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According to ABC News’ Jake Tapper Barack Obama and Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari have very different recollections of their phone conversation on Monday.
At a press availability in Michigan, I asked Obama if Zebari had expressed any concern to him that his plans to withdrawal U.S. troops as president would undo any security advances.
“No, he did not express that,” Obama said. “He did emphasize his belief that we’ve made real progress and I think was eager to see political accommodations between the factions follow up in the wake of this progress.
“I think that he expressed what President Maliki has expressed as well,” Obama continued, “which is that the Iraqis are obviously concerned about their sovereignty and are not seeking a long term occupation by the U.S. And so my sense is that we should be able to execute a withdrawal and set a timeframe – a timetable that continues to allow US forces to support Iraqi forces in going after terrorists, that continues to train the Iraqi police and military as long as we’re not training militias that are turning on each other. One area that I think is important to emphasize is that as a consequence of a huge spike in oil prices – the Iraqi government’s budget is twice as large as it anticipated and so I think its important for the Iraqis to start picking up more of the tab both for reconstruction efforts as well as the need to continue to boost their military capacity.”
But today comes this report that Zebari told the Washington Post “that he had some frank talk for the candidate: ‘The foreign minister said ‘my message’ to Mr. Obama ‘was very clear…Really, we are making progress. I hope any actions you will take will not endanger this progress.’”
Maybe Obama should have checked with Minister Zebari before putting words in his mouth.
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About the author
Don Irvine is Chairman of Accuracy in Media. He is active on Facebook and Twitter. You can follow him @donirvine to read his latest thoughts.
4 Comments for Lost In Translation
Obama always speaks out of both sides of his mouth. He’s a typical politician, one with a gift for reading a teleprompter in a way that makes him look a lot smarter than he is.
I don’t blame Obama for playing the game the same way all the others do.
I blame the people for not listening closely enough to what is actually being said, versus what is being merely implied.
And when it comes to political speeches, nobody ever seems to demand that the candidate account for how all the promises will be funded.
“…And when it comes to political speeches, nobody ever seems to demand that the candidate account for how all the promises will be funded…”
The presumption of that question is that there is no question about whether government power or spending should expand.
The correct questions should first and foremost be: “How are you going to shrink government?” and “How many old laws and regulations will you work to repeal?”
Well, Obama is a prevaricator who depends upon the fact that most Americans have such short attention spans that while he is uttering a particular sentence, they have already forgotten the sentence that preceded it.
One need only listen to his speech in Grand Rapids to hear this dramatically demonstrated. Obama hit every liberal Democrat hot button at least once in that speech, but with complete disregard for the fact that one thing he’d said radically contradicted something else he’d said only seconds earlier.
What makes this guy so dangerous is his huge talent for appealing to emotion rather than reason. Of course, that’s what sells soap with the Democrats. Unfortunately, it also works with about 2/3 of the Republicans too.