There are reports out (I think the first you can see at this link but apparently there have been others) that suggest that Obama when he was on his recent trip to Iraq, was doing some behind-the-scenes negotiations with Iraqi leaders and even American commanders, along the lines of trying to get the Iraqis to delay until after the election announcing that they had worked out with the US a tentative framework for gradual US troop withdrawals. I assume the point would be that even though this was worked out by the Iraqis and the Bush administration, the timing would cause it to be associated with Obama should he win the election.
If this is true, it is incredibly disturbing. The idea of a major political candidate working outside the official diplomatic framework of the United States for his own political purposes would have terrible implications, I think. Both legally and historically, it is always critical that the United States speak with one official voice to both friend and foe internationally. And this case would look even worse, because essentially it would have Barack Obama saying to Iraqis behind closed doors: 'look, I'm going to be the next President so you should listen to me now and do what I'm asking (which, by the way, is to my political benefit), instead of doing what you've worked out with the current sitting administration.'
I wouldn't bring this up, except that I still haven't heard a denial of this from the Obama camp, and it appears the story has credibility enough to get a comment from the McCain camp.
At this point, it is not yet clear what official American negotiations Senator Obama tried to undermine with Iraqi leaders, but the possibility of such actions is unprecedented. It should be concerning to all that he reportedly urged that the democratically-elected Iraqi government listen to him rather than the US administration in power. If news reports are accurate, this is an egregious act of political interference by a presidential candidate seeking political advantage overseas. Senator Obama needs to reveal what he said to Iraq's Foreign Minister during their closed door meeting. The charge that he sought to delay the withdrawal of Americans from Iraq raises serious questions about Senator Obama's judgment and it demands an explanation."
Let me just say, political differences/preferences aside...I really, really, really hope Senator Obama would not do such a thing. It would be a terrible thing if he did. I imagine we will hear more about this and hopefully we can get corroborating information one way or the other.
5 comments:
Wow...that is really disturbing. I have had a hard time trusting Obama anyway, and this just adds to that feeling.
I have a hard time trusting the McCain camp, and the fact that the campaign thought this story worth commenting on says NOTHING to me about it's credibility.
This is the first I've heard of this story, so I can't comment on it directly. But my guess is that Obama has not denied it NOT because it isn't true but because a denial would put the issue in the public eye and suddenly it wouldn't MATTER if it was true or not.
We shall see what else we hear about it. And would it really be so hard for an official campaign comment that says "this report is not true"? Of course, comments from the opposing campaign are not of themselves reliable; however most campaigns at least do a little vetting of questions like this before commenting as to reliability. What I've read sounds pretty solid, but again, if it is not true, I would not let it hang out there if I was in the Obama campaign.
Here's the Obama response. I'm looking forward to hearing more on this as well.
http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5hi9TDNHvuBZpFsO8ZbiFYsnbIl3A
the NYPost is pretty tabloid-ish and glaringly conservative (recent headline: "BAM OUTDOES JOHN IN NEGATIVE ADS"). "Bam" is Barrack Obama, by the way. So, let's see how this comes out.
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