Obama website wants a new candidate to back

MonsterMark

MonsterMark

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Hope and Change.
Looks they they are waking up and not liking what they are seeing.

I see a romp in the election.

America will elect McCain, a man nobody, OK, 10% of us wanted.
Obama. What a natural disaster.

http://my.barackobama.com/page/community/group/SenatorObama-PleaseVoteAgainstFISA/

Even ABC News is starting to figure it out.

ABC: Obama’s Iraq plan “almost impossible”;
July 11, 2008 by Ed Morrissey

Barack Obama has spent the last month waffling on whether he will stick to his 16-month evacuation plan for Iraq, saying alternately that he will “refine” the policy with input from the commanders or that the commanders will take input from him, once in office. ABC News spoke to the commanders and their officer corps in Iraq and got some input first, and discovered two points Obama hasn’t taken into consideration. Not only do they not want to leave, but if they do, they’d like to take their equipment with them: The military has been redeploying troops for years, and Maj. Gen. Charles Anderson, who would help with the withdrawal, told us as we toured Camp Arifjan in Kuwait, “We have the capacity to do a minimum of two-and-a-half brigade combat teams a month — can we expand that capacity? Sure. Can we accelerate? It depends. It depends on the amount of equipment that we bring back. And it’s going to depend on how fast we bring them out.”

It is the equipment that is the real problem. …
90 percent of the equipment would have to be moved by ground through the Iraqi war zone, to the port in Kuwait, where it must all be cleaned and inspected and prepared for shipment. This is a place with frequent dust storms, limited port facilities and limited numbers of wash racks.

While Anderson and his troops have a positive attitude, several commanders who looked at the Obama plan told ABC News, on background, that there was “no way” it could work logistically.

This is the kind of information that policy makers usually get before formulating policy. We can rotate troops out of Iraq on the kind of timetable Obama suggests, but we’d have to leave all of our heavy equipment in Iraq. Unless Obama plans some kind of nationwide garage sale, that would be a rather large loss for the American military in materiel as well as making our exit look more like Dunkirk.

Obviously, Obama didn’t have any awareness of logistics when he made this proposal — and that’s the point. His lack of experience, combined with a hubris that he has consistently shown on the campaign trail, makes clear that he is in way over his head at this point of his career. He has no sense of military policy at all, and got the biggest call of the war — the surge — completely wrong. Yet he insists that he’s ready to lead this nation’s military during a time of war as Commander in Chief?

The troops in the field have strong feelings about premature withdrawal under any circumstances. As one soldier put it, pointing to his bulletproof vest, he doesn’t want his children having to wear the same gear in Iraq in 30 years because we (once again) bugged out before the job was finished. When Obama visits Iraq this summer, he will undoubtedly hear plenty of that sentiment — but they will also include a primer on logistics that Obama should have requested long before he started making promises about the pace of withdrawal.
 
http://www.slate.com/id/2195134/

Obama Gets Help From Iraq's Prime Minister and from the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

By Fred Kaplan
Posted Thursday, July 10, 2008, at 5:55 PM ET

It's been a good week for Sen. Barack Obama. National security is the one area where his opponent, Sen. John McCain, holds an advantage in the polls. Yet on the two most contentious security issues—Iran and Iraq—Obama's views have now been endorsed by two of the most unassailably authoritative figures: the highest-ranking officer in the U.S. armed forces and the prime minister of Iraq.

When it comes to military matters, McCain the war hero might get away with pulling rank on the junior senator from Illinois—but he can't claim more experience than those two.

The stab from Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki turned into a comedy routine. Maliki stated this week that he would not sign any treaty allowing U.S. armed forces to remain on his nation's soil—the current accord, known as a Status of Forces Agreement, expires at the end of this month—unless it includes a timetable for their withdrawal.

Obama has called for just such a timetable. McCain has opposed one, famously saying that a substantial number of U.S. combat troops might need to stay in Iraq for another 100 years.

When asked about Maliki's statement, McCain told reporters that it had been mistranslated—to which Maliki responded that, no, the English version was correct. At that point, some of McCain's supporters said that the prime minister wasn't serious, that he'd been forced by political constituencies to demand a timetable. Maliki again insisted that he meant what he'd said. (Even if he was caving to political pressures, one could infer that this suggests a majority of Iraqis and their major parties want us to commit to getting out in the not-too-distant future.)

It's a rather awkward situation for McCain, who did publicly say four years ago at the Council on Foreign Relations that if an elected government of Iraq asked us to leave, "I think it's obvious that we would have to leave," adding, "I don't see how we could stay when our whole emphasis and policy has been based on turning the Iraqi government over to the Iraqi people."

