McCain Campaign Attack On Alleged Iraq Flip-Flop By Obama Is A Stretch
Has the Obama campaign flip-flopped on the "surge"? Did Obama wrongly predict last year that the "surge" would fail, only to see his advisers argue today that people always knew it would be a success?
The McCain campaign is trying to turn this allegation into a central campaign issue as a way to sow doubts about Obama's judgment and fitness to be commander in chief. But a quick look at the charge shows it to be a stretch.
The McCain campaign today blasted out to reporters this quote from Obama senior adviser Robert Gibbs on MSNBC this morning...
"[W]ell, there's no doubt that the security situation has improved, much as everybody admitted it would if we put more troops on the ground."
The McCain camp is arguing that this is a re-write of history by the Obama camp, and is pointing to this quote from Obama back in January 2007, when the surge was first being debated...
"I am not persuaded that 20,000 additional troops in Iraq is going to solve the sectarian violence there. In fact, I think it will do the reverse."The only conceivable problem for Obama here is his prediction that the surge would "do the reverse." But Obama, very clearly, was making a broader point that isn't contradicted by what Gibbs said today, at least not in any meaningful sense. The key is that Obama said that the surge would not "solve the sectarian violence" -- emphasis on the word "solve" -- which is tantamount to saying that the surge won't solve the political problem in Iraq.
Indeed, here's the rest of what Obama said in 2007 (that the McCain camp cut from his quote):
"I think it takes pressure off the Iraqis to arrive at the sort of political accommodation that every observer believes is the ultimate solution to the problems we face there."
So Obama's larger point was a prediction that the surge wouldn't solve the need for political accommodation, not a military prediction.
Mavericky McSame taking someone out of context? You'd think after all of the whining the Republicans and Mavericky McSame did after the 100 years quote, they'd be more careful.
June 6, 2008 2:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
Kind of like McCain voted against bills to investigate the government reaction to Katrina, not the failure of the levees...but he's a liar and Obama's not?
June 6, 2008 2:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
Unfortunately, SFC Wallace, the Administration was complicit in the actual physical failure of the levees due to their negligence and misplaced priorities. You can't separate the two. Well, you can, but you'd be wrong.
The surge is barely a finger in the dike.
read the article. Be an informed citizen.
http://www.foreignaffairs.org/20080501faessay87305-p30/steven-simon/the-price-of-the-surge.html
June 6, 2008 4:46 PM | Reply | Permalink
When were the levees built? How much funding was diverted from them to other projects by Congress over the years? How much was spent on them during the Clinton administration? Sounds like you could become a "better informed citizen" yourself.
June 9, 2008 10:51 AM | Reply | Permalink
McCain has bigger problems. Oil is at an all time high at $139 a barrel and all he wants to talk about is freggin Iraq and Iran? The stock market tanked some 300pts. BO needs to change the narrative form WAR to the ECONOMY and he needs to do it NOW. McCain wants BO to talk about everything but the economy and BO has to find a way to pivot out of that to the economy.
June 6, 2008 2:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
"I am not persuaded that 20,000 additional troops in Iraq is going to solve the sectarian violence there. In fact, I think it will do the reverse."
C'mon Greg, I'm an Obama supporter but you can't
say sectarian violence is tantamount to saying political accommodation. Clearly there has been some
lessening of violence. McCain can't say it's because of the surge or more importantly it's led to political accommodation. But Obama clearly seemed to be saying more US troops will generate violence not less and that hasn't happened. Yet.
June 6, 2008 2:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
Markg, look at the quote in its full context (helpfully provided by Greg above):
Obama wasn't saying what the McCain camp claims he was saying.
June 6, 2008 2:55 PM | Reply | Permalink
The "reverse" of "to solve" is "to not solve." It's not "generate more." I see the point you're trying to make but you're also putting words in his mouth.
And when you add in the rest of the quote as Greg cited it, he's clearly saying that the solution that will be lacking is sufficient pressure to arrive at the "political accommodation" that would provide the "ultimate solution" (noun form of "solve").
So, clearly, what he's predicting will not be solved by the surge is the challenge of achieving the political accommodations necessary to ultimately address "the problems we face there." At the moment, that seems like a pretty accurate prediction.
June 6, 2008 3:01 PM | Reply | Permalink
Make that "more generate violence not less". I hate TPM's software.
June 6, 2008 2:51 PM | Reply | Permalink
That's a very hard to follow attack from McCain.
June 6, 2008 2:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
It's certainly a lot harder to follow than this one: McCain was against torture, the Bush tax cuts, telecom immunity and George W. Bush before he was for them.
