A new right-wing attack ad says Obama is worse than a flip-flopper. That and other political news in today’s Election Central Saturday Roundup.
Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi wrote off the President’s new “general time horizon” for withdrawal from Iraq, telling TPMtv, “Same old, same old, same old, same old. What are they going to say? They have not said anything as a matter of fact. Aspirational goals, which means it could be ten years.”
“This administration knows that it could have made this same statement a long time ago, and they’re I think being embarrassed into saying something by al-Maliki saying, ‘It’s time for you to go.’ So I don’t place a lot of confidence in that.”
And later: “I think this is just more of the same from the administration knowing that the American people have long abandoned their support of this war and now they’re trying to sound, dare I say the word, reasonable. But I think it’s just more of the same.”
I’ve spent a couple hours now trying to process the probable impact of Prime Minister al Maliki’s explicit endorsement of Barack Obama’s 16 month timetable for withdrawal of American troops from Iraq. My first instinct is always to try not to overstate the impact of momentary developments. But I don’t think it’s enough to say this is a huge development. It’s huger than that. In a stroke, I think, al Maliki has cut McCain off at the knees in a way I’m not sure his campaign strategy can recover from.
Consider McCain’s strategy, which is all bound up with Iraq.
All understand it is a given that the war is unpopular and that the vast majority of Americans want out as soon as possible. The big of wiggle room is just what’s ‘possible.’ McCain has invested his entire campaign in support for the purportedly nascent Iraqi democracy al Maliki represents and the claim that Obama’s support for a timetable for withdrawal irresponsibly risks losing the gains we’ve achieved and giving Iraq back to al Qaeda.
Here, with a brush of the hand and in so many words, al Maliki says, “No, we’re good.”
What exactly is McCain to say to that? He can hardly turn against Maliki or say he doesn’t have a feel of the situation on the ground.
What’s more, he’s given Obama want amounts to a potent new talking point by defining American redeployment out of Iraq as ‘victory’. Says Maliki: “So far the Americans have had trouble agreeing to a concrete timetable for withdrawal, because they feel it would appear tantamount to an admission of defeat. But that isn’t the case at all. If we come to an agreement, it is not evidence of a defeat, but of a victory, of a severe blow we have inflicted on al-Qaida and the militias.”
I don’t doubt that the McCain will come up with some pat response, though their silence so far does signal the difficulty of coming up with it. But McCain’s campaign has been almost entirely dedicated to raising doubts about a withdrawal strategy the great majority would like to embrace. And Maliki has now handed Obama the trump card of all trump cards with which to parry all of McCain’s attacks.
I would not discount the possibility that the White House will muscle Maliki into a retraction of some sort. But I think it will be difficult for that to seem to be anything other than what it is. What he said pre-waterboarding will always appear more genuine than whatever statement came later. McCain may also say that his ‘surge’ strategy is what made all this possible. But fundamentally that’s not a point Obama is arguing. The debate is about whether or not to leave. And on that count, Maliki has now placed McCain is an extremely precarious position.
The McCain campaign has just come out with their response to Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al Maliki’s endorsement of Obama’s withdrawal plan. I think the clotted, dodging-the-issue nature of the response communicates very clearly the box this has placed the McCain camp in.
ARLINGTON, VA — Today, McCain 2008 Senior Foreign Policy Advisor Randy Scheunemann issued the following statement:
“The difference between John McCain and Barack Obama is that Barack Obama advocates an unconditional withdrawal that ignores the facts on the ground and the advice of our top military commanders. John McCain believes withdrawal must be based on conditions on the ground. Prime Minister Maliki has repeatedly affirmed the same view, and did so again today. Timing is not as important as whether we leave with victory and honor, which is of no apparent concern to Barack Obama. The fundamental truth remains that Senator McCain was right about the surge and Senator Obama was wrong. We would not be in the position to discuss a responsible withdrawal today if Senator Obama’s views had prevailed.”