Meanwhile, Maliki's insistence on this score makes life a lot easier for Obama. McCain pressured him into planning a trip to Iraq this summer—he hadn't been there for two years—so he can see the place up close before making judgments about its future. While he's there, Obama will be briefed by Gen. David Petraeus and other commanders; he'll probably also talk with junior officers and enlisted men, and with Iraqi politicians, too. Security in Iraq is better than it was a year ago. To some degree, this improvement is the result of George W. Bush's surge (combined with Petraeus' strategy, Muqtada Sadr's cease-fire, the paying of many insurgents to stop shooting at us, and, most important, the alliance between U.S. forces and Sunni insurgents against the common enemy of al-Qaida—an alliance initiated by the Sunnis before the surge began). It might have been awkward for Obama to praise the troops' accomplishments then rapidly pull them out. But he could say, "If our friend the Iraqi prime minister wants us to set a schedule for withdrawing, well, how could any president of the United States insist otherwise?"
Obama also got a boost this week from reports in the Jerusalem Post and Haaretz that Adm. Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, recently told top officials of the Israeli Defense Forces that the United States would not give them a "green light" to launch airstrikes on Iran.
This is not merely a political statement. To send fighter-bombers to attack Iran, the Israelis would need permission to fly over Iraq on the way. Maliki certainly wouldn't approve such a plan; Mullen was saying that President Bush wouldn't, either.

Obama has said that the situation in Iran—the continued enrichment of uranium, the recent test-firing of missiles, and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's persistently belligerent rhetoric—calls for a full-court diplomatic press. This means economic pressure but also direct talks. Mullen and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates have said much the same thing in public, noting that an attack would merely delay, not halt, Iran's nuclear program and that Iranian retaliation to an airstrike could do far greater damage—especially economic—to the United States and its allies.
McCain hasn't called for military action (except for the standard boilerplate of keeping "all options on the table"), but he refuses to consider direct talks—thus leaving us in the same hole we're in now.

Once more: advantage Obama.

At this point, McCain's challenge is to justify the perception that national security is his strength—to explain how his experience in the military translates into good judgment for making policy.

_________________________________________________________________

Looks like Iraq wants us to leave within the same time frame Obama is proposing give or take a few months.
 
Found this cartoon amusing if not candid

content_cartoonbox_slate_com.gif
 
Well it's a cartoon and does capture a sentiment I'm sure is there in the government and military.
I don't think the cartoonist was lampooning Bush here, just
the unexpected Iraqi withdrawl request(demand?)
"We'll leave when we think the time is right for us and our interests and considerations" is more like it.
 
I share that sentiment.

I'm still wondering how we're paying so much for gas instead of pumping Iraqi oil straight into our tankers. As far as I am concerned, its bought and paid for already. about a trillion dollars worth.
 
U.S. and Iraq near a 'bridge' deal on status of U.S. troops


By the end of July, they hope to finalize a deal that would map out the role and "time horizon" for US troops in the country.

By Sam Dagher | Correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor from the July 14, 2008 edition

http://www.csmonitor.com/2008/0714/p01s11-wome.html

BAGHDAD - By the end of July, US and Iraqi officials hope to finalize a deal that would map out the role and length of stay for US troops in the country.

But this is likely to be a temporary "bridge" agreement, including specific goals for terms of US withdrawal from major cities, followed by further talks on a long-term status of forces agreement (SOFA), says a senior US administration official involved in the talks here.

The US shift to a short-term deal follows comments last week by Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki suggesting for the first time that a timetable be set for the departure of US troops. On Saturday, Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama said that "we need a timetable for withdrawal" and that the US should not commit to a long-term occupation of Iraq.

But a key question is whether any deal can be sold to Iraq's political factions in an election year. The Iraqi government is beset by divisions and conflicting agendas with regard to the status of US forces that are playing out both in the media and in private.

There is strong opposition to any deal from the influential Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr as well as from Iran, which exercises large sway over Shiite factions inside and outside the government and objects to any US troop presence in Iraq.

"We are going to a new process.... The conversation [with the Iraqis] is how we package this in a way that meets [Iraq's] political challenge," says the US official, who spoke on condition of anonymity due to the politically sensitive nature of the negotiations. "I think we can get there…. At least have it [agreement] in good shape [by end of July]."