June 6, 2008 3:03 PM | Reply | Permalink
It's so easy to levy attacks on McShame. Pull any thread. You find a scandal somewhere or cognitive slippage. But it's gonna be very hard for McShame to attack Obama in any substantive way. He's left with lobbing snowballs. But they melt!
June 6, 2008 3:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
Is McShame now in charge of tpm's software? I find it so hard to post the last few days. It wants me to sign in, but won't accept the password (given to me back in Feb by the system, mind you!) There's no way to get to your profile! And then, unaccountably, it decides to post.... really weird.
June 6, 2008 3:12 PM | Reply | Permalink
This latest aside, I've never thought Obama's stance on Iraq was all that strong. His campaign has, with the help of his supporters, trumpeted his opposition to the war from the beginning. But aside from his speech before he went into the Senate he has voted exactly the same as Hillary on the war. His stance against the war hasn't been all that impressive. On the other hand, McCain is married to the war, so Obama has a big advantage.
June 6, 2008 3:14 PM | Reply | Permalink
I don't disagree with you that Obama and Clinton voted together on the war once Obama was in the Senate; but I think that they would both agree that they did not have any good options as Senators without "hurting the troops".
I think if they had better options over the last few years they both would have voted more aggressively but unfortunately that isn't the case and we are were we are today.
It is important to keep in mind that Obama's little speech did stand out at the time when most Democrats were being pushed into a corner and ended up saber rattling right along with the GOP so it did stand out; it isn't everything but is was something and he took a chance back then and it has obviously paid off.
June 6, 2008 3:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
Before your house catches on fire you have lots of options: Install smoke detectors, buy fire extinguishers, plan an escape route, check electrical wiring...
After the fire starts a lot of those options go away and your left with put it out or get the h3ll out.
Just because Obama and Hillary agree on their post fire strategy does not mean that they agreed on their prefire strategy any more than running out of a burning building means that you did not act like a fool and play with firecracker in your kitchen beforehand.
June 6, 2008 3:36 PM | Reply | Permalink
Ok, let's check out the story count for today, 4 clinton, 1 lieberman, 1 mccain and a mccain attack on obama where you are validating the attack? WTF. The clintons lost on Tuesday. Get over it. Where are any legit stories on obama? Where's a kudos post on the historic nature of his win and then you do a post tying in clinton's orginal announcement to run? This is really, really absurd. Are you guys going to start reporting mr. bill's speech appearances next? Come on, what's the catch. Do the clintons own tpm?
June 6, 2008 3:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
Instead of a flip flop, this is just two different statements = one before the surge, one after.
He didn't think this and that would be accomplished, and now that the surge has take place, he acknowledges that maybe some of this did happen, but that doesn't mean all that happened, too.
If that makes any sense.
June 6, 2008 3:28 PM | Reply | Permalink
Why does the MSM let anyone get away with claiming the surge worked. We are paying these groups cash to curb their activities.
Our tax dollars are going to Sunni tribal leaders (on those days they choose not to be insurgents). Our tax dollars are then used to buy more weapons and explosives to kill our troops.
June 6, 2008 3:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
I have another question, why do they call it a surge? I don't get that one, we are going on 2 years now. That's one hell of a "surge" if you ask me.
In actuality it was a gradual escalation over 6 months or so and it has taken almost a year to start to draw down. That's not an f'n surge in my book.
Also, the "surge" had absolutely f'n nothing to do with the security situation. They bought off the sunnis and the sunnis and shittes have separated, there aren't any more mixed neighborhoods in baghdad. The sunnis were killed and driven out.
The "surge" worked my a**.
June 6, 2008 3:51 PM | Reply | Permalink
Seems to me Obama was saying the surge would lead to more sectarian violence, which was a very logical assumption, and that violence would take pressure off the government to make political accommodation.
It hasn't led to an increase in violence, the situation has gone from being on the verge of blowing the lid off the kettle back to a rolling boil. But it also hasn't led to political accommodation either imo because Bush is trying to shove so much stupid stuff down their throats like the Status of Forces Agreement that Iraqis are just running out the clock. Be my guess most people in Iraq, politicians of all stripes included, at this point have a kneejerk reaction against anything the US is for. I can't blame them either.
June 6, 2008 3:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
The problem is that no one on the Republican side is thinking long term.
Obama is saying that the only real solution to the problem is that the waring parties come to a political compromise. That is that they each have to give up something for the greater good. With the U.S. presence, the leaders have less of an incentive to make the hard choices. They can do want all politicians do when face with tough choices, procrastinate. Look no farther than the super delegates in the Democratic party for evidence of this.
In the end Republicans are trying to confuse tactics advantages with strategic victories. We will never be able to get out of Iraq under their plan because they are satisfied with simply keeping the top on a boiling kettle instead of turning off the heat.