Got that? Rolls off the tongue, doesn’t it? Set aside for the moment that McCain doesn’t believe in withdrawal at all. Scheunemann is betting on our believing that Maliki himself doesn’t know what he means.
Late Update: CNN has finally picked up the Maliki statement story. There’s some effort to play it down but there’s only so much you can. It will be particularly interesting to see the response of the jejune Washington Post OpEd page.
TPM Reader RD has a good question some of the more pliant journos would do well to consider …
I take it from watching the news and reading the coverage of the campaign that Obama’s a big fat flip-flopper.
But it makes me wonder… At this point, is there any significant policy position that John McCain currently holds, on any topic, that he’s consistently held over the past 10 years? I mean that as a serious question. On economics, foreign policy, environmental policy, immigration, the role of evangelicals, you name it, it’s hard for me to pin down. I guess maybe on free trade?
I try to learn as much as I can about foreign cultures. And I’m learning that it’s very difficult to translate the nuances of the 
Arabic of Iraqi leaders when they’re speaking at variance with the talking points of the Bush White House. Language is a funny thing.
Along those lines, Dr. Ali al-Dabbagh, who the Times calls a spokesman for the Iraqi government, has released a statement saying that Prime Minister Maliki’s statement was “misunderstood and mistranslated” and “not conveyed accurately regarding the vision of Senator Barack Obama, U.S. presidential candidate, on the timeframe for U.S. forces withdrawal from Iraq.” But as the Times notes al Dabbagh did not specify what had been mistranslated.
Another interesting detail, noted by the Times. al-Dabbagh’s statement was released by CentCom. I do not know how often Iraqi government statements are released by CentCom.
In any case, here’s the rest of al-Dabbagh’s ‘clarification‘ …
Al-Dabbagh explained that Mr. al-Maliki confirmed the existence of an Iraqi vision stems from the reality with regard to Iraq security needs, as the positive developments of the security situation and the improvement witnessed in Iraqi cities makes the subject of U.S. forces’ withdrawal within prospects, horizons and timetables agreed upon and in the light of the continuing positive developments on the ground, and security that came within the Strategic Plan for Cooperation which was laid and developed by Mr. Maliki and President George Bush. The Iraqi government appreciates and values the efforts of all the friends who continue to support and supporting Iraqi security forces.
Al-Dabbagh underscored that the statements made by the head of the ministerial council (Prime Minister al-Maliki) or any of the members of the Iraqi government should not be understood as support to any U.S. presidential candidates.
Late Update: CNN plays it pretty straightforwardly as a mistranslation. Considerably more credulous than the Times.
Todd Gitlin notes the major papers’ rather reticent response to al Maliki’s Der Spiegel interview.
Todd wrote about three hours ago. As of just before midnight, as far as I can tell, the Post relegates the story to two paragraphs near the top of the paper’s story about Obama’s trip to Afghanistan. The article returns to the topic and provides some elaboration at the end. The Times gives the story almost the identical treatment — a short reference below the lede and returned to at the end of the piece.
The most credulous take I’ve seen so far is CNN’s which all but takes al Dabbagh’s ‘translation error’ explanation at face value.
Let me know what write-ups you’re seeing.
Late Update: I’m not sure precisely what it ‘means’. But in scanning around the major news sites I’m noticing that the better coverage of this story seems to be in the big papers’ blogs rather than in their front page stories — most of which are now out on the websites.
Here’s a campaign memo the Obama campaign released today about McCain following Obama on key foreign policy issues.
Former Rep. Bob Barr (R-GA) showed up at Netroots Nation Saturday. Barr is the Libertarian candidate for President, but he’s still best known his over-the-top buffoonery during the Clinton impeachment saga, so his presence at a gathering of progressive Democrats had some of the same dissonance for me as seeing former Nixon counsel John Dean here. Times change. Maybe people do, too: