51st state; the number of American soldiers and civilians in Iraq appears to be well north of 150,000, more than a quarter of the population of Alaska. And both McCain and Obama cast their policies, in part, in terms of what's good for the Iraqis and what they want.
So while there's been some suggestion that Maliki was playing domestic politics, this seems like the opposite. (Who plays domestic politics in the pages of Der Spiegel?) Maliki is playing international politics, American politics even. While some may object to that, it may be a sign that he intends to be a player in the American election from now until November, and realizes how much more leverage he has now on the next president's stance toward his country than he will after our election.
http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/0708/Political_leverage_in_the_51st_state.html#comments
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marginallymanic
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| Posted: Sun Jul 20, 2008 2:40 pm Post subject: |
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Interesting to relate those, to this, from just five days ago.
| Quote: |
Published: Tuesday, July 15, 2008
From just about the moment U.S. troops set foot in Iraq back in 2003, U.S. officials have been rejecting the idea of setting a deadline for their withdrawal. This is an open-ended deal.
In 2004, in fact, even the principal Democratic candidates for president refused to set a date. John Kerry eventually laid out a three-part Kerryesque test that he said would have to be met before he would even entertain the idea. He said he would “measure the level of stability” in Iraq, “measure the outlook for the stability to hold” and “measure the ability ... of their security forces” to defend the country. So no timetable from him.
Nor from Congress. In May of 2005, the House of Representatives, by a vote of 300 to 128, crushed a tepid little measure that politely asked President Bush to devise a withdrawal plan.
Since Democrats took control of Congress in 2006, majorities in the House and Senate have repeatedly refused to set a withdrawal date, and President Bush has repeatedly promised to veto any bill that did. In March of 2007, Bush said he would veto even a war funding bill — a bill that also provided aid for Katrina victims — if it contained a date for withdrawal.
Earlier this year, John McCain furiously accused one of his GOP presidential rivals, Mitt Romney, of wanting to set a timetable. Setting a date would lead to chaos, said McCain, whose support for a war with Iraq predated the invasion itself. Romney just as furiously denied that he had called for a timetable. “That’s simply wrong and it’s dishonest, and he should apologize,” he said.
More recently, with Romney out of the way, McCain has been attacking as irresponsible Senator Barack Obama’s promise to withdraw most U.S. troops from Iraq within 16 months of taking office.
Then last week, out of the blue, Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki announced that he wanted the U.S. to set a ... timetable for withdrawal. A Maliki spokesman explained, “We don’t have a specific date in mind, but we need to agree on the principle of setting a deadline.”
And how did McCain and Bush respond to this repudiation of one of their key policy fetishes? With the only argument they had left: denial.
McCain responded, “As I have said before, we can withdraw and withdraw with honor, not according to a set timetable, and I’m confident that is what Prime Minister Maliki is talking about, since he has told me that for many meetings we’ve had.”
According to The Washington Post, administration officials explained their view that the Iraqi statements were “aimed at local and regional audiences and do not reflect fundamental disagreements with the Bush administration.”
In other words, McCain and Bush believe they know what the Iraqis want and need, despite what they say. And that makes sense, considering how perceptive about this mess these two have been all along.
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http://sentinelsource.com/articles/2008/07/15/opinion/sentinel_editorial/free/id_314211.txt
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