Several senior Iraqi officials close to the talks also see a similar scenario. "We are discussing a framework agreement and it could be agreed upon by the end of the month," says Hadi al-Ameri, a powerful Shiite politician who heads parliament's defense committee. He is a member of Iraq's Political Council for National Security, a body that includes Iraq's president and his two deputies, the prime minister and his two deputies, the speaker of parliament, and the heads of the main parliamentary blocs.

This council could make or break any deal and it is expected to meet in the coming days to discuss the specifics of the agreement, according to Mahmoud Othman, a Kurdish parliamentarian.

When the SOFA talks were launched in March, also under discussion was a broader, framework document outlining the political, economic, and security relationship between the US and Iraq. While the SOFA pact is being postponed, the framework document is expected to be completed soon with an appendix that temporarily governs the status of US forces until a full SOFA is reached, say US and Iraqi officials.

For Washington, the three most important components of any agreement, according to the administration official, is the ability of US troops to operate in concert with Iraqi forces in what is still considered until now a "combat environment," retain the right to detain anyone deemed a security threat, and continue to be afforded immunity from prosecution in Iraqi courts.

The US side is also eager to clinch a deal before the end of President Bush's term. SOFAs are "tedious and complex," take on average two years to negotiate, and require Congressional approval, says the US official. He notes that the SOFA with Israel took seven years to conclude. The bridge agreement under discussion now would be "legally binding" in many respects and only require Bush's signature, says the official.

Although the US has indicated that it would be willing to consider dropping the immunity enjoyed by private security contractors as a concession to Iraqis, it's not clear yet how this would work in practice since firms like Aegis, Blackwater, and others are now an integral component of US military and intelligence operations in Iraq.

On the other hand, the government of Prime Minister Maliki is eager to demonstrate its nationalist credentials to Iraqis and prove that any deal with the Americans replacing their current UN-sanctioned mandate, which expires on Dec. 31, will contradict what some of Maliki's political enemies are saying and bring Iraq a more robust sovereignty.

This was underscored last week when Maliki during a landmark visit to the United Arab Emirates asserted that any agreement would have to include either a timetable for withdrawal or full withdrawal of US forces.

His remarks were later echoed by several of his Shiite aides. "The Iraqi negotiators enjoy the trust of their people and can crush the unrealistic ambitions of the Americans in this agreement," boasted Hassan al-Snaid, one of Maliki's senior partisans, on state-owned Iraqiya TV.

The US official concedes that Washington may have overplayed its hand with some of its opening positions in March, which he says gave opponents of the treaty, particularly Iran, ammunition to "poison" the talks.
"Some of our opening positions were up here," he says. "It looked like we were trying to lock up the status quo through this bilateral arrangement."

But he's quick to add that these are negotiations and that it's natural for each side to aim to maximize their gains. As an example of Iran's alleged meddling in the talks, the official says Iraqis had asked the Americans to provide them with an idea of where in the country they envisioned being stationed in the first quarter of 2009. The US official says the preliminary response was possibly 58 locations. But this was leaked to the media and spun as "we were seeking 58 permanent bases," thereby fueling Iran's alleged "sophisticated cooked-up propaganda campaign."

The US official says the negotiating team is willing to discuss with Iraqis how to meet their demands for a timetable despite Washington's argument that this will only benefit the opponents of Iraq's new political system and allow them to wait until US troops leave.
One compromise would be the notion of a "time horizon ... to include dates for goals of where we want to be."
These would include milestones such as when security responsibilities would be handed over to Iraqis in all 18 provinces especially Baghdad.
So far, the transfer of control has taken place in nine provinces, and the expectation is that it would be completed in the rest of the provinces by the end of this year. Another milestone would be the US "transition from combat mission to overwatch," of Iraq forces, he says.

Lt. Gen. James Dubik, a retiring US Army officer who was in charge of training Iraqi forces during the past year, provided a hint on Wednesday in testimony to Congress. He said US ground troops would "mostly be done" with their combat operations by mid-2009.

Mr. Ameri, the head of the parliamentary defense committee, says future discussions are going to revolve around Iraq's desire for an annual US troop status agreement and the US wish that it be for a longer period, "possibly a few years." Ameri suggests that one compromise would be to have a longer-term agreement that provides each side with the right to end it with 12-months' notice.

But any potential agreement still faces a number of political obstacles.
The Shiite parties, particularly the movement of Mr. Sadr and the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq (ISCI) that continues to back Maliki, are in the midst of a vicious power struggle that is expected to heat up in the run-up to provincial elections set for October. Sadr has warned that the SOFA treaty is "against the interests of the Iraqi people."

His partisans, although weakened and hemmed in as a result of recent military operations, continue to condemn the treaty each Friday during mass prayers coupled with brief demonstrations in Baghdad and the south.

Parallels are being drawn by some local media outlets between the current situation and the British mandate for Iraq in 1920 that sparked a nationwide revolution in July-October.

The government is eager to counter Sadr's weight. When it discusses the troop negotiations with the Americans, it mentions at every possible occasion that it enjoys the backing of Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the reclusive yet highly revered Shiite cleric in Najaf.
Although the US side and the Maliki government both share the goal of weakening the Sadrists, some Shiites in the government particularly those close to Iran are suspicious of the treaty.

ISCI's chief Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim said in an interview on July 4 that any agreement must include guarantees that the US would not attack Iran from Iraq.
"We do not want Iraq to be a launching pad for operations against neighboring countries especially Iran that stood next to Iraqis for a long time and sacrificed for them," said Mr. Hakim.

The US must also tread a fine line with Sunnis when it comes to the treaty.

The relationship between the US and the Sunni population has undergone a sea change over the past two years with many now regarding America as their protector against what they still perceive to be Shiite aggression and Iran's designs on Iraq. In 2004, it was the Sunni leaders who were demanding a timetable for US withdrawal from Iraq as a condition for backing the political process. No more, at least not the Sunnis inside Iraq.

Many Sunni leaders are concerned now that America may cede too much too soon to what they still regard as both a Shiite-controlled sectarian government and security forces.
"We want America to act as a wise mediator to help in creating a political atmosphere for a stable, balanced, and economically viable state," says Alaa Makki, a senior parliamentarian and leader of the Iraqi Islamic Party, speaking in English. "The security emptiness, if it occurs, will definitely be [taken advantage of] by the neighboring countries."

Mr. Makki says Iraqi forces are not ready yet to assume more responsibilities because they are torn by sectarian and party loyalties and "will not behave in a national way."

Jawad al-Bolani, Iraq's interior minister, summed up the challenges in an article published Saturday in the Arab daily Asharq al-Awsat: "The Kurds are with the treaty in public and private, Shiite Arabs are with it publicly but against it secretly, Sunni Arabs are with it secretly but against it publicly."
 
04SCTLS said:
The relationship between the US and the Sunni population has undergone a sea change over the past two years with many now regarding America as their protector against what they still perceive to be Shiite aggression and Iran's designs on Iraq. In 2004, it was the Sunni leaders who were demanding a timetable for US withdrawal from Iraq as a condition for backing the political process. No more, at least not the Sunnis inside Iraq.

Many Sunni leaders are concerned now that America may cede too much too soon to what they still regard as both a Shiite-controlled sectarian government and security forces.

"We want America to act as a wise mediator to help in creating a political atmosphere for a stable, balanced, and economically viable state," says Alaa Makki, a senior parliamentarian and leader of the Iraqi Islamic Party, speaking in English. "The security emptiness, if it occurs, will definitely be [taken advantage of] by the neighboring countries."
Click to expand...

Sometimes it pays to understand the whole scenario. Obama...Are you listening or is your mouth still flapping away?
 
They nailed Michelle to a 'T".

That is EXACTLY how I view her, right down to the Fro and expression on her face.:waving:
 
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What's most delicious here is that The New Yorker is a liberal magazine shooting for satire and instead shooting itself in the foot.
Many regular unsophisticated voters will take this image at face value and not view it as the over the top satire the artist intended it to be.
They say a gaffe is when a politician speaks the truth and this kind of analogy applies here.
The premise of a Freudian slip also comes to mind.
It's a gift to the Republicans who can gleefully say they had nothing to do with this while quietly using it to reinforce opinions that many people already have.
In one image the artist has captured the essence of the fear of Obama in a simple visual way that a thousand fancy words or more couldn't.
Snatching defeat from the jaws of victory is something the Democrats are seem to be good at.
The Republicans have (mostly) gotten over McCain being their candidate and are supporting him whereas clumsy Obama almost has a mini mutiny on his hands as
p i s s e d Hillary supporters pout and wring their hands, threatening to sit out the election or vote for McCain.
 
Yep. The New Yorker was too subtle. If they wanted to attach conservs to this they should have had a conserv magazine pictured with that pic in it.

If you have to explain the joke, it's not funny.
 
A Pilot's View of Obama



,,,,,,,,,,DO I HAVE THIS STRAIGHT?

HIS FATHER WAS A BLACK AFRICAN MUSLIM FROM KENYA

WE HAVE SEEN PICTURES OF HIS AFRICAN FAMILY.

HIS MOTHER WAS A WHITE AMERICAN ATHEIST FROM KANSAS

WHERE ARE THE PICTURES OF HIS AMERICAN FAMILY?