June 6, 2008 3:49 PM | Reply | Permalink
Of course, the Republicans (some of them) are thinking long-term. You're forgetting the main neocon rationale for overthrowing Saddam in the first place: establish a democratic Islamic government in the Middle East that is friendly to USA interests and establish a permanent military presence there to counter the growing influence of China.
That's Neocon Thinking 101.
And come to think of it, McCain's "stay for 100 years" remark may have been a deliberate message to neocons that he approves of the thinking behind "The New American Century."
June 6, 2008 4:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
Here is a link to one of many examples of the US paying the Sunni tribes:
http://www.truthout.org/article/us-commanders-pay-iraqi-enemies-enlist
June 6, 2008 3:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
Might there exist any Obama quotes from last year wherein Obama explicitly conceded that the surge might lead to a short-term decrease in day-to-day violence, in the course of arguing that it could be bad for long-term attempts at reconciliation?
Also did, in fact, the surge "solve" the sectarian violence? My understanding was that what gains against sectarian violence we had seen in Iraq were often or mostly due to the "awakening council" strategy.
June 6, 2008 3:45 PM | Reply | Permalink
Actually, I remember him saying that and alot of dems saying that as well. More of the straight talk express chugging along, whoo, whoo.
June 6, 2008 3:52 PM | Reply | Permalink
Otto Obama introduced the Iraq War De-escalation Act in January 2007. The legislation would have begun a redeployment of U.S. forces no later than May 1, 2007, with the goal of removing all combat brigades from Iraq by March 31, 2008.
This is the basis of the bill eventually adopted by congress that Bush vetoed last year. It's the bill Edwards wanted congress to send back to Bush again and again until he signed it.
June 6, 2008 4:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
I remember listening to a report on NPR a while back that had a someone in the military talking about how they had soldiers whose sole jobs were to be walking around with backpacks of money paying people to stop fighting.
I'm trying to find the actual interview, but since it's audio it'll take a bit.
Anyone else remember anything like that?
June 6, 2008 4:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yep. I heard it also. I think it was one of the military analysts, who seems pretty honest, who was on cnn forever. I think he was a colonel and I can't remember his name for the life of me. I stopped watching cnn about a year ago.
June 6, 2008 4:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
Oh, one other thing, the us military was arming the sunni tribesmen west of baghdad as well. The shiite government was pissed, but this brought down the violence also. The sunnis got the impression through the cash and the weapons that the us military was helping in their defense so that they wouldn't get crushed by the shiites, so the violence went down in anbar province dramatically.
Also, baghdad is split down ethnic lines which dramatically reduced the violence. It's called ethnic cleansing, which the us, allowed to split the ethnic groups.
That's why the violence went down, but it is still astronomically high. The right-wing media just doesn't cover it. Orders from the white house.
June 6, 2008 4:27 PM | Reply | Permalink
An exceptional article from Foreign Affairs -
http://www.foreignaffairs.org/20080501faessay87305-p30/steven-simon/the-price-of-the-surge.html
The Obama Campaign needs to pull the talking points out of this article and shove em down the MSM blowhole.
June 6, 2008 4:37 PM | Reply | Permalink
Unfortunately, SFC Wallace, the Administration was complicit in the actual physical failure of the levees due to their negligence and misplaced priorities. You can't separate the two. Well, you can, but you'd be wrong.
The surge is barely a finger in the dike.
June 6, 2008 4:43 PM | Reply | Permalink
Thanks for posting this, Greg.
[evil grin]
June 6, 2008 6:15 PM | Reply | Permalink
Politico has an article today about something I've been kind of harping on: that being McCain's lack of mental accuity on the podium. The article states that his recent delivery was so poor that emails were coming in from all over the GOP about it. They stated that it was absolutely shocking, and even one of his own people suggested that he wear makeup next time because he looked so weak and old.
McCain isn't going anywhere. He's self-destructing as we speak. His people think that somehow a townhall forum will help him because he's been good at those in the past. Wrong-ola. McCain's tired old polemics, jokes,and verbal buck & wing only work when he is alone. With Barack's brilliance on stage, it is going to be devastating for McCain. Old geezer needs to put his sword down and try a rocking chair. He's truly pathetic!
June 6, 2008 7:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
Clearly Obama is making the same argument he has made consistently--that military force alone isn't going to solve the problem, and in fact may exacerbate it by preventing the Iraqi government from stepping up to the plate.
Of course, McCain is probably looking for a little payback for Obama and the DNC taking advantage of his 100 year comments which were likewise taken out of context and abused. What goes around comes around...
Cheers.
June 6, 2008 11:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
This pales in comparison to ... well ... a lot of shit, but especially McCain's political gymnastics on illegal wiretaps.
June 6, 2008 11:51 PM | Reply | Permalink