Re: New Aussie Labor PM reads and speaks Chinese

On Mon, 26 Nov 2007 08:27:06 -0800 (PST), demorising@xxxxxxx wrote:

On Nov 25, 11:55 am, PaPaPeng <PaPaP...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
US foreign policy,
outside killing Arabs for their oil, is determined by the popular
prejudice (public opinion polls) of the moment.

Iraq to seek long-term US presence

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071126/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_us

Iraq's government, seeking protection against foreign threats and
internal coups, will offer the U.S. a long-term troop presence in Iraq
in return for U.S. security guarantees as part of a strategic
partnership, two Iraqi officials said Monday.

...

U.S. troops and other foreign forces operate in Iraq under a U.N.
Security Council mandate, which has been renewed annually since 2003.
Iraqi officials have said they want that next renewal -- which must be
approved by the U.N. Security Council by the end of this year -- to be
the last.

The two senior Iraqi officials said Iraqi authorities had discussed
the broad outlines of the proposal with U.S. military and diplomatic
representatives. The Americans appeared generally favorable subject to
negotiations on the details, which include preferential treatment for
American investments, according to the Iraqi officials involved in the
discussions.

...


1. On Mon, 26 Nov 2007 08:15:49 -0800 (PST), Jack Linthicum
<jacklinthicum@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

George Bush told a biographer in 1999 (correction) that he intended to
be a war president and Iraq was his target.

http://www.gnn.tv/articles/article.php?id=761

Two years before 9/11, candidate Bush was already talking privately
about attacking Iraq, according to his former ghost writer

Houston: Two years before the September 11 attacks, presidential
candidate George W. Bush was already talking privately about the
political benefits of attacking Iraq, according to his former ghost
writer, who held many conversations with then-Texas Governor Bush in
preparation for a planned autobiography.

"He was thinking about invading Iraq in 1999," said author and
journalist Mickey Herskowitz. "It was on his mind. He said to me: 'One
of the keys to being seen as a great leader is to be seen as a
commander-in-chief.' And he said, 'My father had all this political
capital built up when he drove the Iraqis out of Kuwait and he wasted
it.' He said, 'If I have a chance to invade....if I had that much
capital, I'm not going to waste it. I'm going to get everything passed
that I want to get passed and I'm going to have a successful
presidency." <more>

2. On Mon, 26 Nov 2007 07:36:07 -0800 (PST), Jack Linthicum
<jacklinthicum@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:


Remember those benchmarks and the accompanying goals to be achieved in
Iraq? Now the administration has decided they are impediments in the
progress towards achieving success in Iraq.

"We can't pass their legislation," a senior American official in
Baghdad said. "We can't make them like each other. We can't even make
them talk to each other. Well, sometimes we can. But we can help them
execute their budget."

Ah, the oil revenues.

November 25, 2007
U.S. Scales Back Political Goals for Iraqi Unity
By STEVEN LEE MYERS and ALISSA J. RUBIN

WASHINGTON, Nov. 24 -- With American military successes outpacing
political gains in Iraq, the Bush administration has lowered its
expectation of quickly achieving major steps toward unifying the
country, including passage of a long-stymied plan to share oil
revenues and holding regional elections.

Instead, administration officials say they are focusing their
immediate efforts on several more limited but achievable goals in the
hope of convincing Iraqis, foreign governments and Americans that
progress is being made toward the political breakthroughs that the
military campaign of the past 10 months was supposed to promote.

The short-term American targets include passage of a $48 billion Iraqi
budget, something the Iraqis say they are on their way to doing
anyway; renewing the United Nations mandate that authorizes an
American presence in the country, which the Iraqis have done
repeatedly before; and passing legislation to allow thousands of Baath
Party members from Saddam Hussein's era to rejoin the government. A
senior Bush administration official described that goal as largely
symbolic since rehirings have been quietly taking place already.

Bush administration officials have not abandoned their larger goals
and emphasize the importance of reaching them eventually. They say
that even modest steps, taken soon, could set the stage for more
progress, in the same manner that this year's troop "surge" opened the
way, unexpectedly, for drawing Sunni tribesmen to the American side.

A senior official said the administration was intensifying its
pressure on the Iraqi government to produce some concrete signs of
political progress.

"If we can show progress outside of the security sector alone, that
will go a long way to demonstrate that we are in fact on a sustainable
path to stability in Iraq," the senior official said, speaking on
condition of anonymity.

On Saturday, Ryan C. Crocker, the American ambassador to Baghdad, said
that the military had created an opportunity for progress, adding that
there were some indications that Iraqis on the local as well as the
national level want to move forward. But he cautioned against
expecting quick results on the core issues.

"We are seeing encouraging signs of movement," he said, but added,
"This is going to be a long, hard slog."

"It is going to be one thing at a time, maybe two things at a time, we
hope with increasing momentum," he said. "It is a long-term process."

The White House has been elated by the drop in violence since the
increase in American forces, now 162,000 troops. Public comments by
President Bush and his aides, though, have been muted, reflecting
frustration at the lack of political progress, a continuation of a
pattern in which intense American efforts to promote broader
reconciliation have proved largely fruitless.

There have been signs that American influence over Iraqi politics is
dwindling after the recent improvements in security -- which remain
incomplete, as shown by a deadly bombing Friday in Baghdad. While Bush
officials once said they aimed to secure "reconciliation" among Iraq's
deeply divided religious, ethnic and sectarian groups, some officials
now refer to their goal as "accommodation."

"We can't pass their legislation," a senior American official in
Baghdad said. "We can't make them like each other. We can't even make
them talk to each other. Well, sometimes we can. But we can help them
execute their budget."

Ambassador Crocker drew a distinction between the effectiveness of the
American military buildup in quelling violence and the influence the
United States could bring to bear at a political level.

"The political stuff does not lend itself to sending out a couple of
battalions to help the Iraqi's pass legislation," he said.

Still, he said, there were some positive signs that Iraqis were
interested in making headway on some thorny issues. Provincial
governors, he said, were pressing for a law to define their powers.
"We are past the point where it is an American agenda," the ambassador
said. "It is what needs to be done in Iraqi terms."

Officials in Washington and in Baghdad share the view that military
gains alone are not enough to overcome the deep distrust among Iraqi
factions caused by nearly five decades of dictatorship and war. And in
both capitals there are leaders who continue to hold out hope for
broad political gains, eventually.

"We need a grand bargain among all the groups," said one senior member
of Iraq's government, speaking on the condition of anonymity.

But with that not yet in sight, Bush administration officials said
they hoped approval of a few initial steps might lead to more
substantive agreements next year, including provincial elections,
which the White House wants to see held before Mr. Bush leaves office
in less than 14 months.

<snip>

"I think reconciliation will eventually come," a senior Bush
administration official said, but added, "That's a long way down the
pa

.

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