HIS FATHER DESERTED HIS MOTHER WHEN HE WAS ONLY TWO YEARS OLD AND WENT BACK TO AFRICA BY WAY OF HARVARD UNIVERSITY HOW? WAS HIS FATHER WEALTHY?

HIS MOTHER MARRIED AN INDONESIAN MUSLIM AND THEN MOVED TO JAKARTA WHERE HE WAS ENROLLED IN A MUSLIM SCHOOL

WHEN HE REACHED HIGH SCHOOL AGE HIS MOTHER SENT HIM TO HAWAII TO BE WITH HIS WHITE GRANDPARENTS AND HE WAS PUT INTO AN EXPENSIVE PRIVATE SCHOOL. HE LATER WENT TO HARVARD UNIVERSITY HOW? WERE HIS GRANDPARENTS RICH?

HE LIVES IN A $1.4 MILLION HOUSE OBTAINED THROUGH A DEAL WITH A WEALTHY FUNDRAISER. HOW?

HE 'WORKED' AS A CIVIL RIGHTS ACTIVIST IN CHICAGO . HE HAS NEVER HELD A PRODUCTIVE JOB OR RECEIVED A PAY CHECK THAT WAS NOT GOVERNMENT-FUNDED AND/OR TAYPAYER SUPPORTED.

THE PRESIDENCY IS NOT A CIVIL RIGHTS POSITION, NOR IS IT SUBJECT TO AFFIRMATIVE ACTION SET ASIDES; ON-THE-JOB TRAINING WON'T CUT IT.

HE ENTERED POLITICS AT THE STATE LEVEL AND THEN THE NATIONAL LEVEL WHERE HE HAS MINIMAL EXPERIENCE.

HE IS PROUD OF HIS 'AFRICAN HERITAGE' (A FATHER WHO GOT A WHITE GIRL PREGNANT AND DESERTED HER).

WHERE IS THE PRIDE IN HIS 'WHITE HERITAGE'? (A MOTHER WHO FLAUNTED CONVENTION AND DID NOT BELIEVE IN GOD).

SOME MIGHT THINK THERE WAS NOT MUCH TO BE PROUD OF EITHER WAY.

HE BELONGS, AND HAS BELONGED FOR OVER 20 YEARS, TO AN 'AFRO-CENTRIC' CHURCH IN CHICAGO THAT HATES WHITES, HATES JEWS, AND BLAMES AMERICA FOR ALL THE WORLD'S PERCEIVED FAULTS. (INCLUDING CREATING THE AIDs VIRUS IN ORDER TO INFLICT IT ON AFRICANS).

HE REPEATEDLY WHITEWASHES THE PASTOR, HIS CHURCH AND THE MEMBERS WHO CHEERED AFTER HEARING VITRIOLIC TIRADES AGAINST AMERICA

HE COULD NOT CONFRONT HIS PASTOR BUT HE WANTS US TO BELIEVE HE CAN CONFRONT NORTH KOREA AND IRAN ?

YEAH RIGHT ! !

DURING HIS VERY BRIEF TIME IN THE UNITED STATES SENATE HE HAS MANAGED TO AMASS THE NUMBER ONE ULTRA LIBERAL VOTING RECORD OUT OF THE ONE HUNDRED MEMBERS.

HE HAS VOTED CONSISTENTLY FOR BIGGER GOVERNMENT AND HIGHER TAXES. HE HAS VOTED FOR BIG ENTITLEMENTS AND LEGISLATION THAT WOULD SEVERELY CURTAIL AMERICA 'S ABILITY TO FIGHT TERRORISM AND TO PROTECT OUR BORDERS AND OUR NATIONAL INTERESTS AROUND THE WORLD.

BUT, HE IS A GOOD ORATOR. ISN'T THAT A COMFORT?

YEAH, I THINK I SEE HOW WELL HE COULD UNITE THE COUNTRY.

I THINK THE TRUTH IS THAT HE HOPES NO ONE WILL PUT THE PIECES TOGETHER.

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, this is your co-pilot. LET ME INTRODUCE YOU TO OUR NEW CHIEF PILOT.HE HAS NEVER FLOWN AN AIRPLANE, IN FACT HE HAS NEVER EVEN SAT IN THE COCKPIT, BUT HE SAYS HE HAS RIDDEN ON PLANES BEFORE. WE ARE SURE HE WILL GUIDE US SAFELY THROUGH THE STORMS WE MAY ENCOUNTER ON THIS FLIGHT.
 
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