NYT editorial, ANOTHER IRAQ PHOTO OP: Hints of troop reduction are "a cruel tease"

[DeepModem Mom]

Another Iraq Photo Op
Published: September 5, 2007

Iraq is a long way to go for a photo op, but not for President Bush, who is pulling out all the stops to divert public attention from his failed Iraq policies and to keep Congress from demanding that he bring the troops home. As Americans and Iraqis continue to die — and Iraqi politicians refuse to reconcile — Mr. Bush stubbornly refuses to recognize that what both countries need is a responsible exit strategy for the United States, not more photo ops and disingenuous claims of success.

With Congress launching a series of pivotal hearings this week, Mr. Bush’s eight-hour stopover in Iraq on Sunday won him major play in the news media, including photos of smiling American military forces with their commander in chief. But the facts of the visit undermined his claims that his troop escalation is working and deserves more time and more lives to bear fruit.

Mr. Bush’s only destination was an isolated, well-fortified air base in Anbar Province, not Baghdad where his so-called surge was supposed to bring stability and persuade Iraqi politicians that they had more to gain from reconciliation than score-settling. We suppose Mr. Bush could claim one success for his visit: he did manage to get Iraq’s Shiite prime minister, Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, to visit the Sunni-dominated province.

Mr. Bush pumped up his headlines by suggesting continued gains in security could allow for a reduction in troops as his critics have been demanding and most Americans desperately want. But this is a cruel tease and a pathetic attempt to repackage old promises. Mr. Bush has been dangling that same as-soon-as-possible drawdown for years. The Pentagon had a plan to do just that in 2004. Today, the troop level stands at 160,000, up 30,000 from the start of this year....

***

Mr. Bush clearly has no strategy to end this conflict, which has no end in sight. The American people deserve considered judgments not come-ons from their leaders. Congress needs to insist on a prudent formula that will withdraw American forces and limit the hemorrhaging.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/05/opinion/05wed1.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin

[rodeodance]

1. NYT: Bush Shifts Terms for Measuring Progress in Iraq

Forum Name General Discussion: Politics
Topic subject Bush Shifts Terms for Measuring Progress in Iraq
Topic URL http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x3498065#3498065
3498065, Bush Shifts Terms for Measuring Progress in Iraq
Posted by rodeodance on Wed Sep-05-07 08:14 AM


http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/05/world/middleeast/05assess.html?ei=5065&en=e99bd3dddd0640f6&ex=1189656000&partner=MYWAY&pagewanted=print

September 5, 2007
News Analysis
Bush Shifts Terms for Measuring Progress in Iraq
By DAVID E. SANGER

WASHINGTON, Sept. 4 — With the Democratic-led Congress poised to measure progress in Iraq by focusing on the central government’s failure to perform, President Bush is proposing a new gauge, by focusing on new American alliances with the tribes and local groups that Washington once feared would tear the country apart.

That shift in emphasis was implicit in Mr. Bush’s decision to bypass Baghdad on his eight-hour trip to Iraq, stopping instead in Anbar Province, once the heart of an anti-American Sunni insurgency. By meeting with tribal leaders who just a year ago were considered the enemy, and who now are fighting Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, a president who has unveiled four or five strategies for winning over Iraqis — depending on how one counts — may now be on the cusp of yet another.

It is not clear whether the Democrats who control Congress will be in any mood to accept the changing measures. On Tuesday, there were contentious hearings over a Government Accountability Office report that, like last month’s National Intelligence Estimate, painted a bleak picture of Iraq’s future.

It was the White House and the Iraqi government, not Congress, that first proposed the benchmarks for Iraq that are now producing failing grades, a provenance that raises questions about why the administration is declaring now that the government’s performance is not the best measure of change. ......

[rodeodance]

2. the nytimes is going good work today.

[rodeodance]

3. REC

[Botany]

4. N.Y. Times if Keith says it, will it be fit to print?

oh well :rofl:

[DeepModem Mom]

5. Same idea! (Although this probably was written before 8 Eastern last night.) nt